weekend update March 23,2014

“You live and learn. At any rate, you live.” 

Douglas Adams

Last Tuesday, on a makeshift altar named after the gods of unfinished projects, 

I sacrificed my desire
 to perpetually try something new for dinner.

Because as we all know, though you may not be able to get everything you want, you can often get those things you want most.

Of course, you may have to work
extra hard if the things you want most
don't exist. Yet.

There are a few writing projects that have been simmering on the proverbial back burners of the mind for long enough; they'll never get a chance to cook up perfectly

until they get a chance at front of the mental stove.

And because this week, the desire to devote some concentrated energy to these projects was even greater than my desire to try out a new menu roster, I resurrected a week of menus and the post that lined them up-

and the recap in the subsequent update holds true: 

the honey-salt chicken brine remains my very favorite way to take 

something ordinary

and turn it into 

something uncommon

of all the things we tried during this week of salt, it's the lesson that I remain most grateful to have learned- 

here's a recap of its discovery, along with a few other things that will get a replay in the weeks ahead.

“The cure for anything is salt water - 

tears, sweat, or the sea.”

Isak Dinesen

Every family has it's legends; you're about to learn one of ours. It begins, as most legends do, with a journey. 

well, a family road trip.
Twenty something years later, I hold this photo,
 look deep into their angelic eyes
and wonder if perhaps they had secretly been mapping out a trip to crazytown for hours.

It was a journey that involved a small rental car, long unmarked roads curving queasily over an unfamiliar landscape and three travel-weary children who were becoming more cross and crabby with every mile, until turning around toward the back seat felt a little like facing, well 

(and really, I was perhaps a little crabby too)

And then, as if it had been hand lettered and nailed in place by a benevolent angel

 (wait. Is there any other kind of angel?)  

we saw a sign. 

It pointed toward the left, to an unpaved track which led (or so it promised) to a quiet beachy cove. And that's when I learned the magic math of salt water:

This mood.
This one went from peevish to perky in one 60 second dash to the beach,
stripping down to her skivvies as she ran. There was zero I could've (or would've) done
about the rapidity with which she abandoned her clothes.
I have, however, added an Ariel-style shell bikini in deference to her grown-up sensibilities. 
Sensibilities notably lacking in her childhood.

Saltwater. It can transform a shoreline, or a wound, or a mood- and this week it changed dinner.

Starting with the recipe that will forever change the way I cook chicken: Honey brined chicken. Here's what I learned- taking the leanest piece of a chicken and cutting it off of the bone and out of the skin is a great way to reduce fat and calories; it's also a great way to reduce flavor and moisture. This simple brine kapows both flavor and moisture into the meat in a very big way- without taking much time. Equal parts salt and honey are dissolved in a little hot water, then enough cold water is added to cover the chicken breasts. The chicken soaks for an hour or so, then gets cooked in any way you wish. 

I'd been given this beautiful tin of rosemary salt, so that's
what I used.  Amazing.  

  

It was unbelievable.  To put the brine to the test, I cooked the chicken as simply as I could- a quick pounding to an even thickness, then pan-fried in olive oil. So juicy, so incredibly flavorful- a big, big payoff for very little effort. 

Then on Friday, we found a new way to love fish. Really! We used Mario Batali's whole fish in a salt crust. Well, we used it...mostly.  I decided to forego the $15 a pound snapper in favor of $4 a pound trout.

It went like this:

They've just swum in from costco       and  having lost their heads (and scales and fins)      they lay down in a salty bed.

And now the fun part (well, not for the fish).  The juicy goodness is revealed,        and lands on the plate, with roast veg and gnocchi. Dinnertime!!!!

There are recipes for salt crusted fish that are a little easier than this one, and since this went so, err.... swimmingly, I'm looking forward to trying them. 

Because we both ate seconds! On unfried, inexpensive fish! Any cooking method that can accomplish that gets a big upvote and further tries from me.

The only relative disappointment of the week was my fault, and not the fault of the recipe.

I used Alton Brown's salt crusted tenderloin, which probably would've been nicer if I'd been willing to actually pop the big bucks for a tenderloin. But really- $14.00 a pound ain't gonna happen around here. Well. Not for food. I've probably paid more than $14 a pound  for, you know, shoes. Makeup. Books. Music. But not for food. One must hold fast to one's priorities.

So, I used a bottom round roast and a little time and here it is, getting ready to go in the oven:

You know what's funny? Even though the meat wasn't exactly melt in the mouth tender, it was mighty tasty, and taking it out of the salt dough crust was so cool and so fun that we totally forgot to take pictures. I did however, get a pic of the potatoes that roasted along with the meat:

unexpected fun part? the hardened shell-like pockets left behind as each spud
was lifted from the salt. Or, as the home audience named them, tater craters.

