Mind in the Butter

Food for taste, buds, and family

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Flipping the Script: Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Pears and Stilton

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morefood

Fine Cooking Magazine – to me, the mother of all cooking magazines. Filled with consistently delicious recipes (minus this culinary abomination. Starfruit + chicken? *dry heave*), many with an exciting but not obnoxious level of difficulty, it really is my main source of inspiration. In addition to receiving the hard copy  in the mail, I also signed up for the “Make it Tonight” emails, offering  instant inspiration for dinner that night. I highly recommend it.

Last week this Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Pears and Stilton recipe popped into my inbox, so I decided to add it to my Christmas Eve Dinner plans. It’s a simple winter salad over a bed of escarole with vinaigrette. I flipped the script and made it more substantial by putting the roasted butternut squash, prosciutto (recipes calls for bacon) and Stilton (blue cheese) into puff pastry.  I baked it at 400 for about 25 minutes and served it with the escarole and pears and it was honestly slammin’. While I bow down to the mouth-watering Fine Cooking Magazine, I think I might have outdone them on this one.

Dinner Party Meal Planning

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I’ve had several friends ask me about determining portion size for dinner parties, an essential part of hosting a successful one. I sketched the drawing above as a simple snapshot of the “trifecta” I use when meal planning for large parties. It’s totally unscientific but I think it’s really helpful.  The idea is simple — dinner is made up of 3 parts: starch, veggie, protein. Once you pick your recipes remember these rules before heading to the grocery store:

  • 1 cup of dry starch (risotto, rice, polenta etc.) = 4 servings. If you are using potatoes: 1 russet for 2 people, 2-3 red potatoes for 1 person, 3-4 fingerlings for 1 person.
  • 1 cup of veggie = 1 serving. 1 zucchini= 2 servings, 1 bunch of asparagus = 4 servings. One carton or head of lettuce =4 people for simple salad, 6 people if you drag it through the garden
  • 6 oz/ 1 fist of protein= 1 serving. I think I learned this from Richard Simmons so I can’t take credit, but idea is to serve 6 oz. (size when uncooked) of protein which is about the size of your fist. The butcher or fish guy can easily help with this too since they normally weigh everything for you.  I could recommend rounding to the next 1/2 lb for good measure. So, for a 6 person dinner party: 6 people x 6 oz = 36 oz or 2.25lbs —> ask the counter for 2.5lbs. For shrimp and scallops: 4 scallops=1 serving, 4 colossal shrimp= 1 serving, 6 jumbo shrimp= 1 serving
  • Add an “Elijah” serving e.g. always add 1 more person to the meal planning for leftovers/in case something burns/someone arrives who didn’t RSVP (gasp!).

I’ve kept the post short so you can print and post onto the fridge or add to your recipe book for easy reference. This is how I meal plan but would love to hear other tips and tricks!

Tofino Time: What’d you do with all those chanterelles?

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After picking a heap of chanterelles the other morning, I was sort of at a loss on what to do with them (although thank you to my friends for the inspiration!). But then, two amazing things happened 1) we went for a beach hike and found mussels, (Lie. Dad yanked them off the rocks while Emily and I napped on a log); 2) we went to an amazing ocean front farm and bought fresh goat cheese. With those deliciously serendipitous run-ins, I decided on Mussels with Fennel, Tomatoes and Chanterelles in White Wine and a simple Goat Cheese and Chanterelle Tart (recipe from old post, here).

Dinner with Basil: Homemade Pesto + Caprese Salad

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Green Gold

Red, White and Green

Earlier this week, Ray and I had a special guest for dinner, basil! This beautiful broad-leafed herb is definitely in season with the bundles  so big, I could barely tell it apart from heads of lettuce in the produce section. When I get a bouquet of basil this large, there’s really only two things I want to make, homemade pesto and a caprese salad. And that’s what I did: Seared Scallops with Pesto Rigatoni with a Caprese Salad drizzled with a homemade balsamic vinaigrette. I think I’d like to have basil over dinner more often!

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For the Pesto: I never follow recipes, so in my Cuisinart I just blended pine nuts (they have pre-packaged 1/4 cup bags in the baking aisle at the store), whatever Parmesan I had in my fridge and garlic. I then added the basil leaves and the juice of one lemon.  Word on the street is to keep the Cuisinart running while you add the olive oil through the top feeder until the mixture is smooth. At the last minute I added zest of 1/2 lemon and I’m pretty sure that took the pesto to a whole other level of amazing both in flavor and color.  For perfect single-servings down the road,  scoop any extra pesto into an ice cube tray and cover with plastic wrap making sure it’s flush with the pesto and place in freezer.  For the rule followers,  Ina Garten has a great recipe for pesto.

