eggplant parmigiana, deconstructed

Top Chef often has deconstructed dishes that are plated for elimination challenges. I've never really tried to deconstruct anything before. The basic premise is taking a classic and reimagining it. It should taste pretty close to the original, but it shouldn't look the same. Tom Colicchio explains in a blog post at BravoTV better than me.

Which brings me to my creation of eggplant parmigiana. It's fairly simple to make, but it does take a bit of time to plate...er, bowl as it were. My initial thought was to make eggplant parm in the style of French onion soup. Problem being we don't have one of those fancy broilers that restaurants use to melt the cheese over the crouton on top. Enter the butane torch!

This dish has four main components, each one fairly simple to pull off. Be warned: this will make a mess, and leave you with a dish full of pots & pans. It's worth it though.

First, the eggplant. Skin & cube one eggplant. Cook in sauce pot with 2 cups of a sweeter white wine and enough vegetable stock to cover most of the eggplant. Smash 3 cloves (or so) of garlic, and add Italian herbs to taste. Cook covered until eggplant is soft. If you have an immersion blender, use it to puree. If not, puree in batches in a standard blender. Make sure that the blender is no more than half full, and you have some way to vent the steam. I've read that removing the center insert and covering with a dishtowel is a good way to keep your kitchen clean and prevent a steam-build up.

Next, the sauce. Sweat 1/2 of a diced onion in olive oil. Skin & dice one Chinese eggplant (long & skinny, looks like a zucchini). Add to pot with a large can of pureed tomatoes. Cook sauce for about 20 minutes. Use immersion blender again to smooth out the sauce.

When making eggplant parmigiana normally, you bread the eggplant and brown it in the frying pan. I'm not sure if this does a whole lot, but in keeping with the spirit of deconstruction, toast approximately 1/4 cup of bread crumbs. It's more of a garnish than anything. Set aside.

To plate the concoction, fill bowl halfway with eggplant puree. Stripe the sauce across the top. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs over the sauce. Finally, top with shredded parmesan cheese. Use the butane torch to melt & brown the cheese on top.

Voila! Eggplant parmigiana, deconstructed. For those of you that care, yes, this is a vegetarian dish. I don't imagine that trying to make it vegan would be possible. I doubt there's a synthetic plant-based version of parmesan cheese that is believable.

creativity en la cocina

Learning what flavors play well together when cooking is an ongoing process. Cooking is a less precise art than baking, and that's precisely why I like it. It gets my creativity wandering. I taste new things and want to put my own spin on them. Which brings us to tonight's edition of culinary theatre.

On tonight's menu sweet potato gnocchi with lobster, apple, & goat cheese sauce. For the gnocchi, get an Italian mother, great aunt, or grandmother to teach you. I truly don't have a recipe. I'm sure there's exact "quantities" for the ingredients, but that's not how I learned. I'm still never sure if they're going to turn out right, but somehow they do.

For the sauce's ingredients:

1/2 stick of butter
2 shallots, sliced thin
4 cloves of garlic, minced
1 small apple, diced (choose a sweet variety)
1/2 cup heavy cream
3.5 ounce package of goat cheese
1 tsp. basil (substitute fresh if you're lucky enough to have it)
dash of cinnamon
3 lobster tails, cooked & chopped coarsely

Start by melting the butter over medium-high heat. When it's melted, add the basil & cinnamon. Once combined, add shallots, garlic, & apples.

Saute until softened and some of the liquid starts to release from the apples. Lower heat to medium to avoid burning the butter. Add cream to pan. Stir to combine.

When cream is warm, break goat cheese into chunks and stir into sauce. Once smooth, add lobster meat. Lower heat to simmer. Serve over gnocchi.

Yes, it is as good as it sounds.

summer squash soup

As is usually the case when I improvise a pot of soup, I can never remember how to make it again. In an effort to prevent that, here goes my first edition of summer squash soup. I'm liable to forget I posted this next year when yellow squash and zucchini are back in season, but then I just get to be creative again!

Ingredients
2 zucchini
3 yellow squash
1 Granny Smith apple
Juice from 1 lemon
1/4 stick of dynamite...I mean butter
2 shallots, thinly sliced
3 cloves of garlic, minced
~1 cup vegetable stock
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
Honey to taste

Melt the butter over medium heat in a large saucepan. Add lemon juice, garlic & shallots. Turn heat up, & sauté until the butter begins to brown.

While this is happening on the heat, peel, core, & rough chop the apple. Peel & rough chop the zucchini & squash. The ratio of squash to zucchini should be about 1:1. Ensure this at the store, I guess. Toss all in the pot with vegetable stock. Add enough water to just cover the contents.

When the liquid begins to boil, turn down the heat & cover. Cook until the squash is soft.

