Smoky Cabbage and Raisin Risotto

Do NOT let the title of this dish throw you off. If I tried, I could have come up with something that sounded more appetizing. I think the recipe that we based this dish off called it "Smoky Radicchio Risotto 'Michu'" or something. Whatever "michu" is. But let's just call it what it is: Smoky Cabbage and Raisin Risotto. You know what else it is? Delicious.

Ingredients
Use the standard risotto base for this: arborio rice, onion, garlic, chicken stock, boiling water, salt, pepper, basil. We're just going to be adding some extra ingredients:

• 1 cup golden raisins
• 2 cups thinly sliced red cabbage
• 2/3 cup dry white wine (FIXED, SEAN)
• 1/2 cup chopped smoked Gouda

Cover the raisins with hot water and let soak for 15 minutes or so. They need to be plump before you add them to the risotto.
Do the whole risotto song and dance - cook the chopped onion in some olive oil and garlic until the onion is translucent. Add rice and stir, making sure to coat the rice with all the oil and garlic you possibly can. Do this until the rice gets a little toasty. Add the wine to deglaze the pot. Then add the chicken stock, raisins, and cabbage and stir well. Keep adding water about a cup at a time.
When rice is pretty near done, stir in the Gouda. Make sure to season the risotto with salt and pepper. We also chiffonaded some basil and added that.

Thoughts: This was fantastic. I cannot stress that enough. Was the color weird? Yes, because it turned sort of a light purple. Was that a little off-putting at first? Yes. But don't pay attention to the color. The taste is so fantastic. The cabbage doesn't add a very strong flavor, but it's hella good for you. Golden raisin + smoked Gouda = fantastic flavor combination. I think we're actually going to put more raisins in next time. I was a little skeptical that this dish would work out, but it did and it was amazing. I highly recommend this for adventuresome foodies.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Pasta with Sausage and Mushrooms in Cheese Sauce

Ingredients

• ~1lb smallish pasta, like rigatoni or radiatori
  
• 2 hot Italian sausage links, chopped into 1/2" slices
  
• 2-3c cremini mushrooms, quartered
  
• olive oil, cooking wine, salt, pepper
  
• about 1c half-and-half
  
• 2oz chevre cheese
  
• 10-20 kale leaves, steamed, or a roasted red pepper, seeded and chopped
  

Set the pasta cooking. In a separate pot, cook the sausage in some olive oil until it gets some caramelization. Add the mushrooms and continue to cook, stirring occasionally. Once they are fairly well cooked, add a splash of cooking wine and scrape the bottom of the pot to get the well-caramelized bits of sausage up. Set aside.

In the mean time, blend together the cooked kale or pepper, the half-and-half, and the chevre. Don't add all the half-and-half at once - slowly add it until the thickness looks right (and it blends). In the case of the kale, we had to return the mixture to the stove, cook for a while, and then return to the blender. Kale can be kind of tough.

Once the pasta is cooked, drain it (thought not necessarily all the way - the starchy pasta water helps the sauce stick). Combine all the parts of the recipe together and stir to coat. Season as needed.

Thoughts: This was great, both times we did it. It would be really easy to modify the recipe by using frozen spinach, which is easier to come by, or you could just use tomato. It was really easy to make (especially with both of us working on it). I would continue to talk about the virtues and flexibility of this recipe, but I can't think of anything else, and I'm watching the Oscars right now. It's kinda tough to concentrate.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Pizza Popovers

I can't think of a better name for this.
Ingredients

• 1 recipe pizza dough
  
• 1 recipe pizza sauce
  
  
  
  • 14oz tomatoes, canned
    
  • 1/3c basil, chopped
    
  • 3 cloves garlic
    
  • 1 onion, chopped
    
  • 1/2lb ground beef
    
  • olive oil, marsala, salt, pepper, beef bouillon
    
  
  
• cheese (mozzarella, chevre, or smoked gouda?)
  
• 1 egg yolk mixed with 1tbsp water
  

Prepare a recipe of pizza dough (2.5c flour, 2.25tsp yeast, 2tsp salt, 2tsp sugar, ~2/3c water) and set it to rise. In the mean time, prepare a recipe of pizza sauce. I pretty much cooked the onion along with the ground beef. The ground beef was more or less frozen when I started, so I had to periodically remove the thawed parts from a huge chunk of ground beef. Probably it would be better to thaw the meat completely next time. Anyway, when it was more or less cooked, I added all the other ingredients and set it to simmer for a while, covered. After a little while, I added some beef bouillon to improve the flavor, and some marsala.

