Broccoli Stems

Once you peel the tough outer layer, the stem is tender and offers a mild broccoli flavor.

I recently shredded some peeled stems and mixed with some shredded carrot and fennel; dressed with some basic vinaigrette it made for an intruiging slaw.

But you could also dice it and add it to soups. Or cook it as part of a mire-poix. What else?

Blah Blah Healthy Blah Blah

I love rustling through the fridge and seeing what might come together to make a reasonably tasty, somewhat healthy meal. Tonight's dinner was a great example of this. I had some asparagus, a container of spring mix, and my least favorite vegetable, green  beans-- they squeak when you bite them, they're mono dimensional, and the dimension they inhabit is "bland." But they were paid for and it was probably best to cook them up and pickle whatever portion I didn't eat-- Susan loves cold, cooked vegetables in vinaigrette.

But veggies need something other than themselves, don't they?  Further rusting revealed some homemade mayonnaise, some preserved lemon, and some caramelized onions. (For the second consecutive Sunday now I've cooked down 3 large onions into a concentrated, amalgam of sweet, oniony, goodness-- great on a sandwich, wonderful finely chopped and swirled into some chili.... how else can I use it?)

I steamed the green beans, then parboiled the asparagus while I heated the griddle. While that happened I diced a shallot and sautéed it in some butter. After a minute's steaming I put the asparagus on the griddle for a few minutes. I finely diced some of my preserved lemon and mixed it into a tablespoon of butter to make a compound butter. I put a teaspoon of mayonnaise into a bowel and slowly whisked in some homemade vinaigrette to make a creamy finish for the green beans. I finely diced some of the onion too.

It all came together nicely. The salad got some basic vinaigrette, the grilled asparagus got some lemon butter, and the onions added some deep sweetness to the green beans with the emulsified mayo-vinaigrette. I felt so virtuous after my healthy supper I treated myself to a third glass of wine and a plate of cheese.

Cassoulet? Pork and beans? Leftovers? Delicious. 

Earlier in the week I'd cooked up some tiny white beans-- they were adorable, actually, and cooked very quickly. I had some roasted carrots leftover from Sunday supper and tomato sauce and blanched beet greens frozen from last fall. I had two pork sausages and broke out the food processor to make bread crumbs. Dinner came together in under an hour, though 30 minutes of that was baking. I used one pot, a cast iron skillet.

Saute an onion in duck fat if you're lucky enough to have some (olive oil will do) a few minutes till soft. Add a couple of sliced up pork sausages and cook until caramelized and just cooked through, about 10-15 minutes. 

Add a couple of cups of cooked white beans, some chopped up cooked carrot, some chopped cooked greens, and about a cup of stock, water, or "bean liquid" (the stuff you get after the beans are done cooking). You want it wet, but not soupy. Not even stewy. Season with S and P and simmer for 10 minutes while you pre-heat the oven to 350.

Top the beans with a about a cup of bread crumbs, into which you've whizzed some parsley and a clove of chopped garlic. Drizzle some melted duck fat or bacon fat or olive oil or butter on top and bake for 20-30 minutes, until brown, fragrant and crusty. 

Fried Stuffing

Traditional British breakfasts can be a little on the heavy side, a bit like a traditional American breakfast but with the addition of fried mushrooms, fried sliced tomato, and-- wait for it-- baked beans. However one element of an English greasy spoon that I will at times add to my weekend breadfast is fried bread.

In the UK slices of white loaf are added to hot bacon fat. As the bottom absorbs some of the fat and crisps in the pan, it is flipped and crisped on the other side. It makes for a delicious side for bacon and eggs and takes nary a minute.

For the faint of heart, you can toast your slice slightly first, inhibiting its ability to suck up bacon fat. It will still crisp nicely.

This morning I had a revelation. It is December 2nd, and we're almost out of Thanksgiving leftovers, down to a little cranberry sauce and Susan's delicious stuffing. What is stuffing? Bread. What if I added a couple of handfuls of stuffing to the hot bacon fat?

Wonderful, crispy, savory, deliciousness, the perfect foil for a fried egg and a couple of slices of bacon, that's what. I'm sorry I didn't think of this last week. My arteries probably aren't, but I am.

Got any stuffing left over from your Thanksgiving meal? Fry it up in bacon fat. Out-bloody-standing.

Michael's Beef Stew

My friend Michael posted a couple of handy beef stew tips recently during a Facebook exchange with another friend seeking stew advice. His suggestions include a layer of caramelized onions, whose sweetness would be a rich addition to just about any dish, and deglazing with Guinness. I had a couple of bottles of Edmund Fitzgerald porter from Great Lakes Brewing (a Cleveland brewery, superb beer) so I substituted that.

Typically I'd skip the onions and deglaze with red wine, a more classical French stew. But I was intrigued, and as I had the beer, I went for it.

