I used to dismiss poached eggs as something too fussy for me to make at home, and I would like to recant. They are less splattery than fried eggs and cook just as quickly. Having said that, I went a little beyond basic and cooked them in red wine, like I had at Balthazar one time. A pared-down recipe is here. Though it isn’t exactly traditional (I think the real deal requires a more complex sauce that gets spooned over the top), I appreciate its simplicity, especially after finding more proper recipes that require way more ingredients (herbs, beef broth, mirepoix). Best use of old, leftover wine and stale bread yet.
Have you ever had the mushroom and egg pizza at ABC Kitchen? It’s as wonderful as this video and this slideshow will have you believe. The mushroom pizza I made at home the other night was not nearly as spectacular but I will humbly say that it’s one of the better pizzas I’ve thought up in recent history.
1. Make the dough. I’ve been doing a half-whole-wheat mixture of flour using the reliable no-knead recipe. You could also go the whole shortcut route and buy a blob of dough from the supermarket or your local pizzeria.
2. Sauté the mushrooms. Add some olive oil to a pan over medium heat. Add sliced mushrooms (some flavorful interesting ones like shiitake, oyster, shimeji, trumpet, hen-of-the-woods, etc., maybe mixed with plain old cremini or white mushrooms) and let them sit until they brown. Toss around and add chopped green garlic (or leeks or garlic cloves), salt, and black pepper. When mushrooms are all cooked through and golden, add a squeeze of lemon juice and turn off the heat. Add lots of chopped fresh parsley, thyme, and oregano.
3. Top the pizza dough. Flatten and shape the dough (I do personal-sized because it’s easier to handle). Top it with torn pieces of fresh mozzarella, then the mushroom mixture. I added some thinly sliced asparagus but to be honest, I couldn’t really taste it.
4. Bake away! Put the pizza in the oven (preheated to 500 degrees F) for about 10-15 minutes or until it looks, you know, right. If you want an egg on it, make a little space in the middle of the pizza and add the egg about halfway through cooking.
5. Finish with feta. Add a drizzle of olive oil and crumbled feta cheese to the pizzas.
I don’t know about the rest of you, but when the weather gets hot, I want to eat. And cook. A lot. I spent most of this last (very brutal) heat wave hiding indoors, soaking up other people’s air conditioning. While the streets of New York felt like an even dirtier sauna than usual, I was quietly slurping down iced coffee and eating chocolate cake, chocolate croissants, and squishy cheeseburgers within walking distance of my apartment. At home, I made big ass healthy salads (of the raw vegetable, whole grain, potato, and pasta varieties) while hoping that my responsible 80-degree thermostat setting would prevent any blackouts (I stocked flashlights, candles, and ice-cold tequila, just in case).
Also, I was nuts enough to bake pizza in a 500-degree oven, albeit very quickly. Feel free to try this in other weather.
To make it: Saute sliced mushrooms and chopped raddichio in a little bit of oil (tip: if your radicchio is really, really bitter, you can soak chopped pieces in ice water for at least 30 minutes to leach out some of whatever bitter-tasting compounds). Shape dough (I’m still doing no-knead) and top with mozzarella (torn into pieces), shallots (thinly sliced), mushroom and radicchio mixture, thinly sliced pancetta (torn into pieces), and pieces of aged gouda, in this order. Bake til crust is golden and cheese starts getting bubbly.
Previously: radicchio, apple, and gorgonzola pizza
Hi, I’m back. That month-long intermission was thanks to school work piling up, old friends from high school coming to visit, and nothing terribly interesting or new happening in the kitchen. But school’s out, it’s sunny outside, and I will be doing a lot of languishing around this busy city for the next week.
Amazingly, I finished a take-home final several hours before the deadline yesterday and even had time to bake a little cake salé with cheddar and chives to bring to a class potluck/mingle-fest (yes, we do a lot of celebrating with food in my Nutrition program). After an evening of eating and drinking (both relatively lightly, believe it or not) at Red Rooster AND Dinosaur BBQ, I couldn’t wait to sleep in and be a bum all day. I was woken up by a couple of pigeons doing it right outside the living room window. I don’t know why I’m bringing any of this up, but the point is, I spent my morning making a whole batch of ricotta gnochi and obsessing over all the vegetables piling up in the fridge.
To make it, I tossed cooked gnudi with sauteed asparagus and crimini mushrooms in a pan, then topped it off with a pat of butter, a few shavings of lemon zest (a squirt of juice might’ve been good too, looking back), chopped scallions, and let it heat through. Sprinkle some chives and grated cheese on top before digging in.
Another recipe from the Momofuku cookbook (remember when I made spicy rice cakes with pork?). Sadly, this one fell a little flat after floppy execution by yours truly. I took a few liberties with the recipe, omitting the pickled sunchokes and enoki mushrooms and adding a fistful of arugula instead of a few dainty microgreens. I wanted to make this salad all pretty with bright and flashy watermelon radishes, but they ended up being under-pink and too old and tough (they are supposed to look like this). And finally, we cannot ignore the pistachio puree, which bears an eerie resemblance to the feces of a small infant (that’s right, I said “feces” on a food blog). Blame it on my unsophisticated food processor.
