August 2010 Archives

My friend Lorraine has been bugging me to cook sauerkraut for a few weeks. I was looking through some of her family recipes, and saw something her grandmother used to make called "kapushniki" (mostly referred to as "pagach" on the web), that was lovingly known as sauerkraut pizza to her relatives. This was a savory pastry dough filled with potato or fried sauerkraut and usually served on holidays, particularly Christmas. I thought I would use the kapushniki as inspiration, and combine the 2 varieties into one awesome pizza at my latest pizza party. I told some people what was on the menu as they arrived. Pizza margarita, salami with arugula, mac and cheese pizza, BBQ chicken, steak with roasted red peppers, and of course sauerkraut pizza. This was greeted with a strange reaction by most of my friends, and even a few "I will have to pass on that one" comments, but at the end of the party, 10 out of 12 said that the mash potato sauerkraut pizza was by far their favorite of the night!

Everyone on the internet knows about and has made the no knead bread recipe, but what about the pizza dough? Since I have had some success recently with the no knead bread, I decided to try the pizza version out. I went to Co. last time I was in NY, and loved the pizzas there, so I figured it could work. (Co. is where the no-knead guy Jim Lahey makes pizza). There was one main thing I was worried about. I have made a lot of pizza, and my recipe for dough is very involved. If this no-knead method works, does it mean I have wasted over 20 hours of my life making pizza dough with a double knead-autolyze period?

The short answer is yes, it works, but this recipe isn't for everyone. The dough is VERY wet. I normally use a wet dough, but this thing is soaking. I would almost go as far as calling it a batter instead of a dough! Because of this, you need to be a pizza expert to be able to make pizzas. (good thing I am). The time saved not kneading, was wasted later swearing at the dough trying to get it to cooperate. This dough would not have gone over well at my more hectic pizza parties in Bermuda, and more pizzas would be in the trash than in the oven. I even threw away about 4 of them, one sad one had the toppings on it and everything. My friend at the party made pizzas for years professionally and couldn't even get the thing shaped. The pizzas came out great though. But were they better? That is a hard call to make. I was using my normal dough in Bermuda with my sick wood fired brick oven. These were just on a pizza stone at 550. For now I am going back to kneading, but i may revisit this recipe again in the future.

I ate this meal last weekend late night in Chinatown. Some of the best meals seem to be when I least expect them. The meal is actually very simple to make, the hardest part is finding the red pepper paste. It is sort of the pork version of bulgogi, in fact, the Korean name of the dish is "Daeji Bulgogi". In Chinatown, I skipped all the veggies and just ate the meat piece by piece with my chopsticks(It was late. hah). Making it myself, I decided to have it the way they had meant for me to eat it.

Normally, when a party is a sausagefest, it is not a good thing. In this situation however, it was awesome! Here is some fun pics of my friends enjoying an array of sausages and good times on the beach last weekend. Happy B-day Kim!

I have wanted to make hot dogs pretty much forever, so I made sure to finally check that off my list when I had access to the sausage stuffer. These hot dogs came out soo good! Next year, I want to make a huge batch of these at the beginning of spring, freeze them, and use them all summer! As awesome as they were, I would change a few things for next time. They definitely weren't dry, but they also weren't juicy, next time I would up the fat content. Secondly, the chipotle maple was subtle in these dogs and needed to be turned up a bit. Despite these shortcomings, they tasted great with an unmistakable beefy hot dog flavor and the natural casing had a perfect snap when you bit into it. Not bad for my first time!

There are a few reasons for sausage week this week. One was because the green curry sausage was hitting Tablespoon yesterday. The Second reason is because I suddenly have access to an amazing professional sausage stuffer. This thing is awesome! It totally beats stuffing sausage with a pastry bag! It is really easy and fun to use. The third reason was my friend Kim's Birthday was this weekend so sausages were a good thing to bring to the party.  I could cook for the party, but not have to do any prep there.  This sausage variety came about because green beans and mash potatoes are two of Kims favorite foods, so why not combine them with pork and into a portable/edible form?

Sausage week is here! I have some great homemade sausages for you guys this week, but before we start, I wanted to recap some of the past sausage recipes I have made. The first one is making sausage without a sausage stuffer, then there is some homemade sausages that aren't stuffed in casing, then some recipes with store bought sausage.

Apple Fennel Sausage - Without a sausage stuffer!!!

Grilled pizza with herby sausage.

Pasttata with homemade breakfast sausage.

Homemade sausage is perfect on pizza

Green Mac and Cheese

Of course the epic timpano has sausages in it.

My favorite Italian soup.

