Innholdsfortegnelse for February/March 2018 i Cook's Country

AT FIRST BLUSH, spinach rice might not be the dish that comes to mind when you’re in search of a mouthwatering, deeply satisfying side. But it was my challenge to make it just that. I wanted a dish where mildly sweet white rice provides a comforting backdrop against which the other players shine: a heap of earthy spinach; a healthy dose of olive oil; a sprinkling of fresh herbs; a spritz of lemon; and a caress of salty, creamy feta cheese. But not all versions of this pilaf are created equal. When I scoured the test kitchen’s library for recipes, I was excited to taste the results. Excitement became disappointment as I labored through tastes of bland, watery, or slimy pilafs. One recipe produced loads of overcooked spinach and barely…

BEEF AND BROCCOLI has earned its place—right next to General Tso’s chicken, egg rolls, and pork fried rice—in the rich pantheon of Chinese American takeout dishes. The best versions feature bright, fresh-tasting, emerald-green broccoli and tender beef coated in a pleasantly salty, supersavory sauce. But the bad ones? Steamy salt licks with soggy broccoli and gnarly, chewy meat in a sludgy sauce. And they only get worse as they sit in covered takeout containers. That’s why I wanted a spot-on, fast, and easy recipe for this classic that I could serve piping hot from the pan. I chose a regular nonstick skillet for ease of cleanup and to streamline this recipe for home cooks without a wok. My goal was well-browned, tender beef; crisp-tender, bright green broccoli; and a flavorful,…

HOOSIER PIE WA S born in Indiana as a “desperation dessert” in the 1800s, when fresh fruit was scarce and eggs weren’t always easy to come by. In dreary winter months, innovative home cooks in need of a sweet fix turned to the basics: sugar, cream, and flour—and, whenever it was available, a tiny hit of nutmeg. They’d gently stir the handful of modest ingredients together right in the pie shell before baking it to produce a custardy, pudding-like pie. I loved the poetic simplicity and ingenuity of the antique recipes I dug up, and as I read, I imagined how satisfying it would be to pull a perfectly thickened pie from the oven without even dirtying a mixing bowl. But the fantasy did not play out well in reality.…

HERE’S AN UNCONTROVERSIAL admission: I love brownies. And here’s a controversial one: I’ve made a few batches using box mixes and found myself relatively satisfied. But all things being equal, I’d rather make brownies from scratch, for the deeper, more complex flavor they deliver. A typical box mix consists of measured dry ingredients (flour, cocoa powder, sugar, salt, leavening agent, and in some cases artificial ingredients to enhance flavor or ensure even baking). You add oil, eggs, and sometimes water and then stir together and bake. I knew that I’d have to measure my own ingredients, but beyond that, I wanted my recipe to be as simple as possible and require just one bowl, like the mixes do. Brownies made with cocoa powder alone will do, but I prefer the…

Colors of Beets My grocery store regularly carries golden beets. Do they taste the same as red beets? -Mary Payne, Winston-Salem, N.C. While many supermarkets offer only red beets, there are many varieties of beets in different colors. We tried three of the most common: red beets, golden beets, and Chioggia beets (easily recognizable when cut by their concentric red and white circles). We sampled the three types of beets three ways: raw, roasted, and in our Marinated Beet Salad with Oranges and Pecorino. Overall, tasters found the golden beets “less sweet” than red beets, with a stronger earthy flavor; one taster commented that they tasted “carrot-like.” In contrast, the Chioggia beets were “mild,” with a “bitter aftertaste,” but they got bonus points for their striking appearance when raw (the…

YOU’D BE HARD-PRESSED to find a person who doesn’t love eating a juicy, tender meatball with a slow-simmered tomato sauce. But making them? That’s another story. Between the mixing, shaping, browning, and simmering, it can be a real project. Our usual method for meatballs involves browning them in the oven or on the stovetop before finishing them in the sauce, a technique that adds meaty flavor but can be supermessy and requires extra work. But after our executive food editor’s visit to Philadelphia (see “On the Road”), my coworkers and I all had meatballs on the brain. Thing is, we didn’t want to wait for a Sunday supper—we wanted them on any given weeknight, which meant we needed an easier process. So I wondered, what if I skipped that browning…

