Marinades/Sauces -

by gansie

Purple Cauliflower Majesty

Okay, don’t freak out. But I’m starting to fall in the Liza camp.

It’s so simple and healthy to whip up something containing only veggies and a grain (or an egg), especially in the summer/fall when I can hit up the farmers’ market every weekend. Meat is, well, kind of a pain in the ass and is one more thing to deal with (and one more thing to buy.) Plus, I feel like I am more creative when I find ways to insert a vegetable as the star of the show. Yea, 80P bitches about this latest endeavor, but he’s secretly getting into it as well.

I’m not as hard core as Liza, but unknowingly, I probably eat meat only 2 times a week and it’s mostly when I go out or eat with friends. Seeing a bloody cut of steak absolutely turns me on still. Don’t worry.

Oh, and I blame Michael Pollan. Omnivore’s Dilemma seriously fucked me up. I have a hard time eating meat that was processed in those hell hole slaughter factories. Shit, I’m so brainwashed I don’t even want to buy produce at the Giant up the street. Which brings me to something I’ve been fretting over recently…what will I do when the farmers’ market closes for the winter? I can’t even remember how I survived last frost.

But, I’ll end the meat bashing for this week; we don’t want to turn our bacon contingency away. But there will surely be more on the Pollan phenom, as I’m still figuring out how to process all of this information.

Purple recipe post jump

by gansie

It’s Actually Not a Soup

Thank you for your suggestions on what to do with my crazy blended vegetable concoction. But like a true blogger, I really didn’t listen.

Chickpeas and Serrano Spiked Blended Vegetables

Toast a handful of pine nuts. When starting to brown, set aside. Warm up the sauce in that same pan. In another pan, warm through chickpeas and precooked bulgur wheat. When everything is warmed up, spoon sauce on plate. Top with chickpeas, bulgur wheat and pine nuts. Or if you don’t care about presentation, throw everything together and heat up. Blogging means extra pans and plates, unfortunately.

If your coworker happened to give you a fabulous sack of homegrown tomatoes (thank you Edy!) then top the dish with raw chunks of tomato (sprinkled with kosher salt.)

If you hate tomato, skip that step.

Oh, and not that I even know what this does for my body, nor what it really tastes like, but you can sprinkle nutritional yeast over the chickpeas. I’m trying to find more uses for the yeast. Although my two nut. yeast experts — Maidelitala and Elizabeth — claim you can’t mix it with yogurt. We’ll see.

Tag clarification
So this is not Indian, I know. But with the slight heat and chickpeas and cumin and yogurt, 80 and I felt like it had an Indian flare and texture.

in Recipe / Veggie 3 comments

by gansie

A Soup By Any Other Name

Sometimes I’ll be at home and I’ve already cooked dinner, and I’ve already made lunch for tomorrow (and the next day) yet I still feel like cooking. Well, this is when it gets dangerous. Especially this time of year with all of the amazing vegetables available from the farmers market. Actually, let me take that a half step back.

I’ve finally had my first fight with the market. I could deal with the limiting hours (only 9-1 on Saturdays from May through November); I could deal with the price spikes (a bunch of parsley for 3 bucks instead of 50 cents at Bestway); but I was not prepared for invaders.

So I was taking lettuce out to be washed for a salad and all of a fucking sudden – there was a SPIDER in my bag-o-greens. I didn’t scream. I backed away. I was pisted. I was scared. And then I gently tied the bag together – spider inside – and threw it in the trash. My love affair hit its first bump. And I might be off the salad for the rest of the summer.

Regardless, so there I am, in the kitchen, having already cooked what most people don’t even put together in a week, and I’m ready for more.

Recipe for something, post jump

in Breakfast / Drinks / Recipe / Veggie 6 comments

by gansie

Spice Master: Contestant #1

Editors Note: I’ve got to be honest. So I hadn’t cooked in a while and was trying to think of something I could post on ES. And then I remembered those kick-ass spices that I got from Gypsy‘s travels to Tunisia. Contest – now that’s an easy post. I had no idea that people would actually try to figure out that impossible 12. Especially for the lame prize of pre-made seasoning packets – basically the most opposite item anyone savvy enough to enter the contest would actually want.

Regardless, after checking the entries, we had a tie. And without even asking the co-winners, we decided to ride out the enthusiasm of the Spice Master Contest. So here we are, we demanded that ES readers guess spices they couldn’t even smell and now we’ve demanded that the co-winners give us recipes based on those same foreign spices. Luckily, both bobby (aka bobbyc) and JoeHoya took this opportunity to send in breathtaking recipes. Thank you to both.

So here we are with bobby’s Tunsian recipe. Tomorrow we’ll post JoeHoya’s recipe. And on Wednesday we’ll offer you a chance to vote for the winner in a special Who Cooked It Better: Spice Master Edition. Stay tuned.

