House Girlfriend

In honor of Mother’s Day, I’ve prepared some of my own mother’s favorite meals: a summer picnic!

All quite traditional picnic foods, none of which I’d made before… and all of which turned out wonderfully well. The perfect deviled eggs, refreshing cucumbers, perfect fruit salad, and flawless fried chicken- not that I can take any credit for that (more on that later).  An ideal way to kick off summer, and a lovely way to celebrate Mother’s Day. 

DEVILED EGGS

INGREDIENTS:

4 hard-boiled eggs, cooked and shelled

2 tablespoons Hellman’s mayonnaise (there’s really no other kind)

1 teaspoon strong Dijon mustard

1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

1/8 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

4 drops Tabasco

paprika, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Hard-boil the eggs, then let them cool in a bath of cold water. When the eggs are cooled, de-shell them, then carefully cut them in half. Set the whites aside and add the yolks to a medium mixing bowl. Mash the yolks, then stir in all remaining ingredients until seasoned to your liking, and garnish with paprika.

CUCUMBER AND ONIONS

INGREDIENTS:

2 large cucumbers

1/2 cup red onions, thinly sliced

1 tablespoon coarse sea salt

1/2 cup balsamic vinegar

1/2 cup water

DIRECTIONS:

Score the cucumbers with the tines of a fork, scraping the skin off to form ridges. Slice in 1/4-inch slices and place in a bowl. 

Sprinkle with the salt, cover and refrigerate for one hour.

Remove and drain off any accumulated liquid. Add the onion slices. Combine water and vinegar and pour over the cucumbers. Cover and chill until serving time. 

FRUIT SALAD

INGREDIENTS:

1 large orange, peeled, seeded and cut into bite-sized pieces

1 large lemon, juiced

1/3 cup mild honey

1 green apple, cored, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces

1 fuji apple, cored, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces

1 large banana, peeled (obviously) and thinly sliced

1 cup strawberries, hulled and quartered

1 cup red seedless grapes, sliced in half

1 teaspoon Herbes de Provence, optional

DIRECTIONS: 

Lightly stir together the ingredients in the order of listing. Add the Herbes de Provence, lavender or any other “odd” seasoning of your choosing, if you like. I have never been a huge fan of traditional fruit salad, as it reminded me so much of cafeteria lunches; and, while I am prone to love anything covered and soaked in Provencal herbs, I loved the complexity and unexpectedness that these herbs added to the salad.  

FRIED CHICKEN

DIRECTIONS:

Go directly to your favorite grocery store, find their prepared food aisle. Look for their fried chicken. Does it look good? If not, go to Popeye’s. If it looks good, buy it. At the store. Seriously.

This is probably blasphemy to my southern kindreds, but I am terrified to fry anything… much less chicken. And the fact that it is one of my absolute favorite things to eat makes it all the more daunting. I need several failed attempts at frying chicken before I’m ready to serve it, much less eat it in my mother’s honor. So, I bought it. Sue me: I made everything else. And my local grocery (Albertson’s, if truth be known), has pretty fabulous fried chicken. And with no oily mess to clean up!

Unfortunately, my mother lives many many states away. So I very rarely have the chance to see her on Mother’s Day or her birthday, which is only two days after. It sometimes saddens me that she can only see my progress as a growing house-maker and unmarried-wifey online; but, it’s what I have, so I’m making the most of it. 

In addition to a few choice presents I sent her for the occasions, I asked her to make a list of her favorite meals, things I could cook for her, if only I were there. Things I’ll cook for her here instead! She sent me the following:

• fried chicken
• cucumber and onion salad
• deviled eggs
• fruit salad
• chicken salad
• tomatoes with fresh basil and sea salt
• gazpacho
• ceviche
• strawberry shortcake

Obviously, it’s hot in Tennessee right now and she’s craving summer picnic foods- all things I have little to no experience with. I’ve never so much as attempted a simple fruit salad. And I’m terrified to death of frying anything, much less chicken. 

Funnily enough, The Boyfriend and I were planning a picnic anyway… so I’ll kick off my three days of Meals for My Mother with deviled eggs, fried chicken, cucumber and onions and fruit salad. I’m just hoping that only being able to look at your favorite meals and not eat them isn’t the most torturous present a daughter could give her mom.

We’ll see. Happy Mother’s Day, Mama!

So, I had some eggplant around because I initially intended to make my newly-babied friends an eggplant lasagna. I also happened to have about a quarter of a cup of cheese, some Italian breadcrumbs and my newly harvest basil plant just aching to be thrown together in a bowl. 

