Superbowl Bonanza
I'll be the first to admit, I don't follow football outside of the Redskins, as evidenced by the timestamp on this article. So neither Pittsburgh nor Seattle really get my attention, except that, I'll throw down for the Steelers because they rep the Eastside.
To recap from yesterday, I am highlighting three dishes from Patrick O'Connell's new cookbook:
Phyllo Straws
Wild Mushroom Pizza
and Macaroni and Cheese
I also made grilled wings, cream-cheese stuffed jalapenos with a blanket of lox, spanikopita and a disasterous feta roll.
See, this is how it happens, you buy a whole roll of phyllo and only end up using five sheets. You can't really store it again, it gets torn and dry. So what I am compelled to do is come up with a dish that uses the remaining ingredients.
...And that was a hideous, pasty, and arid feta stuffed phyllo roll. The taste was ok, but all the outer layers crumbled off, and the feta had the consistency of freshly poured concrete.
Well, so far, it's second quarter, 3-0 and the most exciting thing has been the commercials and the food. This could all change by the end of the game.
I certainly encourage everyone to buy the cookbook, but I'll synopsize how I made these dishes, and also talk about the other stuff I made.
I'll start with my recipes, and from that begin with the easiest of them. By far, the simplest dish is the cream cheese stuffed jalapenos with lox.
Buy a can of Embasa whole jalapenos. Because it was a two-fer sale, I got two cans and I didn't read the label. The other can turned out to be julienned jalapenos, so I couldn't use them. Didn't I post an article entitled 'Always read the labels?'
Superbowl update: Even though it's not yet halftime I am going to announce the award for the most incomprehensible ad of our time: The Whopperettes in a surreal ballet featuring women dressed as burger parts dancing around, singing and whatnot. I'd rather see Paris Hilton shave her upper lip.
While your cream cheese is softening, cut the stems off the jalapenos and then cut them lengthwise, creating two boats. Scoop out the seeds and dry the halves off. All you do now is take a butter knife and fill the jalapeno halves with cream cheese. Buy sliced lox and cut rectangles to blanket over each half. Garnish and serve.
The Go Daddy ad was stupid and pointless, all they could do is rehash the tired premise of last years parody. Enough with the Carmen Electra reject.
Ok, so the chicken wings are very easy, too. I use a basic rub of salt, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cumin and cayenne. Use equal portions of each, and keep salting until it tastes how you like it.
Dust the rub all over the wings. You can use whole wings or just the drumette portion. Grill them until good and dark. Serve with....nothing! There is tons of flavor.
I like grilling instead of frying, because grilling fuses the flavor during the cooking process. Frying cooks the meat, and gives it a good crisp, but all the flavor is absorbed by saucing it after the fact. Personally, I like the oil-free method, since I'm getting my fat elsewhere tonight.
Something is wrong with the Hi Def feed for the Rolling Stones audio, the channels are mixed all wrong. I don't like the Stones so it really doesn't matter to me.
Now for the straws. Defrost the phyllo dough and get everything prepped because phyllo needs to be maintained once unwrapped. Have a faintly damp towel handy, once you unroll the dough, you'll need to keep it covered, but not too moist.
You will need:
1 cup clarified butter
1 cup shredded parmesan
Place a single phyllo sheet on a cutting surface. Brush it with the clarified butter. sprinkle parmesan liberally over the whole sheet. Place another sheet on top and brush that down with the butter.
Cut into three even lengthwise strips. Then cut horizontally so you have rectangles that have about a three inch width. Roll each one lenghwise around a pen or pencil and place on a baking tray.
Refrigerate for about 10 minutes then bake at 375 for about 8 minutes or until golden. You can serve with blueberry jelly or some other kind of jam to offset the saltiness of the parmesan.
With the leftover phyllo, I made spanikopita. I already had a packet of feta. You can cut long strips, 6x9, put feta in one end, then triangularly fod like a flag. Seal with the clarified butter. Bake until golden. Mmmm, but mine came out a little dry.
This is some of the best homemade mac and cheese I've had, a fitting tribute to Thomas Jefferson. You'll need:
two cups heavy cream
1 bag macaroni
pinch of nutmeg
salt & pepper
1/4 cup gruyere
1/4 cup parmesan
1/4 cup gouda
That interception made the game pretty interesting.
1 teaspoon minced shallots
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Boil the macaroni, then drain. In a four quart sauce pot, sweat the garlic and shallots for about five minutes. Add the cream and bring to a rapid boil. Lower to a simmer and reduce the cream 20% until it coats the back of a spoon.
When it's there, add the nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste. Whisk in the cheese and cook until blended. Now, here's what I did. I didn't follow the recipe. The actual recipe doesn't call for a second baking, they make it a bit runny, but I like the baked kind.
Pour your creamy cheese into a bowl and start adding macaroni a fistful at a time until you have a nice coated amount. Turn it out into a casserole dish and shave more gruyere to cover the top. Shave on more parmesan. Bake at 375 uncovered until the top is browned, about 20 minutes. Don't forget to salt, the cheese doesn't add as much as you think.