CRUMBLING A BLOCK of feta for a salad, pasta, or pizza can be messy, making packages of crumbled feta a tempting substitute. But how do they measure up? To find out, we tasted four of the most widely available products, priced from $0.50 to $1.13 per ounce, assessing them plain, in couscous salad, and in spanakopita. We also compared them with our winning block feta, made by Real Greek Feta ($0.87 per ounce). The crumbled versions (all made domestically with cow’s milk) couldn’t top Real Greek Feta, which is produced in Greece using funkier sheep’s milk. We did, however, find a few good options for those times when convenience is paramount. Our favorite crumbled feta has lots of fat and a relatively moderate sodium level. Tasters deemed it “savory,” “briny,”…

PORK CHOPS MAKE for a quick and simple weeknight supper, but they can be dull. I wanted to punch up my chops with some big, bold flavors, which would be especially welcome in the drab winter months. You say winter, I think citrus. So I hit the books and found a few pork chop recipes that promised bright citrusy flavors by marinating the chops. But their lemon-, lime-, and orange-juice marinades didn’t deliver the citrusy flavors I envisioned. Instead, I found that the bright flavors dulled during cooking and that the marinades inhibited the exterior browning I wanted my chops to feature. The best way to deliver fresh citrus flavor, of course, is to save it until the end. What if I simply served the seared chops with a vibrant…

NEEDHAMS (ALSO KNOWN as potato fudge or potato candy) are an heirloom Maine candy with an unexpected twist: their creamy, coconutty base is built on mashed spuds. You can’t taste the potatoes in these treats, which resemble Mounds candy bars in texture and flavor. They were popularized in the late 1800s by their namesake, the Reverend George C. Needham of Aroostook County, Maine (a big potato-growing region), who, the story goes, made them for his parishioners. I was admittedly skeptical when I made the first batch of these sweets, but I was pleasantly surprised to discover that plain, unseasoned mashed potatoes (the flavor of which disappeared when I mixed them with milk, butter, powdered sugar, and coconut) did a great job of binding the filling together. A few versions I…

PORK AND BEANS is a dish that was custom-made for the slow cooker. A passable version takes little more than stirring together a few ingredients and taking the rest of the day off. But eating the same old beans with a few hunks of mushy bacon can get a bit stale. For this version, I wanted to follow the lead of feijoada, a classic Brazilian stew that takes the concept to new heights with black beans and three kinds of pork. Traditionally, this dish is a project. To get an idea of what to aim for with our slow-cooker version, I made it for my colleagues. The result was an ultrasatisfying dish of creamy black beans in a full-bodied, smoke-and-pork-infused broth piled high with chorizo, a mess of tender and…

THERE ARE FEW dishes in the world as crowd-pleasing and soul-warming as shepherd’s pie, that layered dish of savory, gravy-soaked beef and vegetables topped with lightly browned, buttery mashed potatoes. But what about those nights when there is no crowd? To scale down this recipe for two, my first move was to settle on a cooking vessel. Traditionally, shepherd’s pie is built in a casserole dish or deep skillet, but too much depth means too much food for two people. So I opted for a smaller, 10-inch ovensafe skillet, which was wide enough for browning the beef and sautéing the vegetables and just deep enough for arranging a top layer of mashed potatoes. In other words, just the right size for serving up two hearty portions. Because I didn’t have…

Creamy Kale Salad with Skirt Steak Serves 4 WHY THIS RECIPE WORKS: Dressing the kale in step 1 gives the hearty greens time to soften while we cook the steaks. 3 ounces Parmesan cheese, grated (1½ cups)½ cup mayonnaise1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce1 tablespoon lemon juice Salt and pepper6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil12 ounces curly kale, stemmed and cut into 1-inch pieces½ cup panko bread crumbs1½ pounds skirt steak, trimmed and cut crosswise into 4 equal pieces1 red-skinned apple, cored, halved, and sliced thin 1. Process 1 cup Parmesan, mayonnaise, Worcestershire, lemon juice, ½ teaspoon salt, and ¼ teaspoon pepper in food processor until smooth. With processor running, slowly add ¼ cup oil until emulsified. Transfer dressing to large bowl; add kale and toss to combine. 2. Combine panko, 1 tablespoon…

