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Posts Tagged ‘recipes’
PANCAKES MADE WITH FRESH RICOTTA
Posted: February 27, 2018 in breakfast, curds, Food, Iron Chefs, New York City, pancakes, Recipes, restaurants, UncategorizedTags: April Bloomfield, breakfast, food, pancakes, recipes, ricotta
It’s National Pancake Day!
These pancakes, based on a recipe from chef April Bloomfield (The Spotted Pig and The Breslin in NYC), are made from fresh homemade ricotta cheese. Light as air…and really delicious! I’ve made a few batches of fresh ricotta cheese in my day, but when the family has a craving for these pancakes at the last-minute, a good-quality store-bought ricotta cheese will do.
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I use Cup4Cup GF flour if I want to make these gluten-free)
1/4 cup yellow cornmeal
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups milk
2 large eggs, separated
1/2 cup fresh ricotta
In a large bowl, combine the flour, cornmeal, sugar, salt, baking powder and baking soda. In another large bowl, whisk together the milk, ricotta, and egg yolks. Fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients.
In a large stainless steel bowl, whisk the egg whites until they are stiff, but not dry. Fold gently into the batter.
Spray a non-stick griddle with a little cooking spray and drop about 1/4 cup of batter per pancake. Cook over medium heat for about 2 minutes per side, until golden and fluffy.
BALSAMIC GLAZED CHICKEN
Posted: February 25, 2018 in Carnivore!, chicken, Food, mustard, Recipes, wingsTags: balsamic, chicken, food, marinade, recipes
I have chicken at least twice a week…can’t get enough of it! So I’m always looking for new recipes. I especially love marinades, because they’re easy to prepare ahead of time, and the flavor really gets into the meat.
The balsamic In use in this recipe is the basic, $9-buck-a-bottle stuff. Don’t use the 25-year-old aged fancy balsamic!
4 lbs. chicken parts, or 1 whole chicken cut up
1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons honey
1 1/2 tablespoon mustard (I use Gulden’s)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
2 teaspoons garlic salt
1 teaspoon pepper
extra virgin olive oil
If you’re using a whole chicken and the breast is really large, you’ll want to cut it in half so that it cooks as quickly as the other parts. Put all the chicken pieces in a large Ziploc bag.
In a bowl, combine the balsamic vinegar, honey, mustard, rosemary, salt and pepper. Whisk to mix thoroughly.
Pour the contents of the bowl into the Ziploc bag, seal tightly, and squish it around to make sure the marinade reaches all surfaces of the chicken.
Marinate the chicken for at least an hour at room temperature. Overnight in the fridge is even better. Make sure you squish the bag every once join a while to move the marinade around. Keep the bag in a bowl to prevent accidental spillage all over your fridge! Remove the bag from the fridge about an hour before cooking to bring the meat to room temperature.
Pre-heat the oven to 350.
Using an oven-proof pan, heat some olive oil (pork fat is even better!) and then place the chicken pieces in the pan. (Discard the marinade.)
Sear for 2 minutes on one side, then sear for 2 more minutes on the other. Place the pan in the oven and cook for 30 minutes, making sure the chicken has cooked all the way through.
IT’S NATIONAL MARGARITA DAY!
Posted: February 22, 2018 in Cocktails, drink recipes, Drinks, margarita, mixologyTags: cocktails, drinks, food, honeybells, margaritas, recipes
You’d think it would be Cinco de Mayo, but February 22nd is National Margarita Day.
My personal recipe uses no sour mix…just 4 basic ingredients. I still have a small stash of the HoneyBells mentioned here, but the original recipe, below, uses pineapple juice. Cheers!
Every year around January, we get a shipment of Cushman’s HoneyBells. They look like fiery red bell-shaped oranges, but they’re not really oranges at all, and their season is very limited.
HoneyBells are a unique natural hybrid of Dancy Tangerine and Duncan Grapefruit. The plants are grafted to a sour orange root-stock, and when the tree reaches maturity, it looks just like a grapefruit tree…but with oranges growing on it.
I usually make my signature margarita, the Algarita, with pineapple juice. But when I get those HoneyBells in the mail, my recipe takes on a new twist:
2 oz. Patron silver tequila (3 oz. is even better!)
