Somehow, I managed to hold on to a half pound of crab meat
without eating it immediately! For those who know me, this
is quite a feat. I can barely wait for a crab to cool before I
start ripping the thing open, let alone let shelled meat wait to
become part of a cooked dish.
But I’d decided on making crab cakes.
My past attempts have been OK, variations on some flour, egg,
maybe a few herbs and, of course, crab. The best I’d previously
done was one that included very few of the former and a whole lot
of the latter. It was basically crab meat loosely held together by
some stuff you couldn’t taste at all over the crab.
But I wanted to do it up right and fancy. Plus I’d recently
thumbed through Seattle culinary icon Tom Douglas’
“I Love Crab Cakes!”, 50 recipes that examine
different cake styles, different crabs and recipes from all
over.
And then I happened upon a recipe that included another one of
my favorite food-like substances: beer.
So it ended up being not exactly a crab cake, it’s
technically a deep-fried fritter.
It turned out well, though I could have used a little more crab
for my personal tastes. I used a pilsner so as not to overpower the
flavor, which also ends up being a great leftover to pair with the
fritters afterward. I lack a hot oil thermometer, so I probably had
it a little too hot, not cooking the inside quickly enough before
getting a deep browned outside and allowing the whole thing to
crisp. I paired it with a garlic-y remoulade dip, that was OK, but
not spectacular so I’m not adding the recipe here. The book has one
that I’ve yet to try. I also served a side salad and a corn
cornbread.
I’ve been taking to heart some meal-planning and time-saver
suggestions given by
readers. There were some great tips, some of which I’ll
elaborate on in the future.
One of the things that helps when faced with a late night and
the need for a quick meal is having a well-stocked kitchen. I read
through simple food guru Mark
Bittman’s suggestions for core supplies.
Fresh out of the
oven
Among the suggestions (and one I was a fan of anyways) is a bag
of frozen shrimp. It’s really a versatile little critter than can
be cooked quickly in a million different ways.
In the past couple years, I’ve seen several variations of
recipes including shrimp and my favorite tiny pasta, orzo. A couple
weeks ago, I threw together my variation based on what I had in the
house. I made double what I noted below because if you
really want to save time, you eat leftovers. Let me know
if you try this out and if you make or should make any variations:
Continue reading →
So in all that talk of high fiber
foods, I tried to go beyond the beans and looked for
something tasty and dessert-like. I found a recipe in one of my
gifted cookbooks, “Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Healthful
Cooking.” The book had a whole section of foods based on properties
like high in fiber or lowfat, etc. and a table of recipes and
stats. I keyed in on the dessert that said 7 grams of fiber per
serving.
I initially bought all the ingredients for a dinner with
friends, but when I started making it, I realized that the clock
I’d been timing my day by had not yet been reset for the season.
So, rather than be 45 minutes late, I cooked it later. Then we ate
it for dessert, and breakfast, and snacks for the next few
days.
Even after all that, I still liked it. That’s gotta say
something, right?
My few complaints were these: As I started cutting up the
berries and placing them in the bowl, they was way more than the
suggested 8X8 pan would hold and not nearly enough crust. Also,
there is no way I found that you can smooth out the crust over the
berries. I tried oiling a clean spoon and being very careful until
I lost my patience. My solution the second time around was to drop
smaller half-spoonfulls all over. The crust gets mushy pretty fast.
I prefer something a little crispier on my cobbler, but managed to
get a little of that back by popping servings back in the oven
under the broiler.
Peach-ified
cobbler
This weekend I made it again for a family dinner. I abandoned
most of the high-fiber, healthy part of it because I really needed
to eat something new. For the filling, I replaced the berries in
the recipe with a couple cups of frozen marionberries and most of a
bag of frozen peaches. Instead of raspberry jam, I used apricot
preserves left in my refrigerator from another recipe, a touch of
honey and I was out of instant tapioca so used about 1 1/2
tablespoons of corn starch. I also used regular buttermilk.
I liked the berry version better, but then again, I’m a pretty
big fan of berries.
Triple Berry Cobbler
(from “Williams-Sonoma Essentials of Healthful
Cooking”)
Filling 2 cups blueberries
4 cups raspberries
4 cups strawberries, stemmed and sliced in half
1/4 cup raspberry jam
1 Tbs instant tapioca
Crust 1 cup unbleached flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
kosher salt
3 Tbs. unsalted butter, room temperature
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup nonfat buttermilk
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Mix together berries and carefully fold in jam and tapioca. (I
heated up the jam a bit to make it runny and mixed the tapioca in
before pouring it over the berries.)
Mix flour, baking soda and baking powder together. In a separate
bowl, cream butter and sugar together until fluffy and pale. Add
half the buttermilk and half the dry ingredients and combine until
getting sticky. Add remaining buttermilk and dry ingredients and
mix just until it’s a sticky mass. Don’t overmix.
