Breakfast for Dinner

In the lead up to Christmas more often than not meals are a quick grab, not something to savor and enjoy. In our house we are just as guilty. Often it is easier to call up the take-out Chinese (or in Calgary go to Swiss Chalet) than spend a bit of time making a meal.

A fun way to bring everyone together is to have breakfast for dinner. When I was growing up it was always my dad’s job to cook Sunday dinner and his trick was often to make breakfast for dinner. It is so fun for kids to turn the day on its head and have something unusual but familiar on the dinner table. Dad used to do waffles, but I find when you are busy they are too tedious. Instead I like to cook a Dutch pancake.

Dutch pancake, puff pancake, or Dutch Baby, it is known by many names. It basically is a puffy crepe cooked in a hot pan in the oven. All you have to do is mix the batter (which can even be done ahead of time) and pour the mixture into your preheated pan. If you desire you can sauté some peeled apples in butter and sugar and serve them on-top of the pancake, covering it with a sprinkle of icing sugar. I prefer my Dutch pancake savory, so I don’t like any sugar on top. Instead I serve it alongside breakfast sausage and a store-bought fruit salad. Serve the breakfast with coffee and hot chocolate and relax, enjoy and pretend you have a whole extra day (just for a while).

Enjoy!

Tender Dutch Baby

Makes 4 servings

3 large eggs
6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
6 tablespoons milk
3 tablespoons butter or margarine

In a blender or with a whisk beat the eggs with the flour, sugar and milk until smoothly mixed. You can at this point put the mixture into the fridge for a few hours or even overnight. Make sure you cover it and give it a whisk before you use it.

Take a large oven-safe 10- to 12-inch frying pan and place it in a 425 degree oven on the center rack. Add the butter to the pan and let it melt in the oven until it is starting to bubble. Tilt the pan to coat it with the butter and quickly pour in the batter.

Bake until pancake puffs at edges (it may also puff irregularly in the center) and is golden brown, about 15 minutes.

Working quickly, cut into 4 wedges and transfer to dinner plates, using a wide spatula; the wedges may deflate somewhat after cutting. If you prefer you can sprinkle wedges liberally with icing sugar.

Merry Chocolate Pavlova

I made a variation of this dessert this year for Thanksgiving. It was probably the most foreign thing I have ever brought into my in-laws home. This says a lot because my in-laws are kind of the foodie type. They enjoyed it immensely though and it was a big hit.

Pavlova is an Australian dessert named after a Russian ballerina. It is a wonderful meringue concoction, crunchy sweet outside enrobing a gooey, marshmallow-like center. Growing up we didn’t have this dessert necessarily at Christmas, but I do feel a big Pavlova has a festive lean to it.

My mother is fond of buying pre-made individual size meringue shells and filling them with whipped cream and strawberries for a quick and easy dessert for company. I have seen the individual ones for sale here in our neck of the woods, but only at Fairway at 125^th Street in Manhattan. Besides I prefer the homemade shell because I find the store-bought ones to be too crunchy with not enough gooey.

The secret to the goo is the vinegar in the recipe. I’m not sure of the science but I do make meringue cookies a lot too and they need to be crisp and that recipe never has vinegar in it. The traditional Australian topping is whipped cream and passion fruit. Passion fruit is a little too hard to find this time of year and very expensive. I like my Pavlova chocolaty and dark, so I put a little cocoa powder in the egg whites, put a smear of chocolate custard between the Pavlova and the whipped cream and top the thing off with chocolate shavings. I also add fruit of course, usually blackberries or raspberries as their taste goes well with chocolate.

Like I said this dessert is not really Christmas-y but it is a show-stopper and I think would make a lovely addition to a holiday buffet table or even Christmas dinner. The important thing is that this dessert needs to have the parts of it made in advance (usually the night before) and then assembled right before serving.

Enjoy!

Christmas Chocolate Pavlova

Serves 12

Pavlova (recipe below)
Chocolate Custard (recipe below)
1 1/2 cups whipping cream
2 pints blackberries or raspberries
1/2 cup chocolate shavings

Pavlova:
4 large egg whites, room temperature
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 Tbsp cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon vinegar
1/2 cup berry sugar
1/2 cup icing sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate chunks

For the Pavlova: Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Using an overturned bowl or a cake pan as a guide, trace a 10-inch circle onto parchment. Turn parchment over, marked side down.

