Autumn Jewels

Roasted garnet yams just scream autumn.

One of the things I love best about the fall is the arrival of garnet yams.  Not only are they absolutely delicious, as an added bonus they're good for you.  It's not often that something so good for you tastes so decadent.

I have to admit that for years the only time I ever ate yams was at Thanksgiving.  And, given how sticky and sweet the Thanksgiving preparation was, honestly it wouldn't have mattered if it was a yam lurking under the marshmallows or a russet potato.  The yams were mostly the vehicle for all the sweet, sticky toppings.

But if left to shine on their own, shine they will.  Like little jewels.  Garnet yams are absolutely delicious roasted with just the simplest preparations.  Melissa Clark's recipe for Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Garlic really showcases all that is truly special about a yam.

Ready for the oven.

Now don't get me wrong.  I suppose if I were a better, more disciplined person, I would serve a simple preparation like this one for Thanksgiving but I'm not.  There's a time and a place for marshmallows and brown sugar.  But there is also a time to let the yam shine on its own.

Recipe:  Cinnamon Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Garlic
(Melissa Clark, Cook this Now, 2011)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 pounds sweet potatoes, preferably garnet yams, peeled and cut into 1-inch chunks
6 unpeeled garlic cloves
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 thyme branches
1 cinnamon stick, broken into pieces
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 425°F. Put all the ingredients in a baking pan and toss to combine, then spread out in an even layer.

Roast until the potatoes are tender and browned, 25 to 45 minutes. Serve hot or warm, along with the garlic cloves.

Getting Back On Track

I have been over-indulging lately.  A trip to my bathroom scale this morning revealed that it is sheer luck that the dial hasn't moved up because I have been having myself a great old time eating everything that isn't nailed down.  It's time to get back to the basics of good eating.

With the holidays coming, I need to get on track.  For me, getting on track doesn't mean a steady diet of salad and protein.  It means a nice balance of foods, just a bit lighter, say without the heavy cream and the apres dinner ice cream.  Desserts are even admissible in moderation.  I always find I can watch what I'm eating much more easily if I don't feel deprived.

Before the oven.  Look how fresh and delicious everything looks.

I recently bought Melissa Clark's newest cookbook, Cook This Now.  It's filled with delicious sounding recipes that focus on seasonably available ingredients.  As I was flipping through the October and November sections I couldn't believe how many of the recipes sounded like something I had to make now.  For dinner.  Tonight.

Tonight for dinner I made this absolutely delicious roasted blackfish dish.  Not to worry if you can't find blackfish.  I couldn't either so I made it with sea bass and it was perfect.  This would be a winner even if I wasn't paying attention to what I'm eating.  Make this.  Now.  It's a winner and if you're already on track, dishes like this one will help you stay there.

Recipe:  Roasted Blackfish with Olives and Sage
(Melissa Clark, Cook This Now, 2011)

*  As noted above, if you can't find Blackfish (also called tautog), use striped bass, sea bass, or mackerel.

Ingredients:


3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 (1-pound) skin-on blackfish fillets, patted dry
Kosher salt, for seasoning
Freshly ground black pepper, for seasoning
1 small bunch fresh sage
1/2 cup pitted kalamata or other olives
Freshly squeezed juice of 1/2 lemon
Urfa or Aleppo red pepper, for seasoning
Best-quality extra-virgin olive oil, for drizzling (optional)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 425°F. Drizzle 1 tablespoon of the oil into the bottom of a baking sheet. Arrange the fish fillets, skin-side down, in the pan. Season the fish generously with salt and pepper. Tear the sage leaves into small pieces and sprinkle over the fish. Scatter the olives on top and around the fish. Drizzle the fish with the remaining 2 tablespoons oil.

Transfer the pan to the oven and roast until the fish is just opaque. 8 to 10 minutes. Squeeze the lemon juice over the fish and dust the fillet with Turkish (Urfa) or Aleppo pepper. Finish with a light drizzle of good oil, if desired.

Another Crazy Cooking Challenge: Mashed Potatoes

It's time for another Crazy Cooking Challenge.  This month's challenge was to find a blog that had an interesting mashed potato recipe.  Easy, you say.  I say that you would be wrong.

