Some Kitchen Stories (new blog!)

This is a new project I’ve been working on with my buddy/co-worker Nicole. She’s an amazing photographer and designer (see: header of this blog) and has been sweet enough to provide me with some of her work in the past- first as art for my kitchen and then photos of recipes I used in the cookbook I made for my mom and a few friends last Christmas.

She’s always looking for new food subjects to photograph and since she lives so close to the office, we came up with an idea:

- Meet at her apartment once or twice a week.

- Cook something delicious.

- She takes the pictures.

- I write something up and post them.

I knew immediately that I didn’t want to go the traditional route of food blogging- mostly because there are so many people out there who already do it far better than I ever could (just check out our Sources/Inspiration list on the new blog to find them). I wanted to do something fun- something that played more to my strengths just like Nicole did with hers. Her boyfriend Mike, an amazing illustrator, was generous enough to do the header and the background for us. Nicole and Mike have been working on the design for a while but it’s ready! It’s finally ready!

Each post is written as an excerpt of a story. It’s kind of like flipping through a novel and reading a scene. The recipe is slipped into the scene somewhere- sometimes it’ll be the focus, other times it will just be in the background.

And… I’m super excited about this- there will be one recurring storyline. Every once in a while, we’ll check back in on “Smitty & The Girl” to find out what’s the latest in a small (fictional) Cliffwood diner named Smitty’s. Missed a few episodes? Just click on “Smitty & The Girl” in the main nav to get caught up!

If we got the recipe from a blog, we’ll cite the blog and talk a little bit about why you should read that blog (because love begets love) as well as our own.

We hope you like it! Visit http://somekitchenstories.com/.

Apropros of nothing

Is this not the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?

Katie Quinn Davies

If I were a photographer of food stuffs, What Katie Ate would make me just throw up my hands and stop trying. NOPE. DONE. NO THANK YOU. Some works inspire, some are just so extraordinary that they make you feel like you’ll truly never see better. Or do better yourself. I’ll just go train monkeys now or something. And now I need to go buy Nutella. Thanks a lot, Katie.

“This is not Thanksgiving.”

Our friend Habs is throwing Thanksgiving this year. It will be a Very Foodie Thanksgiving for these two primary reasons:

1) She lives in Portland, Maine. (Last year’s Foodiest Town in America, I love that such a thing exists.)

2) Habs is pretty much our Martha Stewart. She loves to host. And Thanksgiving, as we all know, is The Hostess Olympics. I might make one of those backstory videos to play before the meal.

We just had a discussion over IM about the big dinner. I am absolutely positive it will be delicious because, like Martha Stewart, Habs will expect nothing less. And she is quite skilled at cooking.  The word “souffle” was tossed around, for God’s sake. And she’s making homemade pop tarts, which I’ve been dreaming about for months- ever since I said, “Uh, can we come to Thanksgiving? And can you please make these when we get there?”

All this delicious food and company (my brother is coming!) will be worth the NINETEEN HOUR DRIVE that Liz, Adam and I will endure with the two dogs. 19 hours. Each way. Let that sink in for a second… Yeah, there it is.  I’m determined to think of it like sitting on a moving beach for a long day, when I’m not driving. Books, CDs, napping, movies on the laptop. Whatever, it’ll be worth it.

But. But. After all this discussion, all this back-and-forth, recipe swapping, INA or DEB debating, Bon Appetit referencing, I had to bring up The Issue. Which is… no homemade cranberry sauce.

I feel like, as a nation, we need to come together on this once and for all. In fact, I’d like to see a mandate from President Obama (a declaration, if you will) that it’s just not Thanksgiving if the cranberry sauce doesn’t come from a can. It needs to be smooth, there needs to be lines, it needs to be purchased from a major supermarket. Every year, the Food Network and Epicurious gamely trot out the homemade stuff. They show you pans of popping cranberries and orange slices and sieves galore. Beautiful bowls of the stuff. Beautiful bowls that the guests will begrudgingly eat. Cranberry relish. Ugh.

Cranberry sauce was one of the few things we never had from scratch growing up, crowded around the Thanksgiving table. In fact, if 10 year old me had suggested it to my harried mother, maker of beautiful, delicious meals and four large Italian-American children, I’m pretty sure I would’ve ended up in the oven next to the stuffing. Who had time to make that along with everything else? Just open the can and shut up. And I wouldn’t have complained anyway because it was sugary sweet, like a sturdier Jell-O, and foreign in its jiggle and just the right consistency all nestled up next to the turkey IS IT THANKSGIVING YET OMG.

