Everyday Dorie: Soy-Sauce Eggs and Sticky Rice
May 27, 2022 at 6:20 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, snacks | 3 CommentsTags: dip, everyday dorie, savory
I think the Soy-Sauce Eggs and Sticky Rice recipe has been nominated for CTBF a few times, but it didn’t survive the final group vote until now. I can understand that a cured egg yolk may not be everyone’s bag, but I thought it sounded like a pretty intriguing technique. I made a special egg-gathering trip to the big greenmarket in Union Square, just to get the freshest I could. The yolks then pickle (I went overnight) in a bath of soy and mirin. Each yolk turns out perfectly seasoned and jammy inside (that color!!), and when stirred through hot sushi rice, coats the grains in a most luxurious way.
Before even reading Dorie’s headnote description of the dish, I looked at the photo and thought, “That’s drinking food,” and cooked up some maitake mushrooms and greens to go with. Turns out, while it’s great with a cold beer for lunch or late-night, I can see it being a good breakfast, too, and apparently even kids love it!
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Everyday Dorie: Black Bean-Chipotle Dip
May 12, 2022 at 7:36 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, snacks | 2 CommentsTags: dip, everyday dorie, savory
Guac is my usual tortilla chip dip, but I’m game to switch up taco night botanas with something as tasty as this Black Bean-Chipotle Dip. This couldn’t be easier…just whiz up a can of black beans with some seasonings and there you have it. I wouldn’t skip the lime and cilantro, but I used taco seasoning in place of cumin, scallion instead of red onion and red Fresno pepper in lieu of green jalapeño. I did use the ground chipotle, but why not sub in a canned chipotle in adobo or another type of ground chile powder instead? You can play around with what you have and what you like. You can also use leftovers as a spread for burritos or breakfast tacos, or even leave this chunkier and more salsa-like than I did…lots of possibilities, so you bet I’ll make this more often.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Everyday Dorie: Eton Mess
April 22, 2022 at 8:18 pm | Posted in everyday dorie, general pastry, groups, other sweet, pudding/mousse, sweet things | 3 CommentsTags: everyday dorie
Eton Mess is a traditional British dessert with whipped cream, strawberries and broken up meringue…it reminds me of a pavlova someone took a mallet to, but it’s beautiful it’s own messy way. Light and summery, Dorie’s version uses a strawberry-rhubarb compote and meringue with Biscoff spice cookie bits swirled through. And my version of Dorie’s version uses puréed mango, sweetened raspberries and meringue with crispy Lazzaroni amaretti cookie bits. The meringue is baked off in a sheet, which is then broken up into crumbles. I bake at home with golden sugar rather than white, so I am assuming that’s what gave my meringue it’s golden hue, as I didn’t neglect it in the oven. It was delicious with the almondy flavor from the cookies, and I was glad to have extra to nibble on. I assembled my Eton Mess parfait-style, which looked quite tidy for photos, but rest assured that as soon as the camera clicked off, I stirred it up and made a mess of it.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see all of our messes this week.
Everyday Dorie: Double-Stuffed Deviled Eggs with Crab
April 8, 2022 at 5:04 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, snacks | 4 CommentsTags: eggs, everyday dorie, savory
Double-Stuffed Deviled Eggs with Crab…oh, how fancy! I’m a fan of deviled eggs and sometimes get them as bar-type snacks out, but rarely do I make them myself. This is a luxe version, with a crab salad filling hiding under a more traditional seasoned mayo-whipped yolk mix.
The dude here and I could probably take down a whole dozen of these, but that doesn’t sound so health-conscious, so I just made one whole egg for each of us. To tell the truth, I measured nothing in either filling mixture. I mean, for two eggs’ worth, it seemed easy enough to eyeball it. Dorie says to adjust for taste anyway, so I just did it to taste to begin with. (I added a squirt of lemon juice to the yolk mix, btw.)