1/2 oz. Cointreau orange liqueur
4 oz. pineapple juice (or fresh-squeezed HoneyBell juice, when in season)
1/2 oz. fresh-squeezed lime juice
Fill a cocktail shaker or tall glass with ice and add all the ingredients. Stir vigorously. Pour into a large margarita glass. Garnish with a lime wedge. Salt optional.
Either way: with HoneyBells or with pineapple juice, it’s a great way to celebrate National Margarita Day! Cheers!
THE NEW SILHOUETTE
Posted: February 19, 2018 in Cocktails, drink recipes, Drinks, Food, mixology, Recipes, Rhode Island, Southern New England, UncategorizedTags: boulevardier, cocktails, drinks, food, Negroni, pineapple, Providence Art Club, recipes, vodka
This past weekend, I was at the annual Providence Art Club Founder’s Day celebration, raising a glass in their honor. And I was again asked to create the drink we toasted the evening with!
First, some history…
The Providence Art Club is the third-oldest art club in the United States. The Philadelphia Sketch Club was founded in 1860. New York’s Salmagundi Club, founded in 1871, came next. But they were both founded by an all-male board. The Providence Art Club is the oldest art club in the nation that also included women. And that was back in 1880! That’s especially huge when you see what’s going on in our country even today…and it’s even more special to me because my wife was elected president of the Providence Art Club last year, making her only the second woman to hold that post in the club’s history!
Several years ago, they asked me to come up with a cocktail for their first Founders Day celebration. One hundred glasses were raised to honor the founding fathers of the Providence Art Club.
Silhouettes of past art club founders, influential members, and presidents line the walls of the Providence Art Club, so my wife came up with the name of the cocktail: The Silhouette. Little did she know that her own silhouette would grace the hallowed walls of the Providence Art Club this year!
In the past, I based my Silhouette cocktail on the Boulevardier, a delicious but strong drink that substitutes bourbon for gin in the classic Negroni. (See the recipe at the bottom of this page.)
But with my wife’s election as the new president at the art club, I thought a new Silhouette was in order, too…and it’s my own recipe for a cocktail I’ve made for many years. I call it Velvet Elvis. Keeping the silhouette theme, we decided to call it The Velvet Silhouette for this Founders’ Day celebration.
The Velvet Silhouette is my version of a fresh pineapple-infused vanilla vodka. (I use Stoli Vanil.) Here’s how it’s done…
Get a gallon-sized glass jar with a lid. Peel, core and slice the pineapple, and place all the pieces in the jar.
Pour in one 1.75l bottle of Stoli Vanil. Swirl to mix, then screw the lid on and keep the jar at room temperature for 3 weeks.
After 3 weeks, strain the liquid, making sure to squeeze out as much as you can from the pineapple pieces. Discard the pineapple and keep the Velvet Silhouette in the fridge until ready to serve. Serve it on the rocks, or as a martini, shaken in a cocktail shaker with ice.
Toasting at the Providence Art Club with the Velvet Silhouette.
The original Silhouette was mighty tasty, but a bit too strong for some of the senior art club members. Nonetheless, a favorite of mine. Here’s the recipe…
2 oz. Eagle Rare 10-year bourbon
1 oz. Antica Formula sweet vermouth
1/2 oz. Campari
2 shakes Regan’s orange bitters
In a cocktail shaker with ice, stir the ingredients and then strain into a rocks glass with one large ice-cube.
Garnish with an orange twist.
Cheers!
NOT MY MAMA’S PORK CHOP
Posted: February 16, 2018 in Carnivore!, Food, frying, pork, RecipesTags: carnivore, chops, food, pork, recipes
Pork chops were a favorite of mine growing up, but my Mom cooked them only one way: breaded and fried in a pan full of oil. They were good, but they were greasy, and my Mom was not big on seasonings. And she cooked the hell out of it. It was time to improve on the original.
Using the best quality pork I can get, like Berkshire pork, makes a real difference in flavor. It also matters to me that the animals are humanely treated while they’re on the farm. No factory-farmed meats.
2 Berkshire pork chops
1 egg
1/2 cup plain bread crumbs (I use gluten-free)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon dried parsley
1/2 teaspoon granulated garlic
1/2 teaspoon granulated onion
olive oil
Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.
Set up 2 bowls. In one, crack and scramble the egg. In the other, combine the bread crumbs, salt, pepper, oregano, parsley, granulated garlic and granulated onion.
