Pasta with Broccoli Rabe (aka Baby or Rapini) , Goat Cheese and Hot Italian Sausage
Serves 4 to 5 – adapted from Saveur

Pasta is one of my favorite meals, ever. I really should cut back. I blame pasta and beer directly for my pear shape and lack of a real climbing ability. That said, maybe you have a better moderation ability than I do.

This recipe would be wonderful with any pasta. The original shows orecchiette, which is wonderful, but I find can be a little pricier than others. I had my father up from San Diego, so I went a little fancier and made some homemade pasta noodles. It takes a bit more time, but I’m getting faster at it.

The original recipe also doesn’t have the meat in it, but I know that sausage and broccoli rabe are a classic Italian pairing. Feel free to omit the meat if you want to make it vegetarian.

• 1 bunch broccoli rabe (about 1 lb.)
• 4 Hot Italian sausages, casing removed
• 1⁄3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 6-8 cloves garlic, smashed with the side of your knife
  
• 3⁄4 tsp. crushed red chile flakes
• Around 1 lb. pasta of your choice
• 2 tbsp. lemon zest
• 4 oz. goat cheese

Prep the broccoli:

Get a large pot of water boiling with some kosher salt and boil the broccoli rabe for about 4 minutes, until tender. Transfer rabe to  a bowl of ice water. You are stopping the cooking process and making sure that it keeps a nice green color. Drain and pat dry on some towels. Chop the broccoli roughly into bite sized pieces.

Start sauce:

Heat 2 tbsp. oil over medium heat in a large skillet and add the Italian sausage. Break it with the back of a wooden spoon as it browns. Add the rest of the olive oil and the garlic. Cook for roughly 3 minutes to let the garlic brown and the olive oil pick up the flavors. Toss in the chile flakes and cook until fragrant, roughly 30 seconds. Add the broccoli rabe and toss until all the flavors incorporate. Remove from heat.

Cook pasta and combine:

Boil a large pot of salted water and cook your pasta as long as required for your preferred style. If you make fresh pasta, boil 3 to 4 minutes. If you have dry pasta, it usually takes 8 to 10 minutes. Once done, drain the water but save a cup of the pasta water to add to your sauce. Dump the drained pasta straight into the sauce along with some of the saved water (start with 1/4 cup) and lemon zest. Toss everything together and add more pasta water as needed.

When serving, add a few small dollops of goat cheese to each plate. A little goes a long way.

I’ve managed to make it to a couple of the SIR Winter Training Series rides so far. I’m not quite as on the ball as I want to be right now, but I feel like I’m making a comeback of sorts.

On Saturday, Chris, Dan Boxer and I rode out to Bothell (25 – 30 miles or so) for a “35 mile” ride around the hills in the area. The cue snakes everyone through an evil series of loops, up and down, but mostly up. Somehow there ends up being something like 4000 feet of climbing. It wasn’t until I flipped my cue sheet over that I realized that the course was actually 45 miles, with plenty of hills still coming.

I figured that I had enough food on me, but I was dead wrong. I forgot my bananas out the door, and some of my Shot Blocks in my bag were hard as rocks. I need to make sure to squeeze them before assuming they’ll work for me. I had a baggie full of awesome homemade energy bars, but they mostly just got me through the first half of the day.

By the time I was on the last hill, my legs were burning and I was seriously undernourished. I was completely bonking by the time we got back to park. I laid out on the ground and soaked in a little bit of sun. I tried to eat a little bit of a (different) protein bar that I had in my bag. It was way too sweet and sent my stomach reeling. Sometimes you have to learn the nutritional stuff the hard way.

Dan and Chris basically had to nurse me back home. I spent at least 15 minutes on the side of the Burke Gilman Trail laying in the grass letting my stomach settle. Thankfully, it was an amazingly beautiful day for it.

