A really nice alternative to this is the no machine fruit sorbet. Take whatever fruit you want, rasberries, strawberries, blueberries, huckleberries, etc. throw them in a blender. Add some 2:3 ratio simple syrup to it, run it through a strainer or cheese cloth, freeze it into ice cube trays and then when you're ready to eat it again just throw them in a food processor or blender and voila- fresh sorbet.

I keep a stash of frozen grapes on hand to quickly chill wine.
Toasted english muffin with a slice of melted cheese. Muenster is my current favorite.

Slices of tomatoes and American cheese layered on Miracle Whip slathered bread.

Tomato Butter sauce recipe that my wife saw/found over on Chowhound.

Take a big can of whole peeled tomatoes, dump in a pot. Mash with potato masher. Throw in 5 tbs of butter. Peel an onion and cut it in half. Throw it in. Bring to a boil, reduce and simmer for 45 minutes. Discard onion. Toss with pasta.

Delicious!

healthy chicken fingers and fries:
roast sweet potato wedges, misted in olive oil, toasted in s&p, pumpkin pie spice, at 375 until they're slightly soft
take chicken breast, cut into strips, dip in egg white, dredge in crumbs of day-old bread mixed with salt, pepper or other seasoning (I used Greek seasoning from that yellow can)
cook on high in non-stick pan till brown on one side, about 4-5 min, then flip. toss in sweet potatoes. serve with german mustard.
yum.

I don't understand discarding the onion. Why not chop it at the beginning and leave it in?

Maybe in 45 minutes of simmering it doesn't break down enough?

It would break down enough in 45 minutes, especially if it were finely chopped. I think it's because this is some sort of "no work" recipe, and cutting the onion in half takes less work than chopping it up, and you still get onion flavor in the dish---though not nearly as much as if it were still there in the final product.

It's a very subtle dish. Try it both ways. I have only ever done it as advertised. There's plenty of onion flavor in there.

I may be getting my basic italian red sauces mixed up, but I think this is Marcella Hazan's recipe.

Hazan also has a gorgeous recipe for tomato chickpea soup, the first step of which is slow-frying whole cloves of garlic in olive oil and discarding them before adding the tomatoes, chickpeas, and rosemary (which also gets discarded at the end). I was really skeptical of this soup, but it's divine.

That sounds very similar to a tomato chickpea soup I made using this recipe on Orangette, but her recipe came from Once Upon a Tart by Frank Mentesana and Jerome Audureau. I really liked the soup, and the pureed chickpeas gave the soup a nice texture.

Yes.

The other thing about this dish is that it is ridiculously easy to make. Without having to even chop the onions this recipe should get an award for being one of the simplest yet so good-tasting recipes ever.

The thread about the sauce made from canned tomato, butter and onion-cut-in-quarters inspired me to think about other really simple recipes that I have made. Probably the most minimalist one I can think of, I learned from Susan Wallace, the pastry chef at BlackSalt. It's got two ingredients.

Coconut Macaroons
One bag of sweetened shredded coconut
One small can of sweetened condensed milk

Empty the bag into a bowl and moisten it with just enough of the sweetend condensed milk so that the coconut sticks together. You'll have a lot of the condensed milk left over. Using a mini ice cream scoop, portion the coconut mixture onto a parchment-covered baking sheet. Bake in a slow oven (200-225) until it just starts to get a little bit brown.

I think the dinner I had last night counts.

When I have a nice piece of white fish (last night, cod), I mix 3 tbs of soy sauce with the juice of 1 lemon, 1 clove chopped garlic, and some scallions (If I have them lying around). Pour over fish, let sit a few minutes, bake. Enjoy!

A minor revelation this week:

I roast the occasional pork tenderloin for dinner using various rubs, marinades, etc. Well this week I cooked up an extra tenderloin which I rubbed with a little EVOO, grainy mustard, and S&P. After it cooled a bit, I threw it in the fridge.

For snackage, or when I don't like what the wife is cooking, I've been slicing it thinly and making sandwiches. Kinda like making your own cold cuts. It's been damn good too-- especially when I slathered a bunch of eggplant tapenade on it.

From here on out, I'll always make extra.

Mix equal parts maple syrup and soy sauce. Use to glaze salmon while baking. Yum.

hot pasta plus butter, 1/2 chicken bullion cube and a splash of heavy cream. So yummy!

Oriental Regency
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We ALWAYS do the same when making any kind of pork tenderloin -- make lots of extras. Makes for great sandwiches and other uses later.

Old stand-by: Marcella Hazan's roasted chicken w two lemons.

