Cooking Marathon in Progress...

In case any of you ever need to know, 40 pounds of chicken breasts can make roughly 340 satay skewers, if you use the 6" skewers and three 1" pieces of chicken per skewer.

Also: consider paying someone else to make them!

Puffed Rice Treats

Growing up I never made those puffed-rice crisp Brand Name treats. 

Not once.

SHOCKING!!!

This probably had to do with my mother not wanting to clean melted marshmallow out of her pans (they still do not own a microwave to this day... le sigh.) which is understandable, but still, boo-urns.

I decided I needed to correct this childhood oversight.

1/2 stick of butter. Melt.

However, I was merely following the instructions on the back of my package of mini-marshmallows, so there isn't much of anything magical going on.

Beyond the magic that is the gooey-sweet crispy.

Add marshmallows to melted butter.

Stir.

Microwave until melted.

Stir in puffed rice and place in greased, tinfoil-lined pan.

Allow to cool.

Seriously?

That's it?

No problem.

Tho I used organic puffed brown rice cereal instead of the brand name.

Don't worry. I'm not going all hippie-crunchy-vegetarian on you.

It was just cheaper...

:)

Roasted Squash Polenta w/ Sage-Pistachio Mascarpone & Sautéed Mushrooms

OK - I'm getting one Thanksgiving-esque food related post in before the holiday is upon us. Then I'm back to my regularly scheduled randomness.

I totally winged this recipe in an attempt to recreate a new dish from one of my long-standing regular haunts, Five Points. 

The owner is now the chef and there have been a lot of overhauls, not all of which are stellar.

(Ahem: the "Limit 2" on the $5 Happy Hour Martinis. Boo hiss.)

However, this has been a starter on the menu lately, and I decided to try to make it at home.

The major reason I avoid making polenta at home is that a) it's time consuming, and b) I don't actually want to know just how much butter, cream, and cheese restaurants put in it to make it tasty.

However, I risked it tonight, and knowing full well that it would be both a fattening AND healthy dish.

And I did a pretty decent job recreating it, if I do say so myself.

And I do.

Obviously.

Raw and ready to roast!

I started by carving up an acorn squash, drizzling it with olive oil and salt, and roasting it in a 425º oven for 45 minutes, turning it once halfway through.

Serious color = serious flavah

For the mushrooms I used a combination of dried (reconstituted) porcini mushrooms and fresh baby bellas. I sautéed them in a combination of olive oil and butter until they were really catching color, at which time I added salt and one grated clove of garlic.

Once the garlic was fragrant I added some of the reconstituted-mushroom liquid and a splash of dry sherry and let it cook out a bit.

Bland base...

I used quick-cooking polenta because... well... it only takes 5-8 minutes! I was extra harried in the kitchen since I was experimenting without a recipe and juggling FAR too many things at once.
(Three pans on the stove as well as the oven and I just did not have 35-45 minutes to stand there stirring regular polenta. Why so many pans? Well I had to make something the hubs would eat as well, what with his anti-mushroom feelings. Grumblegrumblegrumble...)


If you were to eat the quick-cooking polenta plain it really is sub-par.  It needs LOTS of help.
Luckily all the additions here make it fabulous. I followed the instructions on the box, made about 1/2 a cup dry to the one acorn squash, heavily salted it, and about a minute before it was done cooking I added a mix of milk and cream.

It was still rather dull, until...

... now super tasty

... you add the roasted squash! I just carved the flesh out of the skin and mixed it all together with a knob of butter. Suddenly it was an interesting flavor and texture. (Check for seasoning again.) But it was missing the big finish:

Mascarpone!!

I used about a tablespoon per serving (hefty but worth it), and had previously mixed 3 TBSP of mascarpone with 2 fresh leaves of sage, finely chopped, as well as a couple shakes (probably only 1/4 tsp) of dried sage, and 1/4 cup of chopped pistachios. 

Voila!

Serve up the squash-polenta mixture, top with a dollop of the sage-pistachio mascarpone, and then top with the sautéed mushrooms and extra pistachios.

Be sure to stir the mascarpone into the mix while it's hot to create a really decadent mouth-feel and flavor.

