Eating Down the Fridge

Yesterday, I spent far too much money at Clemon's Produce. I spent my entire week's allowance on things like Indian Eggplants, tiny cucumbers, three boxes of strawberries (ripe for the ice cream maker, now that it's finally stable weather here in CenFlo), a massive basil plant, gargantuan beets, and too many more things to count.


It's time to eat down the fridge, my friends.

Cliff and I are still in school and desperately trying to get jobs at this point. We just blew our last Spring Break in glorious Key West (more on this later...Food Tour!), so now it's time to buckle down, break the camel's back, and spend less. At this point, we're good on rent money until June. After that - who knows?

Here's the game plan. The fridge, as you can see, is well stocked. Somehow we ended up with a jar of red caviar (don't freak, it's not the good stuff) and a plastic package of quail eggs in the same vicinity.




Yes, there are lots of fruits and vegetables. I collect food. It makes me happy and makes my life worth living. For some people it's stamps, some people collect cats, others collect religious convictions. Me? I collect food.

Other strange stuff in the fridge/freezer:

More corn tortillas I can never seem to use up
Edamame
Half a loaf of pre-made garlic bread (going to Chef Hell for that one...)
A pound of frozen fresh yeast
Tube of smoked salmon pate from IKEA (yes, I said "tube")

Here's the pantry cabinet:


Behind all that stuff, there's also a few cans of lychees, some coconut milk, and a jar of green curry paste that's just dying to get its little mitts on those eggplant. Other strange things in the cabinet:

Chicago-style Kelly Green Relish
Crystallized ginger
a pound of dried Shiitake mushrooms
a can of collard greens (no idea where that came from)

Yes, there is a jar of French chestnut paste in the cabinet. I seem to remember a recipe for a chestnut cream cake floating around in my recipe folder somewhere. That will happen soon, though I should have just gotten it done with in the Christmas season.

Too bad we were barely home during the Christmas season.

Also, check out the liquor cabinet (yes, that handle says, "Holly" on it. I'm protective of RonRico) and wine rack. Full. No reason to head to Total Wine. Sad.












Now for the challenge. For the next month, I will not grocery shop. I will save about $300 this month by not going to Publix, Clemons, Dong-A (local Viet market), Lombardi's, Whole Foods, or any other grocery store to which I have a growing the persistent addiction.

Grocery store = Holly's crack.

I can handle this. We might have some really creative foods over the next month (honey, brace yourself), but the money we'll save will be totally worth it. I'll blog about the adventure from time to time, especially if I end up making something either completely stellar or absolutely horrendous.

Shouldn't be too bad for the first week or two, but I bet that by April 1, things are going to get a little rough in the kitchen...

The Diner's Bill of Rights

I found this on Scott Joseph's blog. Scott Joseph was the food and dining critic for the Orlando Sentinel for 25 years and was recently relocated (read: laid off) to Orlando Style Magazine, whom I also work for as the Contributing Food Editor. Now, I don't necessary agree with many of Scott's reviews, nor do I really like his style of writing - but with what follows, he was right on the money.

So many people scoff at the way I dine - I get angry when I'm asked to "hold on" to my used fork or when I'm asked "are you still working on that?" People look at me like I'm a complete snob and a horrible dinner companion.

The Diner's Bill of Rights totally makes me feel justified in all of my nit-pickiness. I wasn't taught at culinary school how to run a restaurant properly for nothing. The President of the Le Cordon Bleu in Chicago told me that my service was the best he'd received from any "student manager" at the school's cafe. I know what I'm talking about.

Review these. Don't be shafted by a restaurant again. You have rights when you eat.


The Diner's Bill of Rights

You have the right to a pleasant and relaxing dinner.

You also have the right to a speedy dinner. If you plan to catch a movie or have theater tickets, please tell the server before ordering. He or she can alert the kitchen to your schedule and advise if certain items will take longer than others.

You have the right to relax following your meal. The check will not be delivered to the table until you request it.

No one will ever refer to you as "you guys."

In relation to your right to relax and enjoy your meal, you may also expect an environment free of children running about or being unruly. My managers will ask parents to keep such children under control.

You have a right to bring your children to my restaurant, to educate them on the pleasures of dining out as a family and to teach the manners that are expected of them.

You will never be asked if you're "still working on that?" If you find eating our food work, then we have done something wrong.

If you're joining us as part of your celebration of a special occasion, we're honored that you selected us. However, if it's a birthday, my staff has been instructed not to sing "Happy Birthday" so as not to disturb your fellow diners.

When you call my restaurant to make a reservation, you will be greeted warmly and promptly, and every attempt to will be made to honor your preferred date and time.

You have the right to be seated promptly, but please understand that the scheduling of tables is not an exact science and is subject to the vagaries and whims of previous diners (see "right to relax following your meal").

If you are made to wait in the lounge for a table to become available, you have the right to transfer your bar tab to your table.

The server will not read the menu for you, nor will he or she offer a list of his or her favorite dishes unless a guest asks. The servers are instructed not to congratulate you on your "good choice" each time you order an entree.

No one will ever bring food to the table and ask who ordered each item. It's our job to know which guest ordered each entree, even if the food is brought to the table by someone other than your server.

Someone other than your server might bring your food to your table because it is our policy not to allow hot food to linger in the window just because the assigned waiter isn't there to deliver it.

If there is a delay in your order, someone will explain the reason for the delay honestly. Your server will not tell you the cook made a mistake, and the manager will not tell you the server is having a bad night. We will make every effort to correct the problem as quickly as possible.

If it takes longer than 30 minutes for your appetizer, or if you wait that long between courses, the tardy item will be taken off your bill.

If you stop any staff member going by your table and ask for something, you'll never be told "I'll get your waiter." The person you ask will see to your request promptly; everyone on my staff is working for you.

Your waiter will check back with you after you have had a chance to taste your food.

If something is not right with your food, please tell the server who checks back with you after it has been served. We need to know if the food is overcooked or undercooked, or if it is not hot enough. We'd also like to know if the dish is just something you don't like, or it wasn't what you thought it would be. If any of these problems exist, the dish will be removed, and you may either request the same dish be done to your liking, or you may ask for something else. Either way, your request will go to the front of the line and be done as quickly as possible. The server will offer to keep your companions' food warm while the mistake is being corrected. It is important that you let someone know you're dissatisfied right now, tonight. If you wait until tomorrow to call and complain, there is nothing I or my managers can do to make tonight more pleasant.

You have the right to make special requests, and the chef and other cooks will do everything they can to honor them. But keep in mind that our menu was designed with specific ingredients and cooking methods in mind, and to be more efficient as a restaurant, certain things are prepared in advance, so some requests may not be possible.

