Comfort Food
After a pretty depressing week I spent Sunday at my two-year-old niece Charlotte's birthday party. Because kids love macaroni and cheese, my sister requested I prepare this recipe which has become something of a specialty for me. Macaroni and cheese, cupcakes, Mylar balloons and the laughter of two-year-olds is good for what ails you. I highly recommend it.
My recipe is based on the
Chat 'n' Chew Macaroni and Cheese recipe which I first saw on the Food Network a few years ago. The
Chat 'n Chew is a well known, no-frills eatery near Union Square which has been serving up comfort food to New Yorkers for years. I've modified the proportions and lightened the original recipe a bit since all that heavy cream will incite a gall bladder attack in even the most hearty of eaters. After all, you don't want to kill your guests--that would defeat the purpose of comfort food. Anyway, here's the recipe--it's pretty fabulous if I do say so myself.
Uncle Michael's Mac and Cheese
3/4 cup butter, (1 and 1/2 sticks) plus extra for the baking dish and topping.
1 to 1 1/4 pounds elbow macaroni (I sometimes use shells)
2 cups half and half
1 cup milk
1 medium onion, diced small
3 cloves garlic, minced
3/4 cup flour
4 cups (1 pound) shredded sharp cheddar
8 slices Munster cheese, broken into small pieces (I sometimes use Gruyere when I'm feeling fancy.)
1 1/2 cups grated Parmesan cheese, divided
3 tablespoons
green chile sauce (Such as Green Tabasco) <---
secret ingredient!
1/4 teaspoon ground cumin
Kosher salt
Freshly ground pepper
1/3 cup bread crumbs seasoned with salt and pepper
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter a 9 by 13 by 4-inch baking dish.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat and cook the macaroni until al dente, 8 to 10 minutes. Drain.
In a small bowl, combine the half and half and milk.
In a large saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter and cook the onion and garlic until the onion is translucent, about 4-5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the flour to create a roux, stirring constantly for 3 minutes. Add the milk mixture in a steady stream and whisk until smooth. Bring to a boil, stirring frequently, allow to thicken.
Stir in the 4 cups of cheddar, the Munster cheese, 1 cup of the grated Parmesan, the green pepper sauce, and cumin. Stir until all the cheese has melted; the sauce will be very thick and creamy. Season with salt and pepper.
Remove the sauce from the heat and stir in the pasta. Pour the mixture into the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle with the the Parmesan and bread crumbs, dot with a few pats of butter.
Bake uncovered on the middle shelf for about 30 minutes, until bubbling and golden brown on top.
Labels: Family, Personal, Recipes
Love's Labors
Money was tight this year so Scott and I decided to keep our Valentine plans pretty simple. I volunteered to make a nice dinner, have the candles lit in the fireplace (it's non-working--decorative only), we'd enjoy our meal together and settle in for a quiet evening just the two of us. I'm pretty adept in the kitchen so I thought nothing of this. I can throw a pretty good meal together without even thinking about it. I do it all the time and can even time it to be ready when Scott walks through the door on his way home from work. Protein, starch, vegetable and sometimes even desert. Very Donna Reed.
Last week as I sat in the waiting room at my therapist's office I perused her Martha Stewart Living magazine. I came across the recipe I mentioned yesterday on the very last page. It didn't look that difficult and I've made
Linzer Cookies before. In fact I've tried several different recipes in search of just the right one. Well, if this is Martha's recipe, I thought, it must be good. Plus with that beautiful photo of them on the cover how could I go wrong? What a perfect valentine. I ripped the recipe out and shoved it in my bag.
I make it a point to read recipes all the way through before trying them. So I knew I had to toast the pecans and cool them completely beforehand (figure 30 minutes for that). I knew the dough, which was easily assembled, had to chill for a full 2 hours before rolling out. I knew that after rolling the dough out to an 1/8 inch thick, I had to put the pastry board back in the fridge to chill the rolled dough for an additional 20 minutes before cutting the cookies out. (
Calculate 40 minutes for this, there were two halves to be rolled). Fine.
Finally, I
preheated the oven. That's when the alarm went off "BEEP, BEEP, BEEP, Warning: Carbon Monoxide. BEEP BEEP BEEP!" It was DEAFENING! Over and over again, "BEEP, BEEP, BEEP, Warning: Carbon Monoxide. BEEP BEEP BEEP!" Carbon monoxide? What the hell do I do about that? Is it the oven? How much time do I have to live? Should I call 911? And what about the damn cookies I've already invested over 3 hours in? Not to mention that I haven't even started dinner yet.
A frantic phone call to my father followed. He told me to open the window (which I had already done) and then described the chemical make-up of carbon monoxide to me in great detail (he's an engineer) assuring me that it was most likely not the gas from the oven, but something burning off inside it. "Probably grease," he said. The VERY IDEA! "My oven is perfectly clean, Dad!" He then instructed me to just turn the oven off and see if the alarm stops. Great. Now I'll have to
preheat all over again but maybe I won't die.
I used the opportunity to start dinner. The alarm stopped and halfway through dinner prep I preheated the oven again. Now I'm browning pork chops and cutting fluted little hearts out at the same time. And because it's a Martha recipe, she has to add the additional step of straining and
reducing the cherry preserve filling. Why cherry and not raspberry like every other
Linzer recipe? Well, I'm sure they had a big editorial meeting over at
MSO Headquarters and decided to go with cherry because the color is more
Valentiney. So now I'm reducing cherry
perserves on the same stove top on which I'm braising pork chops. The cookies are in the oven with no alarms sounding and are sharing space with a baked macaroni and cheese I planned for a side dish. By the way, have I mentioned that I still hadn't showered at this point?