Beat egg whites, cornstarch, cocoa, salt, and vinegar with a mixer on medium speed until foamy. Gradually add berry sugar. Raise speed to medium-high, and beat until stiff peaks form, about 7 minutes. Reduce speed to medium, and gradually add the icing sugar. Raise speed to medium-high, and beat until very stiff, glossy peaks form, about 7 minutes. Beat in vanilla. Fold in chocolate chunks.

Using a rubber spatula or a large spoon, spread meringue into marked 10-inch circle on prepared baking sheet, forming a well in center.

Bake until outside is firm and bottom lifts easily off parchment, about 4 to 6 hours. (In my experience 5 hours seems to be the magic number). Turn off the oven and leave the Pavlova to cool overnight. When cool, carefully remove from parchment and place on your serving plate. Alternatively the Pavlova can be stored in an airtight container for about 2 to 3 days.

Chocolate Custard
2 cups whole milk
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
4 teaspoons cornstarch
3 large egg yolks
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon fine salt

For the custard: Put 1 1/2 cups of the milk, the sugar, and the cocoa in a saucepan. Bring to a simmer, over medium-high heat. Remove from the heat.

Meanwhile, whisk the remaining 1/2 cup of the milk, cornstarch, salt, egg yolks, and vanilla in a bowl. Gradually whisk the hot milk into the egg mixture. Return to the saucepan and cook over medium-high heat whisking constantly, until the custard comes to a full boil. Reduce the heat to maintain a simmer, and continue whisking until thick, about 2 or 3 minutes more.

Pour the custard into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, pushing the plastic wrap right down onto the top of the custard to prevent a skin from forming. Let custard cool completely.

To assemble the Pavlova place the meringue on your serving platter. Whip the cream. Spoon about 1 to 1 1/2 cups of the custard into the well in the Pavlova. Top with the whipped cream, leaving a little bit of a border so you can see the chocolate custard underneath. Decorate the top with the berries and sprinkle with chocolate shavings.

Gingerbread Cupcakes

Last year I was in the full swing of cupcake madness. It has swept nearly every city in North America and I was ready to be pulled along. Then came Christmas and I was not ready to give up my cupcake obsession. A new idea had to be born.

In Calgary there is a restaurant chain that isn’t that amazing, but it is one of the places that everyone goes to, because it is there. It is not terrible, but not exactly innovative and fantastic either. It is one of those restaurants that you know you won’t go wrong when you order the burger or the fettuccine alfredo.

Except at Christmas time when they pull out a great dessert that combined with their fantastic cocktails always leads me to say, “Why don’t we go to Earl’s tonight?” This dessert is a warm gingerbread cake. I’m not a dessert person. I’m the one who would much rather order an appetizer than a dessert, but when it comes to this gingerbread cake I’m hooked.

So last year in the mania that was cupcakes I decided to combine my love for this rich gingerbread cake with a cute cupcake. Earl’s serves theirs with caramelized apples and whip cream, not a very portable concoction; something a cupcake has to be. So instead I decorated the cupcakes with royal icing letting it slide and drip off the sides of the cupcake. I topped it off with a piece of marzipan fruit, something you can find online or in cake decorating stores (and even some grocery stores this time of year). It was such a festive look, the white snowy icing combined with the little piece of fruit. And the icing was perfect on the cupcake, a sweet crunch combined with a richly dense, not overly sweet cake.

Here is the recipe for these glorious cupcakes. You can find the recipe for royal icing here on the blog, under the sugar cookie entry. If you can’t find marzipan just use a festive candy.

Enjoy!

Gingerbread Cupcakes

Makes about 12 cupcakes

5 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup unsulfured molasses
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon Dutch process cocoa powder
1 1/4 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup hot milk
Preheat the oven to 350. Butter or line with paper liners a 12-cup muffin tin.

Cream 5 tablespoons of the butter with the white sugar. Add the molasses and the egg and egg yolk.

Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, ginger, cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg and salt.
Dissolve the baking soda in the hot milk. Add the flour mixture to the creamed mixture and stir until just combined. Stir in the hot milk mixture. Pour the batter evenly into the prepared tin.
Bake at 350 for 20 minutes or until slightly springy to the touch. Allow to cool a few minutes in the pan and remove to a rack to cool.

