The Side of All Sides

When asparagus season sneaks up on you, you know warm weather is here to stay.  You can pack the sweaters and fleeces away and break out your open toed shoes.  And the thing is, when asparagus season, and thus, warm weather is here, you probably don’t want to crank up your oven to 400 and roast those little green spears.

Dear readers,

I found a better way.

Chop up an ounce or two or three of pancetta, or bacon, if that’s all you have.  Cook on a skillet till brown and crispy.  Remove, bacon to another plate, reserving the fat in the pan.  Measure out 1/3 C panko breadcrumbs (this is way more because my hand slipped).  Acting quickly, add the panko, stir once or twice till crumbs turn brown (this happens almost instantly), and remove pan from heat.  Remove panko from skillet.  Give the pan a swirl of olive oil or a pat of butter and set it back over heat.  Place one bunch asparagus in skillet, and cook over high heat for a couple of minutes, say, 5.  Layer asparagus, salt, pepper, panko, and bacon on a serving plate.  Dig in to the best thing to happen since, well, roasted asparagus.

There’s Something About the Beach

Something that lingers in the salt air that slows you down.

Last night, I fell asleep to the sound of the waves.  I woke up to the sunrise over the ocean.  And things felt right.

It started raining just before noon, but I wasn’t fazed.  I was off to the grocery store and well-equipped to spend the day cooking.

You know when people tell you why French women don’t get fat?  Because they go to the market each morning, buying only what they need for that night’s dinner?  It’s a charmed existence.  It’s also my existence at the beach.

Of course, instead of buying fresh baguette, I’m buying cheese balls.

But on a recent trip, I picked up some produce, and realized what I wanted more than anything else in the world was roasted vegetables for lunch.

So i went home, cranked up the oven (400), and set to cooking.  I halved some potatoes (40 minutes), and chopped up some broccoli (25 minutes), and that was pretty much it.  I thought I would douse the whole mixture in pesto, but once the oven timer went off, all it took was some salt, pepper, Parmesan, and a squeeze of lemon.

There’s this book, What We Eat When We Eat Alone, and I love the idea of it.  What kinds of food do you eat when it’s just you?  When you don’t have to think about anyone else’s palate?  When all bets are off?

Why Are We Here?

While I am certain I can’t help you with that question in a broad sense, dear readers, I can shed some light on why we’re here on this little blog.

Well, why I’m here.

The other day, a friend asked me why I started A Glass of Milk.  And I told her that I did it to keep track of all the recipes I was making.  They’re from cookbooks, other blogs, torn out magazine pages, and of course, family members.  So this was a way to round everything up into one little spot online.

But when I go back through my old posts, I realize there’s another reason.

Even if I didn’t know it then.  I’m here so I can remember.  This blog now houses three years’ worth of memories.  Three years’ worth of birthdays and holidays.  And three years’ worth of everydays.  Three years’ worth of evenings where I didn’t feel like making a real dinner, so I made something appetizer-y instead.

This is one of those meals.

It’s every bit as memorable as the show-stoppers I pull out on the big days.  Especially when the juices are sopped up with some of this.

I made it after I heard Joy and Tracy talking about it on their podcast.  Joy mentioned that it was the perfect dish to bring to a potluck.  I had all the ingredients ready to go when I hosted a potluck of my own.  And then the whole making sure everyone had a full glass thing got in the way, and I never actually made it.  Till one random night when I didn’t want to make a high maintenance dinner.

Sure, you could make this and entertain a crowd of vegetarians, or gluten-free guests.  Or, you could make it for yourself, while nursing a bottle of wine, and wearing your fuzzy slippers, and swinging by the table for just one more bite as the evening wears on.  It’s your choice.

To make enough for a little gathering, or for one, you will need:

• 1 pound cremini, or white mushrooms, the larger ones cut in half
• 2 T capers, drained, rinsed, and chopped (I didn’t have these, so left them out)
• 3 large garlic cloves, minced
• 2 T vegetable oil
• 3 T unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 2 tsp. lemon juice
• 1/4 C chopped flat leaf parsley, although chives wouldn’t be too bad either

Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.  Toss mushrooms with capers, garlic, and oil, and a pinch of salt and generous pinch of pepper.  Pour in an oven-proof dish and top with pats of butter.  Roast, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms brown, and sauce below is bubbly, 15-20 minutes.  Stir in lemon juice and parsley and serve immediately.

 

Dress Up Your Veggies

On any given night, vegetables take a back seat to whatever main dish graces the stage at our house.  I need some nudging if I’m going to go the extra mile with the green portion of my plate.

But the other day, on my never-ending quest to de-clutter, (Seriously people, what is the secret to keeping crap off horizontal spaces?) I came across Grandma Glass of Milk’s recipe for green beans.