Cherry sausage grilled pizza. Yum.

Italian sausage dumplings. One of the best meals I have ever

eaten.

Sausage - quinoa stuffed peppers. Somewhat healthy and fantastic.

Also of note, my rival macheesmo made some breakfast sausage this weekend. Looks awesome.

Two of my good friends go to Hooters every sunday at the same time, and I am not invited. Apparently I might mess up the delicate balance they have with the waitresses. See, they think that the waitresses actually LIKE them and want to hang out after work. What the waitresses actually like are the enormous tips they leave at the end of the 3 to 4 hour sessions they have there on the weekly Sunday funday. SERIOUSLY JOHN AND SAL STOP IT! Notice that she canceled your date last week? (oh dip) Maybe I am just jealous though since they won't let me come. If I DID go, what I would get is the fried pickles, cause they rule. Much different from your standard fried pickle, these are breaded, not battered, and cut into chips, not spears. I made them this past Sunday to drown my sorrows while my friends were enjoying themselves at Hooters again.

The other day, my friend Amy emailed me asking for a recipe for some delicious pickles we had eaten at my place in Bermuda a few years back. Hmm, let me just find it in my archives to give you the recipe. Nope! Not there. This was a pre-website recipe. I didn't think i had any more of those left! This isn't really a recipe so much as it is throw a bunch of stuff from your fridge and pantry into a jar and eat something delicious the next day. I like it because you get the flavor of pickleing without the scary botulism of canning and jarring! (someone might yell at me for that one, I'm mostly kidding!)

Hey guys, Battle Skewer is up today on Foodie Fights. It is a fun battle idea, and the contestants made some really cool stuff. Check it out. Also battle Tamarind Brown sugar is available for sign ups today. You guys know how much I love Tamarind. Hopefully one of my readers can sign up and really crush the competition!

A few years back when I worked in the Back Bay area of Boston, my favorite lunch spot was The Otherside Cafe. I would head there weekly to escape the corporate world, enjoying the indie sounds blasting from the stereo, off color art, hipster staff, and unique beer selection. These days I consciously cut back on my meat intake, but back then it was unheard of for me to order a vegetarian item at a restaurant. I got the veggie burrito (a wrap filled with cheese and their vegan chili) on a coworkers suggestion, and totally forgot that it was meatless by the time I was eating it! After that I got it every time I went to Otherside.

Well I stumbled into Otherside this past Friday night with some friends. They ordered the vaguely titled "Nachos", some chips with a generous helping of the vegan chili and some cheddar cheese on top. When they were halfway done eating, I said to them, can you believe there isn't meat in there? "What do you mean? There is ground beef right here" Someone said pointing to the chili. That's when I remembered that I had always wondered what was in the chili that was so beef like! A glance at the menu confirmed that it was bulgur wheat, so I set off to make my own version the next day.

I've been talking about my roommate a lot lately, and no it isn't my parents anymore (my roommates got me a sweet car-bed). I moved in with a friend in a sublet situation for a few months until I get my real place september first. Because it is temporary for me, and it is the last month of her lease, we dont have a very robust pantry. Some nights, when it works out that we both haven't gotten paid in awhile, we have trouble figuring out what to eat! Last night was one such situation. I randomly got a coconut in my daily travels (What? It happens, relax). After looking exaustivly at the stock in our fridge and pantry, and thinking of about 7 different options that didn't quite work, we came to this cous cous that actually came out really tasty! And it was free!

My roomate went blueberry picking last week, and afterwards made a blueberry coffee cake with her harvest. I followed her around with a camera while she made the cake, because I don't do enough baking on this website. It was pretty awesome and we ate it for breakfast all week! Also to note - Macheesmo made a coffee cake with actual coffee IN it this past weekend, so thats worth checking out.

The premise of this started out from an episode of Alex's Day Off where she made some Indian spiced cabbage. I wanted it to be a bit more hearty with more veggies, to step off the side into the center of the plate. When I made the Korean bean paste noodles the other day, I really was loving the smell of the potatoes browning with zucchini and cabbage, so I decided to use that combo again. I served the veggies with a roasted chicken leg (I wanted to grill it but was out of charcoal). This meal was very easy and very cheap. The spice mixture served double in the cabbage and as a base for the chicken rub, and the whole thing coast 9 dollars at Whole Foods (if you have a nice spice collection).

I have been eating Korean food here and there for awhile, but I have only REALLY started getting into it in the past few months. There is a place near my new apartment that serves a dish I have not really seen elsewhere. Forget about bulgogi you guys, this dish is where it's at.