All my staff are empowered to correct a problem. Once the situation is corrected, a manager will stop by to ask if you are satisfied. There will always be a manager on hand in the dining room.

No one will ever say "no problem" in response to a request or your thanks. They will say "my pleasure" or "you're welcome." You're welcome.

It is considered improper to remove the plate of one person while others are still eating. Doing so can make the others feel rushed and uncomfortable. Therefore, all my staff are instructed not to remove plates until everyone has finished. If you feel you really need to have your plate removed before your companions have completed their meals, you may certainly make that request.

You have the right to privacy. Servers and assistants sometimes can't help overhearing conversations, but no one will ever offer a comment or anecdote.

I have purchased plenty of flatware for my restaurant. Therefore, no one will ever ask you to "hang on" to your fork or knife following a course so that it can be reused for the next course. Clean flatware will be automatically offered.

You have the right to inspect the kitchen and see a copy of my most recent health-inspection report.

You have the right to tip as you see fit. If you feel the service was not worthy of the customary 15 percent to 20 percent, please let me know so that we can bring the service up to your accepted level of standards.

This is a business, and I'm in it to make money. The food here costs more than it would if you were to make it yourself at home because there are costs associated with operating a business that are factored into the price of each dish. But I pledge that my overall markup will be fair and reasonable. Otherwise, everything else here is just talk.


Reprinted from the Orlando Sentinel, Sunday, August 5, 2007

Movin' On Up

This is what my kitchen used to look like.



This is what my NEW kitchen looks like.



An upgrade, I'd say. :)

Bright Knives, Big City, Big Disappointment

I'm not exactly sure what happened to Top Chef this season. Unlike past seasons, I really didn't care who won, or have any real emotional stake in the outcome. I didn't mind that I didn't have time to watch the finale until 5 days after it aired. I didn't particularly like Carla (a little nuts, if you ask me - Hootie who? Really?), nor did I like Hosea (I have to admit that I was pretty happy when I found out that the cheater was no longer with his girlfriend (who I'm sure is much more awesome than that brat, Leah,) after the show), and of course, no one liked Stefan.

Stefan posed a problem for me early on. He was cast as the asshole - the Steven Asprinio (season 1), the Marcel (season 2), the Hung (season 3),and the Dale (season 4) - and yet I worried throughout the entire season whether or not we were going to have a Top Chef this season that NO ONE in their right mind would work for. Really? Tom Colicchio, you know better. None of the above "asshole chefs" won, except for Hung, but even Brian Malarkey, who I had the pleasure to interview and ask in person, thought Hung was a really great guy and he'd work with him again if asked. Of course, he said the same thing about Marcel, but I have a hard time believing that part of the answer.

Carla, on the other hand, was the uber-underdog. One comment on the Village Voice website says that the men (Hosea and Stefan) completely "dismissed Carla all season in a manner I thought was very sexist." During the entire finale, all those stupid boys could talk about was each other - Stefan was the one to bet, Hosea is an idiot, etc - but not one of them thought Carla was ever a threat - never mind that she beat their asses multiple times AND drove away in a new car.


The Village Voice writer Hailey Eber put it best in her line: "In the end, it all came down to one big meh." Really. Usually, at the end of Top Chef, I'm in tears. When Stephanie Izzard won last season, I was ecstatic, and my heart was broken for Richard Blaise and his "I choked," line. So sad. When Hung won, I wasn't surprised, but the live reveal at the end was so dramatic that I still felt my heart jump. Plus, he looked so cute and Vietnamese and happy. I wanted to hug Hung Huynh and take him out for a banh mi.


At the beginning of the season, I took a survey after the first episode to see who people thought would win at the end. I didn't bet on Hosea - he's annoying and has no spine (if I had to listen to him talk about "HOW EXCITED!" he was to cook for the guest judges one more time...). I didn't bet on Carla (which made her even more awesome at the end). I did bet on Stefan, even though I didn't want to. I wanted Jamie. I wanted her to win SO BAD. It didn't happen, but even to the last, Stefan wanted her, too. Which made me laugh. When men have crushes on women that will NEVER LIKE THEM, it makes me laugh. Jamie is a lesbian. She will never like you, Stefanasaurus.

One more thought - the look on Jeff's face at the end of the finale broke my heart into a million pieces. I hate to see a blonde surfer chef from Miami look that sad. It's just not right.

So, Hosea is Top Chef. Meh. Well, Fabio - I guess it is "Top Pussy" instead of "Top Chef".

Local Hardship, Local Harvest

Fair warning: this post is a passionate and vehement call to action in disguise as food writing. Read on, readers.

Since coming back to Orlando, I have found that one of the great joys of living in Florida is its abundance of locally cultivated produce. In Utah, few things actually grow, so the choices for shopping are severely limited to maybe the poor excuse for a Farmer’s Market in Salt Lake, and the once-in-a-blue-moon trip to one of the four Whole Foods markets. Individually owned produce markets? Fuggedaboudit. In Paris, there are tons of markets, my favorite being on the rue-des-Trois-Freres in the St. Germain area. Golden chantrelles and bejeweled blackberries overflow in September, and in March, fresh new goat cheeses add springtime tang to the grassy air. The markets in Central Mexico were an interesting experience, irregularly shaped cucumbers and bruised apples sitting in sky blue Rubbermaid tubs buzzing with flies was the image I would take away from my brief time in a Mexican tiendita (though, I must admit, while in Mexico I tasted the most cucumberiest of cucumbers). Chicago is known for its springtime-early summer Green City Market, but the crowds are thick, and the selection – not always varied.
Florida, on the other hand, is ripe for the picking. Baskets of grapefruits, okra, lettuces, strawberries, bell peppers, and tomatoes are the gems of Florida produce, and every chance I get, I take advantage. There is nothing like fresh March strawberries blended with a mango and a little water and ice to refresh a body. It’s my favorite drink (add rum and you have yourself a party). The beauty of all of this, is that there’s such often such a bounty that tiny family-owned produce stands crop up all over the city. More affordable and fresher than the chain grocery stores, and, often, straight off the vine with no added wax, strange shininess, or attractive arrangement. The yuppiness of Whole Foods, while the selection is fabulous, always makes me a little weary – produce should look like a pile of nutrition and goodness, not a showpiece. When I am shopping for food, I do not want to feel as though I am being had. And when I shop at “specialty food stores” like Whole Foods, that’s exactly the way I feel.

