Things we ate for dinner

Check out our new project!

2009-09-12T17:30:00.002-04:00

We're cooking our way through the revised edition of Mark Bitman's How to Cook Everything!

Follow our exploits here.

Rigatoni with asparagus, ramps, pesto, and ricotta

2009-05-07T14:30:00.006-04:00

On Saturday, Jon and I had our first successful trip of the season to the Union Square Greenmarket. The last time we'd trekked down there, the produce screamed winter, even though the weather teased spring. However, that unexpectedly un-rainy afternoon last weekend proved much more fruitful, and resulted in purchases of not just the baby spinach and ramps we'd seen in previous weeks, or the eggs we always buy there from Knollcrest Farm, but in lovely purple-tipped asparagus, too.

We had borrowed my mom's car for the weekend, so our next stop was the Brooklyn Fairway (with a quick detour to snag some of the season's first huaraches and pupusas at the Red Hook Ball Fields just down the street). There, in addition to our regular list of groceries, including a 35-strong army of Wallaby organic yogurts, we picked up some ricotta and fresh rigatoni.

We were too full of the Latin street food to eat much of a dinner that night at home, but on Sunday I steamed the asparagus, and tossed it along with chopped ramps in a pan of butter and olive oil, cooked the pasta and added it in, and then mixed it all up with some ricotta and the basil pesto I'd made the weekend before -- a delightfully verdant evocation of the season. I've been salivating at the photo ever since.

Okonomiyaki: Savory Japanese pancakes

2009-05-01T10:48:00.008-04:00

While browsing the foodie web yesterday, I came across this post by 5 Star Foodie about the okonomiyaki she made at home after trying them on a trip to London. I'm a fan of savory pancakes from every cuisine I've tried, so it's no surprise that I've been eager to try okonomiyaki for ages. I haven't found a place in New York that serves them -- and I'd never thought to just try making them until I saw how easy it was in that blog post.

On the train home from work last night, I googled some recipes to make sure I had all the ingredients, and I saw that the most traditional version of the pancakes incorporates grated taro root in the batter, to give it a characteristic springy quality. Since Jon and I live among a wealth of Asian groceries, not least among them the original location of Han Ah Reum or H Mart, I figured I could probably pick up some fresh taro root, and why not make these as authentic as possible? I didn't want our first taste of these to be at all misleading.

So, I went with this recipe as a guideline, and mixed in fillings that we had around the house: chopped bok choy, shredded carrots, julienned red bell pepper, and sauteed shrimp. Then I topped it with a quick homemade okonomi sauce, kewpie mayonnaise, and, of course, our favorite condiment, sriracha, along with a smattering of shredded nori. They were easy and delicious, served up with an easy salad of mixed greens and blood orange, with a soy-citrus-ginger vinaigrette.

An early spring feast

2009-04-30T11:49:00.010-04:00

Inspired by our vernal meal at Blue Hill, we wanted to channel the first stirrings of the season when we cooked dinner on Monday night for a friend who had yet to experience the wonders of our new apartment (and new kitchen). On weeknights, I know it'll take us a while to get dinner on the table if we're making something suitable for company, so I always try to have something to snack on while we're cooking. Ever since I saw this recipe for edamame hummus and baked wonton chips on Not Eating Out in New York, I knew I had to make them, and so I did, with a spicier spin on the hummus and black sesame gomashio on the chips. They were delicious, and so green and spring-y, despite the need to use frozen edamame instead of fresh (since only the first tendrils of spring have really poked their heads out at this point).

While we munched on the hummus and chips, I mixed up the ingredients for asparagus and gruyere crustless quiches and poured them into ramekins to bake. While the main course spent its time in the oven, I was peeling the favas I had flipped out over at Whole Foods in order to repeat my favorite recipe from last spring, for warm fava bean salad with shallot-tarragon vinaigrette. The favas turned out as wonderfully as we remembered them, and despite an eruption of excess eggy goodness in the oven, the quiches were delightful in the end. Jon followed up with a demonstration of his dessert skills: a perfect springtime strawberry-rhubarb sorbet.

ASPARAGUS AND GRUYERE CRUSTLESS QUICHE

9 extra large eggs
1/2 cup skim milk
1/4 lb gruyere, grated
1/2 bunch asparagus
salt and pepper to taste
1 tbsp butter
mixed greens tossed with a mustard vinaigrette, for serving

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Slice the asparagus into inch-long sections and steam.
3. Beat together eggs, milk, and most of the cheese, reserving enough to top each quiche after baking. Mix in the asparagus, and add salt and pepper to taste.
4. Place a pat of butter in the bottom of each ramekin, and spread it around a bit to prevent sticking. Pour egg mixture into 3 or 4 standard-size ramekins, one for each guest.
5. Bake quiches 20-25 minutes, until they set on top.
6. Sprinkle reserved gruyere on top of each quiche, and move ramekins to the broiler for 90 seconds, or until cheese melts and starts to brown.
7. Carefully slide quiches out of ramekins with the help of a fork, and plate on top of salad.

Yield: 3-4 servings

Eating Out: Blue Hill at Stone Barns

2009-04-27T15:30:00.012-04:00

We've been rabid fans of Blue Hill at Stone Barns, Dan Barber's exquisite homage to the pastoral, ever since our first visits to this special restaurant set amid what were once actual stone barns on a Rockefeller-owned retreat in Tarrytown, NY. There's a location in the West Village, too, but we're so enamored of a trip to the close-by countryside -- to eat our vegetables next to the fields and greenhouses in which they were grown and our meat and eggs within sight of the animals that produced them -- that we've never ventured out to its urban cousin.

A meal at Blue Hill revolves around the most local, seasonal produce the earth and herds offer up, and one of our eating out goals is to visit at every possible turning point throughout the year, so we can experience their treatment of dozens of different vegetables, each at its peak of abundance and flavor. This is really the only restaurant in New York on which we'd splurge, though we're not averse to being taken there either.

Between our own devices and the generosity of others, we've now been there four times together (and I had been there once before without Jon). This, I'd have to imagine, makes us relative experts on Blue Hill and fair judges of the quality of any given experience there. When we made our first trip of the year up there on Saturday night, the resulting meal was a standout: spot-on and intriguing preparations of asparagus, lettuce, carrots, and ramps, the earliest signs of spring, evocative seafood, and the tenderest of grass-fed beef.

Here's a run-down of our menu, which begins with the typical profusion of amuse bouches:

Carrots and radishes on the fence
Emmer wheat and parmesan lollipops
Asparagus, pancetta, and sesame seeds
Yukon gold potato chips with sage, and farro crackers
Balthazar's potato bread with Blue Hill Farm butter and ricotta, and beet and carrot "salts"
Beet burgers (Second photo above)
Maine crab in carrot-dill broth with peppercorn sorbet
Asparagus with almonds, pistachios, caviar, and shaved preserved embryonic egg yolk (First photo above)
Crispino lettuce in lettuce broth with spring vegetables (Third photo above)
Maine lobster with ramps in fruit and vegetable sauce (Last photo above)
This morning's farm egg with speck and ramps on red wheat cake
Grass-fed beef with asparagus and parsnip puree
Citrus with milk jam and coconut sorbet (We got to eat dessert outside, which made this even more delicious than it looks below.)
Beet-chocolate cake with coffee sorbet
Pineapple with multi-grain cake and some sort of ice cream
Chestnut macarons
Cinnamon marshmallows, coffee meringue sticks, and chocolate-raspberry truffles

We were too overwhelmed by the time the second round of dessert came out to take in all the dessert descriptions... and it was too dark to get any good photos of them, but they were among the best desserts we've had there, for certain.

