Slap Your Momma Biscuits

Hello all!  I hope to post some tastylicious recipes for you to enjoy in the next few weeks, reversing the trend of several months, ie "not posting at all ever, like, ever".  To break the fast I bring you:

Slap Your Momma Biscuits

Why are they called this?  I don't know, and I named them.  Let me clarify.  Here in the American South, we have this phrase, "It/They was/were so good, they made/will make I/me/you/everyone on the planet slap your/his/her/their Momma."  Okay.  But, why?  Why is something so tasty or delightful that it makes a person want to hit their mother?  I don't know.  It defies my reason.  By the same logic, a person could say, "Oh my, this train is so on-time it makes me want to fart inappropriately in an elevator!" or "I love my girlfriend so much that I want to ask her to marry me and then put minor body damage on a stranger's car!"  Not that I'm negating the actual offense of mother-slapping.  It's just that the implied offense in the "slap yo momma" phrase is similar to stinky farts or not leaving a note when your shopping cart leaves a scrape.  But, at the end of the day, when someone says "such and such is sooo good, it'll make you want to slap yo momma!" they mean it is THAT good.  SO GOOD.  OH MY HEAVENLY HOSTS THERE ARE ANGELS DANCING ON THE TIP OF MY TONGUE.  So let's get down to it.  Just don't slap yo momma.  Or told her you wanted to slap her.  Or she may slap you in a pre-emptive mother slapping strike.

By the way, this is definitely one of those recipes where the technique is actually more important than the list of the ingredients.  Don't say I didn't warn you.

 Slap Your Momma Biscuits

1-1/2 C. SIFTED flour.  IE, sift it into the measuring cup, or sift it and then measure it, but by all means DO NOT measure it and then sift it!

2 TB. shortening or lard
2 TB. soft butter + extra for brushing on the top
1/2 tsp. salt
1-1/2 tsp. single-acting (aluminum-free) or 3/4 tsp. double-acting ("regular") baking powder
1/2 to 3/4 C. buttermilk*

Preheat the oven to 450F.  Combine the sifted flour with the salt and baking powder.  Cut in the shortening and butter until the mixture has a grainy, sandy texture.  If you need more of the fat, add more shortening for crustiness or more butter for tenderness.  Gently mix in the buttermilk until the dough is moist and can be patted into a shape.  Proceed to turn the dough out onto a floured surface and pat it into a shape.  These biscuits are crustiest when you pat the dough 1/2 inch thick and then cut them into rounds with a SHARP biscuit cutter.  They are fluffier if you pinch off the dough into golfball-sized chunks and then softly pat them into a round shape.  Either way, do not overwork the dough!  By "not overworking", I mean that the process should literally process (proh-CESS) like this if you're getting ready to cut out rounds, for example: "Dumdedum, mixing in the buttermilk, dumping it out, pat pat, nudge nudge, a little more patting DONE."  Basically, as soon as you have the dough in a defined shape you've worked it enough.  Otherwise your product will be tough little items useful for sporting practice, or deterring the local racoon from your garden by show of force, but not for eating.  Take it from me, the person who learned how to make pastry before she learned how to make biscuits and paid dearly for it.  Returning to the subject, put your biscuits nestled up to each other with their sides touching on your baking pan or ideally your cast iron skillet, and brush or spread a little pat of butter on each top.  (I just spread it on, but it would be easier I guess if it were melted?)  Then, bake them in your nice hot oven, without peaking (except to look through the glass door with the oven light on, if you are so blessed) for about 10 minutes, or until the tops are golden brown.  If you are not blessed with a glass door and an oven light, wait at least 5 minutes before checking on them.  When they are done, take them out and let them cool off a minute or so before devouring them like hungry animals with lots of butter, honey, jam, gravy, or whatever you like to put on biscuits.  Seriously, they're that good.  They're pretty good leftover too.  So maybe I should rechristen them "Hungry Animal Biscuits."  Naaah.

*You can make your own buttermilk by combining the total volume minus 1-2 TB of milk with 1-2 TB vinegar or lemon juice.  Either option tastes fine.



 

Polenta Gangnam Style

Yes, I just went there.  Ever since I saw the music video which [spoiler alert] features Psy on the toilet [end spoiler], "Gangnam Style" has been my version of "Like a boss".  Which, I guess, was the point.  It's true.  I go around the house at times sounding like a bad impersonation of Kim Jong Il.  Returning to the subject, polenta is my new favorite meat substitute.  In order of likelihood, I will address your violent protests.  "But it doesn't hardly have any protein!"  Please.  When was the last time you chowed down on some plain tofu with salt and pepper for the sheer protein quality?  Thank you.  I would posit that the majority of the protein in a typical low-meat diet comes from: eggs, cheese, and beans.  And, according to some, kale.  But not me.  You will not find me "on the kale trail", as I once heard someone put it.  Ok, that's really the only protest I could think up.  But hear me out: it takes on the flavor of whatever you put it in, much like tofu, while itself having a pleasing texture and taste (especially if you make it with a savory broth), unlike tofu.  It also holds its shape remarkably well, also like tofu.  And, completely unlike tofu, it is both cheap and easy to make in your own kitchen in a short amount of time.  With all that being said, I present to you my tutorial of how to make polenta.  I offer it as a recipe AND tutorial because the recipe I used was somewhat vague and, at the time, I was totally unsure if I was over- or undercooking my polenta.  (I wasn't.  It turned out delicate and firm at the same time, unlike polenta I have had in the past that was dense and grainy.)  So here we go:

Polenta Gangnam Style

1-1/2 C. yellow corn meal (extra style points if it's non-GMO)
5 C. water or broth
1 tsp. salt
1-2 TB. cooking oil
more water

First: put your broth or water on the stove (aka the five cups-worth) and turn the unit on high so it will come to a rapid boil.  Then, whisk together your salt and cornmeal, then two cups of water (aka the "more water").  When the water or broth on the stove comes to a boil, dump all your water/cornmeal mixture into it in one go and whisk it rapidly while it's boiling to eliminate and also prevent any lumps.  Next, turn the heat on the stove down to medium, or even medium low.  You don't want to evaporate the water too fast.  Because that, my friends, is purpose A of the cooking of polenta: evaporating off the excess water.  Purpose B is to denature the corn proteins so that your finished product "sets".  Kind of like jello, which is made from animal proteins.  Geddit?  So, your role, once you've turned the stove Bwn, is to stand in front of your pot wearing your thickest skin or long sleeves and prepare to try not to get splattered by boiling hot proto-polenta while you stir it continuously (stir always in the same direction because that will help you not get splattered as much, especially as the polenta gets closer to being finished) for thirty minutes OR UNTIL DONE. 

