Peggy's Cole Slaw

(Tom Casey's Cole Slaw)
Makes about 6 cups
2 #head cabbage
3/4 cup mayo
1/2 cup sour cream
3T wine vinegar
1t dill seed
salt and pepper
slice cabbage thin, transfer to bowl. Cover with ice water for at least 2 hours. Process all other ingredients. Drain cabbage very very thoroughly. Toss with dressing.
Best served 1-2 days later. Keep in fridge until.
"This is really delicious."

Clam Chowder for Niall

Niall,
This first test batch of chowder left Bill speechless. He uttered all kinds of grunts and other appreciative noises, but otherwise pretty much stayed face down in the bowl until it was gone. I'm keeping this recipe as is. The whole thing took 20 minutes from start to finish, including prep.

It is very basic, and the only thing that sets this chowder apart are the two techniques described in the directions for the recipe below. I know it will offend your chefly sensibilities to NOT ADD LIQUID to the clams when you steam them, and if you must cave on this point you could add a splash of white wine, but trust me when I tell you it isn't necessary. This is how I solved the problem we spoke about -- of how to get the broth to taste like a big bowl of steamers and not like that nasty bottled clam juice...

The linguica is really key, and I hope you won't leave it out just because the folks out there haven't been converted yet. The pancetta gives the chowder a clean, mild porkiness, and the linguica lends a tremendous amount of flavor. I can overnight you a pound or two of the good stuff from Lopes Sausage if you don't have access to a source.

The parsley does change the traditional all-white aspect of NE chowder, adding little flecks of green to the bowl. I'm cool with that and I think the fresh herbs offset the richness of the dish, but you could leave them out if the green is too off-putting.I didn't add any salt to the pot at all, but the dish came out perfectly seasoned between the clams and the pork products. Enjoy...

1/2 cup pancetta, diced small
1/4 cup linguica, diced medium
12 littleneck clams, scrubbed
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 small yellow onion, diced large
2 cups red new potatoes, UNPEELED, diced large
1/2 pint heavy cream
2 cups evaporated skim milk (I used regular whole milk and the flavor was phenomenal but the milk did scald. Up to you. I would use evaporated skim milk next time to approximate the texture of regular milk.)
handful chopped parsley
chopped chives (optional)
Ground black pepper, to taste

Turn the flame to medium-high under a large saute pan with a tight fitting lid. Add the pancetta and linguica and let them just barely begin to render -- about a minute. Add the clams, put the lid on the pot, turn the heat to high and walk away for 7 or 8 minutes. Do not take the lid off.
Prep all the other ingredients.

After 8 minutes, all the clams will be wide open and they will have generated a lot of clam liquor. Pour the contents of the pan into a very fine strainer over a small-to-medium-sized pot. Set the strainer with the clams and pork products aside to cool.

Turn the heat to medium under the pot with the clam liquor and add the remaining ingredients. Cook UNCOVERED until the potatoes are just cooked through, about 8 - 10 minutes total. This allows the liquid to reduce a little while the potatoes are soaking up all that good clam broth and cream.

Towards the end of the cooking time, take the cooled clams out of their shells and cut them in half. (This is super quick once the clams are cool. Don't say the prep crew doesn't have time to do this!) Discard the clam shells.

Once the potatoes are cooked through, add the clams and pork back to the chowder. Let cool for a couple of minutes and taste for seasoning. This makes 5-6 servings, and the chowder is good for several days.

Those two techniques -- steaming the clams first to get their liquid (and ensuring big pieces of clam) and then letting the liquid thicken a bit while the potatoes cook in it uncovered are my Xmas gifts to you, even if you already have them.

Love,
Ruthie

Flounder La Bella Fortuna

I miss Art Bloom. It sneaks up on me sometimes. I used to go and visit him regularly, and I was remembering recently how a friend and I once made the long drive from Bard to P-Town, just to watch the Academy Awards with Art. He was delighted that we had come to see him, and made his standard "special occasion" meal for us; which always took just as long to prepare as it did to eat -- probably 8 hours from shopping to dishes. The courses were always pretty much the same: some variation on steamed mussels, broiled bluefish, lobster and corn, maybe a salad; and vanilla ice cream for dessert. There was lots of wine and bourbon, of course, to go with all that good local seafood.