There are a million mashed potato recipes out there, not all of them particularly interesting. A good mashed potato recipe needs to have a little something something to make it interesting because let's face it.  potatoes are not an intrinsically a sexy food.  They're big and white and for those of us in the "know", they represent everything bad in a carbohydrate.  But I love them and so should you.

The thing about mashed potatoes is that they tread a fine line between sublime and wallpaper paste.  The good ones are deliciously earth moving and the bad ones can make you feel as though you're having a heart attack.  A good mashed potato is hard to find.

Garlic...

Potatoes...

Mashed Potatoes

This recipe form Steamy Kitchen is all a mashed potato should be and so much more.  It's got lots of roasted garlic in it and a fair amount of either milk or cream (your choice).  It can be made to be chunky and full of texture or smooth and creamy, each of which has it's merits.

I am usually a fan of smooth and creamy mashed potatoes but I decided that since this was a cooking challenge that I would challenge myself and go the chunky route.  They were absolutely delicious although with all that yummy roasted garlic, they would divine either way -- creamy or chunky.

Give these mashed potatoes a try and take a peek at Steamy Kitchen as well as all the other great blogs participating in this month's Crazy Cooking Challenge.

Recipe:  Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes
(Steamy Kitchen)



Note:  If you're roasting garlic, you might as well roast more than one head...you can use the rest for other recipes (it will store in the refrigerator for a few days) or just spread the soft, warm, mellow garlic over toasted baguette.


Ingredients:

1 head garlic
1 teaspoon olive oil
4 medium russet potatoes, skin-on scrubbed (for creamy mashed potatoes, peel the potatoes)
3-4 tablespoons butter
1/4-1/2 cup milk or heavy cream (or more)
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt (or 3/4 teaspoon table salt)
1 teaspoon minced fresh chives


Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400F. Cut off the top 1/2-inch of the garlic off. Lay garlic on piece of tin foil, drizzle olive oil over garlic cloves and close tin foil. Roast for 30 minutes or until the garlic has softened completely and is very tender. Let cool and squeeze out the roasted garlic cloves. Coarsely chop.


2. In the meantime, place the potatoes in a large pot and cover with water by 1 inch. Cover and bring to boil and cook for 20-25 minutes over medium heat, until you can easily pierce the potato with a fork with very little resistance. Drain potatoes.


3. For Hearty, Skin-On Mashed Potatoes: Return the potatoes to the pot over low heat, add 3 tablespoons butter, 1/4 cup milk, salt and roasted garlic. Use garlic masher to mash. Do not over mix or the mashed potatoes will turn gummy. Taste and season with additional salt or milk if needed. Stir in chives.


4. For Creamy and Smooth Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes: In the pot, add 4 tablespoons of butter, 1/2 cup of heavy cream, salt and roasted garlic and turn the heat to low. Use a potato ricer to mash the potatoes into the pot. [TIP: If you find that the potatoes need a little more cooking, just put them in the microwave for an additional 2 minutes]. Stir the potatoes. Do not over mix or the mashed potatoes will n gummy. Taste and season with additional salt or milk if needed. Stir in chives.

Recipe:  Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes
(Steamy Kitchen Blog)

*  Note:  If you're roasting garlic, you might as well roast more than one head...you can use the rest for other recipes (it will store in the refrigerator for a few days) or just spread the soft, warm, mellow garlic over toasted baguette.

Ingredients:


1 head garlic
1 teaspoon olive oil
4 medium russet potatoes, skin-on scrubbed (for creamy mashed potatoes, peel the potatoes)
3-4 tablespoons butter
1/4-1/2 cup milk or heavy cream (or more)
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt (or 3/4 teaspoon table salt)
1 teaspoon minced fresh chives

Directions:


1. Preheat oven to 400F. Cut off the top 1/2-inch of the garlic off. Lay garlic on piece of tin foil, drizzle olive oil over garlic cloves and close tin foil. Roast for 30 minutes or until the garlic has softened completely and is very tender. Let cool and squeeze out the roasted garlic cloves. Coarsely chop.

