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Roasted Artichokes (Better than Steamed and Easier than You Think!)

16 Apr

I was always intimidated by preparing artichokes…it seemed like quite a task to get anything edible from this armadillo of a vegetable. But when a recent manager’s special at the local supermarket had eight of them for $1.99, I figured it was a sign that it was time to try.

It's okay to crowd them into the baking dishArtichokes (Cynara scolymus) are thistles, but very delicious thistles. Large globe ones come from the central stem, while babies come from the sides.

I love the way you eat them when steamed or roasted whole…you remove each leaf and hold the pointy end while dragging our teeth on the stem end to get the flesh off. It’s like a delicious secret that you have to tease out with your hands and teeth. And then you are left with the center which is creamy and nutty and entirely delicious.

Pedro gets on the chop

Pedro gets on the chop

Although like many “manager’s specials” these particular artichokes were not at their bright and tight best, they had nice smooth green leaves – if they were a bit separated from the core, well at $1.99 I wasn’t going to be fussed. This was an experiment in technique, after all, so if they weren’t artichokes at their peak, it didn’t matter so much. And the following technique brought out the best in them. Continue reading →

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Easy Steamed Clams for Me – Easy Linguine with Clam Sauce for the Kid

13 Apr

The problem:  I want steamed clams. My dad wants steamed clams. My son won’t eat them. Nor will my mom. I don’t want to cook two meals, because as much as I like to cook, this is not a bloody restaurant.

Cherrystones

Cherrystones

The solution: Both my son and my mom will eat pasta with seafood flavor. So I steam the clams in a nice cooking liquid, remove the offending shells and shellfish for me and my dad, then plump up the liquid into a delicious pasta sauce for the other two.

yum, clams

yum, clams

And so, we had a lovely casual dinner on the deck, with the remainder of the bottle of white wine, everyone enjoying the arrival of spring (and celebrating the absence of the mosquitoes that have been effing up our summer nights for the last few years).

linguine and clams

linguine and clams (these clams were removed immediately after the picture and eaten by me. The pasta went to the kid.

The whole operation takes only as long as it takes to cook up the pasta. So go for it! Click on for recipe

 

cheese for the kid

cheese for the kid

Steamed clams and BONUS linguine with white wine, butter and clam sauce

½ lb linguine (this sauce will stretch for a pound of pasta – 4 servings – if you are extra generous with all ingredients)

1 Tbs unsalted butter

1 Tbs extra virgin olive oil

1-2 tsp garlic, chopped fine

½ Cup dry white wine

A dozen cherrystone clams in their shells, scrubbed

1 tsp or so lemon juice

6.5 oz can chopped clams

Parmigiano Reggiano for grating

Boil pasta according to package directions. Reserve ¼ Cup of pasta water before draining.

Melt butter in a large saucepan at medium high. When foaming subsides, add olive oil and garlic and cook for another minute or so. Add wine and lemon and bring to a boil.

Add clams in their shells and cover. Cook at medium high until the clams open and remove each one with tongs as it opens. I advise checking after about three minutes, and then uncovering every minute or so after that, to move cooked clams out of the pot as quickly as possible, because they get chewy if overcooked. Set clams aside/start eating them with a glass of that nice dry white wine you opened to cook them.

To the remaining clam cooking liquid, add the can of clams, with juices. Cook at medium high for 1-2 minutes, then add drained pasta, and, if necessary, some of the reserved pasta water. Taste for salt, add pepper if desired and serve with grated cheese.

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You Need No-Knead Bread Dough in Your Fridge!

9 Apr

500th POST!!!! 500th POST!!!! Thanks to all of you for following, commenting, liking, and cooking with Hot, Cheap & Easy these past few years. I appreciate your support and love having your company on this food and life journey…Don”t forget to sign up for email alerts if you haven’t already! xoxoxo

As we were learning about yeast for my first-grader’s Science Fair Project, it was obvious that blowing up balloons with anaerobic respiration, while cool, was not enough to fully demonstrate the wonders of this delightful fungus.

The best way to appreciate how useful and all around terrific these little creatures are is to tear into a loaf of steaming, fresh-from-the-oven, homemade bread. Yeast lifts flour from its one-dimensional powder form into the sublime airy, nutty, soft, comforting cloud of tasty goodness that is bread. Add a slab of good butter, and you know that manna from heaven must’ve been a yeast bread.

Basic ingredients

Basic ingredients

The problem is, bread is a pain in the ass to make. You knead, you wait, you punch down. You do it again. Or you have a standing mixer with the right paddles and let the machine do much of the work. And you still have to wait.

