compromises

Dear Kristin,

My hat is off to you and your hubs for trying to eat a more wholesome diet. I won't even pretend that the Whole30 diet sounds like something I would try. I would rather pull my eyelids over the top of my forehead while listening to Neil Diamond's greatest hits than give up cheese or sugar or bread!

To be honest, though, I believe that dad and I enjoy a diet that is somewhat more healthy than we did when we were younger. We certainly have cut down on the amount of processed foods we eat, and we do try to be mindful of the amounts of fat and empty calories we consume. We are part of a generation that was brought up on Chef Boyardee and Tang. Probably 90% of the fruits and vegetables we had as kids came out of a can. Salad? Iceberg lettuce, period. Romaine, Bibb Lettuce or Kale would probably have been viewed with a suspicious eye as some sort of evil cold war enemy plot designed to corrupt the all-American patriotic plates of fine upstanding citizens.

Today we do what we can to eat a more wholesome diet. Cheese is a good example. While we won't eliminate cheese from our diet (that's just crazy talk), we may opt for the reduced fat varieties, and may look for alternate preparations that allow us to keep the richness and depth that cheese can add to a meal while cutting down on the amount we use. This soup is one of the results of these compromises. I came up with this soup after reading a number of recipes for something called "Lasagna Soup". Hmmm.. that sounded intriguing. What I was hoping for was something that would taste like lasagna, but would be lighter than the lasagna I normally make which uses an insane amount of mozzarella and ricotta cheeses. What I eventually came up with turned out to be what I might call "Not lasagna soup", because it really doesn't remind me too much of lasagna except for the dollop of ricotta cheese and the sprinkling of mozzarella that is added at the end. What I love about this soup is the broth - just a hint heartier than a broth, but not anywhere near as heavy as a cream based soup. The flavor of the tomatoes and chicken stock, with just a hint of cream and Parmesan cheese is a winner. Add a green salad and a loaf of homemade bread and you have real comfort food for a cold winter night.

tomato and pasta soup with three cheeses

Soup:
8 oz. farfalle pasta*
1 Tblsp. olive oil
1 lb. Italian sausage, either bulk or removed from casings (hot or mild, according to taste)
1 large onion
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp. Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp. red pepper flakes
2 Tblsp. tomato paste
1 28 oz. can diced or crushed tomatoes
4 cups chicken stock
1 bay leaf
Salt and pepper
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup heavy cream

Topping:
Shredded Mozarella
Ricotta Cheese (either whole or part skim)
Fresh basil leaves

1. Cook pasta in a large pot of boiling salted water until al dente. Remove from heat and drain well.
2. Heat olive oil in a large dutch oven. Add sausage and cook over medium heat until brown, about 4-5 minutes. Add Italian seasoning, red pepper flakes, garlic and onion. Cook about 2-3 minutes longer or until onions are translucent. Drain any excess fat. Season with salt and pepper. Finally, stir in the tomato paste, stirring and cooking until combined, about 1 more minute.
3. Stir in tomatoes, chicken stock and bay leaf. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer until slightly reduced, about 30 minutes. Stir in pasta, Paremesan and cream. Continue to cook until heated through, about 2-3 minutes. Remove bay leaf.
4. Serve topped with a dollop of ricotta**, sprinkles of mozzarella and fresh basil leaves.

* Originally the recipes I looked for used lasagna noodles, but I personally love farfalle - the choice of pasta is yours.
** I actually prefer this soup without the ricotta - I like it topped simply with the mozarella and basil. I feel that you get a better sense of the tasty broth this way. Your dad really liked the addition of the ricotta - so each to his own taste!

brown bagging it

Dear Mom,

This is terrible! Its been months since I've posted!  I've been very busy, we've been unpacking since the big move and I got a job!  It all happened surprisingly quickly and I'm still adjusting to the new schedule.  So my new job is at a great firm in midtown Manhattan and is a convenient 10 minute walk from Grand Central.  I love the energy of working in the Big Apple, but the prices are a little expensive, even for lunch.  So I've been brown bagging it.  I've been quite ambitious with it, and I'm trying to make healthy things that I can make in bulk on Sundays so that they last through the week.  My big kick lately is quinoa, which I'm very surprised just came up as a spelling mistake on my machine - my corrective options were Aquino or Joaquin...

