When Alicia Hansen over at Poise In Parma recently gave away a $50 Whole Foods gift card to enable a lucky winner to stock their pantry, she asked her readers to leave a comment telling her what their favorite pantry ingredient was. There were many terrific responses and it got me thinking as I rifled through a mental list of my “go-to” pantry items. Here’s what I posted:

“I have three: Olive oil, because it’s what I use the most, followed closely by garlic, with coriander not far behind. Coriander is probably my favorite because you can use it in almost anything to brighten the flavors.”

It was actually a tough choice. Besides the three I posted I have many favorite items in my pantry: salt, vinegar, onions, stock, eggs, and the list goes on. So I decided to devote my own post to this topic so I could break it down even further.

Most Useful

The only rock we eat, salt is without a doubt the most useful and most used ingredient in my pantry. We’ve been programmed to avoid high sodium foods, which in itself isn’t all bad, since most high sodium foods are highly processed, but salt isn’t our enemy. In “I’m Just Here For The Food“, Alton Brown offers the following: “On average, Japanese people consume twice as much salt as Americans yes they have the gall to live an average of ten years longer.” Use it right during cooking and you’ll never salt your food while you eat it.

I try to have several kinds of salt on hand: table salt, kosher salt, and sea salt. Table salt is great for baking because its fine grains dissolve easily. Kosher salt is better during cooking because the coarse texture is easy to pinch. Sea salt’s bigger crystals provide a nice crunch when used as a finishing salt.

As a cook, the key, of course, is to learn how to use salt to your advantage. When and how much you salt depends on what you’re making. Salt should be added when it can do the most good, which usually means during or before cooking. Boiling rice, pasta, or potatoes? Salt the water liberally after if comes to a boil and before you add the starches. The water should taste like sea water. You won’t taste the salt in the pasta, rice, or potatoes, but they’ll taste different. And by different, I mean better. Roasting chicken or grilling a steak? Salt before hand.  Learning to properly season while you cook will make everything you prepare better.

Most Used

Garlic and olive oil are the two things I use most. Growing up Italian, this should come as no surprise, but it goes beyond that. These are two very useful and flavorful ingredients.

Many of the things I make contain at least a little garlic, which is why it’s the biggest item in my tag cloud. While garlic can be overpowering and easily burned, it’s real power is in it’s subtlety. Like some of the other ingredients discussed in this post, garlic in small quantities enhances and deepens the taste of many dishes. Added whole crushed, minced, chopped, as a paste, or sliced, it’s an effective and easy way to add layers of flavor. The finer the chop, the stronger the taste. Crushed garlic has the strongest taste of all but when cooked, it has a much milder, sweet taste. I have a press, but I never use it. I like to crush it to remove the skin, then finely chop it before using the edge of my knife along with a little salt to mash it into a paste. I love it for marinades, sauces, stocks, brines, soups, salads, and it’s also great pickled! I don’t think I could cook without it.

When I need a fat, nine times out of ten, it’s olive oil that I reach for. Good olive oil with some herbs and good dipping bread make a terrific appetizer or snack. The important thing about cooking with any oil–olive or otherwise–is not to heat the oil over its smoke point, which refers to the temperature at which a cooking fat or oil begins to break down. Olive oil smokes at roughly between 400 and 365ºF. It’s great for roasting, sautéing, browning, stir-frying, deep frying, as an ingredient in marinades and sauces such as mayonnaise, pesto, or romesco, and as a condiment, drizzled over various dishes.

Olive oil is healthy, too. There are numerous well-documented studies around the world touting the many health benefits of olive oil as one of the most indispensable ingredients of a healthy diet. It’s naturally packed with monounsaturated fatty acids and antioxidants, so not only can a good extra virgin olive oil lower your risk of heart disease and cancer, research has shown that it also provides a wide range of anti-inflammatory benefits that can positively impact illnesses such as diabetes, hypertension, arthritis, and asthma.

Most Versatile

When I considered this category I wanted to highlight the ingredient that I use in the widest variety of ways. For me, the answer is coriander. Coriander is the seed or fruit of the cilantro plant and is a common ingredient in Asian cuisine. One of the oldest known spices, the seeds have a lemony citrus flavor when crushed similar to a blend of lemon and sage.

Ground coriander seed is traditional in desserts and sweet pastries as well as in curries, pickles, chutneys, sauces, beef bases, soups, meat, and seafood dishes with South American, Indian, Mediterranean, and African origins. Add it to stews and marinades for a Mediterranean flavor. It is also used in North American, Mexican, and Southeast Asian cuisines, as well as in spice blends like chili powders, garam masala, and berbere.

• Coriander can be used with lentils, beans, onions, potatoes, hotdogs, chili, sausages, and stews.
• Sprinkle it over fresh salads.
• Use it to flavor homemade bread, waffles and scones.
• It’s an ingredient for some cakes and biscuits including gingerbread.
• It adds flavor to creamed cheese or mayonnaise.
• It’s a garnish for meat, fish or vegetable dishes.
• Use in meatballs, meat or vegetable burgers.
• Add it to stocks and gravies.
• Use in marinades, particularly for meat and fish.
• It goes very well with mushrooms.
• Use to spice up stir-fries and bland vegetables such as spinach.

