Halibut with Lime Butter and Avocado Salsa

I bought a portion of beautiful looking halibut without a plan for it. Looking around the kitchen at what I had I came up with two options, miso glazed halibut and halibut with avocado and lime. So I sliced the fish down the middle and made two kinds. Because of the brown sugar I added, the grainy quality of the miso paste, and the pan being a little too hot (I cooked the pieces of fish separately, but in the same pan), mr. miso got a little burnt on the outside, but it was still tasty.

Here's what you'll need for the far-superior limey version:



Dice the avocado and tomato in tiny chunks. Combine in a bowl with salt, pepper, and juice from half a lime.




Heat a skillet over medium heat with a little oil and butter (half a tablespoon is plenty). Season the skin side of the fish with salt and pepper. When pan is hot, place the fish skin side down in the pan and leave in place for 5 minutes. Season the top side of the fish and flip. Cook for 5 minutes more, or until the fish is opaque in the middle.

Mmmm, crispy skin you can eat!




Meanwhile melt a tablespoon of butter in a saucepan and add the juice from the other half of the lime. Season with salt.



Plate your dish. Place a heap of the avocado mixture on top and drizzle with lime butter.

More Fabio!

Since the last time I talked about Fabio, I've watched almost all of the Top Chef episodes in existence. Fabio is still a little crazy, but definitely charming, and undoubtedly talented. And when it comes to cooking Italian food, there's no one I trust more to tell me what to do. His bolognese is delicious, simpler than the Williams-Sonoma version I used to make, and great to have on hand in the freezer. I made it two weeks in a row because I couldn't get enough.

The second batch was for Jacob, and we made a gigantic batch of fresh pasta. That's a lot of pasta. I can't stress enough how much more enjoyable rolling pasta is with a helper. I've actually been faithful to Stephanie Izard's pasta recipe, sorry Fabs.

Also thanks to Fabio, I broke down my first chicken. If ever there was a chance of me becoming a vegetarian (a dirty word in the Riddell family), it's gone now. I was getting really frustrated as I was hacking away at the chicken with a not-sharp-enough knife, but it is totally worth it to know that I have prime chicken stock making parts just waiting in my freezer. The whole chicken went into a batch of Mary's famous chicken pot pies. Now a whole chicken in every batch!

If anyone is curious, I got a couple new salad plates from anthropologie, that I really love. Jacob works near a wonderful store in Highland Park, IL and when I go visit him at work I end up wandering around the store forever, admiring all the pretty things. I saw these plates and snatched them up right away. They must have been popular because the anthropologie website is sold out of the plates; only the tea cups are left in Old Havana and Tie-dye Ikat.

Sorry if this post lacks a little focus. I've been a little scatter-brained recently.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Every year around Halloween I say something crotchety about how stores start decorating or playing Christmas music too early. It's not because I want to suck away your joy. It's because I don't want us to forget the best holiday of the year: Thanksgiving!

Of course I would like a holiday that's celebrated through food, but what's best about Thanksgiving is its spirit and universality. Thanks-giving is something that we can all and should all do. It's not limited to a certain religion or ethnicity, but instead is a holiday which unifies our country. And we celebrate by cooking and eating with our loved ones! What could be better?

The last time I had Thanksgiving dinner at home was in 2006 so I am very happy to resume the Thanksgiving traditions I left behind. Today I helped my mom make two pies - chocolate pecan and pumpkin - and made red pepper bisque, which will be the first course tomorrow. Later tonight we will be peeling chestnuts for stuffing (they're roasting in the oven at the moment).

It's a little late to do your Thanksgiving grocery shopping, but it'd be a missed opportunity if I didn't leave you with a little side dish idea. This isn't part of my traditional Thanksgiving dinner, but it would go great with turkey and mashed potatoes. Roasted brussels sprouts
with bacon. I've actually seen a similar dish pop up all over the place, which is funny because as I recall, brussels sprouts were THE vegetable kids love to hate. My parents never made me eat them, except for once when I might have even asked for them because I was curious.