Joaquin's Salad

1 cup quinoa
2 cups low-sodium chicken (or veggie) stock

4-5 seeded, chopped plum tomatoes
1 medium cucumber, seeded and chopped (peel too if you like)
1 can chick peas
1/2 cup chopped curly parsley
3/4 cup feta cheese

2 lemons, juiced
2 tbsp. red wine vinegar
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 garlic, minced
salt and pepper, to taste

Cook quinoa according to package directions, usually its a 1:2 ratio of dried quinoa to stock.  Cool cooked quinoa.  Combine quinoa and tomatoes through feta in a large bowl, toss all ingredients together.  In a separate bowl whisk together lemon juice through garlic.  Season with salt and pepper to taste and add to quinoa mixture.  Toss to combine.  Adjust seasoning as required.

This salad has kept in my fridge for 5 days (by then I've usually ate it all).  It will get better if it sits in the fridge overnight.  If it seems a little bland after a night in the fridge add more red wine vinegar and salt and pepper.

change

Dear Mom,

I have made those delightful little buns of pleasure before...  Hmmm... That does not sound like something one typically admits in a food blog.  Speaking of delightful buns, did you hear that George Clooney is officially off the market?  It is true, the perpetual bachelor and man of our dreams is engaged.  Oh well, times are a changin'.  I've made quite the significant change in my life as well: the hubs and I moved to a new city! Tarrytown, NY specifically, about 40 minutes north of NYC by train.  I'm quite excited, the hubs got a promotion (so proud of him) and they wanted him back at headquarters so I decided to leave my job and join him (like I really had a choice).

So far, I'm in love with this little town!  It has an adorable little Main Street, USA type "downtown" anchored by a well-reviewed performing arts center.  There are a lot of restaurants, bars and coffee shops for us to check out, and we're surrounded by some really superb parks with lots of trails for us (including little Lola) to explore.  The best part is it is all within walking distance, including the train to the city if we ever get bored of this town.  Our new apartment has a FIVE-BURNER range, which I'm super excited about.  I've only set off the smoke detector twice...  Plus we have outdoor space for grilling and veggie growing.

Well, all that chit-chat about my new life has made me hungry!  For my first returning NY resident recipe I'm presenting you with a simple Penne Vodka.  With all the running around the hubs and I have been doing unpacking and prepping the place I needed something simple and satisfying.

penne vodka

8 slices pancetta, thinly deli sliced and chopped
extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup yellow or sweet onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup vodka
1 jar marinara sauce (any pasta sauce you like, preferably not too chunky)
crushed red pepper
1 cup frozen peas
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream.
12 oz. dried penne
salt and pepper

Cook pasta according to package directions.

Meanwhile, heat a deep skillet over medium-high heat, add about 2 tsp. of extra virgin olive oil and pancetta.  Cook over heat until crispy, remove with slotted spoon and place on paper towels to drain.  In the same pan, add extra olive oil if needed and onion and garlic.  Cook over medium-high heat until slightly browned.  Lower the heat and add vodka, scraping up any browned bits.  Bring mixture to a simmer and allow the vodka to reduce by half.  Add the jarred marinara and stir in, warm sauce and add crushed red pepper to taste, lower heat to medium-low.

When the pasta is done, remove directly from water to sauce mixture, stir and continue to heat over medium-low heat.  Using a sieve or strainer, submerge the frozen peas in the boiling pasta water for 5 minutes or until defrosted and slightly done (you don't want mushy peas).  Add to sauce and pasta mixture.  Stir in cream, season to taste.  Serve with pancetta sprinkled on top.

What the heck is a peck?

Dear Kristin,

Ah, summer. Here is another recipe that takes advantage of garden fresh produce. Now, this recipe comes from your great-grandmother. She could whip up the best things with the fewest ingredients. Have apples and flour? In the blink of an eye (and with no written recipe), there would be a warm apple kuchen for breakfast. Having ham for dinner? Don't throw out the bone - it will be used to make baked beans, and then re-used again to make soup! (She always told us that she would make the beans and the soup after the dog was finished with the bone, and not before!).