Yes, I threw down the "until done" card.  I already broke one rule and mentioned organic chemistry in this post with the protein denaturing, so I might as well go all out.  Organic chemistry and "until done" do kind of go together, maybe because food is made mainly of organic compounds.  Unlike non-organic chemistry, which tend to happen on a predictable and invariable schedule, organic reactions happen as a law unto themselves.  So it is with cooking.  Sometimes "done" might be shorter than thirty minutes, sometimes it might be longer.  You just kind of have to eyeball it. 

So, what does "until done" look like, since eyeballing it is your best bet?  Well, first of all, you will have reduced the volume in your pot to about half what you started with.  But that's not all, because that will happen considerably before your polenta is really done.  But when that happens, it's time to really watch while you're stirring.  So basically, as you stir and stir you will notice that the surface of the polenta will start to become glossy.  Also, you will notice that, as you stir, instead of the bubbles that form popping and splattering, they will rupture and deflate without splashing and with the majority of the bubble remaining intact.  At this point, I leave it up to you.  When you feel that your polenta is nice and thick and creamy, pour it into a greased pan and let it set, which will take around 15-20 minutes.  At this point you'll be able to slice it.  Enjoy!

Oven-Roasted Potatoes, Ketchup Variations / Fire, Fire, Fire

Something I learned in the American-Style Chop Suey Incident is that Italian Seasoning makes things better.  Typically I am not a big promoter of spice blends, because personally I like to be able to add what I want to add in the quantities that I want to add them in, rather than have my dish's flavor dictated by Knorr or McKormick.  However, I have added Italian Seasoning to my short list of exceptions.  It's good for making a dish somehow zippier.  Just to be clear, it doesn't make it taste more Italian, at least not in my opinion, but it's still good.  I especially recommend it on roasted potatoes, like in the recipe below, and in sautees and sauces that you want to be indefinably meatier without actually adding any meat.

Oven-Roasted Potatoes

3-4 medium potatoes, washed but not peeled
enough Italian Seasoning to generously sprinkle over the potatoes
salt to taste
oil of your choice

Preheat the oven to 425F.  Chop your potatoes thusly: cut them in fourths longways (ie hold them up on one long side and slice off each end, then slice the remaining middle in half).  You should now have four slabs of potato about the size of a deck of cards each.  (The ends will probably be smaller.)  Take each slab and slice it into 3-4 strips, then turn the cut slab as a whole shortways and cut the strips into 1 to 1-1/2 inch chunks.  Put your chunks in a glass baking dish and drizzle them with the oil.  Then sprinkle on your salt and Italian Seasoning.  Bake them in the oven with a tinfoil lid for about 45 minutes, or until they are tender in the middle.  If you like them crispy on the outside, take the tinfoil off for the last 15 minutes or so.  If you like your potatoes softer but not crispy, leave the tinfoil on the whole time.

Additionally: Interesting Things to Do With Ketchup

Mix 1/4 C. ketchup with: 1/2 tsp. curry powder
                                       : 2-3 TB. honey
                                       : 2-3 TB. soy sauce
                                       : 1 tsp. Korean BBQ sauce 
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An interesting note: oil in the oven can catch on fire.  Surprisingly, so can many other things, especially if the oven is on too hot.  Do not turn on the oven too hot.  "Too hot" is defined as anything besides broiling meat put in on the "broil" setting, or 100 degrees or more higher than the stated cooking temperature.  Do not leave things in the oven too long.  "Too long" is defined as at least 15 minutes after you first smelled something starting to burn and though "Oh, I should go do something about that," and then promptly forgot about it. 

Follow proper procedure for kitchen fires if something in your oven catches fire.  "Proper procedure" is NOT defined as opening the oven door, having flames shoot out, saying "OH DEAR!" and slamming the oven door shut.  I promise none of these happened to me while preparing the Oven-Roasted Potatoes.  But that is as far as I am willing to commit in the promise-making department.

It might also possibly be true that I once told my lab partner that I almost set my last lab partner on fire and then immediately got a beaker vacuum-sealed to my hand.  Both of my lab partners developed a fine sense of hyperalertness.  But they didn't trade lab partners!  Even lab partner number one, who not only almost got set on fire as a general concept, but who almost got his genitals set on fire in specific.  Moral of the story: do not try to light your Bunsen burner unless you are absolutely certain which tap is the gas tap.

Gingersnaps / Never Tell a 13-year-old that 1=0

Gingersnaps

3/4 C. butter
2 C. flour
1 C. sugar plus about 1/3 C. in a small bowl for coating
1 egg
2 tsp. soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 C. molasses
1 tsp. ginger

Preheat the oven to 350F.  Combine the dry ingredients.  Cream together the butter and sugar.  Beat in the eggs and molasses.  Combine the wet with the dry, kneading the dough a little by hand if needed to blend everything together into a uniform ball of dough.  Break off walnut-sized lumps of dough and roll them into small balls.  Roll each dough ball in the extra sugar and place about 1 inch apart on cookie sheets.  Bake at 350F for 12 minutes, or until the dough has set and puffed slightly.  Remove from the oven and let cool.  They are really done, I promise.  They will fall a little bit after you take them out, but that's normal-- if you leave them in the oven too long they will scorch and also be too hard.
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Never tell a 13-year-old that 1=0.  Okay, let's begin at the beginning.  Why would you never tell a 13-year-old that 1=0?  Because that person could be my mother.

It was the late '60s.  My mom was in high school.  Because she was bright, she was a little bit younger than the other kids.  She was in all the advanced classes.  One of the advanced classes was a science class (if she told me which one, I've forgotten).  In that science class, the teacher informed his class, as a piece of triviality, that anyone could shut down the most complicated computer by programming it with the information that 1=0.  Interesting, my mother thought.  I wonder if that's really true.  And she filed that one away. 

