January 2007 Archives

August and I shared a salmon fillet one night while Todd was in London, then the next day I made a salmon salad out of the leftovers. I just flaked up the fish, then mixed it with mayo, peas and capers. Ate it in a pita. It was so satisfying, so domestic. It made me feel like I was home.

I am weirdly obsessed with comfort foods lately, but it's not the typical comfort food. It's what I ate growing up. Mayo-based tuna salad. Chicken soup. Hot dogs.

For four days now, I've been pursuing this elusive warm, yummy glow that I felt was just beyond my reach. Then tonight I sat down with my son and my husband for August's first fish sticks, served with baked fries from the freezer and microwaved veggies. And there it was. It didn't have anything to do with good cooking, or even, in this case, homemade food. No chocolate was involved, or lemon zest, or balsamic vinegar. The only salt that made it sparkle wasn't fleur de sel, but regular kosher that my 2-year-old had sprinkled too liberally over the cauliflower, carrots and broccoli.

Unless, of course, you burn it. And use too high of an oil-honey to oats-nuts ratio. I ended up with something resembling oatmeal brittle, and I tried this morning to convince myself that the toasty, bitter burnt sugar flavor I ended up with would be the new taste sensation in granola. Only got a couple bites down before I felt too sick to continue. It makes me even more sick to throw out all this granola. Really, literally, I am going to have to make Todd do it.

I will try again. August had fun with it, plus I decided to use diced dried pears, and I think it'll be a really great granola. Far better than burnt-sugar oatmeal brittle granola.

You know, I wrote this yesterday, then last night I found myself dipping into my failed granola again. Its bitterness is powerful and the sweetness is kind of over-the-top, but I feel like there has to be a place for it somewhere. An embellishment to ice cream or rice pudding? A little could go a long way. And the crunch of burned sugar is a nice contrast to the chewiness of the oatmeal.

I made these muffins again and this time I said, "What was I thinking?" They were chewy, kind of rubbery, flat and light brown. I was trying to figure out how to redeem them, maybe toast them and then spread on some butter . . . wait . . . butter? Then I realized I forgot to drizzle in 1/4 cup melted butter before putting them in the muffin tin. Wow. Now I'm amazed they are as good as they are. They really do have the texture of a low-fat muffin.

Last night I made very good polenta with the best hands-off method: low and slow, in the oven, from the recipe in The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen by Paula Wolfert. I thought it was awesome, creamy and buttery and corny. August, who's a little under the weather, declared he didn't like it before he even put a spoonful in his mouth. After tons of cajoling, and finally calling it cornmeal, he did try it and said it was good. I guess to some polenta sounds more sophisticated than cornmeal porridge, but not to my 2-year-old.

He helped me make it, so that helped in getting him to try it: We buttered a casserole dish, then put in 1 cup cornmeal, 4 cups water, 1 tablespoon cut-up butter and 1 teaspoon salt. Stirring it with a fork didn't mix it all, but it did get the lumps out of the cornmeal. Then we put it in a 350 degree oven for an hour and 20 minutes. During the latter half of this time the mixture comes together, and it starts to bubble a bit. I got a little nervous that it would splatter all over the inside of the oven. It didn't, but when I make this again I'm using a container that's a little bigger than it needs to be.

Took the polenta out of the oven, stirred it and added more salt, then baked it for another 10 minutes. I stirred Parmesan and more butter into the finished product, about 1/2 cup of the cheese and another tablespoon of butter. Ate it with an eggplant and tomato casserole I poached from the Wednesday Chef, who poached it from Marian Burrows in the NYT, who poached it from Jamie Oliver.

I put this cookbook on my Amazon wish list a looong time ago, so I had completely forgotten about it. When I opened it up on Christmas morning, I started praising the giver for making such an appropriate selection when she cut me short by pointing out that I had picked it out for myself. Who said, "Know thyself?" Wasn't it in one of Shakespeare's satirical monologues?

Anyway, it was an excellent selection, and I've made two things from it in the last week that I would definitely make again. One was pasta with ricotta and peas, and the other was chicken thighs braised in tomatoes. When I think about it, I modified both recipes, but the original recipes did have some unusual techniques that gave me good results.

You start the pasta the usual way, boiling a huge amount of water and cooking the pasta; I used orecchiette. (Although who decided that a pound of pasta feeds 4 people? Maybe over the course of a week.) While that's working, you mix 1 cup ricotta with 1/4 cup grated Parmesan, 2 tablespoons cut-up butter, 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/2 teaspoon pepper in a bowl large enough to hold the finished pasta.

Then you saute some onions and garlic. We were feeding vegetarians, so I left out the pancetta or whatever it was that you're supposed to render first, and just used olive oil. 1 medium onion, diced, then a couple of minced garlic cloves go in after the onion is translucent. Cook that a minute or two, then pour the onion mixture in with the cheese.

When the pasta's basically done, maybe a little too al dente, add a couple cups of frozen peas to the boiling water. Heat until the pasta's done, then scoop out a cup of the water and whisk half of it into the cheese with 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice. Drain pasta, then mix with the cheese, adding more pasta water if needed.

I have a perfectly good technique for making quesadillas. In fact, my quesadillas are crispy and gooey in just the right proportion and very versatile. I just toast them up in a dry skillet, for a couple of minutes on each side. If I'm really lazy or August is so hungry he's cranky, I'll microwave them for 30 seconds, but that is only a passable job.

So why did I follow a recipe in a magazine that recommended broiling them? Hidden away in the oven, they ended up burned after a couple of minutes, and very unevenly so, without the cheese melting much at all. And mozzarella? Not an ideal cheese for quesadillas.

If broiling works for you, go for it. I just often try a new technique just for the sake of doing something new, even if I have a tried-and-true way already.