Food and Things » Recipes

These Rich Sugar Cookie Sandwiches Got Raves

Laura Weiss — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 19:02:14 +0000

I almost tossed the sugar cookies I baked for New Year’s Eve into the garbage. The recipe was from Mark Bittman, the NY Times food writer and cookbook author. The round-faced Bittman is usually a reliable source for most cooking and baking challenges—from how to prepare kale to putting together a no-fail buttery pound cake. But this time, it looked like the trusty Mark had failed me.

A few minutes out of the oven, this particular batch of sugar cookies could have passed for water crackers they were so bland and tasteless. Since I was baking treats for a New Year’s Eve party at Chef Renee Marton’s, I set to work to try to rehabilitate them. (It wasn’t Bittman’s’ fault it was mine; I over-mixed the batter.) For sure, when you bring a dish to a chef’s house, you want to get it right.

I thought to myself, OK, add some sugar and fat. So I rolled each cookie in powdered sugar. I whipped up some chocolate ganache and smeared it between two cookies to create a richly fudgy sandwich. That was the only filling I made. Everything else—the nutella, the dulce de leche, I pulled from my fridge. Then I glommed a tablespoon or so of sauce onto each cookie, smoothed it with a spatula, and smushed two cookies together to create a sandwich.

The result? The powdered sugar boosted the drab little ovoid’s richness and heightened the sweetness just a tad. The filling seeped into the cookies transforming them into sumptuous little morsels. By the time midnight rolled around, my near-disaster cookies were fit to be eaten—even by a chef.

What was the best part of this cookie-making enterprise? When Chef Renee drifted by a little after midnight and announced, “Everyone’s raving about your cookies.”

Click here for Bittman’s sugar cookie recipe or use your own.

Ice Cream Recipes Galore!

Laura Weiss — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 17:12:12 +0000

My friend Virginia Willis, the outstanding cookbook author, food entrepreneur and all-around Food Maestro, offers up these delicious-sounding ice cream recipes. I haven’t tried them yet. But from the buzz online, they sound pretty sensational.

Chill, Baby

Virginia Willis

I’m enjoying my summer. I’ve been trying to chill. Trying. It’s admittedly not always my nature.

One of the many things I am enjoying is that I’ve been making ice cream or sorbet this summer at least 2-3 times a week. Read more here.

Three Great Recipes for An All-Tomato Dinner

Laura Weiss — Sun, 07 Aug 2011 15:36:16 +0000

Heirloom Tomatoes. Photo: Laura B. Weiss

At this time of year, there’s no such thing as too many tomatoes. Try these Chef Renee Marton’s recipes that celebrate that luscious summer fruit.

Make each dish individually.

Or go wild and have an all-tomato dinner! Why not? Summer will be over soon and we’ll all be struggling through a tomato drought until summer rolls around again next year.

Summer Tomato Dinner

Serves 4

1. Tomato Rum Punch

2. Tomato, Corn and Flowers Salad with Tomato Toast

3 Tomato Upside Down Cake with Tomato Jam Filling

1. Tomato Rum Punch

This recipe is a riff on lassi- the Indian fruit and yogurt drink—but with an alcohol kick.

4 round tomatoes, cored and peeled (after coring, briefly dunk tomatoes in boiling water. Then remove skin and discard it. Squeeze tomatoes to remove seeds)

4 large basil leaves

juice of two limes

1 teaspoon honey

1 cup rice milk

1 cup dark rum

1 chili pepper—if you like it hot.

Blend everything except the rum in a blender (not a food processor) until well mixed and pourable. If it is thicker than you want, add a little more rice milk. Don’t forget that the rum will thin it down.

4 highball glasses filled with ice.

Divide the rum between the 4 glasses.

Fill with tomato punch and stir. Garnish with a sprig of mint.

2. Tomatoes and Corn, Chives and Nasturtiums, with Tomato Toast

4 red round tomatoes, cored and sliced thickly

2 large shallots or 4 scallions, finely diced, rinsed off under cold water

2 ears of sweet white or yellow corn, shucked

½ cup excellent olive oil

½ teaspoon sea salt

Freshly ground pepper

big handful of chopped chives, including flowers

big handful of nasturtium leaves and flowers

Lay tomatoes on a platter and sprinkle salt over them.Mix everything else together, and place over tomatoes. Leave at room temperature for 20 to 30 minutes.

