combustication

This is a very easy recipe to put together if you have some overripe bananas in the kitchen. I was trying to cut the fat down from my usual banana bread recipe that I adopted from the Better Homes and Garden cookbook circa 1999 and managed to only use 1/4 cup of vegetable oil, with some very moist and tasty results. I made one large loaf and two mini loaves for my neighbors and the initial report is that this is a damn fine banana bread.

Sunday Banana Bread

Ingredients:

3 overly ripe bananas
1 egg
1 egg white
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup yogurt
1/4 cup cooking oil
1/2 cup applesauce
2 tsp. vanilla extract
1 tsp baking soda
1 3/4 cup flour
1/2 cup oats (not instant)

To Do:

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and flour a loaf pan. Beat the eggs and add the sugars, yogurt, oil and applesauce. Smush the bananas and mix with the wet ingredients and add vanilla. Sift the flour and baking soda together in a separate bowl and add slowly add to the wet mixture. mixing just a bit - over mixing makes the bread rubbery. Add oats and mix till incorporated.

Bake for about an hour - until the loaf is a golden brown. Test the center with a skewer to make sure it’s done. Let cool for 10 minutes in pan and then pop the bread out and cool completely on a baking rack.

After browsing through Mark Bittman’s “How to Cook Everything” at a friends apartment while job hunting in September, I fell in love with the man. Oh, I’ve been a fan of the Minimalist NYT’s column, but How to Cook Everything was thick tome full of delicious, yet easy, sounding recipes. Bittman recently came out with “How to Cook Everything Vegetarian” and after much deliberation (do I really need another cookbook), I bought it and I am really glad. The book is full of clever tips, excellent flavor combinations and a great section on legumes and grains. Last night I made potstickers using Bittman’s dumpling dough recipe and my own filling and they were fantastic. I also made the Green Tea Broth with Udon Noodles recipe and really enjoyed the interesting flavor combo of green tea and starchy noodles. Very simple, very easy and very very good. I highly recommend giving this one a shot.

Green Tea Broth with Udon Noodles (adopted from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian)

Ingredients:
water
1/4 cup green tea leaves (I used Japanese Sencha Green Tea - very hearty flavor)
8 oz. udon noodles
salt
freshly ground pepper
mirin, soy sauce or sugar (to taste)

To Do
Put 7 cups of water in a large pot and bring to a rolling boil. Let sit for a few minutes and then add 1/4 cup of the green tea leaves. Let steep for 5-10 minutes, until you have a golden and fragrant (broth) (I did it for about 12 minutes) and then strain the tea, throwing away the leaves. Bring to a rolling boil and throw in a couple of pinches of salt. Add the udon noodles and bring to a boil, then add 2 cups cold water and bring to a boil again. Cover and simmer until noodles are done, about 7-8 minutes. Grind some pepper, taste for salt and add the mirin, sugar or soy sauce if you want.

Bittman then goes on with a list of things you can add to the soup (just one example of how versatile this book is). I added some chopped up local tofu and scallions to the soup during the last 2 minutes of simmering and a couple of dashes of tamari and then a squirt of red chili paste for heat. Once again, a very simple and delicious recipe.

I don’t know where the idea of grilling pizza came from. I remember reading about it a few years ago and giving it a shot and it being completely amazing. Grilled pizza has a delicious and slightly charred bottom and a great (slight) charcoal taste. If you like pizza and BBQing, this is the summer recipe you must try. The above pizza was made during some Memorial Day shenanigans - I think we made six pizzas or something with various toppings. Who needs burgers?

Grilled Pizza

Ingredients:

Pizza dough (make your own, use store bought, or buy from a pizzeria – they will be happy to sell some to you and it’s super-fresh)
Olive oil
Mozzarella (or cheese of your choice)
Tomato sauce (use your own or get a small can of tomato sauce for pizza – it’s a little thicker than usual)
Toppings (basil, rosemary, olives, sautéed mushrooms, olives, whatever)

To Do:

First, heat up your BBQ. You can use a gas grill or charcoal – I prefer charcoal, but use what you’ve got.

In the meantime, stretch out the pizza dough to pie size of your choice (don’t make it bigger than your grill!) and form a crust. If you’re using store/pizzeria-bought dough, divide the dough in two and shape one pizza. Put the remaining dough under a damp towel until ready to use.

