Nothing like Mom's cookin'

My mom is a great home cook. Seriously, I was very spoiled to have her cooking for me as I was growing up. She made some American family classics like tuna casserole, we had a Mexican night every now and then, but the go to was pasta or anything else Italian. Sunday dinner was always something special. A couple weeks ago Erin and I were home and my mom had us and Erin's parents over. My grandpa was there too. Whenever there is company, my mom kicks it up a notch.


Her menu started with a great spread of appetizers. There was some sliced pepperoni and sausage, pepperjack cheese and some very good swiss. She also prepared one of her classics: smoked salmon. The salmon is store bought already smoked and laid it over some chopped romaine lettuce. She topped the salmon with finely sliced onion (I think she would have used chives if she had them), capers, salt, pepper, lemon and extra virgin olive oil. I like to eat some of the salmon on some crunchy toast or bread: a great salty, light appetizer. As if this weren't enough for appetizers, my mom also made some classic tomato bruschetta.

For the main course, my mom prepared one of her standards. Penne with garlic and olive oil as a "sauce" cooked with strips of chicken breast, artichokes, and sun-dried tomatoes. She sautes the garlic with olive oil and onion as a base for the sauce. Then she adds capers (one of her favorite ingredients), artichokes and sun dried tomatoes. Once the pasta is nearly cooked, she adds the previously cooked chicken breast, chopped about the same size as the pasta, to the garlic and artichoke mixture. Finally, you mix the pasta with the sauce. She served it with asparagus that was boiled and seasoned with olive oil, salt, and crushed red pepper.

For dessert, Erin's mom made a Giada recipe: panna cotta with fresh berries. It was a nice light dessert, and tasty end to a big, great meal.

FN Dish

A few posts ago, I wrote a book review for the Amateur Gourmet and how much I enjoyed the book.  The author, Adam Roberts, who has  a great food blog with the same name, has been very busy because he now has a web show called FN Dish.  The premise is for Adam to go behind the scenes of the Food Network to talk about food news, events  and he even gets to interview the famous Food Network chefs...basically any Food Network fan's dream.   

He just got back from the South Beach Food Festival and I've watched a few of the videos from the weekend. He got interview Mario Batali and a very pregnant Giada de Laurentiis and he got to attend a panel about childhood obesity and interviewed Alice Waters and Rachael Ray afterwards.  The think the web show is great and Adam does a great job asking good questions and tries not to look too starstruck.  Adam's story is pretty cool because he found his love for cooking while he was unhappy at law school.  He started his blog a few years ago and has turned it in to quite a career!  Pretty inspiring. 

I definitely recommend checking out the FN Dish and Amateur Gourmet.

Orzo stuffed peppers

First, a big thanks to Dan and Jude, two of our newer readers, pictured above. Whats up guys?

I love roasted red peppers. I love their sweetness and their texture and they are a great addition to a variety of dishes from pastas to pizzas to salads. They are great just on a piece of toast. I've never roasted my own peppers, but my grandma has and they are even more wonderful than the ones you can buy in a jar. Hers were served simply with some olive oil and they were roasted with whole cloves of garlic that end up tender and delicious yet surprisingly sweet and mild.

Still, I've never really thought that a roasted pepper could be the star of a meal. But, that changed this week when Erin and I made orzo stuffed peppers. We got the recipe from a Giada episode. Orzo is a rice shaped noodle that is common in soups. Now, fresh bell peppers are not really in season, but we were able to find a few at our grocery store that would do the trick. We hollowed them out and started on the mixture for the "stuffing". It included zucchini, orzo (cooked in chicken stock), mint (the Greek's basil, according to Giada), garlic and parmasean cheese.





After we stuffed the peppers and put them in the oven, we had a lot of left over stuffing. Of course, we tasted it- it was delicious. The mint was a great touch along with the cool simple tomato and pasta mixture. I think cooking the orzo in stock added so much depth and flavor to the dish and of course the garlic just brought everything together. In the hour it took to cook the peppers, we had eaten all the leftover mixture, it made for a great cold pasta appetizer. The last 15 minutes of cooking, the peppers were uncovered and sprinkled with extra cheese that formed a nice crust. We were going to a little piece of meat to our meal, but since we had already had a lot of food and the peppers looked so good, we decided to have in just with a salad.

The peppers were tender, but probably could have used another half hour to really get the roasted flavor. Still, I think we will probably be trying more varieties of roasted and stuffed peppers.

Roast Beast

Over the past few weeks Erin and I have made a pork loin roast and a beef sirloin roast. I got the pork loin roast idea from my mom. While I was home for Christmas break she made a great tender pork loin roast that was bought already seasoned with garlic and lemon. She slow cooked it in a crock pot for 6 hours and added potatoes, onions, carrots and celery and some water. It made for an easy and great dinner. The pork was so tender you didn't need a knife.