Flash forward to the very special field trip that some of the better students were taken on.  It was to one of the universities that had one of the newest computers in their research department.  My mother was on that field trip.  The computer took up a whole room.  (Remember, it was the late sixties.)  The grad students there were very excited to have these high school students to show around and tell all about their new exciting big fancy computer.  And then they made their fatal mistake.  They told those high school students that, for a short while, they could play around with it.  I mean, what could go wrong?  They weren't factoring in my mother.  All the time since that fateful science class my mother had been hoping to test her teacher's statement.  And so she did, neatly and correctly  entering it into the computer.

The grad students couldn't figure out what went wrong-- one moment there were a bunch of kids barely out of puberty playing with ENIAC Jr or whatever it was called, and then it suddenly shut off and wouldn't turn back on.  Because my mother acted like she had no idea what had happened.  Sadly, the field trip ended early. 

Molto Bene Stracciatella Soup

When I first saw a recipe for (regular-style) Stracciatella soup, I was already sold.   Chicken broth?  Tiny pasta?  Parmesan cheese?  Yum, yum.  Then, when I made it the first time, I discovered that I could not be satisfied with adding the directed amounts of any of the chief ingredients.  I actually have not cooked Stracciatella the way it was intended to be prepared, ever.  But why should I?  I could do it as a creative exercise, I guess, but I like my way so much that I inevitably make it "molto bene" (mo' betta!).  I made it the first time for guests, and they liked it so much they asked for the recipe.

3-4 C. chicken stock or broth*
1/3- 1/2 C. stellini pasta**
1/3-1/2 C. fresh grated parmesan cheese
1/4-1/2 C. white wine
3 whole eggs

Heat the chicken stock and wine together until boiling on the stove.  In the meantime, whisk together the parmesan cheese and the eggs.  When the broth is at a rolling boil, slowly add in the egg mixture, stirring constantly with a fork.  Let cook about 3-5 minutes.  Then, add in the stellini and let everything cook another 3-5 minutes (until the pasta is done).  Serve with a generous amount of additional grated parmesan cheese on top.  Do not feel guilty for putting an ice-cube or two into your soup bowl.  This soup smells so good that you want to tear into it right off the stove and, of course, it is ridiculously too hot to do so.
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*If you're using plain stock, you may need to add some salt for flavor.  But almost certainly not if you're using broth, which is already salted.

**"Stellini" means "little stars".  The original recipe says you can use orzo or pastini or acini de pepe, and I guess that would be fine too.  But why use boring-shaped pasta when you can use STARS?  For "molto bene"-style the stars may work out better in the end anyway-- this soup is very thick.  In fact, after it's been in the fridge for a day it's more like pasta risotto.  Which is fine with me.

Okra & Potatoes

Okra & Potatoes

1 large potato, cut into fairly small cubes*
1 lb of fresh okra, sliced fairly thinly into rounds
1/4 C.-ish of cornmeal (not cornmeal mix, just plain yellow, or, as my southern relatives would say "yella" cornmeal)
salt to taste
2-3 TB. oil for frying

Toss the sliced okra in the cornmeal, discarding any extra.  (Or just tossing exactly the right amount.  It's a knack that you acquire after you acquire the deep-seated loathing of throwing food away.  NO THROW AWAY!  MUST NOT WASTE!  Sorry, I'm turning into my Grandmom.)  Heat the oil in a large skillet or fry pan over medium-high heat.  Add in the potatoes and okra all together.  Cook longer than you think you ought to, until the potatoes are cooked through and browning. on the side nearest the pan.  (About 10 minutes.)  During this process, you can push the okra and potatoes around in the pan if you're afraid they'll burn.  It doesn't really do a whole lot, but it makes for peace of mind.  And cooking is supposed to be peaceful and relaxing, right?  When done, salt them in the pan and then remove them from the pan and drain them on paper towels or disposable napkins.

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Ever think, "Wow, I might love/like okra more/hate okra less if it weren't so slimy"?  Well, this recipe is the answer.  Somehow the combination of potatoes and cornmeal causes the okra to be crisp without being sunk into a Fry Daddy covered in fish fry breading.  It's nummy.  (Not that I'm biased or anything.)  Also, feel free to experiment with your okra : potato ratio.  My version is pretty heavy on the potatoes, being slightly more than half potatoes, because, you know, I love potatoes.  But I love okra too, and I've had this dish with way more okra and it was still good.

*How to Make Small Potato Cubes:
1)  Wash but do not peel the potato.  (It's not really necessary, as most of the potato cubes will be from the interior of the potato anyway and therefore naturally will be skin-free.  Plus the skin on the pieces that do have it will be relatively small and also make those pieces prone to extra-crispiness.) 

2)  Slice your potato longways into 4-5 slices.  How I do this is hold the potato awkward-side up.  That's the best way I can describe it.  The side that the potato wants to roll down onto to lay flat.  That's the side you want pointing up.  Now make slices that are about 1/2-inch (1 cm) thick.

3)  Cut each slice into strips about 1/2-inch thick. (Like thick-cut french fries.)

4)  Cut each strip into cubes 1/2-inch square.  The easy way to do this is to keep all the strips together after you slice each section from step 2, turn them as a unit like you would a deck of cards (aka still keeping the slippery little boogers all together) and then slice them into cubes end-on.  I'm obviously not a perfectionist.  Who cares if you have a few triangular pieces that are not exactly the same size or shape as the others?  They'll all fry up pretty much the same.

Small-Batch Pizza Gein

Dough (makes a top and bottom crust)
1-1/3 C. all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp. black pepper
1/4 C. fresh grated parmesan cheese
1 egg, beaten
1/4 C. shortening
1/3 C. water

Don't the eggs make it all pretty?