She also made this tomato "stuff". She called it chili sauce - but it's not, really. It's more like sweet pickled tomatoes - so we will call it tomato relish. It tastes great on hot dogs & hamburgers - but also on taco chips. Since I made this on Saturday, your dad has also been eating it straight out of the jar! The recipe I have is hand-written on a very smudged and yellowing piece of paper. No title, few measurements, and nonexistent instructions. I quote:

1 peck tomatoes
1 pt onions, chopped & ground
3 hot peppers (+3 sweet)
3 c vinegar
Sugar (brown or not)
1 1/2 tbsp. salt

Beware seeds and stems - more seeds and stems the hotter.
Peel tomatoes.
Cook 3-4 hours, 4-5 hours.
Stir frequently - low heat.
Cover jars in parafin. (sic)

Okay - thanks, Grandma! Now all I have to do translate Grandma-speak!

I had to google "peck" to find out that a peck is 8 quarts, or a quarter bushel. (So saying "I love you a bushel and a peck" says quite a lot!)
1 pt onions - I'm assuming that's 1 pint - but who sells onions by the pint?
Were the sweet peppers just an afterthought?
What kind of vinegar? Cider, white, rice-wine, champagne? Since great grandma was raised on a farm, I'm thinking the simplest - so I choose white.
Sugar - I'm assuming brown, but how much?
1 1/2 tbsp. salt - Finally - something I can measure!!!!!!

With all of that said - I will put the recipe down here, but will not give you instructions on how to preserve this summertime treat. I do not cover my jars in paraffin - I use a hot water bath instead. I won't go into the details - but there is a good video demo on YouTube here.

One word of caution. This stuff smells so good while it's cooking (and that is for the better part of a day), that you will have your husband, kids, neighbors, visiting dignitaries and perfect strangers hanging about your kitchen just to breathe in the aroma. Seriously - it smells that good.

OK - here goes:

tomato relish

12 cups peeled and chopped tomatoes (I used romas, but any good, ripe tomato will do)
2 cups finely chopped onions
2 hot peppers, finely chopped (beware seeds and stems - the more you leave in, the hotter your relish will be)
2 cups finely chopped sweet pepper
2 cups brown sugar
1 1/2 cups white vinegar
1 Tbsp. kosher salt

full disclosure

Dear Kristin,

I returned from my visit with you and Lola to a garden full of vine ripened tomatoes. While this might be a welcome bounty to most people, I must admit that sometimes a bowl of ripe tomatoes can bring back some painful memories for me. After all, I was not always the culinary goddess I am now, and some of my beginning attempts at cooking were, well, in a word, disasters!

Case in point - my first attempt to make homemade spaghetti sauce. This was actually a collaborative failure, as it took both my college roommate and me to create a sauce that had the texture of gummy oatmeal, the color of an over-ripe pumpkin and the taste of wallpaper paste.

Laura (the roommate) and I were sophomores, and enjoying our first month of living off campus in our own apartment. We invited a couple of guys from MIT over for dinner, and decided that spaghetti was about the only thing we could afford to make that would feed four people. How hard could spaghetti be? We had both watched our moms make it hundreds of times, so we were pretty sure we knew what we were doing. Oh, and it looked so easy - just put some tomatoes in a pot with some seasonings, and you're done, right? Ah, the cockiness of youth! We may have watched our moms make sauce hundreds of times, but evidently neither of us was really paying much attention.

We started out with the right idea, putting some canned tomatoes into a pot with some oregano and crushed red pepper. We heated it up, and waited for it to thicken into that rich, sweet tomato-ey sauce that clings passionately to each strand of pasta. We waited, and waited and waited. (With the impatience of youth, we probably waited about 20 minutes, if truth be told.) Well, the sauce wasn't thickening up. What to do? How did our moms thicken sauces? Oh, of course - FLOUR! We stirred in some flour, and were rewarded with a lumpy orange mixture that would make nice bricks once it cooled.

Luckily, there was an Italian restaurant right down the street that served take-out, so as Laura greeted the boys at the front door, I ran out the back, picked up four orders of spaghetti to go, and ran back to the apartment. After barricading the kitchen door, Laura and I put all of the spaghetti into a big bowl and sliced up some bread. We presented this dinner to our dates, who declared that it was the best spaghetti they had ever had.

