So, it’s been a while. What can I say … I’ve let this little blog fall by the wayside in favor of a wedding, a new apartment, a lot of work, a little bit of travel and this little piggy:

His name is Merle, and he’s even more insatiable than I am.

If anyone is still reading, here’s my official declaration that I’m back—with a new look and a new last name. Stay tuned, good things to come : ).

Yup, that’s right, it’s Chicago Restaurant Week again.

Bloggers who inexplicably end up on the media contact list for the Chicago Convention & Tourism Bureau (yours truly) and hangers-on (Dave) had the pleasure of attending the Chicago Restaurant Week press kickoff event last week at the Chicago Theatre.

It was nothing short of fantastic—but then again, give me free food and good champagne and filing my tax return would be enjoyable.

My favorites:

Berghoff’s bacon-wrapped shrimp atop a “Blue Moon” polenta cake. YUM. Definite validation of our choice of caterer

Mexique’s Cochinita Rillettes: pork shoulder rillette (think pâté) on a crostini.

Trout Amandine from the Cape Cod Room at the Drake Hotel. Melt-in-your mouth fish with little pops of crunch from the almonds. Admittedly not as appealing-looking as some of the others, but definitely top three of the night.

Mini beef tenderloin sandwiches from Rosebud. A week later, I still vividly remember the taste of this heavenly combo of perfectly cooked tenderloin, spicy horseradish sauce and tangy coleslaw on a soft roll.

Province’s Rotisserie Shredded Indiana Duck Tacos. Juicy meat and impossibly light and flaky taco shells (fried wonton wrappers, maybe?).

IPO’s goat cheese and strawberry shortcake.

The Bristol’s mascarpone and blood orange cheesecake.

With more than 200 restaurants, only one reservation choice came fast and easy:

Joe’s Stone Crab. A cup of chowder or bisque, four stone crab claws, hash-browned potatoes, coleslaw and Joe’s famous key-lime pie for $22. Um, seriously? I still think this can’t be true. We’ll see when we arrive for lunch next Saturday.

I was late to the party for Cafe Spiagga, NAHA, Blackbird, Duchamp and Mercadito, at least for the days and times I wanted. But I did manage to snag reservations to Branch 27, Veerasway and Cibo Matto.

So what are you waiting for? Go book your reservations, and, in the words of the chubby Restaurant Week mascot, “Eat it up, Chicago.”

… for lots and lots of butter. That’s right. Even more than usual. I’m talking pounds of it. Restaurant-size vats. Because it’s time for my famous saltine cracker toffee. A quartet of the most nutritionally devoid—yet dangerously irresistible—ingredients on the planet: chocolate, refined carbs, sugar and BUTTAH.

This is a combination more addictive than crack, and as a holiday present, it beats the hell out of scented shower gel and Christmas-shaped loofas.

You’ll need:

A couple sleeves of saltine crackers

1 cup of butter

1 cup of brown sugar

2 cups of chocolate chips (your choice of white, milk or dark chocolate)

Nuts, sprinkles or other toppings of your choice

Set your oven to 375 degrees. Place a layer of tin foil over a cookie sheet (with sides, otherwise the toffee will drip off the sides when you pour it over the crackers). Grease the foil and place a single layer of saltines, salt side up, as close as possible without overlapping them, on the cookie sheet. Set aside. In sauce pan, melt the butter over medium high heat and add the brown sugar. Stir until the sugar dissolves and allow the mixture to come to a boil. Once it reaches a boil, let it cook for another 3 minutes. Slowly drizzle the toffee over the crackers—it can take practice to get the toffee evenly distributed, but don’t stress it too much. Stick it in the oven for about 5-8 minutes, or until the toffee looks very bubbly. You’ll know if it starts to burn—the color begins to turn dark quickly and you can see the crackers getting a little charred.

Remove from the oven and immediately sprinkle the chocolate chips over the crackers and toffee.