Filling
1/8th lb. (eg 2 oz.) each, each, each!!!: prosciutto, provalone cheese, italian hard salami, pepperoni
1/4 lb. shredded mozzarella cheese
salt and pepper to taste (use sparingly)
4 eggs, lightly beaten

To make the dough: Combine the flour and the shortening with a fork.  Add in the parmesan, pepper, and water.  Lastly stir in the egg, adding a little bit more water if  you need to for consistency.  The dough should be like a good biscuit dough, but slightly tougher.  Turn it out onto a floured surface, and knead it until smooth and elastic, about 2-3 minutes, adding more flour as necessary to keep it from sticking.  Set it aside to let it rest while you make the filling.

To make the filling: slice all your meats and the provalone cheese into small bites.  Combine them with the eggs, salt and pepper, and the mozzarella cheese in a large bowl. 

Use a 5-inch by 9-inch glass baking dish.  Divide your dough into half.  Roll out the first half to fit the bottom and sides of the dish.  (The dough is fairly workable, so you can press it up the sides of the dish some if it doesn't fit exactly on the first try.)  Pour your filling into this.  Then, you have one of two choices for your top crust.

Option 1: Roll out the second half of the dough the same way you did the bottom crust.  Lay it on top of the filling, crimp the edges of the top and bottom together as you would a pie crust, and cut 3-4 generous slits widthwise in the top to allow steam to escape.  Brush with beaten egg white if desired.

Option 2: Roll out the second half of the dough.  Cut into strips and make a lattice.  Nestle some eggs that you previously boiled and dyed down into the lattices at stategic points.  Brush with beaten egg white if desired.

Either way, bake it all at 350F for about 45 minutes-1 hour, or until the crust is golden brown, the filling is bubbly, and it looks set.  (Remember, there's uncooked eggs in there.)  Let it cool somewhat before attempting to slice it.  This should serve at least 4-6 generous helpings!
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Pizza Gein is one of my favorite all-time foods.  It's traditionally an Easter food, and I think it is definitely worth its own holiday.  As a kid, it was fun to get a piece with a boiled egg in it.  So colorful!  As an adult, making Pizza Gein gives me an excuse to dye eggs.  Oh snap!

For the original, immense batch size, click here.

Some Italian Mystery Ingredients, Revealed

This is not a recipe post as such, but a suggestion post.  I recently tried some recipes out of The Northend Italian Cookbook, which Grandmom gave me with high recommendations, and they were delicious.  Now, that cookbook is relatively current, and I feel bad about potentially defrauding the author, Maria DeMino Buonopane, who looks like a very nice woman based on her author photograph on the back.  So, I'm not going to include those exact recipes here.  However, I did discover by trying out those recipes the answers to some culinary mysteries and, since I have been eating those culinary mysteries from Grandmom's kitchen my whole life I don't feel that it's unethical to reproduce those here.

Mystery #1: Why does Grandmom's tomato sauce taste so good, and so different from, jarred sauce?

The first thing that jumps to your mind (as it did to mine) was a matter of freshness, seasoning, and ingredient choice.  However, the ingredients used (and not used) in the pasta sauce I buy are almost identical (as far as I knew) to the homemade variety.  In addition, jarred sauce avoids the metalic taste from traditional canning.  Still, it just wasn't the same.  Through happy accident, I discovered mystery ingredient number 1, and The Northend Italian Cookbook revealed the second mystery ingredient.

Tomato Sauce Mystery Ingredient #1: rendered meat fat.

If you brown your sausages, meatballs, porkchops (yes, porkchops) or whatever meat you plan on putting in your tomato sauce in your sauce pot first, set them aside, and then proceed to make the sauce, your sauce will have this delicious meaty quality.  (You will still need to add some olive oil after you remove the meat from the pan so you can saute your onions and garlic-- just not as much.)  After you've got the sauce looking like a sauce, add the meat back in and cook everything all together the way you would a meat-free sauce-- about 1 hour on a low simmer. 

Tomato Sauce Mystery Ingredient #2: fresh mint!

I haven't tried this in a meat sauce like the one I describe above,  but in a meat-free red sauce, the fresh mint in delicious.  Instead of the pepperiness of fresh basil (also good) you get a milder zip, as well as the sweetening qualities of mint.  I think this is why commercial tomato sauce typically has added sugar.  But it just can't compare.

Mystery #2: When I saute garlic for a dish, it just doesn't have as much garlicky goodness as when Grandmom does it.

Mystery Step: Frizzle the garlic in a ton of oil.  Half-burn it.  We're cooking Italian, right?  If you want less garlic, go eat a taco.  For a sauce I don't know if I would recommend doing it this way.  However, for something that has garlic as a main flavor (for example the broccoli rabe recipe I posted recently), don't be shy on the number of cloves you use, and once you've minced your garlic, heat about 3-5 TB. oil in a pan until it's hot!!!! and then throw in your garlic.  Push it around in the pan a few times to keep it from actually burning, but it should turn a deep golden brown and even puff up a little.  Basically you're deep-frying garlic on a very small scale.  But the result is an oil full of a bold, nutty garlic flavor, perfect for dipping bread in, pouring over fresh cooked greens, or tossing into pasta with some parmesan cheese.

Butteriest Butter / Great-grandmom Pulls her Tricks

You know that butter you get in a seafood restaurant to dip your crab legs or lobster in?  That butter that is somehow the epitome of butter, and of the concept of butteriness?  Well, today I discovered how to make it.  No, it's not just melted butter.  And no, it's definitely not vegetarian.  But it's great on anything!

1 stick of butter
1 clove of garlic, minced
3 anchovy filets, drained and patted dry (I didn't pat mine, but I guess you could)

Melt the butter in a small saucepan.  Once it's all melted and also stopped foaming for the most part (only a few seconds after it finishes melting), toss in the minced garlic and let it sizzle for a few seconds.  Then, remove the butter from the heat and throw in the anchovy filets.  Mash them up as much as you can, prefereably with a wooden spoon.
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That's it.  I served it over cooked cauliflower today and I couldn't get enough of it.  Not that I dislike cauliflower to begin with.  I am an adult and buy my own groceries, so I don't have to eat cauliflower if I didn't like it.  Which I do, and I did.  But that was some of the most badass cauliflower I've ever eaten.  This sauce was also poured over hot cooked spaghetti or linguine by Great-grandmom Canduci, and while I can't recall ever having it, my mom liked it so much that, despite not even liking anchovies, she still remembers that pasta and how delicious it was.  The secret is that you can't taste the anchovies, at least not in the traditional sense.  They are definitely the "secret ingredient", but the end product is not fishy or even oily.  Just buttery.  So deliciously buttery!

