Food To Warm Your Bones: Soup, Pizza, Bread, and Brownies

Soup, pizza, bread, and brownies. With a seemingly never-ending blizzard going on outside, really—what more do you need?

(Please don’t say bourbon or wine or a Dark & Stormy, because I’m on Day 23 of Sober January, and I am determined to make it to Day 31.)

Anyway, back to the food. When I asked my husband if he wanted me to make anything special for blizzard weekend, he replied with an enthusiastic “Bread! Make bread! Please please please!”

The bread he’s referring to is this, a perfectly round boule with a dense, crisp crust and soft, chewy interior. Hot out of the oven, it is exactly what you want when you’re trying to defrost yourself after several hours of shoveling. The dough is actually the easiest thing to put together, and takes about five minutes since there’s no kneading involved. As I was gathering the flour, yeast and salt, I figured I might as well make pizza dough. Bring on the carbs!

The pizza dough requires minimal kneading, and it also takes almost no time to prepare—if you have a food processor.  I highly recommend that you use bread flour if you’re making pizza or bread. You get a much crisper crust and a wonderfully airy, chewy center.

Making pizza from scratch is like creating a blank canvas on which to paint your dinner. You could go traditional and use tomato sauce and mozzarella cheese, or your could try something different. My best pizzas have been inspired by the leftovers in my fridge.

That pizza you see in the picture?  I cooked a batch of beans in my slow cooker last Sunday and had about a cup left in the refrigerator. Beans on a pizza? I’ve heard weirder. Herbed, creamy white beans are a natural fit with garlic, so I lopped the tops off two bulbs, roasted them, then mashed the cloves into a paste. As for cheese, I had three to choose from: chevre, Pecorino and mozzarella. Pecorino has the salty-tangy-pow of flavor that really punches up the beans and garlic. I finished with a generous drizzle of olive oil and a smattering of kosher salt. Voi-la: a classy, photogenic and mostly importantly DELICIOUS dinner. This is a pizza you can have on its own, or if you’re feeling more virtuous you can have a slice with a green salad or bowl of soup…

Soup! Of course—what could be more perfect on a cold, blustery, blizzardy day?  This one was entirely improvised, and I built the recipe around two ingredients: beluga lentils and lascinato kale.  What’s funny is that both these foods sound so much fancier than they actually are. Beluga lentils are petite black lentils that, like the French green lentils, maintain their shape and texture well in soups. Bonus: they don’t require nearly as long to cook. Lascinato kale, (or Dinosaur kale, or black kale) is my favorite of the kales. It has this unique pebbly texture, it keeps in the fridge for weeks, and the leaves are so versatile. I find they’re more tender than regular curly kale, so they work equally well in salads, soups and sautes.

Here’s the recipe for the soup. Keep in mind I used the seasonings and vegetables I had on hand, but you can use whatever you like. Cumin, coriander and garam masala lean on the earthier side of the spice spectrum. You could add more heat, or flavor the soup with herbs instead.

Recipe: Lentil Kale Soup

Time: 90 minutes, prep to table
Serves: 4

2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 1/2 tsp ground cumin
1 tsp oregano
scant 1/2 tsp coriander
1/4 tsp garam masala
1/4 tsp aleppo pepper
1/2 large vidalia onion, finely diced
1 shallot, chopped
1 medium carrot, peeled and chopped
2 small parsnips, peeled, cored and chopped
5 ribs celery, chopped
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1 cup beluga (black) lentils
1 cup beef stock
4 cups water
1 bunch Lascinato kale (AKA black kale or dinosaur kale), washed, trimmed of stems and cut into 1” ribbons
4 sprigs fresh thyme
Salt and pepper to taste

Heat a large soup pot or Dutch oven over medium high heat for 2 minutes. Add oil, swirl to coat pan. Add all the spices (cumin through the aleppo pepper), and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes. The mixture will be dark and fragrant.

Add the next six ingredients (onion through garlic), and stir to coat with the spice mixture. Lower the heat to medium-low, add a dash of salt, and let the vegetables cook undisturbed for about 10 minutes, until they soften.

Add the lentils and stir, raising the heat back to medium high. Add the beef stock and the water. Allow the mixture to come to a boil.

Once it starts boils, reduce to a simmer and let cook for ten minutes, stirring occasionally. Then add the kale, stirring it into the mixture. You may have to reduce the heat, but you want to keep the soup at a steady simmer for about 35-40 minutes, or until the lentils are tender.

Turn off the heat, add salt and pepper to your taste, and sprinkle the the thyme leaves over the soup. Stir and serve immediately, or allow to cool completely before portioning. Refrigerate for up to 5 days or freeze up to 3 months.

