G's Lentil Soup

There's this little dive of a restaurant in Chicago called The Taste of Lebanon - the food is great but it's a total dive.  Me and my friends used to call it The Smell of Lebanon (BOOM!) Anyway, they have this totes ridick soup that is to die.  My friend G recreated it rather handily, and we've been working on re-creating G's ever since.  We've gotten pretty close.  Here's the recipe, mostly for my own well-being - I keep losing it...

2lb Red Lentils

2 large onions
3 cloves garlic
Cumin (1 tbs? To taste)
Paprika (same)
Hot pepper ( to taste)
Tomato paste ( 1/3 -1/2 a small can?)
Salt
Olive oil
Black pepper

"Heat lots of olive oil in a large pot(1/3-1/2 c?). Add onions and caramelize for a while. Add garlic and spices, cook until fragrant. Salt. Add tomato paste and cook, stirring often so it toasts but doesn't burn. Salt. Add lentils and stir to coat them all with the oil and other stuff.  Salt and pepper. Add about 10 cups water and cook until lentils soften and start to break apart, adding more water if soup gets super thick. Add salt and TONS of pepper to taste. I also added a little more olive oil to make it nice and rich, not sure how much, to taste.  Add a dash of lemon juice at the end."

G's like a real cook and everything so she really follows her nose and her heart when she's cooking.  Not like the rest of us schmucks who are like, "Now, what does she mean by 'hot pepper'?"  Truthfully, I do not know.  Just shut up and put something a little spicy in there.

Tiny cars and food: Roman edition

Here are a couple of pics from our trip to Rome - even though we have tiny cars in the US now, I cannot resist taking pictures of eensy-weensy cars in Europe. How can I get a truck like this?  I could drive it to the thrift store and buy all the jacked up chairs I wanted.  I WANT ONE SO BAD!!!!

Also, look at this Gucci car we saw.  I  WANT ONE SO BAD!

 If you buy a pizza slice to go, they cut it in half, fold it, and hand it to you in paper.  We got these at this great spot for pizza, but I forget what it's called.

One time I ordered pasta with shrimp and it came with heads on.  And then we laughed for a long time.  

Grilled Pizza!

I've been really sick lately - total bummer.  I'm kind of making a comeback now (thanks to a second round of antibiotics), but it's pretty slow.  So, life's been pretty boring for me lately - haven't done much but lay around on the couch watching the slim offerings of Netflix (exhausting everything they had to offer in the British Lady Detective genre) and going to bed crazy early.

But, this weekend, thankfully, I did finally feel a tiny bit better.  Enough to go out for brunch, hang out in the backyard, and even do some cooking.

I made a pumpkin bread with buttercream frosting and salted caramel drizzle that sounds better than it tastes.  I made peach ice cream, which tastes even better than it sounds.  And tonight M & I grilled pizza.  OMG, so delicious.  We made the dough ourselves, and three kinds: Margherita, Mexican, and... wait for it... peach and goat cheese with truffle oil and honey.  It was bonkers delish.

We demand ... a Shrubbery!

So, recently I had a delicious drink that had a "shrub" in it.  What is a shrub? you ask.  Well, it's very simple.  It's a couple cups of apple cider vinegar, which has some fruit in it, you do some stuff, and two days later, you put it in a drink with some booze and some sparkling water, or, just sparkling water, if you're some kind of prude or something (j/k) and then, Oh My.  

I made a raspberry shrub and mixed it with some whiskey.  It's very refreshing.  If you like vinegar even a tiny bit, I think you're going to go completely bonkers over this.

Here's a treat

Goodbye, Tomatos!

So sad!  Tomato season is pretty much over.  We might get one or two more ripe ones off our vines, but the bountiful harvest, alas, is passed*.

M grew I think 8 different kinds of tomatoes this year:  Lemon Boy, Cherokee Purple, Sweet Million, Betty's Orange, Speckled German, Brandywine, Black Prince, Green Zebra.  Many a night we enjoyed tri- or even quatra-colored bruscetta.  My faves were probably Green Zebra and the Black Prince, and Betty's orange.  M's was the Cherokee Purples, followed by the Brandywine.  The Speckled Germans, we agree, were all-around excellent.

I'm quite fond of Betty's Orange because it has a nice provenance.  It's an heirloom tomato who's seeds were passed on to us from M's Granny from her neighbor, Betty.  And it's orange.

I've become an incredible tomato snob and I basically won't even EAT a tomato unless it came out of my own backyard.  Which means that I really don't eat tomatoes about 10 months out the year.  However, this summer I did discover a few recipes for baked/roasted tomatoes that I can probably use with inferior, store-bought, tomatoes and not be too unhappy.