Sticky dough

Sticky dough

I don’t have a standing mixer. I don’t have the space for it. I don’t have the money for it. I don’t have the time to read all the reviews to find the best standing mixer with the best ratings and the best price that I anyway have no room for and no money for…so usually I don’t make bread. This is why bakeries exist.

After a bit more than an hour

After a bit more than an hour

But a bit of digging around the internet found me a fabulous recipe on Jezebel called Foolproof Refrigerator Bread by Jenna Sauers. It required no kneading, no standing mixer, and very little waiting and one batch is enough for three loaves that you can make one at a time when you get the urge. SOLD!

Slash the top for good looks

Slash the top for good looks

Here is our version, which doesn’t really stray much from the original. The measurements and instructions are easy enough for a little kid to follow. We shamelessly took a fresh loaf to the Science Fair and offered still-warm slices to the judges and voila! Leandro won the Creativity Prize (the K-4 category was otherwise non-juried except for a few special recognitions). Talk about fostering a sense of pride and joy in a little boy who loves science and food.

No sense skimping on the butter.

No sense skimping on the butter.

And ever since we have been keeping dough on hand to pop in the oven when we need a snack. It’s done in a half-hour….what could be better for a dinner side or something to wow impromptu guests? Continue reading to get the ever-so-simple recipe. Continue reading →

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Home-Made Hummus: Easy, Delicious, and Versatile

29 Mar

I haven’t made my own hummus in a while; laziness, really. I used to make it regularly and it was a terrific go-to for quick lunches as well as unexpected guests. But there are quite a few on the market that I like well enough to forget how much better it can be when you make it yourself.

As easy as pushing a button.

As easy as pushing a button.

But I had several cups of chick peas that I had soaked and needed to do something with.

I considered making falafel, but what I really need in my fridge right now is something to help me get through Lent with no cheese. (I gave it up for this pre-Easter period of mindfulness and have found it somewhat trying not to be able to just reach for a slice of something salty, creamy and filling whenever I am feeling peckish. While on a spiritual plane it is reminding me to be grateful for all the abundance that is in my life, I am also realizing how much of my son’s dinners and leftovers I have been snacking on. I had no idea how routine it has become for me to nibble on his cheesy pastas or melted cheese tortilla chips while making food or washing up. Wow.)

Ready to be stored in the fridge

Ready to be stored in the fridge

Continue reading →

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Cucumber Sandwiches (Wilde Party Essential)

27 Mar

There is nothing that says English high tea quite like cucumber sandwiches. They call to mind white lace tablecloths, starched just so; the fine china; someone’s Aunts Augusta and Elizabeth; itchy wool socks, the smell of wet dogs just come in from a run in the garden, that sort of thing.

But when you are reading Oscar Wilde’s  The Importance of Being Earnest with friends, two things become apparent.

Watch them disappear

Watch them disappear

One is that it is not the prissy or genteel aunts who are nibbling delicately on the the cucumber sandwiches…no, no. they never get a chance. In this play of love and marriage and double entendres, it is the naughty, insouciant young gentlemen who can’t keep their hands off those cucumber sandwiches and who eat them up before anyone else has a chance. If you choose to look into this further, you might make some connections between the rigidity of social norms of the times and the lust for life that busts out around the edges of it all. Or you might not.

The second thing that becomes apparent is that cucumber sandwiches are fantastic. This is the recipe: Good white sandwich bread from a bakery (thanks to David and Citarella), crusts removed (thanks to Ashley), good salted butter (Irish, in this case), and thinly sliced English hothouse cucumbers (unpeeled, by executive decision; if they’d been the thick-peeled American ones, the peels would have had to come off), topped with a sprinkle of sea salt before putting the top slice of bread on, and there you have them.

“Why are these so good?” Lori kept asking me. “What is it?”

And there really isn’t a particular answer to that except that every one of the ingredients was exactly right. But they are really, really good, and I can see plates of these disappearing off the picnic platters this summer at my house.

Why are they so good? Because they are.

Why are they so good? Because they are.

For more on throwing a play-reading party, click here.

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When Food Allergies Happen to Food People (Gluten-free champiñones al ajillo)

25 Mar

They sidle up to you in the hallway at work when no one else is around. They approach you with the hangdog expression of a sinner headed to the confessional for the same reason they went last week. Or they send you a hesitant text, dangling uncertainly between apologetic and grief-stricken, unable to tell you directly in person. They are embarrassed, bewildered, ashamed.

They are….Foodies with Allergies and they are coming to your house for a dinner party!

This happened to me during the planning of that play-reading party you’ve been hearing a lot about in my recent posts.

Let me clarify. The food allergies didn’t happen to me, the guests with food allergies did (see how quickly I distance my own foodie self from any suggestion of an allergy?). Two friends, food-lovers both, came to me with their tales of woe. One, (who is already vegetarian, for the love of God) has celiac disease, which means her small intestines can’t tolerate gluten – found in wheat, rye and barley. The other is getting tested for possible lactose-intolerance.

