Moroccan Beef Stew

From a recipe on Epicurious from Bon Apetit magazine.

• 2.5lbs boneless chuck roast, cut into bite-sized pieces
  
• 2 small onions
  
• 3 cloves garlic
  
• 1tbsp paprika
  
• 1tbsp garam masala
  
• 1tsp cumin
  
• 1/2tsp turmeric
  
• 1/2tsp cayenne
  
• 1c red wine
  
• 1/2c vermouth
  
• 2c beef stock (we used bouillon)
  
• 1 14.5oz can of diced tomatoes
  
• 1.5c raisins (original calls for golden, we used normal raisins)
  

In a pot, add some olive oil and saute the chuck roast until it's no longer pink - about 8 minutes. It's a lot of meat. I kind of felt like I was butchering a whole side of beef. Anyway, when it's done, put it in a separate bowl (aside). Then add to the pot the onions and garlic and a little more oil. Saute until the onions are translucent, about 5 minutes. Then add all the spices and the wine + vermouth. Stir well until combined, then bring to a boil and reduce to a glaze. In the mean time, you can add the other ingredients to the bowl with the beef. When the wine is reduced to a glaze, just add the beef and all the other ingredients. Stir well and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and let it simmer until the sauce is thickened and beef tender, about an hour to 1.25 hours. Ours was reducing very quickly, so I covered it so the beef could tenderize a little longer. I think this was a wise decision.

Thoughts: We served this over rice, though the original recipe recommends serving it over couscous. It was DELICIOUS. Really amazing. It took a little extra salt at the end to make it perfect, but I would be careful to add this at the END because your stock may be saltier or less salty than ours was at the time. Also, we thought maybe another 1/2c raisins wouldn't be out of the question, though the recipe scarcely needed it. In the future, this could be a perfect recipe for a slow cooker... but we don't have such a thing right now, so. One other thing - apparently our entire floor of the building was permeated with the delicious smells of spices and so forth last night, and this morning our apartment still kind of smells really good.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Fresh Berries with Basil Creme Fraiche

Or basil-infused (LIGHTLY sweetened) whipped cream.



It's pretty good, that's all. There isn't really a recipe to this. It's kind of self-describing.



Disaster Index: 1/10 on waffles or by themselves.

Olive Oil Granola

Best granola recipe yet. This is super addictive. This is my own take on the olive oil granola recipe from the NY Times that's been circulating on the food blogs. I didn't have all the ingredients for that one, so I kind of improvised. I think my flavor combinations are probably better, though. YOU HEARD ME NEW YORK TIMES. Okay.

Ingredients

• 3c rolled oats
  
• 1c quick oats
  
• 1/4c wheat germ
  
• 1tsp salt
  
• ~1/2c packed brown sugar, plus or minus (see thoughts section)
  
• ~1/4c chocolate chips
  
• 1/2c olive oil
  
• .75tsp cinnamon, maybe more
  
• .5tsp cardamom
  
• 1 egg white, whipped until foamy
  

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Mix together all the dry ingredients until well mixed. Add the olive oil and stir around until coated, then whip the egg white and stir that in until well mixed. Spread the granola over a 9x13 pan with steep sides (like a brownie pan). I had a layer of waxed paper on the bottom of my pan. Bake for 20 minutes at 300, stir lightly, turning over the top layer, and then bake for another 25 minutes. Take the granola out of the oven and let it cool overnight. Don't touch it! This is how you get the clusters. The next morning, you can (carefully) break it apart and put it in the fridge.

Thoughts: This is REALLY good. Olive oil + chocolate = awesome. Trust me on this. But what's more, it's hard to eat more than like 1/3c at a go. For some reason this is really unusually filling. Here are some things I might do differently next time:

1. Salt: wheat germ is just naturally a little salty and olive oil is a little savory. This granola turned out a little on the salty side. Which was OK, but it meant I had to add a little more sugar to compensate. Next time, maybe 1/2 the added salt. Or no added salt.
   
2. Egg Whites: while I got SOME of the granola clusters I was looking for, the effect wasn't quite as pronounced as I'd have liked. In the future, I'll use more than one egg white.
   

Disaster Index: 1/10

Chilled Avocado Cucumber Soup

I hesitate to call this "cooking".

Ingredients

• 1 ripe avocado
  
• 1.5 cucumbers, peeled & seeded
  
• 1c plain yogurt
  
• 2-3tbsp lemon juice
  
• cilantro and chives - a couple tbsp each
  
• 1c chicken stock, cooled (or veg)
  
• 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded... plus some of the seeds, too.
  
• salt and ppper
  

Are you ready? This is complicated. You put all of the ingredients in a blender. Follow me so far? Blend them together.

