Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2016 - January 2017 i Cook's Country

THE RESPONSES AROUND the test kitchen to the announcement that we’d be developing a recipe for eggnog fell into two distinct camps: pro and con. Folks either loved eggnog or hated it. There was no in between. Test cook Morgan Bolling had her work cut out for her—not just to create a perfect recipe for eggnog but to win over the naysayers. (Spoiler alert: She did. See the recipe on page 17.) I’ll admit my bias: I was in the pro camp. For most of my life I was . . . well, I was just fine with eggnog. I liked it, but I didn’t crave it. But then I watched the classic screwball comedy The Awful Truth. In one early scene, Cary Grant stands behind a gargantuan punch bowl,…

TOO OFTEN, FRESH and flavorful leeks end up as supporting players in soups—or worse, they never leave the grocery store produce aisle. I wanted to treat this underrated vegetable a little more carefully, braising it slowly to bring out its mild flavors in a warm dish suitable for still-brisk springtime nights. I gathered a variety of existing recipes, and after much slicing, washing, browning, braising, whisking, and dressing, I called my tasters. We agreed on a few things: One, cutting the leeks lengthwise, leaving the root ends intact, made for the best presentation. Two, browning the leeks and then braising them in broth yielded the deepest flavor. And three, it had to be easy. Back in the kitchen, I halved and washed 3 pounds of leeks, seasoned them with salt…

THE CALZONE, SIMILAR to pizza, has been a mainstay in America since the dish traveled here with Italians in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. These half-moon-shaped hand pies were popular midday meals, often sold from carts and eaten on the run. I set out to reinvent the calzone as a shareable meal serving several people. Step one: I ruled out the half-moon pies in favor of a single large, circular calzone. To keep it easy, I started with store-bought pizza dough (though homemade worked just as well). I knew that a cast-iron skillet would be an ideal vessel because I could use it first to cook the meat and then again as the perfect baking vessel. Its high sides would allow for easy assembly and keep this massive…

Danish Blue GREAT DANE “Boom! Pow! There’s that blue cheese flavor,” said one taster of this cheese. Danish Blue (or Danablu) is a powerful and complex cheese made from cow’s milk and homogenized cream. It has a strong salty, tangy flavor with a slightly sweet finish. Its creamy yet crumbly semisoft texture is spotted with silvery blue pockets. It makes a great dessert cheese served with stone fruit or pears. Roquefort DEEP POCKETS France’s “cheese of kings and popes,” once favored by Charlemagne, is a creamy, pungent sheep’s-milk cheese produced in the Roquefort-sur-Soulzon region. Ivory-colored and pocketed with large clumps of dark green-blue mold (Penicillium roqueforti), Roquefort is “luxurious” and “supercreamy,” with crystal-like granules that vary the texture. Its pungent flavor has a bit of sweetness and “a little sharpness…

I T’S HARD TO beat a classic Caesar salad: Bite-size pieces of torn Romaine lettuce leaves and crunchy croutons tossed in a salty, briny, sour, sweet, and savory dressing. For a twist, I wanted to take the things we love about Caesar salad and unleash them on a green bean salad that I could serve as a no-fuss holiday side. I knew that I wanted the dressing to be thick enough to steadfastly cling to the green beans; to achieve this effect in the past, we’ve often turned to mayonnaise or mustard. Both condiments have proved useful in keeping dressings cohesive, so I made two dressings, employing mayonnaise in one and Dijon mustard in the other, along with lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, garlic, and a few anchovies that I minced…

EASY POUND CAKE Serves 8 The test kitchen’s preferred loaf pan measures 8½ by 4½ inches; if you use a 9 by 5-inch pan, start checking for doneness 5 minutes early. To dress up the cake, try our Citrus Glaze (recipe follows). 1½ cups (6 ounces) cake flour 1 teaspoon baking powder ½ teaspoon salt 1¼ cups (8¾ ounces) sugar 4 large eggs, room temperature 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract 16 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and hot 1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour 8½ by 4½-inch loaf pan. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in bowl. 2. Process sugar, eggs, and vanilla in food processor until combined, about 10 seconds. With processor running, add melted butter in steady stream until…

IT’S COMMON TO see shrimp skewered on the grill, sizzling in butter in a hot skillet, or frying in a pool of hot oil in a Dutch oven. But an alternate option, a one-baking-sheet meal with shrimp as the centerpiece, calls for the oven. The beauty of using shrimp for a speedy supper is that they cook through quickly when exposed to any sort of heat. And unlike other proteins that need direct contact with a hot surface or flame to achieve an appetizing sear, shrimp taste great without it. But this is also the danger of shrimp—it’s far too easy to overcook them. If they spend too long in the oven, their delicate flesh turns tough and rubbery. After a few initial tests, I discovered that 6 to 8…