Dust the underside of a cookiesheet with flour and place the pie on top. Brush the top of the pie with olive oil and turn the cookiesheet over the BBQ (so that the olive oil crust-y side is facedown on the grill). Brush the top of the pie with more olive oil and using a metal spatula flip the pizza. Now you should have the crust-side facing up, begging for toppings.

This is the fun part! Ladle on some sauce and spread it around like a pro. Add some cheese. Put the toppings on. IMPORTANT!!! DO NOT OVERLOAD YOUR PIE! It will be tough to get off the grill and the dough may tear leaving you with a cheesy mess. Remember, you have another ball of dough waiting to be used, so don’t overdo it. Cover your grill with the lid and just chill for a few seconds. Have a sip of beer or lemonade. Open lid and look at your pizza. Is this cheese all melty? Does it look delicious? If so, take it off the grill and serve; if not, put the lid back on and cook for a few minutes or keep the lid off to keep an eye on it. This is BBQing, not rocket science.

Serve your pizza to amazed guests. You can BBQ anything!

Some combinations to try:
- Cheddar cheese, soy crumbles (or meat) and salsa for a Mexican-style pizza
- Olive oil, goat cheese and basil for a fresh pizza
- Mozzarella, tomato sauce, pineapple (and ham) for Hawaiian pizza
- Anything you ever wanted to get on a pizza but were to afraid to ask for

It’s been too hot in NYC to cook or bake really. That’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it - not so fast. There are some things that I’ve made that should have been posted a while ago, but remember, it’s not the heat, it’s the humidity…or something.

I present to you the Watermelon Boozer. Perfect for sipping on a terribly moist day. You can even omit the booze, but it’s not as fun.

Watermelon Boozer

Ingredients:

2 cups chopped up seedless watermelon that’s been in the fridge a few hours
6 ice cubes
as much vodka as you can handle

To Do:

Put the ice cubes in a blender or food processor and blend a bit.

Add the watermelon and vodka and keep blending until you get a nice slushy consistency. Add more ice, watermelon or vodka as needs be.

This is not a crazy recipe and will serve two people - or one very hot person.

Fiddleheads are not people obsessed with fiddles, although it could happen. Fiddleheads are young fern leaves of the ostrich fern. How they got fiddleheads from ostrich is beyond me (ah, it refers to how the leaves look like the end of a fiddle), but I’ve been reading about them on many a food blog and got curious. Why are they so special? For starters, they are a very season-specific item, which gets foodies all in a twitter. They’re also super-expensive, which is funny because you can apparently just pick them from the side of the road in Maine (see Millwhistle for some Maine/Brooklyn sassiness). The Coop had them for about $4 a pound, which is a lot cheaper than $8+/lb (at the farmer’s market too). Another seasonal and very expensive item is ramps. Ramps are a member of the leek and onion family and are another foodstuff I’ve been hearing a lot about. The Coop also had them at a much more reasonable price then elsewhere, so I got some. Not a lot (because they were almost all out), but some, and they are awesome.

Cleaning the fiddleheads well can be a pain in the butt, but it’s not as bad as some people make out.

Once clean, the fiddleheads and ramps are a snap to prepare – just sauté them in a bit of olive oil and butter and a dash of salt. I made a very light sauce to go with them for dinner and the whole meal was pretty great. The ramps were really flavorful – a mix between onion and garlic and a little bit of bitter greens all at once. The fiddleheads were okay. They tasted like the ends of asparagus and looked really cool, but I wouldn’t pay a gazillion dollars for them.

Fiddleheads, Ramps and Onions – oh my!

Ingredients:

1/2lb fiddleheads
as many ramps you can get your hands on
½ red onion, very finely chopped
olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
salt
pepper
2 tablespoons plain yogurt
2 tablespoons water
½ tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon tahini
juice of 1 lemon
brown rice or couscous or some nice grain
cooked lentils (optional)

To Do:
Start off by boiling a large pot of water. Clean the fiddleheads by trimming the ends off close to the coil and placing them in a large bowl of cold water. Swish ‘em around and rub off any brown bits. Drain and repeat the swishing and rubbing. Drain again and place in the boiling water for 10 minutes – this is to guarantee against any harmful bacteria. Drain and plunge into ice-cold water to shock them. Set aside.