It’s an ingredient that you can add to almost anything, and like salt, a little will brighten and enhance the flavors in almost any dish.

Most Underestimated

Hands down, vinegar is the most underestimated ingredient in my pantry. It could arguably have taken the crown for Most Versatile. With both flavored and regular varieties in abundance, your choices are nearly endless when it comes to vinegar. Its uses are seemingly endless as well.

• Boil better eggs by adding 2 tablespoons to the water before boiling. It keeps them from cracking.
• Marinating meat in vinegar kills bacteria and tenderizes the meat. Use one-quarter cup vinegar for a two to three pound roast, marinate overnight, then cook without draining or rinsing the meat. Add herbs to the vinegar when marinating as desired.
• Make buttermilk. Add a tablespoon of vinegar to a cup of milk and let it stand 5 minutes to thicken.
• Replace a lemon by substituting 1/4 teaspoon of vinegar for 1 teaspoon of lemon juice.
• Firm up gelatin by adding a teaspoon of vinegar for every box of gelatin used. To keep those molded desserts from sagging in the summer heat.
• Prepare fluffier rice by adding a teaspoon of vinegar to the water when it boils.
• Make wine vinegar by mixing 2 tablespoons of vinegar with 1 teaspoon of dry red wine.
• Debug fresh vegetables by washing them in water with vinegar and salt. The bugs will float off.
• Scale fish more easily by rubbing with vinegar 5 minutes before scaling.
• For extra tenderness with boiling ribs or stew meat add a tablespoon of white distilled vinegar.
• To add a zesty new taste to fresh fruits such as pears, cantaloupe, honeydew, or others, add a splash of rice or balsamic vinegar. Serve immediately to prevent the fruit from becoming mushy.
• Freshen wilted vegetables by soaking them in cold water containing a spoonful or two of white distilled vinegar.
• When boiling or steaming cauliflower, beets or other vegetables, add a teaspoon or two of white distilled vinegar to the water to help them keep their color. This will also improve their taste, and reduce gassy elements. This also works when cooking beans and bean dishes.
• Make pasta less sticky and reduce some of its starch. Add just a dash of white distilled vinegar to the water as it cooks.
• Give some extra zest to your white sauce by adding 1/2 teaspoon of white distilled vinegar.
• Add moistness and taste to any chocolate cake—homemade or from a box—with a spoonful of white distilled vinegar.
• To keep frosting from sugaring add a drop of white distilled vinegar. It will also help keep white frosting white and shiny.
• Make perfect, fluffy meringue by adding a teaspoon of white distilled vinegar for every 3 to 4 egg whites used.
• Perk up any soup or sauce with a teaspoon of red or white wine vinegar.

As you can see, you don’t need to use much vinegar to get big results.

Most Neglected

Most of us have items in our pantries that we’ve forgotten about or rarely use. Take a look for yourself and take out whatever’s in the back that you never see and therefore never use. Have some fun and go pantry shopping to see what you have. Then make something with what you find. It’s a great way to keep your cooking interesting and to ensure that you keep rotating fresh ingredients in and out of your pantry.

What’s in your pantry that you can’t cook without?

I like most vegetables and like to try different ways to prepare them. While I’ve always been a fan of cauliflower, there are many people who shy away from it. I suspect this is because they’ve always had it boiled, steamed, or raw, which while appealing to some, doesn’t bring out much depth of flavor. So after reading Michael Ruhlman’s post about roasted cauliflower I’d been anxious to try it. I picked up a nice, fresh head at the West Side Market and told Renée what I intended to do with it.  She was nonplussed. “I don’t really like cauliflower,”" she said, “so do what you want because I probably won’t have any.” Knowing how she appreciates good food, I remained confident.

Here’s all you need:

Preheat your oven to 425˚F/220˚C. Cut the stem off the cauliflower as close to the base as possible and remove any leaves. Rub oil all over the cauliflower. Put the cauliflower in an oven-proof skillet. Slide the pan into the oven and roast the cauliflower for 45 minutes. Remove it from the oven and smear the soft butter over the surface. Sprinkle with a four-finger pinch of salt.  Roast the cauliflower for another 30 to 45 minutes, basting it several times with the butter, which will have browned.  The cauliflower in the picture was roasted a total of 60 minutes. It’s done when you can insert a paring knife into it and feel no resistance. It should be completely tender.

As it roasted Renée commented how good it smelled. And it did. I had to step outside to clean the snow off Ali’s car before she left for the evening and when I walked back into the kitchen the aroma of the roasting cauliflower teased my taste buds. I couldn’t wait to try it! It was tender throughout but the browned outside edges and the bottom had a bit of a crunch that made the overall texture really terrific. The browned butter and salt were the perfect companions.

I gave Renée a little taste and she immediately went back for more. “Seriously, I don’t even like cauliflower,” she said, “but this is really good. I think if you salted and buttered anything I would eat it. And you can quote me on that.”