I remember every detail of the room looking over the bay. The way the light changed from season to season; how it felt to lie on my back and read with the little orange cat Fire sleeping on my chest, and the sound of distant foghorns and the tide coming in. Art and I would talk about Niall and Scott and Beverly; about music and movies and books and relationships. We had adopted each other as family, and those memories of visits to "the kibbutz" before Art got sick are very precious.

Art's special occasion bluefish came from Howard Mitcham's Provincetown Seafood Cookbook - still one of my all-time favorites. Mitcham, a wild man in the venerable P-Town tradition of brilliant and insane kitchen innovators, was still around when I was a kid, and my parents once took me to the restaurant where he did a very brief professional stint, to eat the Haddock Almondine that he had made famous.

I bought some flounder the other night, and enjoyed a little riff on Art's fish, with some updates of my own. The traditional recipe as I remember it, involved squeezing a lemon over a piece of bluefish or halibut, seasoning it with salt and pepper, and then spreading mayonnaise over the fish before broiling, about which Mitcham says:

"Now listen: when I say fresh homemade mayonnaise I mean exactly that. If you try to squeeze by with that cheap commercial mayonnaise then you will have defiled a fine fish who sacrificed his life for your enjoyment."

I seasoned our fish with sumac and pimenton, salt and pepper, squeezed a lemon over it, let it sit while I preheated the broiler and then spread a little mayonnaise and dijon mustard mixture over the fish and topped it off with a mix of panko and parmesan before broiling. Bill was completely knocked out by the sweet, fresh flounder and it disappeared in a flash. Simple and delicious.

flounder or  swai filets
salt
pepper
sumac
pimenton
garlic powder
dijon mustard
mayonnaise
lemon
panko
grated parmesan
chopped parsley for garnish

Tomato Vegetable Soup with Rice

This is my take on Lydia Bastianich's famous Potato Rice Soup that uses a Parmigiano-Reggiano Rind for flavor. I've made it into a rainy-day-at-the-Cape tomato soup, switched out the celery (which I never have in the fridge) for fennel (which I always have in the fridge) and cut back on the rice so the leftovers don't turn to sludge overnight. This is a hearty soup. It would be terrific pureed, as all tomato soups are, and, in fact, that might just be the key to reviving the leftovers now that I think of it...


3 tablespoons olive oil
4 small red potatoes, washed and cut into 1/3-inch cubes
1 large carrots, diced large
1/2 cup fennel, diced large
1 small can tomato paste
1/2 cup leftover French onion soup (obviously, this was what was on hand. Next time, I'd probably increase the chicken broth by half a cup, and saute half an onion, diced large, with the other vegetables.)
4 cups hot chicken broth
2 2-inch-squares Parmigiano rind, exterior scraped
1 fresh or dried bay leaves
freshly ground black pepper
1/3 cup long-grain rice
1/4 cup chopped basil or parsley or spinach (optional)

1. In a deep, heavy 4- to 5-quart pot, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add potatoes and cook, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until lightly browned, about 5 minutes. Potatoes will stick to pot; adjust heat to prevent stuck bits from becoming too dark. Stir in carrots and celery and cook, stirring, another 2 to 3 minutes. Add tomato paste and stir to coat vegetables.

2. Add broth, onion soup, Parmigiano rinds and bay leaves. Bring to a boil, scraping up bits of potato on bottom, then simmer. Cover pot and cook until potatoes begin to fall apart, about 40 minutes. Stir in rice and cook until rice is tender but still firm, about 12 minutes. Remove bay leaves, stir in parsley or other green leafy chiffonade (if desired), and check seasoning. Remove rinds and cut into small pieces. Put a piece in each soup bowl and ladle soup on top. Serves 4-6

Restaurant-ish Pasta

More pasta. Its not all we're eating...really! I just can't find time to blog lately. I'll get around to writing up the fragrant keema mattar, velvety chocolate bread pudding, pickled beets, pineapple zucchini cake with cream cheese frosting and fabulous lemon chicken sometime soon, but for right now, with my preliminary literature review due at 9am and a long night of blurry-eyed proofreading ahead, I will just note that tonight's pasta was spectacular, if I do say so myself. Layers of flavor, good balance and pretty to look at. Bill ate himself into a food coma and passed out on the couch, indicating that perhaps this dish is a little too "restaurant-ish" for every day usage.