Summer Dinner Party

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Last week after realizing it’s been way too long since we’ve had a dinner party, Ray and I had some friends and their +1s over for a Monday night cocktail/dinner party.  Of course, fitting ten people into any New York apartment is challenge so I kept it really casual and served dinner in the living room around our retro coffee table.

Hosting dinner parties is one of my favorite things in this whole world to do, and I’m finally establishing some good entertaining rules and formulas to keep myself un-stressed, out of the kitchen and in the mix with my guests.  While I don’t follow them all the time, here they are:

1) Make absolutely everything you can the night before, including the cocktail.  (I didn’t follow my own rule and did not have drinks immediately available for my guests upon their arrival, which leads to #2)

2) Have something to eat and drink on the table 30 minutes before your guests are supposed to arrive, even if it’s just some radishes and a bottle of wine or a pitcher of water. Someone is always likely to show up exactly on time.

3) Make sure the night of the dinner party works for the rest of your week. I chose Monday night so I had all of Sunday to shop and cook. It allowed me start off the week with my friends when the rest of the week was filled with business dinners. Friday nights are impossible because you’re tired and there’s no way to shop, cook and clean in time for guests to arrive at a reasonable hour.  Saturday and Sundays night are of course great too.

4) Get the 411 on food allergies and check the menu over with them beforehand.  Ray doesn’t eat meat and I have another friend who’s, well, allergic to everything so instead of getting really creative, I kept it simple.  I made sure my one-pot dish could be easily adapted to serve (almost) everyone. For my friend, I made a “hypoallergenic” pork chop- seasoned with sesame oil, Dijon mustard, rice wine vinegar served with white rice.

5) You must have a co-pilot/extra Indian/Sous-chef.  I don’t care if you’re Martha Stewart, you need an extra host. Ray always does an amazing job setting the mood with music, candles and lighting. For this party he had the genius idea to pull a Charlie Chaplin film off of Netflix to play in the background while we ate. Thanks, babe!

6) Candles and music are a must.  Films noir and cats to entertain your guests are a plus.

7) When you’re friends ask if you need help…say yes! I am very verbal and eager to have my friends help me in the kitchen when I am in the weeds, even if they just stand there and give me the latest gossip on their lives while they completely assault a tomato.

8) Eva’s (generally fool-proof) Food Formula: 2 appetizers (at least 1 vegetarian option) + 1 signature cocktail + 1 one-pot dish (that can be made the night before) + vegetable + 1 dessert = dinner party success.

Here are some highlights after implementing the formula for last week’s dinner party:

The Coconut Crusher

The Coconut Crusher

As my signature cocktail, I served a drink I completely made up: Coconut Rum, Vodka, pomegranate and blueberry juice with a mint garnish. It’s possible that I subliminally  stole this idea from a photo my brother’s girlfriend posted on my sister’s Facebook wall, but I think it’s safe to say, I made it completely my own. My original recipe called for white grape juice, but the pomegranate was an awesome substitute.

To make this divine cocktail: tear 6 mint leaves and put at the bottom of a glass, fill to the brim with ice, then add 1 oz vodka, 1 oz coconut rum then top it off with some slammin’ juice–pomegranate, raspberry lemonade, peach, white grape juice, surprise me. Stir. Sip. Smile. Ah.

White Bean, Prosciutto and Arugula Crostini

Smashed White Bean Crostinis with Arugula and Prosciutto. This is a riff on a crostini served at our local Italian restaurant. My interpretation involves 1 can of rinsed, smashed white beans with 2 cloves of garlic, a squeeze of lemon, salt and pepper. I spread a little salted butter on the sliced baguette before  spreading the white beans.  Top it with prosciutto and/or arugula and then the party is in order!

Arugula, Radish and Pecorino Salad.

Arugula Salad

My formula calls for a vegetable, this salad is by far the easiest most delicious solution to a large group: washed arugula, shaved Pecorino, sliced radishes. Add tomato and/or hearts of palm if you have them handy.  For the vinaigrette I simply squeezed the juice of one lemon over the lettuce with a hefty splash of good olive oil, salt, pepper. I could eat this salad everyday.