Puree the mixture. I love my immersion blender for soups such as this, but a regular blender or food processor would do the job just as well. Just be careful because the soup is, well, boiling hot. When it is to your desired consistency, return to saucepot & add minced ginger. Cook for about 5 more minutes over low heat. Taste & add honey a bit at a time. The soup is supposed to be a bit sour. The honey really helps cut that, but the ginger brings it together.

Serve with a dollop of Greek yogurt or sour cream if desired. I stared at my spice rack for some herbs to add to it to give it some more complexity, but I drew a blank. I'm certainly open to suggestions, if for no other reason than to try making it again!

fraiche

This is my first trip overseas. The trials and tribulations of going it alone for the first time have been minor at best. I have the knowledge of my better half's travel experiences to build upon. Stay in a hotel? Crazy talk. Apparently, eating out three meals per day for a week or more really wears on your nerves. Unfamiliar foods can induce culture shock. I've loved most of the meals we've had and merely liked the rest. More on that when I return.

Where to stay if not in a hotel? Rent an apartment, of course. It's brilliant. Where else can you get out of the tourist bubble and learn the ins and outs of shopping at the market? How else would I learn that you have to weigh your produce at the grocery store before going to the cashier? Actually, I think someone may have told me that tip in the past; however, it took me being in line and trying to pick up social cues before the memory was triggered.

Our first nights here, I made some pasta from the bottega with sauteed vegetables from the fruit stand and chicken from the boucherie. It wasn't too different from what we often make at home. Aside from the lack of spices and herbs, it was no different really. Homemade Italian food in France? Oui. Our French diet has been expectedly devoid of les légumes. This allowed us to indulge at lunchtime and not feel like our sang was turning into beurre.

Enough of the French-English mishmash. Time for tonight's recipe. I want to recreate this at home, but it may be a little more difficult. Tonight, I made what I'll call a Virginia cheese steak...minus the cheese, and pork instead of steak. Yeah, I need to work on the name. Suggestions welcome.

Ingredients
1/2 lb. center cut pork chop, cut into strips across grain
1 Granny Smith apple, cut into half circle slices
2 cloves of garlic, coarsely chopped
1/2 onion, julienned
1/2 zucchini, julienned
olive oil
1 baguette
Salt & pepper to taste.

1. Heat oil in pan. Saute onions & garlic until they begin to brown.
2. Add zucchini. Cook until they begin to soften.
3. Lay apple slices between everything in pan. Flip when browned.
4. Add pork. Stir until done.
5. Layer individual ingredients into baguette so that each bite will have every flavor. Bon appetit!

Fresh ingredients are clutch. A good recipe is only as good as the ingredients that go into it. I made this for less than ten euros. It served two. The key to recreating this sandwich at home will be locating a proper bakery that makes a good baguette. I fear that may be the hardest part. I know that adding to this recipe will be the easy part. Cinnamon or a dash of cayenne might make this just perfect. A soft cheese such as brie or gouda might also be a nice accompaniment.

getting out the crock pot

Top Chef introduces me to many different ingredients and flavor profiles. When I happen to have the ingredients on hand, I'm more likely to introduce them to a dish.

Enter the spice rack. Earlier in the summer, I used the ground ginger and basil on it to season a fillet of salmon to give it a distinctly Thai feel when it was finished with the slab of grilled pineapple. To tie this tale together, Top Chef this week had a pork competition. One of the cheftestants (yes, that's really what they call them) made a tenderloin that she seasoned with fennel and paired with sweet potatoes and apples. I've never had fennel before, so I didn't particularly know what it tasted like. It's on the spice rack. Experiment time!

Ingredients
3 lbs. pork tenderloin
1/2 bag of dried lentils, rehydrated
3 sweet potatoes, peeled & cubed
25 oz. jar of plain applesauce
12 oz. your favorite Oktoberfest beer (or soup stock)
approx. 1 tsp. fennel
cinnamon

Layer the ingredients into a six quart crock pot. If yours is smaller, adjust quantities accordingly. I put the potatoes on the bottom, then lentils, then cubed pork, and finally applesauce. Season somewhere in between and add the liquid. Cook on high for 4 hours or so. If you want to cook it longer on low, I'd recommend browning the pork first so it's still recognizable at the end of the day.

Serve it over rice on a rainy day. It was pretty delicious. It'll be here all week.

variation on lasagna

I'm not sure why. Sometimes, I just get a hankering for some lasagna. Today was one such time. Spring break memories of the Tuscan lasagna made me think a variation of the traditional meat, cheese and sauce was in order. In the past, I've merely added ingredients. Portabello mushrooms. Italian sausage. More cheese. Tonight, I went outside of that modus operandi. I went Greek...sort of.