3 cloves garlic
1 scallion
6 sun dried tomatoes
hefty glug of white wine
juice of one lemon
olive oil
spoonful of chicken fat
1/2 cup chicken broth
2 T pesto
large handful of shrimp, sheeled and deveined
red pepper flakes
handful frozen peas
2 T pesto
copious amount of chopped fresh parsley
salt and pepper, to taste
linguini
pesto bread crumbs

Linguini a la Campagnola

I used to live down the block from a little neighborhood Italian restaurant where they make this dish: a fantastically savory pasta in garlic and oil with sun dried tomatoes, perfectly sauteed broccoli and a hunk of broiled goat cheese to swirl into the mix.

I made a double batch, thinking we'd eat the leftover portion for lunch the next day, but BT went back for fourths, until finally all that remained was an empty pan. Instructions to follow.

oil
scallions
broccoli
sundried tomatoes
garlic
parsley
goat cheese
salt and pepper

linguini

Ben & Jerry's Strawberry Ice Cream

Cook the eggs or don't cook the eggs - that part's entirely up to you. But make this ice cream. Make it without any further delay.
This is my ideal strawberry ice cream, exactly as is.
(The only element I might play around with in the future is maybe mixing everything in the blender for easier pouring and fewer bowls to wash.)

1 pint fresh strawberries, hulled and chopped
juice of half a lemon
1/3 cup sugar
2 large eggs
3/4 cup sugar
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine strawberries, lemon juice, and 1/4 cup sugar in a mixing bowl, and set aside to macerate in the fridge for 1 hour. In a large mixing bowl beat eggs until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Gradually add 3/4 cups sugar, mixing well. Stir in milk and vanilla and mix well. Mash strawberries to a puree. Add the strawberry puree to the custard and mix well. Gently stir in whipping cream just until combined. Pour into a chilled ice cream maker and follow the manufacturer's instructions.

Rotelli, Asparagus and Peas with Saffron Cream

Unable to leave well enough alone, I made a number of strategic changes to (an already perfectly good) recipe from Deborah Madison's The Greens Cookbook. (Not using any saffron in the saffron cream, for one thing...!)

Madison writes: "The peas are small and fresh, the asparagus, pencil thin. The fragrant saffron-flavored cream makes this pasta filling and substantial. This is a rather special dish, fine for a company dinner." I most wholeheartedly agree.

4 - 6 ounces fresh pasta (tagliatelle or wide fettuccine would be ideal.
1/2 bunch asparagus
1 cup green peas
1/4 teaspoon tumeric
1 tablespoon butter
2 scallions finely diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
½ cup heavy cream
Salt, to taste
1 cup parsley, roughly chopped
1 thin strip lemon peel; very thinly slivered
Parmesan cheese
Pepper

Bring a large pot of water to boil.
Melt the butter in a wide saute pan, and gently cook the shallots for several minutes, or until they are soft. Add the cream and the saffron infusion, bring to a boil, reduce slightly, and season with salt. When the pasta water is boiling, add salt, and cook the asparagus, and then the peas, in the boiling water. Scoop them out when they are done and add them to the cream. Next cook the pasta; when it is done, add it to the cream, turning it over several times with a pair of tongs to coat it with the sauce. Add the chervil leaves and the lemon peel, and serve on warm plates with grated Parmesan and freshly ground pepper.

