Random Recipe Search: Thai Drunken Noodles

This is probably one of my top five favorite dishes and I really need to find a good recipe. Columbus does not have many Thai restaurants and among the few that exist Pad Kee Mao is not a dish that shines.

The search turned over a few promising recipes. Templeofthai.com has what appears to be a fairly simple recipe and includes pictures of the steps. However, they include baby corn, which really don't care for. Authentic or not, I prefer stir fried red peppers and tomatoes.

The recipe on epicurious.com includes tomatoes (which is good) and ground chicken (which is just strange to me).

Visualrecipe.com's recipe seems pretty basic, but not particularly interesting.

I also ran a search for "Pad Kee Mao" and came up with the following (linked by site/blog name): Massive Appetite, New York Times, and chow.com.

I keep thinking that it will be a while before I attempt this, but I think I should do it soon if I want to include tomatoes. I got some terrific ones at the Farmer's Market today.

Excuse me, is that pork on your face?

As I mentioned previously, I only have one semi-regular pork recipe, the tenderloin recipe from my Martha Stewart cookbooks (Every Day Food). I feel like in order to be a grown up, I need a good pork chop recipe. The pork chops my mother cooked as a kid were tasty, but not interesting and others I've enjoyed don't seem appropriate for everyday eating. On my friend J.'s blog I found the a recipe for Pork Chops Marsala that sounds really good. I may make these soon and use the asparagus I bought this afternoon (originally I was going to remake the pesto pasta with white beans and use the asparagus instead of the zucchini).

Also, I made the minty lentil orzo pasta this afternoon. I wish I could have had more than a bite. We hung out with another couple and the husband complimented me. He was particularly fond of the red onions.

A Beef With Me, A Beef With You: Part I (Flatiron Steak)

I once told my mother that when I started eating meat again I would not limit myself to poultry and fish, that I would eagerly start consuming beef and pork. When I thought about the things I missed as a vegetarian, it was not turkey sandwiches and chicken salad, but rather, pork ribs and filet mignon. Needless to say, even though I am an avid carnivore, I do not cook a lot of pork and beef. Indeed, I only have one semi-regular pork recipe (the roast pork loin from Everyday Food). Otherwise, as far as non-poultry dishes go, I've made lamb in the form of chops and kabobs and was complimented both times.

Some friends of ours gave us some beef from their meat CSA and it's been sitting in my freezer for a few weeks now. I took inventory and now need recipes and cooking techniques for Flatiron Steak, Beef Loin Porterhouse, and Beef Rib Eye.

Today we begin with Flat Iron Steak--a cursory glance over google indicates that this cut is one of the most recipe-oriented. I found the following, which look interesting:

Perfect Flatiron Steaks from allrecipes.com

Flatiron Steak with Red Wine Sauce from foodnetwork.com (One of Giada's recipes, I am willing to put aside my feelings to try it although I can't imagine it's the only red wine steak recipe out there.)

And see, here is another for Flatiron Steaks Marinated in Red Wine from allrecipes.com.

Foodandwine.com has two "fast" recipes which sound lovely, Chipotle-Marinated Flatiron Steak with Avocado-Corn Relish and Flatiron Steak Salad with Thai Dressing.

And finally, from epicurious.com, Grilled Flatiron Steak with Chimichurri Sauce.

Of these, I think the ones from the foodandwine.com are the ones I will go with. They look easy enough and appropriate for quick summertime cooking. Ideally, I would serve ice-cream with them for dessert but that's not going to happen until next summer.

Desperately Seeking Annie's Goddess

When we go on the super budget next year, I am going to start making my own tahini based dressing. I have found the following, and we shall see which ones are comprable to Annie's:

Wikibooks

Recipezaar

about.com

Obsessed With Risotto

I am absolutely determined to learn to make risotto, and I believe that I have found the recipe that I want to try:


Pumpkin Risotto


Although, I don't know why it's called Pumpkin risotto when there isn't any pumpkin in it.

Wedgie!

Just because the wedge salad is just way to eat blue cheese dressing in a manner that is ore socially acceptable than spooning it out of the bottle does not mean that there aren't specific guidelines to be followed to insure a quality product. These salads are simple, refreshing, and at the same time, decadent and with quality ingredients it is really difficult to ruin this blue-cheese glutton's delight (although I have had more than my share of sub par wedgies).

