spicy cashew curry

How do you like tofu?  Growing up, I knew of a lady who ate tofu.  And did yoga and milled her own flour.  Until a couple of years ago, I'd never had it much, because I love and eat meat and had no need for it.  Shortly after moving to Atlanta, though, I ate some that was hidden in a salad from Whole Foods.  It was an accident!  Remarkably, though, I liked it, and started eating it with some regularity, and did not, in fact, start wearing sandals with socks or chain myself to a tree.  

I enjoy the texture of extra firm tofu, and the ability to flavor it any which way you choose.  But you may not, and that's okay, because the beauty of this curry is that you can substitute things to personalize it to your taste.  I used tofu this time, but if you don't want to go there, use chicken, or shrimp.  The original recipe from 101 Cookbooks called for just green beans and cauliflower, but I also added snow peas, because I'm CRAZY LIKE THAT.  Carrots would be good too. 

I can't tell you how pleased I was that this turned out to be edible.  I generally stay away from cooking Asian food at home, because I just don't know what I'm doing at all, and figure curries and dumplings and tikkas are best left to experts.  So the fact that I actually made something that resembled Thai food at home, and in a decidedly cheaper and probably healthier way than the neighborhood noodle house, sort of blew my mind.  Feeling all crunchy granola with the tofu, I packed in the vegetables, and used light coconut milk I found at Trader Joe's.  We had this curry over rice on a very cold night last week, and with a liberal (borderline excessive) amount of spice, it was just the right thing.

Recipe below . . . 

mushroom marsala pasta with artichokes

My cooking has taken a turn for the methodical.  On any given day, I take the following steps:

1.  Go to Smitten Kitchen
2.  Literally salivate
3.  Cook the dish Deb posted
4.  Reap praise

It is fool-proof, unless you count the step where I print out the recipe and make an extensive and detailed grocery list and then leave them both sitting on my desk very nearly every. single. day.  But don't count that.

I wanted this pasta the minute I saw it.  I still have a thing going on with mushrooms, and I'm still on a neverending quest to eat enough carbs that I am rendered home-bound.   And, as it turned out, I could eat and eat and eat this particular dinner forever and ever without stopping.  For maybe 5 years, uninterrupted, I could cook and eat this delicious earthy masterpiece.  Would you come visit at my bedside?

This is probably the 20th recipe of Deb's that I've made and then immediately composed fevered emails to family and friends demanding that they do the same, in all caps.  The 20th thing that I've literally written home about.  How's that for endorsement?

Get the recipe here. 

Apple Pie with Cheddar Crust

 What's your favorite pie?  Mine is apple I think.  Although, I also really love chess pie.  And my mom makes this chocolate bourbon pecan pie that will make your knees weak.  Then there's pumpkin pie, which I didn't care for until recently but now wonder what in the world I was thinking.  And I quite like a peanut butter pie, the no-bake kind?  Oh -- COCONUT CREAM PIE!!!!!!  I also LOVE coconut cream pie, and lemon pie, and ooooooo, cherry pie in the summertime, and have you ever had a peach pie?  Oh, how I love pie in every way, shape, form, or flavor.  My favorite though -- favorite favorite -- is apple pie, with vanilla ice cream.

If you too like apple pie, could I get you to try this one next time?  Could I also get you to make your own crust?  I know, it's asking a lot, but wait until you have a free Saturday afternoon, pour yourself a glass of wine, and make a pie the way your grandma did.

The wine, you don't really need (my practice is to always recommend wine), because in reality homemade crust isn't as bad as it sounds.  If you're in possession of even the most basic food processor, you're golden.

And look, I'm not against semi-homemaking anything (Semi Homemade with Sandra Lee, though, is another story -- a bad one).  I believe Alton Brown when he says that there's no discernible difference between cake-mix cake and from-scratch cake because, well, he's a scientist.  And I do use pre-made pie crusts, especially the refrigerated roll-out kind, for something I'm going to take to the office on a Tuesday, or as the base of a cherry tart you might make on the fly and eat, in its entirety, by yourself, for dinner.  I've never done that, I'm just saying, it was would be convenient.

But for this pie, please, go on and make the cheddar crust.  The cheese, I like.  It's interesting and adds a little bit of savory to the already delicious sweet mix.  A homemade crust -- flaky, the result of tiny bits of unmixed butter -- does right by this pie.  And remember, wine is available by the gallon.

Recipe at MarthaStewart.com.

