Here are some ingredient notes: If you’ve never had quinoa, it is an experience I highly recommend! In addition to being tasty (something like ever-so-slightly bitter couscous) it’s also obscenely nutritious. Tamari is a gift from god. Carménère is one of my favorite kinds of wine, and the particular label I used (Chono) is Chilean and I think the grapes are grown organically, since they serve it at Yield. The flavor notes include “roasted red peppers,” “dark chocolate,” and “leather.” So… heh. I got it for $14.99 at a nearby “under $15 per bottle” store. :q

There are obviously many variations you can make on this recipe. For example, you could use a wine other than carménère; my opinion on the “cooking wine” issue is that you should use a good wine but hey, you only need a cup and you can drink the rest! Couscous would be a worthy (yet somewhat less nutritious) substitute for the quinoa. If you can’t find nori, but have fresh sage in spades, then you can replace the nori with sage leaves fried in olive oil or browned butter (not as vegan). Finally, ignoring the vegan theme, this would be an excellent side for a roast chicken. PS I totally made the whole thing up, so if you think it’s missing something, please let me know (also, please come up with a shorter name).

[This is a fairly "easy" vegan recipe because the ingredients are widely available. It doesn't have agave syrup or arrowroot or seitan or "nutritional yeast flakes" (shudder).]

Quinoa with mushrooms, nori, pinenuts, and a carménère-tamari reduction

• 1 cup quinoa, rinsed and drained
• 2 cups water
• olive oil
• 1 shallot, finely minced
• 1 1/2 cups roughly chopped mushrooms (I used some mix of gourmet kinds from Green Giant)
• 2 sheets nori (toasted), crumbled
• 1/2 cup pinenuts (not toasted)
• 1 tablespoon tamari soy sauce, plus extra to taste
• 1/2 tablespoon white rice vinegar
• 1 cup carménère (or other spicy red wine)
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• salt and pepper

1. Prepare the quinoa: It’s basically prepared the same way rice is prepared. You put 1 part quinoa 2 parts water into a pot, then bring it to a boil, cover it, and bring the heat down to “negligible.” Do this *while* you make the stuff that goes into it (as opposed to right before or after).

2. Sauté the shallot on medium in olive oil until translucent, then add the mushrooms, a dash of tamari, and half the crumbled nori. Sauté until the mushrooms have rendered all their liquid, then bring the heat up to medium-high to burn off said liquid and (ideally) char the shallots a little. Remove to a bowl and cover with a paper towel.

3. Wipe the saucepan from the previous step dry, but leave any traces of shallot or nori that got singed to the pan if you can (we want them in the sauce). Toast the pine nuts briefly on high heat until they’re fragrant and they’ve rendered some of their oils. Remove to a bowl.

4. Reduce heat to medium, and immediately deglaze the still-hot pan with the wine. Reduce the wine by a little less than a half, then add the rice vinegar, tamari, and brown sugar. Reduce slightly, until flavors have combined. Reduce heat to low, add the thyme, then taste and adjust for sugar, tamari, salt, and pepper.

5. Mix the mushrooms and pinenut mixtures into the quinoa (now done and hopefully still quite hot). Serve drizzled with the wine-tamari sauce and garnish with remaining nori.

I served this up with Henry/Rachel Ray’s famous roast broccoli (which came out mostly wrong because I did it wrong), and Smitten Kitchen’s strawberry-rhubarb crumble. As for the latter, I totally skipped over “butter” the first time I read the ingredients, so I ended up substituting vegetable shortening, which is less good.* Definitely a winner, though, so I’m looking forward to making it again. :v

The reason dinner was something of a failure was that I totally forgot that Ryan doesn’t really eat at all. XD So I ate most of it myself, though he sampled everything and approved. Also, he took a tylenol and could only have a touch of wine, so I ended up drinking nearly the entire bottle myself, but hey… it helped me sleep!

* By the way, Crisco has trans fats in it as does anything with “partially hydrogenated” whatever-the-fuck. They can say it contains zero grams, so long as it has less than one gram. Thanks FDA and food industry lobbyists!