Allow them to melt for a few minutes, and then spread the chocolate around with a silicone spatula. Top with any other ingredients (nuts, dried fruit, sprinkles). I’m thinking I might venture even further into cardiac-blockage territory this year and top a batch or two with bacon …

Allow to cool, then chill in the freezer or refrigerator. Once fully chilled, peel off the tinfoil and break into pieces.

A warning—one pan of this stuff will never suffice.

Hope you all are slowly coming out of a nice Thanksgiving food coma (and just in time to enjoy the last of the leftovers!). Obviously, this post is too late for this year, but be sure to flag it for next year if your turkey-cooking skills could use a little work.

As some of you may know, we have crowded, rowdy Thanksgiving every year at my parents’ house in Tucson—complete with tequila shots and sports gambling. The food is always amazing, but the birds don’t get as much love as they should.

The 50 or so lbs of turkey are my dad’s job, and suffice to say he’s more of a set-it-forget-it-and-go-have-a-bloody-mary kind of guy than a doting tender of the turkey. Plus he never thinks the bird is cooked enough, so it’s inevitably a liiiitle on the dry side.

When it comes to the dirty work, though, he’s your man.

Sorry, love you daddy, but I thought we could step our game up this year. And did we ever.

We did the usual turkey trio: one in the oven, one in the fryer, and one on an ancient charcoal grill that’s been around since Tucson was dirt roads and cowboys.

The ultimate consensus was that the brined, butter-slathered, oven-roasted turkey was the clear winner, but the others held their own.

So we’ll start with the star of the show—a massive, fresh (no frozen birds at our party) 22-pounder which I lovingly brined, slathered in a buttery marinade and monitored with a trusty digital probe thermometer. All that—and a little help from my friend Alton Brown—gave us one of the best birds to date.

The perfect roast turkey

You’ll need:

One turkey, thawed (recipe is for a 14-16 lb. bird)

2 sticks butter

1 tablespoon pepper

1/2 tablespoon salt

1 tablespoon garlic powder

For the brine:

1 cup kosher salt

1/2 cup light brown sugar

1 gallon vegetable stock

1 tablespoon black peppercorns

1 gallon heavily iced water

A container large enough for the bird and the brine

For the aromatics:

1 red apple, sliced in half

1 half onion, sliced

1 cinnamon stick

4 sprigs rosemary

6 sage leaves

The night before Thanksgiving, slightly tipsy off Ra’s dangerously strong whiskey and diets, I brined my bird. First, mix all the brining ingredients together—minus the ice water—in a large stock pot (I upped the ingredient amounts for our big bird).

Yes, that is a bottle of Jack Daniels in the background. No harm in maintaining my pre-thanksgiving buzz … besides, how else does one find the stamina to pull off Thanksgiving dinner for 50?? By the way, I had nothing to do with the Belvedere bottle reflection you see in the brine pot.

When the brown sugar and salt have dissolved, remove the mixture from the heat and let cool to room temp.

Add the mixture to your ice water and put the bird in. I have a last minute Ace Hardware run to thank for my brining bin. Technically it was plastic file folder container, but who’s counting? Worked like a charm.

Brine the turkey overnight in the fridge.

Here’s where it gets tricky; timing the bird perfectly is next to impossible, but follow Alton’s loose guidelines: About 2-2 1/2 hours for a 14-16 pound bird (temps to follow). I estimated that our monstrosity would take about 4-5 hours, plus 30-45 minutes to rest, so I put it in at 11 a.m. to be ready at 5ish.

First, heat the oven to 500 degrees. Yes, that’s right. Alton says it crisps the skin and gives you a nice golden brown color. Mine didn’t look as good as his, but since it was delicious anyway, I’m sticking to the plan.

Then, remove the turkey from the brine, rinse it off and pat it dry. Place it in a roasting pan and set it aside.

Heat your aromatic ingredients in the microwave in a small bowl of water for a few minutes.

Once they have cooled stuff them in the turkey cavity. If the giblets are still there when you go in, you missed a step.

Now get to work on the butter mixture. Mix softened butter with your seasonings.