Thanks, honey; I just did.

If Ali is home you’re likely to find her endlessly watching “Friends” on DVD, even though she’s seen every episode so many times she can quote the lines right along with the actors. So when it came time to title this post I looked to one of her favorite shows for inspiration. You may find the menu inspiring enough on it’s own.

I like to cook special things for special occasions and believe that food and cooking are powerful ways to express love, offer hospitality, and bring people together to share in the experience. Since it was Renée’s birthday yesterday we invited a few friends over for dinner with a menu of her choosing. Being a Maryland girl, she loves seafood, so I turned to my trusty James Beard cook books and found a few entrée recipes for her to choose from. For an appetizer, I suggested something from Michael Symon’s Live To Cook. For dessert, Renée chose something she’d seen Chef Anne Burrell make on Food Network. So here’s the Brewer’s Daughter‘s birthday menu:

Appetizer: Roasted Dates with Pancetta, Almonds, and Chile

Entrée: Shrimp Floridian en Papillotte

Dessert: Panna Cotta with Roasted Figs and Balsamic

The One With Dates

This is one of the best kind of dishes: it’s easy to make and has complex, layered flavors. The sweetness of the dates and the saltiness of the pancetta combine with the almonds and spicy heat of the chile flakes for a perfect balance of intense taste elements.

Begin by preheating your oven to 350°F. Put the dates on a small rimmed baking sheet and roast them in the oven until heated through, about 5 minutes. Turn off the oven but leave the dates in there while you cook the pancetta.

In a medium sauté pan over medium heat, cook the pancetta until it is three-quarters crisp, about 5 minutes. Add the almonds and continue cooking until they brown, a few minutes. Add the garlic and cook for another minute or so. Add the red pepper flakes and stock and bring to a simmer, scraping the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Remove the pan from the heat and whisk in the butter, stirring continuously until the butter is melted. Stir in the lemon juice and parsley.
Add the dates to the pan and swirl and toss them in the sauce. Divide the cooked dates among four to six plates and spoon the sauce over them.

The One With Shrimp

This recipe combined two of the things that Renée loves most: seafood and blue cheese. Like the dates, it’s easy to prepare–unless you have to peel and devein the shrimp like I did, which isn’t hard, just time-consuming–and it can be prepped ahead of time and popped into the oven while your guests are enjoying their apps. The creamy, flavorful cheese mixture marries with the juice of the lemon to bathe the shrimp in a wonderful sauce.

Blend the blue cheese with the cream cheese and the chives, parsley, and garlic. Thin the mixture with the wine.

Take four large squares of aluminum foil and heap one-quarter of the cheese mixture on each. Top with a quarter of the shrimp and a slice of lemon. Bring the edges of the foil up over the shrimp and fold them together. Fold up the ends of the foil to make a tight package. Arrange packages on a baking sheet and bake in a 400 degree oven for 20 minutes. Simply unwrap and enjoy!

The One With Heavy Cream

Panna cotta is a soft, creamy, eggless custard whose name literally means ‘cooked cream’. This dessert continues the theme of easy to make but flavorful dishes. Despite its luxurious texture and elegant presentation, panna cotta is easy to prepare and is a blank slate for many added flavors. The fig topping adds a terrific contrast to the wonderful texture and sweetness of this dessert.

The first step is to soften the gelatin. Here’s where it got interesting. I couldn’t find sheet gelatin. In fact, the people in the grocery stores I went to didn’t even know what it was. So I bought powder. Then I had to figure out what the ratio was for converting sheet gelatin to powder. I posted the question to Michael Ruhlman on Twitter and got a plethora of responses. Based on that Twitter exchange, Chef Dan Moody was kind enough to put together an entire blog post outlining the conversion from sheet to powder. Thanks, Chef!

For sheets, submerse the gelatin sheets in a small bowl of cool water to soften. If using powder, sprinkle the powder over the surface of 2-3 tablespoons of cold water and allow it to bloom for several minutes. Make sure you don’t just dump it in; the powder in the center won’t absorb enough water. If it doesn’t absorb enough water, the gelatin and your dessert will be grainy. I used a bit too much water, so although my panna cotta did set up, it was not as firm as I would have liked.

In a small saucepan combine the cream and 1 cup sugar. Slit the vanilla bean lengthwise and scrape the seeds. Add the seeds and the hull of the vanilla bean to the saucepan. Whisk to combine. Bring the mixture to a boil and turn off immediately. Remove the softened gelatin sheets from the cool water and whisk into the hot cream mixture. Remove and discard the vanilla bean. Pour immediately into serving dishes and refrigerate for 2 to 3 hours or overnight.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Toss the figs together with the remaining sugar and balsamic. Let macerate for about 15 minutes. Roast in the preheated oven for 15 minutes or until the figs are soft and the sugar and balsamic have started to caramelize on the figs.

Top the panna cotta with the roasted figs and enjoy! (This paired really well with New Holland Dragon’s Milk Oak Barrel Ale!)