• They are delicious! While they steam they emit this stunningly tasty broth. Look into it.
• They are cheap, esp. for seafood! $5/lb is the price for Manila clams down at the Berkeley Bowl, and that is definitely enough to feed two people.
• When you buy them… they are STILL ALIVE. Creepy, eh?

This is a very simple and traditional way to prepare them, and the most expensive part is the bottle of wine, of which only about 1/2 cup goes into the cooking… so you get to drink the remainder with dinner! Serves you + 1 fly honey.

Linguini with clams (basic)

• 1 lb small clams, such as Manilla or Littleneck (this should be about 2 dozen and a bit)
• fat (butter or oil), about 3-4 tablespoons
• 3 large cloves garlic, minced
• 1 small shallot (or 1/4 of a mild-tasting onion), minced
• 1/2 cup dry white wine (Kendall Jackson’s sauvignon blanc is a very good choice here and it’s inexpensive too)
• 2 tomatoes, peeled, cored, seeded, and diced
• 1/2 lb linguini

Melt the fat in a large pot on medium, add the minced garlic and shallot and sauté until fragrant and beginning to soften (about 2 minutes). Add the clams to the pot, the wine, and about half the diced tomatoes. Bring to a boil, then cover and let steam until the clams open (about 5-8 minutes). Meanwhile, cook the linguini to your desired specifications. Remove clams to a bowl (discarding any that do not open… that means they were dead when you got them :/) and cover with foil. Drain the linguini and throw it in the pot, which should have a nice thin layer of broth at the bottom. Throw in the remaining tomato and toss it all together over medium heat for a few beats. Serve the linguini with clams on top (either you can remove them from their shells or the diner can… your choice!) immediately.

This recipe of course begs for additions and variation. I was planning on tossing some arugula in as well, but my stock had gone extra-bitter so I decided against it. I also added some grated chestnuts as an experiment, but I do not recommend this, as chestnuts are a pain in the ass to prepare and they didn’t add much to the dish.

The recipe is from Café Zuni, which is just over the bay, but it’s a pretty expensive joint, and doing it yourself is not too hard. Smitten Kitchen’s summary (which is what I linked above) suffices here, except I will make the following notes: (1) I only had 10 hours to salt the chicken, though 1-3 days is the recommended salting time (it still turned out quite good and I’ll do it right when I inevitably repeat this recipe someday). (2) It was very difficult to find a chicken quite small enough. To be fair, I only had time to look in one store (see the first note) but I went to Andronico’s which has fairly good meat selection. I managed to find a 3.68 pound free-range chicken, so that’s what I used. (3) Once in the oven (which you start at a whopping 475˚F) the chicken was very good at hissing and spitting and getting chicken fat all over the oven’s heating coil (oh how I wish we had a gas range) which led to a lot of smoke; long story short I ended up removing the batteries from our smoke detector.

As you can see, I served it with the bread salad (recipe also in the above link). For dessert, Brandon (my guinea pig for this dinner) and I had poached pears, also a first!

Pears poached in spiced vin santo

• 2 small pears (pref. d’Anjou) peeled, but not cored or stemmed
• 1 750 mL bottle of Italian dessert wine such as vin santo or marsala
• 1/2 cup of water
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 cinnamon stick, broken in two (this is harder than it sounds to do)
• 1 tbsp vanilla bean paste (or a real vanilla bean)
• 1/2 inch ginger root, peeled and finely chopped
• for serving: whipped cream or 1/2 cup mascarpone cheese, honey and powdered cinnamon to taste

Combine the wine, water, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, and ginger in the smallest (but still deep) saucepan you can find. Bring to a boil on medium, then reduce to right below a simmer and add the pears (position them so that the liquid covers as much of the pear as possible). Cook for 20-30 minutes or until tender (so that it yields to a fork), rotating them occasionally so that they pears poach evenly. Once they are soft, remove the pears to a serving dish and reduce the remaining poaching liquid by half. Serve the pears standing up (you might have to slice off the bottom to make them stand) covered with the poaching liquid/syrup (strained, of course), and with a small dollop of whipped cream or honeyed mascarpone.

Anyway, now I have a leftover chicken carcass and poaching liquid. Probably I will turn the chicken into chicken stock and also chicken-and-barley stew. The poaching liquid will probably get added to hot apple cider to create INSTANT HOLIDAY CHEER. Science!