Spice Master Contender: bobby

Typically when I cook a new dish, I look at a bunch of different recipes, get an understanding of the basic concept of the dish, keep the essential ingredients the same, and play around with the rest. For Coucha (spelled Koucha in some references), I couldn’t find any recipes — only descriptions. Odd, since most references describe it as a “Tunisian favorite.” The basic idea seems to involve cooking a young lamb shoulder smothered in oil and spices at low heat in a sealed earthen vessel — similar to a Moroccan tajine. The low heat for an extended period of time breaks down the fat, making everything delicious, and the sealed vessel keeps everything super-moist.

I built my own clay vessel out of flower pots at Lowes — just had to make sure everything sealed fairly well.

From the rest of my reading on Tunisian cuisine, I gathered that nearly every meal is served with couscous. It is prepared in a special couscoussière, which steams the grains while you cook a stew of meat, vegetables and spices below. I didn’t have one of these, so I put the couscous in boiling chicken broth, then mixed in an assortment of spiced vegetables.

To finish everything off, I mixed up some harissa — spicy pepper & garlic sauce. From what I gather, harissa is the ketchup of Tunisia, only with flavor.

Click through: full recipe, more pics, serving suggests

in Contests / Recipe / Red Meat 5 comments

by BS

Crazy Cooking Confession: Drinking the O Juice

Last time I shared a secret with you guys, you totally ripped me a new one, yet for some reason I still feel compelled to keep on sharing every weird thing I do.

I know Edouble has already told ya’ll about the great pickletini, but I think you still may not quite understand how much we love drinking salty, briny water. Back in the day, when I finished a jar of pickles or olives, I used to simply pour the excess liquid down the drain before washing the jar out and recycling it. But then when I lived with Edouble, I was sharply reprimanded for this wasteful action. Why? Girl likes to take the jar and drink the leftover juice like it’s lemonade. This is an action that has caused more than one observer to gasp in horror and/or keel over in laughter.

I’ve since tried it myself, and while I can’t down an entire jar of the stuff as quickly as Edouble can, I have to admit I have become a full-fledged fan, and will never again throw away leftover olive juice.

So recently I was throwing together some kind of tortellini explosion style dish, emptying my fridge and throwing all kinds of randoms in with the pasta.

in Personal / Recipe / Trends 8 comments

by 80 Proof

Artsy Photo of the Day

So good, it sticks to your ribs.

Recipe after the jump…

in Photos / Recipe 3 comments

by gansie

Syn, Syn, Syndicated

Just letting you know, I’ve become Robert Novak. No, really. People now pay to reprint my writing. I know. Crazytown. So, watch out for a gansie coming to your local Onion…New York, Chicago, Wisconsin, Austin, Denver, Minnesota, San Francisco…

Oh, and I never read. This story for the Onion was quite a struggle and I severely bothered my friends over this feature.

Read and Feed

What used to be a way for suburban mothers to get out of the house has now evolved into a way for young, single 20-somethings to get out of the house. While book clubs may vary drastically in theme (feminist, history, Oprah), participants (co-workers, neighbors, Craigslisters), and fun (glass of wine, bottle of wine, bowl of marijuana), all book clubs rally around food.

Some book clubs meet at a centrally located restaurant where they can linger over dog-eared pages, drink from communal
pitchers, and let other people make the food—but that can lead to members spending more time contemplating the pages of a menu than those of their literature.

Instead, class up your next book-club gathering and create a meal based around your book choice. (Or, alternatively, choose your book around a meal.) Here are some fine page-plate pairings to get your literary and culinary mind in gear.

Ron Paul, The Revolution
w/ Broiled Steak and Chipotle Dipping Dauce

If you think hope is audacious, don’t care about villages, and are through trying to live up to daddy’s example, perhaps you’d be more interested in the political upheaval espoused by 10-term congressman and Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul. His The Revolution touts the glories of the Constitution, reveres the vision of the Founding Fathers, and rages at what’s wrong with our current government. While chewing through this meaty treatise on libertarianism, pay tribute to Paul’s Texas roots by chewing through a broiled steak.

In a Pyrex dish, marinade a cut of flank steak with extra-virgin olive oil, crushed garlic, cumin, oregano, chili powder, kosher salt, and freshly ground black pepper; toss in some red wine too, but only if it’s from California—Paul’s an isolationist. While this sits, mix together sour cream, one chopped chipotle in adobo sauce, plus some adobo sauce, salt, pepper, and a few squeezes of a lime to create a smoky, hot dipping sauce. When the guests arrive, stick the steak under the broiler for two minutes, then flip it and cook it for another two minutes. Transfer to a cutting board, drape it with tin foil, and let it sit for seven minutes. Slice against the grain and serve it with your sauce. Keep your utensils in the drawer.

in Politics / Recipe / Red Meat / Veggie 3 comments