 TO MAKE THIS CAKE, YOU WILL NEED: 8 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 3 pieces 1½ cups pecan halves, plus about 30 halves for decorating 1 cup (5 ounces) all-purpose flour ¾ teaspoon ground cinnamon ½ teaspoon salt 4 large eggs, separated 1 cup packed (7 ounces) light brown sugar 2 teaspoons vanilla extract ⅓ cup spiced rum 1½ cups Chocolate Glaze (recipe follows)  FOR THE CAKE: Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 300 degrees. Grease 9-inch springform pan and line bottom with parchment paper. Microwave chocolate and butter in bowl at 50 percent power, stirring occasionally, until melted, 1 to 2 minutes; let cool slightly. Process 1½ cups pecans, flour, cinnamon, and salt in food processor until finely ground, about…

What’s in a Name? What’s the difference between broccoli rabe, broccolini, and broccoli? Jerry Schutz, Hopewell, Va. Most Americans are familiar with broccoli, but not the other two. Broccoli, broccolini, and broccoli rabe are all cruciferous vegetables, but broccoli rabe is more closely related to turnips, another member of the Brassicaceae family. Broccolini is a cross between broccoli and Chinese broccoli, and it looks like broccoli stretched into a long, skinny form. Broccoli rabe has a bitter bite that can be polarizing: People who love dark leafy greens are typically fans, while others can be turned off by its pungent flavor. In a recent tasting, our tasters lauded its “sharp” and “minerally” flavor and spicy finish. Broccolini is a bit sweeter than broccoli, with a flavor some tasters likened to…

AMONG THE MOST popular dishes served at Alexander Bodnar’s tiny restaurant in the Hazelwood neighborhood of Pittsburgh (see “On The Road”) is his signature Transylvanian goulash. Like its Hungarian counterpart, Transylvanian goulash (named for the picturesque area in central Romania, Hungary’s next door neighbor) is a flavorful stew made of browned meat, aromatic vegetables, and a heavy dose of paprika. But while most Hungarian goulash is made with beef, Bodnar’s version features pork and tangy sauerkraut. To re-create the dish, I started with a boneless pork butt roast that I cut into chunks. I knew that this cut has good marbling and was therefore well suited to a prolonged braise that would result in tender meat and deep flavor. Browning the pork in batches built up a flavorful fond in…

VEAL MARSALA, THIN cutlets or medallions of meat served with mushrooms and sweet Marsala wine, is a ubiquitous menu item at Italian American restaurants. You’ll find pork Marsala, too, but it tends to be dry and disappointing. I knew I’d have to choose the right cut of pork, one that’s easy to work with but also tender and quick-cooking. Pork loin proved too tough, but pork tenderloin, cut into slices, worked better. After pounding the slices into thin cutlets, however, I found that they too easily overcooked. Instead, I settled on 1½-inch-thick medallions. I could cut 12 from two tenderloins, enough to serve four people heartily or six less-hungry people. I was happy to find that my medallions all fit into a single 12-inch skillet. They developed a pleasantly brown…

B ONE-IN CHICKEN PARTS, from kid-friendly drumsticks to parent-pleasing breasts and thighs, are one of my favorite weeknight suppers. Bone-in pieces are juicier and more economical than boneless. But they are usually relegated to the oven, and they take time to cook. I wanted roast-chicken flavor with crispy skin in one skillet on the stovetop, with delicious browned bits left in the skillet to make a pan sauce. The variables: which pan to use and at what temperature, if and when to flip the pieces, and if and when to cover them. I tested a variety of techniques, but none was easy or foolproof enough. Then I came across a method that intrigued me: chicken arranged skin side down in a cold nonstick skillet. Why not? I nestled the pieces…

IF THE ONLY “eggnog” you’ve experienced is the prefab stuff you find in the dairy case around the holidays, you’re forgiven for not liking it much. You’re also forgiven for not knowing what it is. Most commercial eggnogs consist of milk pumped full of factory-produced stabilizers, yellow food coloring, and sweeteners. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, in fact, requires just 1 percent of the drink to be actual egg yolk solids. I long ago swore off eggnog, having never actually tried the real thing. So on a recent afternoon in the test kitchen, faced with the task of mixing up six existing eggnog recipes for a tasting, I didn’t know what to expect. But I was happily surprised. Real eggnog is made from a few simple ingredients: milk, eggs,…