Ingredients:
3 slices of bacon, cut crosswise into strips
Brussels sprouts, cleaned and halved
1 Tbsp butter
salt and pepper
sage (optional)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400.

In an oven proof pan, brown the bacon over medium heat until crispy and set aside. Drain all but 2 Tbsp of the bacon grease (pretty much enough to coat the bottom of the pan). Add the butter and melt, add the sprouts and sage if using and sautee until brown on one side. Season with salt and pepper, stir, and transfer to the oven for 20 minutes or until tender and brown.

Toss with the bacon bits.

Enjoy your holiday! I will be checking in tomorrow with what I am thankful for.

Pepper Bisque Revisited

I literally just want to sit and write all day today. I have to review a concert for a class and I just finished it. I thought I'd get a head start on the next assignment - a review of a pop music CD - because I think that'll come pretty easily to me. But of course, no matter what, I still have moments of procrastination which I fill with blogging! Yayyy!

A while ago I posted a recipe for red pepper bisque and said it could be cool to make red and yellow and serve them together. Well...I finally did it! I just divided the recipe in half and kept everything separate until it was time to put the soup in bowls.

Instead of red pepper flakes, I used dried aji amarillo to spice up the yellow pepper soup. You might have noticed that this is the same pepper I made into a vinaigrette for the asparagus in the surf & turf post. That's because Stephanie Izard swears by it in her cook book and uses it in almost everything. These dried chiles really aren't that spicy. They just add a hint of heat in the back of your throat.

It's funny, because these chiles are actually the cause of the only qualm I have with Girl in the Kitchen, which is that she correctly translates aji amarillo to mean "yellow pepper" but then refers to them from then on as "aji chiles" which is like saying "pepper pepper." "Amarillo" means yellow, not "aji." Oh well! Editorial mistake.

Surf & Turf Anniversary-Style

Well, it's been three years since Jacob asked me to dinner for the first time. I remember I was very sick with the usual hacking cough and I think even a fever! But I had been admiring that cute tuba player from a distance for so long that I knew I had to go. Good thing I did!

Jacob came to Cleveland on Thursday night and I had an exciting weekend planned for us. I had braised pork belly ready for dinner on Thursday and tickets to the Cleveland Orchestra on Friday night. I made fresh pasta and the homemade meatballs I had frozen for dinner on Friday.

Jacob got me a cast-iron skillet for an anniversary present, which is awesome because previously, the only pan I had that could go from stove to oven was my Dutch oven. He also brought me a bottle of Allagash Curieux and a bottle of Black Currant Ephemere, which I thought was only available in Canada! The black currant colored the beer pink and made me think of sparkling grapefruit juice. It was super fruity, but with a "beer-y" finish, unlike its apple counterpart which is more floral.

On Saturday morning, we went to Cleveland's West Side Market, to look for dinner ideas. We bought some asparagus, scallops, and a steak and proceeded to surf and turf it up! Jacob had been wanting scallops ever since I showed him a recipe for seared scallops with goat cheese-yukon puree from Girl in the Kitchen. He's been lusting after goat cheese purees after having his favorite steak at Carnivale in Chicago which comes with malanga root-goat cheese puree. I've never seen a malanga root in its original form, but the puree was heavenly.

We spent Saturday afternoon in the kitchen, drinking our Ephemere, watching TV, and making dinner. The scallop technique was lifted from Girl in the Kitchen, but everything got a little tweak.

IZARD-INSPIRED GOAT CHEESE-YUKON PUREE
Ingredients:
1 lb. yukon gold potatoes, peeled and quartered
2 cups chicken stock
1 tsp salt
1 1/4 cup half & half
3 oz. soft goat cheese
salt and pepper

Directions:
Bring the chicken stock, potatoes, and 1 tsp salt to a boil and simmer, covered for 20-30 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a small saucepan over low heat, combine goat cheese and half & half, stirring occasionally until goat cheese has melted into the cream.

Drain potatoes and return to pan. Mash immediately, adding the goat cheese mixture. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside and keep warm.

