A Therapeutic Evening in the Kitchen

It’s been so long since I’ve cooked for myself in my own kitchen that I forgot how enjoyable it can be; how washing and cutting up vegetables can be relaxing and therapeutic. Don’t even get me started on the smell that fills the house when there’s something baking in the oven. For this piece that something baking was marinated chicken. My senses perked up the minute the Clean Linen smell of my Glade plugin was overtaken by the sweet smell of the marinade fused with a hint of garlic.

First things first. Before I got to the baking of the chicken I had to cook the base ingredient of the dish I had chosen to prepare. I cooked a pot of red quinoa (pronounced keen-wa). Quinoa is a grain, and, as the back of the box tells me, it contains “one of the best sources of protein in the vegetable kingdom.” It’s a complete protein grain. It’s good for you. That makes me feel good about eating it. For you gluten intolerant folks, it’s gluten free. Trying to eat a health conscious diet in a fast-paced stressful world when sometimes all I want to do is eat a box of cookies is difficult. Finding something that is good for me, easy to prepare, and also tastes good is a gift from the gods. Well, actually the ancient Inca civilization in South America, but I’m not telling their story. Back to the cooking. I cooked the pot of red quinoa and then place the pot into the refrigerator to cool down. For the dish I’m preparing the quinoa needs to be cold. So straight from stove to refrigerator. Of course, with a pot that hot one should place it on a pot holder. Just sayin’. 

While the quinoa cooled, I moved on to the chicken. I took two medium sized chicken breasts, and with a chop stick, poked several holes into each breast, piercing them all the way through. (If you had a frustrating day this is a great way to stab something and not get put in jail.) While shopping at the grocery store I’d purposefully neglected buying a marinade in lieu of a salad dressing I had at home: Brianna’s Home Style Blush Wine Vinaigrette. (There’s a sticker on this particular salad dressing that says it’s perfect for strawberries. Hence the sweet smell filling the house.) I took my holey chicken breasts and placed them on a tin foil bed and poured the salad dressing on top. I didn’t cover them in it to sit for hours I merely coated them with it making sure they were sitting in a salad dressing bath. I then sprinkled them with garlic salt and Goya Sazonador Total seasoning. Lots of the Goya. I wanted there to be plenty of it so that when the juices started flowing all the seasoning wouldn’t end up running off the chicken breasts and flavoring the salad dressing. Can’t you see it? The chicken breasts sitting in that salad dressing bath as it heats up and begins to bubble around them like a Blush Wine hot spring? Mmm!

I poured myself a glass of red wine and turned on a little Miles Davis (thanks “Carrie Mathison” on Homeland for turning me on to his music) and set about creating the rest of my meal for the evening. I mean it is creating isn’t it? Mixing and blending, chopping and peeling, adding color and flavor. Food is yet another canvas on which to be creative. I always enjoy the colors of the food and mixing those colors to create a visual that is just as beautiful to see as it is tasty to eat -- a feast for the eyes as well as the palate.

The washing and chopping began with a medium sized orange bell pepper. Can’t you just see the pop of color that orange bell pepper gives the brownish red quinoa? When I’ve made a version of this dish in the past I’ve tended to use yellow bell pepper, but orange seemed the right choice this time. It is fall after all. Next I peeled and seeded a medium sized cucumber followed by a medium sized purple onion. Are you sensing a size theme here -- two medium sized chicken breasts, a medium sized bell pepper, cucumber, and onion? I’m not really a size queen, I swear. After seeding the cucumber I chopped it into quarters and then diced the quarters into smaller chunks. The same with the onion. Diced. Small pieces. So right now I’ve got a brownish red quinoa canvas onto which I’ve spattered orange bell pepper, light green cucumber, and purple onion. What I chose next was an unconventional addition to this dish that I hadn’t thrown in before -- fresh mango. Yes, you read that right. Fresh yellow mango. I love mango and have a mango corer that I love to use. It slides right down the pesky, odd-shaped core and gets it out of my way leaving the meat of the mango housed inside two halves of skin. I cut the mango into strips, peeled away the skin, then, you guessed it, dice it into bite-sized cubes. To the brownish red canvas I’ve added orange, light green, purple, and now a pop of yellow.

With the veggies and fruits portion peeled, cut, and added, I moved on to the meat and cheese portion of the dish. The chicken cooked for roughly 30 minutes in its foil packet. The sweet smell making me salivate. I couldn’t resist taking a bite of it as I prepared to cube it. It was the first time I had used the Brianna’s dressing as a marinade. It won’t be the last.  

After adding the cubed chunks of chicken to the other ingredients, I prepared one of my favorite ingredients in this dish: crumbled feta cheese. Normally I buy it already crumbled, but his time the only way I could get regular feta cheese (i.e. not flavored or fat free) was to buy a block of it. I cut the block in half and began to crumble it. It ended up being about a cup. Maybe a little more, but who’s measuring? Besides the mango and the chicken, I decided to add another new addition: two tablespoons of capers. 

I love capers. They give such a salty kick to any dish. If you’re keeping up with these ingredients you’ve noticed that it is a mix of sweet and salty. The bell pepper and the mango are sweet. The feta and the capers are salty. The onion adds a bit of bite. The chicken was marinated in a sweet salad dressing. This dish is not only healthy (fresh ingredients, high in protein), it’s colorful, crisp, and crunchy.  

To finish off I tossed three tablespoons of olive oil and three tablespoons of red wine vinegar over top of the ingredients. I sprinkled on a nice bit of the Goya seasoning, some garlic salt, and plain black pepper. Contemplating whether or not my mixing bowl was big enough, I began to blend its contents, making sure the olive oil, vinegar, and seasonings coated everything. Of course there’s the obligatory taste, add more seasoning, stir, and taste again. It’s what you do. It’s the only way to know if it’s right. 