Place an oven-proof pan on medium-high heat and add a little olive oil. Once the oil is hot, cover the pork chops in the egg wash and then coat with the bread crumb mixture. Place in the hot pan to brown and sear. Do this with both chops.
After a few minutes, flip the chops over in the pan and place the pan in the oven to finish cooking.
Remember, good pork does not need to be cooked to death!
CAJUN CHICKEN BREASTS
Posted: February 13, 2018 in Carnivore!, chicken, Food, frying, Recipes, spicyTags: breasts, Cajun, chicken, Fat Tuesday, food, Mardi Gras, recipes, tenders
It’s Fat Tuesday! Laissez les bon temps roulez!
I lived in Mobile, Alabama back in the late 80’s, and if you asked the locals, they’d quickly tell you that Mardi Gras originated in Mobile, not New Orleans.
Joe Caine paraded through the streets of Mobile dressed in a Native American costume in 1868, and is credited for our current way of observing the Mardi Gras celebration. Of course, it’s hard not to think of New Orleans when you hear the phrase “Mardi Gras,” and I spent many a weekend on the streets and bars of the crescent city back in the day.
It was then that I fell in love with Cajun food, and needed to learn how to cook it myself. I bought cookbooks by two of the greats: Justin Wilson and Paul Prudhomme. I learned about layers of seasoning, and often I’d use those ideas in my own dishes.
When I moved to Rhode Island in 1990, I had yearly Mardi Gras parties at my house, and I cooked massive batches of these Cajun chicken breasts, using a spice mix I learned from my cooking experiments. They’re so good, my daughter asks for them all the time.
Double-dipping in the seasoned flour is a messy step, but it makes them extra crunchy and flavorful.
1 cup all-purpose flour (I use Cup4Cup flour to keep it gluten-free)
1 tablespoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons sweet paprika
1 teaspoon granulated onion
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
1 teaspoon basil
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon gumbo file (file powder), optional
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken tenders or breasts
4 eggs
oil for frying (I like using avocado oil and some pork fat for flavor)
Cut the chicken breasts into manageable pieces. If they’re thick, slice them horizontally to make two thinner breasts. A thick piece of chicken won’t cook all the way through.
Combine the flour, salt, paprika, onion, garlic, basil, white pepper, cayenne, black pepper, thyme and gumbo file in a bowl. Mix well.
I like to separate the 4 eggs, placing 2 eggs in 2 separate bowls. This keeps the first bowl “clean” and not gummed up with flour. You’ll see what I mean once you start, because it’s a bit messy. So, crack 2 eggs in the first bowl and the other 2 eggs in the second bowl. Scramble them up and put the bowls on either side of the seasoned flour bowl.
Pre-heat a pan of oil to 350 degrees.
Dip the chicken in the first egg bowl and then the seasoned flour mixture. Shake off the excess flour and dip the chicken in the second egg bowl, making sure the flour is covered by egg. Then dip the chicken back into the flour for a second coat. Carefully place the chicken in the pan. Fry the chicken until it’s cooked all the way through and golden brown. Drain on paper towels.
If you need to feed a crowd, just double or triple the recipe. I used to make a 10x batch for my Mardi Gras parties!
FETTUCCINE ALFREDO: THE ORIGINAL MAC AND CHEESE
Posted: February 7, 2018 in Food, Italian, pasta, RecipesTags: alfredo, fettuccine, food, ITALIAN, pasta, recipes
February 7 is National Fettuccine Alfredo Day!
My first foray into serious cooking started when I bought “The Classic Italian Cookbook,” written by the Marcella Hazan.
Like many great recipes, Fettuccine Alfredo is not complicated…but few restaurants that offer it get it right. Most of the Alfredo sauces I’ve had were watery, floury, and salty and had nothing in common with the real deal.
To this day, if I want a great Alfredo, I make it like Marcella.
1 cup heavy cream
3 tablespoons butter
Fleur de Sel or sea salt
1 lb. Fettuccine, fresh or dried
2/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
Freshly ground pepper
A very tiny grating of nutmeg
Put 2/3 cup of the cream and all the butter in a large saucepan that will later accommodate all the pasta. Simmer over medium heat for less than a minute, until the butter and cream have thickened. Turn off the heat.