THE TURF

I'm kind of a meat n00b when it comes to cooking. I'm hoping that this new cast-iron skillet will allow me to practice my meat cooking skills so I can hypothetically audition for Masterchef some time and not make a fool out of myself!

Ingredients:
1 Delmonico steak, about 1-1 1/2 in. thick
2 Tbsp soy sauce
1 clove garlic, minced
salt and pepper
1 Tbsp olive oil

Directions:
Season steak with salt and pepper. Marinate steak in soy sauce and garlic, covered in the fridge for about 2 hours. Let steak come to room temperature before cooking.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

In oven-safe skillet, heat the olive oil on high heat. Dry the steak with a paper towel (re-season if necessary), and sear in the skillet for 2-3 minutes. Flip and immediately transfer to the oven. Let cook for 6-7 minutes and remove. Let meat sit (it will continue cooking in the pan, so remove it or leave it as you see fit based on its doneness).

ASPARAGUS IN AJI AMARILLO VINAIGRETTE
Ingredients:
1 dried aji amarillo chile
1 Tbsp champagne vinegar
1 Tbsp lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 tsp salt
1 lb. asparagus trimmed and sliced diagonally into 1 inch pieces
1 Tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper

Remove stem and seeds from chile and reconstitute in a bowl of very hot water for 5 minutes. In a food processor combine chile, vinegar, lemon juice, olive oil, and salt until smooth. Refrigerate until ready to use (this can be done well in advance)

Heat olive oil in a saute pan and saute asparagus for 5-7 minutes, until just tender. Season with salt and pepper. Toss in a bowl with enough vinaigrette to coat and set aside, reseason if necessary.

THE SURF
Ingredients:
1 Tbsp olive oil
6 sea scallops
salt and pepper
2 Tbsp butter

Directions:
I'll quote Stephanie on how to best sear a scallop, since her directions were very clear and fool-proof! I was very proud of what I accomplished because of her.

"Pat the scallops dry and season both sides with salt and pepper. Heat the olive oil in a large saute pan over high heat. Add the scallops to the hot pan. (Avoid overcrowding the scallops in the pan. If they are too close together, they will steam instead of sear. Sear them in batches if the pan is not big enough to hold them all at once.) Let the scallops brown for 1 minute, then reduce the heat to medium. Continue to cook until a brown crust forms. Add the butter to the pan. Turn the scallops over to brown the other sides. While browning, spoon the melted butter over the tops of the scallops to baste them. Remove them from the pan once you've basted them well and all edges are nice and browned."

Since I had my hands busy, Jacob was my food photographer throughout the process and took all these awesome pictures. He likes to make fun of me for the way I say scallop, with an "a" as in "hall," instead of scallop with an "A" as in "hat." I think it's just one of those words like "Halloween" that some people just say differently. Either way we get to make fun of each other whenever the word comes up, and marvel at the many inconsistencies in the English language.

"Meatball Time!"

I've been having some typing issues lately. My brain seems to get ahead of my fingers, which makes sense because I never learned how to type the "proper" way. From growing up with AIM, I learned to type fast, knowing that friends on the other side could see that "MRYHAUTBOIS is typing..." Little did they know I was sweating on the other end, hoping they didn't notice how long it took me to respond, and how long my response was. Stupid, I know, but I did learn to peck away pretty speedily. And whatever my method is, my brain usually knows what to do and where to go on the keyboard. No thanks to elementary school. I never got to use those cool looking typing programs. I don't know how it is these days, but each classroom had 4 or 5 computers in it, which we only got to use during indoor recess on rainy days. So the computers were for the four kids who got there first. I've never felt the need to run anywhere, so I never got to use the computers. Anyway...when I gchat with Jacob, I get a little ahead of myself and hit "enter" before i get all right letters in the last word. It's frustrating.

Rant over.