That little girl in the shell bikini- the one who grew up to be my brilliant, beautiful, cancer-kicking, life-living daughter? She once tacked this to her bedroom wall:

"One can always trust to time. Insert a wedge of time and nearly everything works itself out."

I think Isak Dinesen's quote could've been scrawled right underneath it. 

Because time and salt water can sort out a great many things.

This week, as I've been ladling out one cup of salt after another (and learning so much in the ladling!!!!) I've been thinking about the necessity of salt- the dangers of too much-

Alice, after all, nearly drowned in her own tears.
What- you thought I was going to mention
something about blood pressure?

And the importance of just enough. 

And that's what I hope. I hope for a week that's properly salted.

A week of piquancy, of work that breaks a creative sweat, a week of healing.

And I hope that this week, if there must be salt tears, instead of swamping you, they bear you up.

And float you safely toward home.

Menus, March 18,2014

“Those who don't learn from history 
are doomed to repeat it.” 

Edmund Burke

The thing is, sometimes what you learn from history is so pleasant that it bears repeating- for instance-

once you learn how good one cookie is,
you keep wanting to repeat the lesson, don't you?

For the next two weeks, I'll be delving into dinner history, reworking and retrying menus from last spring and summer, while I devote some concentrated time to a few writing projects that are just nearly as much fun as this little blog- 

let's start with the post that introduced me to what has become my go-to way to cook chicken breast, the glorious, ever-reliable honey and salt brine.

Happy history, from March 2013-

I love you like meat loves salt.

folktale type 923

Cozy up and pour yourself a warm beverage- I have an old and unoriginal story to tell you. A story so old, so unoriginal, that it has it's own section in the codex of  fairytales and folklore. A story so old and unoriginal that if I only knew how, I could tell it as it was told in old English, Shakespearean English, German, French, Italian, the languages of ancient India and Pakistan....I could even tell as it's been told on the breezy porches of Appalachia a century ago.....

Once upon a time, there was a king who was flattered and coddled for so long that he became stupid and foolish

as evidenced in part by his tolerance of  the royal barber's
practice of  the "courtier cut".
.

One Saturday (Saturday being the day his ego most often needed reinflating) he gathered his lovely daughters to his side, and in front of an audience, asked each one to tell him how much they loved him.
The two eldest heaped the praised high and deep- each loving him more than the other until the king their father was loved more than air or water or wealth or their even own husbands.

and the crowd went wild.
No, really-  people love emotional overload.

Then came the turn of the king's youngest daughter,

a slightly more thoughtful sort.

"Father", she said simply, "I love you as meat loves salt".
A statement so honest simple that it took everyone by surprise, and disappointed her father the king, who preferred his lovin' on the flashy flowery side.
No, she did not love him more than life, or more than her husband; she loved him exactly as a daughter ought to love a father. 

It was a statement for which she was banished from her father's sight and kingdom.

Because contrary to popular opinion,
honesty is a rather dicey policy.

Not to worry- although in Shakespeare's King Lear the whole mess ends badly, in most versions our young heroine sneaks into the castle's kitchen on the night of a great feast and persuades the cook to prepare the entire meal without salt. In a flash of rare and remorseful insight the king realizes the depth of his daughter's love and, well...

hugs and happiness ensue

 I heard a version of this story for the first time back when the earth was cooling, and this-

was fancy salt.
(it was fancy because it wasn't the store brand)

  But now! well! First came this prezzie, all the way from Denver CO:

A gift that smells and tastes so yummy- but how best to use it?

And what's up with all the different salts available now? 

These and other questions sent me to the information streams of the internet, and the nearest Central Market. I gathered more questions from the internet, and from the market, I gathered these:

And I set myself to learn the  differences between finishing salt, brining salt, kosher salt.....I want to taste it all

So I did what any curious salt and carb loving woman would do. I started a Buffy marathon, popped a pot of popcorn, and didn't stop munching till I'd tried all the salts.

The things I do in my relentless pursuit of knowledge.
Remarkable.

You can learn more than I could ever tell you about salts from these articles at Food 52, Real Simple and Rachael Ray. Or, you could combine your love of history with your passion for food and read this uber interesting looking book about the way salt has shaped the world we live in. Me? 

I can tell you that a pinch of smoked salt on an omelette or a sandwich boosts it into realms of stratospheric awesomeness, and that fluer de sel has the punchiest taste and the the most wonderful texture of all the salts that I tried. And I can also tell you that dinner this week is not for those under rigid sodium restrictions, because I'm playing in the kitchen with my new best friend, salt.