Serves 2

Linguine a la Vongole

Not much of a recipe to record, but damn if this wasn't extra special good...
1/3 - 1/2 lb linguine
1 sundried tomato chicken sausage, sliced lengthwise and then horizontally into 1/2 inch slices
4 plum tomatoes, quartered
3 garlic cloves, sliced thin
12 littleneck clams, cleaned
generous pinch crushed red pepper
generous glug of white wine
handful chopped fresh oregano or basil
handful chopped fresh parsley
2 tablespoons pesto
salt, to taste
handful chopped fresh spinach

Spaghetti al Burro e Formaggio

This is really an amalgam of two comfort dishes from the Italian restaurants I worked at a million years ago when I was still cooking for pay. At Ciro and Sal's the pasta al burro e formaggio is pure solace: a whiff of garlic, handfuls of freshly grated cheese and lots of chopped parley to brighten the whole thing up. At Carmine's the lemon butter sauce is also a favorite of mine -- the flavors given extra depth and complexity with the addition of white wine and chicken stock and basil. So here, then, is Ciro and Carmine's love child, all grown up: a little lighter and more modern, with the combined wisdom of north and south. (Bill went back for third helpings. How bad could it be?)

1/2 pound whole wheat spaghetti
4 tablespoons of butter
1 clove garlic, finely minced (or more to taste)
1 hearty glug of white wine
1 hearty glug of chicken stock
1 small zucchini, cut in half lengthwise and then crosswise into thin half moons
2 handfuls of fresh baby spinach (or substitute 1/2 fresh basil, if you have it)
1/2 cup fresh parley, chopped
freshly grated Parmesan cheese, to taste
salt and pepper to taste

CJ's Pesto

Well, it turns out this is really Marcella Hazan's pesto recipe, but since it was passed down to me almost twenty years ago by the lovely and inimitable Courtia Jay Worth, I will always think of it as "CJ's pesto" whenever I make it. It is life-affirming, verdant and-- ah, that reminds me. There's a word for all of that in Spanish: reverdecer. It means to become green again, as in fields after a winter frost. Maybe that's what I need a little dose of right about now.

2 cups fresh basil
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons pine nuts
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons freshly grated Romano cheese
3 tablespoons butter, softened to room temperature


Blend first 5 ingredients to a paste in a blender. When evenly blended, pour into a bowl and beat in the cheeses by hand. Incorporate the butter.

Before spooning over pasta, add a tablespoon or so of the pasta cooking water to achieve the desired consistency.

Scallion Spinach Pesto

I adapted this recipe from the Wild Leek Pesto over at Kalofagas, using almonds instead of walnuts, and changing all of the proportions in little ways, to suit my tastes. It was extremely delicious on pasta the first night; equally tasty smeared on a piece of broiled fish the next; and finally, tonight, wickedly good stuffed into brined and pan-roasted chicken breasts. (Bill's favorite variation.)

Looks like the scallion pesto may stay in regular rotation for a while...Thanks, Kalofagas!


Ingredients:
1/2 cup almonds
1 cup chopped scallions (green part only)
1 clove of garlic
1 1/2 cup of baby spinach
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup grated Romano cheese
Salt and pepper, to taste

Blend. Taste. Adjust. Apply liberally.

Sizzling Rice Soup

I loved this soup when I was a kid. Over the years it has completely and inexplicably disappeared from all but a few old-school NYC Chinese restaurant menus; but no matter, I've started making it at home. In fact, we've eaten it three times this week, in an effort to make up for lost time.

The loud sizzle is a special moment in my day. What can I say? I've always loved those little tableside flourishes. Plus, it's a kind of perfect duo: combining the guilty-pleasure-sensation of pop rocks, with the inarguable health benefits of chicken vegetable soup.

3-4 ounces frozen shrimp, thawed
2 tablespoon rice wine
2 teaspoon soy sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 large skinless, boneless chicken breast
4 cups chicken broth
1 cup chopped raw broccoli
½ can of sliced water chestnuts
¼ cup sliced scallions
handful of snow peas
4-6 rice cakes from 1 package Chinese rice cakes (or you can make your own, which I did the other day but would prefer to not ever have to do again in the future.)

In a bowl, mix together the shrimp, cornstarch, sherry and soy sauce and set aside. Poach the chicken breast in the chicken broth in a soup pot over medium heat. Bring to a boil and then immediately reduce the heat and allow it to simmer until the chicken is just barely cooked through. Remove the chicken breast and set aside too cool slightly.