Trim the ends of the ramps and take off and leaves that are inedible. Roughly chop the leaves, but keep the bulbs intact. Sauté ramps with a bit of olive oil and salt. Place them on a plate and keep any oil in the pan. Add some butter and then sauté the red onion on low heat until it caramelizes. Throw in the fiddleheads and sauté with the onions for about 5 minutes on medium heat.

Make the sauce by whisking the yogurt, water, tahini, lemon juice and some salt and pepper to taste. The sauce should be on the thin side, so add more water if necessary.

Assemble a plate by placing brown rice (or other grain) on the bottom. Place lentils on top of the rice (did this for protein, but you don’t need them) and then add the ramps on top with the fiddlehead mixture. Drizzle with sauce and serve.

Israeli couscous may be the perfect way to punch up a typical pasta salad for the summertime. Also known as pearl couscous, this couscous is slightly larger than you might be familiar with and tastes more like pasta - think orzo.

You can cook it quickly in some boiling water like a pasta (only leave it in for a few minutes, you want it al dente), steam it like traditional couscous or use it in a risotto recipe. The recipe for a quick and summery recipe below is pretty easy and delicious, but try experimenting with different vegetables or nuts or just substitute Israeli couscous in your usual pasta salad.

Israeli Couscous w/Caramelized Onions, Eggplant and Feta

Ingredients:

1 cup Israeli Couscous
olive oil
1 Vidalia onion, sliced into slivers
2 cloves garlic
juice of one lemon
1 tablespoon of tahini
5 baby eggplants (3-4″ in diameter) or 1 large eggplant, chopped
2 sprigs of mint, leaves cleaned and chopped
1/2 cup feta cheese, crumbled
salt and pepper to taste

To Do:

Boil a pot of water and place couscous in the water with a pinch of salt. Cook until couscous is al dente (3-5 minutes). Drain couscous and rinse with cold water. Set aside.

Heat up the olive oil and sauté the onions in a small pan. The trick to getting them caramelized is keep cooking the onions over a very low heat so its sugars are released. Stir them a bit every once in a while and keep an eye on them while you move on to the eggplant.

In a large frying pan, heat up a splash of olive oil and then add the garlic. Lower the heat to medium and add eggplant and cook until it gets a bit crispy. Set aside.

Once the onions and eggplant are done, add them to the couscous in a large bowl. Whisk up the lemon juice, tahini, some salt and pepper to taste and a tablespoon of olive olive oil. Pour over the couscous, onion and eggplant mixture and mix. Add the mint and feta and mix it up some more. Serve warm or cold.

Homemade granola is really freakin good. I’ve become a bit obsessed with it after reading a Minimalist article in the NYT’s in January, but never thought to take a picture or even describe the recipe because it’s really just too easy. As Mark Bittman points out “there are two good reasons for making your own granola. One: it tastes better. Two: it contains better ingredients.” Couldn’t have said it better myself. I used his recipe as a starting off point, but as the article goes on to say, you can do whatever you want. I really like dried cranberries. Bittman really likes dried coconut. I kept it out of this recipe, but if you want to use the coconut, add it in with the nuts. You can make a great tropical-type granola with some coconut, crushed Brazilian nuts and dried pineapple and papaya. Yum. The Bittman recipe is a Times Select article, so you’ll have to be a member of the Gray Lady in order to access it, but if you just want to make granola…

Homemade Granola or Tina’s Take on Bittman

Ingredients

5 cups rolled oats
1/2 to 1 cup nuts and seeds of your choice (this granola was made with cashews and pecans)
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon, or to taste
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Dash salt
1/2 to 1 cup maple syrup
½ tablespoon of walnut oil or other neutral oil
½ cup raisins (you can use pretty much any type of dried fruit)
½ cup dried cranberries

To Do

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cover a large sheet pan with tinfoil or parchment paper. In a large bowl, combine oats, nuts and seeds, cinnamon, vanilla, salt, oil and maple syrup.

