Cooking with Kids (The PG-13 Edition)

If you give a kid some carrots, and tell him to peel them...he'll want to chat while doing so.

He'll ask lots of questions.

Among them?

"Hey, Mom?" "What's that called when a word or sentence is spelled the same forward and backwards?" "Is it a mammogram?"

Then you'll have to explain that its actually called a palindrome, and a mammogram is a special x-ray for boobs that helps to detect cancer.

Then you'll have to explain how they do a mammogram.

Then you'll have to explain how there is no test like that for a penis, so stop worrying about it.

Then you'll realize that the recipe you were working on has taken a wrong turn.

While the kiddo was peeling, I was onto my next recipe from cookbook number 8 of 99....

Back to the Table by Art Smith.

Art was Oprah's personal chef. I must have seen him on her show at some point and liked what he was making. I don't remember it at all, but something must have made me want to buy his cookbook.

It is a beautiful book full of fabulous looking recipes. Only problem is, I don't recall ever making any! I think I have some sort of problem. Is there a 12-step program for cookbook addicts?

Anyway....

I chose Herb Roasted Chicken, another recipe that fits into the 17 Day Diet.

It is a fairly simple recipe, but when you have a child peppering you with questions about anatomy and medical procedures, its easy to mess it up.

Things started off well. I had enough sense to gather my ingredients and take a photo:

There was a lot of chopping involved. This recipe called for a mixture of fresh herbs, so I was getting some practice with my new knife, fielding questions from the kid, feeling like a rock star in the kitchen. I got the herb paste all ready to go, showed the kiddo the raw chicken and all of the nastiness I pulled out from inside of it,  and then proceeded to follow the recipe and rub all of that herby goodness underneath the skin and all over the chicken. It was looking fabulous.

Until I realized that the bird was upside down.

And I had rubbed all of the good stuff on the underside of the chicken. Not the breast.

Oops.

Looks good here, right?

You do NOT want to see what it looked like when I turned it over to carve it. Ick. So much ick.

The good news is that it tasted great! I would imagine it is even more delicious with all of those herbs in the right place instead of the wrong one. But that's what you get when you're explaining mammograms to a pre-teen boy.

Here is the recipe. Hopefully you won't be as distracted as I was if you choose to make it!

Herb Roasted Chicken
Back to the Table by Art Smith

One 4 pound chicken
2 cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon of salt
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon of fresh tarragon, chopped
1 tablespoon of fresh basil, chopped
1 tablespoon of fresh marjoram, chopped
1 tablespoon of fresh thyme, chopped
1 tablespoon of oregano, chopped
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 lemon
1 carrot, chopped
1 rib celery, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1 cup chicken broth

Preheat oven to 400

Position a rack in center of oven and preheat oven to 400°. Clean chicken inside and out with cold water and pat dry. Arrange on rack in a roasting pan.

Chop garlic, then mash with salt to make a paste. Transfer to small bowl. Add oil, tarragon, basil, thyme, marjoram, oregano and pepper, and mix. Slip your fingers under the skin of each breast to loosen; rub as much herb paste as you can under skin. Rub remaining paste in body cavity, then place a lemon half inside. If desired, tie chicken legs together with kitchen twine.

Place chicken, breast side up, on rack in a roasting pan. Roast 30 minutes, basting twice. Scatter onions, carrots and celery in pan. Roast about 20 to 30 minutes longer, basting once or twice, or until a meat thermometer inserted in thickest part of thigh, without touching a bone, reads 180°.

Transfer chicken to a platter. Pour pan juices into a small glass measuring cup. (Discard vegetables in roasting pan.) Let juices stand 5 minutes, then skim off any fat from surface. Place pan over high heat on stove. When pan is sizzling, pour in degreased juices and broth. Bring to a boil, stirring up browned bits on bottom of pan with a wooden spoon. Strain into a sauceboat. Carve chicken and serve with pan juices.

A Little Bit of Summer in Winter

There's snow on the ground, it was 16 degrees today, and we are all wearing thermal underwear.

I am dreaming of warm weather.

I complain in the Summer when its too hot, I complain in the Winter when its too cold. I can't help it.

Despite the freezing cold, I made a very "Summery" dinner.

Ina Garten's Salmon Salad.

This comes from the original 1999 Barefoot Contessa cookbook, and has always been a favorite of mine. Luckily, it fits in nicely to the 17 Day Diet.

I started with two pounds of fresh salmon. I've become pretty good at cooking salmon ever since I got the skillet that goes into the oven. I start it on top of the stove to sear, flip it over and then finish it off in the stove at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

After it cooked, I let it rest for a bit before I broke it up into pieces. It was really hard not to pop bits in my mouth as I was doing this. It was so good! All I did was drizzle a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper before searing. Yum.