The basic salad consists of two parts, iceberg lettuce and dressing. It must be iceberg lettuce. If there is something that ice-berg lettuce can do that no other lettuce can do better (even Boston and Bibb are better on sandwiches and burgers), it is the wedge salad. The dressing should be of the highest quality with nothing more than mayonnaise, buttermilk, lemon juice, and blue cheese. Although this salad is perfectly acceptable, most people desire more than that to precede their steaks. It is important, however, not to go over board. In my opinion, there are only four more things that can be included on a wedge without going overboard. And these should be used judiciously. They are, in no particular order: bacon, halved grape tomatoes, red onion, and coarsely ground pepper.

The assembly of this salad couldn't be more basic, but there are a few things worth noting. I have noticed that many restaurants are moving to a sixth sized, rather than a quarter sized wedge. This is unacceptable. It's iceberg lettuce, cut your costs elsewhere. Additionally, and this is true for all salads other than warm ones. Salad should be served on chilled plates. Many a wedge has been ruined having been served on a room temperature plate, or worse, one freshly removed from the dishwasher.

Our Contribution to Meghan's Mexican Party

Chips and two dips and a sweet thing:


Guacamole
I'm a purist when it comes to guacamole: avocados, chopped onion, minced garlic, salt and pepper, lime juice, and chopped cilantro.

Salsa Dip:
16 oz of sour cream
jar of medium salsa (Newman's Own is a good one)
one packet of hidden valley ranch dressing

mix and chill over night. (It helps to drain the salsa if it's watery.)


Shortcut Mexican Brownies


Grocery list
three avocados
red onion
cilantro
sour cream
jar of salsa
hidden valley ranch dressing
chips
Betty Crocker fudge brownie mix
ground cinnamon
almond extract

Tonight I will make this:

Miso Chicken

However, I am going to cook on the grill pan rather than the skillet. We will have it with a side of green beans and edamame.

Middle Eastern Inspired Chickpea Salad

This is a recipe I made up on my own. It was inspired by middle eastern fattoush:

1 can of chickpeas (drained and rinsed)
1 red bell pepper diced
1/2 red onion finely chopped
1 med-large cucumber peeled, seeds removed, and diced
1 bunch parsley chopped*

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
3 tbs ground sumac
2-3 garlic cloves minced

Wisk together lemon juice, olive oil, sumac, and garlic. Mix in chickpeas, pepper, onion, cucumber, and parsley.


*Confession: I actually did not serve this with parsley but would in the future.


It was pretty good. I am hoping that after the flavors meld, it will be even better tomorrow. I served it with seared tempeh. I have decided that tempeh is better served marinated in thick sauces and when seared only using an oil based marinade, it doesn't taste as well. Otherwise, I would recommend serving this salad with garlicky chicken kabobs.

It took us two days and six different stores before we finally found some ground sumac. Of course, we found it at the local middle eastern food store, which is exactly where I should have gone in the first place. I was truly surprised that the Clintonville Community Market didn't have any because their bulk spice collection is immense. They have turtle shell. How they can have turtle shell and not ground sumac, I will never understand.

This looks amazing and I must make it

I found this recipe for Basil Lemonade on epicurious. It reminds me of the time my stepfather surprised my mother and me by ordering the basil gelato and olive oil cake at the floataway cafe in Atlanta.

I love the idea of using basil in desserts so I did an advanced search in epicurious.com and found the following recipes:

Basil Ice-Cream (Another good reason to invest in a good ice-cream making machine someday.)

Basil Lime Syrup (I could adapt this and make Basil Limeade.)

Lemon Cakes with Basil Lemon Syrup (One of these days I am going to have a whole post dedicated to lemon cake. It was our wedding cake and I believe it will be the first thing I make with my Kitchen Aid mixer.)

Food Network has several, these look to be the most enticing:

Frozen Strawberry Lemon-Basil Mousse

Basil and Lime Sorbet

I am a little disappointed at the lack of basil-centered desserts on both Food and Wine and Martha Stewart.

Fireworks and Barbeques!

Really, those are the two things I associate with July 4th. Say what you will about freedom and independence, I generally think about these things every other day in various political and intellectual contexts and actually welcome a break from it.

My contribution to my aunt's barbecue is my famous Orzo Salad with Feta, Spinach, and Mushrooms. I may have used more spinach than I needed, but I think it turned out well.

Whenever I cook something from my Food & Wine magazine, I feel a twinge of gourmet guilt. My original goal was to cook at least one thing from every issue. I think I need to resume that goal. Beginning this month, I am going to try to do this, likely for our weekly "treat" dinners, those meals where nutrition takes a back seat to taste and decadence.