Hazelnut macaroons

• 2 3/4 cups hazelnuts, shelled and skinned (see below)
• 2 plus 1 egg whites, room temperature
• 2 1/2 cups sugar (I used 1/2 cup less, and it was still very sweet, so use your discretion)

To skin hazelnuts, place on a foiled baking sheet in an even layer and roast in the oven at 375˚F for about 8-10 minutes. Pour the toasty nuts out onto a kitchen towel, then fold the towel over the nuts and rub the towel against your nuts (??) vigorously to remove as much of the outer skin as possible. The skin is not really bad or anything, and it won’t all come off anyway, so this is really kind of optional. Also optional: toasting the nuts anyway… the taste of toasted hazelnuts is better than raw, in my opinion, but it’s up to you!

Preheat the oven to 300˚F and line a cookie sheet with butter-greased parchment paper. Grind the nuts fine in a food processor and place in a large mixing bowl. Whisk two of the egg whites to stiff peaks and fold them into the nuts in smallish batches. Fold the remaining egg white in, and then add the sugar and mix until fairly homogeneous. Roll into 1-1 1/2 inch diameter balls and place on the cookie sheet slightly flattened. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until lightly browned. [I had to do it in two batches because our bakeware sucks, and each batch was around 20 cookies.]

Whatever you do, don’t let any water or milk touch the chocolate as that causes it to “seize” and do weird things to the texture. Use chocolate and nothing else (maybe sugar is okay, but there’s already two cups in the cookies for god’s sake).

Sole à la meunière (Translation: Fancy-ass fish sticks.)

• 1 lb Dover sole filets*
• salt, pepper, flour, milk
• 1 stick of butter
• 3-4 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped fine

Season the sole filets with salt and pepper on both sides, then dip them in milk and dredge them in flour until lightly coated. Heat 4-5 tbsp of butter in a skillet on medium until melted and foaming, then fry the sole filets, turning once until browned on both sides. Remove the sole to a serving platter (cover it with a paper towel if desired), and remove the skillet from heat. In a fresh saucepan, melt the remaining butter and let it brown slowly on medium-low heat (it will turn a brown color and smell nutty). Carefully pour the hot butter into the fishy skillet, stir it to let the butter absorb the fishiness, then pour the resulting butter mixture over the fish. Sprinkle with the parsley and serve immediately.

* So apparently you have to be very careful when buying sole, because there are two species of fish named Dover sole, and one of them (the one I expect is more commonly available in American supermarkets) is not truly sole. They are both flat fish, but real Dover sole has a very delicate flaky texture and an unmistakable subtle taste which the other kind lacks completely.

The fishing industry is really sketchy with naming, by the way (another example is how basa swai can’t be labeled “giant catfish” even though that’s what it is, because the catfish lobby is just that powerful). I guess they figure that one white, flat fish looks the same as all the others!

Marmalade chicken

• 4 breasts chicken, butterflied and (optionally) pounded thin with a meat tenderizer
• salt, pepper
• olive oil
• marsala or sherry, for deglazing
• 2 tbsp butter (optional)
• 1 tbsp dried rubbed sage
• 1/4 of a white onion, minced
• 1 c chicken broth
• 1 1/2 c marmalade*

Pat the chicken breasts dry, season with salt and pepper, and brown in a skillet with some olive oil until just about done through. Remove the chicken and deglaze the pan with some sherry, turning the heat down to medium. Add the butter (opt.), sage, onion, broth, and marmalade, and let the sauce reduce for about 20 minutes. Add more broth and marmalade if it isn’t voluminous enough for you. Finally, replace the chicken in the pan, coat it with the sauce, and let it cook, covered, for an additional 10 minutes on low heat.

Variation: Use 2 duck breasts instead. Score the fatty side of the breast, sear it on both sides 5 min each, then keep warm in a 200˚F oven. Make the sauce using the rendered duck fat and no butter (unless you feel like it). Skip the last step and instead reduce 5 minutes more. Slice the breasts against the grain and pour the reduction over top to serve. This seems like a very good idea to me.

* We used Safeway’s Seville orange marmalade, which is a tad on the bitter side, but pleasantly so. Use your discretion: I believe in you!