Once cooled make the royal icing, spread the icing on the top of the cupcakes and don’t worry if it runs down the sides a little, this adds to the effect. Top with the marzipan decoration and allow the icing to harden.

Joan's Chocolate Yummies

When I was growing up Christmas always meant Christmas baking and goodies. My mother is not a cook at all and most of these goodies would be made by my dad or my older sister, or brought over by friends.

There was never any deviation from the menu, always the same goodies every year. This is not a complaint. It is great to have special treats that you only eat at a certain time of year. It would seem so weird to eat shortbread cookies in May, and for that reason they are all the more delicious in December.

Today’s recipe is called Joan’s Chocolate Yummies because that is what they were called on the recipe card in our kitchen. I think they are known by many other names including bird’s nests. One of my favorite seasonal items was always these little melty, chocolatey, crunchy mounds that melt a little in your hand, forcing you to eat them a little more quickly.

It is such a simple recipe, the only hard part for me here on the east coast for the past six years has been finding butterscotch chips. I usually have to order them from Fresh Direct. Joan was my parents’ next door neighbor when we lived in Lake Bonavista and though I have no clue where she is now, her memory lives on in these delightful little chocolate bites.

Enjoy!

Joan’s Chocolate Yummies

Makes about 2 dozen yummies

1 12 oz bag of chocolate chips
1 12 oz bag of butterscotch chips
3 cups chow mein noodles (the crunchy kind)
3 cups rice krispies

Melt the chocolate chips and the butterscotch chips in a bowl above simmering water.

Remove from heat and add the cereal and the chow mein noodles.

Form a yummy by dropping a tablespoon at a time of the mixture onto waxed paper. Let cool overnight and store in an airtight container.

Woo-ing Cookies

I had a roommate in University who wooed with baked goods. He was famous for his pies that definitely got a few girls to look his way. He was taught the art of baking by his mother and I always thought it was so great that here was this cool, masculine guy who knew how to bake a great pie. It’s a skill we should all teach our sons.

One of his other specialties was an amazing recipe for sugar cookies. I’m a sucker for a good sugar cookie and at the time I was trying to woo my very own man so I had my roommate teach me how to make them. The recipe is really simple and can be used at any time of year. The time I got him to show it to me it was right before Valentine’s Day as I was on my way down to New York to visit my boyfriend. Valentine’s Day ended up being our wedding day, coincidence? Maybe, but I like to think the cookies had something to do with it.

This recipe has a simple icing that you can put on the cookies. But this time of year I like to use a royal icing as decoration. Royal icing is the kind that becomes very hard when it cools and you can tint it to any color. The Christmas I was pregnant I made these cookies and my sister and my husband decorated a whole bunch of pregnant snowmen with the icing. (They were regular snowmen without icing). Essential in my opinion to decorating holiday cookies are some sort of sanding sugar or sprinkles. Just walk down the baking aisle at Shoprite here in Hoboken and you’ll find lots of options. So get out your holiday shaped cookie cutters and let’s make some more cookies!

Adam’s Sugar Cookies

Makes about 3 dozen, depending on the size of your cookie cutters

1/2 lb butter (at room temperature)
1 1/2 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 Tbsp. vanilla
1 tsp. almond extract
3 cups flour
1 tsp. b. powder
1/2 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar, beat in the eggs.
Stir in vanilla and almond extract.
In a separate bowl sift together dry ingredients.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet.

Chill the dough in the fridge for 3 hrs. Roll out 1/4" thick, and cut out.
Bake at 375 F for 8-10 mins.

Here’s the icing recipe that Adam gave me:

Icing

1 cup icing sugar
4 tsp. hot milk
1/2 tsp. vanilla
2 tsp. lemon juice
food coloring (optional)

Mix together all ingredients together. If it is too thick add more milk, if it is too thin add more icing sugar. Paint onto cooled cookies.

Here’s my recipe for royal icing. By the way I never minded using raw egg whites when I didn’t give these cookies to young kids, but now-a-days there are plenty of people with compromised immune systems around me (pregnant women, elderly people, young kids) so I use either meringue powder, which you can buy online or in cake supply stores, or pasteurized egg whites, and those you can get almost anywhere.