Grand-grandmom Canduci was a card.  I got reminded of some good stories about her when I was putting up the broccoli rabe post, and decided I would share them.

Gardening: see "How to Get a Free Trip to the Grocery Store"

Great-grandmom was a wiley and resourceful old fox and, according to her children, a wiley and resourceful young fox too.  Great-grandmom's method of getting stuff done around the house that she needed to delegate or just didn't want to do herself was to rope the unsuspecting bystander (read: family member) in with a statement something along the lines of "Hey, can you come help me with this?"  Who's to turn down a sweet old Italian lady?  HAH!  Inevitably you would look up from pulling weeds or whatever it was you were "helping her" with and she would be gone!  She even did this to me with the crab grass in her front walk, and she died when I was about 8 years old so I know I must have been a fairly small child at the time.  Wiley indeed!  To pull her tricks even with a little child!  I remember the deep sense of irritation I felt. 

This is also the method Great-grandmom used when, in her later years, she needed a ride to the grocery store.  "Can you give me ride?  Is on the way!" she would ask innocently.  "Of course!" was the only allowable answer-- remember, this is the woman who smacked her own adult sons with the wooden spoon she was cooking with for failing to compliment her cooking.  (FYI: the answer is always "Oh, it is so delicious," to an Italian woman.  Otherwise: smacking.)  So, the driver in question would load up Great-grandmom and drive over the the Acme ("Ack-em-mah") and she would then turn to them and say, innocently, "Oh, can you help me carry groceries?  Is only a few things.  Short trip."  So, the driver would get out of the car (remember, at this point she or he has been promised that it will be "short trip" that is "on the way", meaning the driver still has other business to attend to) and become more and more incredulous as Great-grandmom worked her way through the entire grocery and at least one full cartload.  It's obvious that her victims (read: family members) were truly fooled only a few times.  But what are you going to say to Great-grandmom?  No?  No.  In fact, you beat her at her own game, if you could, by claiming to have a strict appointment that you were running late for, or almost out of gas.  Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.

Broccoli Rabe A Thousand Ways

1 bunch broccoli rabe
2-3 cloves of garlic, minced
1 onion, sliced into strips

Steam the broccoli rabe 1-2 minutes.  Strain and saute in olive oil with the onions and garlic until all are soft.  Serve hot as a side dish, over pasta, or on a kaiser roll.  Makes about 4 servings.
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I don't think I've posted this one before, although it feels like I have because Broccoli Rabe is such a common ingredient both in the recipes in this blog and in Italian cooking in general.  Let me let you in on a little-known secret about Italians: we love vegetables.  Especially soft, summer vegetables like Broccoli Rabe, green beans, zucchini, and, to a certain extent, tomatoes.  If you've been reading this blog awhile, you can probably guess what I'm about to tell you.  We love vegetables because vegetables are cheap.  Think about it.  Nonna and Mama can have their house lot-sized vegetable gardens out back with free children/grandchildren labor all summer, can the bojangles out of what everybody eventually gets sick of eating, and going to the store becomes almost unnecessary.  Throw some chickens into the mix and it isn't. 

This is pretty much how Grandmom grew up.  Whatever meat the family had frequently came out of the backyard (this was before home owners' associations) or out of the river or woods nearby courtesy of her father and brothers' hunting efforts.  My great uncles still take a great amount of pride in having regularly put meat on the table all those years ago. 

This recipe is straight off my Great-grandmom Canduci's table, and straight off of Grandmom's too.  She still makes it for me whenever I go to visit her because it was one of my favorite dishes growing up.  And that, my friends, is what they call "The Mediterranean Diet." Not that there aren't any fat Italian kids out there.  I'm sure there are, what with all the "eat eat" and "finish finish", ending with "no throw away, MUST NOT WASTE!"  I'm pretty sure that whole "you don't have to clean your plate" movement skipped the Italians, at least in this country.

Broccoli Rabe Patties

About 1 lb broccoli rabe (also known as "rapini")
1-2 eggs
1/2 to 1 C. fresh bread crumbs
oil for frying

Steam the broccoli rabe until done, 2-5 minutes.  Strain, let cool slightly, then chop into small pieces.  In a bowl, mix together the broccoli rabe, eggs, and fresh breadcrumbs*.  Make into patties and fry like a hamburger in a little oil.  Serve as is or on a bun!
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*I say fresh breadcrumbs because they're basically the only binder in this recipe.  Otherwise you would just have an omelet, also very Italian, but which does not fit the recipe's description of something you can "fry like a hamburger".  For the record, the original recipe omitted the instruction to make them into patties, but did stipulate that you fry it like a hamburger.  Hamburgers come in patties right?  Judi, please correct me if I'm misreading the original recipe.

Pan-Fried Zucchini Flower Omelet

Several dozen zucchini flowers (enough to make 1-2 C.)
1 green pepper, chopped
1 onion, chopped italian style*
1 zucchini, sliced thinly
1 potato, sliced thinly -or- green tomatoes, chopped and sugared
4 eggs
salt to taste
olive oil for cooking

Wash the zucchini flowers and saute in a little oil just for a little bit.  (They will cook fast.)  In a separate skillet, saute the rest of the vegetables until tender, starting from hardest to softest.  (IE if you opt for potato, put it in the pan first, then the zucchini, then the green peppers, then the onion.  Otherwise, go zucchini, peppers, onion, tomato.  That way they'll all get done about the same time.)  When the other vegetables are all cooked, add in the zucchini flowers and a little more oil.  Beat the eggs, and add in the salt.  Pour the egg mixture over the vegetables in the skillet, then reduce the heat to medium low and let the egg cook until set, swirling it around in the pan a little once it's set enough to come loose in a single piece.  Serve as is or on kaiser rolls. 
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I confess to getting a little lazy.  I looked at my post list and realized that it was still February the last time I posted anything.  Then I found this recipe among the ones Judi gave me to put up here.  How could I not post this!