Wednesday:Honey Brined Chicken breast

Once the chicken breasts are brined, I'll pound them and pan fry them in a little olive oil. I'll be pan roasting a few beets that are in the fridge,  and warming up some lefover Cheesy Polenta. I'll be making enough chicken for a stir fry on Saturday.

Thursday:Salted beef tenderloin and salted baked potatoes

Alton Brown, I'm putting several dollars worth of beef, some time, my blood pressure and dinner into your capable hands. If you say it's good, I'm ready to believe you. I'll be using the leftovers later for beef burritos

The internet loves these baked potatoes! I'll be sure to update you on whether or not they're worth the extra step.

Friday:chicken and asparagus stir fry
I'll use the chicken leftover from Wednesday here, along with some
asparagus that's on sale at Kroger (asparagus is on sale pretty much everywhere right now). I know that cashews are an expensive addition, but I super duper love them in stirfrys, so I'm doin' it.








Saturday: Whole fish baked in a salt crust 
always a chance here that I may find a new way to like fish. Hope so! Depending on how cold it is outside, I'll either put this together with a box of grape tomatoes pan roasted in some olive oil and balsamic vinegar, or a simple salad.

Sunday: Beef Fajitas and salsa
 I'm jonesing a little for the salsa at Tin Star, so I may try this recipe with any leftover tomatoes from last night. And I'll probably stir up a little Rodrigo style sauce too.










You've realized what the king realized, haven't you, on the night of the tasteless feast? That in seven simple words, his daughter had told her father that she savored her life more because of he was a part of it.
I wonder what it is that you love the way that meat loves salt.
What it is that adds flavor and zest and color to your life.
Maybe that stack of books by your bed.
Maybe the that puppy that spins in happy circles every time you come home.
Maybe (if you're lucky) there are a few people on that list too
And I hope that this week you get a moment or two to gaze quietly at those who are near and hold clearly in your imagination those who are far and think about how flavorless your life would be without them.
I hope you have a moment to think about the laughter and wonder  and astonishment with which they season your days.
And I hope that you can hug them close, and smile into their eyes as they smile into yours and hear yourself saying

i love ya like salt.
And i hope you hear it back.

Menus and grocery lists, November 20, 2013

Love bade me welcome; yet my soul drew back,

Guilty of dust and sin.

But quick-eyed Love, observing me grow slack

From my first entrance in,

Drew nearer to me, sweetly questioning

If I lacked anything.

George Herbert

It was a great good fortune to come of party-hosting age when and where I did. I was in my twenties, and Martha Stewart was a model turned caterer who had published little book that was as visible to me as the ghost writer who penned it :

Yep, that long ago.

This cultural icon-to-be had just landed on the bookstore shelves when we loaded up the kids and moved to a beautiful land where the perfect hostess was any woman who could open the front door and smile at the same time:

And yes, once or twice we did invite
a kangaroo over for dinner.
They are very tasty. 

When, after a few formative years we returned to the Great State of Texas, the first stanza of George Herbert's lovely poem on love was painted (by yours truly, determined to never outgrow the scribbling on stuff phase)  in blue script at the entrance of our kitchen.

 And so it was that as I passed a hundred times a day by these words of grace and welcome, George Herbert (who hadn't partied since 1633) was silently mentoring me in the art hospitality, even though these:

were the only chargers I'd ever heard of.

Through various embarrassments, I have since learned that a charger is the big plate on the bottom that does what a placemat used to do and that you are not supposed to put food on, that it's a good idea to disable  smoke detectors before cooking a big meal (hey wait. Did I able those back on after last Thanksgiving?)  and like this clever hostess,

I've learned that if things start going awkward,
it's best to paste on a smile, and offer a colorful beverage.

Thanksgiving arrives on a silver platter in 9 short days. That's 216 hours, for those of you who have learned how to live without sleep. 

Since these sorts of occasions ladle a full helping of insecurity gravy right on top of my personal mash of excitement and enthusiasm, I decided (in a moment of crazy) to ask the internet how to be a perfect Thanksgiving hostess. News flash: this did not help. Corollary news flash: the modern American perfect hostess turns out to be someone I think I cannot be, and maybe don't even want to be around.

So, if the person the modern world calls a perfect hostess is a woman not many of us could happily feast with, what's a bad hostess? I asked the internet that too, and found out that a whole lot of people

Are really mad at Hostess
 for trashing their favorite snack food.

 In the end, George Herbert's four hundred year old lesson in hospitality came again to the rescue.

