The Picky Eater Overcomes Salmon!

Here's a little lesson about picky eaters: Most of us don't like certain foods, not because we have tasted it and not liked it, but instead because we didn't like the look of them, they smell funny, everyone seems to like them and we need to be 'different', etc. Salmon, for me, is an interesting case. For a long time I used to love to eat it cooked; and then one day, I had a horrible kedgeree-making experience and I have gone off salmon altogether. Mind you, I still love salmon in sushi form, and of course, smoked salmon. Hey, I'm a New Yorker!

98. Grilled Salmon - *Grills*
99. Posh Mushy Peas - *Grills*

I mentioned previously that in CL's Grills chapter, Tom shows various ways of cooking different types of fish and seafood. For the purpose of finishing this project on time, I decided to lump fish into one category, and seafood into another. With the grilled shrimps already done a few days ago, I thought I'd finally tackle my fish aversion, namely for salmon!

I picked up a nice piece of salmon fillet and decided I would pair it with some mushy peas. Tom's recipe for the peas actually comes from Nigella. He says he had seen her prepare it on TV but cannot find it in any of her books, so he made up his own from memory. Tom, psst, if you're reading, How to Eat!

I started on the peas and salmon at basically the same time as neither took very long to cook at all.

I blanched a garlic clove in some salted boiling water for a few minutes, and then I added some frozen peas and a couple of mint leaves.

While this was simmering, I oiled a hot pan and seared a salmon fillet skin-side down for about three minutes. I turned it over briefly and then tranferred it to a baking pan. I know that salmon tends to be sort of bland unless heavily seasoned, so instead, I took some advice from the ladies at Nigella.com and made a paste of mustard and maple syrup. I brushed this on the salmon before putting it into the hot oven.

Then, since the fillet was quite small, I only baked it for about 3-5 minutes. It was perfectly done, and not too dry!

While the salmon rested I quickly processed the drained peas, garlic and mint with some sour cream (Tom says creme fraiche, but for only a teaspoon, I didn't want to make a special trip), butter and salt.

Then all I had to do was serve up the salmon with the mushy peas.


The salmon was yummy - it was perfectly cooked, and the glaze definitely gave it a special flavor. The peas were good too! I love the combination of flavors, not to mention how gorgeous they look together on the plate!

Well I guess I'm growing -- I finally ate salmon after my two-year hiatus! Next, anchovies! Yeah right!!!!

The Red, White and Shrimp!

With a bit of a hectic holiday weekend and no real inspiration to cook, I had to fit in a CL recipe somewhere!! I decided to make a bean and shrimp salad for our 4th of July BBQ, and utilized Tom's method for cooking shrimp in the process!

96. Grilled Shrimp - *Grills*

The fish/seafood section of the Grills chapter is a bit tricky! Tom divides it up into different types of fish, and lumps the seafood all in one category. Since I am not a big fish eater, and since making every type of fish would throw me off the project altogether, I decided for the Grills chapter I will make one type of fish and one type of seafood. I have not yet decided on the fish yet for my project, though am psyching myself up for salmon, but I know my favorite seafood has to make an appearance - shrimp!

The recipe for the bean and shrimp salad comes from Nigella's Feast and At My Table column. Now, for all intents and purposes, the shrimp are not actually supposed to be fried/grilled - they are actually boiled, but I don't think Nigella would object, especially since it is a summer type of dish!

The grilling is fairy simple, as per Tom's instructions. He says seafood such as shrimp and scallops only need to be seared on both sides in a tablespoon of oil. That was easy enough! I had to work in batches, since there was no way a pound of shrimp was fitting in my frying pan.
All in all, it didn't take long, and the result was some beautiful pink and plump shrimp!

They were ready for the salad. The rest consists of some borlotti (cranberry, roman) beans mixed in with some chopped garlic and sea salt. They are then tossed with the shrimp with a bit of oil and some lemon juice. And that's it! The beans and shrimp are mounded on top some radicchio leaves and ready to serve! I assembled the salad at my sister's place for the BBQ.


The BBQ was eaten indoors because we weren't sure what the weather would do. It was an incredibly hot, hazy, sticky day. Ah, typical New York summer, and which also would mean it would start pouring any second. We had loads of meat and veggie dishes -- sausages, chicken wings, grilled sweet potato, Israeli pickles, grilled and boiled corn on the cob. But no BBQ is complete without a lovely dessert!