The beauty of the second bake is the flavor that can be extracted from cheese when it is browned. There is a whole extra dimension, equal to a bubbling crown of gruyere on seafood crepes, when you perform a secondary melt and burn. Gruyere, gouda, jack, are all greatly suited for melting. Cheddar is actually not as desireable because it breaks down into too much oil. Gruyere takes on a nutty, fragrant essence when browned. Fantastic!
The macaroni I used was Barilla, and they perfectly boiled and expanded properly. Elbow macaroni is the perfect vehicle for the cheese. It forms perfect U joint pipes to hold the creamy sauce, and the baking solidifies and binds the sauce to each elbow. It also introduces great contrast in texture. You have the creamy underlayer cushioning the snappy crisp of the top macaroni.
Finally, the pizza. Pizza dough is:
1 package active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (110 degrees F.)
2 1/2 to 3 cups flour plus more if necessary
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
In a large bowl, combine yeast with water, olive oil, salt and stir well to proof. After 5 minutes, add half of the flour and mix well to thoroughly incorporate. Add all remaining flour except 1/2 cup and mix well with your hands. Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface and knead dough for at least 5 and up to 7 minutes, adding enough additional flour as necessary to form a smooth and elastic dough. Dough should not be sticky. Transfer dough to a lightly oiled 2 or 3 quart bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp towel and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, usually at least 1 hour.
That came courtesy of Food TV, which I know is droll and contrived to lift from Food TV. Look, it's a time saver.
Slap it out to about 10"-12" or so. For this, you will need:
wedge of fontina
2 shallots
Virginia ham
truffle oil
parmesan
any assortment of wild mushrooms, I used porcini.
Preheat the oven to the highest setting 500 usually, not broil.
Thinly slice the shallots and mushrooms. Caramelize the shallots on a medium heat until they produce a nice brown color, then add your mushrooms. While that is sauteeing, brush your pizza dough with the truffle oil. Lay flat shaved fontina to cover the dough.
Tear the thinly sliced ham into strips and lay on top of the cheese. Dust sage and majoram onto the pizza. Remove the shallots and mushrooms from the heat and distribute on the pizza. Lightly salt and shave parmesan on top.
Bake it for 8-10 minutes, checking regularly for browning on the edge. Remove, let it sit for a bit, and carve it up!
The contrast of the sweet shallots and ham landscapes it a great clash of flavor. The truffle oil lends an underlying nutty quality to enhance the rich taste of the cheese.
To recap from yesterday, I am highlighting three dishes from Patrick O'Connell's new cookbook:
Phyllo Straws
Wild Mushroom Pizza
and Macaroni and Cheese
I also made grilled wings, cream-cheese stuffed jalapenos with a blanket of lox, spanikopita and a disasterous feta roll.
See, this is how it happens, you buy a whole roll of phyllo and only end up using five sheets. You can't really store it again, it gets torn and dry. So what I am compelled to do is come up with a dish that uses the remaining ingredients.
...And that was a hideous, pasty, and arid feta stuffed phyllo roll. The taste was ok, but all the outer layers crumbled off, and the feta had the consistency of freshly poured concrete.
Well, so far, it's second quarter, 3-0 and the most exciting thing has been the commercials and the food. This could all change by the end of the game.
I certainly encourage everyone to buy the cookbook, but I'll synopsize how I made these dishes, and also talk about the other stuff I made.
I'll start with my recipes, and from that begin with the easiest of them. By far, the simplest dish is the cream cheese stuffed jalapenos with lox.
Buy a can of Embasa whole jalapenos. Because it was a two-fer sale, I got two cans and I didn't read the label. The other can turned out to be julienned jalapenos, so I couldn't use them. Didn't I post an article entitled 'Always read the labels?'
Superbowl update: Even though it's not yet halftime I am going to announce the award for the most incomprehensible ad of our time: The Whopperettes in a surreal ballet featuring women dressed as burger parts dancing around, singing and whatnot. I'd rather see Paris Hilton shave her upper lip.
While your cream cheese is softening, cut the stems off the jalapenos and then cut them lengthwise, creating two boats. Scoop out the seeds and dry the halves off. All you do now is take a butter knife and fill the jalapeno halves with cream cheese. Buy sliced lox and cut rectangles to blanket over each half. Garnish and serve.
The Go Daddy ad was stupid and pointless, all they could do is rehash the tired premise of last years parody. Enough with the Carmen Electra reject.
Ok, so the chicken wings are very easy, too. I use a basic rub of salt, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cumin and cayenne. Use equal portions of each, and keep salting until it tastes how you like it.
Dust the rub all over the wings. You can use whole wings or just the drumette portion. Grill them until good and dark. Serve with....nothing! There is tons of flavor.
I like grilling instead of frying, because grilling fuses the flavor during the cooking process. Frying cooks the meat, and gives it a good crisp, but all the flavor is absorbed by saucing it after the fact. Personally, I like the oil-free method, since I'm getting my fat elsewhere tonight.