However, if Whole Foods happens to be the only place where I can find (wild) Alaskan sockeye salmon, that’s where I buy it. I refuse to buy fish that has the tiny disclaimer “color added” on the placard. To me, that’s like buying a diamond ring that says, “sparkle added.” Not awesome. Buy wild.
More on local fish markets (I love Lombardi’s Seafood more than life) later.
I had one produce market in particular that I absolutely loved. Only about three miles from my home in Colonial Town, the hub of the burgeoning Viet population in Orlando and home of probably the best pho ever, some of my favorite afternoons were spend in its tiny aisles, picking up dragon fruit and wondering how to use it, enjoying the smell of the “root vegetable room” where the earthy aroma of clay and sand permeated the walls around which sat piles of onions, yucca, potatoes, and other tubers. I loved wrapping the Chinese long beans around my arms like snakes on Cleopatra’s bracelets. I loved ordering a small cup of boiled peanuts (another reason I love Florida), and stuffing my shopping basket with things I would never have time to cook. I loved that my total never seemed to exceed twenty dollars, though when I got home, my refrigerator would be stuffed to the brim with fresh fruits and vegetables.
The economy has been brutal to small businesses lately, and when I returned from Birmingham in December, I drove to my produce market, expecting the same bounty as when I left in July. My produce stand had fallen victim to our interrupted economy (trying not to use the word “recession”). As I peeked through the glass doors and saw all of the stalls in the store empty, my heart sank. There were no potted herbs outside the door, no flowering orchids blossoming with purple and orange blooms. I supposed that my produce stand would be forever lost, and that I would be relegated to the Publix produce section, with its sterilized tomatoes and waxy apples. Never again able to bite into a tiny pickling cucumber without having to wash it first, savoring the crispiness from first bite to last.

I found Clemons’ Produce while riding down Curry Ford Road to Blockbuster to return a few movies. Clemons’ supplies the produce for many of Orlando’s “local food” restaurants like Dandelion, Ethos Vegan Kitchen, and the acclaimed gastropub, The Ravenous Pig. I stopped in, and was aghast at the seemingly endless aisles of unadorned produce. Not only did they have fat royal purple eggplants and skinny, lavender Japanese eggplants, I found an assortment of tiny white Thai eggplants and purple-and-white striped Indian eggplants. Chinese long beans, fava beans, mangos a plenty, durian (gross…but yay!), huge papaya, green and brown coconuts, purple potatoes. No longer would I be forced into overpriced tomatoes or 2 for $5 strawberries when they’re abundantly in season. Now I would buy poblanos to roast and strawberries for 2 for $3.
The moral here is to find local food. You never know who will close next, so buy local, and buy in abundance. No one will be sad when you show up to their door with a warm Thai curry teeming with tender vegetables and piquant spice during these windy months. No one will be sad that you used fresh pinto and kidney beans that you shelled yourself to make the chili and rice you bring to your neighbors.
Buy local, my friends. Buy. Local.

Peru Triumphant!

Occasionally, I crave Peruvian food. I crave its soft textures, its rich sauces, its bright colors, and its ability to justify the eating of rice at any given moment.

Living away from my boyfriend has meant more than one hardship in my life for the past three months, not the least of which is the fact that I don’t get to see his parents very much now. No more weekends in the stifling humidity of Ft. Lauderdale. No more late-night trips to the beach. No more home-cooked Peruvian meals. That one is probably the worst. Every time I drive down with Cliff to see his parents, they see to it that we are constantly well-fed (see La Casita de Carmencita for more on this). My all-time favorite non-ceviche dish is aji de gallina, a stew made from boiled and shredded chicken, yellow spicy aji peppers, and bound together with a thicker-than-thick sauce of Parmesan cheese (a vestige remnant of Italian settling in Peru and Argentina), walnuts, evaporated milk, and bread. This is all seasoned with onions, garlic, and plenty of saffron-hued turmeric. Most recipes call for hard boiled egg (one of the only foods in the world that I hate), and kalamata olives. I like boiled red potatoes. Aji de gallina is to die for and is very easy to reheat again and again.

So – I was craving. I haven’t seen Carmen and Hugo since July, and it was high time that I learn to make the aji. I have a Peruvian cookbook that I trust about 50% of the time. And 50% just wasn’t going to be good enough. I needed aji de gallina, and I needed it to be stellar. I needed it to taste like the comforting, yellow food I have come to look forward to when I drive the four (sometimes grueling, sometime quick, depending on how hungry I am) hours to South Florida.

I found another recipe on AllRecipes.com that received 4.5 stars. You can find it here: Aji de Gallina. I printed it out and checked out the nutritional information. I tend to do that these days, now that I work at a nutritionally-conscious food magazine with stringent guidelines for its fare. The single serving of aji de gallina contained 333 calories (not horrible), but the kicker was the 14 grams of fat, and I’m sure a bunch of it is saturated. Ugh. No thank you. But looking at the list of ingredients, I saw that it would be very easy for me to “lighten up” if I wanted to.

I wanted to.

Instead of using one whole loaf of white bread, I switched to half a loaf of whole-wheat bread. The halving of the amount was for two reasons, one: whole wheat bread has a higher gluten content than white bread, so the thickening agents would be more powerful – therefore, less was necessary; and two: someone on the discussion board for the recipe said it tasted too bread-y. Now, I don’t know about you, but every time I’ve had a fragrant bowl full of aji de gallina, the last thing I’ve tasted was the bread. So I took her advice.

I also honed in on a can of fat-free evaporated milk that I found at The Pig. Great find. Will use again.
The aji de gallina tasted great. No bread-y ness. Still that lovely smoky, depth of flavor from the walnuts, turmeric, chicken, Parmesan, and garlic. It’s in my fridge now, waiting for me to come home and sing to it and eat it again. The recipe makes 12 servings, so I have a feeling I’ll be eating it for a few days. Not that I’m sad about that. I’m actually really happy about that.

When I got back to the office this morning, I entered the information for my new recipe in ESHA, the nutritional software most often used to analyze the nutritional value of a recipe. I was incredibly happy with the results of my lightened version of aji de gallina that I almost shouted for glee and did a jig in my dead-quiet office. Even with the addition of a few boiled red potatoes, the meal only cost me 141 calories and 4 grams of fat. Unbelievable.

Now just add some long grain brown rice, and you’re set for life.

Eating Your Feelings

I've been noticing a pattern sneaking up in my posts. I'm obsessed with comfort food.