Used to be that only one American lemon would fit inside the cavity. No longer a problem since most birds weigh in excess of 3 1/2 lbs.

Roll the lemon(s) around on the counter to make insides mushy while preheating oven to 350 F.

Wash and dry the bird. S & P inside and out. Prick the skin of the fruit all over w needle or fork, then stuff it/them into the bird.

Sew up the opening and place the bird breast-side down in your pan, so it looks as if it's praying. Or the After shot at a guillotine. Or both.

After half an hour, turn the bird over on its back, taking care to avoid puncturing skin. Roast till done, checking by trying to shake hands with a leg (it should move freely), or making a small incision between thigh and breast to check color and texture of white and dark meat.

Get yourself four or five 15 ounce cans of Cannellini beans (the Spanish beans will do, but the Italian are best); two of the mid-sized cans (28 oz?) of whole tomatoes (not stewed and especially not with basil added); a head of garlic; a good handful of sage and some olive oil.

Finely chop a boatload fo garlic; maybe half a head. Open the cans, drain the beans.

Pour a thick pool of olive oil in an appropriately sized pot. The olive oil pool should have depth enough that the garlic is deep frying in in, not sauteeing. Even more than you think.

Heat the oil, fling in the gralic. Just when it starts to brown on the corners, dump in the beans in. Stir and ponder for a moment and then start adding the tomatoes, pulverizing each one individually with your fist like some video game tyrant eliminating an irritating (and much smaller) underling. Do this until you think the beand look "right." Maybe one can of tomatoes for every three or four cans of beans.

Stew for a half hour, adjust the salt, chop lots of sage and add it.

Turn the heat to low and warm for anotyher 10 minutes or so, until the sage softens and the flavor infuses.

Serve with crusty bread, spicy sausages, and manly wine.

I've appropriated Waitman's bean "recipe" and it's a favorite at our house. Instead of sage sometimes I throw in a sprig of rosemary, then fish it out before serving.

Mince some sweet onion, mix it with equal amount of mayo, season with a little S&P. Spread it on small slices of rye or pumpernickel top with grated Parmesan and bake at 350 until brown. It sounds gross, but it is really quite good and a great quick party snack.

Pesto Shrimp Asparagus Gnocchi (Cooking Light)

Store bought bag of gnocchi off the grocery store shelf (surprisingly not bad) 2-3 cubes of pesto from the freezer, half a bag of frozen uncooked shrimp from TJs, and half a bundle of asparagus. If you keep bags of shrimp and cubes of pesto in the freezer, aparagus is the only fresh ingredient required.

Boil gnocchi and remove saving water to boil shrimp & chopped asparagus for 5 mins. Remove and add to gnocchi. Mix in pesto.

Pasta with Greens - Vegetarian

Saute 4 cups sliced onion until soft and slightly carmelized
Add 1 clove minced garlic, stir 1 minute
Add 6-8 cups washed greens (kale, mustard, spinach, broccoli rabe)
Saute until greens are soft

Mix with cooked farfalle pasta and crumbled feta

Serve with crusty bread.

Different version of above:

pasta
bag of baby spinach
head of garlic

Cook the pasta. Roast the garlic. Put the pasta in a bowl when cooked and add spinach. Toss till the spinach is wilted. Throw in the garlic, some kind of oil, and a squeeze of lemon juice if you have it around. Add salt and pepper at some point. Eat from bowl

Here's another pasta dish: Ravioli with blue cheese cream sauce

Heat heavy cream in a pan at low to medium heat, add a few chunks of blue cheese, stir til cheese melts. You can add more cheese to taste, and the sauce will have thickened a bit. You can sprinkle a little salt, garlic powder, parmesan, etc. to taste. In the meantime, cook one of those refrigerated packs of ravioli. Pour sauce over finished ravioli.

Easiest, Most Crowd-Pleasing Dessert Ever--Homemade Key Lime Pie

6 egg yolks
2 cans sweetened condensed milk
1 cup key lime juice (when they're in season, you can buy them fresh and squeeze them--but when they're not, you can cheat and buy Nellie's brand)
1 large pre-made graham cracker crust

Mix first three ingredients till it reaches a custard-like consistency. Pour into crust. Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes (depending on your oven--just make sure the filling is somewhere between liquidy and solid). Serve to much applause.

Here's my "hints from heloise" tip of the day:

I like roasting beets by trimming them, wrapping them in foil with some evoo and s&p, then throwing them in the oven at 425 for 45 mins to an hour depending on their size. Take em out of the oven, let them cool a bit (you can easily peel them with your hands at this point) and then pour the beetified evoo into a bowl. Then make a vinaigrette out of it!