Spaghetti frittata

2009-04-23T11:44:00.007-04:00

Growing up, the only experience I had with cooking was when my brother and I joined our dad in his kitchen a few times a month. In high school, I began to experiment a bit with cooking for myself, but in college, I lost access to the requisite space and appliances to do much beyond microwave mac and cheese and suffer through meals in the dining hall.

The major exception was the summer I spent living with an amazing group of girls in a house in Somerville, Mass., a half-hour walk from our jobs near campus. A few of them were pretty tremendous cooks, and one of them, Naomi, introduced me to a dish that I fell in love with pretty instantly. I don't recall the details of her rendition of the spaghetti frittata, but I do remember how delicious it was, and how different from anything I'd ever seen.

The dish is now commonplace in our house, where Jon and I call it "spaghetti dentata" for the toothy bite the top layer of pasta develops under the broiler -- and where I vary the execution a bit every time I make it. Most often, we have this for brunch, but it makes for a great quick weeknight dinner, especially when you have lots of wonderful, farm-fresh eggs on hand from the greenmarket. Last night, I stirred some roasted garlic and onion jam into the mix, which gave it a pleasant sweetness, and served it over baby wild arugula with a mustardy vinaigrette.

SPAGHETTI FRITTATA

1/2 package whole wheat spaghetti (we love the Trader Joe's brand)
6 extra large eggs
2 tbsp roasted garlic and onion jam (Stonewall Kitchen makes this incredible condiment)
3 tbsp grated parmigiano reggiano
1 tbsp butter
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Cook the pasta in salted boiling water until al dente. Drain.
2. Beat the eggs with roasted garlic and onion jam and 2 tbsp parmigiano. Add salt to taste.
3. Melt butter in a 10-inch skillet. Pour egg mixture into pan, and immediately add spaghetti into egg mixture, making sure it's evenly distributed. Grind a generous amount of black pepper on top, and let cook over medium-high heat until the top is almost set (about 10 minutes).
4. Sprinkle remaining tbsp of parmigiano over top of fritta, and move the skillet to the broiler for the top to set and brown (about 3-4 minutes, but keep a close eye on it to ensure it doesn't burn).
5. Slice into six or eight wedges, serve, and eat.

Yield: 3-4 servings

What we've been cooking

2009-04-22T11:07:00.008-04:00

We know it's been a long time since we've posted here. Between the time pressures of Jon's first year of his PhD program, and the crush of production and post-production on my film, we haven't had much time to write about the food we've continued to cook all these months. In a sense, the blog had served its purpose -- it got us to consider our food more carefully and inspired us to cook with incredible frequency and passion. Still, now that things are winding down on my project, and with spring here and summer fast approaching, we want to try to start back up and share with all of you the exciting things we've been creating in our wonderful new kitchen in Woodside, Queens.

Here's a taste of what we've been cooking in our absence from the blog:

1. Golden beet napoleon with chevre and chocolate-balsamic vinegar, 2. Peas with shallots, tarragon, poached egg, and bacon, 3. Caramelized romanesco cauliflower, 4. Vegan carrot cake cookies with cream cheese frosting, 5. Spicy salmon with steamed broccoli, 6. Whole-wheat spring pea ravioli with ricotta and chives, 7. Shrimp with garlic scape pesto, 8. Cauliflower soup, 9. Fennel, orange, pistachio salad, 10. Homemade grilled pizza with caramelized onions, roasted red peppers, tomato sauce, fresh mozzarella, and a sprinkling of parmigiano reggiano, 11. Ramp and goat cheese crustless quiche with mixed greens, 12. Baby spinach, chicken, and asparagus salad with Dutch gouda and dijon vinaigrette, 13. Beet "panini" with caramelized onion and blue cheese

Our first CSA feast!

2008-07-01T23:23:00.010-04:00

A good part of the beauty of our CSA share is that we aren't entirely sure what's going to come our way every week. When we're just cooking for ourselves, this fact leads to a bit of constraint where before there was simply Whole Foods and its endless supply of comfortable ingredients.

But when we are cooking for others, as we were this past Thursday, it leads to inspiration, and a multi-course (mostly) farm-fresh meal through which we attempt to convey the sublime quality of real food, a sort of culinary proselytizing spoken through turnips, lettuce, chard. This is especially true when the meal in question takes place hours after the CSA pick-up; in such a situation, we are forced (thrilled) to depend even more heavily on the bounty of Windflower Farms.

This meal was a special occasion. Our close friend Lacey, about to depart this coast for the land of Chez Panisse and trolley cars, found a few hours of her final New York week to have a meal with us. This was a major occasion, befitting a real feast, and so we developed a lengthy menu that bracketed a CSA-centric tableau with a couple pre-planned courses.

First up, Jon made an amuse bouche of bacon-wrapped tri-colored raisins (shown above). The raisins were tossed with brown sugar and ginger, and then wrapped in bacon and baked. These were out of control delicious, a perfect combination of sweet and savory. Though different than the bacon-wrapped dates of Homeslice West, they were at least as good and certainly more unique.

Next up, Ali made a salad of farm-fresh lettuce, homemade croutons, and baked goat cheese medallions. This lettuce, picked up from our farm earlier that day, was the best head of lettuce either of us had ever had, and the goat cheese medallions came out beautiful.

After that came Ali's Swiss chard gratin, a full-bodied gratin whose cheese played well with the sharp bite of the chard.

For the main dish, Jon made a garlic scape pesto and baked some cod in it. The garlic scapes were a combination of those we got from our CSA and some we picked up from the greenmarket. The real trick of this pesto, though, was the inclusion of toasted pistachios. The result was a unique type of nutty pesto, one we would highly recommend for as long as you can get your hands on some scapes. As a side, Jon made some more of his CSA turnip fries, this time spicing them with the to-be-named Italian spice mix his mom brought back from Turkey.

For dessert, Ali made wine-marinated frozen spiced grapes, which turned out to be the perfect antidote to the humidity that Lacey was about to leave behind. They were plump, sweet, and extremely cold. They were convenient as well, as this recipe, which requires a day or two to make, leaves behind a marinade of spiced wine, which Ali easily converted into a delicious and complex sangria that we enjoyed all night, sending Lacey stumbling home, drunk, and, we hope, satisfied and happy.

BACON-WRAPPED TRI-COLOR RAISINS

Time: 10 minutes active, 15 minutes inactive

4 strips bacon
1 tbs butter
2 cups raisins
Brown sugar to taste
Pureed or very finely diced ginger to taste

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. In a bowl, mix raisins, sugar, and ginger
3. Cut bacon strips in half. Carefully place raisins on the piece of bacon, centered. Roll the bacon around the raisins, and press in sides to firm roll.
4. Rub butter on foiled baking sheet. Place rolls on buttered surface, and bake for 15 minutes. Serve.

FARM-FRESH SALAD WITH BAKED GOAT CHEESE
Time: 15 minutes active, 30 minutes inactive, excluding croutons

1 head red-leaf lettuce, chopped into 1-inch diameter pieces
1 tomato, sliced and then quartered
homemade whole-wheat garlic croutons
1 log chevre (we used some from the Vermont Butter & Cheese Co)
breadcrumbs (I ground some up while I was baking the croutons)
1 egg white

For the citrus-champagne vinaigrette:
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup muscat orange vinaigrette (from Trader Joe's)
1 tbsp chopped garlic
salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. Slice the chevre into four discs. Coat each medallion with egg white and then dip into breadcrumbs, coating it well. Refrigerate medallions on parchment paper for 10 minutes or so.
2. Slide the medallions on parchment paper onto a baking sheet and into a 350 degree oven. Bake for 20 minutes or until cheese is pretty soft.
3. While cheese is baking, whisk together vinaigrette ingredients, and dress the lettuce, tomato and breadcrumbs, tossing to coat.
4. Portion out the salad, then top each bowl with one goat cheese medallion.

