Note: this tasted better than it looks
Tempting the Fates
I haven’t been cooking long enough to become cocky, but occasionally I can really put it together. The other night it was nifty wine-poached chicken breasts on a bed of perfectly fluffy couscous, with steamed broccoli florets that looked like the Platonic Ideal of broccoli.
That evening I said to The Girlfriend, “Today, I feel like a chef.” Of course, she’s used to my pronouncements from the kitchen, but they’re usually along the lines of “I can’t believe I spilled all of that,” so this was a big deal.
For this one particular meal, everything worked. I did all of my prep before things needed to be put in the skillet, and the side dishes were done at the same time as the main course. I made enough for leftovers; I cooked something new to me (couscous); most importantly, it tasted good.
Brimming with confidence, I decided to improvise a dessert. I usually decide what to make based on what’s in the cupboard and then figure out what to do with it. By now, I was a chef, so how hard could it be?
I didn’t see anything that screamed ‘dessert ingredient,’ but I saw a can of kernel corn that I had ignored for weeks. It looked forlorn, continually passed over by the more popular canned green beans.
I knew what I had to do. I resolved to make a dessert, with a can of corn. I google ‘corn dessert,’ (again wondering how people cooked before the internet), and I find something called ‘El Atol de Etole.’
What’s weird, is I had just mentioned to The Girlfriend how I don’t make traditional Salvadoran corn-based beverages nearly often enough.
Since I don’t have a picture to show you, imagine a creamy yellow egg-noggy looking beverage. The recipe looked to be a breeze—just milk, corn, brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon sticks and a pinch of salt.
You start by putting the corn and milk in a food processor. I only have a little one-button wannabe blender, but it works just like a grownup blender (as long as I only need to ‘pulse’ things).
In with the corn and milk I tossed the sugar, vanilla, salt . . . and cinnamon sticks. APPARENTLY I did something wrong, because after a few normal pulses, I suddenly heard a kind of ‘ka-chonk’ sound, followed by an otherworldly cry of pain from within my little blender.
Also, goop was shooting out of a hole in the top. A hole I had never noticed before, but which is apparently there to allow goop to shoot out.
Alright, I say, maybe the cinnamon sticks weren’t supposed to go in. Maybe you can’t, in fact, purée cinnamon sticks with a one-speed three-cup mini-blender from Target. I take the sticks out, and fire the thing up again.
This was going very badly. Put it this way: if a local news crew had been filming in my kitchen, the anchorman would have introduced the story by describing the scene as ‘Cornmageddon.’
More horrific grinding sounds from within the machine, and I realize it had TRIED to purée cinnamon sticks, leaving lots of little cinnamon sticks mixed in with the goop.
Now in my defense, nothing on the machine or its packaging expressly warns against trying to liquefy cinnamon sticks, and nothing on the jar of cinnamon sticks said “DO NOT PLACE IN TINY MACHINES.”
By this point most of my kitchen and at least one of our cats was covered in sweet, viscous corn juice, and the kitchen looked like a crime scene (“At this point, we believe the suspect leaves clues written in liquefied corn.”).
Clearly I had offended the Cooking Gods with my hubris! Or, it was the fact I didn’t really read the recipe that carefully.
Either way, after cleaning up the carnage (cornage?), I looked at the recipe again. I see that it says “will thicken nicely on the stovetop,” and I think, “Stove?” I don’t remember using a stove.
Gradually, things started to become clearer. I finally figured out the cause of the fiasco! Only the corn and the milk go in the blender—the other stuff you add later!
I have to admit that the experience humbled me a little. But I learned something very important–that if I find a great recipe, I should read the entire thing, as opposed to just the first paragraph. Maybe even print a copy.
Or maybe I just need a more powerful blender.
Measuring Up
As much as I’ve learned about cooking in the last year, one thing is preventing me from getting to the next level.
No matter how well one of my ‘dinner experiments’ turns out, I’ll probably never be able to make that dish again. Oh, we’ll have something similar, but I never seem to be able to recreate my cooking successes.