Thoughts: This has an interesting flavor of cucumber and avocado (no surprise there) and chilled it makes a great summer soup. My one complaint would be with regard to the texture, which, right out of the blender, is a little airy. I mean, it's so feathery light that it's almost not really soup at all, and I found that a little unusual, though I can see someone liking it. I think that next time I might put little julienned cucumbers or some little greens on top. Watercress would go perfectly with this soup.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Breakfast Pizza

This was delicious, though there were some missteps.


Ingredients

• Dough
  
  • 2.5c flour
    
  • 4tbsp olive oil
    
  • 1/2tsp salt
    
  • 1tsp sugar
    
  • 2.25tsp yeast
    
• Sauce
  
  • 2.5tbsp butter
    
  • 1.5tbsp flour
    
  • 1c milk
    
  • 1/2c pepper jack, grated
    
  • ~1tsp chopped or powdered (?) rosemary
    
  • ~1tsp basil
    
  • pinch of salt, pepper to taste
    
• Other Ingredients
  
  • 1/2 red onion, sliced
    
  • ~4-8 pieces of bacon, chopped
    
  • arugula
    
  • eggs
    

First, make the dough: mix all the ingredients together and adjust the liquid:flour ratio until you can knead it on the counter (for about 5 minutes) to get a nice, elasticky dough. Grease a bowl, and set the dough to rise in it (covered with plastic wrap) for about 30 minutes. When it's done, turn it out onto the counter again and roll out into a big square to fit on a big baking sheet. Then cover with a towel and set aside.


Preheat the oven to 350. Now, we make the fillings while the dough rises. Start by making the cheese sauce. In a saucepan, melt the butter and cook until it stops foaming. Then add the flour and stir until well incorporated, then add the milk. Turn the heat up and cook it until the sauce thickens, then turn off the heat and add the cheese and herbs. You can probably add the herbs earlier, but I didn't. Anyway, stir the sauce together and set aside.


Now the other fillings. Sautee the onion and bacon together until the bacon is pretty well cooked through. That's actually about it for this step.


Pizza ASSEMBLE. Add the sauce in an even layer, then put the onion and bacon evenly around the pizza. I added some sliced tomatoes to mine. Then you bake it. We started at 350 but increased to 500. It took about 15-20 minutes for the crust to be nice and brown. In the mean time, fry an egg (over easy, if you please). Take the pizza out and sprinkle VERY liberally with arugula. Then put the egg(s) on top of each serving. Serve!


Note: we attempted to crack the egg on TOP of the pizza and hope it would cook properly in the oven. IT DID NOT. Frying an egg = same result, less variability. ALSO I made the mistake of adding arugula BEFORE baking. Claire warned me about this but I didn't believe it. That was wrong of me, and I will be the first person to admit it.


Thoughts: Really good, but hard to prepare in moderation. Delicious, though. I would do this again. It's not really pizza - it's kind of like a croque madame, but with arugula and onion. I liked it. On the other hand our actual EXECUTION left something to be desired. We messed up 1/2 the pizza with my stupid ideas and the other 1/2 looked awesome.


Disaster Index: 7/10 salvaged to like 1/10. Claire insists that her half was always 1/10. WHATEVER CLAIRE.

Sticky Lemon Rolls

Like cinnamon rolls, but lemon.

Ingredients

• Dough
  
  • 2.25tsp yeast
    
  • 3/4c warm water
    
  • 1 stick butter, softened
    
  • 1/4c white sugar
    
  • 2tsp vanilla extract
    
  • 1tsp orange extract or maybe some more lemon zest
    
  • 4.5c white flour
    
  • 1/2tsp salt
    
  • 1/2tsp nutmeg
    
  • zest of 1 lemon
    
  • juice of 1 lemon
    
  • 2 eggs
    
• Filling
  
  • 1c sugar + some
    
  • 1/4tsp freshly-ground nutmeg
    
  • 1/2tsp powdered ginger
    
  • juice of 1 lemon
    
• Frosting
  
  • 6oz cream cheese, softened
    
  • juice of 1/2 lemon
    
  • zest of 1 lemon
    
  • 1c powdered sugar, more or less
    

Ok. Mix all the wet dough ingredients in a bowl and whisk thoroughly. Add flour, 1c at a time, until you've got about 3c added. Then add the last cup and a half and turn onto a counter and knead for 5 minutes or so. Set aside and cover to rise until doubled, one hour.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the filling ingredients. When the dough is doubled, roll it out on a floured counter top until about 18" across and 10" deep. Spread the filling over it evenly, leaving a small lip on the far end of the dough. Carefully, roll up the dough starting at the far end and rolling toward you. Take a bread knife and, using long sawing motions and minimal force, cut the log of dough into 12 pieces (try halving it twice and then cutting into thirds). Place the pieces cut side down in a greased 9x13 pan. Set aside to rise until doubled, about an hour. Preheat the oven to 350, and when the rolls are risen, bake for about 30-35 minutes.

When they're getting close to done, whip together the frosting ingredients. Take the rolls out of the oven and spread the frosting over all of the rolls. Allow to cool and serve.