The crab salad has a surprise addition of apple bits. I was going to skip that, but I did have a green goldrush apple in the fridge, so I went all-in and even added some slices to garnish my egg-shaped plate. Tail feathers, if you will. These are delightful. Crab, to me, is the superior crustacean– tastier than lobster– and I did pay dearly for a small pot of picked lump meat. It’s fine, and I used just a bit of it here, so I can probably make two other crabby recipes out of what’s left, but if I were having people over for champagne, oysters, potato chips and deviled eggs (my dream party), I’d probably try to show off the crab salad as the top layer.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Everyday Dorie: Chicken and Beer Stew
March 25, 2022 at 5:27 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, soups | 4 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, savory, stew
This Chicken and Beer Stew is really supposed to be Beef and Beer Stew, but as I don’t eat read meat, I made some mods so I could try it, too. I actually nominated it for this month, thinking it would be good for St. Paddy’s day, when really it’s based on a Flemish carbonnade. I’m all over the place.
I swapped boneless, skinless chicken thighs, turkey bacon and chicken stock for the other meaty stuff, but followed all the flavorings (spices, mustard, a bit of brown sugar, dark Belgian ale, etc) and flavor-building steps (browning the meat, caramelizing the onions forever, etc) Dorie had listed. I did not, however do the multi-hour oven braise for my dish, because I knew the chicken thighs didn’t need that. I just kept everything on the stove-top for cooking. Following Dorie’s “chockful of vegetables” suggestion, I added in some carrot and baby potato chunks, and let everything low-bubble braise on the stove for 30-45 mins. When the saucy stuff was reduced a bit and everything else was tender and stewed, I called it done. Well, almost. My stew was kind of pale in comparison to the dark color of a beef one. I stirred in a dash of super-dark mushroom soy sauce, my secret ingredient for boosting color and umami when I am doing red to white meat replacements.
The weather is always up and down here in March, but the past several days have been chilly, so it was a nice cozy dinner for last night. I didn’t bother to cook noodles as Dorie suggests, since I had those potatoes in my stew. I like the little bit of sweetness the dish has, but I did save adding the splash of cider vinegar to the pot until after it was off the heat, so it would cut that and brighten the flavors up a bit. I’m looking forward to round two tonight, as stuff like this usually gets better the next day.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.
Everyday Dorie: Carrot-and-Mustard Rillettes
March 25, 2022 at 2:46 am | Posted in condiments, cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, salads, savory things, veggies | 6 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, salad, savory
Carrot-and-Mustard Rillettes…hmmm…one of the stranger “things on toast” I’ve made. Rillettes are shredded meat confit, but there’s no meat to be found here. Instead we have toasted bread, spread with a Dijonnaise-type mix and topped with steamed carrots and Comté cheese cubes that have been tossed in more even mustard and some spices.
Strange, but good, and with just enough pungent mustardy heat to make you pay attention when you take a bite. I used some homemade sourdough and drizzled the assembled toasts with the good olive oil and then put on a floof of micro greens. A little, messy, but it was a nice change-up from the kale salads I make for lunch several times a week. Carrot toast may become a repeat thing around here.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Everyday Dorie: Pasta with Sardines, Fennel and Walnuts
February 11, 2022 at 5:15 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, pasta, savory things | 4 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, pasta, savory
The thing about fishy-fish like sardines is that people either love ’em or hate ’em. I’m a lover, so sign me up for a big bowl of Pasta with Sardines, Fennel and Walnuts (or pine nuts, if you are sticking faithfully to the recipe). This very classic Sicilian dish also has capers, raisins, tomatoes and lemon in the mix. Although my husband is half Sicilian, the love of sardines doesn’t swim though his blood, so I made this one all for myself. I splurged on a fancier jar of olive oil-packed sardines because I wanted to use that oil in the saucy stuff that coated the pasta. The dish is salty, briny, oily, sweet, and acidic all at once. There is a lot going on, but to me, it all works so well. I have half a jar of sardines left, so I’m going to try another version of this recipe later in the week.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.
Everyday Dorie: Cauliflower Tabbouleh
January 28, 2022 at 5:44 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, salads, savory things, veggies | 3 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, salad, savory
Cauliflower– it’s so hot right now. Turns out that something once viewed as boring, pale and bland has the “caulipower” to transform itself into pizza crust, rice, tots, and a cream sauce substitute. No longer do we over-steam and under-season hacked up crumbly florets and toss them in melted butter so we can sadly choke them down; we gleefully and wildly slather cauliflower with every spice and paste we can get our hands on and roast it whole (one of my favorite ways to prepare it, btw) or deep fry it in nugget-form and drench it in delicious sauce. We even eat the leaves, which just a few years ago were generally regarded as trash. And now we make Cauliflower Tabbouleh out of it! I joke. I eat tons of cauliflower, and have nothing but supreme veggie respect for it. In fact, two weeks ago I got my teeth whitened and it sustained me for four days in a row, in the forms of pureed cauliflower-potato soup and cauliflower cheese pasta.