Chocolate Flourless Cake, Black Cherries and Fresh Whipped Cream

Chocolate flourless cake with black cherry coulis and fresh whipped cream. Normally I use this recipe for the cake and jazz it up with a berry sauce.  Last week I chose black cherries, so I heated them on the stove with 2Ts of sugar, 1t of vanilla extract and reduced it until it was a syrupy sauce.  Served with homemade whipped cream, it’s divine!

Summer Entertaining Cooking Class

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Roast Leg of Lamb with Ratatouille Vegetables

Stingray and I took a “Couples Summer Entertaining” cooking class at Culinaerie, back when we were living in Washington.  Despite our food snob status, neither of us had taken an actual cooking class, so this was a real treat (thanks, Mom!). Dressed for date night we marched to the front of the class kitchen (again, food snobs) to ensure optimal viewing and instruction by the school’s co-founder Susan Holt. On the menu was a Wild Mushroom and Goat Cheese Tart, Roast Leg of Lamb with Ratatouille Vegetables and a Brulee of Summer Fruits. The menu was straightforward and accessible, but impressive enough that I was eager to add to our repertoire.  I would even argue it could be easily adapted for the winter months by swapping out seasonal vegetables in the ratatouille and replacing the lamb with beef.

The class was extremely well done with plenty of support staff, great instruction and endless wine.  We were obviously the most experienced couple, starring multiple times as the “example table.” Although, I suppose…upon further reflection we spent just as much time sizing up the competition as we did chopping mushrooms.  DC friends–try their classes and steal more delicious recipes for me!

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Exotic Mushroom and Chevre Tart

Mushroom and Chevre Tart

Ingredients

(Serves 8 as an appetizer, 4 as a main course)

  •  1 ½ cups exotic mushrooms, such as shiitake, crimini, Portobello, or oyster
  • 2 tablespoons vegetable or canola oil
  • Salt and fresh black pepper to taste
  • 2 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary or tarragon
  • 1 package frozen puff pastry dough, slightly defrosted
  • 8 ounces soft goat cheese, at room temperature
  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
  • 2 cloves fresh garlic, very finely minced

Brush the mushrooms free of any dirt and trim rough parts of the stems; cut into ½” slices.  Heat a large sauté pan over high heat, add half the oil, then add half the mushrooms.  Sauté about 3 minutes, with very limited stirring, until mushrooms are golden brown; repeat with remaining oil and mushrooms.  Season cooked mushrooms with salt and pepper and add herbs.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Roll out pastry into a rough circle, about 14” in diameter, and place on large baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Spread goat cheese over surface, stopping two inches short of the edge.  Distribute mushroom mixture evenly over top, then bring extra pastry over mushrooms to form a border.

Combine butter with garlic; using pastry brush, paint or drizzle the garlic butter on top of the mushrooms.  Bake in center of oven for approximately 30 minutes, until pastry is golden brown on top and bottom.  Allow to cool slightly then cut into wedges.

Roast Leg of Lamb with Ratatouille Vegetables

Seared Lamb

Ratatouille Vegetables

Ingredients 

(Serves 2)

  •  1 – 1½ pounds boneless lamb leg
  • 1 medium zucchini (about 1 pound), cut in 1” cubes
  • 1 medium red or yellow onion, cut in 1” cubes
  • 2 plum tomatoes or 1 heirloom tomato, quartered
  • 1 red pepper, cut in medium dice
  • 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • ½ teaspoon sugar
  • Juice of half a lemon
  • Handful of minced fresh basil leaves and/or 2 tablespoons good quality pesto
  • 4 – 5 Calamata or French Nyons olives, pitted and halved
  • 2 ounces Gruyere, grated

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Season lamb leg with salt and pepper, place on a rack over a sheet pan fat side up, and roast for 45 minutes.  Remove from oven.

 Toss together the zucchini, onion, tomatoes, pepper, olive oil, salt, sugar and lemon juice.  Roast in a large sauté pan for 15 – 20 minutes until vegetables start to soften and brown.   Remove from oven and stir in basil and/or pesto and olives.  Top with gruyere and return to oven for 10 minutes.  Remove and serve with thinly sliced lamb.

Brulee of Summer Fruits

Brulee of Summer Fruits

Ingredients

(Serves 2)

  •  ½ cup heavy (whipping) cream
  • 2 tablespoons sugar
  • 2 cups fresh raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, strawberries, sliced peaches
  • 2 tablespoons demerara, turbinado or brown sugar

Beat the cream with a whip until soft peaks form.  Add sugar very slowly and continue beating until sugar is dissolved and the cream forms stiff peaks.