Something is wrong with the Hi Def feed for the Rolling Stones audio, the channels are mixed all wrong. I don't like the Stones so it really doesn't matter to me.
Now for the straws. Defrost the phyllo dough and get everything prepped because phyllo needs to be maintained once unwrapped. Have a faintly damp towel handy, once you unroll the dough, you'll need to keep it covered, but not too moist.
You will need:
1 cup clarified butter
1 cup shredded parmesan
Place a single phyllo sheet on a cutting surface. Brush it with the clarified butter. sprinkle parmesan liberally over the whole sheet. Place another sheet on top and brush that down with the butter.
Cut into three even lengthwise strips. Then cut horizontally so you have rectangles that have about a three inch width. Roll each one lenghwise around a pen or pencil and place on a baking tray.
Refrigerate for about 10 minutes then bake at 375 for about 8 minutes or until golden. You can serve with blueberry jelly or some other kind of jam to offset the saltiness of the parmesan.
With the leftover phyllo, I made spanikopita. I already had a packet of feta. You can cut long strips, 6x9, put feta in one end, then triangularly fod like a flag. Seal with the clarified butter. Bake until golden. Mmmm, but mine came out a little dry.
This is some of the best homemade mac and cheese I've had, a fitting tribute to Thomas Jefferson. You'll need:
two cups heavy cream
1 bag macaroni
pinch of nutmeg
salt & pepper
1/4 cup gruyere
1/4 cup parmesan
1/4 cup gouda
That interception made the game pretty interesting.
1 teaspoon minced shallots
1 teaspoon minced garlic
Boil the macaroni, then drain. In a four quart sauce pot, sweat the garlic and shallots for about five minutes. Add the cream and bring to a rapid boil. Lower to a simmer and reduce the cream 20% until it coats the back of a spoon.
When it's there, add the nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste. Whisk in the cheese and cook until blended. Now, here's what I did. I didn't follow the recipe. The actual recipe doesn't call for a second baking, they make it a bit runny, but I like the baked kind.
Pour your creamy cheese into a bowl and start adding macaroni a fistful at a time until you have a nice coated amount. Turn it out into a casserole dish and shave more gruyere to cover the top. Shave on more parmesan. Bake at 375 uncovered until the top is browned, about 20 minutes. Don't forget to salt, the cheese doesn't add as much as you think.
The beauty of the second bake is the flavor that can be extracted from cheese when it is browned. There is a whole extra dimension, equal to a bubbling crown of gruyere on seafood crepes, when you perform a secondary melt and burn. Gruyere, gouda, jack, are all greatly suited for melting. Cheddar is actually not as desireable because it breaks down into too much oil. Gruyere takes on a nutty, fragrant essence when browned. Fantastic!
The macaroni I used was Barilla, and they perfectly boiled and expanded properly. Elbow macaroni is the perfect vehicle for the cheese. It forms perfect U joint pipes to hold the creamy sauce, and the baking solidifies and binds the sauce to each elbow. It also introduces great contrast in texture. You have the creamy underlayer cushioning the snappy crisp of the top macaroni.
Finally, the pizza. Pizza dough is:
1 package active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (110 degrees F.)
2 1/2 to 3 cups flour plus more if necessary
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
In a large bowl, combine yeast with water, olive oil, salt and stir well to proof. After 5 minutes, add half of the flour and mix well to thoroughly incorporate. Add all remaining flour except 1/2 cup and mix well with your hands. Transfer dough to a lightly floured work surface and knead dough for at least 5 and up to 7 minutes, adding enough additional flour as necessary to form a smooth and elastic dough. Dough should not be sticky. Transfer dough to a lightly oiled 2 or 3 quart bowl and turn to coat with oil. Cover with a damp towel and let rise in a warm place until doubled in size, usually at least 1 hour.
That came courtesy of Food TV, which I know is droll and contrived to lift from Food TV. Look, it's a time saver.
Slap it out to about 10"-12" or so. For this, you will need:
wedge of fontina
2 shallots
Virginia ham
truffle oil
parmesan
any assortment of wild mushrooms, I used porcini.
Preheat the oven to the highest setting 500 usually, not broil.
Thinly slice the shallots and mushrooms. Caramelize the shallots on a medium heat until they produce a nice brown color, then add your mushrooms. While that is sauteeing, brush your pizza dough with the truffle oil. Lay flat shaved fontina to cover the dough.
Tear the thinly sliced ham into strips and lay on top of the cheese. Dust sage and majoram onto the pizza. Remove the shallots and mushrooms from the heat and distribute on the pizza. Lightly salt and shave parmesan on top.
Bake it for 8-10 minutes, checking regularly for browning on the edge. Remove, let it sit for a bit, and carve it up!
The contrast of the sweet shallots and ham landscapes it a great clash of flavor. The truffle oil lends an underlying nutty quality to enhance the rich taste of the cheese.
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