The best part of this whole vegetable ensemble was the crazy delicious pan-roasted oyster mushrooms, which were seared in oil then coated in butter, garlic, and sherry vinegar. I know no better way to prepare mushrooms.
Until very recently, my favorite application for barley was beer. Then I gave this humble grain a whirl as a non-alcoholic lunch and loved it. I used hulled (not pearled) barley, which has the germ and bran intact, making it a whole grain. It smells a little malty when you cook it, and the chewy grains combine harmoniously with the earthy flavor of mushrooms and carrots (and beef, as in soup). For a complete lunch, I have it warm with a poached or fried egg (or two) on top.
about 4 cups cooked barley
olive oil
a dab of butter (optional)
15 cremini mushrooms, quartered
1 carrot, diced
1/2 small onion, chopped
fresh herbs (I used parsley and thyme)
salt and pepper
1/2 cup broth
2 tablespoons creme fraiche (optional)
Heat olive oil over medium heat in a large pan. Add butter if using. Add mushrooms and let them brown, undisturbed, for several minutes (10 maybe? I lost track). Add carrots and onion. Saute for a few more minutes. Add herbs, salt and pepper to taste, and broth. Lower heat and stir in creme fraiche. Combine with cooked barley.
In the past, I’ve committed horrible culinary crimes against even the humblest of mushrooms. Bruising them. Letting them get all slimy in the fridge. Cooking them on heat that was too low. Adding salt to the pan way, way too early and watching the mushrooms simmer in their own extracted juice. At last, I think I may have gotten it right. Months ago, Diana and I showed up at a Whisk & Ladle dinner with some MilkMade goods to share. The guest chef from Studiofeast cooked up some crazy delicious trumpet mushrooms, served to guests with a consomme but perfect for snacking on with nothing but lickable fingertips. The secrets, he told me, were 1. patience (don’t move them around the pan and wait and wait and wait for them to get really caramelized), and 2. lots of butter and olive oil. And there was some sticky balsamic vinegar in there at the end. I’ve yet to re-create that night’s addictively delicious dish, but the advice got me back into mushrooms. I’ve been patiently preparing them here and there ever since.
This stuff is delicious on polenta, in a quinoa salad with more herbs and vegetables, smothered all over a piece of chicken, or maybe just about everything.
1 pound mushrooms, cut into bite-size pieces (any slice-able kind you want! or like, a mix)
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 small shallot bulb, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
splash of white wine (optional)
about 1/2 cup broth (I used chicken broth, but vegetable works too if that’s your thing)
splash of balsamic vinegar
some thyme
salt and black pepper, as usual
a few tablespoons of heavy cream or creme fraiche (optional)
Add butter and olive oil to a heated pan. Add sliced mushrooms and leave them alone for a little while on medium heat (at least 5 minutes). When they start to brown, toss them around so the other mushroom surfaces can get brown. After 5 more minutes or so, add shallot and garlic. Let cook for another few minutes, or until everything is soft. Add white wine and scrape up all the slightly burnt pieces stuck to the pan. Add broth, vinegar, thyme, salt, and pepper and let simmer until liquid has reduced. Add cream or creme fraiche at the end.
(photos by the lovely Jocelyn Voo)
I finally got to make pasta with Ashwin again, this time with the very talented Mr. Rajen (who was visiting). Our follow-up to Spaghetti Made by Drunk People was (to borrow more than just photos from Jocelyn) something that made everyone go “aw yeah.” We cleared off as much counter space as we could, cracked open a few bottles of wine, and broke in the pasta machine that Jocelyn found in her office and gave me (yes, she is all over this post, because it wouldn’t have been possible without her).
It took a few tries to get the hang of the machine, but we ended up with fresh fettuccine that we tossed with a cream sauce and some greens. Very few things make me happier than a night with good food and good friends, no matter what time we end up eating.
Here’s how we made the pasta:
We loosely followed the recipe on a package of semolina. Combine equal parts unbleached all-purpose flour and semolina (made from durum wheat, a hard species of wheat) with olive oil, salt, and a few eggs. Knead until elastic. Add more flour if the dough is too sticky. Let rest for about 20 minutes. Roll out dough in the pasta machine (photo tutorial here), then use the noodle cutting attachment. Boil noodles in salted water for a few minutes, until tender but not falling apart.
Mushroom and Leek Cream Sauce
Melt a pat of butter in a heated pan, over medium heat. Add sliced leeks (just the white and light green parts). Cook for a few minutes, until leeks are soft. Add minced garlic and sliced mushrooms (we used crimini mushrooms). Season with salt, pepper, and thyme. When mushrooms are cooked, add heavy cream. Lower heat to low and let the cream sauce thicken. If it starts getting too thick, add a little more cream. Add cooked pasta to the pan and toss to coat. Top with grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.
Broccoli Rabe with Garlic and Crushed Red Pepper
Heat olive oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add chopped broccoli rabe, minced garlic, and a lot of crushed red pepper flakes. Saute until broccoli rabe stems are tender and leaves are wilted. Add chopped olives (chopped anchovies could also be good). Season with salt and black pepper. Toss with cooked pasta and extra virgin olive oil. Top with fresh bread crumbs.