It All Comes Together

In addition to what I made, Renée put together a wonderful salad with toasted pine nuts, dried cranberries, mushrooms, cherry tomatoes, English cucumber and a terrific balsamic vinaigrette. Each dish had it’s own opportunity to shine, but together I think it made for a special birthday dinner for my beautiful bride and our wonderful friends. She’s always proud of my cooking and I’m always proud to serve her something that makes her happy.

The culinary history of Beef Wellington is a bit of a mystery. Many theories exist as to its origin–all of them lacking hard evidence–but none support invention any earlier than the 20th Century. The earliest recipe found titled “Beef Wellington” was published in 1940 in The Palmer House Cook Book and is a much simpler version than the classic which came to prominence in the 1960s. Beef Wellington was the premier party dish of the time: it was rich, dramatic, expensive, and seemed difficult and time-consuming to prepare. As couples started engaging in culinarily keeping up with the Jones, dinner parties became elaborate as complicated recipes were prepared more frequently. Beef Wellington was considered difficult and expensive because it required puff pastry and pate de foie gras. It defined what a gourmet dish should be.

While it is not known exactly who invented Beef Wellington, there is a long Anglo-Irish-French tradition of meat cooked in pastry. The Wellington steak of England, the steig Wellington of Ireland, and the French dish known as Filet de Boeuf en Croute could all claim influence. Whether the English, the Irish, or the French first baked filet of beef in a crust we may never know, but I think we can be fairly sure the French would not have named it after Wellington.

The classic Beef Wellington is a fillet of beef tenderloin coated with pate de foie gras and a duxelles of mushrooms that are then all wrapped in a puff pastry crust. “Wellington” is sometimes informally used to describe other dishes in which meat is baked in a puff pastry; the most common variations use sausage, lamb, or salmon.

While watching the finale of The Next Iron Chef: Super Chefs, Chef Elizabeth Falkner chose Beef Wellington as one of her dishes. Both Renée and I thought it looked great and although I’d seen it before and knew of the dish, I couldn’t remember ever ordering it in a restaurant and I’d never prepared it before. A quiet Christmas Eve dinner with my bride seemed like the perfect time give it a go as part of the celebration.

Chef Falkner wrapped her tenderloin with prosciutto instead of pate and I liked that idea, so I decided to do the same.

Duxelles is made with any cultivated or wild mushroom, depending on the recipe. Wild porcini mushrooms provide a much stronger flavored than white or brown mushrooms. Fresh is best but reconstituted dried varieties work, too. Leftover duxelles can be spread on toasted slices of baguette to make a crostini or can also be filled into a pocket of raw pastry and baked as a savory tart.

To make duxelles, add mushrooms, shallots, garlic, and thyme to a food processor and pulse until you get a finely chopped mixture. Add butter and olive oil to a large saute pan and set over medium heat. Add the mushroom and shallot mixture and saute for 8 to 10 minutes or until most of the liquid has evaporated. You want a paste-like consistency. Season with salt and pepper and set aside to cool.

If you choose to make your own puff pastry, there are plenty of recipes out there, but  many of the frozen varieties are quite good and easy to work with. Depending on the tenderloin you get, you may have to tie the tenderloin in 4 places so it holds its cylindrical shape while cooking. Mine was pretty solid, so I didn’t tie it. Drizzle it with olive oil, then season with salt and pepper and sear all over, including the ends, in a hot, heavy-based skillet lightly coated with olive oil – about 2 to 3 minutes per side. Meanwhile set out your prosciutto on a sheet of plastic wrap on top of your cutting board. Make sure the plastic is about a foot and a half in length so you can wrap and tie the roast up in it. Lay the prosciutto in overlapping layers so it forms a rectangle that is big enough to encompass the entire filet of beef. Use a rubber spatula to cover the prosciutto evenly with a thin layer of duxelles. Season the surface of the duxelles with salt and pepper and sprinkle with fresh thyme leaves. When the beef is seared, remove from the heat, cut off the twine if you tied it and coat lightly all over with Dijon mustard. Allow to cool slightly, then roll up in the duxelles covered prosciutto using the plastic wrap to tie it up nice and tight. Tuck in the ends of the prosciutto as you roll to completely encompass the beef. Roll it up tightly in plastic wrap and twist the ends to seal it completely and hold it in a nice log shape. Set in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes to ensure it maintains its shape.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F. (See below for Fingerling Potatoes.)

On a lightly floured surface, roll the puff pastry out to about a 1/4-inch thickness. Depending on the size of your sheets you may have to overlap 2 sheets and press them together. Remove beef from refrigerator and unwrap the plastic. Set the beef in the center of the pastry and fold over the longer sides, brushing with egg wash to seal. Trim ends if necessary then brush with egg wash and fold over to completely seal the beef – saving ends to use as a decoration on top if desired. Top with coarse sea salt. Place the beef seam side down on a baking sheet.