This time I turned again to Tom's Strawberry and Polenta Shortcake. You may remember that when I made this last September, I didn't have scales and must have measured the flour wrong because what I got was a shortarsecake. This time I used my scales in glee and got two perfect sponge layers. I filled the middle with whipped heavy cream and fresh and gorgeous strawberries. Then, I sprinkled the top with icing sugar and some strawberry decorations. Beautiful!

The cake was a big hit!!! It isn't a big cake, but that not that small either. It was completely demolished. Not one crumb left! That is a triumph for me, as even when I make the most delicious cakes, usually there is at least one slice left at the end - baker's treat. Nope, no such luck. I got a small piece, seen below, but no seconds!

Everyone kept saying how they loved the texture of the sponge - and how it had a hint of lemonyness in it! I have to agree, this is probably my favorite cake to eat at the moment! Both of these recipes are really fantastic. I'm so glad I got to remake this cake and also try out Nigella's lovely salad. She is a marvel!

A welcome distraction, with some S&M

You may be reading the post title and wondering what I'm on about. Well I have been so involved in Cupboard Love lately, I haven't had a chance to cook out of other books. While reading The Next Nigella, I came across a Nigella Lawson dish from How to Eat I have never tried before, and I was sorely tempted. 'The Next Nigella' had made Nigella's mash from Nigella Bites and paired it with the Red Wine, Cumin and Onion Gravy from HTE and sausages. It looked to be a beautiful combination -- sausages and mash -- S&M; what did you think I meant, you perverts!??

Luckily for me, Tom also had a way of cooking up sausages in his Grills chapter!

93. Grilled Sausages - *Grills*

The sausages are simply the 'hot pan-hot oven' method. So, I seared some Italian sweet sausages (I was actually after some bratwurst but my communist-block Russian store didn't have any - they did have knackwurst though) on a hot unoiled pan.

Then, I put it in a preheated oven at its highest setting. I wasn't sure how long to leave them in there - see, Tom doesn't actually say. He did say that sausages are quite fatty so I should prick them, which I did, and that they benefit from this cooking method like chops, but no actual time was given. I looked at my Nigella books, and she shifts from 30 to 45 minutes. I kept an eye on the sausages and they took about 20 minutes to be the color I wanted and knew Rafa would like. He was the only one eating them because I have a horrible reaction to minced meat/sausage-type stuff.

While the sausages cooked I had the gravy already done but still simmering on the stove, and the potatoes for the mash were boiling. I added loads of butter and milk to the potatoes when they were done and what resulted was a beautiful creamy mash. I served up dinner to Rafa and myself - I had mash and leftover salad from yesterday, with the gravy of course. Here is Rafa's plate:
Rafa really enjoyed his meal, but only managed one sausage and some mash. It hardly happens, perhaps the culinary equivalent of a blue moon, but the man just wasn't hungry! Damn, the first time he really really liked something, and he wasn't bloody hungry! Well now I'm going to feed him veggies every day till he begs for some S&M! Hrmph!

The Reluctant Non-Vegetarian

Perhaps I'm a closeted vegetarian, because whenever I think of planning a meal that involves meat of some kind I really wish I was doing something else, like shopping! Meat doesn't excite me; there I said it! But even though CL is not exclusively meat, meat, and more meat, (actually it's very veggie-friendly!) there are still lots of meat recipes to get through, especially in the Grills chapter.

79. Grilled Steaks - Grills
80. Braised Peas in Red Wine and Sage - Grills

Beef! The foundation of the American family -- and it couldn't be more stressful to me! For weeks I have been doing my pseudo-research on the type of steak cut to buy. I watched an episode of Test Kitchen where the editor of Cook's Illustrated (I call him funny, bow-tie man) described the best cheap cuts from a cow. I couldn't for the life of me remember what they were -- something like sirloin and butt, huh? So I also consulted my friend, Lisa, on Friday, the day I was to buy the steaks. She said her favorite was rib-eye. I went to a Chinese supermarket near where I live after work on Friday and none of the cuts looked familiar, and I really had no idea which would be good for grilling. I even asked the nice Chinese man behind the counter which would be good for frying or grilling (I simulated grilling action by flicking my wrists). He just smiled and shook his head. Ok -- so no steaks Friday night. I texted Lisa:

Me: So no steak tonight too fucking complicated
She: Get a ribeye

I had then remembered that I did see ribeye at the store -- but I was already walking home and thinking of a cunning plan of convincing hubby we were going to eat out that night - sushi!