I had forgotten how much I love this dish.  *Hides head in shame.*  To make up for a couple years without them, I’ve eaten them pretty much every day for the past two weeks.  It helps that the farmer’s market is overflowing with baskets of green beans right now.

Grandma Glass of Milk’s green beans are dressed up with sauteed onions, and tomatoes, splashed with red wine vinegar, and cooked for a flash just to lose that little bit of crunch they hold.  They’re simple, but inspired.

And when your main dish is something you could make with your eyes closed, then use the 5 minutes you found to dress up your veggies.

To make a side for 4, you will need:

• A bunch of green beans
• 4 T unsalted butter (don’t tell my Grandma, but more often than not, I only use 2)
• half an onion, finely chopped
• salt
• pepper
• 1 tomato, chopped, seeds discarded

Steam your green beans till they retain a little bite, drain, and set aside.  Melt butter in large skillet.  Add onion, and salt and pepper, to taste, and saute till golden, about 8-10 minutes.  Add tomatoes, and stir quickly.  Throw green beans back in the skillet, toss everything around, and remove from heat, so the tomatoes retain much of their brightness.  Tell your main dish to step aside.

 

 

Share the Wealth

We’re well into the time of year where a little knock on the door may send you running for cover.  Because this is the time of year when that little knock from a friendly neighbor means one of two things.  Tomatoes.  Or zucchini.

I was lucky enough to be a recipient of the former just the other day.  So I roasted the former with some of the latter, and pulled together Deb’s zucchini rice gratin.  Which I would like to rename TOMATO zucchini rice gratin, because, to me, the tomatoes were the star.  They were home grown, vibrantly red, and juicy beyond my wildest dreams.  And they, with a little help from some Parmesan cheese, take this over the top.

This gratin is packed with summer flavors, and light enough that you can still put a bathing suit on after a helping for lunch.

It also solved my age-old what-do-I-do-when-Ina’s-vegetable-tian-produces-a-veritable-soup-at-the-bottom-of-the-pan question.

Answer:  I layer cooked rice with the onions in the bottom, and that absorbs any and all errant juices.

To make this as a side dish for 4, you will need:

• 1/3 C (uncooked) rice, or 1 C leftover cooked rice
• olive oil
• 2 or 3 medium zucchini, sliced 1/4 inch thick
• 1/2 lb. tomatoes, sliced 1/4 inch thick
• salt
• pepper
• 1 medium onion, halved and thinly sliced
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves
• 1/2 C grated Parmesan, divided

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.  Place tomatoes and zucchini on baking sheets, and sprinkle with a little salt and pepper.  Not too much salt, as there will be salt in almost every step of this dish, and you don’t want to overdo it.  Roast tomatoes for 10 minutes, zucchini for 20.  When you take the tomatoes out, flip the zucchini over to let the other side crisp up.  While that’s going on, cook rice according to your favorite method (side note–this was my husband’s and my first fight in our relationship).

Heat large, heavy (oven-safe) skillet with 2 T oil, and add onions, garlic, and another sprinkle of salt.  Cover, reduce heat to low, and let cook, stirring occasionally for 15-20 minutes, until onions are limp and tender.  If you had the time and/or patience, you could keep going and caramelize them to make the dish a little more indulgent.  Add the onion mixture, eggs, thyme, and half of the cheese to the cooked rice, stirring till combined.  Throw in a generous grind of black pepper too, if you like how it feels.

Add another T olive oil to the bottom of that heavy bottomed pan.  Layer half onion mixture in the bottom.  Top with an even layer of zucchini, using about half of what you roasted.  Spread another layer of the onion mixture on top of that, and repeat with the remaining zucchini.  Top with tomatoes, and top that with cheese.  Pop the gratin in the oven for about 20 minutes, until the eggs have done their thing to hold the mixture together, and the cheese is golden brown.

 

Snack Responsibly

My husband doesn’t like to watch certain movies with me because I will recite every single line right along with the characters.  Beauty and the Beast, A League of Their Own, 10 Things I Hate About You, and Mean Girls, are just a few titles on the “off limits” list.  The first time I saw Mean Girls, it gave voice to so many of my inner-most thoughts, it was all I could do not to commit the lines to memory the first time around.
“She’s a life ruiner!”

“I’m a mouse…duh”

“Ohmigod I love your skirt, where did you get it?”

“Boo, you whore!”

and most importantly, “Girls who eat their feelings.”

Ladies, gentlemen, I am a girl who eats my feelings.  I just didn’t know it until I saw Mean Girls.

It certainly explains all the brownies.