Place mixture on the baking sheet and bake for 20 minutes, stirring and flipping the granola around a bit. Turn the heat down to 275F and bake longer, until the granola browns evenly. If things are looking to crispy or smelling a little burned, turn down the heat of the oven a bit more. I really like my granola crunchy, so after a while I turn the oven to about 250 or so and just keep an eye on it.

Remove pan from oven and add raisins or cranberries. Let it cool to room temperature and then transfer to a sealed container and store in refrigerator. This will keep for a while, but you’ll probably eat it all. I suggest using it to top yogurt or ice cream or just eating it plain with some (vanilla) soy milk or regular milk and berries.

p.s. The new Combustication header is courtesy of the Farm in Mercersburg, PA. Lovely bunch of a grass, no?

Gather some friends for a weekend at a farmhouse and you get good times, fire, lots of booze and tons of food. A big star was this chocolate cake/brownie concoction that we had for dessert on Saturday night with some vanilla icecream. Have you ever had whipping cream not whip? We went through two containers of heavy whipping cream that was just not feeling it. I think the chocolate saved the dessert, but the (non)whipping cream was just baffling. The recipe for the cake below is from Saveur and I didn’t change a thing. OK, I didn’t have super high quality chocolate or butter, but the thing was still amazing. When searching for “brownie” on Saveur a recipe popped up with this description: “bearing a strong resemblance to a rich, dense, gooey brownie, this dessert takes the cake.” SOLD! A very unfussy and delicious recipe, I highly recommend it as an elegant alternative to brownies.

Fire! Fire! Fire!

Make Yr Own Bloody Mary

The farmhouse was also filled with ladybugs - lucky, right?

Marie José’s Chocolate Cake

Ingredients:
14 1/2 tbsp. European-style high-butterfat butter (I used regular salted butter)
3 tbsp. flour
7 oz. quality bittersweet chocolate, chopped into small
pieces (I used bittersweet baker’s chocolate squares)
3/4 cup sugar
5 eggs, at room temperature, separated

To Do

Preheat oven to 350°. Grease a 9″ glass pie dish with 1/2 tbsp. of the butter, dust with 1 tbsp. of the flour, tapping out excess, and set aside. Cut remaining butter into small pieces. Melt butter and chocolate together in a medium bowl set over a pot of simmering water over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon. Remove bowl from heat and stir in sugar, then the remaining flour, then the egg yolks, stirring until well combined. Set aside to let cool briefly.

Meanwhile, beat egg whites in a medium mixing bowl with an electric mixer on medium-high speed until soft peaks form, 2–3 minutes. Using a rubber spatula, fold one-third of the egg whites at a time into chocolate mixture. Pour batter into prepared pie pan.

Bake cake until a toothpick inserted in center comes out with some moist crumbs still attached (cake will rise and top will crack as it bakes, then collapse on itself as it cools), 30 minutes. Transfer cake to a wire rack to let cool briefly. Serve warm or at room temperature, with ice cream, if you like. [Ice cream is essential!]

More food pics from family Easter time (remember, I broke my camera, so pictures are at a premium)! This one is of a canolli cookie - a new favorite dessert. I got the recipe from Food & Wine and followed it to the letter when I made it for some friends a couple of months ago. This time, I didn’t have some of the ingredients for the cream and winged it, but they were still great. Making the round tubes of cookie can be annoying without a dowel, but I managed with a wine bottle and a wax-paper lined candlestick. I should just get a dowel already. You could also just make a sandwich with the cookies and cream. The results are still delicious. The vanilla and citrus of the cookie play off each other and the cookie is a delicate counterpart to the rich mascarpone cream filling. You could go crazy with add-ins to the cream. It might be fun to put some cocoa in the cookie dough and make a minty cream filling…project for the future!

I’m putting the recipe from Food & Wine pretty much straight. Note: The recipe is by Gina DePalma who is the pastry chef for Babbo.

My sister is very excited.

Cannoli Cookies with Coffee Cream (with Combustication modifications)

Ingredients

For the cookies:

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 cup sugar
2 large egg whites, at room temperature
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon finely grated orange zest
3/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Pinch of salt

For the cream:
1 cup mascarpone
1 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon pure coffee extract (I used a tablespoon of extra strength coffee I brewed up)

Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting

To Do
Preheat the oven to 375°. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Trace three 4-inch circles (as dark as you can) on each with a pencil; turn the parchment over.