Pasta with Cauliflower

This is one of those recipes that was so surprisingly good that I want to share with as many people as I can, as soon as possible.  I say "surprisingly good" because, while cauliflower isn't usually offensive to anyone (heeeeeey brussel sprouts), it isn't exactly the shining star of the vegetable universe.   Furthermore, the pasta requires a good amount of anchovies, and it -- GASP -- doesn't call for the inclusion of any animal formerly walking this earth.  This alone is normally a deal breaker. 

Except when it isn't, because y'all:  trust me, this is awesome.

Just days ago, Greg was all "YUCK" over a pizza I ordered with anchovies, so obviously I didn't tell him about the fish until after I fed it to him, and even then I started talking quickly about umami (the supposed "fifth taste") created by just a tiny bit of anchovy (or MSG, if you have it and no one will sue you).  But he couldn't tell!  It really just adds that certain something, a salty savoriness bearing no resemblance at all to sea creatures, I promise.

If you've only had cauliflower boiled or sauteed or (no judgment) microwaved, you're really doing yourself and your vegetable a disservice.  Cauliflower wants to be caramelized, it wants to spend just a little bit of undisturbed time sizzling over or under a high flame, to develop a golden brown.  Only then does it show itself to be, not boring, but full of flavor.  This pasta lets it sing.

Recipe below

Cream of Mushroom Soup

Before last month you couldn't get me to eat mushrooms.

Because, check them out here.  Brown, limp, spongy, and -- worst of all -- slimy, like eating worms, and not the delicious Neon Sour Crawler type.

Last month, though, Greg took me for this incredibly special birthday dinner at Five and Ten in Athens, and the third course of our EXLUSIVE CHEF-DESIGNED ONLY-FOR-US SIX-COURSE BIRTHDAY MENU (that's right) was a mushroom risotto with chanterelles, shiitakes, and buttons, shaved parmesan and leek crema.  See?

It being an Incredibly Special Birthday Dinner, I had to at least try it, and lo and behold it turns out that I LOVE FANCY MUSHROOMS!  The fancy -- I guess that's the difference.  Maybe I just eat like a 5-year-old and the things that used to frighten me swimming around in glass jars in my mother's pantry are actually really, incredibly delicious in real life, especially when prepared by James Beard Award nominees.

The point is, I'm trying to get mushrooms in my belly as fast as possible now, vis-a-vis, in one instance, this cream of mushroom soup.  NOT Campbell's.  NOT to be used as a casserole base.  Although . . . can you imagine?  The recipe is from Balthazar in New York City (where I have dined, actually, having what I called at the time the "best meal and best dish and best single bite of my life," though later investigation would reveal that, while it was certainly an exceptional meal, I was possibly somewhat influenced by their equally exceptional wine) by way of the Smitten Kitchen.  It is a creamy, extravagant, flavorful soup, but not a hard one to make, freeze, and save for a little luxury at your desk lunch all week.

Recipe follows . . . 

More Scenes from Antico Pizza Napaletana

 

BYOB!

 

If you still haven't been to Antico, well, you are in serious danger of failing at life. 

Penne with Pumpkin, Sausage, and Spinach

AGAIN, with the gourds.

Yes, true, but you love it.  You want to eat pumpkin until your face turns orange and you are poisoned by vitamin A.  You want all things squash -- seeds, innards, jack-o-lanterns, carved-out decorative little bird houses -- and I am going to give it to you.  Well, not all things.  Birds ought not be encouraged.

Adult Supervision

Being an aspiring homesteader, I had to spend time this weekend doing some back-breaking from-scratch project, so because I knew you wanted the aforementioned pumpkin, on Sunday I put up pumpkin puree from a couple of obsolete jack-o-lanterns.  Let me tell you, though, it wasn't easy.  Cutting up pumpkins is hard.  As Greg noted while we struggled to carve the most basic design, butchering the thick rind of a slippery, wobbly gourd with a dull chef's knife is a rather interesting children's activity.  Indeed, cutting, roasting, and pureeing endless batches of leftover pumpkin took all my strength, and thus the rest of the homestead was left neglected and covered in seeds and orange pith.  I shan't do it again.  I shan't!

I shall, however, be doing this pasta again, with canned pumpkin puree.  I have a new go-to combination and it is this: sausage+pasta, or, on an even more basic and true level, pig+grain.  This time, with cinnamon and sage, some unnecessary but redeeming spinach, and pillows of grated parmesan, it was a surprising success.

 

  Recipe follows . . .