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I didn’t forget the brownies, by the way. Here’s a recipe for fudgy brownies that has all the flavor and a little less guilt than standard recipes. And here’s a tip: If you want to amp up the chocolate flavor, add a teaspoon of instant espresso to the dry ingredients, and a tablespoon of chocolate liquor to the wet ingredients. Your inner chocaholic will thank you.

 

Cheesy Butternut Mac

I had another financially-related freakout this afternoon. A little free time at work afforded me the opportunity to do something I have long procrastinated doing: shopping around for health insurance. Freelance producing is nice work if you can get it—and I am very thankful to be employed—but one of the major costs of any freelance work is having to pay for your health insurance. Adding insult to my non-existent injury, the options for remotely decent health insurance at a reasonable cost are few. I compared five plans and did the requisite calculations. So many digits! My eyes are exhausted from popping out of their sockets.

I avoided making any decisions, electing instead to ponder my dinner—and I needed a dinner to be excited about. It’s been a long week, and I’ve behaved very well with my diet. I didn’t want to blow all that effort, but I wanted to eat something other than fruit and Greek yogurt.

I’m getting really tired of non-fat Greek yogurt.

I looked through my basket of old issues of Cooking Light, and found a potential dinner on the cover of the September issue, 2011: the creamiest-ever mac & cheese.

I’ve never made mac & cheese myself, but I know what the real thing tastes like. I’ve had it once—just once. I watched my friend Pam make it for Easter years ago. I remember a towering heap of shredded cheddar cheese, a carton of half & half, and (at least) a half pound of butter. I remember the bubbling goo at the edge of the pan, the crispy tips of the slightly charred ziti, and each piece underneath coated with just the right amount of cheese, buttery sauce.

I also remember a lot of bad mac & cheese. And I’m not talking about the stuff from the box. I have a soft spot for the nuclear-orange stovetop mac & cheese that I prepared on a two burner stove in college, while the pre-fab fish sticks crisped in the shoebox-sized oven below.  I haven’t eaten boxed mac & cheese in over ten years, but in that time I’ve had lots of bad baked mac & cheese. It’s a mainstay at catered parties, hospital cafeterias, and at video shoots (on the rare chance hot food is provided). You know the kind—It’s in a giant aluminum pan that’s been perched atop a sterno for 8 hours at a minimum. And you know that because the macaroni falls apart as you spoon it onto your plate. The sauce is the right color, but it’s thin and watery. And something that may have once been cheese clings to the macaroni like the last bits of yogurt at the bottom of a plastic cup. Not exactly “Mmm, mmm…good!”, is it?

So you can imagine how, in spite of my excitement over the sight of mac & cheese on a magazine cover, I was dubious about Cooking Light’s claim that this recipe was the “creamiest-ever”.

While I have my doubts about makeovers of traditionally decadent, calorie-loaded food (and with good reason—light ice cream is light years from the real thing), I had a good feeling about this recipe. The base of the cheese sauce is not actually butter or bechamel, but butternut squash, cooked with milk and chicken stock, then pureed.  You obviously can’t claim the title of “creamiest-ever mac & cheese” without cheese, and this recipe called for a good amount of gruyere, romano, and parmesan. I had all those, plus some leftover shredded cheddar from the chili I made last week.

The trick to making a lightened up version of a heavy dish is to keep your expectations in check. A sauce made with butternut squash, milk, yogurt and a limited amount of shredded cheese is not going to taste like one made with butter, cream, and massive amounts of cheddar. All you can hope is that what you ultimately make tastes good, if not very good, and that the calories you’ve saved will be spent on the day when nothing but the real thing will do.

So here’s the recipe.  I made half, and followed the instructions pretty closely, BUT I added two ingredients to amp up the flavor of the sauce: old bay seasoning and smoked chicken sausage, which I happened to have in the fridge. The verdict: Yes, the sauce is most definitely creamy. But if I were me two hours ago, I would have added more cheese. Do that, and you’ve got yourself a better-than-good—dare I say, damn fine—dinner on the table.

My Summer in Food

It has been a very hot and very busy summer.  I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for fall. Apples, apple cider donuts, pumpkin spice lattes, pumpkin ice cream, butternut squash, hearty vegetable soups, braised beef…

The chilly air means sweater weather. Orange is the dominant color of my wardrobe. I am never without a hot beverage (or a chronic case of the sniffles). And every Sunday, the apartment will be filled with aromas of simmering soup, roasting vegetables or a bubbly, baked pie. I can’t wait.