M Y FAMILY HAS been making Lighthouse Inn Potatoes for parties and holiday dinners since I was a kid. Chunks of soft potatoes baked in a rich cream sauce and topped with golden bread crumbs—what’s not to love? The Lighthouse Inn was an iconic hotel and restaurant located in New London, a popular seaside town in southeastern Connecticut, for more than a century before it closed its doors in 2009. Executive chef Leon “Wally” Walden, who worked there for nearly 50 years before his 1992 death, was known for many of his dishes, but Lighthouse Inn Potatoes was perhaps his most beloved offering. After he died, the local newspaper, The New London Day, published his recipe in tribute. The recipe that the newspaper published calls for leftover baked russet potatoes,…

WHEN I THINK of parties, I think of sparkling conversation, refreshing cocktails, and savory little pass-around party snacks like crostini. These little toasts (crostini actually means “little toasts” in Italian) provide an excellent blank canvas for a range of toppings, from cheese to meat to vegetables. Ideas flooded my brain and I couldn’t wait to get started. I knew that each of these stacked bites would need to deliver major flavor but also be easy to eat one-handed. (I’m presuming, of course, that the other hand will be grasping a glass of something refreshing.) So they needed to be sturdy, and they needed something to help the toppings stick. For the toasted-bread platform, I chose a baguette. A thin slice of baguette is just the right size for finger food.…

CACCIATORE, WHICH MEANS “hunterstyle” in Italian, refers to a rustic dish of freshly caught game (usually rabbit), foraged mushrooms, and rosemary that’s traditionally served after a hunt. It’s since become a ubiquitous Italian American dish, with bone-in chicken substituting for rabbit and chunky tomatoes and peppers added to the saucy braise. My biggest challenge was avoiding dry chicken and a too-thick or too-thin sauce. To leap over these hurdles, I had to find a way to sync the cooking of the chicken and the sauce so that everything finished at the same time. Nixing chicken breasts in favor of leg quarters fit the bill; dark meat stays moist in long braises, so the window of time for cooking them could be a bit more flexible than with white meat. Additionally,…

WHY DO SO many people serve ham for the holidays? A better question might be, why do people serve anything else? A salty-sweet spiral-sliced ham is precooked (just heat, glaze if you like, and serve), sliced for easy carving, and feeds a crowd. These hams are big, easy, and delicious. But with so many products on the market, which one should you buy? To answer this, we selected seven widely available varieties of bone-in spiral-sliced ham (a mix of shank-end and butt-end cuts; we tasted whichever was easier to find) and asked 21 editors and cooks to taste each one. We began by tasting slices of plain, oven-heated ham; we moved on to ham sandwiches stacked with never-heated, refrigeratorchilled slices, using a different ham from each manufacturer for each tasting.…

NEAT IDEA Organize It! Beth Haber, Colorado Springs, Colo. Frosting and decorating holiday cookies can turn into a huge mess—especially if my kids are involved. To keep things neat and orderly, I use a 12-cup muffin tin to hold the sprinkles, glitter, and candy. This way all the decorations are contained in one place. SMART TIP Grate Idea for Brown Sugar Mike Harrison, Palmyra, Va. I’ve found myself with rock-hard brown sugar on many occasions; the kind that’s too hard to salvage with any of the well-known tricks. Unwilling to pitch it in the trash, I’ve found that I can grate the sugar using a rasp-style grater and use the dry, granular sugar for sprinkling on oatmeal, berries, or buttered toast. Waste not, want not. GREEN CLEAN Citrus Scent Bob…

P ALE GREEN AVOCADO and vibrant pink grapefruit, both in season during winter’s bleakest months, make a handsome couple. At the fruits’ best, the buttery and nutty notes of the soft avocado play well with the grapefruit’s invigorating tang. But if assembled carelessly, the combination can be bitter and wet. I wanted a salad that showcased the natural beauty and best flavors of each fruit. Grapefruit peel is intensely bitter, as is the pith—the soft white layer between the fruit and its skin. I tried simply cutting away these two offending layers and then slicing the exposed fruit into rounds. This method was quick and easy, but the result still retained too much membrane and was tricky to eat. The better method was to cut each segment away from its…