Add the shrimp mixture, green onions, water chestnuts and broccoli to the pot over medium heat. Simmer for 3 minutes. While the shrimp is simmering, cut the reserved chicken breast into chunks and add the chicken back into the soup. Add the snow peas and adjust for seasoning.

Meanwhile, heat 3 tablespoons of oil in a frying pan. Brown the rice cakes in the oil very briefly on each side. They should be very hot. Remove the rice cakes from the oil with a slotted spoon, and blot on paper towels.

Add the rice cakes to the soup at the table. If both are hot enough, the soup will sizzle loudly.

The Apple Cake of Righteousness

It's Shavuot...
So why am I baking an apple cake, one might wonder, on the one day of the year I could completely justify making blintzes for dinner, or even a cheesecake...

I'm really not sure. It just sort of happened; but now that I think about it, I suspect it has something to do with the fact that my main peeps have been sick for the last couple of weeks. First my mom and now Bill. I've been nursing both of the patients -- which for me mostly means cooking enormous batches of soup, loading everyone up with Chinese herbs and kvetching loudly that no one is washing their hands often enough. Last week I produced multiple batches of matzoh balls for my poor sick mom, and now for the last three days I've been turning out pots of sizzling rice soup, meal after meal (luckily, Bill loves sizzling rice soup, or the repetition wouldn't be much of a comfort to him in his drippy, feverish state.)

I suddenly found myself making many of his faves yesterday -- fish with wild leek pesto, popovers, tom kha gai, and now this -- this apple cake that he loves best of all. I couldn't swear to it, but I believe the original recipe came out of the Settlement House Cookbook a million years ago. And did I mention that this apple cake, which my grandmother used to make for Rosh Hashanah, is also my mom's favorite thing to eat? Strangely, she and Bill have the same favorite foods, along with sharing the same hypervigilant, overly analytical nursemaid. Of course, this is the best apple cake in the world, so it isn't hard to love.

Anyway, since it is, in fact, Shavuot, let me quote Megillat Ruth by way of reminding my sick mother and my sick husband where I'm coming from and where it's at...

"But Ruth replied: Do not urge me to leave you or turn back from following you; for where you go, I will go, and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God, my God."

(Ohhhh...the righteousness...the righteousness...)

Ingredients:

6 apples
1 tablespoon cinnamon
pinch of allspice and nutmeg (optional)
1 cup raisins
5 tablespoons sugar

2 3/4 cups flour, sifted
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups sugar, or a little less according to taste
1/4 cup apple juice
2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
4 eggs
1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a bundt pan. Peel, core and chop apples into chunks. Toss with spices, raisins and sugar and set aside.

Stir together flour, baking powder and salt in a large mixing bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together oil, apple juice, sugar and vanilla. Mix wet ingredients into the dry ones, then add eggs, one at a time. Scrape down the bowl to ensure all ingredients are incorporated.

Pour half of batter into prepared pan. Spread half of apple/raisin mixture over it. Pour the remaining batter over the apples and arrange the remaining apples/raisins on top. Bake for about 1 1/2 hours, or until a tester comes out clean

Lemony Herbed Rice Salad

I adapted this recipe from Viana La Place, adding a variety of fresh produce that was still warm from from Irwin's garden. It's a keeper -- light, fresh and full of flavor.

1 cup arborio rice
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
juice of 1/2 large or 1 small lemon
1 cup tightly packed flat-leaf parsley leaves, coarsely chopped
1/4 cup chopped chives
1/3 cup chopped fresh dill
1 cup chopped cooked vegetables (we had leftover steamed asparagus and broccoli, so I used those -- but it could have been any variety of vegetables, really)
1/3 cup green olives, coarsely chopped (optional)
1 tablespoon capers, rinsed and drained
grated zest of 1 lemon
Salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste


Bring a large saucepan of salted water to a boil. Add the rice and simmer over moderate heat until just tender, about 14 minutes. Drain thoroughly.

In a large bowl, toss the rice with the olive oil and lemon juice. Stir in the fresh herbs and other ingredients and season with salt and pepper. Serve warm or at room temperature.