Justin & Meredith Winokur's Kitchen Cooking Notebook
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KitchenKatalog: Blog 269
Sunday, January 19, 2014, 04:22 PM
There were kind of two parts to this meal. The first was the papaya salad and the second was trying to roll it in rice papers.
First the salad. We julienne the green papaya at first by a mandoline and then manually which was a pain but I managed. We followed the recipe pretty faithfully except we increased the amount of dressing since we had a lot of papaya. And we used only 1/2 pound shrimp. Finally, we fried all of the scallions both for the dressing and the marinade. We skipped the peanuts but also added thai basil, mint, and cilantro. Meredith also did something like massage the papaya with the dry seasonings to soften it a bit. The salad was really good. A lot of flavor, though less than the one we have had at a restaurant. The herbs added a nice amount of nuance to the dish. I like the green papaya more than ripe since I have had pretty bad luck with papaya in the past.
The second part was trying to make summer rolls out of it with rice paper. The real problem was that these were too small of rice papers for what we tried to do. They just didn't come together well (though I think Meredith had more luck than I had). I think we would have had more luck with larger papers. I definitely want to try and do these again (with veggies and the more regular things inside). But with larger rolls!
Green Papaya Salad with Shrimp (from Splendid Table)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7158, 2014-01-19_162220
Saturday, January 18, 2014, 04:21 PM
Meredith and I made fish, soup and braised leeks.
The fish was cod that we coated in a mixture of pecan meal, salt, pepper, and a bit of panko. We coated it all around and really patted it on. We then baked it for like 12-15 minutes at 350 (ish--with that oven). It came out pretty good. Not the most flavorful but you could really taste the fish. It probably would have been better if we marinated it or did something like that.
We made french onion soup (sans cheese) with lots of really well reduced/caramelized onions, Then, we made the soup with a mixture of beef and chicken broth and white wine (2:2:1 ratio or so). Not much else there. The soup was pretty simple and pretty good though not incredible. I do not know what I could do to make it more rich.
Finally, we did braised leeks. We cut off the greens and then peeled the outer layer. The rest was from the recipe below. Not too special to the recipe but they weren't very good. They were a bit mushy and stringy. I have never had braised leeks or leeks in any real form for that matter so I have little to compare it to.
It was certainly an acceptable meal but at no point was anything all that special. Maybe we will use some of these ideas again but with changes.
Braised Leeks (from Martha Stewart)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7154, 2014-01-18_162124
Thursday, January 16, 2014, 08:42 AM
This was Meredith's idea and mostly her execution but I'll do my best to explain. We had socca (french chick-pea flour crepes) with all kinds of toppings inspired by a restaurant near us. I have my picture assembled. Here is everything we had. Note that everything was made by scratch:
So, it was a pretty easy and very pretty meal. We would certainly make it again!
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7149, 2014-01-16_084242
Tuesday, January 14, 2014, 08:07 PM
I had heard of using eggplants as pizza crust (may or may not do in the future) but I decided to try to make open-face [almost] reubens instead.
I sliced an eggplant into about 1/4 to 1/3 thick slices (thicker than thickest mandoline setting). I pammed it, then sprinkled it with salt, pepper, and caraway (to fake rye bread flavor). I roasted it at 400 for 12 minutes. I then flipped them and did the same seasonings and roasted them for 5 minutes.
I then topped the eggplant slices with home-made fat free thousand island (see below), then [heated] sauerkraut, then pastrami (Hillshire Farms brand), then slices of swiss-cheese. The pastrami was 7 ounces which is a little bit less than I wanted but to be honest, it was enough. I roasted them for other 5-7 minutes to melt and heat it all
The dressing was from the recipe below. I upped the relish to a full tbsp since it needed it. I also did use low-sugar ketchup since I had it. The dressing was pretty good though I do not recall how other commercial ones. This was pretty easy and good though so I'd do it again.