Any schmuck could make this.

Jesus. one tablespoon of butter for an entire pound of pasta? You'd have to be a shmuck to serve that. And not even any cheese? Feh!

Somehow I doubt that Sarah Moulton herself is responsible for that, though shame on her for not being more aware of what is going out there with her name on it.

at least throw some bread crumbs and paresan on it!

Ingredient list is complicated on this one.

I like this comment in the reviews: "this was wonderful. you could really taste the flavor of the water. "

Patak's Chicken Tikka Masala. Sautee chicken, add sauce, can of tomatoes, chopped onion. Super easy and pretty damn good.

http://origin.www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/105591

Be sure to read the reviews. I'm not sure which one I like better, this one, or the icecube recipe.

Well, they are trying to appeal to a younger crowd...

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This is the usual way I roast my chickens, Anna - but for a few minor differences.

Oven 400 F.

Don't bother with skin-pricking - the high roast knocks the fat out without the need of acupuncture.

Put one lemon cut into quarters and one small onion cut into quarters inside the chix with a knob of butter right in the middle of them. If they don't all fit, throw the extras onto the bottom of the roasting pan.

Don't bother to do any sewing chores unless there's an audience who are ready and waiting to appreciate the glory of the sewn-up bird before you carve it. Usually by the time I get the chicken out of the oven my audience is howling with desire from the aroma and I fear for my life unless I get it cut up and served ASAP. I've not found any appreciable difference in the done-ness of the breast meat using this method for one regular-size chicken in the home kitchen - tying or sewing vs. not. It could be that the high heat and the knob of butter provide whatever is needed to compensate.

Turn chicken every half hour till done - usually around one and a half hours. Around two hours would be a big chix.

If you like crispy skin, use a rack on top of a roasting pan for the bird to sit upon. I just use the rack from my toaster oven placed upon a gorgeous yellow-glazed rectangular pan. It looks great.

When done, pour in a tiny dollop of boiling water (made in the microwave tout suite) and stir the drippings together for a non-reduction sauce. Remove any excess lemons, of course. The onions generally almost-disintegrate into the sauce. Down-and-dirty. And very very good.

That was a lot of words to describe a very simple process but I felt it needed to be said. I do like to avoid any chores involving sewing.
........................................................................

Here's a recipe for a dense chocolate dessert which is incredibly simple.

Boule de Neige

Ingredients
8 oz. extra-bittersweet choc
2 tsp. instant espresso
3/4 C sugar
1/2 C boiling water
2 sticks butter, soft
4 large eggs
1 T Grand Marnier
Heavy Cream/Sugar for whipped cream decoration

Action Plan

(Preheat oven 350 F.)

1. Process chocolate together with espresso and sugar in food processor till choc is fine slivers.

2. Add boiling water with machine on.

3. Add butter, eggs, Grand Marnier - with machine on or bit by bit your choice, till smoothly blended.

4. Line 5C mold (I use a stainless steel bowl) double lined with aluminum foil 45 min. to 1 hour till top cracks.

5. Refrigerate overnight till firm. Unmold - decorate with whipped cream.

It's sort of like eating a rich chocolate bar. Really I don't know why I bother to make it rather than just eating a rich chocolate bar but it does create an atmosphere of fanciness which denotes sacrifice of precious time.

Since when did lemons contain fat, Karen?

* * *
The boule sounds wonderful (and as a title, so much better than that awful, anthropomorphic name that dresses dessert en chemise)--in youth, the combination of chocolate and Grand Marnier seemed so high-class and grown-up. Sort of like sling-backs.

It's a pleasure to see you here. Joy to the whirled.

* * *
P.S. Zora, I had never seen that epicurious recipe, so thanks for the laughs. Ditto re ice.

Mpfh.




In a world where needles or forks go right along with the fruit into the bird, I guess lemons can contain fat.


A surreal world it is.

Tomato crisps
Last night I noticed some grape tomatoes in my kitchen were starting to wrinkle. Thinking they were no longer fresh enough to eat fresh, not enough to make sauce, I decided to dry them overnight in a low (about 180f) oven.

I sliced each of them longitudinally in half and placed them on a foiled and lightly oiled half sheet. Then I sprinkled a little kosher salt on top and put them in the oven.

The result, after about 7 hours of oven time, was a batch of tomato crisps with a very tasty sweet/salty flavor. Just the thing for a mid-morning snack.