SobaAddict70

Fried heirloom tomatoes with filfel chuma, garlic and parsley; sourdough whole wheat bread Fagiulini spilusieddi ("imaginative green beans", or green beans with slow-cooked onion, wild arugula and mint), cold roast chicken

Spicy carrot salad (page 65, from the "Jerusalem" cookbook by Yotam Ottolenghi). Also had leftover roast chicken but I'll spare you a pic of that. Tonight's menu is still in the planning stages, but there will be fried tomatoes with garlic (page 50) to start.

1 very large ancho chile, soaked in boiling water for 30 minutes, covered, until softened cayenne pepper, sweet paprika, ground cumin and caraway seeds dry-roasted in a 10" skillet over medium-low heat the recipe instructs ground caraway but I left them whole looks a bit like this afterwards. I could have ground the caraway seeds but I wanted some textural interest. after the 30 minutes are up, trim and remove the seeds from the ancho, then slice into chunks. process the ground spices, garlic cloves, ancho chile and sea salt in a food processor. I halved the amount of garlic...20 garlic cloves is a bit much, don't you think? particularly when the cloves are quite "fat" for lack of a better adjective. process for a little bit, then add about 5 tablespoons safflower oil (I subbed olive oil). spoon pipelchuma into a sterilized jar, then cover with oil. keeps in the fridge for up to one month. the marinating liquid consists of pipelchuma, sugar, cider vinegar, caraway seed, ground cumin and slow-cooked onion Spicy carrot salad (page 65). You'll note the carrots were left whole (these are baby carrots), instead of being sliced into coins. This was a nice alternative to the usual Moroccan or North African carrot salad I'm more familiar with.

it's a combination blender/food processor. brand is Cuisinart. this is a decidedly non-tech kitchen. I finally broke down after years of resistance and decided I wanted a blender for my birthday last year. so, I will concede that it's useful for some things; it's not something I like to admit. being a luddite is my own issue.

it's a marketing term to differentiate eggs from chickens raised in a factory-farm vs. eggs from chickens raised at a small family farm (the kind of vendors you see at farmers' markets in many cities in the U.S.) that's all. it's something you will see me use all the time, but unless you have that background knowledge, I agree it can be confusing.

rotuts: occasionally I'll stop by the Papaya King near my apartment and order some tater tots fresh from the deep-fryer, topped with fried peppers and onion. one of my guilty (food) secrets. Radishes, chicken skin chicharrón, crispy bacon, peach chutney The radishes were blanched, then fried in bacon drippings (that had a little black mustard seeds tossed in until the seeds started to spit and pop). The peach chutney is from Beth's Farm Kitchen. Chicken salad sandwich (leftover roast chicken, chive mayonnaise, celery salt, black pepper, finely minced scallion, finely diced celery), heirloom tomatoes

I don't have much experience with chicken salad. I think I've had it at most, less than a handful of times since I was a kid. :blink: Hard to believe, no? Salade parisienne doesn't really count as "chicken salad", of the type that I'm thinking of; it sometimes has chicken but the resemblance ends there. So, just like in the potato salad thread, I'll be cooking my way through this one eventually...Exhibit A will be JAZ's chicken salad tonight. I'll be making the mayonnaise from scratch too. How do you like to make yours?

In fact, I could probably come up with a handful of ideas w/r/t duck fat given enough time. For instance, I love the thought of using duck fat instead of butter when making scrambled eggs.

Looks awesome.

Would you be open to a bean salad that had, say, green beans, chickpeas and white beans, and had a slightly sweet dressing? Bacon might be involved. I'm playing around with ideas in my head at the moment. Green beans will probably start appearing in a few weeks, after which I'll be able to test a few things. When I say "slightly sweet", I mean 1 tablespoon sugar at most, although I might end up with something that uses the natural sugar present in fruit and vegetables instead of refined table sugar.

I could probably get Sichuan roast duck if I knew which restaurants had them in NYC's (Manhattan) Chinatown. I put Manhattan in parentheses because the City has two other Chinatowns, one in Queens and a less well-known nabe in Brooklyn. The one I'm referring to is predominantly (or maybe "was" is the operative word now) Cantonese, but seems to be majority Fuzhounese these days with a Cantonese minority. Most of the restaurants I'm familiar with are Cantonese though, and so those are the ones I go to.

this thread is going to make me want to schlep to Chinatown one of these days and get some Cantonese roast duck. maybe this weekend, come to think of it. it's been a while since I went to Noodletown. I can pick up a duck on the way home....

BTW Ashen, it's not often that pix of red meat make me hungry but yours did.