Back to the matter at hand…when I think of tabbouleh, I think of a salad that’s very heavy on the chopped herbs, with a little tomato and bulgur mixed through. An herb salad really, rather than a grain salad. This one of Dorie’s is definitely cauliflower-based– the cauliflower this time standing in for bulgur– but there’s room to mess around with ratios, mix-ins and seasonings if you’d like. I stuck pretty much to Dorie’s suggestion of chickpeas, raisins, almonds, mint and parsley mixed into grated cauliflower and tossed up in a lemony dressing. I made a nice big bowl of the stuff, and it was a good lunch for a couple of days.
Dorie recommends tasting the salad after it’s assembled to adjust the seasoning and then letting the salad sit for an hour or more before plating it up. I tasted mine yet again after it rested, as I find I usually like a little fresh lemon squeeze and olive oil drizzle right before serving.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see what we all thought.
Everyday Dorie: Stuffed Cabbage
January 14, 2022 at 12:01 am | Posted in breakfast things, cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things, veggies | 2 CommentsTags: everyday dorie, savory, vegetables
Stuffed Cabbage is a recipe that might be more appropriate for a book called All Day Dorie than Everyday Dorie. Never mind the three hours of cooking time (hands-off, in the oven, no big deal), I think I probably spent close to two hours assembling the dish. No joke, I had to take a coffee break in the middle of it. But that’s ok– I did it on a cold, grey weekend day when I didn’t want to leave the house and was up for a kitchen project.
I’d never made stuffed cabbage rolls before. I don’t eat ground beef or pork sausage, so I swapped these filling meats for ground chicken and turkey sausage. I couldn’t see how I could successfully get the cabbage leaves off the head in one untattered piece without blanching the whole head, so I just did that, rather than blanch the individual leaves as Dorie instructs. It was a process of removing a few leaves at a time and re-dipping the head in water to easily peel off the next layer, and I do have some leftover blanched cabbage still on the head, but I’ll use that in a soup or make okonomiyaki with it this week. I was able to fill and roll the leaves pretty easily and I skipped the step of securing them each with a toothpick. They were fine.
For the tomato sauce, I didn’t pay attention (i.e., I totally didn’t tread the instructions first) to the fact that the ingredients were supposed to go into the Dutch oven in layers along with the assembled rolls. Instead, everything for the sauce went into the pot at once and I snuggled all the rolls down into the mix. I was kind of irritated with myself, but figured that the cook time was so long that all would be fine. And it was! These are a delicious winter dinner (or a few dinners–even a half-batch was a big batch). I didn’t really know what to serve the cabbage rolls with, as they’re kind of complete on their own, with a meat and rice filling, veggies and a sauce. I just went with a little cucumber and sour cream salad and sprinkled some crispy fried onions on top. I also meant to sprinkle the rolls with parsley, but after all that time putting them together, I completely forgot.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.
Everyday Dorie: Spatchcocked Chicken
December 24, 2021 at 3:09 pm | Posted in cook the book fridays, everyday dorie, groups, other savory, savory things | 1 CommentTags: chicken, everyday dorie, savory
It’s been a while since I’ve cooked a whole bird, but this Spatchcocked Chicken was a good excuse to haul out the roasting pan. Spatchcocking is a technique that involves cutting out the chicken’s backbone and flattening down the breastbone a bit so it roasts more evenly and quickly. I’m not the most nimble butcher, but it’s not really too gruesome a task (I used heavy kitchen shears to get the job done), and you can save that backbone to add to your future stockpot. Dorie had us rub up the chicken with butter and Middle Eastern spices (although you can take the flavorings whichever way you choose) and add some veggies to the pan before it all went in the oven. It came out pretty seductively bronzed and moist, and was a good reminder to make a roast chicken dinner more often.
For the recipe, see Everyday Dorie by Dorie Greenspan, and head over to Cook the Book Fridays to see how the group liked this one.
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