Essentially what I’ve prepared is a summer salad. I know, summer is over, but with the warm days we’ve been having in October this could easily be an Indian summer salad. The colors make sense now, right: orange, yellow, purple, and dark green (the capers) tossed into the brownish red quinoa? It looks like fall even as it hints to the recent hot days when watermelon might have been on the dessert menu.

Of course I needed a couple of side dishes to go with the quinoa salad. I bought a can of turnip greens because they remind me of home. Glory Foods brand Seasoned Southern Style turnip greens. (Kind of makes you wanna sing “Love that chicken from Popeyes doesn’t it?) I let the turnip greens simmer on low while I was peeling, chopping and dicing. When I serve them the finishing touch is always a small pour of vinegar over the top. I don't know what it is about the acidic tartness of vinegar that works on turnip greens, but turnips greens aren't turnip greens to me without it. I also steamed fresh green beans that I snapped myself. Throw a little sea salt on top of the green beans before you cover and steam them. That’s some tasty goodness right there. Don’t let them steam too long though. You’re gonna want them crisp.

Don’t forget to top off your glass of red wine. It goes great with this meal.

W&W "Chocolate Pumpkin Brownie Muffins"

I met Heather in the cake mix aisle of Food Emporium last Saturday night. I was listening to a story my friend Brandon was telling me. It was heartfelt and I should be punished for not listening as intently as I should have been. If I had been listening with both ears focused solely on him, I probably wouldn't have heard the woman next to me asking an employee for pumpkin; real pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling. I couldn't help but stop Brandon and ask her if I had heard her correctly. I mean how many people at the same time are looking for canned pumpkin? She said that she was indeed looking for pumpkin. She wanted to make these brownie muffins she'd seen made on television. I looked at her with a "What'chu talkin' 'bout, Willis?" look on my face and revealed the chocolate cake mix I had in my hand. We discovered we had both seen the same program and wanted to make the same brownie muffins. We laughed and introduced ourselves then went our our merry pumpkin-searching way.

Here's the story: Thursday I happened to be channel surfing and came across a channel that I'd never heard of before. It's called Cooking Channel. Sounds like direct competition with The Food Network to me. Anyway, I watched a couple of shows. One was about putting a french spin on ordinary dishes. I recorded that one so that I could try some of it later. The other was a series called Hungry Girl. On the episode I watched, the host, Lisa, was swapping. Let me explain that a little. She wasn't swapping butter for margarine; she was swapping the fatty food you love with something similar but low fat. She showed the viewer how to get the same type of feeling one gets from eating something they love without eating it and all of its fat. Her example: chips. She loves chips. Chips are loaded with fat. She took fresh kale and cut it up, sprinkled it with sea salt, sprayed it with olive oil spray (briefly) and then placed it in the oven to bake for 10-12 minutes. It came out of the oven crunchy. It's a healthy, fat free alternative to chips. She said it has the consistency of pop corn. Another chip replacement was Lavosh. I had never heard of Lavosh: a round thin Middle Eastern bread that is soft like a tortilla. It was very large. She cut it into pieces, placed it on a cookie sheet and popped it in the oven for 2 minutes. They crisp right up and again replace your crispy chip desire with something that crunches like a chip, but has no fat. Basically, you're tricking your senses with the crunch you desire but not adding the fat to you waist line. Disclaimer: I did not try either of these things.

What I did try was her low fat/low calorie chocolate brownie swap. It was so simple. Two ingredients is all you need plus whatever you might use to dress it up without taking away too much of its healthier-for-you factor.

1 box of chocolate cake mix
1 can of pumpkin

You read right. Those are the two ingredients.

I used a Duncan Hines® Devils Food cake mix and a can of organic pumpkin. It's important to note here that it's pumpkin NOT pumpkin pie filling. Just plain old pumpkin in a can. The pumpkin replaces everything else that the cake mix calls for.

Pour the cake mix into a bowl and then add the pumpkin to the mix. You're gonna need to put some elbow grease into it because it takes a bit of stirring to mix the pumpkin and cake mix to a smooth batter. Don't be afraid. It didn't really take that long. If you choose to taste the batter at this point, you're going to find yourself in brownie heaven. Seriously, that's what it tastes like; a rich, chocolate brownie.

Here's where I made some changes; I am a tweaker afterall. I added two teaspoons of vanilla and a sprinkling of cinnamon. Actually, I started with one teaspoon of vanilla and a sprinkling of cinnamon, but after blending it into the batter and tasting it, I decided to add another teaspoon of vanilla and more cinnamon. None of that is detrimental to the low fat/low calorie plan thus far. Oops (sly grin) here's where I messed up. You see, I wanted caramel baking chips in these brownie muffins. I couldn't find them at either grocery store I went to. I settled for a Milky Way® Caramel candy bar. Hey, I wanted my caramel and I found a way to get it. Who are you to judge me? I chopped the bar into small pieces and dumped them into the batter.

Let's review:
1 box chocolate cake mix
1 can pumpkin
2 teaspoons vanilla
cinnamon 'til your heart's content
1 Milky Way® Caramel bar chopped

Remember Lisa, the host? She suggested tin cupcake liners. I couldn't find any so we went without. I sprayed Pam® all over the muffin pan and then spooned the batter into the muffin holes. The recipe only makes 12 brownie muffins.

They bake for 20-24 minutes.

Get the liners! The brownie muffins didn't exactly stick to the pan, but they were so moist that they fell apart as I tried to get them out of the pan. The cupcake liner would hold it all together.

Okay, I don't want to brag and truthfully, I just added to somebody elses recipe, but they were amazing. Seriously, I recommend trying this at home. We served ours with fat free vanilla frozen yogurt.

They were dense and gooey and chocolatey just like a brownie should be. It was like a chocolate explosion in my mouth; sometimes sticking to the roof like too much Wonderbread® or peanut butter. Don't be deterred by that. It was amazing. The caramel melted, and in some instances bubble right out the top. I could smell the cinnamon while they baked. Everyone agreed that they were a good choice for satisfying our sweet tooth and our chocolate craving. That's killing two birds with one low fat/low calorie stone.