Until next summer, I must remind you of two of my favorite things to do with green tomatoes - Green tomato bread, which is amazing**, and my green tomato Italian Farmhouse Pickles, of which I just made many many jars.  If you are very lucky, I will give you one and you can experience for yourself the feeling of pure adrenaline that results.  It's kind of like getting slapped in the face.  Maybe I'll give them to my enemies as well, just so I can see the look on their rotten mugs. 



*Note: this word caused me and M much consternation.  Is passed?  Is past?  I hope I got it right, but I'm too lazy to look in the Chicago Manual of Style.


** Except she puts 1 cup of Spenda in which I think is DISGUSTING!  Why would you ever ruin perfectly good food you grew in Your Own Yard but dumping a bunch of POISON in it, I ask you?  Anyway, just leave out the Splenda, 1c sugar is plenty. 

Rejoice: Brunch

We had a lovely brunch with a few friends today. We hashed out a menu and then rewrote the whole thing after I discovered a recipe for asparagus pie (with chevre and goat cheese - *drool*) in Bust magazine and M remember that we hadn't included that all-too-important-item: deviled eggs!

Cucumber and Raspberry Vodka Sparklers
Coffee

Deviled Eggs
Salmon Mousse

Asparagus Pie
Fried Potatoes
Berry Fruit Salad
Buttermilk Chive Biscuits (with bacon)

Lemon Curd Cupcakes
Assorted Ice Creams

Oh, my dear, it was lovely (if I do say so myself.) Yet another reason I love Bust magazine. Sometimes I forget what I'm reading, and I'll be like, OMG, this magazine is so great, it's all about women! And then I'm like, Oh, duh, it's Bust. What is WRONG with you, you STUPID IDIOT!?! (joke.)

In other food news, we popped into Publican yesterday and had the best french fries (oh, pardon moi: frites) I've ever had, ever? I intend to go back, soon, preferably with a meat-eater, or, with someone who hates french fries, so I can eat them all by myself. Aside from all that fun, the weekend passed, as it usually does, in the blink of a lamb's tail. Happy Spring!

Coconut

When we were in Hawaii a few years ago, driving along a mountain road we saw a woman selling roasted coconut. We do not like coconut, but we do like side-of-the-road-food, so we bought some, and it was incredible. We've never had anything like it since.

Husband is trying to recreate delicious treat and bought two coconuts and drained them (hammer a hole with an awl into opposite sides, like so...)


"There are two schools of thought," he tells me, "One is, you wrap it in a towel and you go outside and bang it like hell on the sidewalk. The other is, you wrap it in in a towel and go outside and hit it with a hammer." Observe.



That was disgusting. Then he did it again. Success.



Then you chop up the coconut and roast with sugar for... 10 hrs! It's still in the oven.

Thanksgiving 2010 Menu

Cheese plate with fig jam
Paté*
M's Agreeable Pickles
K's Disagreeable Pickles

Roast Goose
Sage Stuffing
Mashed Potatoes
Indiana Sweet Corn
Brussels Sprouts with Roasted Chestnuts
Broccoli au Gratin
Bread Rolls

G's Petit Gooseberry Pies
P's Pumpkin Pie

And, a lot of wine.

* I made it myself! It was unpleasant...

evil cupcakes

I've been wanting to make be-flagged cupcakes for ages now, and finally did it! Fun! Gee, these are really nice.

More tomatoes?

It's starting to get cold in this area, so we pulled the rest of the tomatoes off the vines, including the green ones.

In previous years, we tried to follow our grandmothers' advice and wrap the green tomatoes in newspaper, snuggle in a box, and put in a cool, dark place. Supposedly the tomatoes will ripen, we were told, and we'd magically have red tomatoes when we expected them the least. What really happens is, you put the tomatoes in the basement, promptly forget about them, and then what you have is a box full of mold when you least expect it.

This year I decided to try a few recipes instead. I'm not a big fan of fried green tomatoes, so the first thing I made was Green Tomato Bread. It's kind of like zucchini bread, but tastes a little crisper. It was delicious! I took a loaf to my office and everyone raved. Very easy to make. Here's a pick of the green tomatoes all chopped up - you just squeeze the liquid out and mix in the dough. Nice and cinnamon-y - I'd highly suggest this if you have some green tomatoes to use up. Recipe via Cooking with Michele.