Since I started this blog in 2006, I’ve posted 7 entries on the subject of comfort food. Here they are (with links), from most recent to oldest:

1. Stock Market Crash Comfort
2. Paula Deen and Me: The Lady & Sons Review
3. Beyond "Baby Food": Comfort Restaurant Review (Richmond, VA)
4. Catfish Johnny’s Review (Lake Panasoffkee, FL)
5. Grandma Food
6. Comfort Me With Collard Greens
7. Comfortable Food

Maybe it's just that this particular time in my life has been stressful, and the only things I’ve been able to turn to are the classic foods that I remember as a kid being completely obsessed with. The friends that I still have from my childhood, the ones that remember growing up in the Kapherr house as much as I did, still characterize the dinners around our table as “some of the weirdest food I ever ate.” But none of them deny that it was good.

For most of my childhood (HA! I just wrote “childfood!”), we had a Moroccan student live with us. So, my idea of comfort food might not be the same as yours. The smells of curry and roasting chicken and saffron couscous are the aromas that bring back the memories of home for me. Maybe for you, it’s meatloaf, oatmeal (my latest obsession), spaghetti and meatballs.

Whatever it is, tell me. I want to know what you crave when times are hard. Because, as sad (or as beautiful) as it is, we all eat our emotions.

Comparing Apples and Oysters

Sometimes I wander aimlessly around my kitchen deciding what to put in the food processor.


And sometimes, I end up putting a million things in the food processor.

And sometimes, it tastes amazing.

This happened today.

I was flipping through my favorite cookbook, Jamie Oliver’s “COOK: With Jamie,” and I found an interesting combination of anchovies and rosemary pureed together with lemon juice and olive oil to make a sauce for salmon. I, honestly, had never heard of such a combination. But now that I think of it, the combination is just-so-South-of-France it makes my head spin.

I didn’t have anchovies, which, I must admit, is unusual in a kitchen that I inhabit. I generally have a good can of anchovies around in case of emergency oily-salty-fish craving or in the event that there happens to be a frozen pizza around when my boyfriend isn’t. When he is there, he covers it with whatever meat products are in the refrigerator, leaving no room for the humble anchovy.

Instead of the anchovies, I chose another South-of-France ingredient just as salty and briny as the anchovy: capers. I like capers because you can pronounce my last name to rhyme with them, although my last name is actually pronounced with a short “a” rather than a long “a” sound. But no bother. The caper allows my name to be used in limericks, and thus, I love it.

So, I went out to the garden to pick some fresh rosemary from the bush that runs along the path to our fountain. That makes me sound very Jane Austen-y and provincial. And I love it.

I dumped two tablespoons of drained capers into the 150-year-old Cuisinart food processor, owned by my roommate (who is NOT 150-years-old at all) and whizzed it up with the rosemary leaves, a tablespoon or so of olive oil and some ground pepper. It smelled…well…like Nice. And Aix-en-Provence. At the same time.

At some point, I had decided to make cauliflower, because cauliflower is white, and I have only been eating white foods for the past week. It has to do with the stock market. Read the post below, and you’ll understand.

You would think that cauliflower, because it is white, would have no nutrients, or be fattening, like other white things like butter, cream, flour, lard, etc. This isn’t the case, though. (This is going to be a long blogpost, I can already tell.) Cauliflower is actually in the same family as broccoli, broccolini, cabbages, etc., and thus very high in nutrients and very low in calories. Yay! Thus, we can make up the calories in other ways.

When the cauliflower had been steamed, and had turned a lovely and comforting shade of translucent white, I dumped it in the food processor with the caper/rosemary/France mixture. I poured in a half cup of milk. And a half teaspoon of butter (see also: calories). And I processed everything into a creamy, fragrant mess. It tasted insanely good, especially after adding a half teaspoon of salt. It needed something, though. Green apples…something with some tang. I pushed the apple thought away, believing myself to be temporarily insane.

My roommate brought me back to earth, thankfully. “Is that going to be your entire meal?” she asked. I guess I should have something protein-like, huh.

I’d been saving a half-tub of shucked oysters in the freezer for some homemade biscuits and Southern Oyster Gravy, but it was becoming more and more apparent, that I would never have time to make the gravy, let alone homemade biscuits. I barely have time to paint my toenails, which is a much more important duty than making biscuits, surprisingly. So I took the oysters out of the freezer, defrosted them, and put them on the stove.

Soup, I thought.

When the oyster likker started to steam slightly, I poured in my beautiful cauliflower mixture and added another quarter-cup of milk, just to make it soupy. I brought it to a good temperature slowly, being careful not to cook the oysters too much. As I always say (I actually DO always say this), the only thing worse than an overcooked shrimp is an overcooked oyster/mussel/clam. Shellfish is not to be overcooked.

We were chatting, and my roommate told me she felt like she had seen the oyster/cauliflower combination somewhere before. A quick Google search revealed a New York Times recipe for Cauliflower Soup with Oyster Garnish. There it was. Green apples. Right there in the recipe. I was not insane. I was a genius. Or perhaps both.

I quickly took the bag of chopped up Granny Smiths out of the Ziploc where they were being held in the crisper, and dumped them into, what else, the food processor. I pulsed several times until the apples were small chunks, perfect for lying atop a bowl of white oyster and cauliflower chowder.

It was an elegant soup. Elegant in a comforting way. Like Princess Diana. If she had a soup, it would be this one.

Cauliflower, Rosemary, and Oyster Chowder with Apple Garnish
For the elegant and comforting women of the world, with admiration

2 cups cauliflower florets
Leaves from a sprig of rosemary
2 T drained capers
2 T olive oil
8 oz shucked oysters in their likker (juice)
½ t butter
¾ cup 2% milk or half-and-half, divided
½ Granny Smith apple, seeded
Salt
Pepper

Steam the cauliflower florets in a little water until translucent.

Pulse capers, rosemary, olive oil in food processor until blended. Add steamed cauliflower, butter, and ½ cup of milk and process until creamy.

Add cauliflower mixture to a pot on low heat and add oysters in their liquid, as well as the rest of the milk. Heat slowly until the soup reaches desired temperature, about 8-10 minutes. Stir often.

Dice Granny Smith apple with skin on into 1” chunks and pulse in food processor until apple is in small chunks.


Ladle soup into bowls and top with a tablespoon of apples. Drizzle with walnut oil if desired.

Serves 2.

Stock-Market-Crash Comfort

The easiest way for me to say this: we're in trouble. After Congress, led by the House Republicans, voted down the $700B bailout proposal, the stock market plummeted yesterday, losing more points in one day than ever in history - almost 10%. Granted, the stock market isn’t the economy, but it sure as hell isn’t completely disconnected to it.

I left work yesterday channeling Wall Street – in a slump. I’ve been a bit bored lately, coupled with my father’s health problems, and my complete lack of inspiration for writing my thesis, I felt like the only thing that would cheer me up in the least (outside of a surprise visit from my boyfriend, Cliff, a.k.a. the man who makes my world go ‘round), was some serious comfort food.