After cooking the salmon, the rest is a cinch. Just dicing up the celery and onion, and chopping the dill. Other than that its a few tablespoons and teaspoons of this and that.

Miraculously, we all ate the same thing for dinner! Even the picky kiddo ate it, and went above and beyond expectations by thanking me for making it.

I'll have to thank Auntie for creating it. Another satisfied customer!

Oh, Auntie. You've Led Me Astray!

There was a time when I whole-heartedly believed in anything that Auntie Ina had to say. Her word was golden. I needed to have the brands that she suggested, I wanted to have her fabulous cookware and kitchen, and I absolutely had to make a pilgrimage to the Hamptons to visit the original Barefoot Contessa store.

Granted, I was all of 26 and still impressionable at the time.

But....if Auntie said it was faaaaabulous? I wanted it.

Until I got the Loaves and Fishes Cookbook.

Loaves and Fishes is a food shop in Sagaponack that opened in 1980 and is apparently a favorite of Auntie. She references their cookbook ALL of the time, and even has visited the store numerous times on her show. Of course, if Auntie loves it so much it HAS to be amazing. Right?

Interestingly, the book was not easy to find. Eventually I was able to get a hold of a copy on Amazon and I was very excited to see what all of the fuss was about. I imagined it would be like a gift from my fairy godmother...because Auntie Ina is the epitome of fabulous.

So, umm. Yeah.

Not so much.

Most of the recipes call for either butter, mayonnaise or sour cream. Even the meats! And it wasn't decadent sounding stuff, it just sounds gross. It's very 1980's and not in a good way.

Lamb, Mint and Spinach Salad. Cheese Chowder. Scallops with Tomato, Garlic and Cream. Calve's Liver with Tarragon Butter Sauce. Sausage and Duck Casserole.

Eww.

It became clear that there was nothing that was going to fit in with the 17 Day Diet in this book. When this happens, my boys are the lucky ones.

They're getting baked goods.

In the Loaves and Fishes book, even the sweets were fairly unappetizing. Yeesh.

I chose something basic...Oatmeal Cookies. Supposedly it is one of Loaves and Fishes most popular items, and it happens to be one of my husband's favorite cookies.

Oatmeal Cookies

1 cup (2 sticks) butter
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 1/2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups old fashioned oatmeal (instant will not work)
3/4 cups walnuts, chopped
3/4 cups raisins

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Cream butters, sugars, vanilla and egg until the mixture becomes light in color.  In a separate bowl, mix the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, salt and oatmeal. Add to the butter mixture and blend well. Add the walnuts and raisins, folding them into the mixture to incorporate them evenly. Drop tablespoons of batter onto greased or parchment-covered cookie sheet 2 inches apart.  Flatten slightly. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

According to my husband, the cookies are good. Not the greatest, but good. All I can vouch for is the smell. They smelled SO good.

The best thing about this book is that it is worth a lot of money. For some reason, this $15 book is now going for $50 or more online. I'm going to cash in, because there is no way we are going to be eating these retro, fat-laden monstrosities. Bye-bye, cookbook #6 of 98. Auntie may think you're the bee's knees, but I'm still queasy from just reading your recipes!

The Tides Have Turned

Cookbook #5 of 98....

A little bit of Auntie herself.

Interestingly enough, this is a recipe that I have tried before, but I have NO recollection of making it. I did not recognize the name of the recipe, even when checking the ingredients. I didn't even see the notation I made at the bottom of the recipe:

When it came time to make it, I looked more closely at the page and noticed my very descriptive and potential Pulitzer-Prize winning notation:

Can you see it over there in the bottom right corner?

No? 

I guess that's why I missed it upon first glance. 

If you can't manage to make it out, it says....."ICK."

Apparently I did not like this recipe when I made it. I don't remember it very well. The book came out in October 2008.

My, how things have changed!

Since changing my eating habits with the 17 Day Diet over a year ago, my palate has certainly evolved. Foods I wouldn't dream of touching before are now some of my favorites!

I guess I can count broccolini among them now?

This recipe was quick and easy, although prepared differently from how I typically do my vegetables. Auntie wanted me to boil the broccolini. I have some issues with boiled vegetables. Mainly stemming from my mother-in-law annually murdering a poor head of cauliflower or broccoli at Christmas dinner by boiling the life out of it and plopping it into a bowl.

I know now that boiling for the correct amount of time does not suck the life out of the vegetable. This was a quick two minutes in boiling, salted water. Thanks, Auntie.