And that, to me, is the beautiful thing about salads. Just toss some disparate ingredients in a bowl, find a way to tie them together (in this case, the lemon juice), and you have a fresh, healthy, new masterpiece for your repertoire.

EGGPLANT SALAD

INGREDIENTS:

1 large eggplant, horizontally sliced

3 roma tomatoes, diced

1 clove garlic, minced

5-6 fresh basil leaves, chopped

1/4 lemon, juiced

1/4 cup shaved parmesan/romano/asiago

1/4 cup Italian breadcrumbs

salt and pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Turn on the broiler, and cover your broiler pan in tin foil. Place the eggplant slices onto the pan and drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper. Roast for about 5 minutes on each side, re-drizzling with olive oil on the opposite side. 

Remove the eggplant from the pan and, when cooled, coarsely chop and add to a large mixing bowl. Stir in the tomatoes and garlic.

Add the cheese, breadcrumbs and seasoning to your desire. Next, stir in the lemon juice and take one final taste test… 

Perfection!

Well, it’s that time again. Two more of our friends have had a baby and it’s The Boyfriend and I’s turn to take them food picked fresh from the food tree. 

I had so many lasagna noodles left over from our last Food Tree Lasagna, that I felt I had to make lasagna again- however unoriginal. Luckily for my repertoire, these particular friends are vegetarian. And, so, the search began for a lasagna recipe that would bring powerful flavor and depth, without the meat, tomatoes or general lasagna-y-ness. I found inspiration in Southern Living’s Zucchini-and-Spinach Lasagna, but deviated from their ideas so much, that I ended up (you guessed it), making up my own. 

ZUCCHINI-AND-SPINACH LASAGNA

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 cup red onion, finely chopped

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

15 ounce container of ricotta cheese

1 tablespoon dried oregano

1 tablespoon dried basil

5 small zucchini squashes (about 1.5 pounds), thinly sliced

2 cloves garlic, finely minced

12 ounce bag of spinach

16 ounce bag of mozzarella cheese

1 pound lasagna noodles

1/4 cup of grated parmesan cheese

salt and pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a heavy skillet and saute the onions until translucent (3-4 minutes). In a medium mixing bowl, combine the ricotta cheese with the onions, basil and oregano, and set aside.

Prepare your lasagna noodles- I bought the ready-to-bake noodles, but I’ve been boiling them for 1-2 minutes just to let them absorb a little moisture ahead of the baking and it’s been working out quite nicely.

Heat the rest of your olive oil in the skillet over medium-high heat, then saute the zucchini until lightly browned.

Add the spinach and toss with the zucchini until just wilted. Add the garlic, and cook for 1 minute more.

Set this aside and begin to assemble your casserole!

Lightly oil your dish (again, I used two 8x8 inch casserole dishes- but the recipe is ideal  for a 13x9 inch casserole, as well) and cover with one layer of noodles. Spread atop this a thin layer of the seasoned ricotta cheese. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle atop this a layer of mozzarella.

With a slotted spoon, take one third of the zucchini-spinach mixture and spread out upon the cheese.

Season with a dash of salt, if desired, and layer atop this another layer of noodles. Repeat the ricotta-mozzarella-vegetable-noodles layering twice more and top with one final layer of noodles. Sprinkle the top with remaining mozzarella and parmesan, and season with pepper.

Bake, covered with a lightly greased piece of foil, for 25 minutes. Uncover and bake for an additional 10 minutes, or until cheese is lightly browned. 

Could these BE any more beautiful?

Now, I really need my friends to stop having children, if only because it’s all The Boyfriend and I can do to keep from eating the entire dish seconds after it’s left the oven.

NOTE: I only wish I had known the last time I made lasagna this trick of keeping it covered for the first two-thirds of baking: the cheese kept so much fresher and cheesier. 

The first time I went to New York City, at the tender age of 18, we were set loose on a place called Little Italy. It had lived in my mind already for years, due to copious viewings of mafia movies and John Gotti exposes on “20/20”- but little did I know how romantic I would find it in person. The Little Italy I saw on that visit has all but disappeared now, pushed into a 5 block radius by the encroaching megaliths of Chinatown and Hipsterville. 

At the time, it was a wonderland of something completely unknown to me: Italian culture and food. My father rarely let us order pasta at restaurants and my southern family, whose cooking skewed towards cajun and southwestern cuisines, weren’t big on the savory pastas of our Italian-descended countrymen. That day, being offered wine and endless breads, pastas I’d never heard of and sauces I’d only dreamt of, was a revelation. 