I forced myself into the car after I got home and fed the cats, feeling the drain of getting an hour and a half of sleep before and 8-hour workday after an 8-hour drive and looking forward to a 12-hour sleep to come. After cruising through the aisles at Publix (yay Publix!) in a half-asleep daze, I ended up with a carton of organic milk, some (full-fat) Colby Jack cheese, a couple of cans of Ro-Tel (more about this later), and a rotisserie chicken.

A note about the chicken: It was the last one under the heat lamps and about five other people were on their way to snatch it.

I won.

I was not about to wait another ten minutes for more chickens to come out of the rotisserie. That’s ten minutes I could have been asleep.

Upon arriving at home, I put some water on the stove an boiled some whole-wheat rotini pasta and started scalding some milk…

A half hour later, I sat in front of half of my lemon-pepper chicken and a mound of steaming, creamy macaroni and cheese. Comfort food is white. That’s just the way it is. I felt bad that I hadn’t steamed some green beans or made a salad, but after listening to Marketplace and the exceedingly dismal economic conditions and projections, I got over it.

Macaroni and cheese from scratch is probably the only thing I’ll actually take 30 minutes to make after getting an hour and a half of sleep the night before. Just letting you know.

Stock-Market Slump Mac and Cheese

8 oz pasta of your choice
2 T unsalted butter
2 T all-purpose flour
1 ½ c milk (fat content of your choice)
8 oz shredded Colby-Jack cheese/Sharp Cheddar
½ t salt
½ t white pepper
Dash Tabasco

1. Boil pasta until al dente, drain, keep warm in a pot.
2. Melt butter in a small pan.
3. When melted whisk in flour and cook 1 minute to a paste. Remove from heat.
4. When milk comes to a boil, add flour/butter roux and bring back to a boil.
5. Cook milk until thick, stirring constantly with wooden spoon or whisk.
6. Add cheese and stir until completely melted.
7. Add salt, pepper, and Tabasco.
8. Pour cheese sauce over drained pasta and stir to coat completely.

Enjoy with other white foods: chicken, mashed potatoes, etc, and large glass of Cabernet Sauvignon or (for extra comfort) extra-light, extra-sweet coffee. Be comforted.

A Blast from the Past

I can't help it. I love blogging, and I can't stay away from it.

I recently (5 seconds ago) found this deep, deep in my My Documents folder, tucked away where no one would find it for years. 7 years, to be exact. It's an assignment from my Humanities class in high school (Go Wildcats!) that my friend Jennifer and I wrote to show the world how funny and smartassy we were when we were 17. I thought you might enjoy it. I love the last sentence. And for those of you who didn't know Jenn or I when we were 17, that's a picture of us from our Senior Prom. We had matching bangs. I love that girl.

Holly K.
Jennifer B.
Humanities 1
September 8, 2001

How to Really Cook Greek Like a Pro….Wrestler

Rice Pilaf with Mushrooms (Pilafi me Manitaria)
Makes 6 servings


1 medium sized onion, large enough to make a grown man cry
¼ cup butter
2 garlic cloves
3 tablespoons chopped bad-smelling Italian-style flat-leaf parsley
2 teaspoons fresh thyme, or if you’re ghetto, dried thyme.
1 cup long grain white rice that doesn’t get soft, no matter how much water you put in it
1 ½ cups of chicken broth with the gross fat floating at the top
½ cup (or as much as you feel is necessary) dry white wine, or cooking sherry
1 pound mushrooms
2 tablespoons lemon juice
½ cup freshly grated parmesan cheese

Using a heavy metal saucepan, sauté the onion in two tablespoons of the butter. If this doesn’t make you cry, you are a heartless bitch. Add the garlic, parsley, thyme, rice and mushrooms and sauté 1 minute. After you do this, realize that you were not supposed to put in the mushrooms, and cry some more. Add the water and sherry/wine, until someone cries out in despair “HOW MUCH ARE YOU PUTTING IN THERE, HOLLY!?” Then, laugh, and add more rice. Meanwhile, wash and stem some more mushrooms. Melt the butter and add the lemon juice and mushrooms. Sauté quickly, 2-3 minutes, just until hot. Add to the cooked (but still crunchy) rice, and fluff like a cloud, and sprinkle with cheese. Then act surprised when it tastes good, and swear on the fact that it does because of how much alcohol is in it.


Greek Cheese Pie (which is actually just a quiche…)

The Dough
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup warm water
2 tablespoons oil
½ spoon oregano
“dash” of salt

Mix ingredients, which look like they’ll never come together, but finally do, and knead for about 2-3 minutes, adding flour to it until it doesn’t stick to the hands. Complain continually, until this step is complete, and then separate unto 3 equal parts.
The filling:
A couple of chopped green shallots, or if you feel it is appropriate, you may use green onions.
1/3 cup of finely chopped parsley
2 cups wonderfully salty feta cheese, crumbled
½ cup freshly grated Romano cheese
½ cup whole milk, or, better still, half and half. If you don’t know how many pints are in a cup, get the big one.
3 eggs
salt, pepper, thyme

Beat the eggs senseless. Place them aside, and chop and mix all other ingredients, running around like crazy because everything is happening too quickly and you didn’t chop everything BEFORE you put it in the pan. Heat until the cheese begins to melt. Add salt and too much pepper, balancing it by adding too much thyme and yelling “BAM!” at the top of your voice. Allow to cool at room temperature; then mix in the eggs.

Some assembly required:

Look for a rolling pin, and settle for a glass, out of frustration, when you can’t find one. Roll out the 3 dough balls, complaining routinely about how much time it takes. Make each on a bit bigger than your baking pan(s). The amount of dough will give you the right thickness…so we hope.

Place the first layer on the greased pan, with ends hanging over the pan rim – add the first layer of the filling. Follow on with the second dough layer, add the rest of the filling, okay? Finish off with the last dough layer; fold the dough layers together. “Pluck” a few holes, making sure you go through the second layer of dough, too. Bake for 45 minutes, or until you’re done resting. If a burning smell follows your resting, and you opening your eyes to the smell of smoke. Call 911, and never cook again.

We interrupt this holding pattern to...remember David Foster Wallace

I can’t help but be saddened and disturbed by David Foster Wallace’s suicide this past weekend. Wallace hanged himself on Friday at his home in California, found dead by his wife, at the age of 46. He was one of the greatest writers of contemporary fiction to date. One of his novels, Infinite Jest, a sprawling work over over 1,000 pages (which I haven’t read, but which is on the never-ending to-read list) was named one of TIME Magazine’s 100 Greatest Novels of All-Time. His postmodern style kept readers interested, and he wrote about ironic themes, mostly about our culture and its addiction to pleasure and materialism in the search for happiness.