Once the pizza dough is ready, remove 2" balls of dough and roll them into wide discs, one at a time. Depress the disc into a muffin tin. Put some sauce in the cup, and then add a large amount of cheese. Pinch the dough shut at the top. Repeat until the dough is used up. Brush with the egg wash. Bake at 375 for 15-25 minutes, until golden brown on top.

Thoughts: These are delicious. The original recipe, which we did not follow at all, called for canned and premade everything, but I think that I liked this version. The pizza dough also contained about 2tbsp of rosemary, which I think really improved the flavor. We agree that this was delicious.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Chocolate Ganache Filled Chocolate Truffles

Amazing - makes about 4 large truffles. They could use to be smaller, though... I can see this recipe making 7-8 normal sized chocolates.

Ingredients

• ~6oz (1c) chocolate
  
• 3tbsp half-and-half
  
• skim milk as needed
  

Reserving a tablespoon of chocolate chips, melt the remainder in the microwave using 30 second bursts and stirring well between each iteration. Once they're FAIRLY melted, just stir them and let the residual heat melt them the rest of the way - don't overcook. Divide the chocolate into two equal portions in different bowls. Heat the half-and-half in the microwave until it's just warm to the touch. Add it to one of the bowls and stir well. It should look a little watery for a second and then thicken into a ganache. Using a DIFFERENT spoon, stir the reserved tablespoon of chocolate chips into the OTHER bowl. This is your tempered chocolate shell. It doesn't matter if it doesn't all melt, but try to get most of the chips dissolved.

Depending on the thickness of the ganache, you can now use a melon baller or small ice-cream scoop to scoop out little blobs of chocolate onto a piece of waxed paper. If the ganache is too liquidy, chill it in the fridge until it gets a little more solid. (If you do chill it, make sure to come by and stir it every five to ten minutes so that it doesn't cool unevenly). Place the blobs of chocolate in the freezer for 20 minutes.

Check on the tempered chocolate, making sure it stays melty. Alton Brown recommends putting the bowl on top of a heating pad turned to low. Just make sure not to let it get too hot.

Now take the blobs out of the freezer. You kind of have to move quickly - take a toothpick and dunk each one in the melted tempered chocolate, then put the truffle on a sheet of waxed paper. Twist the toothpick to get it out of the chocolate, and then you can add a little dab of extra chocolate to cover up any hole it leaves. Do this for each of them. Let them cool for 10 minutes or so on the counter, and then put them in the fridge until they set completely. Then you can take them out and they won't melt all over.

Thoughts: This was a test of a basic truffle recipe. I sort of made up the process, but combined it with some knowledge about the science of tempering chocolate. These turned out GREAT. In the future, it would be easy to add flavors to the chocolates. When you heat the half-and-half, just steep some lavender in it for a while, then filter out the lavender. Or try earl grey. Or orange extract. I'm also thinking that I might sprinkle some sea salt on top of the truffles. Make sure that you make them smallish - mine were fairly large, and they're a little much for one person. You kind of have to split them in half and share.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Chocolate "Nougat" (?) Chocolates

A first attempt - I halved all the ingredients because I didn't want to make 4 dozen chocolates, but this kind of makes the recipe really weird. Double all ingredients listed if you don't want to mess around with 1/2 an egg white.

Ingredients

• 1/2 an egg white (I know, weird)
  
• 1.5c powdered sugar
  
• .5c unsweetened cocoa powder
  
• 1/6c light corn syrup
  
• 12oz (about 2c) semisweet chocolate chips
  
• rock salt (we used penzy's "french gray sea salt")
  

In a medium metal bowl, beat the egg white until it's frothy but not stiff. Add the cocoa and corn syrup and beat together. Then slowly add powdered sugar until you have something that resembles a dough. Add powdered sugar until you can knead the dough. Turn it out onto a counter dusted with powdered sugar, and knead into a smooth texture, then roll it out to desired thickness. Cut the dough (you can use a cookie cutter or, if you want square chocolates, a pizza cutter or just a chef's knife works well). Arrange the pieces of dough on a cookie sheet and put in the freezer.

Now, melt all but 1/4c the chocolate chips, either in the microwave (30 seconds at a time, taking out to stir regularly until there's enough residual heat to melt the chips the rest of the way) or in a double boiler (same deal - take them off the heat when everything is melted ENOUGH that it will melt the rest of the way without the heat). Add the 1/4c extra chocolate chips and stir until everything is MOSTLY melted. This is to temper the chocolate (basically, the 1/4c chocolate chips are seed crystals to reestablish the lattices you destroyed by melting the chocolate).