But before autumn comes to Brooklyn, here’s a look back at some of my favorites this summer—the home-grown, the raw, the cooked, and the more successful experiments…

Late June

I discover garlic scapes at the farmers’ market. I’m so fascinated by their shape and aroma that I buy 2 bunches…and have no idea what to do with them.

Voi-la! Pesto. Made with garlic scapes, olive oil, parsley, parmesan, and some pecans I had in the freezer. As potent in flavor as it is bright in color.

JULY

Yellow corn grits with shrimp and bacon. A lovely mess, worth every minute spent in an infernally hot kitchen.

Cooking Light’s lightened-up Lemon Bars. Tart & creamy custard, crunchy nutty crust. A new fave.

August

My birthday cake, made from scratch by my mom. Layers of golden sponge cake, vanilla custard and chocolate cream, surrounded by toasted almonds and hazelnuts. I rationed out portions for myself for the week. The cake didn’t last longer than 3 days.

Raspberries from my mother’s garden. The bushes grow wild, and no matter how much she cuts them back, they take over half the yard every summer.

The fig tree dominates the other half of the yard, and threatens to take over the house. By the 17th of August, the tree has fruited completely, but not one of these little guys is ripe for the picking. Wait for Labor Day, mom advises.

Is there nothing in the world more emblematic of summer than a perfectly ripe peach?

Oven roasted ratatouille with garden grown eggplant, tomato and zucchini…

…makes an excellent topping for pizza!

I finally got around to making The Kitchn’s Magic One-Ingredient Ice Cream. Google it, read the recipe, follow it to the letter, and be amazed by the texture and flavor (helped immensely by cinnamon and vanilla).

Early September

I love my mother’s hands in this shot. She’s shaping the foundation of our dinner…

Foreground: Mushroom/Sausage Pizza. Background: Margherita

More raspberries. This time, I make sauce: raspberries, sugar, Grand Marnier. Right now I’m having some with fro-yo. Mmm.

Sunday September 2nd. Finally, the figs are ready.

Lip-Smacking Lemon Curd

Picture this:

You’ve been wanting to make lemon curd for weeks. After a lengthy search for just the right recipe, you find one that calls for the following:

• 2 eggs
• 2 tbsp. butter
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 2/3 cup lemon juice
• 1 tbsp. lemon zest

The recipe yields 1 and 1/3 cups curd, which would be enough for you—but you’ve been invited to a dinner party tonight.  And the irrepressible overachiever within you thinks it would be a fabulous idea to surprise your host with sponge cupcakes, strawberries macerated in Grand Marnier and agave syrup, and some of that lemon curd.

Solution: double the ingredients, double the curd.  Easy enough.

But as you’re gathering all the elements, you realize you have only 3 eggs. And just under a cup of sugar. You find 2 tablespoons of unsalted butter (exactly!) wrapped in the fridge, but that’s all the butter you find.

You have laundry at various stages of washing and drying in the basement. You have not showered, and the bed hair you woke up with isn’t the sexy kind you can get away with outside the home. Four pots, each containing lunches and dinners for the week, are at various stages of cooking on the stove. The dinner party is less than 3 hours away, and it’s pouring outside.  You’re not particularly anxious to run to the grocery store, nor do you have time.

You could stop here, just bring the bottle of wine you told the host you’d bring to the party.  But you’ve been wanting to make lemon curd all week. And because the cake batter has been mixed—and you can’t very well serve a naked cupcake—there’s no turning back.

New plan: Make the curd, but just increase the ingredients by a third.

Again, easy enough. But you’ve forgotten how to add fractions. And you’re running out of time. Did I mention you really need a shower? The pot filled with black bean soup is bubbling over. The phone is ringing. It’s Mom. Those phone calls never last 5 minutes.  What do you do?

Stop thinking and cook.  And somewhere in between, just breathe.

RECIPE:

Tart Lemon Curd,

A Very Happy Accident by Yours Truly

bastardized from Cooking Light’s Lemon Curd (May 2000)

Ingredients:

• 3 large eggs
• 2 tablespoons lemon zest
• a scant cup of sugar
• 1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice (about 5 medium-large lemons’ worth)
• 2 tbsp. unsalted butter

Method:

Combine eggs, zest and sugar in a saucepan over medium-high heat, whisking constantly until sugar dissolves.  It’ll take about 3 minutes.

Stir in the lemon juice and the butter. Continue stirring, and cook until the mixture loosely coats the back of a spoon. It’ll thicken as it cools.