I’m sure you’re thinking, “Ooh, he must be an artist, like some jazz-inspired cooking phenom who improvises something brilliant, but, driven by his creative ambition, refuses to make the same thing twice.” And I appreciate that you think that.
But no, the reason we won’t be revisiting my Poached Dill Chicken Breasts in Homemade Mushroom Gravy on a bed of Garlic-Chili Potatoes with Grilled Asparagus anytime soon is two-fold:
1) I don’t measure.
2) I never write down what I’ve done.
Consequently, I’m always conflicted when I share my cooking—I want it to taste good, but not so good that I have to . . . make it again. Because I’m not sure I can!
A book of my recipes would need to say things like, “Cook until it looks like it did the last time, then let it sit for a while.” My cookbook would be filled with units of measure like “a bunch,” “just a little,” and “long enough so that it all sticks together but isn’t burnt on top.”
I came across a recipe the other day that required me to convert everything from metric units. OK, it wouldn’t have required it, if any of my measuring doodads had been metric.
Conceptually, I’m on board with the metric system (or as I affectionately call it, Système international d’unités). I just haven’t had much call to use it.
When I look back on my high school years, I ask myself the questions we all ask:
“Should I have taken a foreign language?”
“Was my English teacher really that hot?”
“Why did I have to study the metric system?”
From about eighth grade on (way back in the last century), it was made very clear that this country would be changing over within just a few years.
Committees were formed, deadlines were set, transitional congressional oversight whatevers were convened. The message was clear.
If I didn’t get with the program, there would come a day when I wouldn’t be able to cook, or shop, or even understand road signs.
Well, they missed that by a country kilometer. Like with so many forward-looking ideas, most Americans responded to the idea of metric conversion with about the same enthusiasm I would have for a new Tony Orlando album.
As a country, we collectively said, “Nah, we’re good.” I guess we were hoping to convince the majority of the civilized world to switch back to an antiquated, klunky system used by fading superpowers and former empires.
Countries which have not adopted the metric system are shown in red
I have a theory as to why the U.S. never ‘went metric.’ I think the reason we stayed with our quaint ‘imperial’ system of measurements is the same reason half the country is abuzz every time there’s a royal wedding.
My theory is that, as a nation, we all feel a little guilty about kicking England’s ass in the Revolution, we’re having second thoughts, and we want to become a colony again! Take us back, Mother England! We want a figurehead leader—we want pomp and, dammit, we want it with circumstance!
We want those cool red phone booths you guys have, and double-decker buses! We’re tired of trying to run the world! It’s too freaking hard!
I think I would be cool with us suddenly becoming British again—sure, I’d have to get used to cooking and eating things called ‘toad in the hole’ and ‘bubble and squeak’ and I’d have to learn a bunch of different curse words, but at least I’d have free health care.
Behind the Cooking
I fe
el that I’m ready to pull back the kitchen curtain and reveal a little of my cooking magic. I’ll take you through one meal from ingredients to ingestion, and along the way, I’ll give you some insight into my ‘process.’
MRI of my brain deciding what to cook
First of all, I always have a notepad nearby, because at any moment, I might come up with the next big thing. Like when I woke up and scrawled THREE SLIDERS SEALED PANINI-STYLE INSIDE A WIDE FRENCH ROLL. It didn’t really matter that we never buy French rolls, and I don’t have a Panini press.
I’ll ask myself questions for a jumpstart, like, “Why don’t you see vanilla and peanut butter together more often?” or, “What if I shredded some macaroons, threw ‘em in a pan and fried them?”
If you think something will taste good, why not try to make it? There’ll be some messes along the way, and you’ll throw out some food once in a while, but you’ll also, sometimes quite by accident, make some surprisingly good meals.
For example, one morning, with no set plan, I shredded some potatoes, chopped up some carrots, onions, garlic and celery, threw it all in a skillet and made the most amazing vegefied hash browns (I think the key was the dollop of horseradish).