Take the dough out of the freezer. Dip the pieces of dough into the chocolate and then (as best you can, anyway) put them on a piece of waxed paper. Sprinkle a small amount of salt on top. Let them cool for 15 minutes at room temperature, then put them in the fridge for a little while until the chocolate sets. Then you can take them out and leave them at room temperature all you want.

Thoughts: When I originally made this recipe, I didn't know about tempering the chocolate. Untempered chocolate has a much lower melting point than tempered chocolate, so as soon as you pick up these chocolates they start melting in your fingers. Later attempts at SIMILAR candies proved more successful.

The "dough" center of these chocolates is okay, but I find it a little overly sweet, overly chewy, and overly dense. This led me to feel I wanted more of a "mousse" texture on the inside. The salt on top was a definite plus, though, and really improves the taste. Overall, this was amazingly successful for such a generally finicky cooking process, but there's room for improvement.

Disaster Index: 3/10

Cilantro Cumin Butter Sauce

Made to accompany perogi, though you could put it on just about anything.

Ingredients

• 1.5tbsp butter
  
• 1/2tsp cumin or to taste
  
• 1 tsp dried cilantro or to taste
  
• ground black pepper to taste
  
• 1/4tsp salt
  

Just put everything in a sauce pan. Melt the butter and cook until it browns just a little. Add the perogi (or whatever) and toss to coat. Let it cook just a little longer, tossing around so nothing sticks. Ta da!

Thoughts: This was pretty much what you got for "hot sauce" if you ordered at Pel'meni (now closed) in Madison, WI. They also put sriracha and vinegar on the pelmeni. I could see doing that, but Claire wanted something less spicy but still flavorful so I whipped this up.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Cinnamon Streusel Coffeecake with Apples

Variation with ~1.5c cherry halves

Ingredients

• Streusel
  
  
  • 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1/3 cup packed granulated sugar
  • 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
  
  
• Cake
  
  
  • 3 cups flour
  • 1 tbsp baking powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 1 and 3/4 cup buttermilk or plain whole yoghurt
  • 1 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 3 large eggs
  • 7 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
  • 2 apples: peeled, cored, and chopped
    

For the streusel : Mix everything together in a bowl until the mixture resembles wet sand. Set aside.

For the cake : Heat oven to 350 degrees and grease a 9x13 inch baking dish. Mix flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt together in a large bowl. Whisk buttermilk, sugars, eggs, and melted butter in a separate bowl until smooth. Gently fold the wet mixture into the dry one. There will be lumps. Don't panic. And don't overmix. Fold in the chopped apples. Mix until completely incorporated. Put the batter into the dish and spread it evenly with a rubber spatula or something. Sprinkle the streusel evenly over the top. Bake until the streusel is golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out with only a few crumbs. This will take 40-45 minutes. Take cake out of oven and cool it for 15 minutes before eating.


Thoughts: This was hella delicious. The original recipe didn't call for apples, but we put them in and I'm glad we did. I highly recommend it. Also, I accidentally put in 1 tsp salt rather than 1/4, like the original recommended, and I thought it would totally ruin the cake, but it actually made it better. So just go ahead and put in that whole tsp of salt. You won't regret it. I also recommend eating this with lemon curd. Just so long as you eat it. Whatever.


Disaster Index: 1/10

Avgolemono

aka Egg Lemon Soup.
Ingredients

• 4c chickens stock (or veg)
  
• 1/3c rice or 1c pasta
  
• 3 egg yolks, beaten
  
• ~2tbsp lemon juice
  
• 2tbsp chopped parsley (dried works)
  
• pepper, to taste
  

Cook the pasta in the chicken stock, adding extra water as it boils off. Aim to have a little less than 4c when the pasta/rice is done. Add the lemon to the egg yolks and whisk. When the pasta is done, take it off the heat. Temper the eggs by adding a ladle-full of soup stock to the eggs, whisking constantly. Then add the eggs to the soup, again whisking constantly. Stir in the parsley and pepper and serve.

Thoughts: This is a really easy soup with a lemony, creamy taste. It's really great. The tricky part is adding the egg - it's supposed to thicken the soup without cooking all the way. So don't put it back on the heat after you add the egg. We use really little pasta - orzo is probably best. Though you could make it just as well with extra long grain white rice. It occurred to me while this was boiling away that the amount of salt in the stock probably lowered the boiling point of the water, so the pasta took a long time to cook. If you're working with bullion (as we were), you might consider cooking the pasta FIRST and then adding the bullion. Next time I think we'll do it that way.

