Innholdsfortegnelse for August/September 2020 i Cook's Country

THE PROMISE OF bistec de palomilla (which translates as “butterfly steak,” indicating the way in which the steaks are sliced and/or pounded to resemble a butterfly) is meat deeply flavored with vibrant garlic and citrus flavors and smothered in gently sweet, golden-brown onions. It’s a celebrated Cuban tradition in thousands of American and Caribbean homes. Many of the recipes I found in my initial research called for marinating less expensive steaks such as round or cube steak with garlic and lime juice to help tenderize the meat and introduce flavor. But my experiments consistently yielded steaks with muted flavor and uneven texture—a result of the meat sitting in the acidic lime juice. Did I need to marinate the steaks at all, or could I introduce these flavors in a different…

RIPE SUMMER TOMATOES need nothing more than a little olive oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper to help them taste their best. Many cooks, myself included, like to add a little sliced onion to the mix; the onion’s pungency accents the sweetness and tartness of the tomatoes. A few tips on making the best version: Use a sweet onion, such as a Vidalia, to balance the vinegar, and slice it thin. Fruity cider vinegar calls out the tomatoes’ sweetness. And letting the dressed salad sit for an hour allows the flavors to meld and draws liquid out of the tomatoes that mixes with the dressing to become an elixir so tasty that, when the tomatoes themselves are gone, you’ll want to pick up the bowl and drink the dregs. TOMATO AND…

TACOS AL PASTOR contain an irresistible combination of flavorful components: deeply seasoned pork, charred fresh pineapple, warm corn tortillas, and a bounty of lively toppings. Traditional versions are made by slicing fatty pork (usually shoulder) thin and then marinating it in what is essentially an adobo sauce of dried chiles, spices, and often citrus or vinegar. The marinated slices are then stacked high on a vertical spit and cooked slowly—as they spin around and around—until they’re tender. When it’s time to make the tacos, the heat is cranked up so that the outer layer of meat on the spit gets lightly charred; the cook slices the charred pork off the rotating spit right onto warm tortillas and then adds toppings before handing the tacos over to waiting taco fiends. So…

THE RAINIS heavy when I pull up to Michelangelo’s Pizzeria and Italian Restaurant in Sarasota, Florida. The dining room is empty at 11:09 a.m., but the glass display case is full. A pizzaiolo wearing a white T-shirt, white apron, and motivated white socks takes my order for stuffed pizza. After putting my slice into the oven to warm, he introduces himself with a heavy New York accent. Mike Iannucci started working at his cousin’s pizzeria in Long Island, New York, when he was 15 and has been in the pizza business in some capacity ever since, bringing his expertise with him when he moved to Florida 30 years ago. He doesn’t own Michelangelo’s and says he’s content with that. He tells me that, from experience, “When you own a restaurant,…

SALMON IS A perennial favorite in the test kitchen for quick and versatile weeknight dinners. For this easy one-pan supper, I wanted to highlight fresh summer flavors by roasting fennel and tomatoes alongside my salmon and then tie it all together with a garlic-lemon-herb compound butter. To ensure that the licorice-y fennel became caramelized and sweet, I gave it a head start by spreading it out on a baking sheet and letting it get some color in the oven before adding my other ingredients. I stirred in halved cherry tomatoes and sliced garlic before adding the salmon fillets and let it all roast together while I stirred lemon zest, minced garlic, and minced thyme into softened butter. By the time the salmon was cooked, the tomatoes had slumped and released…

PRALINES Makes about 16 candies You will need a digital instant-read thermometer for this recipe. It is important to use a long-handled metal spoon to stir and portion these candies so that your hands remain a safe distance from the hot sugar. In step 4, you may end up with fewer than 16 pralines. The 3-inch circles on the underside of the parchment paper will help with portioning. A standard 12-ounce can of evaporated milk is about 3 inches in diameter. 1 cup (7 ounces) granulated sugar1 cup packed (7 ounces) light brown sugar¾ cup evaporated milk6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 6 pieces½ teaspoon table salt1½ cups pecans, chopped 1. Using pencil, draw 8 evenly spaced 3-inch circles, in 2 rows of 4, on each of two 16 by…

Start Me Up I just bought a charcoal chimney starter to light briquettes for the grill. Any tips for how to use it? –Luke Norman, Berwick, Maine Chimney starters safely ignite charcoal without the need for lighter fluid. These simple gadgets consist of a cylindrical body with a handle, plus two stacked chambers inside. The large top chamber is for charcoal, and the smaller bottom chamber is for newspaper. You fill the bottom chamber with newspaper (two gently crumpled sheets should do the trick), load the top chamber with the desired amount of charcoal, and then light the newspaper. Depending on the amount and type of charcoal (and the weather conditions), it can take 20 to 40_minutes for the top layer of charcoal to become covered in a fine layer…