Transfer the curd to a bowl to cool for about 10 minutes. Then, get a piece of plastic wrap big enough to cover the bowl. Poke a few holes in it, and then place the plastic wrap directly on top of the curd. This prevents condensation from forming, but more importantly it prevents a thick, rubbery skin from forming on the curd (note: this applies to any hot/warm pudding or custard).  Refrigerate.

Once the curd is [mostly] chilled, you can transfer it to a glass jar. It keeps for about a week—if it lasts that long. You’ll get about 16-20 servings from this recipe, assuming each serving is about 2 tablespoons. (In which case, it’s 2 Weight Watchers Points Plus per serving.)

A couple of notes on taste…

This curd is ideal for spooning over a sponge cake, a croissant, sweet bread or macerated berries; or, mixing it with yogurt and granola.  You could call it “tart”, but I like to think the limited sugar helps to preserve the integrity of the lemon’s punch and zing. Tracie, who hosted the dinner party, loved the stuff, as did our friend Liz. My boyfriend found the curd a bit too tart. If your sweet tooth needs a little more sweet, add more sugar. Or, you could just follow the original recipe.

A Perfect Meal to Kick Off Spring: Pasta with Fresh Ricotta, Herbs & Spinach

Pappardelle with Baby Spinach, Herbs & Ricotta

Do you ever find that there is a certain food you love that you can’t keep in the house, because once it’s there in plain sight—staring at you, tempting you—you’ll throw any willpower or sense of portion control out the window and eat the whole thing?

I call these danger foods. For my boyfriend, it’s Nutella. For my father, it’s pound cake. For me, it’s fresh ricotta cheese. (And we can add fresh mozzarella, burrata, St. Andre, drunken goat, and Taleggio to that list.) I can’t keep cheese around because I can’t just have one slice. I must have more. I must have it all.  But because I’m not a big fan of feeling shame and stomach cramps, I don’t keep it around.

I made an exception this weekend and bought a container of freshly made ricotta at Fairway. And though I have at several points this weekend stolen a spoonful from said container, I had enough willpower to set aside plenty of this precious cheese to prepare a recipe I’d been meaning to make for a whole year: Pappardelle with Baby Spinach, Herbs and Ricotta.  A photo of this dish graced the cover of the April 2011 issue of Cooking Light, announcing the arrival of spring and a welcome break from root vegetables, casseroles and winter stews.  My, did it look pretty!

Spring had arrived, and I had fresh ricotta. Time to get cooking. But before I got started, I made a few substitutions.  Cooking Light’s recipe calls for fresh dill and chives—lovely herbs, but I associate them more with potato or cucumber salads, not pasta.  I elected to use fresh basil and oregano—bright and sweet with some peppery notes. And I kicked up the amount of ricotta from 1/3 cup to a heaping 1/2 cup. Why?

Why not.

RECIPE:

Pappardelle with Baby Spinach, Fresh Herbs & Ricotta

Adapted from Cooking Light, April 2010

Serves: 3 – 4

Total Time: 30 minutes; Active time 20 minutes

Ingredients:

• 8 oz. uncooked pappardelle pasta
• 1 tbsp. kosher salt
• 1 heaping 1/2 cup of fresh whole-milk ricotta cheese
• 3 cups baby spinach
• 1/3 cup fresh oregano leaves
• 1/3 cup fresh basil leaves
• 1/3 cup fresh Italian parsley leaves
• 3 tbsp. freshly grated Pecorino Romano cheese
• 2 tbsp. olive oil
• 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
• 1/2 tsp. kosher salt

Tools:

• Food processor (optional)

Method:

Set a large pot of water to boil on the stove; add salt and cover. Cook pasta according to package directions, taking care not to overcook.

While pasta is cooking, place spinach in the food processor and pulse a few times to lightly chop. Set spinach aside. Add basil, oregano and parsley to food processor; pulse until chopped (but not minced). Add to the spinach. (If you don’t have a food processor, no worries—use a sharp knife for the chopping, and mind your fingers!)

Once the pasta is finished cooking, set aside about 1 cup of the cooking water before draining.

Return pasta to the pot. In a small bowl, whisk together the ricotta with about a 1/2 cup of the cooking water. Add to the pasta. Next, add the chopped herbs and spinach, olive oil, Pecorino, salt and pepper. Toss gently to combine, and add additional cooking water if the mixture is too dry.

Divide into 4 bowls and serve immediately. Eat slowly, and savor the start of spring.

Note:

Pappardelle are wide-ribbon pasta. If you can’t find pappardelle, fettuccine works well in this recipe. And though I love fresh pasta, I find dried pasta holds up better here.  

Weight Watchers Points Plus Information:

• 10 Points Plus per serving (and worth every one!)