In an interview with Terry Gross on NPR’s Fresh Air broadcast, Wallace explained that the reason for his themes stemmed from his realization that though he and his friends had life much easier and were much better taken care of than the previous generation, they were still very sad. He wanted to know why. I only hope he found out.

It makes me wonder, all of this, why so many writers are unhappy and why so many take their own lives. What do they want to accomplish? Is it that they can’t bear the cruelty or the irony of the reality that has tortured them since their creative inception? Is it that they just can’t wait for the posthumous immortalization that awaits any great thinker or artist? What has the stereotype of the tortured artist done for (or to) these tortured artists?

I am happy; I am an artist. Can those two things be put together, separated only by a frivolous semi-colon? But for me, it is true. I am happy. But, then again, I write about food. I wonder if that is what separates the writers of fiction from the writers of non-fiction, and food in particular. Food makes me so happy. Here’s my reasoning for not succumbing to the fate that so many writers before me have suffered: I’m not sure if I can eat in the afterlife, so I want to live as long as possible so I can continue to eat and to be happy.

I also have an insanely amazing boyfriend, who I could go on about forever (but that’s another blogpost), but David Foster Wallace had a wife. They were happy together, from what I have read, so maybe that’s not a qualifier.

I’m going to share with you some of my deepest pleasures – some of the foods that make me so happy to be alive. And make me grateful for the ability I have to realize how happy I am, and how much I love life.

1. Falafel
2. Eating way more than one fortune cookie and passing the fortunes around the table to the person we feel needs it most at the time.
3. Nutella out of the jar (instant gratification meets instant happiness)
4. Any seafood stew (Bouillabaisse, Cioppino, Parihuela, etc.) coupled with crusty garlic-rubbed bread slices.
5. Cote de Gascogne wines, Colombard and Ugni-Blanc varietal blends – crisp and fruit-heavy, perfect for everyday, all the time

Holding Pattern

Hello everyone! For the time being, I’m suspending On Food and Eating from new postings. I know you’re all devastated, but it’s for a good reason. Before December ends, I need to have a book written. Yes, my friends, my Master’s thesis. It’s in the developing stages right now, but I need to get some words on paper, which means focusing my attention on my thesis and its attempt to make sense out of my obsession with ethnic and fusion food. Never fear, though, I will be writing, and prolifically, about the restaurants and foodways I encounter in the next three and a half months. They’ll just all appear at the end of the semester.

In all honesty, I probably won’t be able to resist a mini-post or two about some cool thing I ran into at the grocery store, on a menu, etc, but no full-fledged posts. Check back periodically if you’re all that interested.

That being said, enjoy your Fall months, and I’ll be back after the holidays! Until then, eat up!

Cover Band

Every once in a while there’s a magazine cover that I can’t stop looking at. It’s provocative, risky, eye-catching – not your typical O: The Oprah Magazine cover with a curly-haired black woman laughing back at you, mouth gaping, eyes twinkling. It’s not your typical food magazine cover either, the sliced pie or the cross-sectioned sandwich overflowing with cheese, meat, some kind of heirloom tomato, and maybe a baby hydroponic lettuce. Sometimes, the magazines go out on a limb, and sometimes they hit a home run.

Today I received the September issue of Gourmet magazine and the cover of this month’s issue stopped me dead in my tracks.

It is GORGEOUS.

I’m not just saying this because it’s the “Paris on a Budget” issue and because my love of Paris, Parisians, Parisian food, etc, is more than well known, having lived there for a cumulative total of 11 months. I’m saying this because…well… it is GORGEOUS.

The photo, below, is a market stand in one of the fresh-air (plein-aire) markets on a typical Parisian street, with cardboard signs announcing the amount of each kilogram of whatever food it is. These stands are gorgeous, much like the food stands lining Main St. in Flushing, New York (which I recently visited, explored, and fell in love with).

The funny thing is, I JUST took a picture like this at one of the markets in New York, on the outskirts of SoHo called “The Garden of Eden.” I’ll post both the picture of the cover and the picture I took at the market side-by-side so it becomes more and more obvious to you why I should work at Gourmet in the future.

No. Seriously.

The Omnivores Hundred

from Chocolate and Zucchini blog:

"The Omnivore's Hundred is an eclectic and entirely subjective list of 100 items that Andrew Wheeler, co-author of the British food blog Very Good Taste, thinks every omnivore should try at least once in his life.

He offered this list as the starting point for a game, along the following rules:
1. Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2. Bold all the items you’ve eaten (I've added an asterisk for the items I'm particularly fond of).
3. Cross out any items that you would never consider eating. (I've used italics, since Blogger is kind of lame in its formatting)
4. Optional extra: post a comment on Very Good Taste, linking to your results."

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare*
5. Crocodile (but alligator is a favorite)
6. Black pudding* (in the form of boudin noir)
7. Cheese fondue (Hooray for birthday dinners in Switzerland!)
8. Carp
9. Borscht*
10. Baba ghanoush*
11. Calamari
12. Phở** (one of the great things about living in VietTown in Orlando)
13. PB&J sandwich (I had one during my first trip to the US when I was 15; I did not quite understand its appeal)
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart* (a.k.a. Dirty Water Hot Dog)
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes (strawberry wine is SO good)
19. Steamed pork buns*
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes (so many this summer, I'm almost tomatoed-out)
22. Fresh wild berries*
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans (having a Latino boyfriend, it's necessary)
25. Brawn, or head cheese (I'm sorry. It's just too gross)
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper (I'm not sure I see the point)
27. Dulce de leche* (In coffee, it can't be beat)
28. Oysters** (Nothing better than a fresh oyster with lemon and a dash of Tabasco)
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas (They don't really float my boat)
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi (I've had mango; I think I'd like the salted version)
34. Sauerkraut**
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar (I'll take the cognac, but hold the cigar)
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O (It'll take a lot for me to do Jell-O shots again)
39. Gumbo*
40. Oxtail*
41. Curried goat (I've had this in the Sierra Madres in Mexico prepared by Indians. Kinda gross)
42. Whole insects (I would try them, but they'd have to be dead, and cooked)
43. Phaal (I'd try a forkful, but wouldn't order it for myself)
44. Goat’s milk (I'm not a fan of milk in general, so I prefer it in yogurt or faisselle form)
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/€80/$120 or more (I probably wouldn't order it, but I'd drink yours)
46. Fugu (I don't think I'd take the risk)
47. Chicken tikka masala**
48. Eel* (I've only ever had it in sushi)
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi (I've recently bought a jar, but have yet to open it)
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal* (guilty passion)
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine (but if I ever make it to Montreal, I'll try it)
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin (again, I'm not sure I see the point)
64. Currywurst
65. Durian (I've seen it, but never tasted it)
66. Frogs’ legs*
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake** (fried dough = love)
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain* (ditto Latino boyfriend comment)
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette**
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini*
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill (I think I'd be so horrified I'd lose my appetite)
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail* (yum)
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum (I may think about making this tonight)
82. Eggs Benedict**
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant (someday...sigh)
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate*** (if you could see me right now, I'm standing and clapping)
91. Spam (I was raised in the South. Enough said)
92. Soft shell crab*
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish*
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox*(
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

I may think about making my own list sometime. I'm sure it would be different. But for now, I'll just bask in the glow of my eating prowess and set some goals to eat my way through the rest of the ones I haven't tried. Do the same!