Drop the fettuccine in a big pot of boiling salted water. If the pasta is fresh, it will take just seconds. If it’s dry, it will take a few minutes. Cook the fettuccine firmer than usual, because it will finish cooking in the pan with the butter and cream. Drain the pasta immediately and thoroughly when it’s done and transfer to the pan containing the butter and cream.
Turn the heat under the pan on low, and toss the fettuccine, coating them with the sauce. Add the rest of the cream, all the grated cheese, 1/2 teaspoon salt, the pepper and the nutmeg. Toss briefly until the sauce has thickened and the fettuccine are well coated. Taste and correct for salt.
Serve immediately!
REUBEN SEUP
Posted: February 5, 2018 in bacon, cheese, Food, Recipes, sauerkrautTags: food, recipes, reuben, sandwich, soup
Why have soup and a sandwich when your soup can be your sandwich? I had all the ingredients to make a Reuben sandwich. But I wanted soup. So I made Reuben Seup…I mean Soup!
Think French onion soup, but using Reuben ingredients…
Rye bread slices
Sauerkraut, drained and rinsed
Chicken stock
Pastrami, sliced thinly
Swiss cheese, sliced thinly
I like to take the sauerkraut, rinse it under cold water, then toss it in a pot that already has some finely chopped bacon and onions cooking in it. Once the ingredients have cooked down, set it aside. (If you prefer not to use bacon and onions, that’s fine, too.)
Find a source for great pastrami, like a good deli in your neighborhood. I make a stop at the Forest Pork Store in Huntington, NY, every time I visit my Mom, and they have incredible pastrami you only dream about.
Heat the chicken stock in a pot. Take the thinly sliced pastrami and chop it up into bite-sized pieces. Place the pastrami in the chicken stock to warm through. Keep the stock warm on low heat.
Now you’re ready to assemble…
Take an oven-proof soup bowl. Line the bottom with some rye bread.
On top of that, place a nice helping of the sauerkraut.
Pour the warm chicken stock with the pastrami over the sauerkraut.
Layer slices of Swiss cheese over the top of the bowl. Place it under the broiler until melted.
Eat!
It satisfied my soup and sandwich craving!
FRIED CALAMARI
Posted: February 2, 2018 in Food, frying, Recipes, seafood, UncategorizedTags: calamari, food, fried calamari, frying, recipes, seafood, squid, Wolfgang Puck
Calamari is the official appetizer of the state of Rhode Island. And for good reason. Squid means big business, and what we catch in Rhode Island accounts for up to 50% of the east coast’s quota every year! Squid have a lifespan of 12 to 18 months, reproduce twice a year, and can be caught year-round, with very few catch limitations, making it lucrative for fishermen.
Great fried calamari is an art form. It may seem like a simple dish, but to make it light and crispy, you need to be on your game. That’s why it can be a real hit-or-miss item on most restaurant menus. And there’s nothing worse than getting what would have been a great plate of calamari had the chef not decided to pour sauce all over it, turning the crispy cephalopod into mush.
What makes great fried calamari are three basic elements: it needs to be wild-caught in the US (preferably Rhode Island!)…properly cleaned…it needs to be fried at the right temperature for the right amount of time so that it’s perfectly cooked and not greasy…and the coating needs to be light and crispy.
1 lb. wild caught cleaned squid (thaw if frozen)
1 cup flour (I use gluten-free these days)
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon dried parsley
1/2 teaspoon granulated garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 cup milk
1 large egg
oil, for frying (I use avocado oil)
Thaw the squid and slice them into bite-sized pieces. In a bowl, whisk the milk and the egg together. Toss in all the squid pieces into the bowl to coat. Place the bowl in the fridge for at least 15 minutes.
In another bowl, combine the flour, oregano, paprika, parsley, garlic, salt and pepper. Set aside.
Fill a large pan halfway with oil…or use a deep fryer if you have one. Heat the oil to 350 degrees.
Working in small batches, remove the squid from the milk and egg mixture, let some of it drip off, then place the squid in the flour mixture and toss to coat. Shake off any excess flour and place immediately into the hot oil. Fry them until they’re golden brown, about 4 minutes. Serve immediately with tartare sauce, tomato sauce, hot peppers, whatever you like. (But keep the sauces on the side for dipping.)
About the oil: I cook almost exclusively with olive oil. But for hot frying like this recipe requires, I go with avocado oil, which can take higher temperatures.
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