SWISS CHARD GRATIN
(Adapted from here)

Time: 10 minutes active, 20 minutes inactive

2 bunches Swiss chard leaves, chopped
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter
1 cup low-fat milk
2 tbsp white whole-wheat flour
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup grated parmigiano reggiano, divided in two
2 tbsp whole wheat bread crumbs

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. Place chard leaves in a saucepan with water and cook over medium heat until leaves are just tender, 3 to 4 minutes. Drain, reserving 1/4 cup of the cooking liquid. Set chard aside.
3. In the same saucepan, heat olive oil and butter over medium heat. When butter has melted, whisk in the flour until blended. Whisk constantly for 1 minute. Slowly whisk in the milk and reserved cooking liquid. Continue cooking and stirring until the sauce thickens, 3 to 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and stir in half of the grated cheese. Stir in the cooked chard and transfer to four small baking dishes.
4. Sprinkle with remaining cheese and breadcrumbs. Bake for 20 minutes or until hot and bubbling. Serve immediately.

BAKED COD WITH GARLIC SCAPE PESTO
(Adapted from eggs on sunday)

Time: 30 minutes active, 10 minutes inactive

4 cod fillets, approx. 1/3 lb each
1.5 cup chopped garlic scapes, finely chopped
1/2 cup toasted pistachios
juice of 1 lemon
1/2 cup parmigiano-reggiano cheese, grated
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup bread crumbs
coarse salt and pepper, to taste

1. Preheat oven to 350°F.
2. In a small pan over medium-low heat, toast the pistachios.
3. Place the scapes, pistachios, lemon juice, and cheese in a food processor. As you pulse, drizzle in the olive oil until desired consistency is reached.
4. After processing is complete, mix in salt, pepper, and breadcrumbs.
5. Spread pesto onto cod, and bake for 10 minutes, or until fish is flaky.

FROZEN SPICED GRAPES
(Adapted from Thursday Night Smackdown)

1/2 bottle white wine (we used this great slightly sweet Hungarian stuff we picked up at Astor Place)
1 lb seedless green grapes
1/2 cup organic sugar
1 tbsp of lemon zest
cinnamon and nutmeg to taste

1. Mix all ingredients together in a large bowl. Add the grapes. Marinate in the fridge for at least 24 hours.
2. Drain the grapes, retaining the liquid in the empty wine bottle (or adding it back to the other 1/2 bottle...we added a peach and strawberries to the mixture for some delicious white sangria). Put the grapes in a bowl, toss with a little more sugar to coat, then place in the freezer and freeze overnight.
3. Remove the grapes from freezer 20 minutes before eating so they thaw to the perfect consistency and serve.

Baked garam masala turnip fries

2008-06-25T22:32:00.005-04:00

Ali and I joined the Stanton Street CSA this summer, which brings us farm-fresh produce from Windflower Farm, and our first pickup of the season was this past Thursday. Sadly, Ali was in Chicago for her brother's graduation, so it was just my friend James and I walking over to the garden in Sara D Roosevelt Park for pickup. We got a nice, manageable first half-share, at a size I am sure is to grow as the season progresses: turnips, radishes, bok choy, lettuce, salad greens, garlic scapes, and a basil plant all made their way back to the apartment in our bags.

Though we were excited to jump in immediately and make a veggie-feast for the ages, my dad was also in town, and, he not being one for veggies, we agreed to go out to dinner. To get a taste of our spoils, though, we made these turnip fries in a flash before heading out to dinner. They were like potato fries, only earthier, on account of the truly fantastic turnips we got from the farm. They were fantastic, and, though they were good baked, I have a feeling they'd be even better fried, if you're feeling naughty.

BAKED GARAM MASALA TURNIP FRIES

3 large turnips
1.5 tbs olive oil
1.5 tsp garlic salt
1 tbs garam masala powder
Pepper to taste

1. Pre-heat oven to 450 degrees.
1. Peel the turnips, then cut to fry size, about 3/8" by 2". If you have one, julienne them with a mandoline.
2. Put the fries in a bowl; toss with olive oil.
3. Put all other ingredients in a bag; shake to mix. Put oiled fries in the bag; shake vigorously.
4. Cover a baking sheet with tin foil. Place the fries on the foil, and put the baking sheet in the oven. Bake for about 20 minutes, until brown.

Yield: A quick snack for two.

Goat's milk cheesecake frozen yogurt

2008-06-25T12:20:00.006-04:00

My best friend James and I dreamed up this recipe during his recent visit to the city. It started, as most meals in our apartment do, with a random walk through the Greenmarket. James has always been one for off-beat foods, especially if they're in liquid form, and so it wasn't surprising that a small stand selling single-serving drinkable goat's milk yogurt caught his eye. He picked one up, and stashed it away in the fridge for a snackable moment.

Goat's milk yogurt, we learned, has both the central pungency of goat cheese and the sourness of a strong greek yogurt. We decided to use it, along with some cream cheese, as an ice cream base, yielding by far the best, most professional and unique frozen dessert our churner has produced yet.

GOAT'S MILK CHEESECAKE FROZEN YOGURT
(aka Frosty the Goatman's Zesty Yogurtcake)

8 oz goat's milk yogurt
8 oz cream cheese
zest of 1 lemon
6 oz greek yogurt (we used Trader Joe's honey greek yogurt)
1/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt

1. Combine all ingredients in a blender or food processor, and blend until smooth.
2. Freeze, following directions, in your ice cream maker.

Yield: 4 servings

Spinach, heirloom tomato, and squash salad

2008-06-24T23:08:00.005-04:00

As we were leaving the Greenmarket with our lamb and garlic scapes, we popped into one last stall in search of bok choy to go with them. Jon found a few happy heads of it set among the spinach and arugula, but my eye wandered (as it tends to do) to a small crate full of even smaller squash: inch-long zucchini and yellow squash, green and golden patty pan, and even a few blob-like specimens with gorgeous squash blossoms still attached.

I picked out a choice few, and (as often happens) they waited patiently for a few days in our produce bin before I had a chance to call them up for duty. Our friend Lily came over for dinner one night, while James was still staying with us, and I needed a salad to accompany Jon's reprise of his now-famous scallop curry, this time with butternut squash. I figured that there's no such thing as too much squash, so I sautéed all the little buggers with a bit of olive oil and garlic and tossed them into a salad of spinach, spring onions, and gorgeous heirloom tomatoes. Few things go together as well as zucchini and mint, so I tied it all together with a mint vinaigrette from the copy of Mediterranean Fresh, by Joyce Goldstein, that my friend Margaret had given us.

SPINACH, HEIRLOOM TOMATO, AND SQUASH SALAD

Time: 15 minutes active, 10 minutes inactive

1/4 lb assorted baby squash
1/2 lb spinach
4 spring onions, sliced
2 large heirloom tomatoes, sliced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 1/2 tsp olive oil
pecorino romano (for grating)

1. Slice the squash thinly, and sauté it with garlic and olive oil until slightly soft.
2. Combine squash with spinach, spring onions, and tomatoes. Toss with mint vinaigrette (see below) to coat, and top with grated hard cheese like pecorino.