It turned out that convincing Rafa was not that difficult - that man will say yes to anything involving the prospect of consuming beer! And I had decided I could always go back to the store on Saturday, which is what I did!

I bought two ribeye steaks - for a total of about $11 - ouch! I also got some frozen peas for the second dish.

Both were incredibly simple to make.

First, I started the peas. Since the peas were to be braised in red wine, Tom kindly requested (he did say please!) to not use plonk. Ladies and gents, non-plonky wine at your service:

If you're straining your eyes it's a Californian cabernet sauvignon - no idea what that means but I wasn't going to drink the puppy. The fact that it didn't say Goya on it meant it wasn't plonk!

Now back to the peas, I sweated some onions, garlic and sage (had to use dry as my store was out of fresh - typical!) with a little bit of salt. To this I added the red wine, which I let simmer for a little bit, and then I finally added the frozen (but thawed) peas. This was allowed to simmer in the sauce for about twenty minutes.

I got started on the steak close to the end of the peas' cooking time.

For well-done steak, which is how Rafa likes it, all you need to do is sear an oiled steak on one side in a hot and dry frying pan, and then season the steak before putting it into a hot oven. I really didn't care how well cooked my steak was since I kinda guessed I wouldn't enjoy it anyway. I used the poking test for doneness, and then let the steak rest for a few.

The steak was OK; nothing spectacular. Perhaps a better quality meat not cooked as much would have tickled my fancy, but really nothing to write home about. The peas did not impress either...


I could understand how they would have tasted horrible with plonk, but even with the non-plonk they were not that exciting either. Hmmmn, thank god for chocolate!

I had made these earlier in the day; they are from the Moosewood Low-Fat Cookbook. Not sure if I actually had a low-fat experience out of it since I gobbled up those three, plus five of their brothers shortly afterwards. A closeted-vegetarian surely needs his/her kicks from somewhere!

The night of fun did not end there!!! There was zilcherama on TV last night; Rafa and I stared at each other for a little bit - that got old very fast! So, we decided to play a one-on-one game of Pictionary. In case you're wondering if that is a euphemism for fornication, let me assure you it is certainly not! One-on-one is sort of ridiculous because the game ends in about 15 minutes and we can't exactly figure out who gets the points - plus we didn't have a rules manual, whoops!

Here is the finale to our intense game - Rafa at the board:


That's his drawing for 'warpaint', people - yah, I know, it baffled me too! Ten points to the person who can figure out which one of the above is Iraq!

Istanbul, Constantinople, Istanbul....

I am really all about theme nights... cooking a few dishes from the same country of origin, pretending that you are in some exotic locale. Plus, it's a way of getting a few recipes down at once, which is something I am in need of doing! Tonight - it's Turkey night!! No, not Thanksgiving... Turkey, the country -- lamb, tzatsiki (cacik), and salad!

72. Grilled Lamb Chops - *Grills*
73. Tzatsiki of Sorts - *Junk Food*
74. Turkish Salad - *Larder Salads*

When I went in search of minced lamb the other day and was completely unsuccessful, I did manage to pick up some lamb chops -- or at least I think they are. The package (yes it's from a supermarket, kill me all now!) said Australian Shoulder Lamb Chops. So I either have lamb shoulder or lamb chops - well, it looked grillable so I thought, why not?

Since the lamb chops would take the shortest time to cook and needed to be served warm, I started on the tzatsiki and salad.

Tzatsiki, as Tom points out, comes in many forms in many countries. The yogurt/cucumber/mint dish in Turkey would in fact be called cacik. Tzatsiki is the name for the dish in Greece. Lamb and yogurt always seemed to be a good pair so I didn't mind borrowing this recipe from the Junk Food chapter.

For the tzatsiki, I grated a cucumber that was deseeded.

