Eastern Market Debauchery: Sausage, Mussel and Squid Ink Fettucini

Fall is here! Summer air's soft edges are beginning to harden as winter approaches. Warty gourds and bags of waxy apples offer themselves to ogling Eastern Market go-ers. Young couples circle antiques. They quarrel over where one really could put that ostentatious secretary desk. Teenage girls cram toes into vintage pumps as they hand over eight crumpled, sweaty dollars from knock-off coach purses...and then there's me.

With exactly thirty eight minutes before the doors of Eastern Market closed I touched, sniffed, licked and scrutinized every piece of produce with the (obvious) goal of finding ingredients for THE ULTIMATE Sunday Night Meal. (Did I mention I still managed to find time to wolf down a crab cake sandwich with lemonade while on my quest...I know, I'm impressed too.)

I had called my dad earlier in the day and he told me he was making mussels for dinner. So I, as any good daughter would, of course, decided that I must make mussels as well. How many times have I cooked mussels? Good question. Answer: Zero. I don't think I've ever even had mussels outside of a restaurant let alone figured out poundage and how exactly one might clean/cook them. It turned out to be quite easy and surprisingly cheap, about $ 3.50 a pound for PEI mussels.

With the cornerstone to my meal established and inspiration coming from every market stall, I finally achieved ultimate Sunday night victory: Chorizo and andouille sausage, mussels, lump crab meat and squid ink fettucine served with homemade marinara sauce and shavings of pecorino romano cheese.

I'm not going to lie, I totally high-fived myself on the metro home. Once completed, I served the piping hot bowl of jet-black pasta with crusty french bread and roasted garlic cloves. It was definitely some of my best work.

Unlike normal posts however, a recipe for this indulgent Eastern Market creation will not follow. The reason for this is one of sad truth. The dish's deliciousness was so unparalleled I shall never attempt a dish of equal greatness ever again. Publishing the equation to its awesomeness would be much too painful for my soul. BUT...I do have a great tip if you find yourself with too much garlic on your hands...read on!

Roasted Garlic Buds with Salted Olive Oil:

1 whole garlic bulb
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt
pepper

Preheat oven to 350. Keep the husk on the garlic bulb and cut in half, parallel to counter. Place each half on a square of aluminum foil. Drizzle the combs of garlic with 1/2 tablespoons per half. Don't over think it, just put olive oil on them. Add salt and pepper to taste (again, don't over think it). Wrap each half by turning the corners of the foil up to the top of each garlic half. Place in oven for about 20 minutes. Garlic should be buttery soft when foil is opened. Place garlic halves on a plate and allow your guests to scoop out the sweet, garlicky cloves with each bite of bread. Divinity!

.0001 Second Hello Dolly/7 Layer Bars

The motivation behind the Hello Dolly was, well...the same motivation for most of my recipes...something was about to go bad and I had to do something FAST!

I had these delectable, crispy oatmeal chocolate chip cookies that I surprisingly couldn't eat fast enough. For fear of losing these sweet nuggets of pleasure, I employed my Cuisinart and made the ultimate eezey-peezey dessert bar.

I threw the cookies, about 1 cup of graham cracker crumbs (enough crumbs to cover the bottom of a small glass dish or spring-form pan), and two tablespoons of melted butter into the Cuisinart and pulsed until incorporated. (If you don't have a Cuisinart, don't freak out, either smash the cookies in a Ziploc by hand or simply don't use them at all and just gently mix graham crackers and butter until well mixed instead).

Pack mixture down in the pan. Sprinkle the surface with chopped walnuts (or hazelnuts, or almonds), then chocolate chips (and butterscotch or white chocolate chips), then shredded coconut. Finally, take a can of sweetened condensed milk and drizzle over the top of all the layers. DO NOT MIX.

Place in 350 degree oven for 20 minutes. The edges will be golden brown and the sweetened milk will seal all of the delicious layers of the bar. It's not really 7 layers, but it is 7th heaven....