For mint vinaigrette:
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup chopped fresh mint

1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup chopped fresh mint
1 tsp honey
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 1/4 cups olive oil

1. Boil the lemon juice and chopped mint to create an infusion. Bring to a boil, remove from heat, and let steep for about 10 minutes.
2. Strain into a mixing bowl, then add all other ingredients and whisk together.
Note: I don't ever really measure things out when I cook, but these are basically the amounts given in the original recipe. I swapped in apple cider vinegar for the recommended red wine vinegar, because we had it and I like it.

Yield: 4 servings

Twice-cooked lamb and bok choy with chili paste

2008-06-23T23:50:00.003-04:00

On my first visit to China, when I traveled across the country in 1999 with an amazing program called Where There Be Dragons, I was a vegetarian. Even though I made it out to Sichuan province, I never tried its renowned twice-cooked pork. It was left for some friends I made in Hangzhou, six years and much of a lifetime later, to introduce me to the delicacy. I was there researching a travel guide to the city, and my old friends Jason and Colette put me in touch with Si Meng, a teacher and Chongqing native, who now called the more temperate city by the lake her home. I met Si Meng and her husband, Justin, for dinner one night, and we left on what I thought would be a short walk to the restaurant. Well over an hour later, we had hiked across the hills that line the northwestern shore of the lake, and I was staring at a dingy hole-in-the-wall, known for its authentic Sichuan spices and friendly owners.

The outgoing couple ordered up a storm, but the standout dish was the crispy, glistening pork belly, sliced thin atop a mound of these cylindrical, grass-green vegetables that I'd never seen before. Si Meng explained that these were garlic scapes, the early shoots of hard-neck garlic, which farmers remove to concentrate the flow of nutrients into the developing bulbs. In the States, even as recently as 2005, those bright stalks were discarded, which is why they seemed utterly new. How wonderful for me, then, that they seem to be gaining a wide following now, at least here in New York. Jon and I have found them at the Greenmarket consistently for the past couple of weeks.

We were there last weekend with his friend, James, who was in town for the week from San Diego, and the scapes beckoned to me from their curled abundance on one of the covered stands. I bought as many as I could reasonably justify, and we continued on into the market. There, we encountered the yarn-covered stall of the Catskill Merino Sheep Farm, where we picked up just under a pound of lamb shoulder. If you can cook pork twice and eat it too, why not lamb?

That night, we were off to Homeslice West, but the lamb sat waiting in the fridge for our next dinner at home. The next evening, I adapted this recipe to use our meat of choice and items from our pantry, and Jon sautéed up some bok choy, smothered in his homemade chili paste.

TWICE-COOKED LAMB

Time: 30 minutes

3/4 lb lamb shoulder (all fat and connective tissue removed)
1 tbsp mirin or white wine
3 slices ginger
2 cloves garlic, flattened
1/2 yellow bell pepper
1/4 lb garlic scapes
2 tbsp peanut oil
1 tbsp sambal olek
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tbsp dark soy sauce

1. Place the lamb in a large saucepan and cover with water. Bring to a boil, then add wine and ginger
2. Cook the lamb for 20 minutes, then remove from the water and allow to cool (discard the other contents of the pan). When the lamb is cool enough to handle, slice across the grain as thinly as possible in pieces about 2 inches long, removing all fat.
3. Slice the garlic scapes in 1 inch pieces. Julienne the bell pepper and jalapeño.
4. Heat a wok or sauté pan over medium-high to high heat. Add the oil, and when it is hot, add the flattened garlic cloves. Fry the garlic until it is very brown, then remove it and discard. Add the peppers to the wok, and cook for 1 minute. Add the garlic scapes, and cook for another minute.
5. Push the vegetables to the side of the wok and add the sambal olek; heat briefly. Add the oyster sauce, soy sauce, and lamb slices, mixing all well and ensuring the lamb is covered with all the spicy mixture. Cook only for another 1-2 minutes, until everything is heated through.

Yield: 2-3 servings

Eating Out: Homeslice West

2008-06-23T18:08:00.010-04:00

A few months ago, an article about underground New York City dining clubs caught our eye. People were charging relatively large sums of money for home-cooked meals and serving them to groups of 20 or 30 against the will of the Department of Health. Obviously, we were intrigued.

We signed up for the mailing lists of all the groups mentioned in the article, and the first one to get back to us was Homeslice West. Billing themselves as "a culinary speakeasy," Homeslice West is the brainchild of Hayden and Becky, two Upper-West-siders from the South who grew up cooking and never tired of it. After falling in love with the city, they wanted to give something back by creating a cozy space in which groups of friends could comfortably mingle and enjoy good food and drink. In creating such an atmosphere, Hayden and Becky have undoubtedly succeeded. The space they used, the apartment of a friend, was nothing but friendly, and most of the diners (average age, about 30) were repeats, greeting each other by name.

The food began on its highest note, and, from there on, was always adequate but often uneven. The finger-food appetizer waiting for us when we entered was a jalapeño-bacon wrapped date stuffed with pecan cream. It was exquisite, perfectly crispy on the outside and succulent on the inside. After taking our seats, we were served buttermilk biscuits with honey butter. These were above-average biscuits, at least on par with the fabulous biscuits at Little Giant. The appetizer of rock shrimp ceviche with plantain chips, however, was simply sufficient, lacking anything to set it apart from any other straight-up ceviche. The salad was summer asparagus with heart of palm, in a blood orange vinaigrette. It too was simply adequate.

The entree, pictured above, was a macadamia-crusted mahi mahi with pineapple-papaya relish on black lentils. The lentils themselves were the highlight of the sit-down portion of the meal. Exquisitely smoky, they perfectly offset a quite-good piece of fish. Lastly, the dessert was crispy cake fritters with key lime creme, a shout out to one of the cooks' Florida roots. These were delicious.

Homeslice's food, simply put, did not merit $50 a head, especially when New York restaurants like Little Owl set the bar so high at that price point. On the other hand, dining there was, if nothing else, a fascinating social experience. We'd certainly recommend it to everyone once, and we were encouraged enough by it that we plan on trying another one of the dining clubs sometime soon.

Chili-cilantro flounder and peas with pesto and pistachios

2008-06-16T18:36:00.006-04:00

This past Friday I noticed a new stand in the Greenmarket: Pura Vida Fishery. I'm not sure if they're new at the market, or I just hadn't noticed them before, but their catch looked beautiful, and their prices were reasonable.

The fishmonger recommended the flounder, and I started recipe-hunting for something appropriate. I came across this recipe from Apartment Therapy and adapted it to include the remnants of my last batch of homemade chili paste. To go along with the fish, Ali made a fantastic side with some peas in the pod I picked up from the market.

She shucked the peas, then tossed them briefly in a pan with the pesto left over from her tart, a handful of raw pistachios, and some low-fat greek yogurt. The result was sweetly green and herbaceous, the perfect evocation of spring.

CHILI-CILANTRO FLOUNDER

3/4 lb flounder
1 jalapeño
3 garlic cloves
1 tbsp grated ginger
2 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp white wine
1/2 cup chili paste
1 tsp sesame oil
1/3 cup chopped cilantro, with more for garnish
scallions, chopped for garnish
1 cup organic brown rice, cooked according to package instructions

1. Heat the oven to 475 degrees. Pat the fish dry and season lightly with salt and pepper. Place in a glass baking dish.
2. Chop the pepper and garlic, and grate the ginger. Put in a food processor with the soy sauce, white wine, chili paste, sesame oil, and cilantro. Pulse until blended. Pour the sauce over the fish. Bake for about 8 minutes, or until the fish flakes easily and is cooked through.
3. Serve immediately over brown rice, garnished with scallions and cilantro.