Castelvetrano olive tapenade and fromage blanc crostini Castelvetrano olive tapenade: Castelvetrano olives, capers, lemon zest, garlic, anchovy, fresh thyme, olive oil, Italian parsley, scallions, cayenne. Adapted from One Good Dish by David Tanis. Roasted asparagus, heirloom tomato salad, soft-cooked egg Asparagus: asparagus spears tossed with olive oil, sea salt and black pepper, then roasted at 350 F for 10 minutes. Heirloom tomato salad: chopped heirloom tomatoes dressed in an herb vinaigrette. Vinaigrette: 1 tablespoon minced shallot macerated in 2 tablespoons lemon juice and a pinch of sea salt for 5 minutes; whisked in 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil and some minced oregano leaves and chives, seasoned to taste with black pepper. Roast chicken, tatsoi with ginger and almonds Chicken: rubbed with a 1:1 mixture of sea salt and black pepper on the inside and outside, then roasted for 1 hour at 375 F. Tatsoi: tatsoi, garlic, ginger, olive oil, almonds, water, soy sauce, white pepper and sesame oil. Strawberries with rose sugar, heavy cream and black pepper

Dinner's already set in stone for the next couple of nights (you'll see why when I post to the Dinner thread later), but I'll probably be making the couscous with tomato and onion (page 129) this week. Seems like I'll have to visit Kalustyan's to get pomegranate molasses, barberries and za'taar.

Chard with yogurt, tahini and buttered pine nuts (from "Jerusalem: A Cookbook", pages 88-89) Baby carrots, with young onion and radishes About 5 ripe tomatoes (3 heirloom tomatoes and 2 Jersey tomatoes), quartered I cooked them, covered, over medium-high heat until they broke down, then added 1/4 cup water and simmered the resulting sauce over low heat until thickened. Then added sea salt and black pepper to taste, and 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil. Penne with summer tomato sauce (the green stuff are finely minced tops from a couple of young onions; they're not as harsh as scallions and provide just a hint of allium) In other news, here are some edible organic pesticide-free roses I sterilized a jar, then partially filled the jar with rose petals. Then filled it with some heated white wine vinegar. The jar will sit in a cool, dark place for 4-6 weeks, whereupon it will become rose petal vinegar. To be continued...

true, but I cook for one 99% of the time; very often, a 10" will work just as well. it also does depend on whatever it is I'm making. if I'm sautéing LOTS OF THINGS (I know that's terribly vague), then I'll switch to a larger pan. that kind of recognition comes with practice though; the OP will eventually acquire it in time as his skills improve.

There's even a recipe for brik...oh wow. Wowie wow wow. It's calling my name...

It's a non-stick 10" pan. Tramontina is the maker. I use whatever works for me. I don't have a preference. Not sure if that answers your question.

That was a first course. I doubt very much I'll dislike anything in this cookbook. I adore the flavors emblematic of Middle Eastern cuisine; their profiles already appear in much of my cooking and it's a vegetable-heavy genre, which is a huge plus. I'll probably be making this again; I can see it as part of brunch, for instance. I really want to make maqluba as my first major project. It's a "cake" made from eggplant, tomatoes, rice, chicken thighs and spices. The rice is the "batter" that seals everything together, and all of the ingredients are cooked in a spice-infused chicken stock. Unfortunately that will have to wait until later in the year since eggplant is not yet available at USGM.

Probably hothouse-grown, but it's the same vendor that has that huge stall near the southwestern corner of the park -- today they had just about every kind of summer green imaginable and baby carrots, asparagus and beets. The tomatoes have been awesome.

Here, you see 2 tablespoons tahini in a measuring cup. I typically cook for one person so all quantities listed in this thread are halved or as close to that as possible, for those of you who are following along but don't have the book. To that, add 1 tablespoon lemon juice, a little crushed garlic (I used half a clove), 2 tablespoons yogurt (Ottolenghi calls for Greek yogurt, but I subbed regular plain yogurt) and a tablespoon or so of water. Whisk until smooth, like so: Reserve the sauce. Next, take your chard and trim it. This is about half a large bunch of chard; I used part of it for the first demo in the Sauteeing Vegetables thread. Trim the chard; Ottolenghi instructs you to separate the stems from the leaves. This is relatively immature chard so the stems aren't nearly as tough as they normally would be. I could have kept the chard whole, but separated them anyway. I blanched them in lightly salted simmering water, then shocked them in ice water and squeezed out the liquid, like so: This is 1 tablespoon unsalted butter and 1 tablespoon olive oil. Melt the butter and add 2 tablespoons pine nuts once the butter foams. Toast the nuts and lift out with a slotted spoon; set aside and reserve. This is about 1/2 large clove garlic, sliced thinly. Add to the pot or pan with the butter-oil mixture; fry until the garlic turns color, then add 1/4 cup white wine. Cook until the wine has reduced by nearly two-thirds, then whisk in 1 tablespoon unsalted butter and add the chard. Cook the chard until it's warmed through. Taste for salt and pepper. Remove from heat, then divide chard amongst warmed serving bowls. Top with tahini-yogurt sauce. Sprinkle with pine nuts. Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil and garnish with a touch of paprika, if you like. Chard with tahini, yogurt and buttered pine nuts (pages 88-89) Time: About 30-35 minutes, including prep.

I searched for "Jerusalem" and didn't get any results. Anyway, someone will fix it sooner or later.

Sure. Maybe one of those will be tonight.

After USGM, I went over to a Barnes & Noble and bought which I've been wanting to get for a long, long time. My partner, B, has their book "Plenty" which came out in May 2010. I considered buying that, but it didn't "grab" me the same way that this one did. I'm dreaming about making a few things right off the bat, like for instance, maqluba (page 127), sabih (page 91), charred okra with tomato, garlic and preserved lemon (page 74) and roast chicken with clementines and arak (page 179). I'm looking forward to cooking my way through this book. Anyone want to join me?