The meal we’re going to analyze here is a simple meat/sauce/pasta concoction, but there was one hurdle to overcome when I made this.
As a Jew, I’ve never kept strictly kosher, but at the time I made this dish, I wasn’t eating or cooking swine.
The thing is, we won a free pound of pork sausage in a contest at our grocery store, and money was tight that month. So, after minutes of deep spiritual questioning, I decided God wanted me to cook it.
Note: since the night I made this dish, I’ve relaxed my position on pork. Mostly because I remembered how much I love bacon.
About the following recipe: be sure to follow the measurements and steps precisely or . . . well, I have no idea what might happen, but I’m not going to be responsible for it.
Capellini Con Carne Gratuito
E Sugo Insolito
(Long Skinny Noodles with Free Meat and Unusual Sauce)
prep time: 10 minutes
cooking time: from 30 minutes to an hour
servings: 6 or so
Ingredients
1 box of angel hair pasta (‘capellini’)
1 handful of sliced mushrooms
1 piece of onion
1 stalk of celery
1 carrot
A few shakes of rosemary
The last of a small container of sage
1 shake of parsley
More than I intended of cumin
Some dill
1 can of organic tomato sauce
1 can of green beans
Plenty of extra virgin olive oil
A few splashes of Tabasco™ sauce
A little kosher salt
1 lb.of ground pork sausage
zero cloves of fresh garlic
What I Was Thinking
I open my cupboards for inspiration. Capellini (which I believe is Italian for ‘a dollar a box’) is enough like spaghetti that I figure I’ll just make my own red sauce.
I can cook the sausage in a skillet, and I’ll just use some kosher salt to offset the whole pork thing.
Now, the onion is looking a little tired, and the mushrooms look they might turn in a couple days, so I have to use those.
And the carrot is in because, even though I’ve never seen either of us grab a carrot for a snack, for some reason we buy carrots every week, and I’m tired of throwing out carrots.
I know it’s borderline heretical to make a pasta dish without garlic, but I was out of garlic. Since it was too hot to walk to the store, I said to myself “Screw it, I’ve got other spices,” and, “Who needs garlic anyway?”
For the sausage, I grabbed parsley, sage, and rosemary, and for the next ten minutes, I had the song “Scarborough Fair” stuck in my head. (Good thing I didn’t have any thyme, or I might have actually conjured up Simon and Garfunkel right there in my kitchen.)
I also grabbed some dill, because it was next to the rosemary, and I used cumin, because my baby loves her some cumin. Which would be a great name for a blues song.
The tomato sauce I used was organic, because The Girlfriend always buys organic, even though I’m pretty sure most of the pesticides are gone by the time the tomatoes are turned into sauce, pressure-sealed and then sautéed.
Oh, and I could have used whole mushrooms, but then I would have needed to slice them.
Instructions
In a big pot, bring a bunch of water to a boil. Add some salt at some point in there. When the water is at a rolling boil, realize you should have prepared the vegetables. Turn off burner.
Place carrot, mushrooms, and onion into the weird little blender thing you got for your birthday. Use ‘pulse’ setting, as that’s still the only button it has. Set aside ‘pulsed’ veggies.
Now scoop veggies back into blender and add celery that you forgot to put in with carrot, mushrooms and onion. Set aside veggies again.
Bring water to boil. Again. Add pasta to water. To duplicate my results exactly, it’s very important to forget how quickly angel hair pasta cooks.
In a bowl, mix the sausage with the spices, including the sage, because ‘adding sage’ sounds like something chefs do.
Pour olive oil into a big skillet; sprinkle salt and shake the Tabasco bottle at the skillet like you’re that guy in church who spreads the incense.
Heat skillet for a bit, then add sausage mix to skillet in small chunks.
Use plastic spatula to break up meat, then take partially-melted spatula out and use wooden spoon.