PEAS WITH PESTO AND PISTACHIOS

1 lb peas in the pod, shucked
1 small yellow onion, diced
4 green onions, chopped
1 tsp olive oil
2 tbsp homemade basil pesto
1/3 cup raw pistachios
2 tbsp low-fat greek yogurt
1 tsp tarragon
salt
freshly ground pepper

1. Heat the pistachios in a sauté pan for 3-5 minutes, until toasted, then reserve on the side.
2. Add olive oil to the pan, then sauté onion and green onion 3-5 minutes until soft.
3. Return pistachios to the pan, and add peas, pesto, and yogurt to the pan and sauté for 2-3 minutes, until pesto and yogurt mix and peas start to change color. Season with tarragon, salt, and pepper, and serve.

Sweet potato ice cream

2008-06-16T00:45:00.001-04:00

This tasty batch of ice cream came about as the result of a happy synchronicity: on the same day, last week, that I ran around the Greenmarket before work picking out whatever veggies looked especially tasty (a journey that led to Ali's wonderful tart), I discovered that our ice cream maker's bowl was, once again, frozen and ready to go. Just an hour later, we were having our first taste of this ice cream, made from a single sweet potato and a few spices.

The recipe is an adaptation of a David Lebovitz recipe, but I suggest you simply use your instincts when spicing the mix.

SWEET POTATO ICE CREAM

Time: 15 minutes active, 40-45 minutes inactive

1-2 sweet potatoes
12 oz whole milk
2-3 tbs butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tsp nutmeg
2 tsp cinnamon

1. Quarter the sweet potato. Microwave for five or six minutes. Remove from microwave, and butter the sweet potato as best you can with about a third of the butter. Microwave for another eight or so, or until the sweet potatoes are soft and mashable.
2. Scoop the potato into a bowl, and mash in the rest of the butter. Put the buttered, mashed potatoes in a food processor with the rest of the ingredients. Purée until fine. Add more milk if mix is too thick.
3. Cool in your fridge or freezer for 20-30 minutes, then freeze in your ice cream maker according to the instructions.

Yield: 4-5 servings

Summer squash, spring onion, and heirloom tomato tart

2008-06-16T00:13:00.006-04:00

My friend Margaret came over for dinner the other night, and I felt a bit like she'd joined the audience at an Iron Chef taping. Jon had surprised me with produce from the Greenmarket, and I had to figure out a way to use the featured ingredients. Margaret and Jon went along with it, somehow unflinchingly confident that I'd pull together a dinner in the end, using all the things that had caught Jon's eye on his way to work that morning. The last item he bought, a sweet potato, inspired us both to think – hmmm, wouldn't that be good as ice cream? – and Jon took on the challenge.

I began with a version of my now-fallback spinach and strawberry salad, with the addition of pea shoots that we'd bought the weekend before. It went over well, as expected, and I could concentrate my creative efforts on the main course. We had two beautiful heirloom tomatoes, like bruises ready to bleed, and four young specimens of yellow squash. I found this recipe for a summer squash tart, held together with chevre and pesto, and we just happened to have a whole bunch of basil left over from ceviche night. I whipped up some pesto on the spot with that, the last crunchy bits of a block of parmigiano (augmented with cage-aged gruyere), and some raw pecans, in place of pignoli. That got mixed in with a log of chevre from the Vermont Butter & Cheese Company to make a sort of pesto spread.

We've been very good about sticking to whole grains around here, so I scoured the internet for a puff pastry recipe that uses white whole wheat flour, which I've come to love. Nothing doing in that realm, so I just risked it all and subbed it into this recipe for a rough puff. Happily, despite my adventurous streak and my lack of baking experience, the crust turned out delicious. I'm sure it'll come into frequent rotation as our CSA starts up this week, and next time I'll take it out of the broiler 30 seconds sooner!

SUMMER SQUASH, SPRING ONION, AND HEIRLOOM TOMATO TART

Time: 50 minutes active, 60 minutes inactive

2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
1 lb small yellow squash, sliced 1/4 inch thick
5 large spring onions, thinly sliced
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tbsp prepared pesto
5 oz fresh goat cheese, softened
2 red heirloom tomatoes, very thinly sliced

For the puff pastry:
1 1/4 cups cold white whole wheat flour
1/4 tsp. salt
12 tbsp cold butter, cut into pieces
1/4 cup very cold water

1. Pour the flour and salt onto the cold cubes of butter. Using a chef's knife, cut the butter into the flour. Work until you have a crumbly mixture. Flatten any large chunks of butter with just your fingertips. Add the ice-cold water a little at a time to loosely bind the dough. Mix the dough until it just hangs together. Shape the messy, shaggy dough into a rough rectangle and roll it out until it's 1/2 inch thick. Resist the temptation to overwater or overwork the dough; it will eventually hold together.
2. Fold the dough in thirds like a business letter. Don't worry if it breaks in pieces. Turn the package of dough 90 degrees so the folds run vertically. Square off the edges of the dough as you work. Roll the dough into a rectangle that's 1/2 inch thick, always rolling from open end to open end. Continue rolling, folding, and turning until the dough looks smooth. By four or five "turns," the dough should hang together well.
3. For even more layers, fold the smooth dough up like a book. To do this, fold the two shorter sides into the center and then fold the dough like a book. Brush off excess flour as you fold. Wrap the dough and chill it for half an hour before giving it two final turns. At this point, you can then use the dough, though another short rest will make rolling and shaping easier.
4. Preheat the oven to 425° and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. In a large skillet, heat the olive oil. Add the squash and onion and season with salt and pepper. Cover and cook over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, until the squash and onion are lightly browned, about 5 minutes.
5. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, blend the pesto with the goat cheese. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the puff pastry to a 12-inch by 8-inch rectangle. Lay it on the parchment sheet. Spread the goat cheese all over the pastry, leaving a 1-inch border all around. Top with the squash mixture. Arrange the tomato slices on the tart and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Fold up the sides, pressing the corners together. Trim any excess pastry at the corners.
6. Bake in the lower third of the oven for about 35 minutes, until the edges are golden and the bottom is completely cooked through. Finish in the broiler for 2 minutes, watching more carefully than I did that it doesn't burn. Cut into squares and serve right away.

Yield: 6 servings

Eating out: Little Owl

2008-06-14T09:41:00.004-04:00

Jon and I have wanted to eat at Little Owl for ages, and Jon tried for weeks to get us a reservation at a good time. Finally, a month or so ago, he lucked into an 8 pm table for this past week, and so we went. It's more than we used to spend for dinner on anything but a special occasion, but we've decided that it's only really worth eating out when we can have truly incredible food (or incredible company).

After work on the first cool evening following a serious heat wave, we walked from our apartment across the 6th Avenue gauntlet of frat boy sex shops and rainbow-flagged cafes to the still-charming inner reaches of the West Village. The Little Owl sits on the corner of Bedford and Grove, in a glass-walled space under the watch of a small sculpted owl that perches on the roof of the building across the street.

