Apology for lack of posts!
March 31, 2008
Since I know you all wait anxiously for my postings (sure), I’m sorry that this month has been an extremely slow month. I have been put on a new project at work (good for my day job, bad for my hobbies) and basically have no desire to get in front of a computer once I get home.
Though the blogging is slower, I assure you the cooking and experimentation has not. It’s becoming a weekend tradition that Saturday night through all day Sunday acts as the unofficial bread/cookie baking time of the week. I have been humbled by the amount of time and commitment it takes to bake a great loaf of bread – Jim Lahey and Steve Sullivan, I bow to your awesomeness.
Therefore, I have not had the time to give all of my projects the blogging attention they rightfully deserve. I still want to share what we’ve been up to with you though so I have decided to start a Flickr account and put up pictures with captions of our food in lieu of holding out until I can write about them.
I hope to have it up some time this week, so look out for it in the right hand pane of your browser.
For now, I leave you with two random picks of my recent babies, salted soft pretzels and homemade Oreos á la Deb of the wonderful Smitten Kitchen.
Trip to Tampa
March 15, 2008
Party of Two, Part Two
March 7, 2008
This post is part of a two part series on our Super Bowl party for two. To see the kick-off post - pun(t) intended - click here. I crack myself up 
As opposed to the poisson cru, this dish is more along the lines of traditional Super Bowl party fare and can just as easily be made for twenty as it is for two.
Part Two: Triple P Skins
The ingredient list for this recipe is made up of things that we always have on hand in our kitchen. Potatoes are a near perfect blank canvas for you to use your imagination with whatever you have in your refrigerator. C’mon, it’s potato, cheese, and meat. You can’t really mess it up.
Different pairs I can think of off the top off my head:
- smoked Gouda and thick cut double smoked bacon
- extra sharp cheddar and bacon
- Gruyère and crisped prosciutto
Let me know if you think of any more yummy combos. I would be happy to experiment and have you over to taste test In the meantime, here’s the recipe for our Triple P Skins.
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Triple P Skins (aka Pancetta Pepper Jack Potato Skins)
makes 8 skins
1-2 tablespoons olive oil
4 medium sized Russet potatoes, scrubbed
1 cup shredded pepper jack cheese
1/4 pound of pancetta, fried, crumbled, and drained on a paper towel
2 scallion stalks, greens and whites chopped
freshly cracked black pepper
sour cream
Preheat the oven to 400F degrees and set a rack in the middle of the oven. Rub the potatoes with the olive oil and place on a baking sheet. Bake the potatoes for about 45 minutes or until fork tender.
Remove the potatoes from the oven and let them cool until they can be handled. Slice potatoes in half lengthwise and scoop out the insides. Reserve the innards for another use. How much potato you choose to leave behind in the shell depends on your preference but I would suggest not taking out so much that the shell can’t handle the filling and gets soggy or limp when picked up.
Lay the potato skins on a baking sheet and fill them evenly with the cheese and pancetta. Season them with black pepper to taste. Bake in a 450F degree oven until the cheese is bubbly and as toasted as you’d like. This will probably take 10-15 minutes.
Let the potatoes cool a bit before topping with sour cream and scallions.
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By the way, remember the innards you saved? There are tons of different things you could do with them. Potato salad, mashed potatoes, hash browns, etc… In our case, we made a quick patatas bravas!
Yes, that is the Spanish Wikipedia page for patatas bravas translated through Google. My favorite line is where it says the potatoes are “accompanied by a spicy tomato sauce that is poured over the potatoes using the entire body warm.” Doesn’t that just sound so dirty??
Well I dunno about all that hooplah but this is our quick version. Heat a tablespoon of butter in a large skillet. Once it foams, add the potatoes and a tablespoon of paprika and a ½ teaspoon of salt. If the mixture looks dry, add a pat of butter at a time until desired crispness/fry is achieved. Serve with ketchup.
Party of Two, Part One
March 6, 2008
The next few postings will be about the Super Bowl party Jason and I threw this year. Attendees: Jason and I. Yes, we decided to make it a low key day and just had a “party” for two! The first of 4 dishes that we decided to make was something near and dear to our hearts.
Dish 1: Poisson Cru
Jason and I literally ate poisson cru every single day while we were on our honeymoon in Tahiti. It’s a simple dish; basically a tropical version of ceviche. We were taught how to make it when we went on a motu picnic in Moorea and the locals did a demonstration for us on the beach. Our version was a valiant effort at recreating it, but there was something that just wasn’t right. Perhaps it was the fact that we had to buy our coconut from the supermarket versus scavenge for it below the large palm trees. Or that the tuna was not caught the same morning we bought it. Or it could have just been the lack of warm sand between my toes
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Poisson Cru
2-3 tablespoons of salt
1/2 pound sushi grade tuna, diced
1/2 an English cucumber, diced
2 plum tomatoes, seeded and diced
milk from 1 fresh coconut (instructions on extraction below) or 1/2 can of coconut milk
juice from 1 lime
Mix salt with cold water in a large bowl. Swish tuna around in the salt water for a few minutes and then drain. Add the rest of the ingredients to the tuna and mix well. Salt to taste. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes to allow the flavors to meld before eating.
* Jason just mentioned that he thinks there were onions in the poisson cru we had in Tahiti. I vaguely recall that but am not 100% sure. I will add a bit of diced onion to the mix next time and see if that makes a difference.
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And now we’ll stop here to talk about the opening of the coconut. Yes, it will take you a few seconds to look through the photos and say to yourself, “Hey self! That’s easy. I could totally do that.” And yes friends, I will encourage and support you because you can. But please trust that it took us (i.e. mostly Jason) at least 20 minutes to do it all from start to finish. There was also heavy grunting and sweating involved and not the good kind.
How to Open a Coconut Without Having to Use Power Tools according to our ingenuity and years of watching MacGyver
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Gather the appropriate tools. For the sake of your health and those partaking in the final dish with you, I recommend sanitizing them first. In our case, a hammer, screw driver, kitchen towel, and pliers were necessary.
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Hammer the screwdriver into the holes found on top of the coconut. Keep in mind that you have to puncture at least two for air flow reasons, but three makes the water come out quicker.
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Drain out the coconut water from the holes.
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This is not pictured because I was hiding for safety reasons but once the coconut is drained, wrap it in a towel you most likely will not use again. Then beat the heck out of the coconut with the hammer. This picture is a breathing point between the beatings. Half of the outer layer came off and Jason thought he had triumped. Alas, not so simple so back tothe beating he went. As you can imagine, this step will involve heavy cursing so parental discretion is advised.
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Now you need to grab the pliers and use it to pick out the meat. In fact here, you only see half of the coconut because the other section is in several little pieces. I won half the battle.
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Shred the meat with a grater. Strike that. If you’re smarter than me, use a food processor or blender. Trust me; your knuckles will thank you.
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This next step is not pictured at all because by the end, Jason needed a rest. Gather the shredded meat into a sheet of cheesecloth, twist tightly, and squeeze the juice. Oh you ran out of cheesecloth last time you used it to drain your homemade stock? Well so did we. So you can do like we did and use one of Jason’s old (but clean) white t-shirts. The shirt will become another victim to your culinary foray though and will
most likelydefinitely need to be thrown away.
Was it worth it? Honestly, if we had a fresher coconut it probably would have been. The coconut we got was shrink wrapped and had an off smell so I was a bit disappointed. Next time I make this, I will probably use canned coconut milk unless I can find a good supplier of fresh coconut. If anybody knows of a good purveyor, please let me know!
Good luck and maruuru!