Gluten-free tapas...

Gluten-free tapas…

Now it does seem like food sensitivities and intolerances and flat-out allergies are on the rise in our population. The whole peanut thing has taken over many schools, which have nut-free areas. Gluten-free has been the latest way for companies to flog their products as ostensibly healthier because it has less of something.

Continue reading →

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Stilton and Toasted Walnut Balls (more Wilde party recipes)

23 Mar

Stilton is to England as Gorgonzola is to Italy, as Roquefort is to France, as Danish Blue is to …oh come on, must I?

As such, this blue cheese was the perfect choice for an Anglo-Irish themed evening during which we were reading Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest and drinking Pimm’s and eating beef stew and shepherd’s pie and ushering in St. Patrick’s Day. If it was a bit of a mix of cultural culinary references…well that’s okay by me! I’m American; we screw this stuff up all the time. Just look at the eight page menus at a “Greek diner” and tell me how that makes any sense whatsoever.

A view of the welcome appetizer table. Hot food was later set out in the kitchen for self-service...

A view of the welcome appetizer table. Hot food was later set out in the kitchen for self-service…

So my friend David, who is actually quite famous for his good taste, and who kindly offered to help with the planning and preparations, found the following recipe for Stilton and Toasted Walnut Balls, originally from the BBC. I didn’t so much adapt it as make the instructions more specific to make it more user-friendly. I started it early in the morning and he finished it up a couple of hours before party time.

Rich (very rich, very, very rich) and crunchy and peppery, it has a terrific mix of things going on in every tiny bite. Twenty-six may not seem like much for a party of ten, but trust me, they are very satisfying and most people are not going to have more than two before looking for something more crisp and bracing to balance them.

Continue reading →

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Traditional Irish Shepherd’s Pie with Lamb

18 Mar

So about this Anglo-Irish party.

I have long, long, loooong wanted to stage a dramatic reading of a play at someone’s home. You know, just get copies of a play for everyone, assign roles and read it. In my mind’s eye, it would be a wine-sodden affair (to ease stage fright and add to the hilarity), and there would be good food between the acts to keep the energy going (and keep the wine from creating utter chaos). I mean, I like a regular old dinner party as much as anyone, but since I can’t seem to leave well enough alone, I thought this would be a worthy way to imbibe in the name of Art.

A view of the early buffet items

A view of the early buffet items

This would, however, require a lot more space than I have in my little apartment. So I mentioned it to likely friends over the years, and everyone thought it would be a great thing indeed. A few even laid claim to having thought up the idea themselves (which I have most vociferously not allowed to happen…you know who you are and you are never-ever-ever going to get away with it).

Before the mashed potato topping

Before the mashed potato topping

But no one offered to have it at theirs.

Finally, I did what all of us high achievers must do when we have a great idea. I did it myself.

I set a date, commandeered my parents’ kitchen and living room in their absence (which in my teenage years would have been called having a party when your parents are away and sort of hoping it doesn’t go all Risky Business on you), invited a few friends, made an executive decision on the play (The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Play for Serious People by Oscar Wilde). I ordered multiple copies from the local library. Then I started menu planning.

This is where we wonder whether we've poured ourselves enough wine to last through Act One. We ended up bringing the bottles along...just in case

This is where we wonder whether we’ve poured ourselves enough wine to last through Act One. We ended up bringing the bottles along…just in case

Continue reading →

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The Best Ever Slow Cooker Beef Stew

16 Mar

I’ll tell you more about the party I made this large amount of Beef Stew for, but I can’t tell you right now, because I am still recovering from the fun and therefore just going to do a workmanlike job on this post…can’t manage much more…

Brown those veggies...I don't even like celery, but this worked beautifully!

Brown those veggies…I don’t even like celery, but this worked beautifully!

(…let me tell you that getting the little man to soccer at 9 a.m. this morning was a testament to a mother’s love. Actually two mothers’ and one dad’s love, as right there beside me this morning were two of last night’s guests cheering on their kid in the freezing cold! We came home and ate this for leftovers!) 

Don't skip the browning of meat and veggies...it really draws out sweetness and adds complexity

Don’t skip the browning of meat and veggies…it really draws out sweetness and adds complexity

But for now, all you need to know about the party is that the theme was Anglo-Irish (Think St. Patty’s Day meets Oscar Wilde), the good cheer was flowing, and this beef stew – tender, rich, deep, complex, and hearty – provided much-needed ballast for a full sail kind of night! Do it, do it, do it!