I removed excess moisture and mixed it with thick yogurt, dried mint, finely chopped garlic and salt. I let it get 'cool as a cucumber' (thanks, Tom!) in the fridge, but before that I snapped a pic!!

Then, a few minutes before dinnertime, I began the salad. It is not a difficult salad, just time-consuming because it takes on qualities from salad niçoise, which must have potatoes and eggs just so. I first did the chopping for the salad - yellow peppers, tomatoes (deseeded), cucumbers (deseeded), and lettuce. I also added the butter beans before I put the entire thing in the fridge.

I boiled some new potatoes for the salad, and once a bit cool, tore them into uneven pieces. After tossing the potato shards in some olive oil, I let them sit to the side until I would start assembling the salad.

The lamb chops were just basically the hot grill/hot oven method used in all of the Grills chapter. I seared some lamb chops on the grill pan, and then seasoned them and put them into the very hot oven for a few minutes to finish them off. Here are the Australian Shoulder Lamb Chops!

While the meat was resting I finished the salad -- boiled a couple of eggs, toasted some almond flakes, and dressed the salad with olive oil, white wine vinegar, chopped dill, salt and pepper. I topped the salad with the almonds and put the quartered eggs to the side as a garnish. They came out a bit too, erm, runny, even though I boiled them for six minutes as stipulated. Oh well, never mind.

Here is the finished salad!

And closeup!

To go along with the Turkish theme, I also baked Nigella's Nigella Bread -- aka, bread with nigella (kalonji) seeds from How to be a Domestic Goddess.

The dinner was delicious! I had one of the chops, and although it was quite boney, the meat part was tender and juicy. It was lovely dipping some meat into the tsatski. The salad was fantastic too - lots of textures and colors, and I loved the unusual additions of almonds and dill!

Sorry I couldn't get a table shot - we have horrible lighting in our apartment and the only place that gets good light for pictures is the coffee table - so what you may see in almost all of my pictures that I don't crop to an inch of the picture's life is my Leksvik coffee table. We don't eat at the coffee table -- well not all of the time.

It's easy being green...

Meat is a big thing for my family. So much so that we can't wait for the thermometer to climb high enough to have an excuse for an outdoor barbecue. This weekend we didn't need any excuses; the weather was beee-yoo-tiful, and it's Memorial Day, the barbecue holiday of the year and the unofficial start of summer. Time to take out my white pants and sandals!

Since the BBQ would be full of meat, I thought I'd turn to the Grills and Pasta chapters for some lovely veggie and BBQ-friendly recipes.

62. Green Sauce (Salsa Verde) - *Grills*
63. Lentil and Vinaigrette Salad - *Grills*
64. French Bean and Avocado Salad - *Pasta*

The first two recipes could be made in advance, but not too far in advance, so I got started on them while I was still home. The title for this post is an appropriate one, and it's funny because I didn't plan for my menu to be so 'green', it just turned out that way.

The sauce was quite simple to make. It is basically a mixture of chopped gherkins, mustard, chopped shallots, and garlic, with some chopped herbs (I chose mint and parsley) forked through.

To this the oil and vinegar is added. The consistency of the salsa is up to the cook, and my mother-in-law tends to blend all the ingredients to make a loose sauce for fish. Since I was going to use the salsa as an accompaniment to meat, I decided to chunkify it and use less oil.

The lentil salad was just as easy to prepare. I pounded some garlic with olive oil to a paste, and to this I added mustard, vinegar, chopped shallots and a tin of lentils. Tom says you could opt to use just-cooked lentils, but it wasn't mandatory so I didn't bother. To the mixture, I added some chopped parsley, and that was all there was to the salad! I had a quick taste-test before I put it in the fridge and I must say YUM-O!

I prepared the avocado salad when I got to my sister's since avocados tend to oxidize fairly quickly. All that there was to it was blanching some green beans (couldn't find French, but who's counting?) in boiling water for a couple of minutes and then draining them. Once cool the beans were added to some torn up lettuce leaves and slices of avocado. I dressed the salad with lime juice and a dash of olive oil and salt.