But I digress. Now I'm excited by a harvest of ripe red tomatoes and am not afraid to slowly coax them into a sauce that I can be proud of. Not only do I make the sauce from scratch, but I make it with ingredients that I've picked right out of my own back yard - roma tomatoes, green peppers, and fragrant green basil.

This is a pretty rustic sauce, with big chunks of sweet tomatoes and tangy green peppers. The amount of seasoning you use will definitely vary depending on the ripeness and sweetness of the tomatoes. It makes a quick weeknight supper, as once you assemble the sauce, it cooks and thickens in about the time it takes to cook up a pot of pasta. Add a salad and a crusty loaf of french bread, and you're all set.

summer harvest pasta sauce

6 to 8 large, well-ripened roma tomatoes
1 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 of a large red onion, roughly diced
1 large green pepper, cut into 1/4 to 1/2 inch strips
2 cloves garlic
Salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbsp. tomato paste
2 Tbsp. sugar (or to taste - the amount you use will vary with the ripeness and sweetness of the tomatoes)
2 Tbsp. Italian seasoning
Fresh basil for garnish

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Remove pot from heat and place tomatoes in the water to loosen the skins.
2. Heat the olive oil in a large skillet. Lightly saute the onion, green pepper and garlic in the oil until the vegetables just begin to soften. Add salt and pepper to taste.
3. While the vegetables are sauteing, peel and coarsely chop the tomatoes.
4. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, sugar and Italian seasoning to the skillet. Reduce heat to medium or medium low, and simmer slowly until sauce thickens, about 15 to 20 minutes. (now is a good time to cook your pasta)
5. Serve sauce over pasta of your choice - I like farfalle, but you can use linguine or spaghetti just as well. Garnish with fresh basil leaves and grated Parmesan cheese.

new york vs. chicago round two!

Dear Dennis,

It's really too bad you didn't come with me to visit Kristin. You missed out on some really good eats & some fun times. Yes, we ate a lot, but we did try to burn at least some of it off with a five mile run/walk on Saturday and a kayaking stint on the Chicago River on Sunday. While it might have been tempting to catch our dinner while kayaking, we thought it might be a little unwise to consume something from a river that has been known to catch on fire.

Since pizza is always on the menu when we visit Chicago, we decided to keep the tradition going. However, instead of going to one of our favorite chi-town pizza joints, we decided to stay in and have a nice little kitchen competition instead. Pizza Throw-Down!

Kristin's challenge was to create a Chicago style deep dish/stuffed pizza. My challenge was to come up with a thin, foldable New York style pizza. So, create we did. Kristin's windy city pizza was good, with two crusts surrounding a filling of ricotta, and then topped with peppers, onions & mozzarella. A side of sauce added the finishing touch. The New York style pizza was a thin crust affair, topped with a thin layer of sauce, fresh tomatoes, mozzarella and fresh basil. Cooking the pie on the grill gave the crust an authentic brick-oven type finish.

After the flour settled, we both agreed that the visiting team won this challenge. Go New York! I think we'll continue to work on the stuffed pizza, though, because it definitely shows some promise.

new york style grilled pizza margherita

dough for a 12" pizza
1/2 c. jarred pizza or spaghetti sauce
1 tomato
6 oz. fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced
fresh basil leaves

Preheat grill to 400F.
Remove pulp and seeds from tomato. Slice tomato as thinly as possible. Dry slices on paper toweling to remove excess moisture.
Roll pizza dough on floured surface as thinly as possible, while still being able to move it without tearing.
Place dough a pizza pan that will withstand direct heat from grill.
Prebake crust on grill for approximately 2 to 3 minutes, or until bottom just begins to brown.
Remove crust from grill.
Spread pizza sauce on crust, going all the way to the edges.
Place sliced mozzarella over sauce.
Top pizza with sliced tomatoes.
Carefully slide the pizza from the pizza pan directly onto grill over indirect heat.
Cook pizza over indirect heat for about 2 minutes, or until cheese melts, being careful not to burn the bottom of the crust.
Carefully remove pizza from grill. Top with fresh basil leaves and allow to rest a few minutes before serving.