Overall, they were pretty good. Nowhere near as good as a_real_ reuben, but good enough for dinner and was certainly healthier. I actually calculated the points below too. I would do it again for sure though two slices of rye bread wouldn't have been too many more calories/points that I may just consider that next time.
(oh, I also had leftover squash)
Fat Free Thousand Island Dressing (from Ari's Menu)
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Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7142, 2014-01-14_200726
Monday, January 13, 2014, 09:57 AM
I am still working through leftover moussakka, but today, I also roasted a kabocha squash. I followed the same as I did last time(sliced into crescents, 30 minutes at 400, flipped half way). I used pam, salt and pepper. The squash again came out really, really good. I thoroughly enjoyed eating it this way. I did east some of the skin but not all of it like last time. I wonder if it was a bit more roasted last time making the skin more edible (though the meat was fully cooked).
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7138, 2014-01-13_095717
Sunday, January 12, 2014, 09:21 AM
I started out making buffalo cauliflower. I made the batter with some ranch powder too (I've done this before but I only just added it to the recipe). Anyway, I made the batter too wet causing a lot to fall off and just cook the batter on the pan. It also didn't go very far so instead of making a second batch, I decided to play.
I steamed the remaining cauliflower and used the immersion blender and potato masher to mostly mash it with some chunks. I added the rest of the ranch powder, an egg, some flour, and other seasonings. I tried to make it like a pancake on the non-stick but it was just not really cooking and didn't flip well (Back left of the right picture). So I decided to pan-fry (more oil than sauté but not as much as really frying) it (back right of the right picture). This worked a little bit better but not much. It did have more flavor from the oil. Finally, I put the rest of the batter in the pan and I cooked it while moving it making a strange cooked cauliflower mush (bowl in right photo). Actually, that was pretty good. The ranch powder really helped with the flavor.
So, it was a strange meal but actually pretty good. Lots of food.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7133, 2014-01-12_092115
Saturday, January 11, 2014, 04:15 PM
I made lentil moussaka using the regular recipe with the lentils. I went a bit heavier on the seasonings too.
This was my first time doing it into an aluminum lasagna pan and it was a tight fit. I thought I had made too much eggplant and potatoes and it ended up being pretty close. When I do it again into a pan like this, I may up the recipe a bit, especially the béchamel where it was really, really close.
I had made this and cooked it for 25 minutes. I then let it cool and took it to my friends where did another 20-25 minutes. I thought it was less flavorful than usual but it may just be that I was eating a lot of other stuff then too.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7128, 2014-01-11_161534
Saturday, January 11, 2014, 11:11 AM
I have always enjoyed popcorn and I had been using the air popper for a while but it always tastes a bit stale. And I had to spray it with pam to get any seasonings to stick. Plus, I had some stove-top popcorn at friends house. So I decided to try it.
I used the basic method outlines by this America's Test Kitchen video which I also outlined below:
I followed this with small test batches. As I said above, I used heat 7/10 but I think I would bring it to 5 or 6. I also put a layer of parchment under the pot so I could shake without scratching (can only do that on induction).
On my first test, I used canola oil and I liked it a lot. The popcorn had a bit of the oil flavor and was a good texture. Enough oil stayed on the kernels that I could just season without pam. The next batch, I tried extra virgin olive oil. This seemed to smoke a little bit and a few kernels had a smokey taste but not too bad. While it is a healthier oil, I didn't like that it was smoking. And canola isn't really too bad anyway.
In the future, I may try to use regular (ie non extra virgin) olive oil. Also, Meredith found this post also by America's Test Kitchen and they use water. Not sure if I am willing to try that.
I also need to test with different pans. I did small amounts here (1/4 cup) which is half of what I normally pop. There was more room in the pan but probably not twice as much (though I could test with the pan dry and see). But if I go any bigger, I need a lot more oil to coat the pan. I'll play and see what I can figure out.
Also, I want to investigate adding seasonings right to the oil while popping. Maybe some garlic and pepper in the oil then other seasonings on top.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7120, 2014-01-11_111144