AFTER FEASTING ON the deservedly famous chicken and rice at Nong’s Khao Man Gai in Portland, Oregon (see “Old-School Flavors with a Smile”), we came back to the test kitchen to create a recipe for home cooks. Following the lead of the cooks at Nong’s, we began by poaching the chicken whole with garlic and ginger, simultaneously creating perfectly juicy meat and flavorful chicken broth. Then, while the bird rested, we cooked fragrant jasmine rice in the poaching liquid to make a rich, poultry-infused rice to serve alongside the sliced and shredded chicken. The ultracomforting, subtly flavored chicken and rice could stand on their own, but at Nong’s it’s the bright, savory, spicy sauce that wakes it all up and keeps customers coming back for more. The sauce is a…

IT’S WEDNESDAY NIGHT, but that doesn’t mean I’m willing to make compromises when planning dinner. Enter this bold, exciting, Mexican-inspired meal of plump, juicy shrimp simmered in a deeply flavorful, garlicky, chile-infused sauce. The first building block of this dish is dried guajillo chiles. These long, lanky chiles are fruity and lightly spicy. As a big fan of dried chiles, I knew to seed them, cut them into pieces, and toast the pieces in a skillet to bring out their flavor and add a subtle smokiness. Next, I tossed the toasted chiles into my blender, which I used as a makeshift spice grinder. It turned the guajillos into a vibrant, complex homemade chile powder that packed way more depth than a supermarket version would. I blended in water, Worcestershire sauce,…

TO BE FAIR, the barbecue-style cheesy corn in Kansas City is more cheese than corn. As Executive Food Editor Bryan Roof discovered on a recent visit to Missouri, it is so cheesy that you eat it with a spoon. In addition, its pleasant pops of bright, sweet corn and savory nubs of meat provide a creamy, stick-to-your-ribs counterpoint to a barbecue lunch tray of smoked meat. To mimic the meaty spread it goes with (and since barbecue joints often stir barky bits of leftover smoked meats into it), I started re-creating this cheese-packed side by rendering two strips’ worth of cut-up bacon in a saucepan, a shortcut substitute for those chewy, smoky, meaty morsels of leftover barbecue scraps. Once the bacon was crisp and its fat had rendered, I dumped…

ALSO KNOWN AS a Dutch baby, a German pancake features a giant puffed rim that makes for a festive presentation—and it comes together in a flash. It’s traditionally made by pouring a thin, eggy batter into a hot skillet and baking it; the heat from the skillet and oven convert moisture in the batter to steam, which causes the pancake to balloon dramatically (and then fall). The end result, like Yorkshire pudding or popovers, features a creamy, custardy center surrounded by a crispy browned lip. Classic versions include apples baked right in. I started with a batter of flour, milk, eggs, brown sugar, salt, and vanilla, which I stirred together by hand. Pancakes from early tests with raw or only lightly cooked apples baked up too wet, and bites of…

Better Peanut Butter Beater What do you do with a just-opened jar of natural peanut butter (or tahini)? The separated oil on top needs to be stirred back in, but the jar is full. We’ve tried methods such as simply stirring it with a fork (very messy and ineffective) and dumping it all into a bowl and whisking it until it’s smooth (too much work). But we’ve recently found a better way. Grab your handheld electric mixer and attach just one of the beaters. Firmly grasp the jar with one hand, press the beater into the peanut butter until it touches the bottom of the jar, and mix on low speed for about a minute. The oil stays in the jar, your arm isn’t tired from stirring, and the peanut…

CAJUN-SPICED MEATBALLS IN a roux-based gravy are a real thing and a popular weeknight supper in Louisiana. This deeply seasoned dish has everything I love about good Cajun cooking: bold flavors, rich meatiness, plenty of spice, a balanced kick of heat, and the savory toastiness that comes from a dark-cooked roux. And the white rice and hot sauce are important parts of the mix, so don’t serve this dish without them. Serves 4 to 6 We recommend using a #16 portion scoop to divvy up the meatball mixture. To make shaping easier, wet your hands slightly. Serve with a dash of Louisiana-style hot sauce. MEATBALLS 22 square saltines1 cup milk2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce2 pounds 85 percent lean ground beef2 ounces Parmesan cheese, grated (1 cup)1 tablespoon Tony Chachere’s Original Creole…

THE ONLY WAY I would eat zucchini growing up was doused in bottled Italian dressing. I loved how the mild, porous zucchini soaked up that tangy, salty, herbed vinaigrette. My tastes have (thankfully) evolved, but I wanted to see if I could create something similar—just a little more grown-up. This wasn’t a unique idea, as I found tons of recipes that called for marinating either raw or cooked zucchini in an Italian-inspired dressing. I made a handful of those recipes and dug in. A few of the recipes called for tossing raw, bite-size pieces of zucchini in the dressing and letting the acid and salt in the dressing do the work of softening it. But the squash released a lot of water, and these samples became too diluted. And bite-size…