After that, its just whisking up a few things in a measuring cup and pouring over the broccolini. 

It was fast, easy and tasted so good hot or cold! 

Action shot:

Keeping the balsamic theme going, I ate mine with my favorite chicken:

Here is the recipe for Broccolini and Balsamic Vinaigrette. I halved the recipe because I didn't want to be stuck with a huge batch. Half made plenty! Enjoy!

Hidden Gem

Cookbook number 4 of 98 just knocked my socks off!

I pulled it off the shelf and figured that this would be one that ended up in the discard pile at the end of this experiment.

Another relic from the late 1990's and the beginning of my relationship with my husband:

The White Dog Cafe Cookbook.

When I was first dating my husband, we were living in New York. He had grown up just outside of Philadelphia and I had never been there before. Being the crazy kids that we were, we decided to get in the car and drive to Philly so he could take me to the White Dog where we would eat nachos and drink Leg Lifter Lager. We literally drove to Philadelphia, looked at the house where he grew up (not telling his parents that we were driving right by) and then went into the city to sightsee and eat.

Ahh, young love. You can stay up all night and do impulsive things and it never seems to take a toll on you. After being married for 15 years I can barely make it until 10:00 before I start falling asleep!

The following year we went back to the White Dog Cafe with my husband's family for Christmas Eve dinner. It was not as good as the beer and nachos night.

As one of our gifts, my future mother-in-law gave us the White Dog Cookbook. I don't recall ever using it. I'm sure I paged through it at the time but it must not have spoken to me, so it sat on the shelf untouched.

Imagine my surprise when I took it out and found myself putting flags on multiple recipes! I guess I needed to grow into the book to appreciate it?

I chose a soup recipe because it is FREEZING here. Literally. It's going to be 0 degrees tonight. Brr.
Making this soup was a bit of a project, but fortunately it was well worth it!

Ratatouille Bisque

This soup was AMAZING. Well worth the effort. It wasn't hard to make, but it was what we call in Yiddish a "patchke." That means it was a bit of a mess. There are multiple roasting pans involved, lots of chopping, using the blender or food processor, etc. This doesn't bother me but I know some people don't care for too many steps and a bunch of pans to wash! Regardless, I think this soup is worthy of the time and mess. It was that good!

I did adapt the recipe just a bit to fit into the 17 Day Diet. I also cut it in half because I didn't want to be stuck with a huge pot of soup that no one liked if it wasn't very good. I'll post my version of the recipe here and just let you know that it can be doubled to make more.

Ratatouille Bisque

Preheat oven to 450 degrees

1 small head of garlic, roasted (easy to do...cut off top, pour on a bit of olive oil, wrap in foil and bake for 30 minutes at 375 in the oven. I threw mine in the toaster oven.)
1 large red bell pepper, chopped and seeded
1 large yellow pepper, chopped and seeded
1 sweet onion, peeled and chopped
1 bulb fennel, fronds removed and core cut out, chopped
1 eggplant, sliced lengthwise
6 large, ripe plum tomatoes, halved
1/4 cup olive oil
1 1/2 cups tomato juice
1 1/2 cups water
1 T Balsamic vinegar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 packet of Truvia (recipe called for 1 tsp sugar)

Toss peppers, onion and fennel in a bowl with half of the olive oil.
Spread in a single layer on a baking sheet and roast until lightly charred for 45 minutes

Toss the tomatoes with 1 T of the oil and spread on another baking sheet and roast until charred, about 30 minutes.

Rub the eggplant halves with the remaining oil and put them cut side down on baking sheet. Roast until soft, about 20 minutes.

When the vegetables are done, remove and let cool to room temperature.
Remove the eggplant pulp from the skin by scraping out with a large spoon. Discard skins. Squeeze garlic cloves out of their skin.

Puree all of the roasted vegetables in blender or food processor in batches.
In a large, non-reactive saucepan combine vegetables with the remaining ingredients. Taste for seasonings and add more tomato juice or water to thin if needed.

Depending on who is eating it, you can serve with a sprinkle of parmesan cheese or some crusty bread.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what other treasures this cookbook has in store!

Hello, Neighbor!

The big news in my area is that a (very) minor celebrity has arrived this week to serve time at the local federal prison.

Yes, it is table-flipping Teresa Giudice from The Real Housewives of New Jersey. Which brings us to #3 of my 98 cookbooks.

I will admit to watching the show, but I plead the fifth as to why I own this cookbook. I would blame it on the alcohol, but I don't drink. I really am not sure what the heck I was thinking when I bought this back in 2010. It probably had something to do with liking the show and being on a diet. Who knows? Maybe I was all hopped up on carbs when I ordered it.