Oodles of Noodles

My dad is Italian. By no means, however, does this mean that he has any special ability whatsoever in the kitchen. He can eat like an Italian, but put my father in front of a stove, and he’ll probably open it up and figure out how it works rather than light it up and make food. So when my mom was in the hospital for a few weeks when I was seven years old, our diet was limited to two things: Campbell’s Condensed Split Pea soup, and a concoction that somewhat hearkened back to my father’s Italian roots – using the word “somewhat” as loosely as possible.

This creation that we ate for dinner four nights out of seven was called, in accordance with my dad’s predilection for sing-songy names about pretty much everything, “oodles of noodles,” from the classic Italian dish “molto pasti.” You can see the resemblance.

It was a simple dish, one that combined slightly overcooked noodles (the term “al dente” never seemed to make it into my dad’s Italian verbiage), dried Italian seasoning, butter, salt, and LOTS of Kraft Parmesan Cheese in the cylindrical container. It was white, it was greasy, and it was good. One family video we have is of me terrorizing our enormous, 25-pound orange cat (so named, Purr-Purr), while my dad mixed the Oodles of Noodles.

The day my mom was released from the hospital was the last time I ever saw my dad cook anything that wasn’t popped in the microwave.

Recently, my dad had a mild heart attack and had a Pacemaker installed in his chest. Saying that makes him sound like a 1990 Ford Taurus with a bad alternator, but the truth is, he truly believes that he’s the Terminator.

Now that my dad isn’t top notch and I can cook for him, the next time I go home to visit, I’ll make him my own version of Oodles of Noodles:

Spaghetti with Bread Crumbs (Oodles of Noodles revisited)

½ lb thin spaghetti noodles
½ T extra-virgin olive oil
¼ c Italian-style bread crumbs
¼ t crushed red pepper
1 small garlic clove, minced
½ cup flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
zest of ½ lemon
Block of Parmiggiano-Reggiano cheese

Boil spaghetti noodles until al dente, drain and drizzle olive oil over noodles. Toss to coat. Transfer noodles into a large serving dish. Mix next five ingredients together and add to spaghetti. Toss to evenly distribute mixture. Serve topped with large shavings of cheese.

Serves 4

Whippet Good

I was just privy to a tri-cubicle debate on the semantics of Reddi-Wip whipped cream. The problem: we can’t actually use the brand name “Reddi-Wip” in the recipe.

It’s not like Reddi-Wip is one of those brand-name-turned-proper-name issues like Kleenex or Xerox. In those cases, any photocopier could be a Xerox or any light paper used for the ejection of nose monkeys could be called a Kleenex. In this case, Reddi-Wip connotes a particular brand. And we can’t have that.

But what do you call it, if it’s not Reddi-Wip? We threw around the words aerosol, pressurized, canned, and my favorite: spray. None of those words, unfortunately for our Copy Editor, were all that appetizing. But come on, what’s so appetizing about heavy cream solidified by liquid nitrogen? Every time I hear that signature shhhhhhluck! sound, all I can think about are the interminable nights behind the counter at Seattle’s Best where we passed the time only by doing whippets (Google it, if you don’t know what whippets are) in the back room. Talk about nostalgia.

The cold, hard reality is that Reddi-Wip is gross. So gross that they couldn't even spell EITHER of the words in the name correctly. But would Reddi-Wip be any better if it were called Ready-Whip? I'm not sure, it would probably still be chemically processed whipping cream set with liquid nitrogen. Do you really want to put that in your body? I really feel that any food sold in an aerosol can, akin to hair spray or wasp repellent, should be obliterated from grocery store shelves, and from diets in general. I'll attach my favorite REAL whipped cream recipe below. Eat real cream. Maybe just a little of it, especially if you're watching your fat, cholesterol, etc. But, please, for the love of all that's holy, don't eat liquid nitrogen.

I think the copy editor finally settled on using “can of pressurized whipped cream, such as Reddi-Wip” in the recipe, which is fine since we’re just suggesting Reddi-Whip and not actually endorsing it.

The food semantics around here are incredible.

Favorite Whipped Cream

1 c heavy whipping cream (the real stuff)
1/2 c powdered sugar, sifted
1/2 t vanilla bean paste (preferably Madagascar paste)
zest of one lemon

In a cold mixing bowl, beat whipping cream on high speed with an electric mixer until soft peaks form slowly add powdered sugar, vanilla, and lemon zest and continue to beat just until stiff peaks. Don't overbeat, or you'll have some really sweet butter.

The Fleeting Fig

On a blistering Saturday, a few weeks ago, my roommate Donna and I were strolling through the Birmingham Farmer’s Market. Among the verdant (ha!) baby zucchini, the flimsy white boxes overflowing with field peas, and the slices of buttercup yellow watermelon being passed around, my eyes latched on to one of my favorite fruits of summer. The elusive fresh fig.



They were round, plump, juicy-looking, not like the poor little anemic ones we see in the markets in Orlando. These figs, whose ruby-red center lay glistening with clear nectar, were Alabama figs, probably plucked from the tree hours before arriving at the Farmer’s Market. I gravitated toward them while Donna admired a box of Cherokee Purple heirloom tomatoes.

As I leaned down to the green cardboard box full of the little figs to inhale their unique floral aroma, I heard Donna behind me, “Don’t buy figs. My neighbor has a TON.”

Okay, then. I spent my four dollars on a tub of local goat cheese. Good trade off.

When we got home, we walked next door to Kim’s house. Her tree was weighted down with the heft of so many juicy Brown Turkey figs, each holding a fleshy center full of fragrant syrup and tiny seeds. I had forgotten to bring a bag, so I hiked up my dress and gathered the tiny morsels Hungarian-potato-picker-style in the skirt of my dress. Of course, I ate about as many figs as I collected.