Make sure you make the icing only right before you are ready to decorate the cookies. You can place some in a piping bag and cover the rest of the icing in a bowl with a damp tea towel. That will prevent it from hardening before you are finished.

Royal Icing

3 ounces pasteurized egg whites
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 cups icing sugar

In the bowl of a large stand mixer mix the egg whites and vanilla and beat on high until they start to get frothy.
Slow the machine down and add the sugar gradually. Turn the speed up to high and beat until stiff peaks form. Add food coloring if you want at this point.

Dad's Shortbread

This is the time of year when things really do come speeding at you. It seems like only a few days ago that I was putting my daughter in her Halloween costume and now I’m getting her ready for her picture with Santa.

I find one of the nicest things this time of year is visiting with friends. Pretty soon I’ll be up in Calgary, Canada with my family and one of my favorite things about being home is visits with friends. Along with these visits come the trays and trays of holiday goodies. Some of them get made every year and are tradition; others are newer incantations that are sure to become favorites.

I know I have been remiss in posting recently, but I plan to make up for it this week with plenty of holiday goodies that you can make for your friends and family when they come by.

The first recipe is called in our family “Dee’s Shortbread” though it really has become “Dad’s Shortbread”. It is a simple recipe, only 3 ingredients, and is a true melt-in-your-mouth shortbread. For a hard-core shortbread fan this is the recipe for you, as it is not too sweet, but has the pleasant butter taste that melts on your tongue. I use only French butter in this recipe because when a recipe is this simple it is all about the quality of your ingredients.

Also, I prefer Dad’s Shortbread naked with no decoration, but my dad likes to buy those candied cherries and quarter them and put a quarter of a glistening red or green candied cherry atop each cookie before he bakes them. Your choice, but every since I was a kid I’ve loved the look of the cherries and not the taste. I always picked them off before I ate the cookie.

Here’s the recipe:

Dad’s Shortbread

Makes about 3 dozen cookies (depending on thickness sliced)

1 lb butter at room temperature
1 cup icing sugar (powdered)
3 ½ cups flour

Place all the ingredients in a bowl. Cut with pastry cutter until it resembles a fine meal. Take half (or a third) into clean hands and work and moosh together until it comes together to form a nice golden dough.

Roll each portion of the dough into a log and wrap in plastic wrap or wax paper and refrigerate until cool. Cut and bake at 350 until they just start to turn a nutty brown, about 10 mins. Cool on a wire rack.

Friday Chocolate

So to cap off a week of French eating I think it is only fitting we do a dessert. The French are famous for delicious pastries and other yummy desserts but my favorite by far is chocolate mousse sabayon. A sabayon is a dessert prepared with eggs instead of whipped cream.

When I was growing up my dad would make chocolate mousse for us by melting a Toblerone in the microwave and then mixing the melted chocolate with freshly whipped cream. Delicious, or course. It wasn’t until I was older that I learned another, more traditional way to prepare chocolate mousse. Once I tried chocolate mousse sabayon served in the traditional family style way I never went back to plain old melted chocolate and whipped cream.

The sabayon mousse is more intense and rich than a mousse prepared using whipped cream. But it is also lighter than a whipped cream mousse, and in my opinion the flavor of the chocolate comes to the forefront. Should you be reading this on Friday (the day I’m posting it) you won’t actually get to eat the mousse until Saturday. It needs a night in the fridge to set up. Also, skip the cheesy martini glasses filled with mousse and instead set and serve the mousse in your prettiest mixing bowl.

This recipe is technically not one I’ve developed; rather it is from one of my many cookbooks, though I have changed a couple of things. I’m not sure how to credit the cookbook, so I’ll tell you that it is Van Gogh’s Table at the Auberge Ravoux by Alexandra Leaf and Fred Leeman and was published in 2001 by Artisan. You can find it here. It is a great cookbook, especially for art history buffs. I don’t want to do a Jessica Seinfeld here; I just want to share a great recipe. By the way, I often cut the recipe in half because it makes so much and believe it or not but you can get sick of chocolate mousse.

So here’s the recipe:

Chocolate Mousse Sabayon

Serves 8 to 10
1 cup premium dark chocolate, chopped (you can use chocolate chips here too, but make sure the chocolate is of really good quality)
2 sticks cold unsalted butter
10 large eggs separated
1¼ cups icing (powdered) sugar
2 tsp instant espresso (I like this brand which I have seen in local grocery stores)
Chocolate curls to decorate the top

Combine the butter and the chocolate chips and melt them in the top of a double boiler. Stir in the instant espresso and set aside to cool slightly.