• 5 large potatoes, cubed (skinned optional)
• olive oil
• buttermilk
• salt and pepper

Put potato cubes in a pot of warm water, bring to a boil, and then let simmer, covered, for about 30 minutes, or until potatoes are tender. Drain, add olive oil and buttermilk, and mash. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Wilted spinach with garlic

• 4 large cloves garlic, sliced into thin slivers
• 1 lb fresh spinach
• olive oil

Heat olive oil and a little bit of salt in a small skillet over medium heat until shimmering. Add the garlic and sauté until fragrant. Add the spinach and cook about 10 minutes, stirring with a spatula so it cooks evenly.

I don’t have my mom’s recipe so the following is adapted from a few sources, notably Smitten Kitchen’s version.

Tortilla de patata (Potato omelet)

• 1 cup olive oil (don’t worry, you won’t actually consume the whole cup)
• 3 medium potatoes, sliced very thin (I never skin potatoes if I can help it, but you can I guess)
• 1 large white onion, quartered and sliced thin
• 6 eggs
• kosher salt

Heat the cup of oil in a large skillet (preferably with fairly high sides– remember that all the potatoes, onions, and egg need to fit!) on medium-high until very hot (about 3 minutes, when it starts to shimmer and little bubbles appear on the surface of the pan). Bring the heat down to medium-low and add the sliced potatoes, stirring occasionally to make sure that none stick to the pan. Cook this about 6-8 minutes, then add the onions and cook an additional 15 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender to the bite. Drain the potatoes and onions in a colander over a bowl; reserve oil. Meanwhile, beat the eggs and a few pinches of salt (say about 1-2 teaspoons, depending on your Daily Salt Requirements) until just scrambled, and then fold in the drained potatoes and onions slowly. While folding them in, you can chop up the potatoes a bit more (into half-circles or whatever) with a fork or wooden spatula, but it doesn’t matter too much! Let that all sit for 10 minutes.

Now heat about 4-5 tbsp of the reserved oil in a nonstick pan on med-high (I used a wok! since it’s what we had around) until smoking, pour the egg-and-potato mixture and pat it down so that it is relatively flat. Reduce heat to med-low. Run a spatula around the bottom so that a layer of egg creeps in under the potatoes and cook that for 6-8 minutes, shaking occasionally to keep the omelet from sticking to the pan too much. Eventually the top should begin to set: it should no longer be liquid, though still somewhat wet and runny. Now for the fun part: we have to invert the tortilla: (1) Equip oven mitts, (2) Get yerself a large plate, (3) Place the plate over the pan, (4) Turn it all upside down, carefully.

Refresh the pan with fresh oil if it looks dry, then slide the tortilla back in. Run a spatula around the tortilla and cook another 4-6 minutes or until a toothpick stuck through the middle runs clear, making sure to shake the pan every now and again. Serve warm or cold: either works!

A good accompaniment is some fairly standard garlic chicken (pictured above). Heat some olive oil to smoking on medium high, add garlic until it is fragrant and beginning to brown, and then some salted chunks of chicken. Cook all that until the chicken is done through, then add some sherry and toss the chicken to coat in the resulting deliciousness.

Chicken breasts in sage brown butter (with polenta!)

Serves 2 to a great degree of satisfaction, possibly up to 4 if you added another vegetable (honey roasted carrots would do well!)

• 1/2 stick of butter, plus another 1/2 stick on reserve
• 1 package of fresh sage (or about 20 largish leaves)
• 2 boneless, (but optionally skinful) chicken breasts, butterflied (bisected through the xy-plane)
• salt, cracked black pepper
• 1 box instant polenta, prepared according to box directions

Pat the chicken dry and rub in salt and black pepper. Melt half a stick of butter on medium-high heat in a large skillet, and let it brown (but be careful not to let it burn or foam up too much). It will develop a brownish color and a nutty aroma (and flavor). Drop in the sage leaves and stir for about 5 minutes, or until deliciously fragrant of sage. Move the leaves to the sides of the pan, and place the chicken breasts in the pan (with skin down first if using skin). Brown the chicken (about 7-10 minutes on each side) until done, making sure that the sage remains moist and covered with butter the entire time, adding more butter to the pan if necessary (it was for me, but who knows, you might get lucky!).