I will begin with Cold Peanut Noodles with Tofu and Red Peppers. In addition to the F&W goal, it also brings me closer to finding the best cold peanut noodle recipe in my collection. I think I will also be attempting the brandied peaches (with vanilla ice-cream) because they look simply amazing and amazingly simple. Perhaps we'll enjoy them on the same night.

Negro Frijoles Benedict

The review of Friday's breakfast reminded me of the last time I was truly impressed by an interpretation of eggs benedict. This was in Chicago at a little breakfast and lunch place near Grant Park whose name escapes me. The dish consisted of poached eggs on english muffins and spicy black bean cakes and then dressed with a chipotle squash puree. It was amazing. Interestingly, the Flying Biscuit in Atlanta (one of my favorite places for breakfast) has a recipe, Egg-ceptional Eggs, which consists of two fried eggs on black bean cakes topped with tomatillo salsa and sour cream that sadly just does not work. The Biscuit does breakfast very well, but on this it falls short.

Now I am feeling inspired to construct a recipe similar to that I had in Chicago that I am calling Negro Frijoles Benedict.

Ingredients

English muffins, toasted
Poached eggs
Spicy black bean cakes (recipe links to follow)
Butternut squash and chipotle puree or Sauce or salsa of some kind
Avacado slices

Spicy Black Bean Cake links:

Epicurious.com
Sara Moulton/The Food Network
All Recipes

Many spicy black bean cake recipes come include a sauce recipe or salsa recommendation that would work well. Otherwise, my search for a chipolte and squash puree has turned up little in terms of things that might approximate the sauce that accompanied the dish I had. The closest I can find is from a Salmon recipe on about.com

Otherwise, I think the best bet is to make a basic squash puree (Kabocha or butternut seem to be the best to accompany black beans) and add chipotle to it.

Prepare cakes and sauces according to directions. Lightly toast english muffins and top with avacado slices, black bean cakes, and poached eggs. Spoon sauce and/or salsa over egg. Serve with a side of grits (or polenta!) or potatoes and fresh orange juice (or mimosas!).

New Favorite Beverage: Caipirinha

I just discovered that this is Brasil's national beverage. For those who don't know it's made with made Cachaça, sugar, and lime. With my obsession with limes and all things flavored with, I am amazed that it took me so long to try this. I had one at Noche last night.

It may be a little too sweet for Andy, but I want to drink it all summer long. Perhaps I'll make pitchers of it!

Strangest Jamaican Jerk Ever

Last night I did something truly unprecedented. I sent my jamaican jerk chicken wings back to the kitchen because I after attempting to eat them, I couldn't have them near me. I really wanted to like them, but it was just impossible. I had a feeling something was very wrong when they arrived. Even my friend Mike noted the incredibly strong smell of rosemary. Rosemary? The best way to describe them is that they were over-spiced. Not too spicy, but over-spiced. The jerk sauce that I make is a mild sauce, the most prominent flavor being nutmeg (but just barely). My sauce is not the best, but I believe that it approaches the taste of a good jerk sauce. These wings, however, went above and beyond, landing someplace more akin to pot-pourri than anything edible.

So now my curiosity is piqued and I am looking through all my favorite recipe sites in an attempt to discover, not the genesis of this particular jerk recipe, but something that might explain what the chef was attempting. Last night's chicken appeared to be encrusted with something other than the usual nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, and allspice. Probably rosemary, as Mike indicated. The jamaican "jerk" wing and other jerk recipes on epicurious.com as well as the encyclopedia on allrecipes.com indicate thyme as one of the spices used but not rosemary. Perhaps it was a liberty taken by this particular chef.

This is a mystery.

I was still hungry when the waitress took the wings away, but no longer wanting chicken or anything savory or spicy for that matter. I went for sweet and ordered the bread pudding with bailey's irish cream sauce and a scoop of vanilla ice-cream, which more than made up for the wings. The pudding was exactly the texture that I like, not too dense or soggy. Last night's culinary adventure, however, has led me to wonder if a menu consisting of jamacain jerk chicken with bread pudding for dessert would have too many conflicting flavors. I imagine that an appropriate dessert to accompany jamaican jerk would be fruitier than bread pudding. There is a bread pudding recipe with a spiced rum sauce, but that may be overdoing it as well. Thus I think that last night's "meal" has inspired two separate menus:

Menu one:
Jamaican jerk chicken with sticky rice
Vegetable kabobs
Sliced Peaches

Menu two:
Vegetarian pasties with mushroom gravy
Steamed, crunchy broccoli
Bread pudding with warm bourbon sauce and ice-cream