I was anxious to get home though. I had planned to make dinner for my “little” cousin Thomas. He is shipping off to Kyrgyzstan (not to sound like a jerky American, but I had to google that again) with the military. Someone gave him a license to operate a 2 million dollar cargo loader…

We got him pizza’d up with some friends and drank some beers. It was a generally pleasant night, despite my aching body and throbbing muscles.

On the cooking forefront, I’ve had a pretty good streak of Sunday baking going. Three weeks ago I made a homemade pita bread from a couple of random online recipe sites. They came out great so I made a double batch of hummus that I’m still working on. I’ve been meaning to cook up some eggs and stuff them into breakfast pockets. Soon!

Two weeks ago, I had another successful run with making bagels. This time I was able to use a proper stand mixer since Norman was able to find his dough hook attachment. It was so much easier this time around. I still made sure to get in and hand knead a bit though. I’m starting to actually enjoy that process. I played around with some poppy seeds and onions for toppings. I burnt the onions a bit, but the poppy seeds worked great.

Last night I made some English muffins (with Jane’s help) out of Norman’s “The Bread Bible” (Beth Hensperger’s) book. I am constantly surprised at how easy these staples are to make. They take a little bit of time, but it is totally worth it. I’m getting to the point where I can handle multiple projects at the same time, so it cuts down on overall cooking time. I was able to cook us dinner while multitasking the bagel cooking.

English Muffins

Makes 16 or so

• 4-4 1/2 cups of all purpose flour (can sub out a cup or two with whole wheat if you want)
• 1 tbsp of salt
• A pinch of sugar
• 1 tbsp of active dry yeast (1 packet)
• 1 large egg at room temperature
• 1 1/4 cup of room temperature milk
• 2 tbsp of melted butter

1. Combine the water, yeast, and a pinch of sugar in a small bowl with a whisk and sit until foamy (10 minutes).
2. Combine 2 cups of the flour and the salt in a large bowl. Make a well in the center and pour in egg, milk, butter, and yeast mixture. Mix with a paddle attachment (or wooden spoon) until creamy (2 minutes).
3. Add the remaining flour 1/2 cup at a time until you have a soft dough that just clears the sides of the bowl.
4. Switch to a dough hook attachment and turn on medium for 3 to 4 minutes. Alternatively, turn the dough out onto a floured work surface and knead for 10 minutes. If you use a dough hook, you can still hand knead for a few minutes to ensure that the dough is smooth.
5. Lightly oil a large bowl and the dough. Cover with plastic wrap and allow the dough to rise until doubled in size (1 1/2 hours). If it takes longer, be patient.
6. Sprinkle a work surface with cornmeal. Pour the dough out of the bowl and onto the surface and roll out to a roughly 1/2″ thick rectangle. Use a 3″ cookie cutter (or large glass) to cut out muffin shaped pieces of the dough. Combine the scraps and roll them out to make more muffins.
7. Heat a large griddle over medium heat. Cook muffins for up to 10 minutes per side. Keep an eye on them though, they can burn fairly easily. Mine all needed about 7-8 minutes per side. It takes a while for the middle of the muffin to cook properly.
8. Cool on a wire rack. Be patient!
9. Spread muffins open with a fork.

We’ve been in the process of getting a wonderful new roommate (who also enjoys cooking) and things have been kind of a whirlwind around the house lately. The sheer amount of stuff in our kitchen alone has pretty much doubled. Almost none of it is unnecessary, so we are taking on the task of sorting and dividing as needed. Eventually we are going to install some extra shelves on the wall to help pick up some of the slack. For now, there are boxes stacked and tucked away underneath chairs and the dining room table.

I went through a kind of personal funk over the last few weeks on top of that. Stress of work and life sometimes adds up like that. I think I’m back on track though. Sorry to anyone that had to deal with it.

I’ve been working on a pretty major overhaul of a website, and taking on no fewer than 5 major projects at my full time job. Nothing has a strict deadline, but I don’t enjoy having everything weigh in on me at once. I’m getting close to the end of a few of those goals though, so I feel the slack ease a little.