I don't know if anyone else has seen this, but Yahoo has hired a crazy Italian guy to do 5 minute Italian cooking videos online. At first I thought this guy was just insane, but he's growing on me. And let's face it, I have a weakness for Italian food. So after my fresh pasta adventure, I saw one of his videos and got a craving for meatballs. I loved the idea of putting ricotta cheese in the meatball and simmering them in sauce, infusing the sauce with meaty goodness while keeping the meatball moist.

Ingredients:
1 lb. ground beef
1 lb. ground pork
1 shallot, finely chopped
5 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup ricotta cheese
1 1/2 cups grated parmesan cheese
1 1/2 cups panko bread crumbs
2 eggs
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

If you want to add some parsley, basil, and oregano, more power to you. I was just going for simple here. I "doubled" Fabio's recipe and froze most of them so I can make meatballs and fresh pasta for Jacob when he visits at the end of the week for our 3 year anniversary!

Just follow Fabio's directions on how to make the perfect meatball and you'll be all set! You will need to make some tomato sauce, which I had simmering while I made the meatballs. It took basically no time at all.

He claims that the meatballs sear in the pan, but the brownness really comes from the tomato, not the meat, browning. So if you prefer a deeper, darker flavored meatball I recommend searing them in a frying pan on each side for a few minutes before adding them to the sauce. Don't fry the crap out of them though because you want the sauce and steam to be able to penetrate the meatball and keep them moist.

Finally, Fresh Pasta

It's finally happened...I made pasta from scratch. I thought nothing could shake my love for dried pasta. But this first attempt was pretty darn delicious.

I used Miss Stephanie Izard's recipe for fresh pasta, and to be honest, it started out a little hairy. First of all, I started the process at 8:15pm, already hungry. The first step is to make a well in the flour into which you pour your eggs and olive oil and water. But unfortunately, my well was a bit structurally unsound, and since I was doing this on a flat surface and not a bowl, all the water leaked out and dripped onto the floor. I had to add a little water as I mixed the dough with my hands, a very sticky process. Then my reserved 1/4 cup of flour fell off the counter and landed upside down on the floor. Oh well! Sometimes you have to make a mess. I had my doubts but I didn't let myself get too frustrated.

Also, I don't own a pasta maker so I improvised and rolled the dough out myself until I thought it might be thin enough, folded the dough loosely, and cut it into strips. I was wary of how soft the noodles were, but once they were cooked they turned all silky and luxurious. I was so surprised!

I tossed the pasta with a quick tomato sauce I made while the dough was in the fridge, and voila! A yummy, completely homemade pasta dinner! (And it only took me until 10pm to get dinner on the table, without the luxury of a pasta maker to do the dough-rolling for me.)

Kitchen Nightmares

A couple weeks ago I had an interesting cooking experience.  And I mean interesting as in, my smoke detector should have gone off (hmm, I wonder why it didn't?).  Everyone needs those stories though - about how you almost burned the house down or accidentally used salt instead of sugar - they make things interesting, and the successes more meaningful. 

One time I was making some pasta with a salmon cream sauce (one of my go-to dinners), and I had accidentally bought a carton of skim milk instead of whipping cream, which I didn't realize until I poured it into the pan.  At first I just thought the cream had separated in the carton, so I kept pouring.  But alas, I had mistakenly picked up the light blue carton which means skim milk for the generic Jewel brand, but whipping cream for Dean's (a brand of milk in Chicago). Why anyone would bother packaging skim milk in a pint container I will never know.  I thought I could salvage the dish by adding some butter, so I went to open a new package of butter and gave myself a nice deep "paper" cut with the corner of the cardboard package.  With blood everywhere I decided to call it quits for the night and scrapped the project.  The story continues with my search for a band-aid but I won't go into it because it's rather PG-13.

This more recent event was less traumatic, but still definitely a learning experience.  I decided to roast some chicken thighs, using oven temperatures and cooking times from this Williams-Sonoma recipe.  Remembering a Barefoot Contessa show where Ina rubs the chicken skin with butter, I decided to switch out the olive oil for butter, forgetting that butter has a rather lower burning point than olive oil. My Pam spray must have gotten lost when I moved so I greased the pan with the room temperature butter I had lying around.  Pretty much immediately after putting the chicken in the oven I realized my mistake as the butter started to burn and my oven started smoking. I turned down the oven a little, but the chicken still came out with a distinct smokey flavor - a smokiness more evident when the smell in my apartment cleared and I microwaved the leftovers for lunch the next day. 