SO MUCH CAN go wrong with a turkey burger. Even when made with care, it can be dry, dense, or totally lacking in flavor. We’ve cracked the code before in the test kitchen, but our process involved grinding our own turkey meat. I wanted a moist, flavorful turkey burger using store-bought ground turkey. And what’s more, I wanted slightly crispy edges. First I had to rectify the pitfalls of most turkey burgers—dryness and denseness—without changing the culprits: the relative lack of fat and the need to cook turkey to 160 degrees. To fight dryness, you can add moisture, which usually means adding fat. Using fattier ground turkey (usually a blend of white and dark meat and about 93 percent lean) instead of ground turkey breast (white meat only and up…

T HE FIRM PUDDING made with coconut milk and customarily served in chilled cubes is known as haupia (pronounced how-PEE-ah) in Hawaii. Though it’s wonderful on its own, why not put it in a pie? And for that matter, why not put it in a two-tone pie with melted chocolate added to one layer? This is not just a good idea—it’s a delicious reality at Hawaiian bakeries such as Ted’s, located on Oahu. I wanted to bring it home to my kitchen. Rather than the rich, ploppable stuff you usually think of as pudding, haupia is firmer. Experiments with existing recipes gave me haupia that resembled bouncy Jell-O and was far too sweet. I wanted stable yet delicate pudding, balanced but insistent coconut flavor, and measured sweetness. I also wanted…

AS OUR FRIENDS in the United Kingdom have known for generations, a crusty, custardy Yorkshire pudding is without peer as an accompaniment to a resplendent roast beef. It swabs up and soaks up all those drippings and gravy in the most rewarding way. This year I set out to create a foolproof recipe for both items—roast and pudding—that would have them ready for the table at the same time. I started, naturally, with the beef. While I love the impressive stature of a bone-in standing rib roast, it can be tricky to carve at the table. So this year I opted for a boneless rib roast. Its rich marbling would guarantee plenty of beefy flavor, and searing and slicing the roast would be much easier. To prepare it, I called…

SLIDE A BATCH of gingerbread cookies into the oven and the aromas of cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves swirl through the air. Everyone can agree that they smell wonderful. But ask them whether they prefer thin and crisp or soft and chewy and people pick sides. I know this because I surveyed my fellow test cooks on a recent morning: Would you rather have a crisp cookie or a soft one? While many professed a preference for crisp cookies, soft and chewy cookies won the poll. A bit of research into the history of this holiday classic confirmed that this is no newfangled twist; fans of softer cookies have been around for generations. Many of the gingerbread recipes I found had a low ratio of fat to flour, which made the…

BUTTERNUT SQUASH SOUP should be silky-smooth, deeply flavorful, and completely comforting. It should be light enough to serve in cups as an appetizer for a holiday dinner but substantial enough to serve in big bowls alongside hunks of crusty bread and a fresh salad for a modest weeknight supper. But so many recipes cover up the earthy, slightly sweet flavor of the squash. Cooks add extras like sweet potatoes, leeks, potatoes, apple butter, or cider to the mix, and while many of them turn out a reasonable soup (we tried), the squash flavor seems to be an afterthought. I wanted a soup that kept the focus on the squash, with room for garnishes to round things out. I wanted to make it in the slow cooker. And I wanted to…

THE TEST KITCHEN GAUNTLET 7 Dutch Ovens, 8 Tests We put each Dutch oven through the_following battery of tests: 1. Time how long it takes to boil water 2. Cook one batch of White Rice 3. Fry 15 ounces of frozen French fries in_2 quarts of oil 4. Braise one batch of Beef Burgundy 5. Bake one loaf of Almost No-Knead_Bread 6. Wash (five times) with abrasive sponge 7. Whack rim with metal spoon 50 times 8. Slam lid down onto its base 10 times A DUTCH OVEN just might be the most versatile pot you can own. It can go on the stove and in the oven, which makes it ideal for braising meat; cooking soups, stews, and sauces; boiling water; frying; and even baking bread. These pots come…

We’re looking for recipes that have been handed down in your family for a generation or more and have earned a place in your heart. Visit CooksCountry.com/recipe_submission (or write to Heirloom Recipes, Cook’s_ Country, P.O. Box 470739, Brookline, MA 02447) and tell us a little about the recipe. Include your_name and mailing address. If we print your recipe, you’ll receive a free one-year subscription to Cook’s Country. EASY MINCEMEAT FRUITCAKE Makes 2 cakes “Fruitcake has a bad reputation for being loaded with neon red and green candied fruit. This recipe that my mom always made uses jarred mincemeat and dried fruits.” –Janice Campbell, Reston, Va. Mincemeat can be found in the baking section of most supermarkets. This recipe was tested using one 29-ounce jar of Robertson’s Mincemeat Classic. The test…