Serve at room temperature with toast.

Tomato Toast

1 baguette, sliced in half lengthwise, toasted

2 cloves of garlic

1-2 tomatoes cut in half crosswise

Salt and olive oil to taste

Rub a cut clove of garlic over each half of baguette until it is mostly gone. Then rub each piece of bread with a tomato half, cut side down, so the juice and some of the pulp drench the bread. Sprinkle lightly with salt and a drizzle of olive oil.

Serve with the tomato and corn salad.

3. Tomato Upside Down Cake

Recipe by Patricia Eddy, adapted by Renee Marton

1 firm, ripe tomato

2 ounces butter

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 cup tomato jam (recipe below)

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

4 ounces butter, softened

1/2 cup sugar

2 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 350F.

Slice the tomato into 1/8th inch slices.

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt.

Melt 2 ounces of butter in a small pan, add the brown sugar and heat until it is all melted and mixed together. Pour into a 9-inch cake pan or pie plate.

Lay the tomato slices on top of sugar/butter mixture so the slices are touching, but not overlapping. They should fill up most of the space. Gently spread 1 cup of the jam over the tomatoes.

In the bowl of a stand mixer (or large bowl with a hand-held mixer), beat the 4 ounces of butter and ½ cup sugar for five minutes, until creamy and light colored. Beat in eggs, one at a time alternating with half of flour mixture Beat gently until just blended. A couple of lumps are okay. Scrape the batter down from the sides of the bowl and beat again until just combined.

Spread the batter evenly over the tomatoes and jam. This will be a little tricky, but place small dollops spaced evenly and spread them out flattened a bit.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick stuck in the cake comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes, then place a plate on top of the pan and invert cake onto the plate. Do this quickly oR there will be drips.

Serve with whipped cream or ice cream.

Tomato Jam

1 quart cherry or plum tomatoes, coarsely diced

1 thin-skinned lemon, seeds removed and very thinly sliced. (If you can’t find a thin-skinned lemon, remove the peel with a peeler and chop finely, eliminate the white pith, and slice the pulp—keep as much juice as possible).

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup water

Combine everything in a medium saucepan- not an aluminum pan. Simmer for 30 minutes, stirring once in a while, Continue simmering until thickened. Remember that the mixture will thicken more, as it cools. Cool before using in cake recipe.

July 4 Recipe: Red, White and Blue Soup

Laura Weiss — Sun, 26 Jun 2011 20:50:35 +0000

By yogamam.co.uk via flickr.

Red, White and Blue Soup sounds kind of, well, trite when it comes to a July 4 recipe. But, really, this is a colorful and healthy sweet/tart starter for any July 4 meal, says Chef Renee. There are a lot of ingredients, but the prep couldn’t be easier. All you need is a knife, a cutting board and a blender, and you’re good to go.

July 4 Recipe: Red, White and Blue Soup

Yield: 6 servings

RED

Soup base:

1 red seedless watermelon, peeled and cubed. Save all the juice.

½ cup grenadine

Juice and zest from 2 lemons

1 cup white grape juice

1 teaspoon white sugar

½ teaspoon kosher salt

½ teaspoon ground white pepper

Place all ingredients in a blender. Don’t fill blender more than halfway. Blend the mixture until it is fully liquefied. This will take 2-3 minutes.

Refrigerate for at least one hour and stir periodically. The soup should taste sweet and tart.

WHITE

1 cup plain yogurt

1 tablespoon honey

1 lime, juice only

Mix all together and refrigerate for one hour. Put into a squeeze bottle, or you can use a spoon to make dollops onto the soup when you serve it.

BLUE. This is the “salsa” that will garnish the soup.

½ pint blackberries, coarsely chopped

1 pint blueberries, coarsely chopped

1 medium shallot, peeled, finely diced

3 ounces feta cheese, crumbled

6 mint leaves, shredded into thin strips

1 teaspoon white sugar

pinch salt

pinch pepper

1 lemon, zest and juiced.

Mix all the ingredients of ‘Blue” together and wait an hour—keep at room temperature.

When ready to serve the soup, remove it and yogurt from the refrigerator 15 minutes ahead of when you plan to serve it.

Stir soup well, and pour into 6 chilled wide soup bowl.

If you are using a squeeze bottle, make a design on top of the soup, or with a spoon place a dollop of yogurt in center of soup.