We decided that the best way to explore the menu was to share three appetizers and an entrée. The soft-shell crab at Tabla has newly converted me to a fan, and we couldn't resist trying Little Owl's version. They split all three appetizers between us, and plated them in a row on long rectangular plates. The crab was perfectly crisp, with tender flesh peeking out of every crevice, and it stood, statuesque, above a reflecting pool of perfect asparagus risotto, attended by a few cherry tomatoes, cooked to the bursting point. The cavatelli arrived in a small dish, filled to the brim with tomato broth, covered with favas, bacon, and ricotta. I've been excited about trying it since its mention – and gorgeous masthead photo – in the Times article about ricotta. The third dish was perhaps chef Joey Campanaro's most famous creation – meatball sliders, sandwiched between homemade cheese rolls. The photo and recipe in New York Magazine gave us no choice.

Beyond the appetizers, we opted for the special, a generous portion of blackfish on a mound of chive mashed potatoes with truffles and caramelized onions. It was wondrously flaky, and earthy with all the alliums and truffles.

Afterwards, we figured our restraint in the alcohol department merited reward – in the form of a strawberry rhubarb crumble. The slightly sour rhubarb dominated the berries, but a heaping scoop of near-orgasmic mascarpone gelato kept all the flavors in balance. In short, Little Owl blew our expectations out of the water.

Ceviche night!

2008-06-12T16:55:00.002-04:00

The story of ceviche night goes all the way back to mid-March, when we took a cooking class at the Institute for Culinary Education. Taught by Melanie Underwood, the five-hour course covered a range of ceviche recipes, from tuna to scallops to bass; our station even got to make mojitos from scratch for the rest of the class. The whole night was unforgettable, and apparently so were our mojitos: a woman from our class approached us on the street a few weeks ago, excitedly referring to us as "the mojito couple."

Ever since then, we've been itching to try our hand at a few of the recipes. Could we duplicate what we made in that professional kitchen? Would it taste as good without Melanie's handpicked fish fillets, straight from Katagiri & Co. on the Upper East Side? There was only one way to find out.

Our guest for ceviche night was our friend Elyssa, who came over with a kindred love for cooking and a fantastic recipe for mango slaw. It was sweet and delicious, the perfect addition to our seafood spread.

The two ceviches we made were a spicy shrimp –- which, to be fair, is more of a shrimp salad than a ceviche –- and a "Thai" tuna ceviche. The spicy shrimp dish, pictured at the top of this post, is bathed in a spicy mayo sauce, giving it an unbeatable umami note.

The tuna ceviche, though extremely easy to make, is actually quite complex. Sesame oil, coconut milk, avocado and lime and grapefruit juices all coalesce and become something new. We ate our fish when the juices had only partially cooked it, a taste we prefer as sushi lovers.

To top it all off, Ali made baked quinoa cakes with roasted corn and green onions. Though all reports were that keeping quinoa together would be a serious challenge, her take on this recipe worked perfectly, and the cakes were heavenly. (We each took one for breakfast the next morning, heated up with some honey on top.)

The night was fabulous, a fitting follow-up to our amazing experience at the ICE. There's no food we would recommend more than ceviche for a fun night at home -– what with the communal chopping, and then the slow, quiet "cooking" process, it's the best way we could imagine to spend a relaxed night with a wonderful friend.

MANGO SLAW

Time: 5 minutes active, 30 minutes inactive

3 cups shredded cabbage
1 mango, chopped
1/4 cup greek yogurt
2 tbsp cilantro
1 tbsp jalapeño pepper
2 tbsp lime juice
1 tbsp honey

1. Mix all ingredients in a bowl. Refrigerate for up to 30 minutes; serve.

Yield: 4 servings

SPICY SHRIMP

Time: 10 minutes active, 30 minutes inactive

1/2 lb large shrimp
1 qt water
1/2 vanilla bean, split
1 stalk lemongrass, chopped
1 tbsp ginger
2 garlic cloves, sliced
1/3 cup finely diced yellow pepper
1/3 cup chopped green onion
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
juice of 2 limes
2 tbps mayo
3 tbsp sambal olek chili paste, to taste

1. Combine water, vanilla bean, lemongrass, ginger, and garlic. Bring to a boil, add in shrimp, reduce heat to a simmer and cook until shrimp are cooked through, about 2 minutes. Remove form heat and cool shrimp in a bowl of ice. Once cooled, remove shells and devein. Chop shrimp into 1 inch pieces.
2. Combine yellow pepper, scallion, garlic, herbs, lime juice, mayonnaise and chili paste. Stir in shrimp. Chill about 1/2 hour before serving.

Yield: 4 servings

ASIAN TUNA CEVICHE

Time: 15 minutes active, 30+ minutes inactive

1/2 pound tuna, cubed
juice of 1 lime
juice of 1 grapefruit
1/2 tsp sesame oil
1 tbsp coconut milk
1 tbsp soy sauce
4 basil leaves, chiffonade
6 cilantro leaves, chopped
1/3 cup chopped green onions
4 kaffir lime leaves, chiffonade
1 tsp finely chopped chili
1 diced mango
1 tbsp canola oil
2 shallots, peeled and thinly sliced
1 avocado, chopped

1. Combine tuna, lime juice, grapefruit juice, sesame oil, coconut milk and soy sauce. Refrigerate 15 minutes to 1 hour. Remove from refrigerator.
2. Add in basil, cilantro, scallions, kaffir leaves, chili, and mango.
3. Meanwhile heat oil in a sauté pan. Add shallots and cook until crisp.
4. Serve tuna on plate with greens. Sprinkle with shallots and avocado. Serve immediately.

Yield: 4 servings

BAKED QUINOA AND ROASTED CORN CAKES

Time: 15 minutes active, 40 minutes inactive

1 1/2 cups raw organic quinoa
2 1/2 cups water
2 eggs
1/2 cup roasted corn (we had some from Trader Joe's sitting in the freezer)
3 green onions, chopped
Sea salt
Freshly ground pepper
Olive oil cooking spray

1. Preheat oven to 450.
2. Rinse quinoa and cook with water according to package directions (we used the microwave). Once cooled, place quinoa in a medium bowl. Beat together the two eggs in a small bowl and add to quinoa. Stir in thoroughly and add corn, green onions, and a generous amount of salt and pepper.
3. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil and spray sheet with cooking spray.
4. Spray 1/2 cup measuring cup with oil. Fill with quinoa mixture. Empty the contents of the measuring cup onto the sheet. Repeat for 5 more cakes.
5. Place cakes in oven for 20 minutes. Flip carefully with a large spatula, working to make sure that parts don't stick to the pan. Spray pan one more time before placing cakes back down on pan. Return to oven for 10 minutes or until both sides are browned.

Yield: 6 servings as a side, 3 as an entree

Strawberry rhubarb sorbet

2008-06-11T21:58:00.006-04:00

Ali and I have gotten in a rhythm of making sorbet or ice cream every week or so, as that's how long it seems to take for our ice cream maker bowl to fully freeze. This past Saturday we found it frozen again, and the timing couldn't have been better – a heat wave was sweeping the city, leaving us sweltering in 100 degree heat. This strawberry rhubarb sorbet, taken from the pages of David Lebovitz' The Perfect Scoop, was the perfect antidote.

STRAWBERRY RHUBARB SORBET

1 qt strawberries
3 stalks rhubarb, trimmed
1/3-1/2 cup sugar, to taste
2/3 cup water

1. Cut the rhubarb stalks into 1/2 inch pieces and quarter the strawberries.
2. Combine rhubarb and water in a pot. Bring to a boil. Reduce the heat, cover, and cook for five more minutes. Remove from heat and allow to cool to room temperature.
3. Combine rhubarb, water, and strawberries in food processor; purée until smooth. Put mixture in the fridge for thirty minutes, then freeze in your ice cream maker.