Brush the top of the pastry with egg wash then make a couple of slits in the top of the pastry using the tip of a paring knife – this creates vents that will allow the steam to escape when cooking. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes OR until pastry is golden brown and beef registers 125 degrees F on an instant-read thermometer. Remove from oven and rest before cutting into thick slices. Garnish with minced chives, and serve with Roasted Fingerling Potatoes.

Preheat oven to 500 degrees F and place a baking sheet inside to heat.

Add potatoes, rosemary, sage, thyme, and garlic to a medium bowl. Drizzle with olive oil, and season with salt and pepper. Remove sheet pan from oven, lightly coat with olive oil, and pour potatoes onto pan. Place potatoes in oven and reduce heat to 425 degrees F. Roast for 20 minutes, or until crispy on outside and tender on inside.

I preheated the oven to 500 F then lowered it to 425 F before putting the beef in. I planned to cook the beef for 15-20 minutes, then put the potatoes in until the beef reached the proper temperature. My tenderloin cooked in only about 25 minutes, so I put it in the microwave to rest until the potatoes were finished.

Renée and I really liked this dish. It was rich, flavorful, and complex. Besides the obvious upside of a nice beef tenderloin, this dish does have a certain elegance to it. I can appreciate why it was such a popular choice among dinner party hosts. Regardless of its reputation, this is not difficult to make. If does take some time, but good cooking is worth it. If nothing else, I think I found a new tradition for Christmas Eve at our house.

Yesterday while I was making pies, Renée made the off-hand comment that I should do a video with some tips. The next thing I knew she was standing in front of me with her phone asking me questions. In light of this video ambush, I thought I might elaborate further in the tips I shared in the video.

Making great pie crust takes practice, but it’s not impossible. If you haven’t tried it, here are some tips that may prove useful.

1. As with other cooking, mise en place is essential. Be sure to have everything prepped, measured, and ready to go before you begin.

2. After you’ve prepped and measured, chill EVERYTHING, including dry ingredients and your pie plates or tins. Flaky pie crust comes from well-distributed pockets of fat in the dough. Working with cold ingredients keeps some of the fat in solid little chunks which melt when heated and act as steam pockets for the moisture that evaporates from the dough leaving a layered, flaky crust. If you’re using shortening, you may have to put in in the freezer for a few minutes; it just doesn’t get hard enough in the refrigerator.

3. Work quickly. This is why mise en place is your friend. It eliminates wasted time. The warmer your dough gets, the less flaky it will be.

4. Don’t over mix. You want to coat the fat with the flour, not blend them together like you would a cookie dough. When cutting the fat in to the dry ingredients you can use a food processor (pulse, don’t let it run!), a pastry cutter, or a fork. As soon as you have pea-sized pieces and a mealy texture, stop! You’re ready to add the moisture that will bind the dough.

5. Add the liquid slowly and stop sooner than you think you should. Add your liquid one tablespoon at a time. You may not use all the liquid specified in the recipe, and that’s okay! Each batch is different. At this point, rely on your eyes, not the recipe. If you’ve used a food processor to mix the flour and fat, this is a good time to dump the mixture into a mixing bowl and do the rest by hand. Use a fork to mix; don’t mash or stir. Mashing or stirring blends the fat and flour together so that is can’t absorb enough water, which means that little or no steam can form to expand the layers. If your dough crumbles as you try to gather it into a ball, add more water a few drops at a time until it becomes more cohesive.

6. Chill the dough at least 30 minutes. Most recipes call for forming the dough into a disk before chilling. I prefer to roll it out inside of a 64 ounce Zip-lock bag or two sheets of parchment before chilling. It makes the dough easier to work with after it’s chilled. Plus, then all you have to do is place it in the pan and form the edges.

7. Blind bake the crust. If your recipe calls for a blind or per-baked crust, as many custard pie recipes do, put your dough-lined pie plate in the freezer for about 10 minutes. This prevents the crust from slipping down the sides while baking. When the crust is chilled, line the pie crust with parchment paper, wax paper, or aluminum foil. Fill at least two-thirds full with pie weights – dry beans, rice, or stainless-steel pie weights. Bake with weights for 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Remove from oven, cool a few minutes and remove the pie weights. Poke small holes in the bottom of the pie crust with a fork and return to oven (without the weights) and cook for an additional 10 minutes. Be sure to cool it completely before filling. You may need to tent the edges of the pie with aluminum foil when you bake your pie, to keep the edges from burning.

What are your pie making secrets?

In mythology, consumption of ambrosia was typically reserved for divine beings. In the real world, you can make your own and can accompany it with some great music. Beyond the fact that it’s one of my favorite tunes, the Ambrosia song, “Nice, Nice, Very Nice“, which sets to music the lyrics to a song in Kurt Vonnegut’s Cat’s Cradle, is significant to this post for several reasons beyond the obvious riff on the title. The dish in question is made with rice, is very nice indeed, and is one of my strongest food memories. I’d consider it one of Mom’s many ambrosia-like dishes. She didn’t make these often, which turned the days she did into a special treat. Crunchy on the outside and chewy on the inside, these are warm rolls of mozzarella-filled goodness that I dare you to resist. Add your favorite nectar and you’ll be set.