Place a spoonful of blueberry “salsa” on top of yogurt.

Garnish each bowl of soup with a sprig of mint.

St. Patrick’s Day Corned Beef and Cabbage Recipe

Laura Weiss — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 18:40:05 +0000

Corned Beef and Cabbage by by Jeff Kubina via flickr.

“What’s more Irish than a traditional recipe for corned beef and cabbage?” asks Allrecipes.com. For St. Patrick’s Day, you can’t get more Irish than this hearty dish.

But according to 97 Orchard Street by Jane Ziegelman, corned beef and cabbage traveled to New York with the Dutch settlers. Many European countries developed their own variations. But the Irish dish, corned beef accompanied by cabbage, quickly became associated with the influx of Irish immigrants to the U.S.

More recently, Americans of many ethnic backgrounds have enjoyed corned beef and cabbage. I’m not Irish. Yet my mother prepared it every St. Patrick’s Day.

Here’s a recipe from Allrecipes.com.

Upper West Side JCC Hosts Mario Batalli, Amanda Hesser for Food Talk

Laura Weiss — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 19:21:42 +0000

One of the first evens on the 2011 celebrity chef circuit will take place at the Upper West Side JCC when chef Mario Batali and cookbook author and former New York Times writer Amanda Hesser will be talking up their new cookbooks.

Check out Hesser’s web site, Food52, in which readers get to vote on recipes that are submitted to the site.

The event takes place Jan. 12 at 730 pm at the JCC. Here are the details:

Christmas Cookies: Recipes, Bakeries and Mail Order

Laura Weiss — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 13:44:55 +0000

Christmas cookies. Photo by By seelensturm via flickr.

I use to bake Christmas cookies when my daughter was young. Then I got out of the habit. But maybe this year, I’ll make some. There are so many great sources for recipes that it’s hard not to find something that will wow your family and friends.

And there are even online helpers like expert baker and cookbook author Nick Malgieri, who offers tips for making perfect–ok, almost-perfect–cookies. Make sure, for example, that you have all the ingredients before you start. Duh! But who hasn’t taken a quick look at their jar of cinnamon only to discover that it actually contains only one micro-gram of the stuff. Panic ensues. Not good for the cookies. Or for the holiday spirit.

Here are some recipe sites. If you prefer to let a local baker make your cookies for you, check out my post from last year about Upper West Side bakeries and their offerings. And, then, of course, there’s mail order. There’s lots of choices there too. But hurry. Christmas is coming soon!

Have favorite Christmas cookie sources of your own? Let me know what they are and I’ll post them.

Christmas/Holiday Cookie Recipes:

Epicurious

Martha Stewart

Good Housekeeping

Ina Garten

Cooks Illustrated

Rose Birnbaum

Tips for Baking Great Holiday Cookies

Nick Malgieri

Order Your Christmas Cookies Online

Cooks Illustrated has compiled a list of about a dozen mail order sources, including Harry and David and Dean and Deluca. Click here for the entire list.

With New Yorkers in the midst of an infatuation with southern cooking, why not order from “Bon Appetit, Y’all” cookbook author and chef Virginia Willis’ Southern Pantry. She’s got pecan brownies. And you can always order some grits, too.Order at www.virginiawillis.com

Do you have fruitcake fans you need to satisfy? Beekman1802 in the Hudson Valley supplies the Christmas staple.

Cookbooks: Molly O’Neill’s One Big Table Surveys American Home Cooking

Laura Weiss — Mon, 15 Nov 2010 16:52:48 +0000

Lots of people dream about writing a cookbook. But it’s a huge undertaking, as Molly O’Neill, former New York Times Magazine food columnist and author of such classics as the New York Cookbook, told me the other day.

In fact, One Big Table—an expansive collection of stories and recipes from some of America’s best home cooks—took years to conceive and create. With its deeply felt oral histories and cherished recipes gathered from cooks across America, this is a cookbook to be read as well as to cook from.

The lavishly illustrated volume contains recipes—some regional finds, some familiar standards—that include:

The Piping and Marching Society of Lower Chalmers Street Shrimp Dip from Charleston, SC
Maw Maw’s Chow-Chow from Dallas Texas
Zach and Clay’s Brick Chicken with Yellow Squash and Tomatoes, from Washington, DC
Andre Soltner’s Roast Chicken, from New York

The book contains 600 recipes in all, culled, says O’Neill, from an initial list of more than 20,000 contributions. There are also 800 color and black and white photos, both vintage and modern.