My second mistake of that meal, was in the conception of my risotto. Maybe I'm just discovering I don't care for risotto much, but this attempt was starchy and boring. I went for the monochromatic, using onions and fennel. I was underwhelmed.

This project did give me an excuse to practice my picture taking skills. What do you think?

Greek Yogurt

Back in my elementary school days my mom used to put yogurt in my lunch just about everyday. It was usually the Trix kind...yes, like the cereal. I kind of grew tired of it once I figured out that the texture was unlike anything else: decidedly goopy. So I've spent the last 10 years of my life yogurt-free, until about two weeks ago. I finally cashed in on the Greek yogurt fad and I was pleasantly surprised! The texture was creamy and smooth, like ricotta cheese, and it had the tangy yogurt taste without too much added sweetness. My favorite is the blueberry flavor of Fage, which comes in a cute package with the yogurt on one side and the blueberry syrup in the other, reminiscent of the Dunkaroos and "cheese and crackers" of my childhood (you know the ones...with the fake cheese and the little red plastic spatula for spreading the weird cheese-like substance). The only problem is that these individual yogurts cost at least $2 a pop if you're lucky. Kind of an expensive snack. So I decided to opt for buying the big container of plain yogurt and making my own syrup to go with it. Here's a really easy recipe for raspberry syrup:

Ingredients:
1 pint raspberries
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup water
1 tsp vanilla extract

Directions:

Bring all ingredients to a bowl in a saucepan and simmer for about 15 minutes, or until sugar is dissolved and raspberries start to break down. Do not over-stir.

Remove from heat and refrigerate.

What you end up with is a delicious and healthy alternative to a bowl of ice cream after dinner!

Butter: An Argument for Whole Foods

Since acquiring a car, I have taken a few too many trips out to Whole Foods. I'm not one of those organic-obsessed folks, but I am making an effort to reverse Whole Foods' stigma of being more expensive than traditional grocery stores. Organic or not, Whole Foods just has fresher produce, which is what I really care about, and it's not always more expensive.

Yesterday, I went to a conventional grocery store and had a shamefully high bill, higher than any of my trips to Whole Foods. I think this is because when shopping at Whole Foods, you are in a sense shopping as your best self -- the frugal, health-conscious, non-wasteful self. At regular grocery stores, you are just another consumer, buying whatever is on sale, and with a lot more temptation. If at Whole Foods your indulgent snack purchase is a big bag of apples that are on sale and staring you in the face as you walk in, no harm done really. But at other places it might be a buy one get one free 12-pack of coke, or that 10-pack of buttered microwave popcorn that was only a little more expensive than the 3-pack. And pretty soon you have a $60 cart-full of junk food.

Back to Whole Foods being cheaper than regular grocery store prices. If there's one thing I make a point of buying at Whole Foods, it's butter. It sounds a little contradictory to make a point of buying what is essentially milk fat at a store where it's hard to distinguish between bird feed and people feed. However, at a normal grocery store, a pound of Land O' Lakes butter can be upwards of 5 dollars. A pound of Whole Foods brand butter is usually priced at $2.99. And it's rBGH free, if you care about the hormones you consume. If you want more growth hormone for your buck, go ahead and buy that Land O' Lakes butter.

At regular grocery stores leeks are considered a specialty item and are therefore more expensive. I got a huge leek for 89 cents at Whole Foods. Red bell peppers are insanely expensive wherever you go, usually priced by the pepper, not by the pound (a bit misleading because often grocery stores will use the same price-per-pound for green bell peppers, and when they're shelved right next to each other, it can be confusing). Whole Foods non-organic red bell peppers are $3.99 each, which I am pretty sure is a dollar cheaper than most stores. I can't prove this at the moment but when buying ingredients like fennel and celery root, Whole Foods is the way to go. I'll have to price check the next time I go and publish the results, but for sure, more people buy these specialty items at Whole Foods, meaning the supply is replenished more often, meaning that what you're getting is actually fresher.