I also made slow-roasted tomatoes with the smallest tomatoes - you just cut them in half, throw them on a pan on parchment paper, drizzle with olive oil and roast them in the oven at 275 for a loooooooong time. We had ours in there for about 6 hrs. Tasted one tonight - like pure heaven! Recipe via Smitten Kitchen (she has gorgeous photos so I didn't bother.)

Canning!

Quite overwhelmed by the output from our tomato garden, we finally took the plunge to give canning a try! We did twelve half-pint jars (mostly because we don't have a gigantic pot big enough for pint jars), and it was really fun, and our cans are beautiful. When we crack open those jars in the middle of winter and taste the tomatoes from our own garden, I can tell you... we are going to be extremely SMUG.

Tales of long hours spent over the stove, I can tell you, are overdone. We did all the work in about 2 hrs, and then waiting patiently while the jars boil in the pot. Basically, you just boil the jars to make sure they're squeaky-clean, then you blanche the tomatoes to slip off the skins, then you stuff the tomatoes in the jars, then you put the lids on and boil them again.

If you're interested in trying it, I mostly used these two sites:
Martha Stewart, which is kind of basic, and this one, which had more details.

One of the most exciting aspects of canning was discovering just why one of our heirloom varieties was called Amish Pink and Yellow. Here you can see an average haul from our garden, where the orange Amish Pink and Yellow are virtually indistinguishable fro Betty's Orange (an orange tomato from M's Gran's friend Betty, you see.)

When canned, we saw this lovely (wait for it) pink and yellow emerge!

Anyone else canning? I'd be interested to hear what you've made!

Freezer corn

When we were in Indiana last weekend we stopped at our favorite vegetable stand and bought (a mere) two dozen ears. They had a "Freezer Corn Special" for $3-something a dozen if you got 10 dozen, but that's a lot (even for us!)

M's granny gave us her recipe, which I'll recap here. (I posted about this in the bygone days of aught-eight, and just had another laugh at my dad's comment!)

• Slice the kernels off 16-24 ears.
• Melt one stick of butter in a heavy saucepan.
• Mix in corn with approx. 1 cup water.
• Cook for approx. 20 minutes.

The trick to slicing the kernels off the ear is to put a small bowl upside down in a large bowl. Put the ear on the up-turned bowl and slice down with your knife.

Then, hold your knife perpendicular to the corn and drag it down the ear. This is called "milking" the corn.
It's really easy to make and ten-thousand times better than (dare I say it?) canned corn. I can't wait to eat it at Thanksgiving! In fact, we couldn't wait to even get it in the freezer, we had corn for dinner that night!

Panzanella

One of our favorite summer dishes is the Italian treat, panzanella. We first had it at my fave Chicago restaurant, Ante Prima. In our little family, we have bruscetta one day, and panzanella the next, with the leftover bread from the day before. Sometimes we buy lots of bread to make sure we'll have left-overs! You can put just about anything in it, but I like:

• Stale baguette, cubed
• fresh tomatoes
• cubed cucumbers
• thinly sliced red onion
• Balsamic vineger and olive oil vinaigrette

Throw the whole lot into a bowl and toss. Eat immediately. You won't want to wait, anyway!

Bruschetta

Bruschetta is a frequent summer favorite on our family table. Everyone has their own method of making it, but M & I do ours like this:
Start with a good baguette (I get mine at Bennison's Bakery), slice diagonally and brush with olive oil, then turn them all upside down on the pan and pour olive oil over the other side. Toast in the oven for about 5 minutes on each side.

Meanwhile, chop up your tomato nice and small, as well as basil. (That's the fun part for us because it all comes out of the garden.) Liberally salt (kosher salt is best, I think.)

When the toasts are done, rub with a garlic clove, then spoon on the tomatoes.

more tomatoes

Another favorite summer recipe is this one, which I'm pretty sure I saw on the food channel but can't seem to find a source. It's really simple and a really nice, light dish and a great way to use your fresh tomatoes.

So, you cook pasta, I prefer gemelli or some twisty pasta. In the last minute or so, throw some chopped broccoli into the pasta water and then drain when it's al dente. Meanwhile, in a big bowl, dump a thingy of ricotta and mix with 1/2 cup of pasta water. Whisk. Zest some lemon in there. Something amazing happens with the ricotta and water and it makes a nice creamy sauce for your pasta. Mix in the pasta and broccoli and top with cherry tomatoes. You won't BELIEVE how good it tastes. Oh, you can grate parm on top too.

what to do with tomatoes

I made a lovely little appetizer with our cherry tomatoes, basil and fresh mozzarella - it was as delicious as it was lovely to look at.