Drop spoonfuls of crust over the berries. Smooth it out a little
(if you can), but don’t worry about gaps.
Bake 40 minutes or until top is golden and filling bubbles up on
the sides and through the gaps.
With all the fresh veggies about to come out in the farmers
markets, salads are going to be making more appearances
with dinner (and lunch).
I couldn’t quite wait, though, and utilized some frozen veggies
to dress up a salad this weekend.
I ate this before I managed to take a photo, but with the green
and orange and touches of red from the onion and the lettuce, it
was pretty. Well, since you can’t see it, it was downright
gorgeous, I mean you’ve never SEEN a prettier salad. Really. I
swear.
The recipe below reflects how I served it up. The next day
I ate the leftovers for lunch, and it was even better after the
bean mix had marinated for a night and I added some chopped
avocado.
The salad 1 1/2 cups shelled edamame*
2 cups haricots verts (small green beans)
1/2 a red onion, thinly sliced lengthwise
1-2 oranges, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch chunks
Mixed salad greens
*If you’re using frozen edamame and/or green beans, make sure not
to fully cook them (only leave them in the boiling water a few
minutes) and rinse them with cold water so they stay cool and
crunchy for the salad.
Toss together beans, onion and orange. Leave out the greens
until you’re ready to serve.
Whisk together all dressing ingredients. Pour half over bean mix
and marinate for an hour or overnight. Before serving, toss
remaining dressing with greens and beans mix.
I have a little pile of handwritten or memorized recipes in my
daily dinner arsenal that I call my “go-to” meals. They’re things I
can make that don’t take a huge amount of preparation, but that I
wouldn’t be ashamed to serve to guests.
The list grows as I learn to cook better and find new
recipes.
With the sun shining today, I’ll likely go to one of my
favorites that works well for either a grill or a broiler:
salmon.
This is really no recipe at all, just a throw-together kind of
thing. I make use of the now gigantic rosemary bushes in my
backyard and a pretty forgiving fish. Plus it’s a really easy
after-work kind of way to
break out the grill.
The prep takes about all of 10 minutes. Here’s what you need
(base the amount of everything else on the size of your salmon
fillet):
salmon fillet
sweet onion (like Walla Walla or similar variety)
lemon, thin sliced
fresh rosemary sprigs
salt & pepper
foil
Rub salt and pepper on the salmon, layer lemon, onion and
rosemary sprigs on the fillet and close over with foil. Broil or
grill until firm in the center and fish flakes (about 10-15 min.
under the broiler, depending on the thickness of your fillet).
I play around with it, and have added garlic salt and a touch of
cayenne to the rub. The foil helps seal in the moisture, and I
don’t always layer the ingredients in the same order. I think
having the onions closer to the fish gives them a better
flavor.
I’m a late convert to oatmeal. Chalk it up to my aging, no wait,
maturing, taste buds.
When I was a kid, I couldn’t stand the stuff. My mom tried to
compromise, still trying to get me to eat a hot breakfast, by
buying chocolate-flavored Malt-O-Meal. After a bit of begging and
complaining that that stuff didn’t taste very good either, she’d
allow me to put in 1 Hershey Kiss. I always sneaked two or three
and sunk them into the bottom. It was far more like dessert that
way.
In some ways, that’s still how I eat my hot cereal — as a
dessert — though a little less heavy on the sugary goodness.
In the past couple years, I’ve been playing around with how I
eat it, only occasionally plain. A couple times, I’ve tried
overnight versions in the crockpot, like one from
Alton Brown with figs, cranberries and steel cut oats
(steel cut has more
fiber, just had to throw that in there), but haven’t had
a lot of success. It comes out kind of gloppy and/or burned on the
bottom. I think the problem primarly is with my crockpot, less with
the recipes I’m trying.
I generally cook it with half water/half milk. I’m also a fan of
cooking it with water and adding a tablespoon of cream.
I also have a few go-to variations for dressing it up (both are
for two servings):
Here’s another
high-fiber recipe that was pretty simple to make. I made
it while my
cassoulet was baking this weekend and froze some for
giving away and for later in the week.
I’ve copied their recipe below, but I made my own additions
while it cooked because the original recipe seemed a little tart
and lacked some depth. I added about two tablespoons of brown sugar
and a heaping tablespoon of cocoa to the mix. I also simmered it
about 10 minutes longer than recipe called for.
Serving size is about two cups, and each serving has about 16
grams of fiber. It’s only supposed to have 294 calories (and it’s
pretty filling for having that much), but if you add the sugar like
I did, that’ll obviously add up.
The idea of something wrapped in lettuce does not on the face of
it always sound like a main meal to me. But lately, I’ve been
craving a concoction I first had at PF Chang’s, and made some this
weekend.
My husband was pretty dubious about a food wrapped in lettuce.
He didn’t say it, but I”m sure he thought: “Isn’t that salad?” But
I think I made a convert this weekend.