Red Sauce with Crabs

12 small crabs*
olive oil for sauteing
6-8 cloves of garlic
a splash of red wine
Tomato sauce made with: 3 big and 2 little tomatoes, a little sugar, fresh basil to taste, and 2 bay leaves

Clean the crabs and saute them with the garlic in a little olive oil.  Add in the rest of the ingredients and cook until done.**
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*This reminds me of the time Grandmom and I decided to eat crabs since I was up there and Grandmom therefore had justification for buying them.  We both love seafood.  Grandpop does not.  Or rather, he didn't before their marriage, went through a 20-year period where he did like it after being tricked into eating it, much the same way he learned to appreciate rabbit, and then in recent years has returned to his original seafood-hating state.  So we went to the grocery store to purchase some crabs, which in New Jersey is not a difficult thing to do.  But lo and behold!  That day, there were no large, luscious Alaskan crab legs or Snow crab legs for us to take home and boil up with a hint of Old Bay and dunk in hot melted butter.  No.  The only crabs to be gotten in the midst of the summer were little blue crabs.  So we bought them, and took them home, and made this sauce with them, which we ate on top of linguine.  The funny part is that you have to understand that when this recipe says "clean the crabs" it doesn't mean "take all the meat out of the shells"-- it just means "run them bad boys under some water so you don't eat sand and crab poop."  So the crabs should be, and were, in shell.  Hard shells.  And they were little crabs.  So, we started out with a serving platter piled high, I mean high, with tiny cooked crabs, and we, seafood lovers that we are, and stubborn people that we are, commenced to eating them.  When we conceded that we were done, two and a half hours later, we had made it about 3/4ths of the way down, sucking every tiny claw to its very core along the way.  Grandpop had left the table after finishing his non-seafood alternative about a half-hour into the crab festival muttering something about how we were eating too much.  But, as anybody who has ever tried to eat a tiny crab can tell you, there ain't a lot of meat in them tiny crabs.  I think we got more calories from the linguine.  But it was a delicious and messy experience and, honestly, that's what eating crabs should be.

**"Until done."  Possibly the two most obscure words in the English language.  It assumes so much of the recipe reader, like that they know what done is, what it looks like, and about how long it takes to get there.  In this case, you should have a nice saucy tomato sauce (not cooked salsa), and your crabs should be safe to consume without fear of horrible digestive consequences.  So at least 30 minutes on medium-low (think "simmer").  Maybe an hour.  An added benefit to making this sauce is that you have deliciously crabby red sauce left long after you finish off your tiny crabs, which you can soak into good Italian bread (the sauce, not the tiny crabs) or coat more luxurious pasta with.  A good pasta sauce should go a long way.

Pickled Green Tomatoes

As many green tomatoes as you want!
plenty of salt, olive oil, fresh peppermint and leaves, sliced garlic cloves, and hot peppers

Slice the green tomatoes.  Salt them well and let them sit at least 12 hours.  Rinse them and, in prepared jars, layer the tomatoes with the fresh herbs and sliced garlic, and fill the remaining space with olive oil.  Stuff whole hot peppers down the side of the jar or wherever you can find space.*  Put the lids on the jar and can as appropriate.  Serve on slices of Italian bread.**

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It's Lent, and Lent reminds me that springtime is just around the corner, and the fresh bright taste of pickles is just what I need to suit my mood.  Technically, pickles tend to be more of a fall-winter thing, I know-- it's what you do when you're sick of eating whatever your garden is producing fresh and what you eat when the trees and garden are bare.  Maybe that's why I think of pickles in the springtime, then-- it's the freshest thing around until the first peas and baby carrots come up.  Great-grandmom Canduci made plenty of pickles in her day, as well as Great-grandpop Canduci, who is still known for his homemade smoked sausage.  Apparently the girls of the family got out of the sausage making and procuring festivities.  So while my Grandmom and her sisters were at home making pickles, my Great-uncles were off learning the ins and outs of hog-slaughtering!

*If you're new to canning, I will warn you now: spicy things get spicier the longer they sit.  I guess the flavors have a longer amount of time to come out of the food.  But the point is: don't put too many hot peppers in your tomatoes, because however hot the resulting combination is today, it will literally double, triple, and quadruple its hotness over the space of a few weeks and months.

**Drool.  If there's anything better than good Italian cooking, it's good Italian cooking served alongside a good, fresh, crusty-on-the-outside, tender-on-the-inside Italian bread.  It should scrub your gums a little (and hold up to a dip in the soup) but be flavorful enough to take unsalted butter in liberal amounts without a processed bread aftertaste.  In Riverside, you can buy this bread at the supermarket and pay about $2 for it.  New Jersey shoppers laugh in the face of Trader Joe's and Whole Foods for the most part, which peddle things we can get or make on our own under the guise of "gourmet" or "exotic" items.  It is a sad state of things when a good loaf of bread is exotic and saleable at exotic prices. 

Oven Baked Chicken

The Simplest Chicken Recipe Ever

1 roaster chicken
potatoes, washed and peeled, and cut into large chunks (at least 1potato per person)
garlic powder
oregano
salt

Put the potatoes in the bottom of your baking dish, which is preferably a deep but not necessarily large or wide glass dish or casserole.  Rinse the chicken in the sink.  If you're buying your chicken in the US, take out the bag of organs stuffed, aptly, in the chicken's body cavity.*  Season it all over with the garlic powder, oregano, and salt, all to taste, but make sure to rub all of these well into the chicken's skin.  Place the seasoned bird on top of the potatoes in your dish, and then bake it at 350-400F for about 1 hour, or until fully cooked.**
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*In the Canduci family, you don't throw the guts away, you save them and make something else out of them at a later time.  Like gravy.  But people tend to have strong feelings about organ meat, so I'm not going to try to sell them on anybody in this post.

