I have been feeling somewhat excessively negative lately – I think it’s a combination of not enough sleep, the dragging tail end of winter, and irritation that I don’t have a day off from work until Memorial Day – so rather than talk about all the things that are annoying me with the food world, I’m going to talk about the things making me happy. Read the rest of this entry »
Chicken Pot Pie
Green Beans
Salad
I watched a cooking show the other week that ‘lightened up’ chicken pot pie by replacing the traditional crust with phyllo dough. Now, I like phyllo dough, but that doesn’t mean I think it has any place on top of a traditional American chicken pot pie (a Middle Eastern b’stilla is a whole different story, but that’s also a whole different kind of chicken pie). Within the confines of understanding that what you put on top of a pot pie needs to be starchy and comforting – phyllo is too pointy to be comforting – I’m flexible about how you want to top your chicken pot pie. You could use a puff pastry lid. You could roll out a traditional pie crust. You could throw caution to the winds and make the America’s Test Kitchen savory crumble topping that calls for ¾ cup of heavy cream and 6 Tbsp of butter (I tried, but just couldn’t bring myself to do that). You can do what I did and turn it into a cobbler kind of affair and top it with buttermilk biscuits. Just not phyllo, okay? There’s a time and a place for phyllo (spanakopita, baklava, wee cups to serve hors d’ouevres), but chicken pot pie isn’t it.
Chana Masala – alternate version (i.e. kind of, but not really)
Saag with Roasted Butternut Squash
Roasted Cauliflower
Whole Wheat Naan – plain & peshwari
Pomegranate Raita
Sweet & Spicy Pickled Kumquats
Indonesian Chicken
Spiced Basmati Rice
Spiced Broccoli with Coconut
Fresh Pineapple Wedges
Last year I made New Year’s Food Resolutions. So, how did I do? Read the rest of this entry »
Is it possible to be nostalgic for something you’ve never had before? Or have a sense memory of a dish you’ve never eaten?
It will probably surprise no one to learn that I did not grow up in a Spaghetti-O’s kind of house. Ditto on microwave dinners, sugary cereal, delivery pizza, Doritos, or pop tarts. Some of these childhood staples I did sample at friend’s houses with greater or lesser degrees of enjoyment – microwave dinners never did much for me, but I always looked forward to sleeping over at the houses of friends whose mother’s stocked sugary cereals. One way or another, however, I never had Spaghetti-Os in my childhood. This lacunae in my epicurean education did not stop me from experiencing a peculiar form of constructed nostalgia for the TV version of an American childhood I never had, nor particularly ever wanted, when I came across a recipe for homemade Spaghetti-Os. As I read the recipe I could taste the tender meatballs floating in the rich tomato-y soup, and giggled in anticipation of the pleasure of slurping alphabet shaped pasta from my spoon. I still can’t speak to the pleasures of canned Spaghetti-Os, but I can say with authority that the homemade version is exceedingly tasty. Read the rest of this entry »
There’s a comment that Helene Hanff makes in one of her letters in 84 Charing Cross Road about visitors to England that has always stuck with me.
A newspaper man I know, who was stationed in London during the war, says tourists go to England with preconceived notions, so they always find exactly what they go looking for. I told him I’d go looking for the England of English literature, and he said:
“Then it’s there.”
(Helene Hanff – 84 Charing Cross Road – letter April 10, 1950)
My parents lived in London for nearly seven years when they were first married, and their London is a combination of half-forgotten trivia like what color the Bakerloo Line is on the London Tube Map, memories of places they used to go when they were young and fancy-free (as opposed to now when they are more mature and fancy-free), and surprise at how much London has changed in the last forty something years.
My London is an amalgamation of landscapes read about in Jane Austen and Charles Dickens, regency romance novels, Victorian murder mysteries, and urban fantasy novels, jumbled up with images gleaned from BBC police procedurals, Doctor Who (which admittedly is mostly actually Cardiff dressed up as London), and sweeping BBC historical dramas. Read the rest of this entry »
I am so far behind on Dinner reports that we’re just going to do this in summary (with links to recipes) so that I can get to the good stuff, which is all about eating (and drinking) my way through London over Christmas + the first Dinner of 2013 which excitingly features (almost) all members of Dinner seated around the table for the first time in far too long. Read the rest of this entry »
Last Dinner of 2012 – Dinner, December 11th
Chicken Carbonnade
(Fancy) Roasted Brussels Sprouts (with Chestnuts, Dried Cherries & a Maple Glaze)
Bread Read the rest of this entry »
Monday Night Dinner 