Of course, when I served this to the hubs, I omitted the mushrooms and served it as a side dish to some rosemary & pecorino-stuffed pork tenderloin. But that's his own problem.
Well, technically it became my problem as that made for the extra pan on the stove and in the oven while doing other things for the first time.
But it all worked out, and he really liked the dish sans mushrooms. 
So he gets to live.
I mean, hey, 'tis the season and all that.

While I do not suggest trying a new dish if you have company coming for the holidays, I definitely suggest trying this before squash season passes us by, because it is a VERY satisfying dish.

And I am seriously looking forward to leftovers tomorrow!

Sage & Pecorino Stuffed Pork Tenderloin

More experimentation, inspired by what's on hand and what might only have another day or two of a shelf life.
And it worked!!

I feel as though all I ever cook (and so all I really write about on here) are dishes consisting of chicken breasts or pork tenderloins. Again, because they are both affordable and healthy lean proteins, and also because they ensure that I can make dinner in under half an hour most nights.
The only problem is redundancy of meals!

So this time 'round I had fresh rosemary, some sage that was on its last legs, and as always I had pecorino cheese. So, I decided to stuff my tenderloin instead!

I made a slice straight through the center, but refuse to hammer out the meat. Yes, if you do so, you could get more of a roll going, but that isn't the point. I like my meat PLUMP and juicy, and when you beat chicken or pork into a cutlet or schnitzel-ready, you just destroy the meat.

At least that's my opinion.

Since this was only a .85lb tenderloin, I only used 1/4 of a sprig of fresh rosemary, finely chopped, and about 6 sage leaves, also finely chopped. However much fresh herbage that creates, add an equal amount of grated cheese. Sprinkle that down the center of your tenderloin pocket and roll shut.

Use a little butcher's or kitchen twine to make sure your tenderloin stays closed and your filling stays inside.

Season all over with salt, and add it to a hot pan to brown.

Brown all sides and throw into a 425 degree oven for 7-10 minutes (for a tenderloin as small as this one I only needed 7 minutes.)

Remove to a plate to rest and start the gravy.

To the oil and drippings in the pan I added 1 small shallot, diced, 1 clove of minced garlic, and a bit of salt. Once that has softened I add a little flour and stir to incorporate it well, and then throw in more diced sage. Maybe another 5 leaves worth.

(Remember, this was just to feed 2 people.)

Add equal parts chicken stock and white wine and reduce.

That pork looks a bit pinker than it did in real life, but it was tender and delicious. The sage was aromatic, the cheese had a bit of bite that worked surprisingly well with the pork, and the small bit of rosemary made the whole dish feel earthy and pulled together.

(You could go with just one or the other herb. I happened to have both, so used both.)

The hubs approved and it will definitely be a new addition to the dinner rotation!

Cauliflower Concoctions

I have so many ideas for blog posts, and so few days when I'm feeling articulate enough to really write more than just a bald step-by-step. At some point I am going to delve into palates and how they can change and expand as you grow up and have more varied experiences. Along those lines, there are foods I would not touch with a ten foot pole when I was a child, and now I eat them with relish.
And no, I don't mean that pickled crap people put on sausages and hot dogs.
I still won't touch that stuff.

My most recent experiment in palate expansion involved cauliflower.
Blech!
Even tho I just ate it, my knee-jerk reaction is still, ''blech!"
I can't help it.
It probably didn't help that in college I did a play in which there had to be a brain in formaldehyde on a doctor's desk, and to create the "brain" the prop master (hi Krainin!) used a head of cauliflower in a large jar of water colored with a yellow highlighter, and MAN did that thing start to stink after a couple days. The Green Room had that funk for weeks.

A lot of people equate broccoli with cauliflower, and I just have to say, they are wrong. That is like saying carrots and parsnips taste the same. They don't! (But they are both delicious.)
As a child I always ate broccoli, whether raw in a crudité platter, steamed or grilled, roasted, whatever. My mother still won't touch the stuff, but I love it. However, you could not get me to eat cauliflower. It was bland, it was icky, it was white!! Everyone knows that nothing healthy is ever white! So why make me eat it? 
(No one actually did force me to eat it, since no one in my family ate the stuff. I'm just making a point.)