One thing that Whole Foods lacks is a chicken stock or chicken broth that actually tastes good. I go with Swanson every time. I guess if you're shopping at Whole Foods you're going to be making your own stock from scratch, but I don't have time to cook anything that's not going to immediately gratify me.

I love that every store is different, showcasing local farms, breweries, and artisans. This particular Whole Foods seems to have an affinity for Icelandic products for some reason. Not exactly local, but I love Iceland more than the average person, so I'm ok with this. They have Icelandic lamb and Icelandic skyr (similar to Greek yogurt, which is more popular in the U.S.). The dairy isle features this Icelandic butter, which is quite flavorful. (Ok, so you can splurge a bit at Whole Foods too). The butter is $2.99 for a half pound, and tastes kind of similar to Kerrygold Irish butter. It's vivid yellow and has a kind of glossy, waxy consistency. Pick up some of this butter and a baguette, warm the baguette in the oven, and you have the easiest, most heart-warming snack ever. Carbs and fat! They sell those at Whole Foods too.

Think Like a Chef

Well, it's officially fall, and the rainiest September in recent memory has ushered in a chilly and gray October. Our new autumn weather has put me in the mood for changing leaves, fresh apples, and pumpkin spice lattes. I have this Bath & Body Works soap in my bathroom that smells like Macintosh apples and every time I use it, my taste buds go crazy for some crisp apples.

When I bought the chicken thighs to make the Chicken with Tomatoes and Peppers while Jacob was visiting, I could only find a family pack, so I stuck half of them in the freezer for the next time I made that recipe. But the idea of braised chicken thighs had my mouth watering (I don't think I eat enough protein regularly).

I caught sight of a cookbook on my shelf, Tom Colicchio's Think Like a Chef, which my brother had gotten me for Christmas. I hadn't really used it much (just drooled over it) because it features a lot of ingredients not readily available to me: morels, ramps, sorrel, etc. But I remembered that the main premise of the book is teaching universal cooking techniques and leaving the ingredients up to the "chef." Immediately, I fixated on the idea of braising chicken in hard cider.

But then I remembered the popular gastropub dish of moules frites, or mussels and fries which Chicago restaurants have modified to use Belgian white ales, celery, and bay leaf instead of the classic white wine and garlic version. I cast my net out on facebook taking a poll on which - Belgian white or hard cider - would taste better with chicken and I got pretty mixed results. But by asking the question I had given myself the "right" answer: my favorite beer, Unibroue Ephemere!

Ephemere is a Belgian white ale made with apples, but doesn't have the intense cider flavor. Instead, it is delicate and floral, with all the usual orange peel and coriander notes usually found in a Belgian white.

Once that was settled, I just had to wait until I found time to work on my culinary "experiment." In the mean time, I read Stephanie Izard's cookbook and found extra inspiration to combine unusual ingredients and marry the savory and the sweet. That's when I decided that ordinary mashed potatoes to accompany such a dish would be a wasted opportunity to do something really fun! And thus, a recipe was born!

Ephemere Braised Chicken with Sweet Potato-Celery Root Puree

For the Chicken:

Ingredients:
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 oz. prosciutto, coarsely chopped
4 chicken thighs
1 leek, sliced about 1/8 inch wide (white and light green parts only)
2 celery stalks, coarsely chopped
2 carrots, coarsely chopped
1 12 oz. bottle Unibroue Ephemere
1-2 cups chicken stock (enough to surround, but not cover chicken)
2 bay leaves
bunch of fresh thyme
salt and pepper

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Rinse chicken and pat dry. Season with salt and pepper just before ready to brown.

Heat oil in Dutch oven and cook prosciutto until browned. Remove the prosciutto and set aside.

Place the seasoned chicken skin-side down in the same pot and brown 5-6 minutes a side over medium heat. When brown on both sides, remove and set aside.