Now comes the fun part: The trick is to loosen up the skin enough that you can stick your hand in between the skin and the breast and massage the butter in.

Lovely, I know.

Then give the entire outside of the turkey a generous slathering for good measure.

Now comes a special Alton Brown trick: form a aluminum foil triangle to the breast like so:

Now remove it—you’ll use it in a minute.

If you don’t have a digital probe thermometer, I highly recommend it—either way, place your thermometer in the deepest part of the breast, sideways (see Alton’s video to get a visual). Now, put the turkey in the oven and put the timer on the outside of the oven. Start the time so you can keep track and set it to go off when the temperature reaches 161 degrees.

Let the turkey cook at 500 degrees for about 30 minutes to brown the skin. Then lower the temp to 350 and put the foil on the breast. This will keep the breast from drying out to much. Mine was cooking a little faster then I would have liked, so I lowered it to 325 about halfway through and then to 300 for the last hour. When the breast temp reached 161, pull that baby out and let it rest for about 30 minutes. Recruit your best carver (Dave in our case) and get to work!

As I mentioned, the turkey didn’t brown as I would have liked, but just look at that juicy breast meat. MMMMMMMMmmmmmmm. Plus, the gravy we made from the roasting pan juices had a depth of flavor like I’ve never tasted, thanks to the aromatics. And to think … we almost went sauce-less after my mother and Q’s near throwdown over gravy-gate 2009: the previous year’s baked-on stovetop gravy mess.

The fryer and BBQ turkeys were a little less time- and labor-intensive. I skipped brining, although if I’d had more time, I would have used the same brining process for the BBQ turkey (the fryer turkey doesn’t need it since frying locks the juices in.)

Fryer turkey

You’ll need:

One turkey, thawed

Dry rub of your choice

Fryer and oil of your choice (we used Canola oil)

First and foremost, read the directions on your fryer to avoid third-degree burns and house fires. The oil usually takes about an hour to heat (you’ll want it absolutely no higher than 350), so plan accordingly.

Rub your turkey generously with the dry rub of your choice (I used a cajun rub) and stick it on the turkey fryer hook thingy. Yup, that’s the technical term. (Your fryer should come with instructions for this).

Slowly and very carefully lower the turkey into the fryer like so:

Bronco Billy is our fearless fryer.

Give the turkey about 4 minutes of cooking time per pound. Pull it out, let it rest and carve it up.

BBQ turkey

You’ll need:

One turkey, thawed

Butter marinade (same as above with spices of your choice)

Charcoal grill with charcoal and a brick

Rub your turkey down with the butter mix, as I described with the roast turkey. I added a BBQ spices to mix things up.

To prepare our grill, we put a brick in the middle, surrounded by coals.

This keeps the heat evenly distributed and the temperature low and steady to avoid overcooking.

Heat your coals. When they’re ready, place the turkey directly on the grill rack.

Our 15 lb. turkey took about 3 hours and 45 minutes.

Cook until the breast meat is about 161 degrees. And by the way, don’t leave a digital thermometer in the turkey while it cooks as my dad did … it doesn’t end well.

Let it rest and carve.

And there you have it.

After all that, 4 lbs of stuffing, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, corn cassarole and appetizers, you’ll understand why I kept good ole Jack Daniels close by.

Happy Thanksgiving!

… is nearly upon us!! Hip-hip-hooray!!!

As far as food goes, holidays don’t get much better than Thanksgiving. Last year’s Thanksgiving post pretty much covers things so I’m posting the link again (hey, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it). There’s also my Southwest Thanksgiving post and the Paula Deen post to give you a little turkey-day inspiration. Also keep an eye out for a special Thanksgiving Day post. Happy gorging!

I won’t be one of those bloggers that pretends to have thousands of clamoring fans that didn’t know what to do with themselves when their favorite blogger went on hiatus. That being said, for the three of you out there who actually care, sorry for depriving you of dry humor and french toast recipes.