So WHY I got it in my head to try eating cauliflower again is beyond me, but I decided to give it a go. And you know what? With the right preparation, it's not bad. It's not my favorite, but I can make it perfectly edible.
I prepared it two really really basic ways, and sneakily fed it to the hubs to see if he'd eat it, without telling him what I was doing. (So trusting!) He seemed to find it perfectly tasty.

Image borrowed from ChowMama.com cuz I didn't take a pic of mine...

Method One - standard roasting in the oven.

I cut up some of the florets (damn does that stuff grow tightly packed!) and drizzled them with olive oil and salt, threw them in a 400º oven for 20 minutes. They came out browned and crispy, and perfectly tasty. I popped a piece in Mike's mouth, sort of without him seeing what I was giving him, and his response? "Tastes like broccoli."

Not exactly what I thought, but good enough, considering that that style of preparation is the only way I get the hubs to eat broccoli. And he actually likes it that way. Not just "will eat" it.

My own thoughts? Nice light char taste, the salt helps, and the only thing that gets me is the texture. Cauliflower just has such a weird texture. That right there may have been 50% of why I never liked it before.

Method Two - mash that sucker up with a bunch of potatoes and cheese. Oh yes.

I sliced up two yukon gold potatoes, put them in cold water and brought it up to a boil until fork-tender. For the cauliflower, I did not like the idea of boiling. The only vegetable I will actually boil IS a potato that is being prepped for mashing. So, I steamed the cauliflower for 15 minutes on the stovetop, until tender.

Giant bowl of steaming-hot white vegetables.

To this I added about 1/4 cup of fresh ricotta cheese, some salt, and later a decent handful of grated pecorino romano cheese. (Instead I might have used some garlic salt, but I only thought of that after I'd added the cheese, and that would have been too much salt. Maybe next time. But it needed something with flavor to it. Like a small head of mashed roasted garlic!)

Mashed all together it looked like this. 

Had I been worried about presentation, I would have snipped some fresh chives on top for both color and flavor.

Clearly, I was lazy.

Looks aside, it tasted pretty good. Creamy and cheesy and potato-y, tho I could still sense the texture of the cauliflower. I was just too lazy to haul out (and then clean) the food processor, which would have eliminated the texture of the cauliflower.

Note: good way to hide your vegetables from finicky kids - mashed potato purées like this one. Of course, it only works with other white foods like cauliflower, turnips, parsnips, and celery root. 

But the best ways to fool a finicky kid into eating veggies is to add them to mashed potatoes, cover them in cheese (neither of which is terribly healthy...) or purée them into tomato sauce over pasta.

If I wasn't trying to serve this to the hubs as well, I might have used sour cream to create a similarly tasty and creamy side dish with a slightly different flair, but sour cream is on the list of Things Mike Won't Eat, so I'll have to store up that idea for some time I have chosen to make this for just myself.

Which I so don't see happening... too much food for little ol' me.

But maybe one of you will want to try it that way.

Ah, the ubiquitous photo of sautéing shallot.

To go along with our cauliflower experiments, I made a super simple chicken cutlet. 

(Totally didn't realize I was defrosting cutlets instead of breasts when I took them out of the freezer yesterday... whoops.) 

(I don't even know why I bought cutlets in the first place... must have been on sale.)

Super fast pan gravy using the browned shallots and garlic, a little flour whisked in, salt, and a splash of white wine & lemon. If you care enough, crush some dried thyme in there as well. Crank on high until it comes together.

(Sounds remarkably close to Picatta, doesn't it? I didn't realize I'd essentially been making a version of Chicken Picatta as my go-to pan sauce all these years...)

Dinner done.

And I totally ate all the (not pictured) roasted cauliflower as a snack while cooking the rest of dinner.

The reason for the slap-dash chicken is that I cooked this the same day that I made another successful batch of the Julia Child version of French Onion Soup. So I was exhausted from cooking that for 2+ hrs, and then experimenting with cauliflower. The chicken was a total cop-out protein.

But it was still tasty :)