Luckily, Habs agrees. For all her fancy food-work (ha. wordplay), she insists we’ll have canned cranberry sauce (smooth, lined) which is good because I wouldn’t want her to face us if she tried anything different. She actually got all feisty about her own hatred of the homemade stuff. God love her.

Photo credit: Tracilyn on Flickr

Momowhatyousay?

Choosing food as a hobby can be tough.

It is, first of all, a decidedly first-world, middle-class exercise- turning a basic necessity (something that is in huge demand in massive parts of the globe where people are starving- yes, I know, but thanks for reminding me Smug Pretenso in my Brain) into an instrument of fun and joy. It’s a little bit like using a Faberge egg as a doorstop on your yacht. So you automatically sound like an asshole whenever you talk about it. Opinions like this feel completely justified. (And yet, at the exact same time, leave me alone, dude. Am I breaking into your apartment and force-feeding you beef jerky that I JUST MADE HOMEMADE OMG I AM AMAZING. No? Then shut up.) (Also, you wish I was doing that. Don’t kid yourself. It’s homemade beef jerky, are you made of stone?) (I have never made beef jerky.)

I’ve learned to accept this. As I stand in Whole Foods next to a woman who is trying to feed her child organic soy nuts instead of the name brand Cheerios his small body is craving with every fiber of his tiny being, I catch her eye and I sigh to myself, “I am just as bad.” I might be worse because I actually cannot afford to eat like this and I do anyway. I am the peasant who just spent all her gold coin on a mirror so she can gaze at herself. And then she dies of typhus.

Anyway. I cook so much that one of the side effects is that I don’t really get excited about dishes anymore. In truth, looking for new stuff to try, to fold into your budget, into your week can be a little exhausting. And discouraging. Add to that the “status” aspect of being into food (going to the newest restaurant just to say you’ve been, finding the underground places before anyone else so you can be That Guy, flashing around your knowledge of wine and what goes with what) and the competitive aspect (who can make what better and blah blah blah) and meeting people who turn their noses up at Taco Bell (if you showed up with a Nacho Bell Grande right now, I would kiss you on the mouth), the same people who aren’t sure what a “TV” is, well… sometimes you just want to give it all up. Go back to canned soup and tuna noodle casserole and Hamburger Helper.

So, when I tell you my elation over this little snippet about Christina Tosi from New York’s Momfuku Milk Bar, I think you’ll see why. I think you’ll believe me. How precious is she? And how badly do you want to make that Crack Pie?

For a pastry chef who runs one of America’s most exciting bakeries, Christina Tosi has very peculiar taste.

Before the 28-year-old made a name for herself at Momofuku Milk Bar in New York, she was just a little girl in Virginia eating lima beans with ranch dressing, Doritos sandwiches with Miracle Whip, Kraft Macaroni & Cheese mixed together with SpaghettiOs—and very little else. “I had a different perspective on food,” she says. “I knew my combinations, and I knew what I liked.” Lucky for us, her mom, her aunts, and her grandmothers were all avid bakers. “My mom let me eat cookie dough—until it got out of hand,” says Tosi. “That’s when I decided that I needed to figure out how to make it myself.”

That drive propelled her through culinary school, tours of duty as a pastry chef in the kitchens of New York’s Bouley and WD~50, and then on to David Chang’s Momofuku Noodle Bar and Ssäm Bar—where she got her big break. Tosi baked goodies for the staff and so impressed Chang that he tapped her to run his pastry shop, Momofuku Milk Bar. Today, Tosi and her team create all of the desserts served throughout the six-restaurant Momofuku empire. Chang is a mad genius and a rule breaker, and he encouraged Tosi to break a few rules of her own. While other pastry chefs scoured the world for the finest fleur de sel and stone-ground chocolate, Tosi looked to the city’s bodegas for inspiration. She grabbed bags of pretzels, potato chips, and marshmallows and boxes of cornflakes and oats and dry milk powder. These pedestrian ingredients ended up in bizarre creations like cornflake-infused milk; ooey, gooey, and addictive “Crack Pie” with a buttery oatmeal cookie crust; “Compost Cookies” spiked with pretzels, coffee grounds, potato chips, and who-knows-what-else; and towering malted chocolate layer cakes stuffed with charred marshmallows.

Few had seen (or eaten) desserts like these before. They were insane—and they were also insanely good. The key to all this delicious madness? Limitations. “Restrictions help with creativity,” says Tosi. “You have to learn to make something out of nothing. How creative can you get?”