Teresa has sat on my shelf for years now without a passing thought. With all of the attention she's been getting in the local news, I thought I would take her down and try her out.

Being a "healthy" cookbook, it was easy to find a few choices that fit into the 17 Day Diet. I had to bypass the pastas and beans because there's none of that in Cycle 1, but I found some chicken that was compliant. Best of all, I didn't have to go to the grocery store for any ingredients since I had them all in the kitchen already.

I was all set to try out Chicken Breasts with Lemony Thyme Marinade.

It was easy enough to prep...

1/1 cup olive oil
2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp crushed red pepper

4 9-ounce chicken breasts halves with bones (skin removed) -- *I just used cutlets

Just mix everything together and pour it over the chicken:

I let it sit in the fridge while we went to swim team practice...at least two hours.

When I came home I threw it into a grill pan. Teresa cooks hers in the oven under the broiler but I just didn't want to play around with that. I have bad luck with broiling.

It looks pretty good, right?

Well, I'll tell ya.

It was just meh.

Aside from the fact that I smoked out the kitchen with burning marinade residue in the grill pan, the chicken couldn't compare to the almighty Balsamic Chicken or the scrumptious Chicken Souvlaki that I've made before.

Edible. Acceptable. Passable. Those are the words that come to mind after making and eating this chicken. The kiddo ate two pieces without complaint, and I had two cut up into a salad for dinner. I can't say I would ever make it again. Or anything else from the book, really.

So much like Teresa Guidice in real life, I am sending Skinny Italian up the river.....

Arrivederci!

Ode to Joy

#2 of 99......

The Joy of Cooking

It was the second cookbook that I can remember buying for myself. The first was a Betty Crocker baking book that I picked up in college. We'll visit that one another day.

This book was purchased at the beginning of my relationship with my husband. All of the cooking I had done previously was either from magazines or my mother's collection of cookbooks. She didn't have many, and most of them were either Jewish cooking or Chinese. Go figure.

The Joy of Cooking was my go-to for absolutely everything. It covers all the bases, and I used it to make everything from Vichyssoise (Leek and Potato Soup) to Tiramisu. My mother's copy was well used, and looked something like this:

I guess I knew my boyfriend and I were on a serious track, because I went out and bought my own copy of The Joy of Cooking thinking I would need it when we set up our own little home. I can't get over the fact that my version is approaching 20 years old! There have been updated editions since 1997, but I'll stick to mine for nostalgic reasons. 

Unfortunately, the poor book fell by the wayside once I discovered Auntie Ina....and even moreso with the internet becoming the go-to place for recipe ideas. I have to say I am kind of thrilled to pick this one up again, it really is a gem.

That being said, I had to stick to my guns and find something healthy to make.

Luckily, there were plenty of options in my old friend!

I chose Baked Eggplant.

I wanted something relatively easy, and something that my husband (the vegetarian) would eat. This recipe had only a few ingredients and took less than and hour to prep and cook.

As usual, I had to toy with the recipe a bit...I ended up using two larger eggplants rather than four smaller ones. I also chose to use some crushed tomatoes we had from our CSA farm share rather than using fresh as the recipe called for. I tossed in some garlic as well. Those are the only changes. I'll put  the original recipe here, and you can feel free to change it up if you'd like.:

Baked Eggplant

4 oblong eggplants (about 6 ounces each)
3 ounces crumbled fat-free or low-fat feta
3 T olive oil
4 plum tomatoes, seeded, peeled and chopped (or just used canned...about 1 1/4 cups)
1/2 tsp oregano
salt and pepper
1 clove of minced garlic

Halve the eggplants lengthwise. Score the cut surfaces with a knife without cutting through to the skin.

Heat olive oil in a large skillet, then add the eggplant cut size down. Cook at medium heat for about 5 minutes. Turn and cook on the second side for a few minutes. Remove and arrange cut side up in a shallow baking dish.

Sprinkle with ground black pepper and the crumbled feta.

Wipe out the skillet and cook the tomatoes until broken down into a rough sauce. Add salt, pepper and garlic to taste.

Spoon the sauce over the eggplants. Cover and bake until the eggplants are tender, about 35 minutes. Uncover and sprinkle the top with oregano and cook for another 5 minutes more.

Looks pretty good, right?

I ended up crumbling some of my leftover Turkey Sausage on top of it to add some protein. The husband ate it with some crusty bread. The kiddo turned up his nose and ate some Balsamic Chicken instead.

It's going to be a keeper in my house. Just like my trusty copy of The Joy of Cooking!