Erin and I tried to recreate it. It didn't work, but we aren't sure why. I think the pork that I bought was about the same as my mom used, preseasoned and everything. I even consulted her before cooking. She said to just be creative and use what we have and cook it on low for 6 hours or on high for about 4 hours. We cut the loin in half, added carrots, potatoes, onion, apple, sun dried tomatoes and a hot red pepper; we set the crock pot on high for about 4 hours. We seasoned with salt and pepper, parsley, garlic and a bay leaf.



I think the flavors worked ok together. But, the pork ended up a little dry and tough. The potatoes were ok, but the apples were just mush.

In one of the funniest cooking moments we have had together, Erin took a big bite of what she thought was a sun dried tomato. But, it was the hot pepper. Erin isn't the biggest fan of spicy stuff, although she is starting to come around. But, the look on her face after biting into that pepper was of pure horror. She immediately ran into the kitchen and asked what would help cool her mouth. I told her milk and bread. She shoved a slice of bread into her mouth as her eyes welled up with tears. She laughed/cried in anger and pain. I poured her a glass of milk as I tried to keep from cracking up. She kept mumbling with the piece of bread in her mouth and looked oh so helpless. I kinda wish I had the camera out, but I don't think she would let me post a picture even if I took one. Anyway, the meal overall wasn't a big success.

Last week, we decided to go for a beef roast. I saw a Giada episode where she made roast beef with a spicy tomato sauce. Here's the recipe. As a bonus, she used a food processor for the sauce, and we are still looking for every opportunity to use our new kitchen machine. We bought a top sirloin roast from the grocery. We seasoned the meat with lots of salt and pepper and seared the meat on all sides.

Then we put it into a roasting pan and dumped a can of diced tomatoes and put in the oven for about an hour. Our only semi-mistake was that I only put the oven on 300. I wanted it to be medium or even medium rare, but I should have kept to Giada's suggestion of 375 for 30-40 minutes.

As I sliced the roast beef, it was a little rarer than we were going for, but it looked great. The sauce was pretty easy, we stayed pretty true to the recipe, adding some dried parsley to the little fresh parsley we had. Some how Erin's home grown parsley had survived the cold of winter up til January, but we didn't have enough. We also added the tomatoes that cooked with the roast, red wine vinegar, olive oil, crushed red pepper, salt and pepper. The food processor did its work and we were left with a great smelling, if not the most appetizing-looking sauce.


We finished the meal with a simple salad with a homemade vinegar and olive oil dressing that we tossed with the lettuce, sunflower seeds and croutons. The meat was flavorful and tender. It was a good cut of meat, even though it wasn't too expensive (I think it was about $4/pound). The star of the meal though was the sauce. The vinegar and tomato combo really "popped" in your mouth. Erin has since named it "pop sauce". We should have invited some one over for dinner, it was far too much food for Erin and I. I cut the rest of the roast in to pieces about 3/4 inch thick and they made for good steaks for dinner and sandwiches the rest of the week. All in all it was a very good meal. Here is the finished product:

Holiday Biscotti

I am not a baker but this year for the holidays I decided to attempt to make biscotti for my coworkers gifts. At first, I was a little intimidated by the recipe and the whole baking process, but after reading over the recipe and the steps for Holiday Biscotti and Chocolate and anise seed biscotti I realized it was easier than I thought and I decided to give it a go. I thought the Holiday Biscotti with dried cranberries and pistachios would be fun and festive for Christmas presents and I chose to make a second batch (assuming all went well with the first) of the chocolate chip and anise seed for Lisa at work who is a picky eater and I knew she wouldn't like the cranberry pistachio combo. For some reason I could not find the recipe for the chocolate and anise seed on Food Network's recipe but I got it from Giada De Laurentiis' cookbook Family Dinners. Basically, you can use the holiday biscotti recipe and replace the pistachios, cranberries and lemon zest with 1 cup chocolate chips and 1 tsp. ground anise seed.

I began by combining the flour and baking powder in a large bowl and in a separate bowl I beat room temperature butter, sugar, and lemon zest with an electric mixer. After mixing the sugar, butter and lemon zest, I beat in the eggs (1 at a time) and then added the flour. Once all of the ingredients were combined to form a sticky dough, I added the cranberry's and pistachios (get it, red and green for the holidays!) and mixed it all together. Then I formed the dough in to a long, flat log on a lined baking sheet and baked at 350 for 30 minutes or until golden brown.



Then you have to let it cool about 30-40 minutes and then you cut cookie into diagonal cuts and lay then cut side down on the baking sheet and bake for another 15 minutes. Once they are done, you just set the pieces on a rack to cool completely and you are all done! The great thing about biscotti is that as long as you keep them in an airtight container or ziplog bag they last a really long time. They turned out really well and I had fund making them, so much fun that I made 2 more batches the next evening and I plan on giving them to all my family for Christmas. I hope everyone has a great holiday season with lots of great food and great times!