Everything turned out be just so delicious. I was hesitant about serving lentils as a salad, especially since lentils are not a big thing to Russians. In fact, my family was examining the salad while the meat was grilling trying to figure out if there was even a Russian word for 'lentils'. Turns out there is, but I don't remember it now! The lentils were actually the first to go, and the salsa verde and salad plates were licked clean. They were all perfect accompaniments to the grilled chicken, filet mignon, and pork chops and sausages we had. Yes, they like their meat! I for one was really happy with all my contributions since I'm not the biggest meat eater - at least I didn't go hungry, quite the opposite.

A couple of views of my plate:

My brother-in-law's specialty is his grilled meats (that's chicken with salsa verde) and grilled sweet potato.

Another view of the recipes - this one is with the avocado/green bean salad at the bottom.

Lovely outdoor meal, thanks to Cupboard Love and some enthusiastic barbecuing men!

Down With Potatoes!!

Ahhh, I have had potatoes coming out my eyes!!! (Sorry, no pun intended! -- ah, who are we kidding?! Of course it was intended, I'm Ilana!) So, I knew for dinner tonight we were in need of something different and refreshing.

25. Grilled Chicken Breasts - *Grills*
26. Lemon Chicken - *Stir-Fries*
27. Greek Salad - *Larder Salads*

The method for the Grilled Chicken Breasts in the Grills chapter is fairly similar to the beginning of the Lemon Chicken recipe, so I decided to include it in the count of recipes I have made.

I got started for the dinner a couple of hours before the cooking as I needed to marinade two chicken breasts. The marinade consisted of the zest and juice of one lemon, sea salt, chilli flakes, and chopped garlic. I left it to marinade for about two hours.

marinading chicken

Then, about a half hour before the proper cooking I decided to get on with the salad, as it also needed a short marinading time. I combined a sliced red onion with cucumbers and hollowed out and chopped tomatoes.

hollowed out tomatoes

To the vegetables, I added half of a mixture of olive oil, red wine vinegar, and dried oregano. I let them marinade for about 25 minutes. I also marinaded some chopped feta with the rest of the dressing.

marinading veggies and feta

When everything was sufficiently engulfed in lovely juiciness, I added some lettuce leaves and combined everything together, with some torn up mint leaves on top. And that was the Greek Salad done. (I didn't add olives or capers, as we don't really like them.)

Then it was time to cook the chicken, as it didn't take very long and would need to be served warm. I heated up some oil in a hot frying pan (for the grilling method, the only difference is that the chicken would be oiled, not the pan) and seared the chicken breasts without their marinade. I then transferred the chicken breasts to a roasting pan with their reserved marinade and baked it in a very hot oven for about 15 minutes till lovely and juicy! (I cooked Rafa's breast longer, as he likes things, erm, really well done!)

The chicken was lovely and lemony. Tom includes this recipe for Lemon Chicken because he says it is usually done so poorly at Chinese restaurants. Tom's version puts those chicken dishes to shame! It was really fantastic! Paired with the mega-flavorful salad, the two are a match made in heaven! (And there are no potatoes in heaven, ever!)

Meat 'n' Potatoes

The thing about Passover is that you can't eat a heck of a lot of stuff you normally eat loads of -- but the two big things that are not restricted are meat and potatoes!!! Most families subsist on this every night practically, usually with some green specimen sharing the plate, but I have come to that point in my life where meat just doesn't excite me anymore... I see so much more variety in pulses and rice and other grains and vegetables, so I think that this is the hardest part of Passover for me - not to mention EVERYONE seemed to be buying whole pies of pizza in my neighborhood today!

So meat and potatoes it is! The entire Grills chapter is full of meat and fish grilling techniques, and various recipes for accompanying sauces follow.

20. Gallega Sauce - *Grills*
21. Grilled Pork Chops - *Grills*
22. Oven Chips - *Junk Food*

Gallega Sauce is native to Galicia, northwest region of Spain, and is best known for the octupus dish it accompanies in tapa form. Tom notes though that it is great with pork -- and pork chops happen to be Rafa's favorite type of meat! I got started with the sauce first, so I wouldn't have to worry about last-minute fiddling with the recipe. It is a very easy emulsion of smoked paprika (pimentón dulce), olive oil, lemon juice, and salt. Tom suggests marinading a sliced onion in the mixture would make it extra special, so that is what I did! I was quite keen to finally use a lot of the pimentón I got in a market in Valencia. It was there that I got the 'dulce' and the 'picante'... Let me tell you, the picante is HOT!