G.H.: "Take THAT, you meaningless measures of  societal perfection!
Me:"Oh George! My Hero! Come inside, you look like you could use a cookie."

The bottom line (after perusing a webful of horrible/hilarious  bad host/bad guest stories) seems to be this: a good hostess cares about whether or not her guests feel cared for, while the maybe not-so-good hostess gets crabby if she feels like her guests aren't taking good enough care of her.

Which means, I suppose, that in the busy 200 or so hours before a big day, it's a worthy goal for the host (and guest, I guess) to try to sleep well, work well and dine well, crushing some of those crabby feelings before they hatch.  And dining well in a busy week means finding food that is quick and easy to make and nourishing and comforting to eat. 

Maybe like this:

Wednesday:  Bacon and egg potatoes with spinach

There are a few pounds of potatoes in the pantry that would love their turn at the dinner table, so I asked the internet to tell me how to turn them into more than a side dish. I've linked you to the best result, a list of 10 fun potatoes-for-dinner ideas. This one sounded easy and yummy. I'll saute a bag of spinach for a quick vegetable side, and cooking one or two extra potatoes to speed up tomorrow's salmon. Save yourself some time by frying up a little zip bag of bacon for Friday night. 

Thursday: Salmon, potatoes and green beans en papillote

Hard to pronounce, easy to make and fun to eat. The portions of salmon available (by which I mean affordable) at our local grocery are pretty small. So small that they would overcook before the potatoes in this recipe were done. Solution? Cubes or slices of last night's baked potatoes. Asparagus is nearly as expensive per pound this month as salmon, so I'll be using green beans instead. Here's a thing to love about cooking in parchment- you can put these little parcels together in whatever random 20 minutes you can carve out during the day, and they'll be ready and waiting to be thrown in the oven about 20 minutes before dinner time. And at dinner time? They make dinner feel like opening a present.

Friday: Cheddar cheese soup with bacon and tomatoes

Another quick and easy dinner for a cool Autumn night- I wondered and wondered what nice veg would be nice with this soup, and then noticed the tomato and bacon in the picture. Hey presto, soup with tomatoes and bacon on the side. Any last bits of leftover potato can jump in to the soup bowl too.

Saturday: Chicken with sweet potatoes and greens

Two nutritional superfoods on one plate, and for protein a (gasp) store bought rotisserie chicken. I realize that there are some people out there who hold a strong antipathy toward rotisserie chicken, and it has not escaped my notice that these people are rarely the ones responsible for preparing an alternative. Those of us who hope to bake a batch of cookies, make some candle holders, find the candles, buy some candles when we can't find the candles, hang a garland or two and tidy the house this afternoon love these store-roasted birds nearly as much as home delivery pizza.

Sunday: Chicken and Dumplings

ok. See all that complicated chicken and vegetable prep in this recipe? If you have the time and wish to do that, it looks mighty delicious, so go ahead. But I'll be using the leftover rotisserie chicken and a bag of frozen soup vegetables. So why, you may well ask, have I linked to a recipe that I don't plan on using? Because of the dumplings. Just look at that dumpling recipe! It looks perfect! Besides, I always forget whether to leave the dumplings covered or uncovered while they cook, and this recipe spells that out clearly.

and in the next week or so, as you prepare to guest, or host, or both,

 I think it's important for you to know

That picture perfect only exists inside a camera

and is gone before the shutter closes.

That the way you love the world around you

is the end and the beginning of the feast.

And it's important for you to know

that somehow-

not in spite of,

not because of,

but right in the middle of

all your beautiful imperfections,

you are welcomed.
and you are not alone.

Menus May 15, 2013

We're connected, as women. It's like a spiderweb. 

 Sarah Addison Allen

It's been years since the ladies converged on my mother's house, though I can't tell you exactly how many years- 4 at least, maybe 5. But they're here tonight, as am I, all of us having traveled from all over to sit together on my mother's porch under the big bright deep-in-the-heart-of-Texas stars. And as it turns out, they have way more important things to talk about than exactly how long it's been since they talked.

Here they are, laughing at Reddit and Henri the existential cat.

There are things that are unique to gatherings of women. At least I think so. Now that I think about it, it's not as if I've ever participated in a gathering of men. I imagine though that when women get together there's less of this:

and more of this:

( That's Nan's cake on the left. It's responsible
for the best sugar high I've had in a long, long time)

There's less grunting, and more giggling. There's less TV, and more talking. Lots of talking.
And though I suppose it's biologically impossible for me to ever really know what a conversation between men is like, I imagine something like this:

"funny story. recent sport thing. the other day
at work. another sport thing. funny story.
a story about a thing breaking."

while conversations between women are a little more like this:

" funny story. And then the children! awful story.
Food! Funny story. ok,but where are the scissors?
Really sad story. This smells so good! funny story.
 Food! Grandchildren! Puppies! Hilarious joke! Miracle Whip
is NOT mayo. Funny story.You really made that?!?
 Story about loss, grief and courage. Shoes! Food!"