**I don't buy into that BS about "until the chicken reaches 160F internally."  A) Even if you have a meat thermometer, you have to be a meat thermometer pro not to stick it in some part of the relatively small chicken that is going to give you an inaccurate picture of how hot your chicken is.  B) Meat (and most other things) continue cooking after they're removed from the source of heat (this is why you should run your hand under cool water for about 10 minutes after your burn it), so waiting until the chicken is, thermally speaking, "cooked" to remove it from the oven pretty much guarantees it will be over-cooked by the time you eat it, unless you're in the habit of plunging your chicken in an icewater bath immediately after you take it out of the oven.  There is a better way than getting salmonella or taking your chicken on a polar bear swim.  Cook the chicken at the oven temperature the recipe recommends for 30 minutes per pound of chicken.  After that time, take it out, make a slice into the breast, and inspect the color of the meat and juice.  If the meat is light pink or white and the juice is clear, your chicken is, for all practical purposes, done with its time in the oven.  If the meat is dark pink, or if the juice is pink or bloody, put the chicken back in for at least another 15 minutes and then check it again.  (More like 30 minutes if the meat is a pretty dark pink, and if it looks "rare", well, you've got 45 minutes looking at you between now and dinner.  Sorry, just sayin'.)  After it's done according to the above guidelines, remove it from the oven and let it sit out on the counter, covered in a little tinfoil tent for about 5-10 minutes.  If you feel crafty you can even stick your meat thermometer in the appropriate place on the chicken (or leave it in there, if you were using it all along) and watch the temperature of the chicken continue to rise as it sits on the counter.

White Spaghetti with Chicken

1-1/2 to 2 lbs chicken, defatted and cut into pieces
5-6 garlic cloves, sliced
1 large onion, chopped
olive oil for cooking
1/4 C. red wine
parsley and salt and pepper to taste
1-2 pototoes, cubed
1 1/2 C. frozen peas
1 lb spaghetti, cooked

In hot oil, fry the chicken pieces just a little bit-- don't let them get brown.  Then add in the onion, garlic, parsley, and potatoes.  Add in the red wine and let everything simmer uncovered for about 10 minutes.  Add in 4-5 glasses* of water-- enough to cover the chicken-- and the package of frozen peas.  Let it simmer until there is enough sauce for the spaghetti.  (Note from 4/89-- "Too much water.")
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Mystery Ingredient solved: it was a quantifiable amount of peas.  There is still no direction on spaghetti, but I'm guessing that is due to the cooking style of Great-grandmom, which basically dictated that you put in as much spaghetti as you have people to feed, and they'll eat it and like it!

Okay, first things first.  There is a mystery ingredient that I need to get with my cousin Judi to clarify what it is.  It may be spaghetti, since it's not (as far as I can tell) mentioned in this recipe other than in the title.  The 1 lb is my thought on how much spaghetti you would need to go with this sauce.

*I'm not sure if Great-grandmom Canduci was talking about her juice glasses (6 oz.) or water tumblers (12-16oz.)  Either way, it's a lot of water.  Based on the rest of the recipe, what I would do is get to the point where you would be adding in the water and peas, and add in the peas first.  Then, stir everything around in the pot so it's in an even layer on the bottom, with chicken pieces and onions and the like peeking up amongst the peas.  Then I would add in enough water to just go over the top of the peas and proceed as directed.

Good Banana Bread versus the Edible Doorstop

Good Banana Bread

1 egg
1 overripe banana, thoroughly mashed
1/3 C. brown sugar mixed with a little water to make a syrup
1/3 C. oil
1 tsp. vanilla
3/4 tsp. baking soda
2/3 C. flour
1/3 C. boiling BOILING YES I SAID BOILING water

Butter a small loaf pan and preheat the oven to 325F.  In one bowl, combine the eggs, mashed banana, brown sugar/water combo, vanilla, and oil.  In another bowl, whisk together the flour and baking soda.  Mix the two together, scraping the bottom to ensure that all the wet and all the dry make friends.  Pour your BOILING water over the top in one fell swoop, then quickly stir it into the batter.  Pour it all into the loaf pan, and put in the oven for 45 minutes.  Do not peek!  Once the 45 minutes has elapsed, turn off the oven without opening it and let the banana bread sit in there another 5 or 10 minutes, then remove it and let it cool still in the pan another 10 minutes before trying to get it out.  At this point you can slice it. 

You could probably include 1/3 C. to 1/2 C. chopped nuts of your choice.  I would have, except I used mine all up on the edible doorstop.  I may still try and polish that turd by ressurecting it (not to mix my metaphors or anything) as an incorporation in an original dessert creation.  I mean, heck, it's already original if one of the staple ingredients is "edible doorstop".



Good Banana Bread

versus

Edible Doorstop

I have been deeply discontented with the banana bread I made a couple of days ago and which recipe I refused to post here on the blog.  Discontent can be a constructive thing if, you know, you construct things out of it.  Like freedom movements and better banana bread recipes.  Otherwise you basically wallow in your own disgust.  I have been discontented with my life the last few weeks, even though I know better.  How can one person be happy and discontented at the same time?  Not only am I well aware that there is the greater portion of the world that would be delighted to have my life, I know that even me from ten years ago would be astounded that I would not be content with the life I have today. 

So, I put my favorite tunes on Pandora and set out the build a better banana bread.  This banana bread recipe was inspired by my favorite gingerbread recipe, which came from a recipe book called “Ashevittles” published by the Catholic diocese of Asheville, North Carolina, and by an inspired conversation with one of my very best friends.  In addition, the idea for a brown sugar/water combo (to replace the molasses that normally goes in the gingerbread) came from her dad’s banana pudding recipe. Which just goes to show that the people who touch your life are a source of much good and happiness.

Zucchini Bread

3 eggs
2-1/4 C. sugar
2 C. shredded zucchini*
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1 C. chopped nuts
1-1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 C. oil
3 C. flour
4 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. salt

Preheat the oven to 350F.  Mix together the eggs, oil, and zucchini.  In a separate bowl, whisk together** all of the dry ingredients except the nuts.  Combine the two mixtures, then fold in the nuts***.  Grease and flour two loaf pans.  Pour the batter equally into the two pans and bake for one hour or until they pass the toothpick test****.  Let cool before slicing.  Good with butter on top!
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"Good with butter on top!"  Once I got to four stars, I just gave up.  I think everything is good with butter on top, especially all things bread. 