Cheers!

W&W "Red Velvet Soufflé"

Memorial Day 2010 I spent the day in Newport, RI. The last thing my traveling companions and I did before leaving was to have an amazing dinner at The Spiced Pear at the Chandler at Cliff Walk.

The final part of our meal was cinnamon soufflé with amaretto and apple compote. It was amazing. From that moment on I've wanted to make a soufflé. There was a day that we were going to make them for one of our Sunday Family Dinner nights. Not enough time was devoted to learning how to make a soufflé by any of us.

All these months later I finally decided it was time. I wasn't going to wait any longer. I have a tendency to do that - wait until someone will do something with me. I guess it's for support or maybe camaraderie. The waiting for me was over. I was nervous that I would mess up the mixture, but I really wanted to try.

The first thing I needed was ramekins. I had seen them at Crate & Barrel for $2.95 each. That was a great price. I wanted four. I went on a Friday night to purchase them in preparation for making the soufflé the following Monday. I left Astoria at 7pm and arrived just before 7:30pm at the door of a closed Crate & Barrel. I was shocked. The revolving door wouldn't turn. The lights were on, but I couldn't get in. Finally I noticed the posted hours. How could a Crate & Barrel in Manhattan be closed on a Friday night at 7pm? I looked around to make sure I wasn't in some Twilight Zone Manhattan. No such luck.

The next day I was scheduled off work before the ridiculously early closing time so I was prepared to bust a move across town before those revolving doors were locked on me two days in a row. I made it and purchased the 4 ramekins that I wanted.

I had most of the ingredients I needed in my kitchen already. What I didn't have was eggs, red food coloring, whipping cream and sour cream.

The day of baking had finally arrived. I had spent the day basking in and running away from the art at MoMA. I had indulged in lively discussions about art, family and religion. I was nourished with 16 bean soup; my thirst quenched with Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir. The pièce de résistance was to be my first soufflé.

I chose red velvet soufflé. I had already made a red velvet cake on my own twice; it seemed the right choice for me. My close friends know that I love red velvet cake. I want it to be something I'm known for making. A red velvet soufflé seems like a city cousin to the Southern cake.

It was midnight by the time I started making the soufflé's. I was determined though and nobody was leaving until they were done and we had eaten them or thrown them away because they failed to rise.

I started by greasing the bottom and sides of my ramekins with butter - real butter - and then sprinkling them with sugar, lightly coating the butter. The next logical step was separating the eggs. Of the 5 eggs needed per the recipe, 4 yokes needed to be ready to mix into the chocolate as soon as it was melted. I chose Ghirardelli bittersweet baking chocolate per a recipe that I'd seen in a copy of Southern Living magazine. The recipe I had chosen and the one in the magazine were identical excepting the Ghirardelli suggestion.

When the chocolate was melted I stirred in the egg yokes, the sugar, the milk, the red food coloring and the vanilla necessary to flavor and color the soufflé. I actually used my whisk for the first time. I set the chocolate mixture to the side while I beat the egg whites, pinch of salt and more sugar into stiff peaks. As I said, the chocolate needs 4 yokes, but the whites of all 5 eggs are necessary. I couldn't help but be reminded of The Golden Girls episode where Blanche, delirious from staying up all night attempting to be the next great Southern writer, confuses Roses bag of egg yokes for little balls of sunshine. I laughed to myself as I threw a little ball of sunshine in the trash.

With the egg whites stiffly beaten to peaks it was time to fold them into the chocolate. I think the folding was what made me the most nervous. I mean does it have to be folded into the chocolate instead of just stirred in? What if I don't fold it correctly? Is there a right and wrong way to fold? I just had to get over the fear and start folding. As I did so the chocolate became lighter in color and airier in texture. That's what I'm assuming makes the soufflé rise - all the air created by folding in the light egg white mixture.

When all the mixing, blending and folding was done, it was time to spoon. I spooned the mixture into the waiting ramekins. The ramekins were on a cookie sheet for even baking. The oven was preheated to 350°. I placed the ramekins in the oven and set the timer for 20 minutes.

Time to make the topping. First nervous moment: folding; second nervous moment; too much noise during baking making the soufflé's fall. I had to use the beaters. I had to mix whipping cream, sour cream and sugar to a pourable consistency. It didn't take long and through the window in the oven door I could see that the noise had not disturbed the soufflé's. On the contrary, the soufflé’s had risen higher than expected. Thank goodness for the cookie sheet. It caught the entire overflow and prevented soufflé from burning on the bottom of my oven.

Twenty minutes of bake time and the stick came out of the center of one soufflé with a few moist crumbs. Done.

The three of us were standing in the kitchen. The anxious excitement of the rise had turned into anticipation of eating. I didn't even remove the ramekins from the cookie sheet. I poured the whipped sour cream on top of each of them and gave my guinea pigs each a spoon and we dove in.

It was light, fluffy, moist, rich and delicious. I was so proud. The whipped sour cream was such an interesting compliment to the chocolate.

Next time I will fill the ramekins with less mixture to prevent the unsightly overflow. I will also remember to serve it with a nip of Jameson Irish Whiskey.

Cheers!

W&W "Sixteen Bean Soup"

Four days ago I found myself bent over the trash can peeling carrots. I hadn't peeled carrots in about 5 years. The last time was when I made a carrot cake from scratch for my friend Matt's birthday. He didn't believe I had actually peeled and grated carrots and made the cake. It turned out fantastic if I do say so myself.

These carrots were for homemade soup. I chose the three best carrots and the three best celery stalks from their respective bags. Let the chopping and dicing begin. After peeling the dirty skin from the carrots I diced them per the recipe I had chosen. I then washed and chopped the celery stalks. Moving on the onion, I peeled the outer skin from the onion and diced it. I was staring at a bowl full of color and freshness - orange carrots, green celery, purple onion. This soup would be nothing if not colorful.