Ingredients
1 1/2 lbs. of shrimp, cooked & cleaned
12 lasagna noodles, cooked al dente and drained
1 small bag of baby spinach
Fresh basil to taste
Small bunch of parsley
2 lbs. ricotta cheese
1 egg
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan
3 cups shredded mozzarella (or Italian blend)
10 oz. or so of crumbled feta cheese
Tomato sauce
Italian seasoning, if desired

Lasagna requires a lot of bowls for prep and a decent-sized countertop. Chop spinach, basil and parsley. Combine in large bowl. Set aside.

Make sauce. Yes, I said make sauce. Doing this right means doing all the steps right. If you want to use Ragu or Prego, stop reading this recipe and learn how to make your own sauce. It's worth it.

Beat egg in another large bowl. In order, mix in ricotta, parmesan and mozzarella. In small amounts, mix in green stuff until all ingredients are evenly dispersed.

Oil the bottom and sides of a 14" x 9" casserole dish. The deeper the better. Spread a thin layer of sauce on the pan and the first layer of noodles. Cover with half the ricotta and spinach mixture. Next layer of noodles. Layer in sauce, shrimp and feta. Next layer of noodles. Sauce and the remaining ricotta. Last layer of noodles and sauce on top.

Bake for 45 minutes at 350. Let it cool for 5-10 minutes before plating.

Shrimp worked well, but shredded [fill-in-the-meat] or a vegetable substitute would work equally well. Perhaps an olive/peperoncini/roasted garlic/red pepper Greek twist instead of meat? I'm not really sure. I also thought a pesto instead of red sauce would go well, too.

Cooking ain't an exact science; experiment and enjoy the results

big, loud italian dinner

Oh, how I miss them! Way back when the Sopranos were still on the air, back when I lived in my first college apartment (probably the most posh pad I lived in!), we made a weekly tradition of Sunday dinner. Brian bought The Sopranos cookbook and every so often, we'd make a recipe from it. From scratch gravy, chicken cacciatore, lasagna. One thing that was never in short supply was the good friends and flowing beverage. By the time 9:00 rolled around, HBO was a little bit blurry, our belts were a lot bit tighter, and a warm afterglow of a good night permeated the room.

I miss that camaraderie. I suppose that's why I try so hard for '80s movie night to be a success. It was initially, but trying to do it weekly in D.C. is a bit tough. Once a month is more doable for most, though the number of occasions with more than 4 attendees are few and far between.

Flash to tonight. Big, loud, Italian dinner resumes. I actually didn't have enough chairs. First time I've had that many over for dinner. What'd I make? My Pinch-of-this, Pinch-of-that Sauce over homemade gnocchi. Yeah, that's right. I made gnocchi from scratch. To be fair, I had 3 pairs of hand to shape them properly and cook them up right. For what occasion did we undertake this elaborate meal? Mom's in town.

Want the recipe? I learned it from my mom, who learned it from hers, who learned it from hers in turn. One of those, yeah.

Peel the potatoes, boil them. Put them through the potato ricer. Let them cool enough to handle. Knead with some flour. How much? Enough. Add an egg to bind them. Roll the dough out on a floured surface, and cut them into knuckle-sized morsels. Drop them individually into boiling water. They're done when they float. Sauce 'em and serve 'em. Mangia!

Notice how that recipe doesn't really have quantities? Yeah, that's how I learned it, and that's how I remember it. Just like polenta. But that's another day, another meal.

rabbit lovers, part deux

in my new recipe series, here's an easy breakfast casserole that you can make for the masses or just your small lil' family. i prepped it last night for our staff breakfast this morning. 'twas a hit. i doubled it since it was for so many, and i'm glad i did. all that's left is about one spoonful from a 8" x 16" casserole dish.

one cup of dry grits. don't use instant.
one cup of shredded cheese. i used sharp cheddar, but you could make this all kinds of delicious with different cheesy blends. sargento makes that pretty easy!
two eggs, beaten
1/4 cup of butter
seasonings to taste.
optional: bacon, sausage, home fries, chili peppers. use your imagination.

cook the grits according to package directions. stir often to keep them from sticking to the bottom of your pot. when they're done, add the other ingredients to the grits and stir well. if you just dump them in, the eggs will probably poach instead of combining to thicken the grits. when you have a uniform, delicious solution, pour into a greased casserole dish.

you can bake it right then in your preheated 350 degree oven, or put it in the fridge overnight. either way, my recipe said to bake it for an hour. that seemed a bit much since everything was pretty much cooked already. i don't know if it holds together better after an hour because i only left it in for 45 minutes. i got so many compliments on it, and yes, it was that easy.

well, except for the butter jumping out of the pot and skittering across the floor. (no, i didn't put it back in! i had more in the fridge, thankfully.) you know how much of a pain in the neck it is to clean butter off linoleum? i don't recommend trying it yourself. well, the butter on the floor nonsense. i do recommend making this for yourself. i bet it keeps real well, and you could eat on it all week long for breakfast. it's probably not very low in calories or saturated fat, but what delicious foods are?!