See that brown stuff in the pan? That's the fond. It's the caramelized sugars from sauteeing the onions low and slow for about 40 minutes. (The panful of 5 medium sliced onions cooks down to about a cupful of concentrated onion goodness.) It's full of flavor. To release it, you add liquid to the hot pan (over a flame, so it stays hot) and scrape it with a spatula. (It's a good way to "clean" a pan, too.) This is called "deglazing."

 

In this instance, I used beer, which got nice and foamy in the pan. After you scrape up the goodness, you boil the liquid and let it reduce. Basically, you cook the water out of the beer, making a concentrated, thick, flavorful melange of beer flavored with sweet onion residue.

What's this? Leftover beer? Can't waste that...

The red pan above has had a couple of things happen to it. First, I heated oil in it. I cut up 3 lbs of beef chuck into pieces about the size of a pack of smokes and seasoned them liberally with salt and pepper. I then dredged them in flour and seared them in the hot oil. I let them get a good crust, working in batches so as not to crowd the beef. If you crowd the beef it will steam and will not get crusty nor will it leave a fond. Took about 30 minutes in all. (The beef is resting, with the onions, in the pan behind.)

When you cook beef in hot oil it gives off beef juice, which has a lot of sugar, so it reacts the way the sugar in the onions does... it forms a fond. It's very concentrated beefy goodness... it is the essence of beef. You treat it exactly the same way as you did the onions. But first I cut a carrot, onion and stalk of celery into fine dice and sauted that in the beef pan to soften; you can see them in the photo above. After 10 minutes, I added the reduced beer from the onion pan to the cooked dice vegetables, and another glug of beer, cooking it until it was nearly all gone.

Then I returned the beef to the pan and added about 2/3 quart of chicken stock and about a cup of tomato sauce, both homemade and both from my freezer. It almost covered the beef. I brought it to a low simmer, where it remains. More on this later.

Tweaking a Classic

The Vieux Carre, named for New Orleans' French Quarter, is a terrific cocktail first served in the Carousel Bar in the 1930's. It is equal parts rye, brandy and sweet vermout, stirred in a rocks glass over ice with a hint of B&B and dashes of Peychauds and Angostura Bitters, garnished with a twisted lemon rind. It is a terrific drink.

It's a cool night and I wanted a rich, warm cocktail, but not necessarily icy. I opted for a V.C., but built it as I would a Sazerac, but one with no ice. It's delicious. You can taste the harmonious blend of all the different components, and the sweetness of the rye is not lost to the cold.

Here's how it's done:

Fill a rocks glass with crushed ice, set aside.

In a shaker over ice, stir together 3/4 oz (1 jigger) each rye, brandy, and sweet vermouth until chilled. Add a dash or two of both bitters.

Empty the rocks glass and swirl a touch of B&B in the chilled glass to coat the glass.

Strain the chilled mixture into the rocks glass, then twist over the glass a thick slice of lemon peel-- I use a vegetable peeler for a wide, thin twist bereft of bitter pith. Drop the twist, its precious, flavorful oils gaily now skimmng atop your cocktail, into the glass.

Repeat.

A la Provence

Those tomatoes and eggplants weren't getting any younger. I perused a Patricia Wells' book of Provencal cooking and found three simple recipes for roasted vegetables on a cool late summer night: roasted tomatoes,  new potatoes roasted on a bed of chunky sea salt, and roasted eggplant with tomatoes. Prep time, 20 minutes, roasting time, 30, 45 and 60 minutes (in that order)

Amazingly, given the provenance of Provence, no garlic or even onions in these dishes-- though their addition, perhaps along with some anchovies, would not hurt.

Cut up a big handful of any fresh herbs. I used mostly basil, oregano, parsley and a bit of rosemary.

Preheat oven to 400.

1. Roasted tomatoes
Core and halve (around the equator) six or eight large-ish tomatoes. Saute cut side down in a hot saute pan with some olive oil. (Do two batches if necessary to avoid crowding the pan.) After they caramelize (about 5 minutes), transfer them to a baking pan. Deglaze the saute pan with 1/2 cup of red wine vinegar and pour this concentrated goodness over the tomatoes. Roast about 30 minutes. Lots of liquid will form. I drained this and kept it and will add it to my next batch of soup, chili, or stew.

2. Eggplant and tomatoes
Slice one large, two medium, or a bunch of small eggplants lengthwise into 1/2-inch slices. Score lightly, season with S & P, and add to a backing dish which you've rubbed with a tbls of EVO. Sprinkle some fresh grated Parmesan over the eggplant, then top with this slices of tomato. Sprinkle fresh chopped herbs all over and roast for one hour.

3. Sea-salt roasted potatoes

Scrub a pound of small new potatoes, and place in a baking dish with 1/2 cup of large salt crystals. Top with a sprinkling of salt and roast for 45 minutes. If you add a sprig or two of rosemary to the layer of salt it will perfume the potatoes like magic.