Continuing with the slicing and dicing, I peeled and sliced 3 cloves of fresh garlic. Not only was my bowl of fresh veggies colorful, it now filled the room with the pungent smell of garlic. Mmmm!

The only thing left to do really was open the two cans of diced tomatoes. I contemplated the diced tomatoes with garlic and oregano added, but ultimately chose plain-diced tomatoes. It felt like overkill considering the recipe called for garlic and oregano already. I showed a little restraint.

The crock-pot was ready and the time had come for placing all these colorful, fresh, aromatic ingredients into it and letting it magically turn them into dinner.

I had been soaking the blend of 16 beans overnight. I drained and rinsed them in the colander before placing them in the crock-pot. Let the color parade begin. Mostly it was just beans in their brown, black and white shades, but the lentils were green; light green. Loved it! I added the fresh carrots, celery, onion and garlic. I poured in a 32 oz. container of vegetable stock. I chose the Kitchen Basics brand, unsalted. The recipe I used called for chicken stock, but as one of my guests was vegetarian I needed to use the vegetable stock. Seems to me one could use vegetable, chicken or beef stock. It's a matter of personal preference. I then poured the two cans of diced tomatoes in their juice into the soup mixture. The recipe suggests adding water should you need more liquid to cover everything. That wasn't necessary. With the 32 oz. of vegetable stock and the juice from two cans of tomatoes, everything was more than covered. I threw in 3 bay leaves and sprinkled the top with Goya Sazonador complete seasoning. I gave it a quick stir, secured the lid and set the dial to low.

All that's left is to wait.

Let's review:

1 package 16 Bean Soup
3 stalks celery chopped
3 carrots diced
1 large onion chopped
3 cloves garlic sliced
2 cans stewed tomatoes
1 tsp. ground oregano
3 bay leaves
1 32 oz. container of stock

My recipe called for cooking the beans, bay leaves, oregano and stock on high for 3-4 hours then adding everything else and cooking on high for another 3-4 hours. As I was going to MoMA in the afternoon I couldn't be at home to follow the hourly breakdown set forth by the recipe. Isn’t crock-pot cooking supposed to be fill it and leave it? I called my mom and talked to her about it. My thought was: Can't I just put all of it in the crock-pot at the same time and cook it on low for 8-9 hours? Mom thought that would be fine. That's how I proceeded.

Returning from MoMA, my apartment smelled amazing. The soup had been cooking for at least 7 hours at that point. One of my dinner guests wasn't going to arrive until 8pm so I was going to continue letting it cook for another 2 hours. I was dying to taste it and check the tenderness of the beans. My heart sank briefly when I discovered that the beans were not as tender as they should be. My first thought was that we would eat the appetizers for dinner if the beans were not fully cooked by the time we were ready to eat. I turned the crock-pot on high while Anna and I retired to the living for a little bagel snack and conversation.

If you're reading these entries in order, this is the point where I made the olive tapenade.

Brandon had a meeting after our trip to MoMA; a meeting he thought would last no longer than 30 minutes. It lasted almost an hour and a half. Anna and I waited as long as we could before I opened the bottle of Sauvignon Blanc I had chosen specifically for the olive tapenade. I had one bottle. One bottle seemed logical as it was for the appetizer course.

I'm going to jump past the appetizers now and tell you that no matter how put out or annoyed Anna and I were that Brandon took longer than he thought, I'm glad he took longer. The beans cooked on high for more than 2 additional hours. They needed it. It was just enough to push them into the tender end zone.

I had shredded cheddar cheese for anyone who might want it on top of his soup. It was hearty and filling and perfect for a cold winter night.

I searched for two days to find a wine pairing for this soup. Turns out people don't really pair wine with soup. I'm not exactly sure why. We had Pinot Noir. I had multiple bottles of that. There were no complaints from my guests. Who says one can't serve their favorite red or white with soup? Hindsight: beer might have been a better choice. Next time.

Cheers

W&W "Olive Tapenade"

My friend Katrin made an amazing olive spread at one of her parties last year. I've been wanting to make it ever since. I can’t believe I waited so long. I asked her about the ingredients months ago. I could have been enjoying it all this time. I love olives, but I kept them waiting for months to puff up my face and dry up my blood with their salty tang.

I started with nearly one cup each of pitted Kalamata, green and black olives. To the olives I added a tablespoon of fresh capers, 3 teaspoons of lime juice and 1/4 cup of feta cheese. Not owning a food processor, I threw these ingredients into my blender and pressed chop. Once fully chopped, I added Extra Virgin Olive Oil. I didn't measure it; I added it visually. It's all about consistency. I pulsed the blender so that the chopped ingredients mixed completely with the olive oil.

It wasn't until I had emptied the tapenade into a container that I realized I had omitted the fresh garlic clove. I had looked right at it on my recipe and still left it out. Fortunately, I had some minced garlic in the refrigerator. I added a heaping 1/2-teaspoon to cover my blunder.

I served sliced beets, fresh mango and Gouda goat cheese as toppings to help cut the saltiness of the tapenade. I also served sun dried tomato hummus - store bought not homemade. The bread was a very crusty organic French baguette. It made the perfect base for all of the above. The dry Sauvignon Blanc had just the right bite to counter the salt.

Alas, the stirred in minced garlic had no flavor whatsoever. I will add that fresh clove next time and report the difference.

Cheers!

W & W "Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies"

My bestie, Neal, makes an amazingly good oatmeal chocolate chip cookie. He has since we were in college. I bet it's been 20 years since I tasted one for the first time. The first memory I have of those cookies is inside a car on the way to a Christmas party for the Western Kentucky University Dance Company hosted by our physical therapist, Dr. John. Neal had made his cookies and they were housed in a Christmas tin. I can still remember how they looked inside that tin when he removed the lid. I get a little hazy on whether we were allowed to partake of the sweet goodness in the car or not, but I do remember seeing those cookies inside that tin inside that car.

I do believe his are the first oatmeal cookies that I'd ever eaten made with chocolate chips instead of raisins.