In a medium bowl, using an electric mixer, beat the butter with 1/3 cup of the sugar until fluffy. Add the egg whites and beat until blended. Add the flour, orange zest, 1/4 teaspoon of the vanilla and the salt and beat until smooth.

Using a small offset spatula, evenly spread 1 tablespoon of the batter into each circle (try to make them pretty thin) Bake the cookies, 1 sheet at a time, for 8 to 9 minutes, or until lightly golden and browned around the edges (keep an eye on them and don’t let them get too brown). Immediately roll each cookie around a 1-inch-wide tube or dowel (or other tube-like thing - neck of a wine bottle works) and let cool until crisp. Carefully remove the cannoli from the tubes and transfer to a wire rack. Repeat twice with the remaining batter to make 18 cookies.

In a medium bowl, using an electric mixer, beat the mascarpone at medium speed with the cream, the coffee extract and the remaining 1/3 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon of vanilla until firm peaks form.

Fill a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch star tip (or a plastic bag with the tip cut off) with the coffee cream. Carefully pipe the mascarpone cream into both ends of the cookies, finishing with a small rosette at each end. Transfer the cannoli to a platter, dust them with confectioners’ sugar and serve.

The cookies can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days (you can also make the cookie tubes and store them before filling them with the cream). Yum!

Perfect for celebrating spring, this asparagus risotto is very simple and delicious. Try telling that to my little sister. This past Easter she wanted to help me and my brother cook up a meal for our folks, which turned into a dinner party for 8, and I had her stirring that thing for an hour. Tough love kids, tough love.

The risotto was gobbled up and enjoyed by everyone and Amanda gets many props for suffering over that hot stove to make one of the creamiest risottos I have ever tasted. Also, thanks to “Charla” who helped out with some stirring action.

According to the recipe that I got it from, the risotto is actually supposed to made with pearl barley (which cuts down on cooking time), but since it was Passover, I decided to use arborio rice so that Phil could eat it. I also changed the stock part, but am excited to try the original recipe sometime.

Risotto with Asparagus and Hazelnuts

Ingredients

2 pounds medium asparagus, trimmed
10 cups water
4 bouillon cubes or 2 tablespoons of “Better than Bouillon”
1 teaspoon salt, or to taste
2 medium onions, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
6 tablespoons olive oil
3 cups arborio rice
1 cup dry white wine
3 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons finely grated fresh lemon zest
2 ounces finely grated Parmigiano-Reggiano (about 1 cup) plus additional for serving
1 cup hazelnuts, toasted and coarsely chopped

To Do

Trim about an inch off the ends of the asparagus. Cut top third of each asparagus stalk into 1/2 inch rounds, reserving tips and slices together. Coarsely chop the remainder for stock making. Bring the water to boil and add 1/2 teaspoon in a pot, then add the roughly chopped asparagus and cook, uncovered, until very tender, 6 to 7 minutes. Transfer with a slotted spoon to a food processor and process with the garlic cloves and lemon zest. Set aside for later.

Add reserved asparagus tips and slices to boiling water and cook, uncovered, until crisp-tender, 2 to 3 minutes. Transfer with slotted spoon to a sieve and rinse asparagus under cold water to stop cooking. Drain well and save for later. Add the bouillon to the asparagus water and keep at a simmer next to a big pot that will house the risotto.

Sauté the onions in the olive oil until softened in the big risotto pot, 5 to 7 minutes and add a bit of the pepper. Add the arborio rice and stir until the grains are covered with the oil and onions. Add wine and boil, stirring, until liquid is absorbed, about 1 minute.

Now the fun part (I am sorry Amanda). Turn the heat down to a medium simmer on the risotto pot and add about a cup of the stock you just made and stir until the rice has absorbed all the water. Repeat until all of the stock has been used up. It could take a while. You don’t really have to stand over the pot stirring like a lunatic, but it will create strong arm muscles and a very creamy risotto.

Once all the liquid has been absorbed by the rice, stir in asparagus purée, asparagus-tip mixture, and enough additional water to thin to desired consistency and cook over moderate heat, stirring, until hot, about 1 minute. Stir in cheese, then season with salt and pepper. Plate and sprinkle with hazelnuts and serve parmesan on the side. Eat up!