Uncharted Waters: Salmon Wellington

I can't remember remotely how I came up with this one, but I knew it needed to involve frozen puff pastry. Puff pastry is one of the most understated ingredients I can think of. Found in the frozen section with two (2) sheets per box, they are delicious, versatile, elegant, and most importantly easy to incorporate into anything.

I have big plans for my pastry sheets but they first started as Salmon Wellington With Tarragon Beurre Blanc. If you recall, the more common Beef Wellington is tender meat tucked away in the a flaky puff pastry with various herbs and spices. Though I'm confident I didn't invent it, I decided to replace the meat with Pacific Northwestern Coho Salmon that I just happened to have in my freezer, (true story). Puff Pastry sounds intimidating but the recipe is quite easy:

Salmon Wellington

4 4oz salmon fillets

1 pastry sheet, thawed

3 shallots, sliced

tarragon

dill

1 egg, room temperature

Pre-heat over to 425. Flick some flour down on flat surface and gently roll out pastry sheet until fold marks are gone. Work quickly because you want the pastry sheet to stay as cold as possible before reaching the oven. Cut into pieces and place 1 salmon fillet in each square. Use your best judgement here. If the fillet looks too large, get the other pastry sheet. Be mindful though to use as little pastry as possible since it puffs up so grandiosely.

Salt and pepper each fillet generously. Place several shallot slices on top of salmon, then stack a frond of dill and a frowd on tarragon. Press down lightly. Drizzle with olive oil.

To package the salmon in the pastry, pull the pastry up along the longer side of the salmon. Line each side up above the fillet and fold into each other until taught. (Like how they wrap a sandwich at the deli). Curl the edges of the pastry on the short corners in towards the salmon. Secure by pressing with fork.

Lightly beat egg with 1 tablespoon of water. Brush each salmon package with egg wash and place in 425 oven for 2o minutes or until the pastry if puffed and golden brown.

Tarragon Beurre Blanc

I'm sure there's a great recipe online for Beurre Blanc but this is roughly what I did:

3/4 cup dry white wine

1/4 cup white vinegar

several dill fronds, chopped

several tarragon fronds, chopped

2 shallots, minced

1/2 stick butter

Reduce wine and vinegar with shallots and herbs for about 5 minutes. Add salt and pepper. Slice cold butter and add to saucepan. Stir constantly until butter is completely melted and sauce thickens. The object is for the acids of the wine and vinegar to breakdown the milkfat in the butter. Take off heat and drizzle on fillets when they come out of the oven.

We had ours with sautéed mushrooms and basmati rice and it was a slam dunk!

Ode to Charcuterie Plates!...and Rubin Morales

Meet the newest member of our family, Rubin Morales! The photos were taken after I looked high and low for him. I must have not looked high enough because I found him in the closet on top of a stack of Ray's hats. Anyways, I digress...

We recently had the great pleasure of having another equally as food saavy couple join us for dinner. I have to admit it was just as refreshing as the Torrentes they brought.

G and F came to check out our new pad and were sweet enough to bring Torrentes, (my FAVORITE wine in the entire world) some olives, this deliciously nutty Dutch hard cheese whose name escapes me, AND a good buck bamboo plant as a housewarming gift. Best dinner guests ever!

Funnily enough I happened to be working on a cheese plate to serve them when they arrived; with our powers combined we made an ultimate one.

***Quick tip...if you are in a bind like I was with a totally stale baguette in the final hour before my guests arrived...run the baguette under water really quickly and toss in the oven at 350 until the outside is crusty and golden brown, roughly 7 minutes depending on how much baguette was left. The inside will be soft and chewy and no one will know your dirty little secret!