He will not part with his recipe. It was his mother's and maybe someone else's before that. I'm not sure. What I do know is that it is now his. He has tweaked it and made it his own. It has become somewhat of a joke that he won't share the recipe. My mother has gone so far as to tell me to stand near enough to him to watch and mentally record the recipe. I don't really want the recipe anymore, but the joke is part of our history; our lives.

What I do want is a recipe for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that I can call my own.

I'm kind of like Paula Deen when it comes to baking things that tingle your sweet tooth. I want real ingredients; real butter, real sugar, real eggs, etc. I am health conscious. I'm aware of what I put into my body, but when it comes to baked goods, I shouldn't be eating them anyway, so if I'm putting them in my body why not enjoy all the bad-for-me-goodness; rich in taste and texture.

I found a recipe that I liked that seemed to be everything one would need for an oatmeal chocolate chip cookie; butter, white sugar, brown sugar, flour, vanilla, baking soda, oats. It was all there plus a little something I thought would compliment the chocolate very well - cinnamon. I don't believe Neal's cookies have cinnamon in them. My mind was telling me all of these ingredients would bake up to a fantastic cookie, but I wasn't certain. I had already made up my mind that I would throw it all away and mark it down as an experiment gone awry if they tasted horrible.

I left the butter out to soften. I measured the sugars, the flour. I mixed it all by hand. I don't believe Neal uses a mixer of any kind. I didn't want to either. I wanted to actually feel the cookie dough as it got sturdier with each new dry ingredient. My right arm got quite the workout.

With all the ingredients married together in a commune of raw sweetness I was ready to start placing spoonfuls on my Pam® sprayed baking sheet. The oven had already reached it's 350° preheated temperature.

The cookies were supposed to bake for 8-10 minutes. I checked them at 8. I discovered that 10 was the right amount of time. They didn't get too crispy. That is my least favorite thing about a cookie: too much crisp. They stayed crispy enough on the outside, but soft and chewy on the inside. Neal's do that also. These cookies did not taste like Neal's though. Not because of the addition of cinnamon either (my mind was right by the way, it was a good compliment to the chocolate). The texture was different. I'm not sure what that's about. I do know that I felt my dough could have used some water, or maybe some milk. The recipe didn't call for it, but I think I may use one or the other next time I make them. Yes, there will be a next time. I enjoyed them very much as did all the people who got to eat them. It made me proud to share them.

These are not Neal's cookies, that's true. They're mine, and I get to spend time perfecting my recipe now.

Cheers!

W & W "Wine Brine Pork Chops"

Less than two weeks ago I went to a restaurant in Astoria that was a first for me and the two friends who went with me. The evening started out at my house with a couple of glasses of wine and was to conclude with us eating at a little Italian restaurant on the corner of 47th Street and 30th Avenue in Astoria. When we arrived at Cara Bella at 10:20pm on that Saturday night I guess you could say that shocked would be the best word to describe our reaction when a waiter told us they had sent the chef home for the evening. Who does that? It was another small downside, along with lack of taxi service, to living outside of Manhattan. Don't misunderstand, I love living in Astoria, but I am spoiled by the living, breathing, all-night-long energy that is Manhattan. Anyway, we had to come up with a new place. It was cold and the sidewalks still had snow and ice covering portions of them from an earlier snowstorm. We just started walking West on 30th Avenue. It was between the 35th and 34th Street blocks that we noticed a cute green sign on the corner building across the street that read Ovelia. We were hungry and cold and tired of walking and decided to give it a try.

Sometimes taking chances pays off. It was fantastic - from atmosphere to food to price. Right here I'm going to jump from our fabulous appetizers to what caught my eye for an entree - Olive Brine Pork; a grilled pork tenderloin marinated in olive brine. First of all, I love olives. Just ask the bartender who used to make my dirty martini's. I also enjoy pork. So, the combination of the other white meat and the salty swill of the olive intrigued me.

It didn't disappoint. It also led to a discussion on brine. What is it? How do you make it? How do you do it? One of my dinner companions seemed fluent in brine-speak so he informed me with all the knowledge he had on the subject. I decided right then that I wanted to make a brine of my own. One week later and I've got pork chops bathing in brine. (Remember the meatloaf and the addition of thinly sliced pork? Well, I bought 3 pork chops, used one had 2 to play with. I was thinking ahead.)

I used my favorite internet search engine (Google) to look up recipes and then decided to mix and match to concoct my own. I'm a tweaker can't you tell?

First of all, I love red wine so I thought why not use some of the wine I had in the open bottle sitting in my kitchen. It was a Cotes-du-Rhone (60% Grenache and 40% Syrah). I liked it to drink so how bad could it be? I decided that it would be the base for my brine. I used almost 2 cups of it completing the 2 cup portion with water. I added the necessary salt (sea salt) and brown sugar (dark brown) along with some pepper and minced garlic. I also added a bit of apple cider vinegar. In retrospect, and by retrospect I mean as soon as I'd poured it into the mixture, I realized that with nearly two cups of wine I didn't really need to add vinegar. With all the ingredients combined in a pot on the stove, I cooked it over low heat, constantly stirring, until the salt and brown sugar were dissolved.

Most of the recipe's I read called for the addition of ice water or cold water to the mixture to cool it down before adding meat. The hot fluid can begin to cook your meat and that's no way to treat your dinner. I added the cold water and then placed the entire pan in the freezer to further speed the cooling process.

Maybe and hour later my purple concoction was ready to host it two visitors. I poured it into a plastic bowl and added the two pork chops. There it was, my first brine. I sealed the container, placed the bowl in the refrigerator and left it there. There was magic to be done inside that bowl.

24 hours later...

I reached my hand into the cold, purple, garlic-floating-on-top brine and what emerged in my hand was a purple-dyed pork chop. How could I not have expected that? I mean red wine is purple and it stains things. Of course it was going to stain the meat. I was not worried, just amused.