In love with the romanticism of the narrow streets and old buildings, the feeling of being in a country so unlike my own America, I was moved to do something I had never done before: I ordered a meal whose name I didn’t understand. Based purely on the mellifluous sound of the word, I ordered orecchiette. And I’ve been in love ever since.

So naturally, when I came across an orecchiette recipe in Joy of Cooking recently, I had to share it with The Boyfriend. It’s a very simple, light (for pasta) meal that packs a buoyant flavor.

Did you know the secret to Italian cooking is packets of Domino’s Pizza crushed red pepper? 

ORECCHIETTE WITH SAUSAGE AND BROCCOLINI (adapted from Joy of Cooking)

INGREDIENTS:

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil

5 sweet Italian sausages, casings removed

3 large cloves of garlic, minced

1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1/2 pound fresh broccolini, de-leafed and coarsely chopped

1 pound orecchiette

1/4 cup shaved pecorino cheese

salt and pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Heat the olive oil in a large, heavy skillet over medium-high heat. When heated, add the sausage, cooking until nicely browned and breaking the meat up with a spoon as you do. Stir in the garlic and red pepper, cook for 1 minute more and then stir in your broccolini.

Cover and cook until just tender.

Meanwhile, prepare the orecchiette (mine took about 12 minutes to boil to the right consistency, so best to start this while cooking the sausage).

When ready, drain the pasta, reserving 1/4 cup of the cooking water. Add the pasta back to the boiling pot and toss in the sausage/broccolini mixture until the pasta is well-coated. Season with salt and pepper, toss in the pecorino and you are good to go!

A beautiful, delicious dinner in less than thirty minutes… and, my, how it brings me back. 

Every time I need fresh herbs for a recipe I end up spending $3 on a tiny bushel that lasts just the one meal, so I’ve been promising myself all spring that I would plant herbs. I’ve even left a packet of cilantro seeds out on the counter for weeks now- trying to guilt myself into planting them.

Today, it finally worked.

I went to the hardware store to look for a planter and while wandering the aisle in a dumb stupor, not sure what to buy, I remembered an abandoned pot that’s been resting on the side of our apartment since we moved in. I “reclaimed” it, planted my seeds and a few pre-started herbs in it and- voila!- my long awaited herb garden.

Now let’s see how long it takes me to kill them all.

As I am SURE you will remember, about a month ago I began the fight against light in our bedroom. Well, the fight continues… and today I conquered yet another window with film.

Before.

After!

(Now if only there were a way to make window-unit air conditioners look less… air conditioner-y.)

I’ve been tortured by a bag of frozen Mahi Mahi pieces I bought at Trader Joe’s a while back, not quite sure what to do with them. I had 99% decided on making a fish chowder, but after a hot, unfulfilling day… heavy, creamy soup seemed like the worst possible idea.

Thankfully for Google, I discovered not only the perfect dinner for The Boyfriend and I to enjoy after a stressful day, but possibly my new favorite cooking site: Vintage Victuals.

I made her Mahi Mahi with Avocado Salad almost to a T (I broiled my fish- and added a little more corn, some jalapenos and a lot more lime to my salad); it was the perfect meal for an early summer night. Refreshing and fresh, light yet delicious. Not to mention it looks incredibly beautiful:

And I can guarantee I’ll be living off of this avocado salad all summer:

Maybe it’s the coming summer, and my overwhelming desire for the tomatoes and peaches I spent my childhood summers eating, but I’ve lately gotten more than a little obsessed with Pinkberry’s peach-flavored frozen yogurt, to the point where I am structuring whole days’ activities around the Pinkberry vicinity just so I can sacrifice a breakfast or lunch for that peachy chemical goodness peppered with fresh(ish) raspberries… Such is my desire for peaches these days. And my desire for summer.

Wandering the aisles of Trader Joe’s, as I am apt to do, I found a bag of frozen mixed berries. And, while I can’t yet have the peach cobbler I’m dying for, I decided to settle.

I discovered that a cobbler is about the easiest and most satisfying dessert you can make… really. You just throw together some dough (easier than it sounds), throw some fruit on top, cover in copious amounts of sugar and butter and more dough… and you’re left with the fruity, sugary mess that is the miracle of cobbler. So much easier than pie or cake or cookies or ice cream.