2. In the meantime, place the potatoes in a large pot and cover with water by 1 inch. Cover and bring to boil and cook for 20-25 minutes over medium heat, until you can easily pierce the potato with a fork with very little resistance. Drain potatoes.

3. For Hearty, Skin-On Mashed Potatoes: Return the potatoes to the pot over low heat, add 3 tablespoons butter, 1/4 cup milk, salt and roasted garlic. Use garlic masher to mash. Do not over mix or the mashed potatoes will turn gummy. Taste and season with additional salt or milk if needed. Stir in chives.

4. For Creamy and Smooth Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes: In the pot, add 4 tablespoons of butter, 1/2 cup of heavy cream, salt and roasted garlic and turn the heat to low. Use a potato ricer to mash the potatoes into the pot. [TIP: If you find that the potatoes need a little more cooking, just put them in the microwave for an additional 2 minutes]. Stir the potatoes. Do not over mix or the mashed potatoes will turn gummy. Taste and season with additional salt or milk if needed. Stir in chives.

Be There or Be Square

Monday is Crazy Cooking Challenge Day!

Be sure to check back on Monday after 12:00 p.m. for my second foray into the Crazy Cooking Challenge.  I promise there will recipes aplenty all encompassing this month's theme.  (I'm going to keep it a secret because I know how you all love the anticipation of what's coming next...)

Be prepared to swoon!  Be prepared to be inspired!  And be prepared to be inspired to click on links to lots of wonderful food blogs!

Goodreads Review: New Classic Family Dinners by Mark Peel

Take a look at Goodreads

This falls into the category of sometimes your kids really surprise you.

The other day Ted called me from the office to share an interesting little tidbit about our son Charlie.  Charlie, who is a voracious reader, apparently posts book reviews on a site called Goodreads.  I'm not talking about an occasional review.  He has reviewed close to 200 books over the last year and a half or so.  Some of the reviews are for books he's read for classes and some really reflect what he likes to read in his free time -- that is if you can call Ralph Ellison leisurely reading.  He's even been reviewing books he's reading in German while in Berlin although the reviews are all in English.  What can I say?  He's far more erudite than I am.

Anyway, once Ted told me about this I started surfing around Goodreads, not only to read Charlie's reviews, but to see what else was on the site.

Well, it turns out that there's a section dedicated to reviewing cookbooks.  It practically had my name written all over it.  If there's one thing I like doing more than cooking, it's reading cookbooks.  Cover to cover.  And fantasizing about actually cooking everything in a cookbook.  In order.  A la Julie and Julia.

As you know, I have hundreds of cookbooks and I have something to say about each one.  Who am I to deny to cookbook reading public my opinion?


New Classic Family Dinners by Mark Peel

My rating: 3 of 5 stars


I have a litmus test for all cookbooks. If, in the bookstore, I open the book to at least three recipes that I want to make, I buy the book. New Classic Family Dinners passed the test and has turned out to be one of my current favorite cookbooks. While I doubt that I will ever make every recipe in the book, the recipes for Tuna Noodle Casserole and Stuffed Shells made this a worthwhile cookbook purchase.

Mr. Peel's attention to technique and quality of ingredients is what really sets this cookbook apart. New Classic Family Dinners is a great addition to any kitchen library.



View all my reviews

Cookies as Cupcakes

Ever since last summer when I made the chocolate chip cookie dough cupcakes Kate has been asking me to make more.  Recently Kate's friend Isabelle mentioned that she thought Oreo cookie cupcakes would be good too.  Kate being Kate, thought this was a grand idea and who better to ask to make them than me.   Apparently the idea of making these cupcakes herself never entered Kate's mind.

So here I am, just one day into my new kitchen and I'm not sauteing with the aid of my new hood.  No... I'm baking Oreo cookie cupcakes.  (It is true that I am doing this in my new ovens but the hood makes for better copy.)  Anyway, I have engaged in yet another multistep cupcakes project at my daughter's urging.

Melting the chocolate with hot coffee.