I poured a small amount of vegetable oil in a square baking pan and placed the formerly white now purple meat into my preheated broiler. Eight minutes on one side, flip, repeat on side two.

For a first attempt at brining it wasn't bad. It just wasn't as juicy as I thought it would be. The olive brine pork at Ovelia was juicy enough to wring the olive brine out of it. Mine was not that juicy. It then occurred to me that alcohol dehydrates the body. What if the wine was counter productive to the salt and water making the pork chop juicy. Lesson learned. Next time I'm going to use a different base for my brine and maybe even brine the meat a little longer.

I'll save the wine for my glass.

Cheers!

W & W "Meatloaf & Rosemary Potatoes"

As the smell of fresh garlic filled my apartment it occurred to me that I should write about my cooking experiences - the triumphs and the failures. Cooking is a new adventurous undertaking in my life. I've mostly been one for take-out or dining out in my 13 years in New York. So along with the regular stories I tell and the fiction I write, I've decided to add a spinoff blog called The Whisk and the Wine. Pour yourself a glass - my favorite is a California Pinot Noir - and enjoy the dish on my latest dish.

I decided just before Christmas that I wanted to make meatloaf. I have this memory of making a meatloaf once in my life. I was still living with my parents. I have no idea how old I was. It's more years than I really care to think about or reveal at this moment.

I needed a recipe. The first person I thought of was Paula Deen. I enjoy her and she's southern so it seemed the perfect fit for me. She actually demonstrates her recipe via a video clip. I wrote down all the ingredients. Later, I looked at the list and decided to start tweaking it.

The first time I made this meatloaf I added a Granny Smith apple to it in lieu of bell pepper. It doesn't necessarily do that much in the form of flavor, but it adds an interesting texture. Maybe there's just a bite of sweetness. I'm not positive on that though. There's such an explosion of flavors in the meatloaf that pinpointing the flavor of one ingredient is difficult. That first time I cooked the meatloaf I used a Pyrex® loaf pan. We live and learn. Paula's demonstration had the meatloaf baked in a regular 9" x 13" pan. What my friends who ate the meatloaf with me suggested was that the larger pan would allow for the juices to run off thereby letting the meat cook more to the texture we all associate with meatloaf. Baking it in the loaf pan kept everything completely contained. It took longer for the loaf to cook in its own juices than it should have.

This second time I again tweaked the recipe. I left out the Granny Smith apple and added back the bell pepper albeit orange instead of green. I also added pork to the mix.

I started with ground turkey instead of ground beef. I do want to be more on the healthy side. To the turkey I added thin slices of pork. I substitute some of the salt (sea salt) with garlic salt. It adds a nice flavor. I add more onion (purple) than necessary. I like it; what can I say. The orange bell pepper is a bit sweeter than the green and the color is amazing. I discovered a long time ago that color is important to me and food is no exception. Paula's recipe calls for a can of diced tomatoes in their juice. I like to use diced tomatoes with garlic. Can there ever be too much garlic? I mean really, most of the time I'm cooking for me. I'm not kissing anyone after. Bring on the flavor. Instead of bread crumbs the recipe calls for oats. It's supposed to make it fluffy. I just find it more interesting than bread crumbs. Bread crumbs are boring. Oats add an air of mystery and intrigue.

When the meat, salt, black pepper, purple onion, orange bell pepper, egg, oats, and diced tomatoes were all thoroughly mixed together I halved the meat mixture. I took half of it and placed it in the pan and coated it with cheddar cheese. I then took the remaining meat mixture and covered the cheese, forming one cohesive loaf.

Instead of using ketchup with the mustard and brown sugar for the topping this time, I substituted chili sauce. Don't be scared of chili sauce. I used Heinz®. It's not hot and they even suggest it for use on burgers and fries. It just has a different flavor than ketchup. The spices are different and it's less tomatoey.

I wanted to make Rosemary potatoes. I found a recipe and decided to make them as a side dish for my meatloaf. I had already scrubbed and dried about 15 small, red new potatoes earlier in the day. Now it was time to prepare them for the oven.

It was simple enough. I cut the potatoes into quarters and placed them in a bowl. I am a lover of brussel sprouts and have been known to coat them in olive oil with garlic salt and other spices and bake them. I decided to add brussel sprouts to the potatoes. That was my tweak of plain Rosemary potatoes.

I took 6 crushed cloves of fresh garlic along with dried rosemary and infused them in extra virgin olive oil. I poured the oil infusion over the potatoes and brussel spouts and used my hands to make sure everything was coated. Yes, they were clean. I don't suggest this though. It worked; everything was coated, but so were my hands - with pieces of garlic and rosemary. I didn't want to lose any of that flavor so I had to use the spoon to remove the pieces of garlic and sprigs of rosemary from my fingers and add them back to the bowl. I should have just used the spoon for stirring and coating to begin with. Hindsight's 20/20.

Both meatloaf and potatoes needed to be baked at 350°. I put the meatloaf in the oven first at it needed to bake longer. When my timer dinged 20 minutes into the baking, I added the potatoes and brussel sprouts to the oven.

Those of us who only have one oven only have one real option - we have to bake multiple things at the same time. I learned that I should have placed the potatoes in to bake at the same time as the meatloaf, but the brussel sprouts needed less time than I actually cooked them. I should have known that from my prior experience of baking brussel sprouts.

The meatloaf turned out better this time cooked in the larger pan. The juices did run off but so did some of the cheese from the middle. The texture was better, but truly it was all about the taste. It is still an amazing meatloaf. The pork, an interesting idea to me, did nothing in the way of flavor. The chili sauce was fantastic on top. Personally, I think the topping needs a little more brown sugar. That's for next time. The potatoes were good, but needed more garlic in my opinion. I could probably aid that by dashing some garlic salt on top of them before placing them in the oven. The brussel sprouts were over cooked, but still worthy of eating.

Here's to flavor, texture & color (purple, orange, red) and here's to trying it again.

Cheers!