2014-03-15 beef stew

Slow Cooker Beef Stew (feeds a crowd)

1-2 Tbs olive oil

2.5 – 3 lbs stewing beef, cubed

1-2 Tbs olive oil

2 Cups Vidalia onion, minced

1 Cup carrots, peeled and chopped to 1/4 “ chunks

½ Cup celery

1 Tbs or more of minced garlic

2 Cups potatoes, peeled and chunked

¼-1/2 Cup dry red wine

2 Tbs Worcestershire sauce

Pinch hot red pepper flakes

2 generous Tbs tomato paste

2 Cups low-sodium or homemade beef broth

1 bay leaf

¼ Cup white flour

½ tsp salt

Heat 1 Tbs of oil in a skillet to fairly high and brown the meat quickly in batches and turning often. The idea is to create some complexity, not to cook the meat, so work quickly and don’t be too much of a perfectionist. Add oil as needed, and put meat in slow cooker.

In the same skillet, brown onions, cooking for a minute on high then lowering heat to medium. Add carrots, celery and garlic and cook, stirring, until softened and golden. Add potatoes and cook another minute. Add to slow cooker.

In the same skillet, add a splash of red wine, Worcestershire sauce, pepper flakes and tomato paste. Stir to loosen browned bits in the skillet, then pour over ingredients in crockpot. Add broth and bay leaf, sprinkle with flour and salt, turn to combine everything. Cover and cook on low for 12 hours (or 4-6 hours on high). You’ll want plenty of bread for mopping up the gorgeous sauce.

The Glorious Vegetables of Italy: Author Domenica Marchetti pays us a visit PLUS Winter Cauliflower Salad Recipe

8 Mar

Everyone should live in Italy for at least a little while. I lived there for a couple of years in my twenties and it was transformative for all those reasons you might expect: fresh seasonal food, friendly people, beautiful surroundings. It was transformative for other reasons as well, but let’s stick to food.

The Glorious Vegetables of Italy!

The Glorious Vegetables of Italy!

My first job there was picking grapes and apples in the Trentino part of Trentino-Alto Adige, a semi-autonomous region just south of Innsbruck, Austria, at the foot of the Italian Alps, within sight of the Dolomites…crispy cold at 7 a.m., warming Schiava dry rosé wine and ham and cheese panini at 9 a.m. The church bells echoing around the valley at noon made us drop everything and run for la pasta asciutta laborers’ lunch with more schiava and café corretto (“corrected” with sambuca or grappa)…singing opera in the trees…big Sunday family meals, ridiculously everything you might expect, including the hard work seven days a week all season.

One of the things that astonished me was how differently they treated vegetables – not just as an overcooked side to the more important meat dish — but with respect and zest and creativity. They were complex flavor and texture experiences, enhanced by often being straight from the farm. Who knew? I certainly didn’t.

Steam basket. We steamed first and did a little more chopping later to create more nooks and crannies for the other bits to cling to.

Steam basket. We steamed first and did a little more chopping later to create more nooks and crannies for the other bits to cling to.

I reluctantly close the window on that memory (before I kick myself for the many things I didn’t learn when I was there, when I should remain rapturous about the things I did and before I bore the hell out of you with my nostalgic ramblings) and turn to the present.

Domenica Marchetti, a classmate of mine from Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, is genetically predisposed to channel those Italian flavors I remember. Her mother is from Abruzzo and her father from an Italian-Rhode Island family and she spent her summers in Italy in the embrace of a flurry of aunts and their kitchens. After several years of covering the gore and complications that reporters regularly cover and running home to spend all her free Domenica-time elbow deep in cookery books and pots and pans, she put due più due insieme and started writing about food instead.

I actually took mine to work and hid in my office so I didn't have to share...

I actually took mine to work and hid in my office so I didn’t have to share…this is before I got the cheese on.

Domenica’s latest cookbook (they now number five!) is The Glorious Vegetables of Italy and it is big and gorgeous and glorious indeed (In case you don’t believe me, it is a New York Times Notable Cookbook).

You might need one for the coffee table and another to dog-ear and stain and love up in the kitchen, because the images, by Sang An are delicious and you won’t want to get them messed up when you cook! My Sunday cooking companion, Marianne (herself no slouch in the Italian kitchen) immediately decided we had to make the Winter Cauliflower Salad. And we did and it was so robust and delicious and just the perfect way to end this frigid winter to end all winters.

Domenica was very happy to hear that we started our exploration of her book with cauliflower, such an unassuming vegetable, and before I give you the recipe (which is adapted…I just didn’t have everything available and anyway, for the original — especially notable for the slow-roasted tomato recipe which you won’t find here — you need to get her book!), she wanted you to know why this is one of her favorites and emailed this message just for you: Continue reading →

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