Every day I seem to get distracted by some “what’s next” possibility. This is almost always related to bicycling (huge surprise). Paris-Brest-Paris’s official announcement was released last week and it has been on everyone’s mind and lips lately. They also put up an official time countdown on their website, in case you were wondering how many ‘jours’ were left until the ride.

On that note, Jane and I have taken up learning French finally. We’ve been talking about it for a while now. It probably isn’t totally necessary, but it will be nice to know some basics for when I’m lost and delirious in some small French village in the middle of the night. I’m guessing a new language will be about as easy as trying to do math in my head at 1am on these rides. I get pretty excited whenever I learn a new food reference. Regardless of how far I get on the course, you had better believe I’m going to know how to ask for food and beer.

I took on the training ride last week and snapped a picture or two, but it was pretty much pissing rain the entire day up until the last 5 minutes before I got home. Somehow I forgot to bring my shoe covers, so I was spinning in tiny puddles all day. Still, it was good to get out for a legitimate ride with other people again. I felt pretty solid all day. There may be hope for me yet.

Cooking the sauce

Croque-Madame (one of the best things, ever)
Serves 2 – adapted from Epicurious

There are lots of weak versions of this recipe out there. This one beats any I’ve tasted in any restaurant. You’re opinions may vary.

This has enough calories to get you through a 600K.

For sauce
• 2 tbps unsalted butter
• 1 1/2 tbps flour
• 1 cups whole milk
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp black pepper
• 1/8 tsp freshly grated nutmeg

Black Forest Ham and Gruyere Cheese

For sandwiches
• 2 tbps unsalted butter
• 1 3/4 ounces coarsely grated Gruyère cheese (3/4 cup)
• 4 slices white sandwich bread
• Dijon mustard (to taste)
• 1/4 lb thinly sliced cooked ham
• 2 large eggs

Grilled in butter

Topped with sauce and broiled

Finished with a fried egg

Making the sauce:

Melt 2 tbsp of the butter over medium-low heat and whisk in the flour a bit at a time. Let the mixture (a roux) cook for about 3 minutes. It is important to keep whisking it so nothing burns. Consider it exercise for the calorie fest to come.

Slowly at the milk and whisk to incorporate. Bring it to a boil and then drop the heat to a light simmer. Let it cook for about 5 minutes but keep an eye on it. It will threaten to boil over if you aren’t careful. Whisk it occasionally.

Mix in the salt, pepper, nutmeg and 1/4 cup of the cheese until melted. Remove the sauce from the heat. Cover the mixture with a cloth or wax paper (not a lid) while you prepare the sandwiches.

Making the sandwiches:

Lay out the 4 slices of bread. Top two of the slices with a few tablespoons of the sauce each. Split the remainder of the cheese over the slices with the sauce. Spread mustard on the empty slices and top with ham.

Preheat broiler with rack 5 inches or so from heat source.

Melt 1 tbsp butter in large skillet and cook sandwiches over medium-low heat until golden brown, 2 minutes per side Alternatively, you could butter the bread directly, but I find that you need a bit more butter to cover that way.

Transfer sandwiches to a shallow baking pan and wipe out skillet.

Top sandwiches with the remainder of the sauce and broil until the top is golden and bubbly. Note that I cooked mine a touch too long. Keep a close eye on it. There is a very fine line between perfect and burned.

While that is cooking, start 1 tbsp of butter in the skillet you wiped out earlier. Fry up the 2 large eggs over medium heat with a touch of salt and pepper.

Top the sandwiches with the eggs. Eat it right away. Perfect.

My boss at my full time job was nice enough to let me borrow her pasta roller about a month ago. She claimed to have not touched it “in years”, so I didn’t need to be in a hurry to get it back. That is good because I’ve cooked 3 or 4 homemade pasta dishes with it now (I lost track, really).

Before I got the roller, I tried my hand at a potato gnocchi…

Finished gnocchi with ragu

Uncooked gnocchi

Gnocchi with Ragu (adapted from Epicurious)

Variations on original
• I made my favorite ragu from this recipe on Saveur

It is really important that you are able to mash the potatoes very fine. A potato ricer would have been really nice, but I don’t own one (yet). I mashed by hand and ended up with a few small chunks that I had to pick out by hand while forming the gnocchi. It wasn’t a huge deal, but made the process take all that much longer.