As I bent down to pick a few from the bottom of the tree, I caught the unmistakable smell of rancid fruit, decaying at the root of the enormous plant. I should have taken that as a warning.

I had grand plans to make a fig upside-down cake – a gorgeous concoction of sautéed figs in a cast iron skillet with lemon-scented cake batter poured over them and baked for 25-30 minutes and then turned over on itself, revealing the caramelized fresh figs. It seemed too good to be true.

I remember reading somewhere that fresh figs are extremely perishable – meaning that they begin to decompose very quickly – and they weren’t kidding. The next day, only five of those figs were salvageable, and as I leaned over to pick the non-fermenting figs out of the bowl, another waft of that rancid fruit smell pierced my nostrils.

Lesson learned: The next time I pick figs, I will use them immediately.

First Full-Lengther

While I'm preparing for:

1. My boyfriend to come visit me this evening from Orlando so he can eat more than just eggs and sausage.
2. My next blogpost on my new obsession with fresh figs,

I'll just post a link to my first full-length review that was published in Orlando Weekly on July 23, 2008.

http://www.orlandoweekly.com/dining/review.asp?rid=13778

Enjoy, and stay tuned!

The Verdant Movement

This morning I was listening to Morning Edition on NPR (National Public Radio, aka the source of my daily cup of delight) and I heard an announcement of support from The MacArthur Foundation. Their tagline is “to help build a more just, verdant and peaceful world…etc.” Now, I don’t know about you, but I’m all about the “Green movement.” My top five food-related favorite things about it:

1. More farmers markets, which means more local produce and more local goat cheese (at least in ‘Bama). Hooray!

2. An excuse to buy and carry around really cute bags with silk-screened sayings like, “Live. Love. Green.” on them under the premise that they are environmentally-sustainable grocery bags that cut down on waste like CRAZY.

3. The ability to run my car on used frying-oil from local restaurants. I haven’t quite figured out how to modify my engine so I can do this, but believe me, I’m thinking.

4. I save a lot of money on bottled water because I don’t buy it anymore. 30,000 plastic water bottles are dumped into Miami landfills EVERYDAY. I’m having Wall-E nightmares already.

5. Smart cars!

Okay, so the last one isn’t food-related, but they’re so dang cute! I want one.

Anyway, back to The MacArthur Foundation. I just got a kick out of their use of the word “verdant” to replace the word “green.” I understand their extreme commitment to intellectual pursuits, but seriously, I don’t think “The Verdant Movement” is going to catch on. Or maybe their point was to shun the “trend” label, yet still be perceived as environmentally friendly.

This doesn’t really have anything to do with food, I’m realizing, so I’m going to tie the subject matter in immediately.

One of my favorite summer vegetables is squash. You name it, I love it. Zucchini, yellow squash, and especially pattypan squash. These little jewels are light green (verdant) and excellent when roasted, sautéed, or grilled. I made a nice salad last night for dinner that encapsulates the word “verdant,” and will make a nice addition to this blogpost. Eat more squash.

Grilled Pattypan Squash with Dill and Lemon


1 pound pattypan squash, blossoms removed
2 tbsp olive oil
Salt and Pepper
3-4 sprigs of fresh dill
juice of ½ lemon
zest of ½ lemon

Ignite your grill to the hottest setting and put a grill pan on the top rack if you have no grill, a 450-degree oven works just swimmingly).

Cut each pattypan squash into 1” pieces depending on the size of the squash. For the really tiny ones, just half them.

Toss in olive oil, salt and pepper. Pour squash onto hot grill pan and shut the grill top. During grilling, move squash around on the grill pan every few minutes to ensure even cooking on all surfaces. Make sure some browning occurs, so don’t stir too prematurely.

While the squash are grilling, chop fresh dill, zest and squeeze lemon and combine ingredients in a large bowl.

Remove squash from the grill and dump them into the mixing bowl with the dill, lemon zest, and juice. Toss to coat evenly.

Serve with grilled meats or even on its own. Great warm or cold.

Viva la verdant!

La Casita de Carmencita

Here is one of the best falling-in-love stories I’ve ever heard: A woman and a man were at a party. Not together. They were both just there. Fate put them there.

The music blasting a rhythmic salsa, pisco sours being passed around, the part is rip-roaring. The woman, stunningly beautiful with almond-shaped eyes and jet black hair, ducks into the kitchen to escape the din of the chatter. In the quiet kitchen, she finds a man with skin the color of caramel, slicing raw fish. He seems at home among piles of lemons and limes, red onions, salt, hot peppers, and pale yellow cancha, Peruvian corn with kernels the size of nickels. He hums while he works, a lock of black hair falling over his furrowed brow, lined with tiny sweat beads.

He is making ceviche, which happens to be the woman’s favorite food. She is instantly smitten. They have been married for almost thirty years, now.

I love this story because the man and the woman are two people I have come to adore for the past seven months. They are my boyfriend’s parents, Hugo and Carmen, and food remains an important part of their marriage and family now, just as it was the catalyst that brought them together.

Every time I go over to Mama y Papa Alejos’ house in south Florida, I leave full. Very full. We usually wake up to the smell of Italian sausage sizzling in the pan, and stumble to the dining room, where we can see Hugo making omelets in a prehistoric black pan, one he refuses to give up, so warped that its smooth surface has been replaced with grainy black bumps – one for each omelet that has come out of the pan. The coffee on the table, is Folgers, but for some reason, it tastes like a fine French Roast from all the love that has been brewed right in. I’m a croissant and espresso girl, usually content to eat enough to quiet my hunger until lunch time. But in their house, I fill a fluffy slice of Cuban bread with as much sausage, egg, and hot sauce as I can muster and chow down. Inevitably, Hugo will consider what we will have for lunch while we’re at the breakfast table.

Since I’ve been dating Cliff, I’ve been to a plethora (yes, a plethora) of Peruvian restaurants between Orlando and Miami, but the food that Hugo and Carmen put on their table is better than any dining establishment. Chunks of slow-cooked beef or chicken is simmered in thick, verdant cilantro sauce to make a seco. Shreds of chicken swim in spicy yellow aji pepper paste. And of course, there is ceviche. Half of the oval serving plate is for Carmen, a notorious hand-smacker if she sees one of us reaching for too much of her favorite dish, the other half of the dish is for the rest of us to fight amongst ourselves.

I always admire the way the family sits around the able for every meal. Not once in the dozen times I’ve been there has anyone eaten in front of the television, in their room, or on the porch. There are always jokes, stories, and laughter around the table. An atmosphere that I’m used to, and though my grasp of the Spanish language is pathetic at best, I can always laugh heartily with the rest of the family and exclaim, “Que rico!”