Gently fold in the fruit.  Transfer raspberries to 2 individual shallow oven-proof dishes, such as brulee dishes and sprinkle the demerara sugar over them.  Place dish under the oven broiler on the top rack on high and cook just until some of the sugar caramelizes (this will only take 30 seconds or so).  Alternately, use a blowtorch with cautious abandon.  Serve immediately.

Notice all the fearful eyes around me…

Two Coudies Archive: Fine Investment Father’s Day Rockfish

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Daddy-Happy Father’s Day!  Along with great hair, thank you for gifting me with a discerning and rather expensive palette. You’ve programmed me to thrive best when consuming fine wines and champagne, imported cheeses, charcuterie, caviar and fresh seafood.  While my wallet doesn’t appreciate it, my belly definitely does.

Since it is Father’s Day I’ve pulled from the Two Coudies Archive this Father’s Day fish post.  It reminds me of such a great Father-Daughters trip we took a couple of years ago, I’m happy to have a place in cyber space to remember it forever. Love you, Dad!

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For Father’s Day, my sister and I took Dad to St. Michael’s, Maryland (GO THERE!) for a nautically-inclined weekend.  Amidst sunset sailing, an antique boat show and a private plane ride over the Chesapeake Bay (!), we set him up with a fishing guide. Luckily for me he caught three HUGE Rockfish (called Striped Bass, where I’m from). He couldn’t take them back on the plane with him so when I returned to DC, I invited some of my girlfriends over and made a super simple Parmesan Rockfish.  To celebrate summer I added a feta and watermelon salad. While we ate the meal with rice, I’ve added a recipe for some insanely rich mashed potatoes…because that’s what the rockfish would have wanted. Thanks to my girl Nicole GoodHat Aguirre of Worn Magazine for the photos.

 

Parmesan & Parsley Fish:

Preheat oven to 350 and begin marinating fish.

Marinade:

  • 2 large garlic cloves crushed
  • 2  1lb filets of rockfish (or any other white fish)
  • the juice of 1 lemon
  • splash of white wine
  • 2 tsp salt and pepper
  • 3 tsp olive oil
  • 2 shakes of chili flake if you want to get KrAZy

Topping:

  • 1/2 cup Parmesan
  • 2 tsp finely chopped parsley

Mix fish and marinade ingredients together in gallon-size Ziploc and stick in fridge. After it’s chilled again, place in buttered glass dish large enough for filets to lay flat.  Sprinkle with grated Parmesan cheese and fresh chopped parsley.

Depending on thickness, bake for approx 13-15 minutes.  The fish should flake when you pull a fork through it.

**WiLd SiDe:turn on the broiler at the end of cook time for 2 minutes to brown the top.

They will love you Forever Boursin Mashed Potatoes:

  • Russet, Yukon Gold or bliss potatoes
  • 1-3 garlic cloves
  • 3/4 small package of Boursin or Alouette herbed cheese
  • 2 T butter
  • 2 T sour cream
  • splash of milk or cream
  • 1 egg
  • salt/pepper

Quarter and boil potatoes in large pot for about 30 mins. Potatoes will be ready when you can pass a fork or knife straight through with little pressure.  When cooked and tender, drain and return to large pot and turn heat to low.  Mash slightly with with masher or hand mixer. Incorporate all other ingredients except for egg. Continue to taste to adjust flavors and consistency to your liking. Add raw egg and blend.*

*If you have a Jewish family member in the kitchen, do this discreetly. If you get caught, deny everything.

 I-Am-A-Sex-MaH-Cheen Watermelon and Feta Salad:

Vinaigrette:

  • 1 part lemon juice
  • 2 parts Extra Virgin olive oil
  • 1 tsp salt/pepper
  • 1 tsp sugar
  • the leaves of 4 thyme sprigs, finely chopped
  • 5 raspberries, optional
  • splash of any good quality fruit juice in the frig (lemonade, limeade, raspberry juice)
  • 1 T dijon mustard

Mix all together in blender until smooth. If it’s too sweet, add one more lemon and/or pepper. Too tart, more olive oil, then more sugar.

Place a handful of washed spring mix, arugula or spinach on a salad plate. Serve with a slice of watermelon and a feta cube, drizzle with vinaigrette.