This recipe is kind of a go-to for us; I don't know why we didn't blog it before.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Xinxim

Possibly one of the strangest recipes we've done so far.
Ingredients

• 1.5lbs of chicken thighs, cut into thick pieces
  
• 3 limes, juiced
  
• ~4 cloves garlic, crushed
  
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• 1/2lb pre-cooked shrimps (if not pre-cooked, just add them a little sooner. The original recipe called for raw, but we didn't have 'em)
  
• 1 yellow onion, chopped
  
• 1 green bell pepper, chopped
  
• 2 large ripe tomatoes, seeded and chopped (why seeded? I don't know.)
  
• 1c chicken broth
  
• ~1/2c dried shrimp
  
• ~1/2c cashews
  
• ~1/2c toasted peanuts
  
• 1 lobe ginger, peeled and finely chopped
  
• 2tbsp palm oil
  
• 1 can coconut milk
  
• (optional) cilantro
  
• 2 spicy sausage links, cut thickly (chorizo would work, we just used "hot italian sausage" we found at the grocery)
  

Mix lime juice, garlic, salt, and pepper. Place chicken and sausage in one bowl and shrimp in another, and put about 1/3 of this mixture over the (non-dried) shrimp and the remaining 2/3 over the chicken and sausage. Stir to coat. Let marinate for 15 minutes. In the mean time, place the dried shrimp, cashews, and peanuts in a cuisinart and crush them down to a fine meal. In a pan, heat some oil with a high smoke point (peanut oil, for example). Put the chicken and sausage in and cook until they're more or less done. Set aside (back in the bowl of marinade, possibly).
In the same pan, add the green bell pepper and the onion and sautee until soft. Then add the tomatoes, chicken & sausage (and all the marinade they were sitting in), and the chicken stock. Let simmer on low for 30 minutes. Add the nuts/shrimp meal and the ginger. Let simmer for another 5 minutes. Then add everything else, stir well, and let simmer another 5-10 minutes. Serve.

Thoughts: Really great. We could use more soup liquid - more stock. The taste really matured after refrigerating a day (leftovers were really great). Dan felt it was a little greasy - maybe less or no palm oil next time. Also, we could chop the peanuts and cashews up a LITTLE more finely than we did. This made a LOT of soup - next time we could cut the recipe in half and still have enough leftovers for a week. Finally, skip seeding the tomatoes. Just use 1 can of chopped tomatoes. This recipe was really complicated, so anything to simplify it.

Disaster Index: 2/10

Rosemary Crackers

A first attempt.

Ingredients

• 1c flour
  
• 1/2tsp baking powder
  
• 1/2tsp salt
  
• 1/3c water
  
• 1/6c vegetable oil
  
• ~1tsp rosemary
  
• fresh cracked pepper
  
• olive oil
  

Preheat oven to 400. Grease a single baking pan. Mix all of the dry ingredients together, then add all the wet ingredients and mix to form a soft dough. Roll the dough out thinly to fit the entire baking pan. Place the sheet in the baking pan and press with fingers to fit to edges - this also makes the crackers a little irregular, which I like. Brush the top of the dough with some olive oil, and then cut into squares using a pizza cutter. Bake for 10-12 minutes; until browned as desired.

Thoughts: Flavor was great. For next time, I would consider adding a little garlic powder or (instead) possibly a teaspoon of sugar. We actually didn't brush the tops with olive oil - we baked them about 12 minutes, took them out, realized they were not browning, brushed them with olive oil, and then put them back in for a while. It worked, but ultimately we felt the texture was a LITTLE lackluster. A little too thick; not quite crispy enough. Next time, I'd brush them with olive oil FIRST, but also I would consider using whole wheat flour, and I would probably roll them out thinner (and do two batches). All-in-all, this was a great first experience. Right out of the oven they were great, but I'd have to crisp the rest of them in the oven before I eat any more again.

Disaster Index: 4/10

Spicy Beef Strips and Rice

Ingredients

Spicy Beef Strips

• 1 lb rib-eye steak or some other boneless cut. We may have used sirloin. Who knows?
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1 tbsp fish sauce
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 2 tsp garlic
• 2 tbsp green chilies

Cut the steak into 1/2 inch-wide crosswise strips and place them in a shallow bowl.
Mix the other ingredients together to form a marinade.
Pour the marinade over the beef and put in the refrigerator for 1 hour.
Meanwhile, make the rice:

(I am only including this recipe here because it's the first time we've made perfect rice. No sticking to the pan, no chewy grains, nothing)

Rice

• 1 cup rice
• 1 and 1/4 cup water.