So, without further ado: 

MIXED BERRY COBBLER

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup self-rising flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup shortening

4 tablespoons half and half

16 ounce bag of frozen berries (I used a mixed-mix w/ blue, rasp and black berries)

1 1/2 cups sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

3 tablespoons butter, cut into pats

DIRECTIONS:

After defrosting your berries, set them aside and preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

In a mixing bowl, cut together flour, salt and shortening until they resemble the texture of cornmeal. Add half and half and stir in to make a dough. Place the dough on a floured surface and roll out to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut into long strips.

Butter your casserole dish (I used an 8x8 inch dish, 3 inches deep for this). Place some strips of pastry in the dish’s bottom.

Add the fruit, and sprinkle with 1 cup sugar. 

Lattice the remaining pastry strips across the top of the berries. (Not the most impressive lattice work, admittedly.)

Sprinkle the top with the remaining 1/2 cup of sugar and cinnamon, and top with butter pats. (This is the gross part, but it’s so worth it… and would you believe this is only A THIRD of the amount of butter recommended by most southern grandmas?!?)

Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes, until the top is golden and irresistable. 

Me and the cobbler.

The cobbler, five minutes later… it’s that good.

So, not having any children and not being at a point in my life where I want any children, I had never before heard of a food tree. But it seems it’s a term I’m about to become very familiar with: within the last few days two of The Boyfriend and I’s very close friends have had babies. And a food tree seems the friendly and neighborly way of providing them food while they are learning to provide for a newborn human being. 

Easy enough! I love my friends, I love to cook… so why did I decide to make lasagna? 

I’ve never made lasagna before. Never made my own tomato sauce (at least not beyond the incredibly easy roasted tomato and olive oil version I’ve written about before). I barely ever even eat lasagna… perhaps the Italian-American wedding I attended last week inspired me. Perhaps I just wanted to have an excuse to eat our own lasagna all week (because I have to cook two, don’t I?). Or maybe, as I’ve suspected of late, I’m just crazy. 

Either way, I threw myself into another two-day cooking endeavor- and, boy, was it worth it. I opted to create my own tomato and meat sauce, as opposed the traditional way of halving meatballs… it just seemed too labor intensive for what my brain’s capable of at this juncture in my cooking career. The sauce is lovely, and probably usable for any number of dishes in the future. 

DAY ONE:

TOMATO SAUCE 

INGREDIENTS:

1/2 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley

4 cloves garlic, minced

2 oz grated parmesan

2 lbs lean ground beef

4 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium red onion, diced

4 ounces of chopped pancetta

2 28-ounce cans whole tomatoes, with juice

1 cup beef bouillon

1 4-ounce can tomato paste

1 teaspoon dried basil

1 teaspoon dried oregano

salt and pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS:

In a food processor, combine the fresh parsley, two cloves of garlic and parmesan until the mixture is finely ground. With your hands, knead this mixture into the uncooked ground beef.

In a large dutch oven, heat 4 tablespoons of olive oil on medium-high heat. When heated, add the meat and brown until there is no pink remaining. Add the onions, remaining garlic, and pancetta. Reduce heat to medium and cook about ten minutes, until the onions are translucent and softened. Stir in 1 cup of water.

Cook until water is almost evaporated, about 15 minutes. Add bouillon or red wine, the tomato paste and the two cans of tomatoes, crushing the tomatoes with your fingers as you add them to the pot. Stir in the basil and oregano and reduce the heat to a simmer. Leave the sauce uncovered, stirring often. Cook until thickened, about 30 minutes.

Refrigerate when ready, letting the flavors grow and strengthen overnight.

DAY TWO:

LASAGNA (adapted from Joy of Cooking)

INGREDIENTS:

yesterday’s tomato sauce, reheated

1 pound ricotta cheese

1 pound shredded mozzarella

1/8 cup grated parmesan

1 pound lasagna noodles

salt, pepper and garlic powder to taste

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Lightly oil your pan (I used two different 8x8 inch pans, 3 inches deep). Boil the pasta until barely tender, drain and separate.

Arrange a layer of noodles on the bottom of the pan. Spread with one-third of the ricotta, and season with salt, pepper and garlic powder.

Scatter one-quarter of the mozzarella over the ricotta, then spread out about one cup of the tomato sauce over the cheese.

Reserve one cup of sauce for the top of the lasagna. Add another layer of noodles, and continue layering the lasagna until all the ingredients are used. You should end up with 4 layers of pasta and three layers of filling. Top the final layer of noodles with the reserve tomato sauce, remaining mozzarella cheese and the parmesan cheese.

Bake until brown and bubbly. About 40 minutes.  

Cut yourself a slice… and try to save some for The Boyfriend or your newly-babied friends to share!