Women talk a great deal about food. (This is probably because we and the people for whom we prepare food like to eat regularly.)  So I was certain that if I asked for a little advice about what I ought to try for dinner this week, I'd be given a treasure trove of great ideas. 

And so thanks to Charlie, Darlene, Nan, Linda and Mom, here's what we're having for dinner:

Wednesday: Roast Chicken and salad 

I'll be driving back Dallas-ward, probably picking up a rotisserie chicken on my way home. Mom doesn't know it yet, but the salad will be driving back with me- just as soon as I raid her garden...

This gorgeous spinach, some apple slices, cheese, toasted pecans and a balsamic dressing. Can't wait. The link above takes you to the brilliant America's Test Kitchen method for roasting chicken- if I'm home in time, I'll do this instead of the rotisserie bird, and I'll  follow Charlie's suggestion and roast it with lemon and rosemary. I'm going to need some leftover chicken later in the week, so I'll be cooking extra.

Thursday: Brisket and mashed potatoes and green beans
Sadly, I'll be home in Dallas while the crew here is enjoying my mom's amazing, fork tender beef brisket, so

I'll console myself by making one for the home audience. See that sauce in the pic? That, I think, is tomato gravy. It's been a topic of conversation tonight, as the Yankees in the crowd have been trying to describe it's versatile tastiness to this Southern girl. It sounds fantastic, so I'll be finding a recipe and trying it. There are 6 women here, and almost that many opinions on the best way to do mashed potatoes. If you don't have a favorite method, think of trying Pioneer woman's creamy mashed potatoes. I'll need the brisket in a day or two, so any leftovers are going in the fridge and not the freezer.

Friday: Chicken Pot pie
I've linked you to a pretty easy straighforward recipe, but you can make it even easier by using frozen vegetables and a can of some sort of cream soup as the gravy. There's a spin on chicken pot pie that I've been wanting to try ever since I saw it on the menu of  Snooze Eatery in Denver, so instead of baking the filling between two crusts, I'm going to lay a sheet of puff pastry in an oven proof bowl, bake it a bit, spoon the chicken pie filling in, bake it till it's golden, then top it with an egg. Look at that pic closely. I think you'll understand why I want to give this a go.

Saturday: City Chicken and salad
Ok. This is awesome, because city chicken is not chicken at all. It's pork! And, Darlene says, that back when veal was more PC and less expensive, it was pork and veal. I'm going to use pork tenderloin, or boneless chops, or whatever pork is cheapest this week and make these. I'll put these together with some broccoli- just because broccoli is a favorite around here, and it's been awhile since I cooked any.




Sunday: Meat Pie and potato pancakes

This suggestion comes from my own daughter, the fabulous Liz (that's right,  Custom Cakes Liz is one of my grown up kids) who grew up loving meat pies and loves them still. Instead of ground beef, I'll be spinning the leftover brisket in the processor and using it for the pie filling. There's been some interesting discussions here about shreddy potato pancakes vs. mashed potato potato pancakes. If you have mashed potatoes leftover, then maybe use them up by trying this, or if you like the more traditional latke style shreddy pancakes, check out these beauties at Smitten Kitchen.

I'm also headed for home with some ideas for sweets that I can't wait to try- Charlie says that Cooking Light's Texas Sheet Cake is great, (and maybe it'll freeze in little lunchbag sized portions!) And Linda has told me a story of a cafeteria full of school children going back for seconds of these ubercomfort foody Butter Rolls. Seconds. Of Cafeteria food. This makes me very curious.
Blackberries, wild and tame, ramble all over this place, and there's a rumor that tomorrow, my mom might turn some of them into a slow cooker berry cobbler.

unless I eat them all first.

We are connected, we women, as if by a spider's web.
(In a good way. Not in a terrified housefly about to be eaten way)
And I hope this week that you too feel yourself connected by strong invisible threads to people who love you.
I hope you find yourself somehow in the company of those who see the luminous bits that lie deep in the depths of you.
Those who welcome the shadows and the lights of your story and your soul.
I hope you find yourself surrounded once or twice this week with understanding and laughter.
Because I hope that this week, whether you're in the company of men or the company of women, that you find yourself happily

in the company of friends.