Wash the rice very well under cold water, until water runs clear. This will take about 3 minutes, maybe.
Drain well.
Put rice and water in a 2 quart pot over high heat. Bring to a boil. When it boils, immediately turn heat to "low" and put the lid on. Leave for 20 minutes. Don't open the lid. I know you'll be tempted to, but just don't.
After 20 minutes is over, remove the pot from the heat and let sit, covered, for 10 more minutes.
If you want to make sushi rice, add 2 tbsp rice wine vinegar. We did. Then set it aside.

Back to the steak. When it's done marinating, take it out of the refrigerator. Heat a griddle (you're SUPPOSED to use a grill, but seriously. This is Wisconsin. In February. Shut up.) to about 350. Once heated, lay the strips on one at a time and pour the remaining marinade over them. Cook for about 2 minutes on each side. Remove from eat. Mix with rice. Eat them. EAT THEM.

Thoughts: I thought this recipe was pretty straight up except for one thing. The marinade was WAY too salty. It was overwhelmingly soy saucy. I had to get some of that sweet chili sauce and put it on the steak because it gave me a headache. For real. So in the future, try to cut the soy sauce with something. Maybe rice wine vinegar? Maybe sweet chili sauce? Also, it wasn't that spicy. I would recommend using actual chili peppers (serranos?) rather than the canned stuff, which we bought because there were no fresh peppers. Also we overcooked the beef. We cooked it for longer than 2 minutes on each side. It wasn't INEDIBLE, but you definitely have to work for it. But for real, that rice was just fantastic. It just fell out of the pot, and none of the grains were over or underdone. This recipe was pretty good. It definitely has potential.

Disaster Index: 4/10

Quick Bread Cinnamon Rolls

For when you don't feel like rising dough.
Ingredients

• Dough
  
  
  
  • 3/4c low or nonfat cottage cheese
    
  • 1/3c buttermilk
    
  • .25c white sugar
    
  • cap ful of vanilla
    
  • 3.5tbsp butter, melted
    
  • 2c unbleached all-purpose white flour
    
  • 1tbsp baking powder
    
  • 1/4tsp baking soda
    
  • 1/2tsp salt
    
  
  
• Filling:
  
  
  
  • 1.5tsp butter, melted
    
  • liberal 2/3c brown sugar
    
  • liberal 1.5tsp cinnamon
    
  • liberal .5tsp allspice
    
  • liberal .25tsp ground cloves
    
  • 1/2c raisins, plumped in some boiling water
    
  
  
• Glaze:
  
  
  
  • 2/3c confectioner's sugar
    
  • 2-3tbsp milk
    
  • 1tsp vanilla
    
  
  

Preheat oven to 400.

In a food processor, mix the cottage cheese, buttermilk, sugar, butter, and vanilla and run for about 10 seconds until mixed. Add the remaining dough ingredients and run in 2 second pulses until the dough forms a ball. Don't over-process, though. Just until it comes together. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and dust with some more flour. Knead it just about five times until a little smooth. Dust with some more flour, and then roll out into about 12x16", as rectangular as possible.

Mix the dry "filling" ingredients. Brush the 1.5tbsp butter over the dough to about 1/2" from the sides. Use all of the butter. Sprinkle the dry ingredients over the dough and press them in. Distribute the raisins as you desire. We put them on half of the dough and thought it was maybe a FEW too many raisins. I don't really want raisins in my cinnamon rolls, so next time we'll maybe use 1/4c raisins and still just put them on half the dough.

Roll the dough starting at the far side and working toward you (slowly, being sure the dough doesn't stick to the counter. You want to roll it the long way. Using a very sharp knife, cut into 12 cinnamon rolls. Put these on a parchment-covered (and PAMmed) springform pan. Bake 20-28 minutes (we went 24 exactly).

Mix the glaze ingredients and whisk until the the sugar is dissolved. Pour the glaze over all of the rolls (still in the pan) and let sit for about 15 minutes.

Thoughts: These cinnamon rolls were far easier than our normal cinnamon rolls, and possibly more delicious. The dough was really tangy (from the cottage cheese and buttermilk, no doubt) and, because it was a quick bread, it was a little less gummy and a little more just "soft". The dough was very easy to work with, too. All around great idea. They border on too sweet - next time we might try to figure out a cream-cheese glaze (or make a glaze with less sugar) and see what we can do.

Disaster Index: 1/10