Shown clockwise in this photo: some french baguette toasts I drizzled in olive oil, olives marinated with roasted red peppers, that deliciously nutty hard cheese previously mentioned, pork and chicken pâté, smoked gouda, Humbolt Fog (an out- of-this-world goat cheese punctuated with a hyphen of divine vegetable ash), turkey pepperoni (less greasy than the regular), and finally a ramekin of this cheese marketed as "Farmer's Cheese." That name means absolutely nothing to me; however, to give it some context: it has the texture of ricotta, with the tang of a goat cheese and a final low note reminiscent of cottage cheese.

It was all a perfect prelude to a simple dinner of baked salmon with grilled leeks, basmati rice, and a spring mix salad with homemade vinaigrette. For dessert we had apple pie a la mode with some green tea to wash it all down.

Thanks, friends for a lovely dinner...à la prochaine!

Rosh Hashana Sformato with Amaretto Whipped Cream

Shana Tova, to my fellow Jews! What better way to greet the new year than with chocolate, liqueur, and fresh whipped cream??

I had the good fortune of being invited to Rosh Hashana dinner out in Maryland at friend's family's home. As to avoid looking gauche I, of course, brought a new dessert that I had tried out. Little did I know there would be 10,000 people there, so lucky for me the dessert didn't last very long. So by default it was a seemingly huge hit. Sformato is sort of like a cakey-pudding/brownie-mix-without-salmonella sprinkled with sliced almonds served with a sweet, almond liqueur whipped cream. I have to admit it was out of control delicious. I will definitely be making this recipe again.

2 cups whole milk

1 cup sugar

16 oz good semisweet chocolate

vanilla

1 packet of gelatin

4 large eggs, room temperature

1/4 cup sliced almonds

For the Whipped Cream:

1 small carton of heaving whipping cream

1/4 cup confectioners' sugar

splash of almond liqueur

Preheat oven to 350. Butter 2 quart casserole dish that can fit into a roasting pan. I will explain why in a moment. Begin melting chocolate in double boiler. Do this by putting a glass bowl over a pot of boiling water. Make sure bottom of the glass bowl does not touch the hot water directly. Turn off heat once chocolate is melted. Keep over steaming water.

In the meantime, simmer 1 1/2 cups whole milk, sugar and splash of vanilla in saucepan. Once simmering and sugar dissolved, turn off heat. In a small bow, mix packet of gelatin and remaining 1/2 cup of cold whole milk for about 2 minutes. Add milk and gelatin to hot milk and sugar mixture stirring constantly until gelatin is dissolved. Add this mixture to glass bowl of melted chocolate stirring until all contents are fully combined.

Lightly beat the four eggs in separate bowl. Ladle 3 tablespoons or so of the hot chocolate and milk mixture into the eggs and whisk until mixed well. This will temper the eggs to avoid scrambling them once they are added back into the chocolate. Add eggs to the hot chocolate and milk mixture; whisk CONSTANTLY to avoid egg scramble. If you find the mixture has become lumpy, run it through a strainer before pouring into casserole dish.

Once in the casserole gently sprinkle the top with almonds until the top is lightly covered. To create steam bath for the casserole pour boiling water in the roasting pan to halfway up the casserole dish. Place in oven for about 1 hour and 20 minutes. The reason for the steam bath is cook the ingredients gently. This will create the soft souffle-esque texture. The sformato will still be a little giggly when it is taken out, that is fine. Let cool for 30 minutes before serving.

For the Whipped Cream:

Begin whipping the cream on low with an electric mixer. Increase speed as the cream begins to stiffen to avoid Mrs. Doubtfire Whipped Cream Facial. Begin adding amaretto liqueur and powdered sugar; mix until soft peaks are achieved. Soft peaks are when you pull the whisk out and the cream holds its shape; the tip will curl down.

Use a large serving spoon to serve sformato since it is quite soft; add a dollop of whipped cream and enjoy.

Happy New Year!