Add leeks, carrots, and celery to the rendered chicken juices and sautee until beginning to become tender, about 10-15 minutes. Add the Ephemere (minus a swig), bay leaf, and prosciutto and simmer until reduced by about half, about 7 minutes.

Place the chicken skin-side up on top of the vegetables and pour in the chicken stock to surround but not cover the chicken. Season with salt and pepper (about 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1/4 teaspoon pepper). Nestle the thyme in the center. (If you don't have kitchen string to tie the thyme in a bundle for easy removal, find a long piece of thyme and carefully tie it around the rest of the bunch. It should hold.)

Bring to a boil on the stovetop and then place in the oven uncovered. Let it braise for 1.5 hours, keeping an eye on how much liquid is left. You may have to place the lid on it and/or add some more chicken stock.

For the Sweet Potato-Celery Root Puree:

Ingredients:
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cut into large chunks
1 celery root, peeled and large diced
2 Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and quartered
2 cups chicken stock
3/4 cup apple cider
1 tsp salt
3 Tbsp butter
1/4-1/2 cup half and half

Directions:

Place first 6 ingredients in large pot and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer for 30 minutes or until tender. (Cut celery root into smaller pieces because it usually takes longer to cook).

Drain and mash immediately. Add butter, half and half, and season with black pepper.

Assemble your dish!

Girl in the Kitchen

Stephanie Izard, the girl of Girl and the Goat, just released a new cookbook which is as interesting to read as it is to salivate over. As I've read, I've discovered a fearless, spunky girl who uses traditional flavors connected to fond childhood memories and revitalizes them. Although I wouldn't call myself spunky, I feel like we connect with food in a similar way. We just wanna have fun!

The format of her book is actually very similar to the way I approach this blog: each recipe is preceded by a story of the recipe's conception or a childhood memory she attaches to certain ingredients. Not only that, but her writing style is so casual, it feels as though she's talking right to you.

I had to smile to myself when I got to a recipe for Fennel-Potato Soup with Butter-Poached Lobster and Blood Oranges (her chapter on soup is 40 pages long...A girl after my own heart). Her introductory paragraph was oddly similar to a narrative I wrote recently on this blog. I'll quote her here:

"I've never liked black licorice, so I thought it was strange that I fell hard for fennel while working at Spring restaurant -- the anise flavor is so much fresher than what you'd find in licorice. It adds a nice note to just about anything, but especially sauces, stocks, and soups. Now that I'm officially addicted to the stuff, I'm always trying to come up with new uses for it. I tend to think of it as an ideal partner for citrus, so I wind up using it more in winter when citrus fruits are at their peak."

I'm glad that we both share a love for fennel and a hatred for licorice. And if anything, this supports my claim that fennel+citrus is a match made in heaven.

I haven't made it past the soup chapter yet but I am already so excited to try some (or all) of these recipes! Unfortunately, for now, it's back to the research for me. It's going to be a long day!

A Salad Template

Last night I sat down and ate a whole pint of grape tomatoes. Even as tomato season comes to a close, these little guys pack a lot of flavor, making them a go-to salad staple year-round.

My favorite salads usually have something green (not necessarily lettuce), tomato, some kind of cheese, and a vinaigrette.

Here's an easy vinaigrette recipe which you can adapt for just about any use:

Ingredients:
3 Tbsp vinegar
3/4 tsp salt
1/3 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp dry mustard
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Directions:
Whisk together first 4 ingredients. Slowly add the olive oil a little at a time while whisking constantly.

Easy enough right?


For a Greek salad, use red wine vinegar and add some garlic and dried oregano. Toss with coarsely chopped tomato and cucumber, sliced red onion, feta, and Kalamata olives.


For a Caprese salad, use balsamic vinegar and toss with fresh mozzerella cheese, tomatoes, and basil chiffonade.


For a mixed green salad, use either champagne vinegar or balsamic and toss with spring mix, goat cheese, dried cranberries, and tomato!

As you can see I like lots of goodies in my salad, and the more cheese the better!