The best turkey burgers ever

2008-06-09T15:20:00.006-04:00

There's something magical about showing up at the Union Square Greenmarket without a shopping list or a recipe in mind. The trip becomes a type of foodie dérive, and we are able to wander the stalls, drooling over the freshest, most local produce in New York without the premise of a specific search. At some point, the things we covet come together on their own and become a meal.

This past Saturday that meal was turkey burgers with Austrian fingerling potatoes and peas. We picked up fresh tomatoes, potatoes, and peas, still in the pod, from a few different Jersey farms, and we got organic jalapeño cheddar and whole-wheat sourdough rolls from Hawthorne Valley Farms, which is upstate in Columbia County. The turkey meat is from Trader Joe's, seasoned with a marinade I came up with on the spot. Most of its components are interchangeable; for the best turkey burger, the cumin is not.

THE BEST TURKEY BURGERS EVER

Time: 20 minutes, plus 30 minutes to marinate

1 1/3 lbs ground turkey
1 1/3 tbsp cumin
1 tsp hot paprika
1 jalapeño pepper, finely diced
1 tbsp garlic, finely diced
1/2 tbsp ginger, finely diced
1 cup teriyaki sauce (we used Soy Vey)
salt and pepper to taste
a few tomato slices
a few leaves of spinach
garlic mayo (add 2 tbsp minced garlic to 3 tbsp mayonnaise)
organic jalapeño cheddar cheese
caramelized onions

1. Put ground turkey in a ziploc bag with salt, pepper, cumin, paprika, jalapeño, garlic, ginger, and soy vey. Shake vigorously, then let marinate in refrigerator for 30 minutes.
2. Shape meat into four patties, then cook in a skillet until well-done. A grill might be even better, if you're fortunate enough to have one.
3. Serve burgers on whole-wheat sourdough rolls, and top them with jalapeño cheddar, tomato, spinach, garlic mayo, and loads of caramelized onions.

Yield: 4 servings

SMASHED BAKED POTATOES
(inspired by this recipe from The Pioneer Woman)

Time: 15 minutes, plus 25 minutes in the oven

6 fingerling potatoes
olive oil
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
rosemary

1. Boil potatoes in well salted water until slightly tender.
2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Drizzle oil on a baking sheet, and lay the potatoes out on it.
3. Sprinkle generously with salt, pepper, and rosemary, then bake for 20 minutes or so.
4. Finish the potatoes under the broiler for 2 minutes or until the tops have browned to your liking.

Yield: 2 servings

FRESH PEAS WITH SHALLOTS, TARRAGON, AND BUTTER

Time: 10 minutes

1 qt fresh peas
2 shallots
2 tbsp minced tarragon
1 tbsp salted butter
salt

1. Shell the peas (make sure to eat a few right out of the bowl).
2. Sauté the shallots in butter until they start to melt a little. Add the peas and cook for a minute or two, just until the color starts to turn. Add salt and tarragon, then serve.

Yield: 2 servings

Nested eggs benedict

2008-06-07T21:02:00.008-04:00

For most of my life, I ate eggs two ways: scrambled, or in an omelette. I've always hated hard-boiled eggs, which seem like another (lesser) food altogether, and I have to admit I was afraid of them sunny side up or poached. In the last few years, however, I've come to enjoy them both of those ways, but it's only recently that I've tried making them myself. I fried my first egg a few months ago, and have quickly become comfortable enough to serve up lightly fried quail eggs atop the second iteration of my warm fava bean salad.

But I hadn't tried to poach an egg until this week. I scoured the internet for advice, and I probably would have gone with the plastic wrap method if I weren't worried about dropping potentially toxic plastic into a pot of boiling water with my dinner. Then, I thought to ask my dad, who said the trick is in the vinegar – adding enough of it to the water that the egg doesn't separate – and in sliding the egg into the water with a gentle touch.

I followed his advice as I set out to deconstruct a dish that somehow I've never actually eaten. I'm no fan of Canadian bacon, generic English muffins, or hollandaise sauce at brunch, so I've so far managed to steer clear of eggs benedict, though I'm sure there's an intriguing version somewhere nearby waiting to be eaten in the near future. Still, I thought that I could take the elements that do attract me – the poached egg in butter atop some carbs – and turn them into an appealing and easy dinner.

What could be more natural than an egg in a nest? So I cooked up some whole-wheat spaghetti, swirled it in a sauté pan with a little butter, salt, and freshly ground pepper, and piled it on the plate. The poaching went as smoothly as I could have hoped for, and I placed an egg inside each little nest and topped it off with a flurry of parmigiano reggiano. A quick sauté of organic baby spinach with olive oil, onions, garlic, and a hearty shake of the compelling but unidentified spice mix Jon's mom brought back from Istanbul was perfect on the side, as a sort of improvised "florentine" accompaniment.

NESTED EGGS BENEDICT

Time: 20 minutes

1/4 package Trader Joe's whole wheat spaghetti
2 eggs
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
1 tbsp salted butter
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
parmigiano reggiano

1. Add 1/2 cup of apple cider vinegar to a large pot of water and heat until it's just about to boil.
2. Break eggs one at a time into a small dish and carefully slide egg into the water. Cook for about 2 minutes, then carefully remove and let the water drain off the outside of the egg.
3. At the same time, cook spaghetti until it's al dente. Heat butter in a skillet. Drain the pasta, reserving a bit of cooking water, and add pasta and cooking water into skillet with butter. Season with salt and pepper, then plate with the egg.
4. Grate parmigiano reggiano over the dish to taste.

Yield: 2 servings

Kimchi pancakes and spicy Korean pickles

2008-06-05T21:43:00.009-04:00

We both love Korean food, but we don't eat it too frequently because our favorite spot to get it, Bonjoo, is not that inexpensive – and because of all the meat and white rice that tends to show up on our table there. Neither of us had ever cooked Korean food, though we've been enamored of gochujang chili paste for a while now, but I was craving the flavors of the transected peninsula, and we had a veritable jug of kimchi that had started to leak in the refrigerator.

This was really one of those moments that makes me appreciate the internet. By what other means could I uncover a slate of Korean family recipes to try and replicate in my own kitchen after searching for only a few minutes? I came across Kitchen Wench, where Ellie Won posts gorgeous photos of her cooking, and her exciting stash of family recipes for some of the most inescapably intriguing dishes in the cuisine. Jon and I have been pondering the process of fermenting our own kimchi for a while now, and I have a feeling it's Ellie's recipe we'll turn to when the time is right.

One of my nicknames for Jon is "Kimchi Jon" – since the pancakes we relish are transliterated as kimchi jeon, and since kimchi is one of his favorite foods – so I couldn't resist starting there, incorporating our maturing cabbage into a healthfully whole-wheat batter.

I've always loved the spicy cucumbers that often arrive among the banchan presented with your meal at a Korean restaurant, and I figured that with enough chili powder, salt, and vinegar, even Jon would eat these kirbies, despite his innate disrespect for the vegetable. This recipe came from Merril, at Food to Savor, and I'll definitely be returning to her site for more ideas. We snacked on these pickles all night and the next day at lunch. Jon actually just broke out the last of them now for a snack while he watches the Lakers game.