In the large bowl of an electric mixer, mix the egg yolks and half of the sugar. Beat for several minutes until the yolks are a pale yellow color. Mix the egg yolk mixture in the bowl with the melted chocolate.

Clean the empty mixing bowl and now whisk the egg whites and sugar until soft peaks form.

Now fold in the egg whites into the yolk/chocolate mixture, being careful not to deflate them. Transfer the mousse to your pretty bowl and refrigerate for about 12 hours or overnight. Just before you serve it you can decorate it with the chocolate curls. Enjoy!

Ham and Cheese a la Francaise

To continue the week of French cooking I’m going to cook croque madame’s tonight. A croque madame is a ham and cheese sandwich that is topped with a fried egg. A croque mousier is the same thing sans the egg.

I had my first croque at a Belgium restaurant in New York called Petite Abeille. This mini restaurant chain is a fabulous spot for brunch, lunch or dinner. It was at brunch that I first discovered the magic that is a croque madame sandwich. It wasn’t until later at home when I was surfing the net that I discovered that there are two traditional ways to make a croque madame. The first way involved grilling the ham and cheese assembled sandwich in a frying pan before topping it with the fried egg. The second involves grilling the ham and cheese sandwich and then topping it with Béchamel sauce and placing it under a broiler, and only then topping it with the fried egg.

I was totally intrigued by the idea of adding to an already delicious sandwich with a dollop of the creamy, beautiful sauce that is Béchamel. Béchamel is one of the mother sauces of French cooking. The mother sauce term is used to describe sauces that make up the foundation of French cooking (which traditionally is a very sauce heavy food culture). The mother sauces include: Béchamel (flour and milk based), Espagnole (based on brown stock such as beef), Hollandaise (egg based emulsion), Tomato sauce and Velouté (based on light stock such as chicken or fish).

Béchamel is created by cooking melted butter and flour and then adding milk. To this sauce you can add many ingredients, including cheese and fresh herbs, and this makes it one of the most versatile recipes out there. It is the basic white sauce that is the foundation of many popular dishes including lasagna and macaroni and cheese. Don’t be daunted by all the fancy cooking terms though, a basic Béchamel is easy to master and a great cooking trick to have up your sleeve.

To assemble a great croque madame it is crucial to have great ingredients on hand. Cooking a great meal is so much easier when you have fresh, wonderful items to make it from. For a croque madame don’t skimp and get the best deli ham you can find and ensure that Gruyere cheese is the only cheese you use. For the bread I find really fresh white sandwich bread is the best, nothing too crusty though.

Anyway, here’s the recipe:

Croque Madame

Serves 4

8 slices white sandwich bread
8 thin slices of deli ham
8 slices of Gruyere cheese
Butter for frying
4 eggs
Salt and pepper

Béchamel Sauce
4 Tbsp unsalted butter
4 Tbsp flour
2 cups milk
Pinch of freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and pepper to taste

Make the Béchamel sauce first. In a small saucepan melt the butter until it is foamy. Add the flour and stir with a wooden spoon for 2 minutes. This cooks out the powdery taste of the flour. Slowly add the milk and stir constantly (I use a whisk at this point) until the mixture comes to a boil. Now, lower the temperature to low and cook the sauce (again stirring constantly) for 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and a pinch of the nutmeg. Put the sauce on the back of the stove and start making the sandwiches.

Preheat your broiler and then assemble the sandwiches with a couple of slices of ham and cheese in each. Melt a knob of butter in a frying pan over medium high heat and brown the sandwiches on each side one at a time (or if your frying pan is huge to two at a time).

Once the sandwiches are done place them on a cookie sheet lined with non-stick aluminum foil. Top each sandwich with enough Béchamel sauce to cover the top and maybe have a little bit dripping over the side. Place the sandwiches under the broiler for two minutes or so. As every broiler is different keep an eye on them. You want the tops of the sandwiches bubbling and golden brown, not burnt. While the sandwiches are broiling, cook the eggs to your liking in the frying pan, making sure to sprinkle the tops of the yolks with a little bit of salt and pepper. If the sandwiches finish before the eggs, just turn off the broiler and keep the sandwiches in the oven to keep warm. When all is ready remove the sandwiches from the oven and top each one with an egg. I serve a croque madame with a tossed green salad. Enjoy!