So, with the mac and cheese baking, I managed to dust with confectioners sugar and glue together a respectable amount of cookies with their reduced cherry preserve filling. The pork chops still had 20 more minutes to braise. To hell with a vegetable. I made a mad dash for the shower.
Just as I was working my hair up into a nice big shampoo commercial lather, my buzzer rings. My apartment is now 40 degrees from having the windows open for the last two hours. I clutch a towel, but still manage to drip water all over the floor on my way to buzz my gentleman caller in. I unlock the door, hop back in the shower and hope that it is indeed Scott at the door and not Norman Bates, because I'm a prime candidate for the Psycho shower scene at this point. Luckily it was him. The house was still a mess and a mountain of dishes were piled in the sink.
I threw something on and we sat down for our meal. I began apologizing for the mess and the lack of vegetable and the fact that it was freezing and that the flowers I planned to arrange were still in the
cellophane. I explained how I was going to trim the pork chops into heart shapes but there wasn't time and I just wanted everything to be perfect for him. "Relax," Scott said "everything IS perfect." And that's when I burst in to tears--because he was right and I believed him. It WAS perfect. We were together. And really what else mattered? To hell with Martha.
Labels: Humor, Personal, Recipes
Martha Would be Proud
For my valentine, Scott, I made Martha's Cookie of the Month. A Pecan Linzer Cookie with Cherry Filling. What a pain in the ass.
Labels: Recipes
Let 'em Eat Bundt Cake!
I'll bet you didn't know that today is National Bundt Cake Day. Well, it is! Who knew there was even such a thing, but it seems Nordic Ware, the company that introduced the bundt pan back in 1950, has proclaimed it to be so. I happen to know this because I caught a bit of the
Martha Stewart Show this morning and she was practically wetting herself over the fact. Well, you know I love me some Martha, so in honor of National Bundt Cake Day and Martha, I thought I'd post one of my favorite Bundt cake recipes.
My grandmother used to make this recipe and I remember it from when I was a little kid so it's at least 35 years old--probably more. Since it's a doctored up version of a boxed cake mix I imagine it first appeared in a ladies' home magazine or on the back of a box of Duncan Hines at one time. Anyway, it's delicious, easy to make and has been a staple in our family for years. Enjoy!
Sherry Cake
1 pkg. Deluxe yellow cake mix
1 pkg. Vanilla instant pudding
4 eggs
1 cup sherry
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. cinnamon
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine ingredients in a bowl and mix with an electric mixer for 2 to 3 minutes on high speed. Pour into a greased bundt pan and bake for 45 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool cake in pan for 10 minutes then invert on a cooling rack, remove pan and continue to cool completely. Dust with confectioners sugar and serve. This cake is particularly nice served with fresh berries and a dollop of whipped cream or the ice cream flavor of your choice.
Labels: Pop Culture, Recipes
Butternut Squash Soup
Remember that butternut squash I got at the farm last week? Well, it finally got turned into soup tonight. I woke up this morning with a bit of a cold and the nip of autumn in the air, so what better than soup?
It should be noted that this is perhaps the first soup I've ever made in my life from scratch. Not that I'm a novice in the kitchen, on the contrary. I'm addicted to the Food Network and own a shelf full of cookbooks. I like to cook, do it often and am even pretty good at it. But this is my first attempt at soup. And Butternut Squash Soup at that. After researching a few recipes, I came up with a hybrid of my own. Here it is:
Butternut Squash Soup2-3 lb. butternut squash
2-3 Tbls olive oil
2 Tbls butter
1 medium onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1 cup apple cider
3 cups low sodium chicken broth
1/4 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 375 F. Cut squash lengthwise and remove seeds. Rub cut surfaces of squash with 1 Tbls olive oil and place face down on a cookie sheet. Bake for 45 minutes. When squash is finished, remove cookie sheet from oven and set aside until squash is cool enough to handle. Once cooled, use a large spoon to scoop squash pulp from skins. Place pulp in a medium sized bowl and set aside.
In a large, heavy saucepan heat butter and remaining oil. When butter starts to foam, add chopped onion and garlic and sautee until translucent. (About 5 minutes) Next add apple cider and bring to a simmer. Add chicken broth, bring to a boil and then reduce to a simmer for about 10 minutes. Add squash pulp to mixture and stir to incorporate for a few minutes.
Turn off heat and transfer soup mixture in small batches to a blender. Puree soup mixture in blender on low speed making sure the top to the blender is secure. Pour pureed mixture into a large bowl and set aside. Continue until entire soup mixture is pureed. Return pureed soup to original saucepan and reheat. Add grated nutmeg and salt and freshly ground pepper to taste.
Serve hot and garnish with dollop of sour cream or homemade croutons. (Crouton recipe follows)
Homemade Croutons:
Cut half a loaf of French, Italian or sour dough bread into 3/4 inch cubes.
Place in a large ziplock bag and drizzle with 3 to 4 Tbls olive oil, 3/4 tsp garlic salt, freshly ground pepper and 3 to 4 Tbls grated Parmesan cheese. Seal bag and toss ingredients until cubes are thoroughly coated. Place cubes on a cookie sheet and toast in the oven for about 15 minutes at 450 F.
Try this. It's pretty good.
Labels: Recipes