It’s been an insanely busy summer, but I’ll spare you the excuses and get straight to the good stuff …

Portobello, red pepper and goat cheese flatbread/pizza

You’ll need:

1 red bell pepper, chopped

1-2 portobello mushrooms, chopped

8 oz. goat cheese

3-5 cloves garlic, minced

Crushed red pepper  and salt to taste

1 bag of Trader Joe’s pizza dough (you can substitute other dough, but I love this one)

A pizza stone

Olive oil

Have I ever preached the merits of a good pizza stone? It is absolutely crucial if you want to achieve the perfect crisp-on-the-outside, chewy-on-the-inside crust. And take it from me—skip the parchment paper and slap that dough right on the stone. There is an art to this people, so allow me to explain the process:

Ideally, you’ll want to pull your dough out of the fridge an hour or so before you start to let it proof.

Then, you’ll set your oven to 500 degrees and put the pizza stone in to heat it up. Next, ready your ingredients.

In this case, I sauteed the chopped red peppers in a little olive oil for a while to soften them up (ever had a pizza with vegetables that were raw and crunchy? Nothing worse.) and then added the mushrooms in toward the end. Set your ingredients aside and let’s get doughing (forgive me for that one, I’ve been out of the food-humor game for a while). I cut the dough in half so each pizza will fit on the stone—that’s a ball of dough about the size of a baseball. You’ll need a flat, floured surface to work on.

Press your fingers into the dough about an inch inside the outer edge to form a crust. Then press down in the middle with your palms to flatten the dough, and start pulling the dough apart with fingers. Once it is thin enough, you can slap the dough back and forth between your palms or hold one end and let the weight of the dough do the work to stretch it more. If you’re wondering what the hell I’m talking about, here’s a good video tutorial—unfortunately I didn’t have the foresight to visually document this process.

At this point, your pizza stone should be heated. Professional pie-makers may turn their noses up at my method, but trust me, for the home cook this works like a charm: Take the pizza stone out—very carefully—and set it on your counter or stove top. Again, VERY CAREFULLY, place your shaped dough (no toppings yet) on the stone. The crust will start to cook immediately from the heat of the stone, so quickly brush the dough with olive oil, crumble the goat cheese and sprinkle the toppings over the surface. I added a few grates of parmesan for good measure. Stick the pizza stone back in the oven and keep a close eye on it. It cooks very quickly—in about 5-7 minutes. Remove the stone once the crust is golden brown and let cool for a while. The pizza should slide off the stone fairly easily.

Garnish with crushed red pepper and a bit of sea salt to taste.

Three cheers for the winning caterer!!!

We’ve chosen Berghoff—a candidate we almost overlooked because we assumed they were all about beer and brats (although, as you can see from the menu, they go far beyond that). Thanks to an event at our gorgeous venue, we  were able to sample a few of the preferred caterers—including Berghoff. We also came to find out that one of Dave’s former high school classmates worked there—Kelly’s thoughtful and detailed proposal reinforced my warm and fuzzy feelings about Berghoff. But I’m getting ahead of myself, let’s start from the beginning …

Tasting #1: Calihan Catering

The appetizers were pretty good overall. Standouts: butternut squash pizza, artichoke puff, brie and pear quesadilla, and the shrimp in a cracker cup. Nicole, the sales rep we met with couldn’t have been nicer and the service was great.

Each of the three caterers interpreted our theme differently: two buffet stations (long, drawn-out seated dinner is not our style), one Italian, one Latin/Mexican/Southwestern. The main courses were OK, but I didn’t see any cohesion, and the proposed menu was pretty minimal. In the end, the food just wasn’t “us.”

The jibarito (bottom row, middle) was really good, but it was more of an appetizer than an entree.

Tasting #2: Food For Thought

Food For Thought was great. Delicious food, great service and lots of nice, sweet personal touches. They were also extremely professional and seemed to really know what they were doing. Our sales rep Linda was great—a seasoned veteran of the catering biz. The beef beignet (first row, second from left), brie and pear quesadilla (yes, another one), crispy ravioli (first row, far right) and falafel skewer were my favorites of the hor dourves.