attention, rabbit lovers!

that'd be those of you that read this that like rabbits so much you eat like them. i'm even going to share this with some of you that don't necessarily read this. if you're new to my ranting and raving, welcome. disclaimer, i'm not a vegetarian, nor have i ever tried to be. i think this soup is quite tasty; i have made it twice in the last 3 weeks. here's the second incarnation. i preferred this one, she preferred the first. i think a combination of the recipes might make it the best.

first, equipment. sharp knife, oven, cookie sheet, large saucepot, some sort of processor (i use an immersion blender, but a normal blender or food processor would work nicely too).

half of a butternut squash
half of a cooking pumpkin
one box of vegetable stock
4 small potatoes
1 cup half & half
honey
cinnamon, nutmeg, cayenne pepper, various other spices as you wish.

cut the pumpkin and squash in half. remove the seeds and pulp. rub with olive oil and bake for 20-30 minutes. just enough to soften them up. while they're baking, peel and quarter the potatoes. when the gourds are softened up, cut, peel, and cut them into chunks. this takes a while and some serious elbow grease. make sure you have a sharp knife and some patience.

add the vegetable stock and vegetables to the sauce pan. sprinkle cinnamon over the mixture enough to leave a thin film. boil them as if you were making mashed potatoes. when done, process them somehow (here's where my immersion blender came in handy.) blend it all together in the sauce pot, adding the cup of cream. vegan folks, i reckon you could use soy milk?

ladle into bowls with a teaspoon (or so) of honey. a little cayenne pepper really makes it great.

the previous recipe, i didn't use a pumpkin. i used a few sweet potatoes and the whole butternut squash instead. the regular potatoes gave it a better texture in my humble opinion, but she said the sweet potatoes made it sweeter (and thus better). you be the judge.

enjoy.

cookeration

it seems when i plan to make a meal, it doesn't turn out the way i expect it in my mind. leftover vodka sauce, frozen for months, on frozen gnocchi turned out to be a far better meal than the night i first made the sauce. unplanned meals lately turned out pretty well. thought i'd share.

recipe one. ok, so it's not a meal, but it's a damn fine vegetable side dish. ingredients, two tomatoes, one small onion sliced thinly, three cloves of garlic minced, scallions, olive oil, rice vinegar. almost forgot, a pound of string beans. first, clean and cut the beans. sautee the onions, garlic, and scallions in oil in a skillet. when the onions carmelize, add the beans and cover. cut tomatoes into bite-sized chunks. when skillet lid is steamed up and beans begin to sweat, add tomatoes. turn down heat. cook beans to your liking, i like 'em crispy. turn off heat, toss with rice vinegar. serve on side. even better the second and third day.

recipe two. this one's a product of actually learning from a reality show on how to play with flavors. ingredients, chicken breasts, bacon, coconut shavings, fresh pineapple, onion, garlic, vegetable oil, rice. butterfly the breasts and roll with bacon. skewer them with toothpicks or skewers to hold their shape. sautee onions, garlic, pineapple, coconut and about a half-cup of rum in oil (onions and garlic first, then add the remaining ingredients). when alcohol has cooked off, put chicken in pan, and cover. turn down heat. cook 'til chicken's done. serve with rice and the sauce. it wasn't perfect. i'm going to try to get it together into some sort of casserole so the flavors all go together better. the sauce it cooked in was great, the chicken was a little tough. needed the flavor of the sauce.

bon appetit!

inspiration

the new season of top chef appeared unknowingly on my dvr last night. i admit it. it is the only reality show i'll admit to watching. i apparently programmed it months ago for the new episodes only. for those of you not in the know, it's survivor meets iron chef. a cooking competition. budding chefs vie for a feature in wine and food magazine and exactly $100,000,000,000. i may be a little off on that figure...

one of the features i've figured out on this show is that a lot of fancy chefs merely reimagine classic dishes with flair. there are several flavors you don't want to overdo, as they'll compete with one another. sweet. salty. spicy. you wouldn't put strong versions of any of these together. i'm still trying to figure out how to balance these competing flavors when i create on the fly.

tonight as i watched that episode of top chef, i tried again. mostly because i forgot my climbing stuff to go to the gym on my way home, but partly from television inspiration. ingredients. a whole chicken. two sweet potatoes. a can of french onion soup. brown rice. black pepper. garlic. cooked the rice, mixed it all together, shoved it in the chicken, and spread it around the chicken in my casserole dish. cooked it for an hour and change. screwed up by cooking it upside down, but it turned out pretty damn good. i might just have to make it again sometime.

when i have a guest or three...