WHOLE-WHEAT KIMCHI PANCAKES

Time: 20 minutes

1 cup kimchi, liquid squeezed out and diced
1/2 white onion, finely sliced
freshly ground black pepper
1-2 tbsp gochujang (Korean red pepper paste)
2-3 cloves garlic, crushed
3/4 cup white whole wheat flour
3 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 - 2/3 cup water
Sunflower, olive or any other mild-flavored oil for frying

1. Put the kimchi in a bowl, season with freshly ground black pepper and garlic. Add the gochujang and onion and mix together until evenly combined.
2. Add the flour and egg and mix altogether, then slowly add the water, stirring briskly after each addition. Stop once the batter has thinned a bit but isn’t quite as thin as normal pancake batter.
3. Heat up some oil in a large skillet/frying pan over low-medium heat, and once it’s hot, pour a ladle of batter into the pan in the shape of a circle, using the back of the ladle to spread out the mixture and thin out the pancake (you want a nice thin pancake to get a good ratio of crispy outer to soft inner).
4. Once the edges have set and the bottom is nice and crispy, carefully flip the pancake and fry for another 2-3 minutes.
5. Place the pancake on a plate lined with paper towels, allow it to drain, and slice into squares before serving.

Yield: 2 large pancakes – serves 8 as an appetizer, 4 as an entrée.

SPICY KOREAN PICKLES

Time: 10 minutes prep, 15 minutes to sit

5 seedless kirby cucumbers
1 tbsp salt
1/4 cup rice vinegar
4 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon Korean red pepper flakes (not the American kind)
1 1/2 tbsp gochujang red pepper paste
1 1/2 tbsp sugar
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil

1. Slice cucumbers into the thinnest discs you can manage.
2. Put cucumber slices in a bowl and sprinkle salt over them. Mix the cucumber slices around so salt is evenly distributed. Let sit for at least 15 minutes.
3. Add all remaining ingredients. Toss cucumber slices to distribute ingredients evenly.
4. Taste; add more salt/vinegar/garlic/sugar as desired.

Spinach and strawberry salad

2008-06-05T21:19:00.002-04:00

I've made this salad a few times this week, and Jon can't seem to get enough of it. Yet when I told my mom I was making a spinach and strawberry salad, she couldn't quite wrap her mind around the combination. These spring stalwarts are actually a delightful pairing, especially with a quick balsamic vinaigrette to bring them together. If my mom would try it, I'm sure she'd fall in love -- and so will you.

SPINACH AND STRAWBERRY SALAD

Time: 10 minutes

1 package organic baby spinach
1 pint perfectly ripe strawberries (organic if you can find them -- we couldn't this week)
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
sea salt
freshly ground black pepper
parmigiano reggiano

1. Cut the tops off the strawberries and slice them as thin as possible. Add them to serving bowl with washed spinach and sprinkle lightly with salt.
2. In a separate bowl, whisk together olive oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper to taste.
3. Dress the salad, then shave some parmigiano over the top.

Yield: 4 servings

Sweet potato gnocchi

2008-06-03T11:28:00.006-04:00

We've been salivating over this recipe for sweet potato gnocchi since we came across it a few weeks ago, and we decided to dedicate Saturday night to churning out bright orange pillows of deliciousness.

It was easier than we expected to make way too much gnocchi to feed the two of us, so after we played with dough and ate the first results on Saturday, we had two friends over the next night to help us eat the rest of it. Both times, we sautéed the gnocchi in brown butter with sage, but the larger crowd of night two necessitated a trip to the oven for warming -- which resulted in a delightfully crisped exterior worth replicating even when we cook up smaller batches in the future.

We tried twice this weekend to make homemade ricotta according to the recipe from the Times, since it seemed to be the zeitgeist thing to do, but failed both times to achieve the right texture in the final product. It smelled fine and tasted not-awful, but it was way too rubbery. So we resorted to local, organic ricotta from Whole Foods -- theoretically the next best thing. It added the necessary lightness to our dough, and was perfect dolloped atop a plated mound, a deep-fried sage leaf nestled in its peak.

SWEET POTATO GNOCCHI WITH BROWN BUTTER AND SAGE

2 large red-skinned sweet potatoes, rinsed and patted dry
1 1/2 cups fresh ricotta cheese, drained in sieve, plus 1/2 cup for garnish
1 cup grated parmigiano reggiano, plus more for garnish
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 cups white whole wheat flour
1 stick butter
6 tbsp chopped fresh sage plus whole leaves for garnish

1. Place sweet potatoes on plate; microwave on high until tender, about 5 minutes per side. Cut in half and cool. Scrape sweet potato flesh into medium bowl and mash; transfer to large bowl.
2. Add ricotta cheese; blend well. Add Parmesan cheese, brown sugar, salt, and nutmeg; mash to blend. Mix in flour, about 1/2 cup at a time, until soft dough forms.
3. Turn dough out onto floured surface; divide into 6 equal pieces. Rolling between palms and floured work surface, form each piece into 20-inch-long rope (about 1 inch in diameter), sprinkling with flour as needed if sticky. Cut each rope into 20 pieces. Roll each piece over tines of fork to indent (or leave them smooth and simple). Transfer to parchment-covered baking sheet.
4. Bring large pot of water to boil; add salt and return to boil. Working in batches, boil gnocchi until tender, 5 to 6 minutes.
5. Preheat oven to 250°F. Melt butter in large saucepan over medium-high heat. Cook until butter solids are brown and have toasty aroma, swirling pan occasionally, about 5 minutes. Add chopped sage (mixture will bubble up). Turn off heat. Season sage butter generously with salt and pepper.
6. Transfer half of sage butter to large skillet set over medium-high heat. Add half of gnocchi. Sauté until gnocchi are heated through, about 6 minutes. Empty skillet onto baking sheet; place in oven to brown. Repeat with remaining sage butter and gnocchi.
7. Divide gnocchi and sauce among shallow bowls. Garnish with ricotta, more grated parmigiano, and sage leaves.

Yield: 6-8 servings

Baby arugula and jicama salad

2008-06-01T00:06:00.004-04:00

Since Jon was cooking up some spicy chicken and rice, I wanted a salad with Mexican flavors to match. Since I'm still not totally comfortable following a recipe word for word, I did what I always do – my one from column A, two from column B, etc style of cooking.

I was hoping for watercress, mâche, or pea shoots when I sauntered through the Greenmarket yesterday afternoon, but it's not quite yet the season, so I ended up with some tender organic baby arugula from Migliorelli Farm in Tivoli, NY. I picked up jicama at Whole Foods, and some organic chicken chorizo at Trader Joe's, flipped through the Bayless book that we just bought with an old gift card, and threw in the cilantro left over in our produce bin, pepitas I bought in November, and some lime juice. In all, it made for a fresh and fragrant start to one of the more latin-leaning meals we've made so far together.

BABY ARUGULA AND JICAMA SALAD

1/4 lb baby arugula
1 small jicama
pepitas (for garnish)

For the dressing (adapted from Rick Bayless):

1 chicken chorizo sausage, casing removed
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
1/3 cup olive oil
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
salt to taste
juice from 1 small lime
1/2 cup chopped cilantro

1. Peel jicama with a knife and cut into long sticks.
2. Whisk together oil, vinegar, lime juice, cilantro, and salt in a bowl.
3. Sauté the chorizo in a small skillet over medium heat. Stir and break up clumps until it's browned and cooked through, 6-8 minutes. Add the garlic, stir for a minute, then add to vinaigrette and mix thoroughly.
4. Pour vinaigrette and chorizo over arugula and jicama. Toss to coat and garnish with salted pepitas.