****"The toothpick test" is what I call that part of the recipe that goes "until a toothpick inserted [in the middle] comes out clean."  Excuse me, but what middle, what is the definition of "clean", and why is this important?  All questions I used to ask myself when I was a less-experienced baker.  So I'm going to answer them for you. 

1) "In the middle": in all honesty, the best test is to poke the baked item in two or three places, one of which should be the middle, or the thickest part, whichever is thicker.

2) "the definition of clean": depends on your baked good.  For example, since this a fairly moist sweet bread, I would consider "toothpick emerges with a few moist crumbs sticking to it" to indicate doneness.  For a full-on cake (like a yellow cake or pound cake) I would hold out until the toothpick came out with nothing on it.  If at any time gooey stuff, even gooey crumbs, are apparent on your toothpick, put that bad boy back in the oven and try again in a few minutes.  While we're on the subject, unless you want to heat the whole house with your oven, get you some hot pads, take the baking pan fully out of the oven and close the oven door while you're checking it.  This prevents additional baking time while the oven regains all the heat lost while you crouched in front of the oven door doing the toothpick test.  (It goes without saying...or does it?...that you then set your baking dish on some other heat resistant surface like the stovetop after closing the oven but before trying to stick a toothpick in it.)  Incidentally, spellcheck wanted me to replace "stovetop" with "stevedore."  I don't think a stevedore would appreciate a hot baking dish being set on top of him, and since he's a stevedore he, like a mule (according to my uncle) is big enough to do something about it.

3) This is important because otherwise you will have pancake batter on your plate instead of a luscious fully-cooked baked good when you go to cut it.

***"Fold in the nuts": saving the nuts for last ensures that they are fully incorporated, and also prevents them sinking to the bottom of your bread while it bakes.

**Some people bother to sift things with an actual sifter.  Some recipes call for "thus and such amount sifted ingredient" which is a crafty way of saying "first sift this and get [ingredient] all over your countertop, then try to measure fairy dust, then repeat when you only have half as much as you need."  I avoid those recipes.  This recipe calls for the amount you need to dump out of the flour jar into the bowl.  Then use a wire whisk (like you use for scrambled eggs) and whisk all the dry stuff with the whisk.  It fluffs up your dry ingredients so your bread will be light and causes that much less heartache in he kitchen.  It's neater, too.

*Now the zucchini, on the other hand...shred you some zucchini.  If you happen to have a garden, rejoice in the amount of whole zucchinis you need to make up 2 cups of shredded zucchini. 

Sea Legs Salad / The Art of War at Lunchtime

1 pkg sea legs, cut into 2-inch (5cm)-long chunks*
1/4 onion, minced fine
1/4 C. mayonnaise
salt and pepper to taste

Combine all in a bowl, tossing until the sea legs are well-coated with spices and mayonnaise.  Serve on a hard roll.
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*I think the official name for this product is surimi, but Grandmom has always called it "sea legs".  Another word for it is "imitation crab meat".  It is pretty crabby, I have to admit.  It's the stuff you find in your no-raw-fish-allowed sushi roll.  It's made of white fish, so it's definitely not vegetarian!

This recipe is akin to the hotdog sanwiches, in that it is simple, unpretentious, and very tasty.  If I had to pick between canned tuna salad and sea legs salad, I would pick the sea legs any day of the week.  Typically this is served at lunch, the most perilous time of the day if you're trying not to eat your weight.  (Incidentally, I found a picture of me from when I was fat, and I was pretty cute!  I'm glad for my health that I'm slimmer, but I think I let myself get too stressed out about it at the time.)  Anyway, if you're still having fat flashbacks like Steve Carrell's character in the movie remake of "Get Smart", lunchtime can be intimidating.  Not only is "finish, finish" fully in play, but there's also the added peer- (Grandmom-) pressure to "eat up the leftovers".  Because, you know, "must not throw away".  Except Grandmom made enough food the last three nights for a group of "4-6" and there's only 3 of you: you (see above need to not get fat again), Grandmom (practices what she preaches), and Grandpop, who has learned the fine art of "no" over 58 years of marriage.  Eventually you learn some survival strategies-- eat really, reaaaally slowly, take first helpings that are a third of what you would actually want, and learn to give the Italian Guilt Trip as good as you get it.  Yes, it's true: sometimes the only way to get Grandmom to cease and desist is to launch something like "You're trying to make me fat!  You want me to be fat?!?! (make "I caught a fish thiiiis biiig" hands)"

Ridiculously Easy Pie Crust

1/4 C. vegetable shortening, lard, or butter
3/4 C. to 1 C. flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 C. water, or more if necessary for consistency

Combine the dry ingredients. Blend in the fat. Add in the water, very lightly kneading to combine. Turn dough out onto a floured surface. Pat into a ball. Roll out with a floured rolling pin until uniformly about 1/4-inch (6mm) thick, being careful to alternate the direction you roll (N-S to E-W) and flipping the dough top to bottom at least once to ensure you end up with a round that is about the same thickness and isn't stuck onto the countertop. Fold the dough into a semicircle, then again to make a triangle with a rounded bottom. Transfer to your pie pan with the point of the triangle in the exact middle of your pan. Unfold. Shazam.
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I call this "Ridiculously Easy" because it is.  There is a wide-held, long-standing belief that making a good pie crust is similar to being able to do backflips in a leotard.  IE, that it takes years of practice and coaching and that only the truly gifted will ultimately be able to accomplish it.  This belief, as far as I can ascertain, arose out of the butter and lard rationing of the World War II era, prior to the invention of vegetable lard (or "shortening").  You will notice that this recipe has, by weight, three main ingredients.  I can see how it would be nearly impossible to make it if you had to eliminate one of them.  You can tell a true WWII-era pastry recipe if it requires combinations of whole eggs and separated eggs, vinegar, solitary confinement in the refrigerator or freezer, and more than five steps.  I have had some of those finished crusts, and they can be good if executed well.  But they can also be very, very bad.  Kind of like when the girl in the leotard misses the balance beam and gets the wedgie of a lifetime.  So, if you have access to any kind of fat, any kind at all, I recommend you steer clear of the WWII recipes and stick to the basics.  It'll be a walk in the park.