Start to add sauce until you remember that if your meat is smothered in a red sauce you won’t be able to judge the color of the meat to know if it’s cooked long enough.
Test the temperature of the meat, and then realize that since it’s ground up into little pieces, you can’t really use your thermometer. Now you can try to guess when it’s ‘done enough’!
Turn heat down on skillet, then finally remember your angel hair pasta.
Use the big pasta spoon to stir the overcooked noodles, and notice how a chunk of them have congealed into one giant noodly mass. Separate this chunk.
When handle breaks off of pasta spoon, stop stirring. Melodramatically announce that you’ve ‘ruined dinner.’ Drain pasta and set aside.
Turn heat up on skillet ‘just to make sure,’ and add veggie mix. Stir.
Add tomato sauce and stir again. Turn heat down on skillet and cover, while you figure out what to do next.
Empty green beans into microwave safe dish and cook for a minute or so.
Drain beans, then cut beans into smaller sizes. Put beans in skillet and stir.
Pour contents of skillet over noodles. Remind yourself to get garlic. And more pork.
Ode to a Skillet
Thanks to Google and a VERY tolerant girlfriend (both of whom I love), I’ve been able to experiment a lot in the kitchen, and by ‘experiment,’ I mean ‘throw things against the wall to see what sticks (sometimes literally).
Along the way, I’ve learned a lot. For one thing, there is such a thing as too much cumin. I’ve also learned that having the right tools is essential. And since I discovered the Food Network, I frequently point at the screen and say, “I need one of those.”
To be fair, most of the time I don’t in fact NEED a device that shaves parsnips, or a tool designed specifically for cutting the ends off pineapples, but you get the idea.
I may not be wired like the stereotypical male in many ways, but I love gadgets as much as any of my fellow penis-bearers (try that phrase, Auto-correct: “Did you mean ‘pallbearers?’).
Some kitchen gadgets are ridiculous. For example, you can buy an 'egg cuber,' which hard-boils eggs in the shape of . . . cubes. How much disposable income do you have to have before you think, “If only my hard-boiled eggs weren’t always so . . . egg-shaped!”
But until a very spe
cial birthday gift arrived last year, I never had the one item I needed to go from ‘newbie’ to ‘foodie.’ I didn’t own a cast-iron skillet. Now I do, and nothing will ever be the same.
I’m sure experienced cooks are hip to the advantages of going with cast-iron, but let’s review . . . Cast-iron skillets distribute heat evenly, they last forever, and since you don’t really wash them, they develop a layer of seasoning on them over time.
Another advantage to an old-school skillet is that it’s the only object in the kitchen that can be effectively used to whack an intruder in the head during a home invasion.
Face it, if a burglar breaks in, you’re not gonna be able to take him out with your microplane, or your breadmaker. Of course, that’s assuming the burglar breaks in through the kitchen, while I happen to be cooking, but if that happens, I’ll be ready.
I’ve only found two disadvantages to my new old-fashioned fryin’ pan. First, I’ll need to call a neighbor to help me lift it off the burner, as it weighs more than some people’s cars.
Secondly, it would have helped if there had been some sort of warning label saying “IF YOU TAKE THIS OUT OF A 400 DEGREE OVEN DON’T FORGET THAT IT’S MADE OF IRON, DUMBASS, SO AN OVEN MITT IS A REALLY GOOD IDEA.”
The friend who gave me the pan described some eight or nine-step process for properly seasoning my pan before use, but it sounded like it could involve a lot of smoke filling our apartment.
Which might be fine, except the smoke detector at our place is so freaking sensitive that it goes off if I play the word ‘fire’ in Scrabble.
So, without going through the steps, how could I get this Magical Layer of Seasoning. Turns out that, according to the packaging, my new pan was ‘pre-seasoned.’ I figured I was good to go.
Thankfully, the pan came with a sheet of simple instructions to follow before use. I didn’t read them, but it was good to know they were there.
Does This Taste Funny? A Half-Baked Look at Food and Foodies Page 2