Sounds like a challenge to us.

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Stove Room

Last night marked the first time I’ve been able to cook since the Big Move and ho, fruit of my labor, I have missed you so. I’d been feeling sick and off the last few days and I think it’s been the weeks of stress-eating (donuts, hamburgers, that last night of Pompeii).

But no more! The kitchen is unpacked, food has been purchased and my days of force-feeding hot dogs and pasta bowls (soooo tough) are over.  Which brings me to the best part of my new abode:

A stove room. A room for the stove. In an attic apartment brimming with oddities, this is perhaps the biggest and oddest. (If you look closely, you can see the yet-to-be-hung holder of wedding invitations. Hellllppp)

But seriously?  The stove room is MAGIC. It gets hot when the stove or oven is used but the rest of the kitchen stays cool! It’s incredible! And look, I can keep my pots close at hand! A POTS ROOM. A room for my POTS.

So, yes, I don’t have a bedroom closet and have to keep my clothes and shoes in the living room. Who cares?! A room for my POTS!

I celebrated last night by making this-

Scalloped Tomatoes with Croutons (Ina via Smitten Kitchen)

Nicole Did It

Working at a design company has its advantages- the BEST one by far is being able to politely and reverently request that one of the extremely talented designers working with you make something like, oh I don’t know, your own personal blog header. Or Twitter background. Or a Moving Announcement card.

This is Nicole. This is Nicole’s work. Revel in her awesomeness. REVEL.

I am, at this moment, probably Nicole’s biggest fan and non-paying supporter of her work (she’s so thrilled, I’m sure- cha-ching!) as I have the aforementioned blog header, moving announcement which was just sent to everyone I’ve ever met in my life and also four of her food-photo prints hanging in my kitchen (well, I just moved so by “hanging” I mean, leaning against the wall in the living room, mocking me). I am the cheap-ass, opportunistic Medici to her Michelangelo. Please buy her stuff so that I feel somewhat useful.

True Story

Photo Credit: Magda.Indigo

The meanest thing anyone ever said to me was that I smelled like garlic when I slept.

It was my college roommate and it was in response to how much of the stuff I was currently using in my cooking in our apartment (I’m Italian. Garlic is air.) “I can smell it when you’re sleeping,” she sniffed derisively. Which a) is creepy and b) I was SO upset to hear this. Does anyone want to hear this? That they’re some kind of freak who secretes garlic FUMES from their body as they sleep?

This morning, I made an egg white omelette and I must’ve used more garlic than I thought because as I pulled it from the microwave (reheated at the office), I whispered to myself, “garlicky thunder.” Yes. I actually said this to myself. No, I don’t know why but I’ve been laughing at it to myself ever since. I highly recommend trying it, especially in a whisper.

In case you were wondering…

Garlicky Thunder Omelette

2 Egg Whites

Salt and Pepper

Broccolini (3 stems)

Garlic (minced)

Olive Oil

Saute broccolini in pan with a drizzle of oil, covered until cooked through and a bit limp. Add garlic. Whisk together egg whites. Remove broccolini, oil pan, and cook egg whites until firm on bottom. Slip broccolini and garlic on top, fold into omelette. Whisper “garlicky thunder” as you decimate your delicious breakfast.

Homemade Granola

Molly Wizenberg’s recipe for granola in Bon Appetit- she kind of warns you in the article but I’m going to make it a touch more obvious:

DO NOT MAKE THIS IF YOU WANT TO BUY GRANOLA EVER AGAIN.

And… exhale.

Seriously. You will never, ever buy granola again. And now I have to add “makes her own granola” to the list of things I can’t say out loud, lest I sound like a total asshole. Thanks a lot, Molly.

Everyday Granola by Molly Wizenberg

3 cups old-fashioned oats

1 cup coarsely chopped pecans

1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut*

3 tablespoons (packed) brown sugar

3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon (generous) salt

1/3 cup honey

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1 cup assorted dried fruit

Preheat oven to 300°F. Line rimmed baking sheet with parchment. Mix first 7 ingredients in large bowl. Stir honey and oil in saucepan over medium-low heat until smooth. Pour honey mixture over oat mixture; toss. Spread on prepared sheet. Bake until golden, stirring every 10 minutes, about 40 minutes. Place sheet on rack. Stir granola; cool. Mix in fruit. DO AHEAD: Can be made 1 week ahead. Store airtight.

* Available at specialty foods stores and natural foods stores.

Eat by the handful. Ignore judgy looks from dog.