Thanksgiving at Chez Coco

I’ll start with Wednesday night. Thanksgiving eve. My plan was to spend the night at my friend Michael’s apartment so that I could get up the next morning and make monkey bread. You may know it as pull-apart bread. It seemed like the perfect, decadent, overly sweet goodness to have for breakfast on the morning of a holiday – a holiday that is all about eating. Well, not really all about eating, I mean it’s about being thankful and taking the time to acknowledge what you’re thankful for, but then it’s about eating.

So, with work over for the day by 8:30pm, I took my list out of my backpack and headed to Food Emporium. It was crowded, but not as crowded as I expected it to be on the eve of Thanksgiving. I don't really shop for groceries at Food Emporium any more since I moved from Manhattan to Astoria Therefore my lack of knowledge of the store’s layout became apparent when it came to finding the necessities on my list that happen to be non-necessities in my everyday life. Some things I knew exactly where to find, but I had to search for vinegar and oil and Hershey’s cocoa. Then there was the matter of the buttermilk and the Karo syrup. The buttermilk was an ingredient in my red velvet cake recipe and the Karo syrup was needed for the butter cream frosting. So I'm standing in front of the milk products and all I'm seeing is Lite Buttermilk with 1/3 less fat or some amount of less fat. I was thinking to myself, this is red velvet cake; it's decadent and deserving of all the fat that buttermilk has to offer. I did make a quick phone call to my friend Neal, from whom I had gotten the recipe, to ask about the "less fat" buttermilk. There was no answer so I just made the decision myself. I didn’t buy it. Now on to the Karo syrup. I needed Light Karo syrup. I found the aisle with the cake mixes, flour, sugar, spices, syrup etc. This is where the crowd was. Seriously, one just had to park a buggy and walk because there were so many people in that aisle looking for baking soda, sugar and spices etc. that walking was nearly impossible. I found the cinnamon, baking soda, flour and sugar that I needed. I was happily surprised to find the syrup also on that aisle. Unfortunately all they had was Lite Karo syrup. Really, I thought, only Lite Karo syrup? Had the pecan pie lovers hoarded all of the Light Karo? First the buttermilk now the syrup! I'm all about the healthy eating, but some things just beg for the full-fat, full-bodied ingredients. Frustrated I exited the aisle and found myself standing in front of a Thanksgiving staples end cap. There on the second shelf was one bottle of Light Karo syrup. It was slightly to front of the shelf as if to say, "Here I am Michael; I've been waiting for you."

I boarded the R train to Queens with three bags full of ingredients. I still had to go to my apartment, repack the supplies into my Urban Luggage bag (green is the way), pack pajamas and clothes for the next day then walk to Michael's house. It was a time consuming amount of things to do, but I was working at warp speed. I might have been dillying a little, but I was not dallying at all.

I got home and filled my Gladware with the measured amounts of flour, sugar and cinnamon that I would need to prepare the next day's sweet delights. I thought it would be better to compartmentalize and consolidate than to take the full bags of flour and sugar. There was no need to carry the extra weight to Michael's and I was ahead of the game for measuring out the dry goods the next day.

I managed to get out my door slightly before 10pm. It’s a 20-minute walk to Michael's. Even with the extra weight I was anticipating a 10:30pm arrival. I was prepared for a long evening as he thought it best that I bake the cake that night. I had to stop at the grocery store on the way to his house and buy the buttermilk. Imagine the look on my face when all I found at C Town was the same 1/3 less fat buttermilk I had not purchased at Food Emporium. I just thought screw it! I'm not going to another grocery store for a little more fat. I didn’t mention that I also needed to buy some vanilla extract. I purposefully didn’t buy it at Food Emporium, as I knew I had a bottle at my house. Much to my surprise I found my vanilla extract had dried up. I had only had it 5 years. Who knew? Obviously, not this guy.

I did arrive at Michael's around 10:30pm. It wasn't before, but it was shortly after. It was cold that night, but with the coat and the scarf and the walking and the extra baggage, I was sweating by the time I got there. I was so glad to shed my coat and top-layer shirt.

Michael had spent the day preparing everything he needed to in order to make Thanksgiving Day as smooth as possible. We weren't planning to eat until 7pm with a guest arrival time at 5pm. That meant the turkey didn't have to be put in the oven until 2pm. You know what that meant for me? I didn't have to make the cake that night. I uncorked a bottle of wine, threw on my pj's and parked myself on the sofa to watch Modern Family and let the wine relax my tension away.

Thanksgiving Day morning I was up by 8:30am. I went to the kitchen to start making the monkey bread. First thing on the agenda – preheat the oven to 350°. Then I started cutting the first of three tubes of 10 Pillsbury® buttermilk biscuits into quarters. After the first tube was quartered, I sprayed Pam®, with flour for baking, into my bundt pan and then started shaking the biscuit pieces in the sugar/cinnamon mixture I had prepared the night before. I couldn’t help but feel like the little girl in the commercial for Shake ‘N Bake; “It’s Shake ‘N Bake, and I helped.” With my southern roots, I had no problem sounding just as southern as she did, probably even more as I tend to find humor in an over-exaggerated southern accent. Skip to all three tubes quartered, shaken and waiting patiently in the bundt pan for a caramel brown sauce to smother them with sugary goodness. I just had to make it – two sticks of real butter, ½ cup of brown sugar and ½ cup of the remaining sugar/cinnamon mixture heated over low heat until bubbling brown. I poured it over the biscuit pieces and placed the pan into the over. Only 30 minutes to go until breakfast sweet enough to rot your teeth would be ready.

How to pass the time? Watch the parade.

Yes, it was time for a Thanksgiving Day tradition – the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. I’ve watched it for more than 20 years. I can remember times at my parents’ house watching it while sitting in the living room floor cutting up apples or grapes or bananas for mom’s fruit salad. I also have the best memory of all. It involves my mom, sister and packages of craisins flying through the air.