The proportions below make 6-8 rolls; I quadrupled it when I made it, but I know Mom used to make dozens at a time. Here’s what you’ll need:

First, cook the rice and let it cool until you are able to handle it. Obvious, right?  But I’m going to encourage you to adopt a different and better method for cooking rice: cook it like you would pasta. In this method, used by no less than James Beard, there is no measuring of water, no careful timing, or delicate balance of heat. You simply bring a large pot of water to a boil, add salt, add the rice, and boil it for 10-15 minutes. Drain it into a colander or strainer, just like pasta. The key to this method is to add the rice slowly so the water never loses its boil. Try it, you’ll get perfect, fluffy rice every time.

Once the rice has cooled, add the eggs, Parmesan cheese, parsley, and salt to taste. Next, make a patty of rice, lay a cheese strip inside and cover to make an egg-shaped roll. Roll it in the bread crumbs and deep fry in 350 degree oil until golden brown, about 3-5 minutes. You can put a little butter on your hands to keep the rice from sticking to your hands or you can do what sushi chefs do and use water.

These are best warm, but watch out, the cheese inside will stretch into long strands as you bite into them if you’re not careful.  You can also refrigerate them for later enjoyment. A quick zap in the microwave brings them right back to warm, melty goodness.

Following one of Mom’s recipes is one thing. Getting it to turn out like hers did visually, in texture, and taste is another. I’m happy to say I nailed this one. Nice, nice, very nice. Thanks, Mom!

Proper grammar notwithstanding, I know you’re thinking, ” Hey, Paul is dead right; there AREN’T enough songs about squash!” But before you waste a portion of your day trying to scratch out some lyrics for “The  Crookneck Squash Blues”, you might want to take a listen to this song by Australian singer/songwriter Darren Hanlon. Sadly, it’s about the other type of squash, the one that involves a racquet. Maybe if I send Darren some new lyrics he’ll do a version honoring the vegetable. One can only hope.

As for the cooking with squash, I’ve written about acorn and pattypan squash, and pumpkins before but with the wide variety of squash available year round and a plethora of great recipes for them, you can easily see the versatility of the squash family of vegetables.

It was our turn to host dinner club last night and the theme was “Fall Harvest”, so I decided to call on the acorn squash once again as our main dish and prepared Sausage and Apple Stuffed Acorn Squash.  I liked this recipe because I thought the sweetness of the squash would pair very well with the spicy sausage. It was easy to prepare and was enjoyed by all. I tripled the recipe for dinner club, but here’s what you’ll need to prepare 4 servings:

Start your oven at least 15 minutes before you intend to use it and set it to 15 degrees below your intended temperature. This ensures that the interior of the oven will reach a uniform temperature. After you put your ingredients in the oven, turn it up to the proper temperature. Since you lose heat when you open the door, you can be sure that the oven will get up to temp quickly by jump starting the heating cycle yourself.

Combine the melted butter, garlic salt, and ground sage and brush it over the cut sides and cavity of the squash. Add salt and pepper to taste and bake in a large roasting pan, cut side up, at 400 degrees F for 1 hour or until squash is tender yet still holds its shape.

While the squash is baking, fry the pork until light brown then remove it to a strainer to drain. Keep 2 tablespoons of drippings in the pan and add the onions, celery, and mushrooms. Sauté about 4 minutes or until tender. Stir in the apples and sauté 2 more minutes.

Combine the pork, onions, celery, mushrooms, and apples with the breadcrumbs in a large bowl. Taste and season with the fresh sage, salt and pepper, then stir in the egg and 2 T fresh parsley.

Fill the squash halves with stuffing until slightly mounded. Return the squash to the over and bake, covered, for 20 more minutes, until the egg is set.  Top with shredded Romano cheese and garnish with the remainder of the parsley.

You may, like I did, have extra stuffing left over from this recipe. It goes really well in an egg scramble for breakfast and also would make a great filling for a savory breakfast pastry. I think it would also be delicious in turkey, chicken, or peppers.

Give it a try and let me know what you think! I’ll look for your music videos on YouTube.

Fruitful inspiration?

If Beethoven were a baker–and who knows, he may have been–I think this is the banana bread he would have made. In fact, I’ll bet he made himself some banana bread one day and while enjoying a nice warm, buttered slice and pondering the wonderfulness that is the banana, recognized what a fun word banana is to say and began to playfully say the word over and over which culminated in the famous four note opening of the 5th Symphony. I have absolutely no facts to support this claim. It’s just fun to think about.  However, I will defend this as the best banana bread recipe I know. The fact that it’s my mom’s and I grew up eating this bread notwithstanding. You can try to argue for your favorite banana bread recipe, but unless it’s your mom’s, I’ll just have to agree to disagree.

Admittedly, there is nothing unique about this recipe. There are thousands of banana bread recipes to be had. But like other simple recipes, the art is in the execution.