Look Mom, No Hands! Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting

So I've been on this dessert baking rampage recently with deplorable results. I made a chalky, crumbly chocolate ganache cake and a goopey peach cobbler. Defeated, war-torn I was. But I stood up, wiped the flour from my cheeks and licked the ganache from my whisk and, well...called my mother. Ray's favorite dessert/the only sweet thing he will eat is Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting. So I employed Mom to recite to me her ultimate Carrot Cake recipe. My hand cramped up while writing the seemingly extensive ingredient list but it was all worth it. I followed the recipe as religiously as I could (I have this physical inability to follow a recipe) and let's just say my tummy was happy and my ego restored.

I had two critiques of my cake: (1) there was not enough cinnamon and I perhaps could have added nutmeg to make it more fragrant and extra divine. (2) I foolishly forgot to WAIT to put my second cake on after frosting the first. Since it's a two layered cake make sure they are completely cooled. I would also refrigerate the bottom layer after it's frosted before adding the second. I, like usual, was too over zealous and stacked my cakes prematurely and the frosting ended up squishing out the sides making the differentiation between the layers unnoticeable. Overall though it was a hit. Check out the recipe:

Cake:

3 cups flour

3 cups granulated sugar

1tsp salt

1T baking soda

1 T cinnamon

1 1/2 cups vegetable oil

4 eggs, beaten lightly

1T vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups walnuts chopped

1 1/2 cups shredded coconut

¾ drained crushed pineapple

1 1/3 cup pureed carrot

Preheat over to 350

sift dry ingredients together,

add oil, eggs, vanilla,

fold in walnuts, coconut and crushed pineapple

Pour into two greased 9 inch cake rounds

Place in the middle rack and bake for 30-45 minutes

The cake will be golden brown and the corners will pull from the sides

Cool completely before frosting

Cream Cheese Frosting

2 8 oz packages of cream cheese at room temp

1 stick butter, room temperature

3 cups confectioner’s sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1/2 cup shredded coconut (optional)

Beat cream cheese and butter together until smooth

add vanilla

slowly add in sugar

Make Your Man Love You Steak Dinner

This was one of the last meals we had in our old apartment. My man was craving meat and I think I delivered! It's filet mignon, boursin mashed potatoes (see earlier Father's Day post for recipe), garlic broccollini and for a personal and feminine flair, a simple caprese salad.

I seared the filet mignon seasoned with only salt and pepper in a cast iron pan and finished them in the oven until perfectly medium rare. I pulled them off and set them aside. It's always key to let meat sit for 10-15 minutes before serving, especially red (and expensive!) meat for the juices to reincorporate.

The sauce pictured is the inspiration for the "Make Your Man Love You Forever" title. A food critic/best friend of mine told me that after she pulls the meat off of the stove she adds a container of creme fraiche to deglaze the pan. The creme fraiche mixes with all of the delicious fatty bits of meat and melts in to pure divinity. I added thyme to mine to add more flavor and woodiness and it was spectacular. Thanks, Mullete!

In case you are wondering what creme fraiche is, it's a tangy soft french cream most comparable to sour cream, but much more delicate. You can find it in the specialty cheese section for about $6. It's worth trying out! I add it to pasta dishes to make an instant cream sauce and it's fabulous. Its tanginess adds another dimension of flavor to whatever you add it to!

As for the caprese salad, it is the quintessential salad at my house at home and I can never get enough. For this one I put down a bed of spring greens, diced red onions and of course the sliced mozzarella and tomatoes. I salted and peppered them generously but I didn't pour the balsamic vinegar and olive oil until we sat down. If you do it too early, as with ANY salad dressing, it makes the lettuce leaves soggy.

The broccoloni I did super simple with a splash of olive oil and two garlic cloves. I detest floppy veggies so with this method they soften only slightly on the outside and they keep their color. Broccolini tastes and looks very similar to broccoli with longer stems and less florets. They're an attractive alternative although apparently not related.

The way to his heart is through his stomach, right? Enjoy!