One Big Table: A Journey from Potluck to Plate

To compile this substantial tome, O’Neill says she traveled a total of 500,000 miles over a five-year period, some by car, some by air.

The challenge, she explains, was “how to do a demographically balanced portrait” of US home cooking.

There aren’t, for example, many recipes from New York. “At one point, there was too much from New York, but the fact is New York is not the country,” says O’Neill who hails from Columbus, Ohio. “We really need to listen to and respect cooks outside major urban areas,” she added. “The idea that cuisine is being invented in major urban areas is no longer true.”

One Big Table by Molly O'Neill.

O’Neill said she “made a partnership” with hunger group America’s Second Harvest , now known as Feeding America. With a cadre of graduate students, a reservoir of recipes she had received from Times readers over the years, and time devoted to community pot luck suppers and farmers markets, O’Neill gathered recipes from Maine to California.

Gradate students, she explains, would “sit at a farmers’ market and collect names, addresses and phone numbers.”

“The first step was gathering; the second was confirming,” through one-to-one interviews conducted by O’Neill herself. One issue was determining whether recipes truly represented family or community relics—or were plucked from magazines like Gourmet.

O’Neill purged the magazine-derived recipes, but kept some that reflected the contributors’ personal adjustments and imprint.

“People don’t know the provenance” of their recipes, she said.

One Big Table
Molly O’Neill
Published by Simon & Schuster
E-book edition also available
To order, click here

Hot Dog Recipes: Three For Labor Day or Any Time

Laura Weiss — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 17:16:18 +0000

Corn Dogs via flickr by By marymactavish.

These recipes for hot dogs have a twist, drawing special flavors and ingredients from other food cultures, like Vietnam and Portugal. There’s also one for a good old American corn dog. All three are perfect for Labor Day—or any time.

The Banh Mi Dog, the Cataplana Dog and the Iowa State Fair Corn Dog were developed by Chef Renee Marton:

Each recipe serves eight, one hot dog per person.

1. The Banh Mi Dog

This dog draws inspiration from the popular Vietnamese sandwich.

INGREDIENTS

Eight 8 inch baguettes—split, toasted and buttered

8 hot dogs split lengthwise and grilled, flat side down

8 pieces country style pate—same length as the dog, and the same “height” (you can use two pieces, if necessary), not ice cold.

6 cucumbers, peeled, seeded, sliced into half moons and “pickled” in 1½ cups vinegar (light colored), 2 tablespoons white sugar, 1 tablespoon salt for 30 minutes. Drain cucumbers and squeeze dry.

6 sprigs of cilantro leaves.

4 shallots, peeled, thinly sliced and rinsed briefly under cold water, then dried.

½ cup mayonnaise (Hellman’s regular, or homemade) mixed with 3 teaspoons of hot sauce, ½ teaspoon hot pepper flakes and 3 teaspoons Dijon mustard.

Salt and pepper to taste.

TO ASSEMBLE

Place each hot dog half on each half of baguette. Then place a strip of pate on each piece of hot dog. Layer the cucumbers, shallots and cilantro over the meats, and spoon on the mayo/mustard/ hot sauce mixture as evenly as you can covering the entire hot dog.

Press the whole sandwich together and wrap tightly in plastic and foil for 20 minutes. Put a weight on it like a heavy book for the twenty minutes.

TO DRINK: Cold beer or champagne.

2. The Cataplana Dog

Clams and pork go together in classic Portuguese cooking—here’s a hot dog tribute to that tradition.

INGREDIENTS

Eight traditional hot dog buns (the squared off kind, if possible), split, toasted and brushed with olive oil.

8 hot dogs, each wrapped in a strip of bacon, grilled or broiled until bacon is crisp.

48 small clams, cleaned, steamed open and removed from shells

3 small onions, 3 ribs of celery and 3 small carrots- all peeled, cut into small pieces and sautéed in olive oil with 3 large cloves of diced garlic and 1 sprig of rosemary. Vegetables should be cooked until soft; remove rosemary.

Sauce: roasted red peppers bottled in oil, drained (and any black skin removed) and mixed in the food processor with 1 tablespoon sweet paprika, 2 cloves garlic and enough olive oil to make a paste. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

ASSEMBLY

Into each bun, place some onion mixture, 6 clams, the bacon wrapped dog, and then the sauce. Press together, wrap in plastic and foil, and leave for 20 minutes before unwrapping. Put a weight on this for 20 minutes.