French Salad Night

I’m on kind of a French food bend this week; I guess it is in reaction to having lived through the king of American food holidays: Thanksgiving.

It is no secret that I love French food. I especially love the simple preparations of fantastic ingredients. Today’s recipe is not really classically French, in fact I can’t even remember where I got the original idea for it, but the vinaigrette comes from a memory of one of my mother’s cookbooks from the late 60s. I believe it was called Classic French Country Cooking and featured those 60s era cooking photographs that made the food look strangely unappealing and alien.

In the back of this cookbook was a section called Sauces and featured a vinaigrette recipe that for years now has been my standby (with a little tweaking). I make a big batch of the vinaigrette and keep it in my fridge in an old salad dressing bottle. The olive oil does solidify in the fridge, but a trip in the microwave for about 10 seconds before I shake the vinaigrette does the trick. It works well on salad greens and also as a marinade for chicken or pork.

For this recipe I use a cheese slicer that looks like a thin piece of wire to cut the goat cheese. If you do not have one you can use unwaxed dental floss (with no flavoring). I usually serve this salad with some warm bread, home-made if I’m feeling very ambitious. Herbes de Provence are a mixture of herbs, such as rosemary, marjoram, basil, bay leaf, thyme, and sometimes lavender flowers and other herbs. They are available in many specialty gourmet stores such as Williams Sonoma. If you do not have any you can use a mixture of your favorite dried herbs such as thyme, basil and rosemary.

So here is the recipe:

Goat Cheese Salad

Serves 2

6 cups of salad greens (I buy the pre-washed herb mixed greens)
1/2 cup grape tomatoes
8 oz goat cheese
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup flour
3/4 cup plain breadcrumbs
2 tsp Herbes de Provence

Basic Vinaigrette:
1 Tbsp Dijon mustard
1 tsp sugar
2 tsp crushed garlic
Salt and pepper
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
3/4 cup olive oil

To make the vinaigrette:

In a medium sized bowl (I use a 4 cup measuring cup) mix the Dijon mustard, sugar, garlic, salt and pepper into a paste. Whisk in the red wine vinegar, then slowly add the olive oil in a steady stream, whisking as you go. The Dijon mustard will help combine the oil and vinegar. Pour into a bottle and store the remaining vinaigrette in your fridge for your next salad.

To make the salad:

Place the breadcrumbs and the Herbes de Provence in a shallow bowl and mix. Place the flour in another shallow bowl. In the third shallow bowl place the beaten egg. Cut the goat cheese into slices, I usually get about 4 for an 8 oz log. Dredge the goat cheese buttons carefully in the flour, then the egg and finally in the breadcrumbs, pressing the breadcrumb mixture onto the cheese so it sticks.

Place the breaded goat cheese onto a plate and refrigerate for about 15 minutes.

When they have chilled preheat a small skillet on high heat. When it is ready drizzle it with olive oil and place the goat cheese buttons in the pan. Cook for about 1 to 2 minutes per side until they are golden and crisp.

Toss the lettuce, tomatoes and about 2 to 4 Tbsp of the vinaigrette in a large salad bowl until well dressed. Serve the salad in a large plate and top with the warm goat cheese buttons. Serve with warm bread.

Back in Town

Well, I’m back in Hoboken after the Thanksgiving break. Not much of a break for me, between cooking a full turkey dinner with five sides and two desserts, as well as brunch the next day and fresh venison tenderloin, I’m cooked out.

What to do on days you really just don’t feel like cooking? I turn to the French. When it comes to restaurants you can’t go wrong with the brasserie. The food of the working class of France is where it is at in my opinion. The food that makes me imagine Vincent Van Gogh and Paul Gauguin ate the same thing many years ago at the Auberge Ravoux in the south of France.

And in my opinion the finest thing you can order at a brasserie is the onion soup. The steak frites comes a close second. But really is there is nothing more delicious than tucking into a cheesy, bubbly, steaming, bowl of French onion soup?