Thoughts: This is a good recipe, but the filling is REALLY sweet. I'm not really sure what I would do to fix this. I mean, they're cinnamon rolls. I think if I were to do it again, the filling would have no lemon juice at all, just lemon zest (or maybe orange zest). The dough itself was very easy to work with, but I think it didn't really need the huge amount of butter - the eggs were actually probably enough for this. Otherwise, this was really pretty good, though I'm not sure if they're quite enough to convince me to make them again when I could be making normal cinnamon rolls.




Disaster Index: 2/10

Pasta al Cavolfiore

This is a favorite from Claire's childhood. She felt that this was almost as good as what her father makes. This was our take on someone else's take of a Moosewood Cookbook recipe. Anyway.

Ingredients

• 1 cauliflower, cut into florets
  
• olive oil
  
• 1tsp dry basil
  
• 3-4 cloves garlic, chopped or crushed (we got chopped from a jar)
  
• 1 bay leaf
  
• red pepper flakes
  
• optional ~3 hot italian sausages
  
• 1c cheddar plus 1c parmesan cheese
  
• 1 28oz can tomato sauce/puree
  
• vermouth or dry cooking wine
  
• 1lb pasta (we used rotini)
  

If you're using them, chop the sausage and cook in a pan over medium heat until caramelized and cooked through, then set aside. In the same pot, add the cauliflower, olive oil, basil, garlic, bay leaf (or leaves), and red pepper flakes. Add some dry cooking wine and a little water and cover to cook until tender. When it's tender, add the tomato sauce. Bring to a boil and simmer for about 15 minutes (while you cook the pasta). After about 10 minutes, re-add the sausages. When it's done, drain the pasta. When the sauce is finished, take it off the heat and stir in the cheese and the pasta.

Thoughts: This is almost absurdly good. The sausage was a good addition, but unnecessary, but no, good... The cauliflower was perfectly tender. Red pepper flakes are good in just about anything, so it worked well here.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Chocolate Mousse

My mother makes it better than we do. We're working on it.

Ingredients

• 8oz (1 and 1/3c) chocolate chips
  
• 1 stick butter
  
• 8 eggs, separated (do them one at a time and add to separate bowls)
  
• 1/4tsp cream of tartar (tartaric acid powder)
  
• pinch of salt
  
• vanilla extract
  
• up to 1tbsp instant espresso
  

This recipe is influenced heavily by the order and timing of the things you do. In one bowl, beat together the egg yolks with the vanilla extract. In another bowl, add the cream of tartar to the egg whites, along with a pinch of salt. With a CLEAN whisk (if you're feeling really pumped) or an electric egg beater that you registered for but haven't gotten married yet so you still need to use a whisk... um... whip the egg whites into stiff peaks. Now, melt the chocolate chips with the butter in a heavy-bottomed saucepan until JUST melted, stirring constantly, and take off the heat as soon as it's done. Add the instant espresso. Then add to the egg yolks slowly, whisking constantly. The danger is NOT that you'll cook the egg yolks - the danger is that the chocolate seizes. When whisked together, add 1/3 of the egg whites and fold together. Now add the remaining egg whites and fold everything together. Pour into a trifle pan or individual serving glasses (like you might for pots de creme?). Cover with plastic wrap and chill at least 4 hours. *If the chocolate seizes, you need to break it apart. You put it in a cuisinart and blend the hell out of it until it's completely smooth. With luck, you can hide the problem pretty well.

Thoughts: This turned out GREAT for passover desert. Claire thought the texture was unusual, but she was incorrect. My feeling about it was that the flavor was fantastic, but next time I will try to get the yolks to cook a little bit more to thicken the mousse a little more so the ultimate product is a LITTLE firmer. Another possibility would be to use 1/2 the butter. Anyway, this was great. For a first time, especially, this was fantastic.

Disaster Index: 1/10

Apple Matzah Brei

Recipe provided by Eleanor. Thanks!

Ingredients

• 2 cups farfel
• 1/2 cup apple juice
• 1 tsp neutral cooking oil
• 2 eggs
• 3 tbsp applesauce
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp sugar

In a bowl, combine all the ingredients.
Heat griddle.
Spoon ingredients onto griddle.
Eat pancakes. Honey and syrup works well, though the original recipe also recommends apple syrup, jam, or applesauce. Om nom nom.

Thoughts: This recipe really couldn't have been any easier. We were initially worried about the pancakes maintaining their structural integrity when we flipped them, because the farfel is quite coarse. But this wasn't a problem. I think the only thing we would do differently next time is combine all the ingredients and then let them soak for maybe half an hour -- this way the farfel will have time to soften a little more. The texture of these pancakes is a little chewy otherwise. We would probably also add chopped apples, since there's already apple juice in here.

Disaster Index: 2/10 -- pretty darn good