LEFTOVERS FROM A holiday meal are never a bad thing, but bubble and squeak, a quick (and thrifty) hash of mashed potato and cabbage with an English accent, makes having—and eating—leftovers a joy. The dish, which picks up loads of tasty browning in the pan, gets its funny name from the sound the mixture makes when it pops in the hot skillet. Bubble and squeak always contains potato and cabbage, but in Great Britain (where it’s often eaten for breakfast, in addition to as a dinner side dish), it serves as a catchall for whatever other vegetables and meats are kicking around the refrigerator. While I found recipes that call for additions of cooked beets, carrots, peas, parsnips, and even beef roast, I decided to create a more basic version…

A GIANT FIBERGLASS pig in chef’s clothing stands proudly at the door of G. Esposito and Sons Jersey Pork Store in Brooklyn, New York, simultaneously welcoming customers and warning away miscreants. When I step inside, the relative quiet is pierced by a wailing band saw, manned by a stocky, grey-haired butcher breaking down a pork loin into thin, even chops. I post up beneath a canopy of salami and when the sawing stops, I inquire about one of the house specialties, prosciutto bread, prominently displayed atop the butcher’s case. The butcher responds curtly, talking as much with his hands as with his words, “So you wanna talk about prosciutt’ bread?” I do, and soon we’re deep into our shared favorite subject: food. George Esposito and his brother, John, took over…

MANY OF US have unpleasant memories of limp, bloated, army-green Brussels sprouts loitering, shunned, on the edges of our dinner plates. But when I was offered a bite of a friend’s fried Brussels sprouts on a recent night out at a restaurant, I was reminded how good this vegetable can be. These sprouts were crunchy, with a nutty, slightly sweet flavor that made one bite quickly turn into four (or five). I knew I needed to re-create them. I gathered a handful of recipes for fried Brussels sprouts and very quickly learned why they’re not a popular cook-at-home item. Every time I dropped the halved sprouts into hot oil, the oil bubbled up in a fit of anger, splattered, and sent me (and my coworkers) running. Don’t get me wrong—the…

Test Kitchen Tips for Making Any Chili Build and Incorporate Fond Fond, the browned bits that form on the bottom of the pot when you brown meat and vegetables, contributes great richness and depth of flavor when it is scraped off the pot and dissolved into the other ingredients. Bloom Spices Could you simply stir the spices into the bubbling liquid and still have decent chili? Yes. But to maximize flavor, it’s better to bloom your spices—cook them with some fat to release their flavor compounds—before adding the liquid. Evaporate Liquid Chili shouldn’t have a soupy consistency. Many chilis simmer for hours to concentrate their flavor and texture, but because we thicken our tomato base with pureed kidney beans, this chili starts thicker and doesn’t need to reduce as much.…

IT’S HARD TO imagine a more comforting wintertime supper than flavorful sausages and peppers resting atop a scoop of soft, creamy cornmeal polenta. But this Italian American classic often ends with a sink full of pots and pans. I set out to rewrite that ending with a simple one-pan recipe. Polenta has several aliases at the supermarket, with the different names signifying how finely the dried corn kernels are ground. For my quick weeknight meal, “instant” polenta made the most sense—since it’s already cooked and dried, I knew that I could whisk it into hot liquid (traditionally a combination of milk and water) to create a savory porridge that would be done in minutes. But first, the meat and vegetables. After setting my oven to 450 degrees, I grabbed a…

RICOTTA–CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES Makes about 36 cookies Do not use standard-size chocolate chips in this recipe; they will overpower the ricotta. 2 cups (10 ounces) all-purpose flour½ teaspoon salt½ teaspoon baking soda8 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened1 cup (7 ounces) sugar1 large egg plus1 large yolk1 teaspoon vanilla extract8 ounces (1 cup) whole-milk ricotta cheese¾ cup (41⁄2 ounces) mini semisweet chocolate chips 1. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 rimmed baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk flour, salt, and baking soda together in bowl; set aside. 2. Using stand mixer fitted with paddle, beat butter and sugar on medium- high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add egg and yolk and vanilla and beat until combined, about 15 seconds.…