In November of 1997, my mom and sister came to NYC for the first time. I had moved here in May of that year so it was my first Thanksgiving in NYC and the perfect excuse for their visit. It was only natural that we go to the parade. We arrived on the parade route about 6:30am that morning. We already had to fight for a place to see. We ended up on the corner of Broadway and 34th, right where the parade made it’s finally turn after stopping in Herald Square. We were blocked part of the time by a woman in a red hat. I can’t tell you how happy we all three were when she left. The funniest memory of that day comes at my mom’s expense. There were people walking the parade route that year throwing airplane snack size packages of craisins. Well, wouldn’t you know one of them would have to hit mom, square in the face. We still laugh about it to this day. We also wondered that year about the people dressed as a clown or slice of pizza or piece of cake. We imagined what it must have been like to tell their family that they were going to be in the parade dressed as a slice of pizza or wedge of cheese. On Thanksgiving morning 2010 while talking to my mom, I told her what I was in the parade this year. I used the most downtrodden voice I could when I told her I was carrying a pumpkin and waving. My sister was a slice of pizza and my nephew Dylan, not even a thought in our heads in 1997, was craisins. Yes, the craisins live on! Mom had yet to decide what she was in the 2010 parade when we spoke that morning.

The timer went off alerting us that the monkey bread had spent the required time in the over and was now ready for us to behold it in all it brown, glistening, ooey-gooey glory. I dumped it onto a cake platter and removed the bundt pan. It was beautiful and it was ooey-gooey. I’m not sure if I had never made it with real butter before or what the difference was, but the coating looked like caramel and as it cooled while running down the side, it just froze mid drip. It was amazing; so rich, so warm, so sweet. Add the cup of coffee I was enjoying along with the parade and you’ve got a Thanksgiving Day morning that got off to the right start.


When the parade ended at noon, I had two hours, in which to make my first-ever red velvet cake from scratch, before Michael had to put the turkey in the oven to bake. I found myself in the kitchen staring at the ingredients. I was intimidated. I don’t know why. I think I’ve always thought red velvet cake was difficult to make and that everything had to be done perfectly or it would be ruined. I decided the best thing for me to do was to jump in and get started. I must admit that I was shocked at how much oil went into the batter of this cake – 1¼ cup. I just let myself be in the moment. I’d wanted to make this cake for about 5 years and I was finally doing it. One thing I had to remember is that it should be fun. I put a lot of pressure on myself to succeed. Failure is not an option. I wanted the cake to be amazing and was freaking myself out about it. Honestly, it’s just ingredients, blended together, placed in a pan and baked. It’s not like I was removing someone’s liver.

Because I made the monkey bread that morning, and it required a bundt pan, I decided, at Michael’s suggestion, to make the red velvet cake in the bundt pan. It was a beautiful, shimmering shade of red. I must confess that I licked the beaters. Is there anything better than licking the beaters? Only eating the cake, in my opinion. Anyway, the batter tasted amazing. I could only hope the finished product tasted as good. On that thought it occurred to me that unless I burned the cake, it had to taste good. It could only taste like the baked version of the wet batter I had licked off of those beaters. Relax Michael, I had to tell myself.

Once it was in the oven, the hardest part was over. I poured myself a glass of wine. It was noon! The smell of cake filled the air as I waited for the timer to beep and alert me to check the progress. Back to the intimidation. I found myself whispering as I opened the oven door to look at it. What was this a soufflé? No! It was merely a cake. Intimidation be gone. It was baking and it was fine. It took longer because of the thickness of the cake due to the bundt pan, but I checked it every five minutes for about 50 minutes and when it was done, the toothpick was clean.

Twenty minutes into the cooling time of the cake I started making the frosting. I like butter cream frosting for red velvet cake. It’s much richer and more elegant on such a gorgeous cake than the easier, and in my opinion, cheaper, cream cheese frosting. I will admit that I was a bit confused by the fact that the frosting recipe I was using did not call for butter. Call me crazy, but I would think butter cream frosting would have butter in it. I got the recipe from a reliable source and chose to not question it any further and just combine the ingredients of the recipe and hope for the best.

I learned two things about frosting. I had no idea what “soft ball stage” was. Michael had to Google it. Turns out that sugar syrup dropped into cold water will form a soft, flexible ball. That’s the first thing I learned, as I had to cook the sugar concoction until it did that. The second thing I learned was that I had merely made white icing. It was perfect for drizzling over my red velvet cake, but it tasted like marshmallow cream and hardened as it cooled. My mom is sending me her butter cream recipe for next time.


The drizzled cake reminded me of a candy cane. There was nothing wrong with the frosting either. It wasn’t what I wanted, but it worked. The cake was very moist and the crunchy texture of the hardened icing was a nice compliment.

I can actually say I was proud of myself for both of my sweet creations on Thanksgiving Day. I’m thankful that I didn’t burn either one. I’m thankful that I tried something new.

The friends arrived at Michael’s apartment; the wine flowed, the food was eaten, laughs were laughed over dinner and during games of Celebrity and Apples to Apples. Michael’s table was gorgeous. It was his grandmother’s. He also has her china. He wanted to host Thanksgiving dinner at his house this year to use the china and the table that had once belonged to such an important person in his life. I know about that importance in my own life. I think she would have been proud. The day was lovely and joyful. The only thing missing was Tynan, who thankfully joined us twice that day via Skype.


While I’m being thankful I want to take the opportunity to say that it is a wonderful thing to have people in this world that you can be with on special holidays when you can’t be with your family. Those people become your family. For much of my life, being a theatre performer, I wasn’t home for Thanksgiving Day. Now, working in an NYC theatre box office, our business not only don’t close for holidays, we add more performances during the week. So I am thankful to have people to laugh with, eat with, share with, cry with and drink wine with.

I am truly blessed everyday of my life. I have a wonderful family, beautiful friends, good health, a great job, an amazing home and a red velvet cake recipe that will now become part of my baking repertoire.

Thanksgiving at Chez Coco