If you’ve never had one, they’re pretty simple things. Bibb or
Boston lettuce leaves are filled with marinated meats, veggies,
crunchy things and topped with a savory sauce. You can be pretty
flexible about what you put inside. The key is to making a sauce
that has a lot of flavor that you like.
Places like PF Chang’s, The Cheesecake Factory and others serve
these as appetizers, but I thought they worked well as part of a
multi-plate meal (I also served up some stir-fry bok choy and a
plate of my grandma’s-style fried rice), and would probably be fine
eating just these for dinner. Actually, if I was more carefully
watching what I ate, I would just have the wraps as meals. They’re
relatively filling, and depending on what you put in them, they can
be relatively fat-free.
For my lettuce wraps, I included marinated and stir-fried
chicken slices, some thin-sliced, marinated shitake, bean sprouts,
julienned carrots that I briefly stir-fried,
and deep-fried maifun sticks.
So, like I said, the key is in sauce, something blending
salty-sweet-savory-spicy. I’ve seen variations on Thai style chili
and lime, various soy-based sauces and more. You just have to find
what you like. I happen to love big ginger taste and Hoisin sauce, so below I’m offering up
one to my tastes. I’m also including the marinade I used for the
chicken. Continue reading →
As I’ve matured (but not that much), so have my St. Patrick’s
day traditions. I’ve moved on from Guinness and Irish
Car Bombs (yes politically incorrect, but oh-so tasty,
unless you’re under 21, in which case they taste like crap) to
Irish stews and Shepherd’s pies.
If you want to make your own corned beef, you should have
started a week ago, according to a Bon
Apetit recipe.
But there’s still time to whip something up for tomorrow. Local
food writer Ann vogel offers up a
recipe for Irish Soda Bread, which would be good either
with a stew or just maybe a few slabs of Irish cheese (I’m partial to the
Dubliner myself because it taste’s pretty good and I can find it at
my local grocer).
I haven’t found an Irish stew recipe to stick with yet, but The
Seattle Times had a promising
lamb stew recipe on Saturday. I’m looking for something
with a lot of thick, flavorful soup, preferably including stout. I
want something I can eat it atop my other favorite Irish dish:
Colcannon.
Colcannon is a mix of mashed potatoes, greens and other goodies.
It’s apparently a dish made for Halloween, but I’m going to ignore
that. here’s the recipe I’ve used a few times. I can’t remember
where I originally got it, so apologies to the author.
Colcannon
1 pound cabbage, cored and sliced
1 pound potatoes, chopped, skin-on
1 leeks, sliced thin
1 cup whole milk
salt and pepper
pinch of nutmeg
1/2 cup butter
Boil potatoes until tender. Drain and keep warm.
Combine milk, half the butter, salt and pepper in a large pot
and bring to a simmer. Add cabbage and leeks, cover and cook until
tender, about 15 minutes. Add potatoes to mix and mash. Add
remaining butter, nutmeg and season to taste. Serve.
I’ve tried this with chives instead of leeks, which came out
pretty good. I’ve also seen recipes where cooked bacon was chopped
up and added to make it more of a main dish.
Whatever you’re making, hope it turns out well, and I’d love to
hear about it. Happy St. Patrick’s Day!
The alternate title for this blog entry was: What I made from
all the stuff I had to use up in my ‘fridge. Thursday night, before
a five-day vacation (I’ll be back next Wednesday) I found
myself faced with some stray veggies and meat in the refrigerator
and found myself faced again with the stray food still sitting on
my shelves, a testament to poor pre-vacation planning.
This happens more than I should admit, but there was good news
in this one. It seems like all those recipes and food blogs I’ve
been reading are starting to pay off. I managed to open the fridge,
pull out a few of the things in there and make a meal, no recipes,
and for the first time, didn’t end up with something I’d
rather toss out or feed to the dog (note: I don’t
actually feed people food to my dog).
It was even something that I think was shareable, though it
probably needs a little work (crowdsource recipe-making anyone?).
Not all the proportions aren’t precise, because I’m not so good at
pre-planning the packing part either. If any of you try it, let me
know how it came out for you and what changes you make.
Chicken and Fennel in Sherry Cream Sauce
1.5-2 ilb chicken thighs (skinned and trimmed)
2 Tbs olive oil
1 fennel bulb, halved and sliced
1 onion, diced
3 carrots, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
About 1 Tbs dried thyme
2-second pour (1/2 to 3/4 cup) of dry sherry
About 1 cup vegetable stock
About 1/2 cup cream
1 tsp
truffle cream
Heat olive oil in a medium-sized skillet. Brown chicken over
medium-high, remove from skillet and set aside. Saute fennel, onion
and garlic until onion begins to wilt. Add thyme, sherry and
vegetable stock to skillet, stir. Add carrots and lay chicken on
top. Cover and simmer 20 minutes.
Add cream and truffle cream. Stir and simmer about 1 minute
more. Serve over rice.