TO DRINK: Vinho Verde, or a Gin Fizz

3. Iowa State Fair Corn Dogs

Adapted by Renee Marton from Andrea Albin

When John Willoughby, former Gourmet magazine editor, caught sight of these freshly fried corn dogs, he exclaimed, “Just like the Iowa State Fair!” When he bit into one, he acknowledged that it was even better. Grilling the hot dogs first lends them a deeper, smokier flavor, and the buttermilk-cornmeal coating fries up to a thick, fluffy shell—delicious with mustard or ketchup and a frosty root beer on the side.

INGREDIENTS

8 wooden or metal skewers

8 hot dogs

1/2 cup plus 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour, divided

About 8 cups vegetable oil, divided

1 1/2 cups cornmeal

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/8 teaspoon cayenne

2 large eggs

1 1/4 cups well-shaken buttermilk

ASSEMBLY

Oil grill pan, heat until smoking and grill hot dogs, turning occasionally, until charred on all sides, about 8 minutes total. Transfer to a plate and cool slightly, then insert a wooden stick into each hot dog, lengthwise.

Put 3 tablespoons flour on another plate and roll hot dogs in flour to coat, shaking off excess.

Heat enough oil in a tall pot (narrow rather than wide) so that the hot dogs can be submerged in the oil, with room to spare for bubbling over, while you hold the stick. The temperature should be 350°F all the time. (Use a thermometer.) So fry one hot dog at a time. If you immerse several at the same time, the oil temperature will decrease, and greasy hot dogs will result.

Meanwhile, whisk together cornmeal, remaining 1/2 cup flour, 2 Tbsp vegetable oil, baking powder, sugar, baking soda, cayenne, and 3/4 tsp salt in a medium bowl. Add eggs 1 at a time, whisking well after each addition. Whisk in buttermilk.

Transfer some of batter to a tall glass, filling it almost to the top.

Working in batches of 2 or 3, dip hot dogs, one at a time, into glass of batter, to coat them (add more batter to glass when necessary). When oil reaches 350F, fry the battered hot dogs, turning occasionally, until batter is cooked through and golden-brown all over, about 3-5 minutes. Transfer corn dogs to a rack with paper towels underneath to drain.

Return the oil to 350°F; refill glass with batter between batches. Continue as above.

Serve with ketchup and yellow mustard.

These hot dogs should be eaten right away, and not wrapped tightly, or they will get soggy.

TO DRINK: Beer.

Recipe for Father’s Day: Smoky Gazpacho Mario with Spicy Slim Jim Stirrer

Laura Weiss — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 16:25:30 +0000

Gazpacho. Photo by paul goyette via Flicker.

How about a gazpacho recipe for Father’s Day from Chef Renee that’s he-man enough to please Dad and that’s also sure to win over the rest of the family?

Smoky Gazpacho Mario with Spicy Slim Jim Stirrer

Serves 4

The night before: fill one ice cube tray with tomato juice, and freeze overnight. Use the rest of the tomato juice in the recipe below.

Place 4 tall highball glasses in the refrigerator.

INGREDIENTS

1-quart Sacramento tomato juice, or V8 juice, divided as indicated above
1 cucumber, peeled and seeded, and cut into large dice
1 green pepper, seeded, and cut into large dice
½ red onion, peeled and cut into large dice
½ lemon, juiced
¼ cup sherry wine vinegar
¼ cup olive oil
large pinch Italian parsley (no stems), plus 4 nice sprigs
1 clove garlic, peeled
1 teaspoon smoked paprika
½ teaspoon salt
½ jalapeno pepper (or serrano)- optional
12 twists fresh black pepper

One package of Slim Jim sausage sticks. Remove from package and leave at room temperature for 30 minutes.

METHOD

Place all ingredients (except Slim Jim sticks) in blender. First pulse until every ingredient is well chopped, then puree until you have an easily pourable drink.

Add 1 cup of vodka (or dill seed flavored Aquavit) and re blend briefly.

Taste for seasoning.

Add tomato ice cubes to highball glasses. Pour in the Smoky Gazpacho Mario until ¾ full and add a Slim Jim to each glass, along with a sprig of Italian parsley.