Honestly, this isn’t a recipe for a weeknight. I spent like 4 hours on the whole thing, but I’m pretty positive that I could knock half an hour to an hour off with some practice. The ragu itself has to cook for 3 to 3 1/2 hours though. It doesn’t need to be babysat, but you need to have some patience.

(more…)

I made this last night and it came out pretty great. It seems like the last few times I’ve cooked with Norman over, things have came out kind of “meh”. I was happy to have what I considered a success on my hands.

Ziti with Sausage Gazpacho Sauce
Via Epicurious

• 10 tbsp olive oil
• 1 1/2 lbs tomatoes, cubed – the original calls for cherry, I used romas from our garden.
• 3 bell peppers, cored and quartered – go crazy on the colors
• 2 medium red onions, cut in to six to eight wedges
• 2 lbs zucchini,  (4 medium - I had 2 monsters from the garden), trimmed and quatered lengthwise
• 4 garlic cloves, peeled
• 4 mild to hot Italian sausages
• 3 tablespoons Sherry vinegar
• 1/2 tsp sugar
• 1 pound ziti pasta
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
• 1/3 cup chopped fresh basil
• 1 cup crumbled ricotta

(more…)

Norman was over the last few nights and we were trading off cooking spots. Monday night he made a great spring pasta with asparagus and peppers. It was nice and light so we had room for the Dutch Baby with Lemon Sugar that he made. Supposedly the dessert is “tremendously popular in Seattle” despite the fact that none of us were very familiar with it. It has been doubling as a fatty breakfast pastry too. He repeated the favor on Tuesday night, but I handled the dinner portion that evening.

Norman was raving about this dinner, so it must have been pretty decent. He is the best cook I know.

The original recipe says you can use a red or white onion. I think the presentation is much more dynamic with red, and I needed more excuses to cook them anyways. I made the gratin side dish first because I don’t have a separate broiler on our current stove. It gave it a chance to cool down a bit while I cooked the trouchia.

Chard and Onion Trouchia
Adapted from Debrah Madison’s – Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 large red onion, quartered and thinly sliced crosswise
• 1 bunch chard, leaves only, torn into bite sized pieces
• Salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 garlic clove
• 8 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 2 tablespoons chopped parsley
• 2 tablespoons chopped or torn basil leaves
• 2 teaspoons chopped thyme leaves
• 1 cup grated Gruyere cheese
• 2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a 10inch skillet. Add the onion and cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until completely soft but not browned, about 15 minutes. Add the chard and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, until the moisture has cooked away and the chard is tender, about 15 minutes. Season well with salt and freshly ground pepper.

Chop or garlic fine with a few pinches of salt, then stir it into the eggs along with herbs. Combine the chard and onion mixture with the eggs, stir in the Gruyere cheese and half the Parmesan.

Preheat the broiler. Heat the remaining oil to the skillet and when it’s hot, add the eggs. I don’t think that I let my pan get hot enough. My dish stuck to the pan a bit. It was savable though.  Slide the pan back and forth a few times to make sure the eggs are not sticking. Keep the heat at medium high for about one minute, then turn it to low. Cook until the eggs are set but still a quite moist on top. Add the remaining Parmesan, slide the pan under the broiler and broil until browned. Keep and eye on it though. There is a fine line between browned and burnt.

I sliced the trouchia like you would a pie or a quiche. Enjoy.

Onion Gratin
Adapted and altered from Debrah Madison’s – Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone

• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 pounds of yellow onions, thinly sliced
• 1 pinch of rosemary
• 2 eggs
• 3 tbsp flour
• 3/4 cup grated Gruyere cheese
• 3/4 cup of heavy cream (Okay… so it is a little decadent. Treat yourself, girl.)
• 1/2 cup of water
• 3/4 cup of bread crumbs

There was plenty of “gratin” with these onions, so you can probably tone it down or add more onions to your taste. For me, they were perfect.