Classic Cucumber Pickles The soft, porous texture of cucumbers—and their naturally short shelf life—makes them a historically popular choice for pickling. Here’s a breakdown of some of the most common pickled cukes. 1 SWEET PICKLES: Bread-and-butter pickles are typically made with waffle-cut cucumber rounds that are seasoned with sugar; mustard; celery seed; and turmeric, which adds color. Crunchy gherkins and cornichons—made with pinkie-size cucumbers that are seasoned with clove and garlic—are classic accompaniments to cheese and charcuterie boards. 2 LACTO-FERMENTED PICKLES: These are the big sour and half-sour kosher dill pickles traditionally made in (and sold from) barrels. “Full-sour” pickles are fermented longer than half-sours, so they have a stronger flavor and less crunch. There’s no vinegar added; the acid you taste is from the lactic acid created in the…

THE STUFFED PIZZA at Michelangelo’s in Sarasota, Florida (see “A Life of [Pizza] Pie”), a behemoth packed with meat and cheese, is truly special. But is it a reasonable dish to make at home? I was determined to find out. The concept is simple enough: two layers of pizza dough with “toppings” in between. But I suspected that the pizza’s tricky architecture could lead to spillage. I wondered if baking the pizza in a cake pan would help, so I tested a basic recipe once on a rimmed baking sheet and once in a 9-inch cake pan. The pan helped with structure, but the pie didn’t develop the deep golden color I wanted. When I tried building the pizza directly on the baking sheet, however, the rim impeded my ability…

ROSEMARY FOCACCIA Makes two 9-inch round loaves The bread can be kept for up to two days well wrapped at room temperature or frozen for up to two months wrapped in aluminum foil and placed in a zipper-lock bag. SPONGE ½ cup (2½ ounces) all-purpose flour⅓ cup (2⅔ ounces) water, room temperature¼ teaspoon instant or rapid-rise yeast DOUGH 2½ cups (12½ ounces) all-purpose flour1¼ cups (10 ounces) water, room temperature1 teaspoon instant or rapid-rise yeast1 tablespoon kosher salt, divided¼ cup (1¾ ounces) extra-virgin olive oil2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary 1. FOR THE SPONGE: Stir flour, water, and yeast in large bowl with wooden spoon until well combined. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let sit at room temperature until sponge has risen and begins to collapse, about 6 hours (sponge…

Powerhouse Ingredients IT’S THURSDAY AT 7:45 p.m., and I’m just wrapping up a long day. I remember that Lauren (my wife) is working late and this is my day to take care of dinner. There’s nothing in the cupboards or the refrigerator, and I’ve got no clue what I’m going to pull together for food. Searching the kitchen, hoping I can avoid resorting to takeout, I swing open the freezer. Relief. There in the back corner sits more than a quart of Slow-Cooker Sausage Ragu, a half batch from my final go-around with the recipe in the test kitchen. Twenty-five minutes later, my wife comes home to the aromas of slow-simmered tomatoes, garlic, fennel, and Italian sausage—as I’m just showering our portions with grated Pecorino Romano cheese. With a stroke…

AMERICANS SPEND MORE money on shredded cheese than cheese in any other form. Last year, shredded cheese beat out block cheese by more than $1 billion in sales, according to IRI, a Chicago-based market research firm. Could we find a good shredded cheddar? We chose six, focusing on sharp cheddar. Three of the products were orange and three were white; all were “traditional,” “thick,” or “farmstyle” cut. We sampled the six products plain and melted atop nachos. When sampled plain, the strands seemed dry, with a slightly duller flavor than we’re used to in sharp cheddar. Still, tasters found all the cheeses to be “savory” and “sharp.” When we sampled the cheeses melted on nachos, tasters zeroed in on differences in meltability. Some cheeses were “smoother” and “more stretchy,” while…

SALTED BUTTERSCOTCH SAUCE Serves 8 to 10 (Makes 1½ cups) We like to serve this sauce warm with our Endless Summer Peach Pie (page 23), but it can also be drizzled over ice cream, bread pudding, or cake. 1 cup packed (7 ounces) light brown sugar½ cup heavy cream8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces and chilled, divided½ teaspoon table salt½ teaspoon vanilla extract 1. Combine sugar, cream, 4 tablespoons butter, and salt in medium saucepan. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring often with rubber spatula, until large bubbles burst on surface of sauce, about 4 minutes. Remove from heat. 2. Carefully stir in vanilla and remaining 4 tablespoons butter until fully combined, about 1 minute. Carefully transfer sauce to bowl and let cool for 30 minutes (sauce will thicken…