There were several recipes for Oreo cookie cupcakes on the internet but none that really captured that Oreo-ness I was after.  So I picked and chose amongst the recipes and came up with my take on the
Oreo cookie cupcake.

The Oreo pieces tossed with flour so they don't sink to the bottom of the cupcake.

The "double stuff" at the bottom of each cupcake.

Ready for the oven.

First of all, they are delicious but moreover, they are adorable.  They kind of look like what an Oreo would look like if it was a cupcake.  Each cupcake has at the bottom one Oreo wafer with the "double stuffed" cream attached.  The top wafers are broken up in the batter and baked into the cake.

Right now I am all about cream cheese frosting.  Why not?  And this frosting, studded with Oreo cookie crumbs, is rich and divine.  Topped with a mini Oreo cookie, these cookies are really picture perfect.  See what I mean?

The finished product.

Recipe:  Double Stuffed Oreo Cupcakes
(Adapted from Cooks Illulstrated, May/June, 2010)

Ingredients:



3 ounces bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped
1/3 cup Dutch-processed cocoa
3/4 cup hot, strong-brewed coffee
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons bread flour 
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
6 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons white vinegar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
18 Oreo halves, with cream filling attached


Directions:


Preheat oven to 350°F and line a muffin pan with cupcake liners. Twist Oreos in half and set aside the extra cookies for later. Place the side with cream filling in the bottom of each cupcake liner, cream-side facing up.  Reserve remaining tops.

Place chocolate and cocoa in a medium bowl and pour the hot coffee over the mixture. Whisk until smooth and transfer to the refrigerator to cool completely, 20-30 minutes.

Whisk 3/4 cups flour, sugar, salt, and baking soda together in a medium bowl; set aside.

Cut the reserved Oreo tops into quarters.  Place them in a bowl and toss with remaining 2 tablespoons of flour.

Whisk oil, eggs, vanilla, and vinegar into the cooled chocolate mixture until smooth. Add flour mixture and whisk until batter is smooth.  Add the reserved Oreo tops and flour and combine well.

Divide batter evenly among muffin pan cups, filling each 3/4 full. Bake until cupcakes are set and firm to the touch, 17-20 minutes. Allow to cool in pans 10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely before frosting.

Oreo Cookie Frosting


Ingredients:



8 oz cream cheese at room temperature
1 stick butter at room temperature
1 Tbsp vanilla extract
3-4 cups powdered sugar
6 tablespoons Oreo cookie crumbs
18 mini Oreo cookies


Cream butter and cream cheese until fluffy.


Add vanilla extract. Slowly add powdered sugar and Oreo cookie crumbs.  Whip until light and airy.


Assemble the cupcakes:

Once cupcakes have cooled completely, using a large star tip, frost with cream cheese frosting. Garnish each cupcake with a mini Oreo cookie.

We Have Lift Off

The hood.  Note the new wall color.  It's kind of a goldy tuscan yellow.

I am very happy to report that my kitchen is back up and running.  Vince and his guys finished painting today and it looks just beautiful.  The hood is gleaming stainless steel and has enough torque to suck anything up that comes off of the stove.  I am in heaven.

Ted's birthday cake

Today is also Ted's birthday and up until 3:30 this afternoon when the guys pulled away from the curb, I wasn't sure if I would be able to cook Ted a birthday dinner.  I hoped that I would be able to but I had to first get the kitchen back in working order.   Luckily I am nothing if not efficient, and I got to work and in two hours flat it looked as though there had never been any construction.

But there's a limit to how creative I could be at 5:30 in the afternoon, especially when I hadn't yet been to the grocery store.  I decided to call on an old favorite, Ina's Weeknight Bolognese (You Little Tarte 11/8/10).  It's quick.  It's easy.  And it tastes like it's been simmering away on the stove all day.

I picked up some nice lettuce for a salad and then made a quick stop at Prantl's Bakery for a birthday cake. (Normally I would have baked, but there's a limit to what is humanly possible after a week under construction.)  Nonetheless, we had a perfect birthday celebration complete with cake, presents, and a brand new ventilation system.