Remove the cooked chicken breasts and cover with a towel to keep them warm and reserve about 1/4 cup of the juice/fat/butter for serving. Adjust the heat to high, until butter smokes and foams a little. Add the instant polenta to the pan (I had some leftover; judge for yourself how sagey you would like the polenta), and let it brown and crisp on the outside, stirring to mix in the butter mixture. Salt to taste. Serve the chicken breasts over the polenta, and pour the reserved juices over top.

Last step: EAT IT :v … preferably with a nice Italian red.

Corn cherry scones (adapted from The Cheese Board Collective Works, makes 10-12 scones)

• 2 cups flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda*
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 2/3 cup and also 1/4 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 cups medium-grind cornmeal*
• 2 sticks (1 cup) cold butter, cut into small “pea-sized” cubes
• 3/4 cup dried sweet cherries
• 1 1/4 cup buttermilk*

Preheat the oven to 425˚F, bitches! Mix the flour, baking powder and soda together and then sift it into a mixing bowl of highest quality. Add the salt, 2/3 cup of sugar, and cornmeal, and mix with a wooden spoon until it is nigh on homogeneous. Add the butter and use your fingertips to incorporate the little butter-chunks into the dough (don’t mix it too much, though, just get the dry ingredients to adhere nicely to the outside of the butter). Mix the cherries in so that they are mingling casually with the dry ingredients, then make a well in the center of the bowl, pour the buttermilk in, and mix/fold until just combined.

Separate the dough into 10-12 scone-sized rounded chunks and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Sprinkle them with the remaining sugar so the tops are coated nicely and then stick ‘em in the oven and immediately bring the temperature down to 375˚F. Bake for 20 minutes or until they are done. [Mine needed 25 minutes or so.]

* Notes on the ingredients: I think these might need a smidgen more baking soda. I couldn’t find any gradations of cornmeal other than “cornmeal” and “polenta,” but the latter is probably too coarse, so use the former (which seems right). I used %1 buttermilk and that also seems to have worked fine; who knows what difference whole buttermilk would make though?

Tonight, Michael was off having fun with friends, so we took the opportunity to make something not only with vegetables, not only vegetarian, but vegan (gasp)—ratatouille. Unlike most French fare, the recipe for this rustic vegetable stew is somewhat flexible. We opted for the stovetop route, adding non-traditional yellow squash and substituting red bell peppers for the typical green, resulting in a very colorful dish (red, orange, yellow, green, and purple are all in the mix). It’s really very easy, once you assemble and chop up all the ingredients! Also: surprisingly delicious despite not having any suffering in it.

Rainbow Ratatouille

• 5-6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 6 cloves of garlic (or to taste), broken/crushed with the back of a knife and then chopped
• 1 large onion, sliced thin
• 1 large eggplant, cut roughly into 1/2 inch cubes
• 2 large zucchini, sliced into long strips and then cut into quarter-strips
• 6 small crookneck squash, cut into thin circular slices
• 1 large red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and chopped
• 5 medium tomatoes (preferably slightly overripe), chopped roughly
• 1 tbsp each of dried thyme and oregano (or to taste)
• 1 cup shredded fresh basil
• red pepper flakes (to taste)
• kosher salt (to taste)

Sprinkle chopped eggplant and squash with salt while you start. Heat half the olive oil on medium-low, then cook the onions and garlic until onions have softened. Add the remaining oil, turn the heat up to medium; let the oil heat, but don’t let it smoke. Add the eggplant and cook until the eggplant is soft, about 8-10 minutes. Add the zucchini, crookneck squash, and bell pepper, cooking for another 10-12 minutes (stirring to prevent scorching). Finally, add the tomatoes and the seasonings, allowing everything to soak through. Let that stew for another 8-10 minutes (uncovered, as the tomatoes add a good deal of water). Serve with a baguette (and/or Rice-a-Roni if you have an entire shelf of your pantry dedicated to it because it is always on sale… *looks around shiftily*).

(Picture was taken right before the tomatoes went in.) Tomorrow: Sausage cappelini (with homemade pesto!) and bruschetta. :9