Butter a baking dish that you don’t mind guests seeing. Mine was a bit bigger than I needed. Someone should really buy me some Le Creuset
dishes to round out my kitchen. Preheat the oven to 350.

Put olive oil over medium heat in a large skillet. Add onions and rosemary and stir until onions are covered with oil. After a minute or so, turn the heat down to low and cook until onions are soft and translucent, 30 to 40 minutes. If you want to go for it, I’ll bet it would be even more awesome if the onions were caramelized (1 to 1 1/2 hours on low heat).

In a bowl, whisk together eggs, flour, heavy cream and water. Add onions to the baking dish and cover it with the Gruyere cheese. Pour egg and cream mixture over the top of all of that. Sprinkle the bread crumbs over the top. Bake for 25 minutes or until the top is nicely browned.

I made this dish about a week ago and it ranked in my top three so far. Very easy and amazingly delicious. Give it a go.

Grilled Plank Steak with Soy-Chile Glaze
via Food & Wine

• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil
• 1 tablespoon minced garlic
• 1 tablespoon finely grated fresh ginger
• 1/2 cup soy sauce
• 1/3 cup lightly packed dark brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper
• 2 1/4 pounds flank steak
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• Thinly sliced scallions and lime wedges

1. Light a grill or preheat a grill pan. In a small saucepan, heat the oil. Add the garlic and ginger and cook over moderately high heat, stirring occasionally, until the garlic begins to turn golden. Add the soy sauce, sugar and crushed red pepper and cook, stirring, until syrupy, about 3 minutes; let cool.
2. Season the steak with salt and pepper. Grill the steak for 10 minutes for medium-rare meat, turning once; during the last minute, brush all but 2 tablespoons of the glaze over the steak. Transfer the steak to a cutting board and let stand for 5 minutes.
3. Thinly slice the steak and brush with the reserved 2 tablespoons of glaze. Transfer to a platter, sprinkle with scallions and serve with lime wedges.

Mushroom Fried Rice
via Food & Wine

• 1 1/2 cups long-grain rice
• 3 tablespoons cooking oil
• 1/2 pound cremini mushrooms, sliced thin
• 1/2 pound shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, caps sliced
• 1/2 pound white mushrooms, sliced thin
• 1/4 teaspoon dried red-pepper flakes
• 1 tablespoon grated fresh ginger
• 6 scallions including green tops, sliced thin
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1/2 cup frozen peas
• 1 teaspoon Asian sesame oil

1. Cook rice and set aside to cool. We have a rice cooker… so you should too.
2. Meanwhile, in a large nonstick frying pan or wok, heat 1 tablespoon of the cooking oil over moderately high heat. Add half the mushrooms and cook, stirring frequently, until the mushrooms are tender and golden, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a plate. Repeat with the remaining mushrooms and another tablespoon of the cooking oil. Add these mushrooms to the plate.
3. In the same frying pan, heat the remaining tablespoon of cooking oil over moderate heat. Add the red-pepper flakes, ginger, and scallions and cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Increase the heat to moderately high and add the rice, salt, and soy sauce. Cook, stirring, for 2 minutes and then add the peas and mushrooms. Cook, stirring, until everything’s warm, another 1 to 2 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the sesame oil.

I’ve had a really good string of great meals lately, but this last week I had a couple of back to back failures. Well, the word “failure” might overstate it a bit.

The first dish was some extra breaded chicken that Norman had brought over for me to use up. He gave me pretty specific directions on how to cook them but the pan got too hot and burnt the outside without cooking them all the way through. I had to oven cook them for a bit and I couldn’t seem to get the meat thermometer to read properly. They seemed to end up burnt and overcooked a bit, but not terrible. I made what ended up being an extremely mediocre salad as a side. I was pretty disappointed all around.