The pastas were really, really great—especially the wheat mushroom ravioli with cream sauce. YUM. I felt like I was at an upscale Italian restaurant. The stuffed pasta bar was great too. The Mexican portion of the meal was good, but again, the items seemed better suited as hor dourves. Mini ice cream cones and macarons were a sweet end to the meal. I knew Berghoff was going to have a hard time topping this …

Tasting #3: Berghoff

Berghoff started of on a very promising note: a Berghoff beer flight, house root beer and not one, but two Better-With-Butter-featured specialty cocktails (the Blushing Bride and the Green City Gimlet):

Then the hor dourves…

We loved everything (except that grape/cheese/nut ball in the bottom right corner—hey, you can’t win em all). As you can see, we’re going for the “gourmet comfort food” vibe: mac and cheese, grilled cheese, mini baked potatoes, paella bites, crab cakes—the stuff people stand outside the kitchen door and stalk the cocktail servers for. Kelly assured us they would pace the hor dourve service to avoid a feeding frenzy.

Then the buffets …

There’s something to be said for do-it-yourself “Food-Name-Here” bars. Pasta and salad bars? Pretty great. Tamale and a risotto bars??? That’s taking things to a whole ‘nother level. And this did. Tender carnitas, perfectly cooked flank steak and shredded chicken in red sauce on top of soft, moist tamale cakes or taco bowls with all the fixins, including an out-of-this-world avocado and black bean salad. YUM. Ooey, Gooey risotto with bacon, mushrooms, peas, asparagus and tomatoes; crispy, surprisingly delicate parmesan chicken; caesar salad; and Italian-style breads (including a phenomenal potato focaccia). DOUBLE YUM.

And as if we weren’t about to explode, cake tasting was next (a huge plus for Berghoff—their in-house pastry chef is great and can do just about anything. Not having to choose a baker: Just one more thing I can cross of the list).

So many amazing flavors and fillings, why choose? So we didn’t. Mini cupcakes for everyone!

So thanks Kelly and Berghoff—we are beyond thrilled to have you as our caterer!

Full disclosure (I don’t want to get sued by the FTC). This post is sponsored by the Slice Slab.

You see, Dave has sort of stumbled into the cutting board business. That doesn’t sound at all odd, does it?

Long story short, we got our hands on some excess Corian (think poor-man’s granite), a state-of-the-art machine designed for cutting countertops and the like out of huge slabs of wood, granite and plastic, and an ingenious design for a unique and fabulous carving board. See, not weird at all.

A pretty neat design (thanks Roy) was made even better after we had the idea to put a graduated “spout” on the corner of the board so you could use the juices collected in the grooves of the board to make gravy and other sauces. This idea came after Q made mess of my mother’s stovetop last Thanksgiving trying to transfer turkey juices from one of those disposable foil roasting pans to make gravy. I present to you, the Slice Slab:

We tested it out, and it works like a charm. I’ll show you if you promise not to judge my filmmaking skills …

You get the idea. We’re shamelessly pimping it on YouTube. All kidding aside, I seriously love this cutting board. Even if you aren’t planning to harvest those cooking juices, it makes cleanup super easy, and it’s dishwasher safe. Not to mention really good-looking.

Anyway, since this is a cooking blog (and Dave made me promise gravy recipes in our video) without further ado, I give you the easiest homemade gravy recipe you will ever use to impress your in-laws:

Homemade turkey, beef or chicken gravy

You’ll need:

about 1/4 to 1/2 cup drippings

about 2 to 4 cups of liquid — either broth or water

flour as needed to thicken

salt, pepper and garlic to taste

Using your handy dandy Slice Slab … oh wait, you don’t have one? You can buy it here, then.

Now that that’s taken care of, funnel the juices and drippings from your turkey/beef/chicken carving and any from the pan you cooked with into a sauce pan (as I mentioned, this can get messy, so I suggest you pour the juices from the pan right onto the slice slab, then funnel them neatly into your sauce pan!). Add two-thirds of the broth or stock to the sauce pan. Place it on the stove at medium heat.