A big portion of pimentón for only .60 Euros!

The final mixture before adding onions

Once the sauce was pretty much done, I got started on the french fries, or chips for the Brits like Tom! A couple of tablespoons of butter were melted in a hot oven in a roasting tin, and then cut up potatoes were added and roasted.

The pork chops were equally simple. The fat of the pork chops were seared first on a grill pan, and then each side of the chop was seared for two minutes. Then, the chops were put in a roasting tin and baked. This is part of Tom's 'Hot-Pan, Hot-Oven' method. The pork chops baked in the hot oven at the same time as the oven chips.

Once everything seemed to be cooked fully - I planned it so it would be done at roughly the same time - I just put everything on the plate and we went to town!

The sauce was fierce! -- but definitely in a good way! The smoked paprika really did its job, and the onions were so beautifully marinaded even after such a short time. The Oven Chips were the highlight though for me!!! I've never roasted fries with butter, and it made it so soft and moist, I think I will use this method from now on! I was going to make mayonnaise as a condiment for the fries, but the Gallega Sauce was perfect on top of the potatoes as well. Fantastic!

After dinner all that awaited us was a beautiful piece of flourless chocolate cake! Not a bad way to end a lovely day off!

Burger-licious!

I had it in mind this evening to cook a nice comfort meal - with all the works. Tom N-D's Junk Food chapter includes many recipes for meals such as these. I discussed my idea with Rafa over email:

Me: Tonight I'm thinking burgers. Let me know what you think!

Rafa: With meat?

Let me explain. Rafa doesn't consider anything that wasn't once an animal to be part of a burger. So when I made Nigella's Mushroom Sandwich, I called it a Portabello Burger. He found that ridiculous; as how could it be a burger if the mushroom was never a living breathing walking animal! I am inclined to agree with him, and only called it a 'burger' because I didn't think 'sandwich' sounded substantial enough.

But for tonight I wanted to make a burger for real... and this time with lots of sides.

4. A basic, no-nonsense hamburger - *Junk Food*
5. Dill sauce - *Junk Food*
6. An edible coleslaw - *Grills*
7. Basic ice cream shake - *Afters*

I bought all the ingredients for dinner after work and got started as soon as I got home! The coleslaw came first as it needed to 'cure'. The carrot was grated and white cabbage finely chopped:

Then, they were put in a bowl with lemon juice, salt, and a pinch of sugar. They were left to 'cure' for 30 minutes.


Meanwhile, I started working on the dill sauce which was supposed to be an added condiment to the whole burger operation. I've never eaten dill sauce before, let alone made it. This is probably when I should tell you I haven't actually eaten an entire burger in my life! I have a phobia with minced meat, and I figured this project was the way to overcome it. The dill sauce was a very basic combination of mayonnaise, yellow mustard, dill, and chopped up gherkins. I am not exactly sure what gherkins are so I bought some lovely Israeli pickles instead... yum yum yum! (I also added some dijon mustard and mayonnaise to the cole slaw when it was all 'cured', and it was ready to go!)

Love that color!

The condiments!!! Squeezy-bottle central!

Then I got started on the burgers. All that Tom indicates to add to the meat is some salt and pepper - the meat should do the rest!

I don't use this grill pan enough -- I love it!

And then it was all down to putting the burgers together. Rafa wasn't sure about the dill sauce, but he drowned his burger in it later... It's a yummy and pungent sauce; I could imagine using it for many things.

My burger - tarted up with cole slaw on the side and dill sauce on top

And Rafa's - tarted up in his own way ;)

After dinner, I watched a fabulous episode of Lost and then got started on our 'afters'. No burger diner experience is complete without a frothy and yummy ice cream shake.... Or maybe it's just me that has romantic visions of poodle skirts and tight sweaters, eating burgers with shakes after school... Or maybe I just watched Grease one too many times.

The 'ice cream' of choice was chocolate! Maybe too bold for Sandy Olsson, but definitely not for me!! A couple of scoops of ice cream were pureed with some ice in a blender and then a cup of milk was added.... Turned out to be the most fabulous shake ever!!! And a perfect end to a lovely meal!

I loved the combination of all the flavors and I'm looking forward to many more theme nights such as this one!