The very next day I was pretty determined to redeem myself with a Chicken Gyro dish. The recipe tasted fantastic, but our broiler burnt out the Naan bread well before my instructions said they should. It said to warm for 3 minutes with foil over the top and then uncover for about 2 to brown them. It took about 45 seconds to go from warm to black and I wasn’t paying close enough attention. Regardless, the meal is worth making again.

A few days ago I had seen a recipe on TV (Cook’s Country) for whiskey barbecue pork chops that looked pretty amazing. I put that together last night with some pan fried potatoes that I grabbed from a recipe online.

If I were to do this again, I would probably make more sauce for the pork chops. It was delicious. Enjoy

Whiskey Pork Chops
Serves 4

• 1/2 cup  Whiskey (save some for dessert!)
• 1/2 cup apple juice (cider)
• 2 tablespoons light brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon dijon mustard
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 teaspoons cider vinegar
• 4 bone-in, center-cut pork chops, about 1-inch thick
• 2 teaspoons vegetable oil
• 1 tablespoon butter
• salt and pepper to taste

1. In a bowl, whisk together whiskey, cider, brown sugar, mustard, cayenne pepper, vanilla and 2 teaspoons vinegar.
2. Transfer 1/4 of the whiskey mixture to a gallon-sized zip-loc plastic bag. Reserve remaining marinade.
3. Add pork chops, press the air out of the bag, and seal. Turn bag to coat the chops with the marinade. Refrigerate for about 1 hour.
4. Remove chops from the bag and pat with paper towels. Discard that marinade.
5. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat.
6. Season chops with salt and pepper and cook until well browned, about 3 to 4 minutes per side. Chops should not be fully cooked yet.
7. Transfer the chops to a plate and cover tightly with aluminum foil.
8. Add reserved whiskey mixture to the skillet.
9. Bring to a boil and scrape up any browned bits with a wooden spoon.
10. Cook until reduced to a thick glaze, 3-5 minutes.
11. Reduce heat to medium-low and tip the plate with the chops on over the skillet to drain any juices that accumulated back into the skillet.
12. Add remaining 2 tablespoons vinegar, whisk in butter and simmer until glaze is thick and sticky, 2-3 minutes.
13. Turn off head and return chops to skillet and let them rest in the pan until the glaze sticks to the pork chops. Evenly coat both sides
14. Check with a meat thermometer at the thickest part of the chop. It should read at least 145°. It takes 5-7 minutes.

Panfried Smashed Potatoes
Via Epicurious (I skipped on the cheese)
Serves 4

• 8 medium red potatoes (about 2 inches long; 1 3/4 pounds)
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1. Generously cover potatoes with cold water in a 3-to 4-quart pot and add 1 tablespoon salt.
2. Boil until almost tender, 10 to 15 minutes.
3. Drain potatoes. Transfer to a baking sheet.
4. Lightly crush to about 3/4 inch thick with a potato masher, keeping potatoes intact as much as possible.
5. Heat oil in a 12-inch heavy skillet over medium-high heat until it shimmers.
6. Transfer potatoes with a spatula to skillet, then lower heat to medium-low and cook, turning once, until golden brown, about 20 minutes total.
7. Season generously with pepper.

Yeah, so this is starting to become a food blog now… Sorry for the crap quality pictures. The iPhone works fine outside and chokes quite a bit indoors (without flash). Still, you get the idea.

Last Saturday I took the fixed gear out on SIR’s Winter Training Series around the Dash Point area. I wasn’t the only one dumb enough to ride it single, but I was the only one dumb enough to ride it fixed. I did better than I thought I might. Still, I had to walk a couple of times up some hills that were too steep.

I was pretty convinced that I need a much smaller gear ratio up until this last weekend. I still think I need to step it down, but I don’t think it needs to be that much. I am rather liking the ability to ride down hills without having to blow out my knees or ride my breaks all the way down. If I dropped down a couple of gear inches, I think I could get up just about anything and still be able to spin it out on the descents. At this point though, it might take too much money to fix that situation. That still isn’t growing on the trees around here.