The key to this recipe today is as much technique as it is actual ingredients. Cooking the onions to a golden caramel color will ensure that your soup will have the depth of flavor that a great bowl of onion soup should have. Some of my secrets for ensuring a great soup are: a mix of onion types, a tiny bit of sugar on the onions at the beginning, a splash of a nice dark rich port to further sweeten the pot and a toast on the croutons (I just use leftover Balthazar baguette for this) before the broiler.

I recently read a recipe for this soup that included cooking it in the oven for over 3 hours. Now, I don’t know about you, but I don’t have time for this. The sugar sprinkled on the onions should help you achieve some of the flavor a long, slow cook in the oven does.

Essential to this dish is a trip under the broiler for the soup with its cheesy top. If you don’t have a proper French onion soup bowl you can just pass the croutons under the broiler sprinkled with cheese and then top the soup bowl with these, but it is not as satisfying as really digging into the soup through the molten cheese. You can pick up oven-safe soup bowls pretty much anywhere (such as Ikea or Target) but my favorite source is Fishes Eddy in Manhattan.

The original inspiration for this recipe comes not from a fancy French Cookbook, but one of my mother’s old cookbooks from the 70s.

French Onion Soup au Gratin

Serves 4

4 cups onions (about 4 onions, 3 Spanish and 1 red) thinly sliced
1/4 cup butter
2 tsp sugar
40 oz good quality beef stock
1/2 cup port or red wine if you have no port
1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp fresh thyme
Pepper to taste
1/2 of a leftover baguette, sliced
1 cup grated emmental or gruyere cheese (or a mix)

In a large saucepan melt the butter and then add the onions. Sprinkle over the sugar and stir. Cook the onions over medium-high heat until they are tender and dark golden brown. This will take about 20 to 30 minutes.

When the onions are cooked add the port and deglaze the pan (scrape up the brown bits) then add the beef stock, Worcestershire sauce, fresh thyme and pepper. Bring to a boil and let simmer for 15 minutes. After 15 minutes reduce the heat to a simmer and taste the soup to see if it needs salt. Don’t add salt before this so you can taste how much salt the beef broth has.

While the soup is simmering place cut each slice of the baguette in half. Place the croutons under a preheated broiler until golden in color, about 1 to 2 minutes. Ladle the soup carefully into your oven-safe soup bowls and leave 1 inch of space at the top. Place the soup bowls on a cookie sheet and sprinkle the top of each bowl with the croutons and then with the grated cheese. Place the whole lot under the broiler until they are bubbling and brown.

Serve with a green salad.

Memories of Take-Out

Please be patient with me while I figure out how to write out these recipes in a format that is easy to use. Most of the things I cook originate from a recipe source, but then I change things and amounts, so at the moment I’m not sure of a great form to present them in , but you can be assured that every meal I present here has been served by me at least a dozen times.

So, we had a rough night last night. A sick baby, a late bath, and a midnight trip to the laundry room has made me feel very low energy today. On days like this I want to cook very little and think about it even less.

A few years ago we lived in Hell’s Kitchen and one of our favorite places for take-out was Island Burgers. They don’t serve fries, but their burgers and chicken sandwiches (which they call churascos) more than make up for the lack of fries. They feature a huge variety of toppings that make it entirely possible to eat there every day and still have something different. I am a predictable person though and usually ordered the same thing every time, the Marco burger.

So tonight I think I’m going to make something inspired by Island Burgers and the Marco and hopefully the day will be better than last night. A few notes about the recipe. I'm not sure what they use to marinate their chicken at Island Burgers so I just use extra pesto for my marinade. Also, I buy my baguettes at Kings. They sell the Balthazar bakery bread there and the baguette is delish. As for pesto sauce you can find it at every grocery store in Hoboken, usually near the fresh pasta. I use basil pesto, but any pesto type would work well in this recipe. Also, whatever you don't use can be frozen.

If you want to be super indulgent you can make a milkshake to go along with this sandwich. I don’t serve this with fries at home either, just to keep it authentic to the restaurant experience and the sandwich is usually filling enough.

Anyway, here’s the recipe. Enjoy!

Hell’s Kitchen Take-Out Chicken Sandwiches
Serves 2 hungry people and then some

1 large chicken breast
4 Tbsp pesto sauce
2 Tbsp ranch dressing
4 slices of bacon
4 slices of Swiss cheese (or whatever cheese you have on hand)
1 baguette
2 plum tomatoes
4 slices of red onion
Lettuce

First, take the chicken breast and place it between two slices of wax paper. With a meat pounder pound the chicken very flat, about a half an inch thick. Smear the chicken with 2 Tbsp of the pesto and place in a dish covered in your fridge for an hour.