Birthday Fish Tacos

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This past weekend marked Mom’s __th birthday, celebrated just the way she likes, with all her chicks back in the nest on Cape Cod. Since Mom is rather difficult to shop for, I kept to what I know and made her dinner – Birthday Fish Tacos with a Carrot and Cabbage slaw, Black Bean and Hominy salad and a homemade “crema lima.”  This dish is easy, inexpensive, and loaded with vibrant and flavorful raw vegetables. It’s hot and cold, crunchy and soft, spicy and mild and has ingredients that can be easily swapped out for picky or sensitive palettes. Long story short…crowd pleaser.

This dinner was a team effort, so after we perched Mom on the couch with some tune-age, we all (armed with plenty of wine and SoCo) took off in separate directions like oil and vinegar.  The men congregated around the BBQ (despite heavy rains!) and we ladies set up shop in the kitchen to make the salads. The result was a perfectly balanced family-style meal . Check out the recipes below, which have been adjusted to feed about 4 people.

Seafood:

For my version of these tacos, I was lucky enough to have salmon, halibut and shrimp on hand, and even luckier, had Dad on hand to grill the seafood with smoky Mesquite wood chips for insanely intense flavor.

  • 8 oz filet of fish – Halibut, Salmon preferred.  Local options: Hake, Bluefish, Cod. Cheap option: Tilapia
  • 1 lb shrimp (frozen is fine but de-shell and de-vein before grilling)
  • McCormicks Cajun Seasoning
  • Cayanne Pepper
  • Paprika
  • Juice of 2 limes
  • 3 T Olive Oil
  • Salt/Pepper to taste

Slice fish into 2-3 inch filets against the grain, rinse and pat dry, put into gallon Ziplock with shrimp (fresh or frozen). Put back in frig.

For marinade: In a small bowl, mix juice of 2 limes, olive oil, 2 taps of Cayanne, 2 taps of paprika and 1/4 canister of McCormick’s Cajun (seems like a lot, but just trust me).  It should be pasty but not dry. Add more oil or a splash of whatever you are drinking to thin it out, or dump in more spices if it needs a charge up. Be sure to taste it to see what the salt/pepper situation is, add S & P accordingly.  It should taste really intense since it’s a marinade.

Pour mixture over fish and shrimp and shake bag around so all seafood is coated. Keep in frig and hold off on cooking until salads are done, about 30 mins. (We’re getting there.)

To BBQ: call your Dad to prepare and insanely hot and smokey grill for you.  While he does this, create 2 foil boats (1 for fish, 1 for shrimp) so that the marinade doesn’t escape once you place the seafood down on grill- nothing fancy. Once BBQ is ready, set foil boat on grill rack and place just the fish filets to cook, about 4-7 mins on each side (depends on thickness of fish).  Remove and add the second foil boat with shrimp and cook 2 minutes on each side. Do them separately since shrimp cook wicked fast.

If Dad is not available/Stovetop Instructions: Heat large frying on med-high. The pan is ready if you flick water into it and it spits.  Don’t add oil or butter because marinade already has considerable amount. Add just the fish filets using instructions above.  Once cooked, keep filets under foil or in low heat oven while you cook shrimp.

While the fish marinates…make salads

Carrot and Cabbage Slaw

  • 1 small red cabbage, or 1/2 large cabbage (don’t buy the pre-shredded)
  • 1 bag of pre-shredded carrots
  • 1 box crystallized ginger (in the dried fruit/nut section)
  • 2 T apple cider vinegar
  • 1/4 chop cilantro, rough chopped
  • 4 T Olive oil
  • Salt/Pepper

In a small bowl, wisk vingear, olive oil and salt and pepper. Taste. The rule is 1 part acid to 2 parts oil, so adjust this based on your salad size.

Slice cabbage into thin pieces to match carrots.  Be sure to remove white core. Thinly chop about 12 pieces of ginger. In large bowl toss carrots, cabbage, ginger, cilantro and vinaigrette so salad is coated evenly. Place on dinner table.

Black Bean and Hominy salad:

Black Bean and Hominy with Cilantro and Red Onion

  • 1 can black beans
  • 1 can hominy
  • 1/2 medium red onion, diced
  • 1/4 c cilantro, rough chopped
  • 3 T Olive oil
  • Juice of 1 lime

Drain and rinse beans and hominy (can substitute yellow corn). Toss all ingredients together. Place on dinner table.

Crema Lima

Sounds fancy, super simple.

Crema Lima

  •   juice of 1 lime
  •  1 canister creme fraiche or sour cream
  •  salt

In a small bowl mix creme fraiche, lime juice and pinch a salt. Should smooth, runny and  super tangy.

Serve meal buffet-style with warm corn and flour tortillas.