In another container, use the remaining broth or water to make a roux. If the liquid is not already warm, heat slightly and slowly add flour, one tablespoon at a time, whisking to dissolve the flour. Once the roux is smooth and starting to thicken a little, add it to the sauce pan and stir. Add spices to taste and additional flour to thicken as needed—in very small increments so it won’t clump.

Gravy isn’t the most aesthetically pleasing food in the world, so instead, I’ll leave you with this for inspiration. Happy Carving.

OK, so I stole my post title from the concept for Effen’s new cheeky ad campaign. I’m sure they won’t mind.

Recently, I had the pleasure of enjoying some “Liquid Luxury”—courtesy of Effen and the Effen awesome folks at Zocalo Group—while contemplating sustainable design, really cool succulent party favors and apple and bacon pizza.

And let me tell you, the chefs and mixologist at ROOF at The Wit aren’t Effen around (OK, I’m done with the Effen jokes, promise). The food and drinks were fantastic. And the bottles of Effen (again, courtesy of Zocalo and Effen) we got beforehand weren’t so bad either. Who gets a bottle of vodka messengered to their office?? This girl. I may or may not have gone home and immediately poured myself a stiff, impossibly smooth screwdriver.

Anyway, back to the party at the Wit, where copious amounts of vodka cocktails on a Tuesday were unabashedly encouraged.

We had more than our fair share of Sustainable Sours, Green City Gimlets, Chicago Caipiroskas and Second City Sparklers (recipes below for your imbibing pleasure). The general consensus was that the Green City Gimlet was the frontrunner. And the food, ohhhhh the food. Most of it didn’t live to be photographed, unfortunately … Funghi pizza with roasted oyster mushrooms, mozzarella and thyme; Salsicia pizza with house-made sausage, cured tomato fennel and havarti cheese; Apple and bacon pizza with sliced apple, smoked gouda, cobb smoked bacon and rosemary; Roasted sweet pepper and goat cheese crostini; Marinated rock shrimp crostini with white bean puree and parsley salad; Grilled cheese panini with tomato fontina soup; and PLT: Crispy pancetta, arugula, cured tomatoes, lemon aioli …

It was all soooo good. So, so, sooooo good. Or maybe it’s just the fact that my pre-wedding diet and workout regimen has exponentially intensified my cravings for anything cheesy and carby.

Once I’d settled down from the pizza frenzy, I was able to focus (using the word focus very loosely, as I was at least three cocktails deep at this point) on a presentation on the past, present and future of sustainable architecture and design in Chicago from Jonathan Boyer of Farr Associates, and one from clever ROOF mixologist Jonny Abens on the night’s libations. And let’s not forget the fabulous view:

I’ve always loved Effen, but after this event, I had a newfound appreciation. As a matter of fact, that bottle in my freezer is calling to me right now …

Sustainable Sour

You’ll need:

1 1/2 oz. Effen Vodka

1 oz. St. Germain

1/2 oz. simple syrup

3/4 oz. fresh lemon

Pour ingredients over ice, shake and strain into a martini glass. Garnish with a lemon and cherry.

Green City Gimlet

You’ll need:

1 1/2 oz. Effen Vodka

1/2 oz. Cointreau

3/4 oz. fresh lime

2 basil leaves

Muddle one basil leaf and add remaining ingredients over ice. Shake and strain into a martini glass. Garnish with a fresh basil leaf.

Chicago Caipiroska

You’ll need:

1 1/2 oz. Effen Black Cherry

1 oz. brown sugar

2 lime wedges

2 dashes cherry bitters

Muddle lime wedges and add remaining ingredients to shaker. Shake all ingredients and pour over ice into a rocks glass.

Second City Sparkler

You’ll need:

1 oz. Effen Black Cherry

1/2 oz. Domaine De Canton

1/2 oz. fresh lemon

prosecco

Pour first three ingredients over ice, shake and strain into a champagne flute. Top with prosecco and garnish with a lemon twist.