So earlier this year, I started trying to eat more green things, and fewer chocolate things.  It’s been an uphill battle, to say the least.  Because around 3:00 every day, I get hungry and I need a snack.  Yes, I am 27, and I still need an after school snack.  But look!  I found a green one!  One I can eat with no guilt!  And one that still tastes like I should feel guilty about it.  Roasted Edamame with Cranberries.  From Tracy Shutterbean!

To make enough for a week’s worth of snacking, you will need:

• 1 1/2 C edamame (I use frozen, and thaw it first)
• 2 tsp. olive oil
• coarse salt
• 1/3 C dried cranberries

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Line a baking sheet with foil.  Toss edamame with olive oil on prepared sheet, and sprinkle salt on top.  Roast for 20-22 minutes, giving the mixture a toss about halfway through.  When finished, the edamame should be brown and some of the skin should look crinkly.  Let cool and toss with cranberries.  Per Tracy’s suggestion, I threw mine in a jar and shook it up.

Hello Monday

Hello Monday.

Hello allergies.

Hello Starbucks.

Hello no air conditioning, and 90 degree day.

Hello 10 hour workday.

Hello quiet house.

Hello new smitten kitchen recipe.

Hello Food52.

Hello good china.

Hello milk.

Hello spring peas.

Hello top quality butter.

Hello lemon zest.

Hello simple dinner.  And hello tattoo I need on my forehead: simple is always best.

I’m thinking of marketing this as a sequel to Goodnight Moon.  What do we think?

To make milk peas for 4, you will need:

• 2 C fresh peas (fine, use frozen if you have to)
• milk (the fattier the better)
• butter (the best you can get your hands on)
• the zest of half a lemon
• salt
• pepper

Place peas in a small saucepan, and cover just barely with milk.  Heat over medium heat until just simmering.  Watch the milk carefully as it takes almost nothing to boil over.  Cook 3-4 minutes and remove from heat.  Spoon peas into dishes, leaving some milk pooling at the bottom.  Top with a pat of butter, sprinkle of lemon zest, and salt and pepper.  Serve immediately.

 

 

Finding Recipes

When deciding what to make for dinner, one has a wealth of places to go looking.  Cookbooks are a great start.  I can’t wait to get my hands on this one, the winner of Food 52′s Piglet cookbook showdown, and this one, which I’ve been anticipating for quite some time.  Don’t even get me started on this one.  It may be the very first cookbook I cook from beginning to end.  If you peruse your cookbook collection to no avail, you can turn to magazines, like Cook’s Illustrated or Fine Cooking.  And if that fails, there are 8 billion food blogs out there to satisfy your every need.

But just in case you’ve exhausted all those options, and you’re still sans dinner ideas, there’s one other source that’s never let me down.

The Williams Sonoma catalog.

It’s the one catalog that I always look through.  The one that can’t go to the recycling bin until I’ve had my way with it, which usually means I’ve torn out half the pages.

I don’t know who they have in their kitchens, but those people are good.

I’ve noticed broccoli cheese soup on a lot of blogs lately, but I was wary of making it.  I didn’t want to eat anything that would feel too heavy, or taste too much like something you would order at Applebee’s.

And then, I noticed a recipe for broccoli-cheddar soup in the latest WS catalog. They were using it to hawk this Cuisinart Soup Maker and Blender, but you don’t need one to make soup.  You can use a regular blender or hand blender.

I knew if there was a broccoli cheese soup worthy of our weeknight rotation, this would be it.

And it really and truly was.  It’s packed with cheddar flavor, but doesn’t feel too heavy.  There’s a little hint of heat in each spoonful, so the flavor isn’t one-dimensional.  Plus you can serve it with just about anything.  Chicken, noodles, a crusty loaf of bread, beer, or a glass of chardonnay.

To make soup for 4, you will need:

• 2 T olive oil
• 1 garlic clove, finely chopped
• Kosher salt
• 1 lb. broccoli, cut into 1 inch florets
• 3 C chicken stock (I ended up using a bit more, and of course, you can use vegetable stock if you’re so inclined)
• freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 C spinach leaves
• 1 T light beer (I had white wine open, so used that instead)
• 4 oz. extra sharp white cheddar cheese, grated
• 2 pinches cayenne
• finely grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese for garnish

In a heavy bottomed pot or Dutch oven, warm oil over medium heat.  Add onion, garlic, and a few pinches of salt.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until aromatic and tender, 8-10 minutes.

Increase heat to high, add broccoli, stock (I added enough stock to cover the broccoli completely, probably about 3 1/2 C), a few pinches of salt and black pepper; bring to a simmer.  Cover and cook broccoli over medium heat, about 10 minutes, or until broccoli is tender.  Remove from heat.  Transfer soup mixture and spinach to blender and blend till smooth.  When you’re blending hot liquids, you want to fill your blender halfway at the most, so you may have to do this a couple of times.