Here are the players:

Allegro con brio

The first movement opens with the two-note motif of sugar and shortening. Cream them until smooth and fluffy. This is a critical step in this and many other recipes. In the creaming method you cream the sugar into the fat, add the eggs, then the liquids and dry ingredients. But what does it mean, exactly? Creaming simply means to mix sugar and fat together until you get a light, fluffy texture. Creaming is usually done with butter or shortening and white sugar, but you can also cream using brown sugar,  lard or even margarine (although never recommended). It takes about 10 minutes by hand; less with a mixer. Sounds simple, and it is, but there are a few things you need to know to get it right.

Why Is It Important to Cream Butter and Sugar Correctly?

When fat and sugar are creamed, the rough sugar crystals cut into the fat, creating air bubbles in the batter. These air bubbles serve as a concentration point for leavening gases and steam.

Incorrectly creaming the fat and sugar could have adverse effects on the final results. When fat and sugar are creamed, the rough sugar crystals cut into the fat, creating air bubbles in the batter. These air bubbles serve as a concentration point for leavening gases and steam. If the fat and sugar are creamed well, the entrapped air is more evenly dispersed among the fat leading to more even rising and a light, airy texture. It’s like yeast making bread rise.

Leaveners like baking powder and baking soda act to  enlarge the air bubbles that already exist in the batter; they do not create more.  Leaveners release carbon dioxide when moistened and heated which gravitates to the air bubbles and expands them like tiny balloons causing a cake or cookie to rise. Uneven bubble distribution causes one side to rise more than the other or puffing  then falling resulting in a flat cake, bread, or cookie. During creaming, sugar particles are coated with a layer of fat. When the batter or dough piece warms in the oven, the fat layer melts away enabling water to mix with the sugar and go into solution. As the sugar changes from solid to liquid, it causes the batter or dough to flow or spread.

Shortening or lard creates and holds air bubbles the best but butter is good, too, and also adds flavor. Margarine doesn’t hold air as effectively, while vegetable oil doesn’t at all. And make sure to use room temperature butter, shortening, or lard. It the fat is too hot or too cold it will not form air bubble as well.

Sugar crystal size also affects creaming; the smaller the air bubbles formed during mixing, the more fine and dense the texture. Superfine sugar is often used in delicate cake recipes where a fine texture is desired. The sugar crystals are super small and create tinier air bubbles than when using regular crystalline sugar.

Creaming Using a Mixer

Slice the shortening into small chunks and put it into the mixing bowl. Turn the mixer on low until the shortening gets soft then turn it up to medium for about a minute. When the blades get clogged, scrape them off and start again. Mix until the shortening is smooth. Then, add the sugar a little at a time, pouring it into the side of the mixing bowl. Stop periodically to scrape down the sides of the mixing bowl. Keep mixing until it becomes light and fluffy, similar in texture to whipped cream, but more dense.

Creaming By Hand

Creaming by hand is the traditional way to do it, but it can be tiring. Remember, machines are your friends. The process is the same as above. Begin with room temperature shortening cut into small chunks. Beat it with a wooden spoon until is becomes soft. Add the sugar a little at a time and keep mixing until the light fluffy texture is achieved.

How do you know for sure when it is creamed correctly? Here are some things to look for:

• When the mixer starts to form ridges, it is a sign that it is done.
• When the color becomes a pale cream (if using butter).
• When it starts sticking to the sides of the bowl.

Andante con molto

Emulsification occurs when one liquid is evenly dispersed into another. Examples of emulsification include vinaigrette, mayonnaise, and milk. Mixed properly, the emulsion will hold and the parts will not separate.

The second movement, in egg flat major, is a lyrical work in quadruple variation form. The goal here is to get the eggs completely incorporated into the butter one at a time, mixing in between each egg addition. Here comes our question again: what does “completely incorporated” really mean? We can recognize that the mixture is thinner and you can’t see any egg any more, other than the color, but what actually happened here?

Shortening, like butter, is a combination of water and fat, which don’t harmonize well with each other in the wild. Emulsions are mixtures of two or more liquids that are normally un-blendable. Emulsification occurs when one liquid is evenly dispersed into another. Examples of emulsification include vinaigrette, mayonnaise, and milk. Mixed properly, the emulsion will hold and the parts will not separate. To get them on-key, you need an emulsifier. Our friend, the egg, contains water and fat of its own, as well as lecithin in its yolk which acts to complete the triad. You want to eggs to be completely mixed with the shortening and sugar, completely dispersed.  By adding eggs one at a time, you help to ensure that the eggs mix with the other ingredients rather than just mixing with each other.

Scherzo Allegro

The third movement is in ternary form, consisting of a scherzo and quintet. Add the bananas to the wet ingredients. Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and add it a little at a time to the mixing bowl until just smooth. Don’t over mix! By slowly adding the dry ingredients, the proteins in the flour won’t have much chance to combine with the water to form too much gluten. Less gluten means more moist deliciousness. Split the mixture between two 8 x 4 x 2 1/2 inch bread pans. Pop it in the oven at 350 degrees for about 50 minutes.