Once the hour is up, take out the chicken and preheat a grill pan that has been drizzled with a little oil so the chicken doesn’t stick. Sprinkle the chicken with salt and pepper and place in the grill pan for about 5 minutes per side or until cooked all the way through.

While the chicken is cooking, cook the bacon. I cook mine in the microwave on paper towels, one minute a slice. Cut the tomatoes into slices. Cut the heels off of the baguette and cut it in half and then cut open each half. Smear one side with the remaining pesto and the other with the ranch dressing. On the ranch side place the lettuce, tomato and onion. On the pesto side place the cooked chicken, bacon and cheese. Close-up the sandwich and enjoy!

Oh and if you are ever on 9th Ave check out Island Burgers & Shakes in person.

Hungry in Hoboken

Living in Hoboken you have the opportunity for a variety of take-out and though it is lovely to tuck into some Thai food once in a while, it is also nice to sit down to a nice home cooked meal.

Welcome to Hungry in Hoboken a new website that will help those of us out there that need a little inspiration when it comes to making dinner. This website is for the stay-at-home-mom (sahm), the working mom (wohm) and the darling husbands (dh) out there who everyday contemplate that simple question: “what’s for dinner?”

I’m often asked by my friends how I stay organized and creative when it comes to putting daily meals on the table. Organization is the key, and here is where this website comes in. I’ll do the organizing for you; tell you what you need to buy and what you need to do in order to assemble dinner any night you want. And I’ll provide the creative aspect too, giving you access to my sources for great meals that are hearty, often kid-friendly (but a warning they may not always be) and tasty.

One of my true pleasures in life is to cook for other people, so on occasion I will also give you entire menus for dinner parties that I've had or will be having. You can be confident that everything I post here will be delicious, creative and wonderful.

So without further ado, let’s get started!

So tonight’s meal is actually inspired by the weather in Hoboken today. It is grey and wet and rainy today. The original idea for this recipe came to me from a magazine recipe many years ago. I think it was Real Simple magazine, which by the way I think should be named Real Redundant; they seem to have the same thing in there every month. Anyway, the original recipe featured eggs but I’ve cut them out completely. Here goes:

Twice-Baked Potatoes with Chicken Sausage

Serves 4
Baking Time: 1 hour (for potato) 20 mins (for stuffed potato)

2 Idaho baking potatoes cleaned and scrubbed

2 -3 chicken sausages (the pre-cooked variety that usually comes in flavors like sun-dried tomato, I like the artichoke flavor) My dh loves the chicken sausage so I usually use 3.

2 Tbsp sour cream

1 Tbsp butter

2 scallions cut into pieces

Salt and pepper to taste

1/2 cup grated cheddar cheese

Poke the potatoes with holes and set them in an oven set at 400 and let them bake until they yield to a knife, about an hour. You can hurry the potatoes along and microwave them for about 10 minutes to speed up this process, but I find the microwave makes the potato a bit mealy so I stick to the oven. I find it really isn't a hardship to chuck them in there around 5 pm and then forget about them until closer to 6.

When the potatoes are close to being done cut up the sausage into one-inch sized chunks and place them in a pre-heated skillet with a little dab of olive oil to brown them nicely. This should take about 5 minutes.

Take the potatoes out of the oven when they are ready and leave the oven turned on. Cut the potatoes in half length-wise and scoop out the steaming insides into a bowl. Place the shells on a cookie sheet and sprinkle the naked insides with a little salt and pepper. Into the bowl with the hot potato flesh add the sour cream and butter and mash away. Take a taste test at this point and add salt and pepper to your liking. At this point I use a hand held mixer and whip the potatoes up into a fluffy pile, but you don’t need to do this as really a fork or potato masher will do the job nicely.

After you have the mashed potatoes done add the scallions and the chicken sausage and about 4 Tbsp of the cheese. Mix all up and divide the mixture evenly between the four shells. Top the mounds with the rest of the cheese and place back in the oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until the cheese is golden.

I serve one half per person of this dish along with a tossed salad. Enjoy!