Transfer the soup back to the pan, and add cheddar and cayenne, stirring till cheese is melted.  Serve with grated Parmesan on top.

On Carbs

I finally made spaghetti squash.

Actually, a more truthful interpretation of the tale would be that I finally cut into a spaghetti squash.

It was like my Everest.

I had bought squash before, and never been able to actually get it open.

Anyway.

I win.

But not when it comes to spaghetti squash.

Because it tastes nothing like spaghetti, dear readers.

Why didn’t anybody tell me?

It’s like crunchy water.

Even when you gussy it up with cheese and call it au gratin.

It still just tastes like crunchy water.

I’m over it.

Currently

Sitting on my couch, donning sweats and slippers, and watching college football.

Thinking about the next time I’ll be hungry.

It’s likely to be 2012.

Today was our last tailgate of the season.  Due to consistent run ins with poor weather, our plans to dine in style in our favorite College Park parking lot were thwarted several times in September and October.  Thus, our crew went all out for the Terps’ final home game today.  And though our team gave us nothing worth cheering about, the meal we ate afterward more than made up for it.

I had guacamole.

And two kinds of meat.

And chocolate cake.

But before all that could happen, I had to have soup.  Lots and lots of soup.

It’s good for you.

So I ate it all week long.

For lunch and dinner.

That’s how you prepare for a day of complete and total overindulgence.

This particular soup is from The Barefoot Contessa, whom I’ve missed terribly.  I hadn’t seen her show, nor cracked the covers of any of her cookbooks in ages.

Which would explain why I rushed into the soup-making process, forgetting that Ina’s soups always feed you, your family and a dozen or so of your closest friends if you make them as written.

Thank goodness I used my biggest pot.

And thank goodness there’s still a whole container-ful in the freezer.

Winter is coming, and soup is what winter is for.

This soup is not so much a recipe as an idea.  Saute some onions and carrots, add vegetable stock, and throw in whatever you have in the crisper.  I used Ina’s ingredients the first time around, but wouldn’t be afraid of dialing back the broth and adding some canned tomatoes with their liquid, next time.  The noodles could just as easily be swapped for barley or rice.  No matter what you add, you’re going to end up with something satisfying.

The highlight of the whole soup experience, however, was the pistou.  The margins of Barefoot in Paris taught me that pistou is like French pesto (also what I imagine saying “pesto” with a French accent would sound like).  It’s the same basil, garlic, olive oil mixture, but with tomato paste mixed in for good measure.  I thought spooning a dollop on top of each bowl would serve as a mere garnish, but it made such a noticeable difference throughout each slurp.

To make soup for 10, you will need:

*A head’s up that this is one of those recipes in which it is extremely useful to have ingredients chopped in advance.  But don’t feel like you have to.  I rarely do.

• 2 T olive oil
• 2 onions, chopped
• 2 chopped leeks, white and light green parts
• 1 pound potatoes, 1/2 inch diced (don’t bother peeling them, you’re making rustic food at its best)
• 1 pound carrots, 1/2 inch diced (again with the peeling, just wash them)
• 1 T Kosher salt
• 1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
• 3 quarts vegetable stock (sure, use chicken stock)
• 1 tsp. saffron threads (but only if your friend brought you some from her trip to Spain, otherwise it’s too expensive)
• 1/2 pound haricots verts, ends removed and cut in half (or straight out of the Trader Joe’s freezer bag)
• 4 oz. spaghetti, broken in small pieces

To make 1 C Pistou, you will need:

• 4 cloves garlic, peeled
• 1/4 C tomato paste
• 24 large basil leaves (or thereabouts)
• 1/2 C Parmesan cheese
• 1/2 C olive oil

Heat the olive oil in a large stockpot (mine was probably an 8 quart-er), add the onions, and saute over low heat until onions start to brown.  Slow and steady wins the (flavor) race here.  Add leeks, potatoes, carrots, salt, and pepper, and saute over medium heat 5 more minutes.  Add stock and saffron, bring soup to a boil, and simmer, uncovered for 30 minutes.

While that’s going on, make pistou by combining all ingredients in a food processor, and setting aside.  The tomato paste didn’t glide through my mini food processor, making my pistou thicker.  I loved it that way, because I could see the bits of basil throughout the soup after I stirred it in.  Back to the soup.

Add haricots verts (unless you’re using frozen, and then add them 5 minutes before your soup is done) and spaghetti, bring to a simmer, and cook 10 more minutes.

When ready to serve, add a heaping tablespoon of pistou to each bowl.  Grate Parmesan on top if you so choose.

p.s….It’s almost embarrassing to tell you how much I love opening a new tube of tomato paste.  But I really do get a little thrill from breaking the foil seal.