Allegro

The triumphant and exhilarating finale begins when you remove the bread from the oven. Check for doneness by inserting a toothpick in the center. If it comes out clean, it’s done. Allow the bread to cool for 10 minutes then remove it from the pan to cool further on a wire rack.

Now, the best part: slice it, butter it, and EAT IT! And make sure you say, “Ba-na-na-na!” Beethoven would be proud.

Reading the ingredients on a food package can be daunting (unless you happen to be a food chemist), disheartening, maddening, and down right scary. In most cases, it’s not possible to imagine what those ingredients actually look like raw or in the places where they grow because, frankly, they don’t exist in nature in their raw state. Following this rule will help eliminate lots of chemicals and foodlike substances from your daily consumption.

If you can roast a chicken, you can serve dinner to anyone. It’s one of the basic cooking skills every self-respecting cook needs to have in his or her culinary toolbox. I saw this recipe on the Cook’s Illustrated site and wanted to try it. I’m always impressed with their tried and true methods; they’re simple, effective and they’re just good, solid food science. I added a twist or two of my own, too.

As part of the Chagrin Falls School District’s Bridge to the World Program, 15 students from Jeppe Boys High School in South Africa are visiting Chagrin Falls High School from September 20th to the 27th. We are fortunate to have the opportunity to host one of the Jeppe students, a charming and well-mannered young man named Christopher. I thought this dish would serve as a terrific example of American home cooking .

The Cook’s Illustrated technique has several things that are different from the standard roast chicken recipe:

Sounded good to me, so I went for it!

The Cook’s Illustrated recipe calls for a whole chicken, of course, but I’m using three large bone-in breasts and an 8-pack of drumsticks. The key to adapting the recipe is to pay attention to the temperature of the breasts as they roast. Here’s the original ingredients list:

In addition to the prepping the chicken as suggested below, I choose to brine my chicken parts using a variation of a brine from Michael Ruhlman and Brian Polcyn’s Charcuterie: The Art of Salting, Smoking, and Curing consisting of water, kosher salt, sugar, bay leaves, garlic, black peppercorns, and rosemary. I’ve written about brining before and its virtues cannot be overstated. Once you try it, you’ll be hooked on the flavor and moistness it adds to your meats. Combine the brining ingredients and bring the mixture to a boil to dissolve the salt and sugar, then allow it to cool to room temperature then refrigerate until chilled. Add the chicken and place it back in the fridge for 8-12 hours for a 3-4 pound chicken. The parts I used required less brining time; about 2-3 hours.

Patting meat dry with paper towels before adding it to a hot pan ensures quick, flawless browning. Dry meat produces a crisp, dark, even sear and leaves behind a wonderfully flavorful golden fond that is the perfect base for pan sauces. Left wet, meat produces fond too quickly which burns and turns bitter before the meat finishes cooking leaving you no yummy goodness on which to base a sauce. The excess moisture remains trapped between the meat and the pan resulting in a softer sear than the dried meat.

To roast your chicken, adjust your oven rack to the middle position  and place a 12-inch ovensafe skillet on rack–I’m using a cast iron skillet–and heat the oven to 450 degrees. Meanwhile, combine the salt and pepper in bowl. Pat the chicken dry with paper towels and rub the entire surface with oil. Sprinkle the salt mixture evenly over the chicken and rub it in to coat the chicken evenly. For a whole chicken, tie the legs together with twine and tuck the wing tips behind the back.

Transfer the chicken, breast side up, to the preheated skillet in the oven. Roast chicken until the breasts register 120 degrees and thighs register 135 degrees, about 25 to 35 minutes. Turn off the oven and leave the chicken in the oven until the breasts register 160 degrees and the thighs register 175 degrees, about another 25 to 35 minutes.

Move the chicken to a carving board and let it rest, uncovered, for 20 minutes. While the chicken rests, prepare the suggested pan sauce below, if you decide to use it. Then, carve and serve.

I served my chicken with sautéed squash and onions. Simple and delicious!

• 6 medium summer squash, sliced
• 1/4 cup butter
• 1 medium onion, sliced thinly or diced
• salt & pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a large skillet. Add the onion and a little salt and cook over medium heat until just tender. Add the yellow squash and continue cooking over medium heat, stirring until squash begins to soften. Cover and continue cooking over low heat until nice and tender (usually about 20-25 minutes). Add salt and pepper to taste.

What I Liked

As expected, the Cook’s Illustrated technique delivered flawlessly. The chicken cooked perfectly with a well-browned, somewhat crispy skin and was moist throughout. The seasoning combined with the light brining added a terrific flavor and finish to every bite. Plus, I love a recipe that cooks in a single pan! Coupled with the sautéed squash and onions it was a great meal that tasted like it took a lot longer to prepare. Cooking up all the pieces parts I had on hand means there’s another bonus: leftovers! And Christopher thoroughly enjoyed it!

What I Would Have Done Differently

Absolutely nothing. There are times, no matter how long you’ve been doing something, when you pause for just a moment to admire your own handiwork. As simple as this dish was to make, it was no less satisfying than more complex dishes I’ve prepared. So I’ve got that going for me. which is nice.