Quick New Years Stir-fry

Been a busy holiday around here. But never fear. I have something super tasty, beautifully colored, healthy and, most importantly, easy for you to whip up during a busy time.

[What you need]
Olive oil
3 cloves garlic
1 head bok choy
1 head cauliflower (We used purple cauliflower, but any color will do. You have to admit the purple give it a certain something though)
~ 12 oz of shitake mushrooms

[What to do]

1. Press the garlic and let it sit a few moments as the oil heats up then add it to the pan.
2. Chop the bok choy, adding the stalks to the pan first (they take longer to cook) then the leaves
3. Chop and add cauliflower and mushrooms
4. Cover and simmer for about 5-8 minutes

See? Easy! Perfect for the night when you're tired of cooking elaborate holiday meals

Torrone

Picture, if you will, your favorite childhood candy. Maybe, like my madre, your mind goes to miniature Tootsie Rolls or, like my sister, you're thinking of the ever allusive Zero bar. For me, there are two candies which make my mouth water with nostalgic joy. One is dark chocolate. One is nougat. Both involve almonds. I really don't know if I can stress enough how much I love almonds.

One of these can be found in just about any corner of the world. The other...I have only ever seen in grocery stores that specifically market themselves as "Italian". Because of the lack of such stores in the little nook of the world I find myself in, I've decided to whip up a batch on my own for the holidays.

It turned out to be a lot harder than I thought it would be.

The recipes I found were simple enough. The problem was: it takes a long time and a lot of patience, two things I never really seem to have in spades. If I had to watch a bunch of thermometers and jump back and forth between pots like my other candy making adventures require, I actually might have found this easier. In reality, making Torrone is a highly meditative chemistry lesson ideal for the day I had this Saturday when we snowed in anyway.

Torrone

Adapted from Dellalo and Food52

[What you need]
12 oz of honey (about 1 1/2 cups)
4 cups of whole almonds
3 egg whites
flavoring to taste (a box of Torrone from the store will come with vanilla, lemon, and orange. Lemon is my favorite so I used it exclusively, but feel free to get creative.)
1 1/4 cup powdered suger (optional: for the impatient among us.)
2 sheets ostia wafer paper (which can be found here - honestly, I just used rice paper for my first batch. I mainly include the more traditional detail for the fun story my madre tells in which she and her sisters used to peel the paper off the nougats and "play communion" when they were young.)

[What to do]
1.Set up a double boiler system and pour in the honey. Cook until it is clearly of a liquid consistency, stirring frequently. This took me around an 1 1/2 hours.
2. In the meantime, roast the almonds. Put them on a rimmed baking sheet in the oven (at around 350 degrees F.)  for 10-15 minutes.
3. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. This step is crucial, do not rush it. The eggs are the binder that bring the whole thing together.
4. Fold the egg whites into the honey. Continue folding until the mixture becomes thick and somewhat caramel-like. This step, also crucial, takes a long time. I, personally, almost gave up on it, thinking that it would never set. Don't panic. Just stir. (If you find that you can't deal with this any longer, add the powdered sugar. It will help thicken things up; however, the candy will no longer be authentic.)
5. Fold in the almonds and flavoring. The mixture should be thick enough that the almonds don't all sink immediately.
6. Line a baking dish with wafer paper and pour the mixture in. Place another wafer paper on top and press down with your hands or other weight. Set aside for at least an hour while it firms up; it may take longer.
7. To serve, flip it over and cut the nougat into squares.

Comfort Food: Slow Cooker Beef Roast

I offer my apologies for the missed post last week and the lateness of this post. You see, I've been doing a lot of cooking lately, but I have forgotten to take pictures. That means we've missed out on some great stuff, but never fear. I will make them a second time, just for all of your benefit. Especially now that I've learned, thanks to Thanksgiving, that people are actually reading this. [I'm still trying to figure out the comments section. I'll let you know when I have that sorted out.]

So without further adieu, a childhood favorite and a good meal for very lazy days: The Slow Cook Beef Roast.

The best thing about this meal is not even the ease of it. It's the smell. Coming home to the smell of this delightful meal simmering away is heavenly. Even more so on freezing winter days like the past few have been.

All it takes is a few vegetables, beef stock, and a beef roast (Just about any cut will do. It will be cooking so long that it will be plenty tender. I assure you.)

Slow Cooker Beef Roast

via (to the best of my knowledge) mi madre

[What you need]

Cut of Beef

Salt

Pepper

Carrots

Potatoes

Onions

Beef Stock or Broth (enough to pretty much cover the roast)

A slow cooker

[What to do]

1. Season the Beef with salt and pepper then add to slow cooker

2. Chop up the various vegetables and add them around the roast.

3. Cover this in stock/broth

4. Cook on low for about 8 hours

5. (and don't forget this step, it's crucial) At some point in that 8 hour period, leave and then come home so you can enjoy that smell.

See? Wasn't that easy?

Polenta

You're about to walk into some contentious territory, so I suggest you prepare yourself.

Polenta is one of those foods that can be found pretty much anywhere (I mean, it's essentially cornmeal mush), but what you put on it drastically varies by region. Fry it and cover it with milk based beef gravy and you've done it Pennsylvania Dutch style. A tomato sauce? Northern Italian territory.

I know, I betraying my Sicilian roots here, but Polenta is tasty and I think it's status as a "peasant food" to the point where I know people ashamed to make it make it a little less of a betrayal.

There are Polenta stories in my family, though most of them involve my mother carefully explaining to me that my bisnonna would probably have never made polenta

All of this aside, I really enjoy the dish. It is a hearty and warm meal that reheats well and is a perfect dish to make large quantities of on cold night as we approach winter.

Polenta

[adapted from Food52]

[what you need]

4 cups ricotta whey (you can get the whey by making this recipe)

1 cup ground cornmeal

1 teaspoon of salt

2 tablespoons oregano

1 tablespoon parsley

1 tablespoon basil

2 tablespoons parmesan cheese

[what to do]

1. Set up a double boiler. (several cups of water in one pan with another pan or bowl overtop)

2. Put whey, cornmeal and seasonings in the top of the double boiler. Stir carefully.

3. Cook until polenta is thick. This should take between 30-45 minutes.

4. Stir in cheese

5. Either top with gravy/tomato sauce and serve or separate into containers for storage and top with choice toppings later. I like to make large batches ahead of time for hearty lunches.

Ricotta Cheese

Ask my madre what my feelings are regarding ricotta cheese and she will probably recall my description of said cheese as "a little piece of heaven." It is, honestly, my favorite cheese of all, and with as much as I love cheese, that's a high honor.

Cheesemaking is a project I have wanted to undergo for some time, but I've been far too nervous. It seemed like quite the undertaking and I just wasn't sure of where to begin. With some help from cheesemaking.com though, I was well on my way.

Cheese is in my blood. On my father's side of the family, there's a whole branch of cheesemonger types, but because it's my favorite (and honestly, probably the easiest), I went a little more toward madre's Italian side for my first foray into the world of cheese*.

To create a "little piece of heaven" you start with whole milk (making certain it is not ultra pasteurized) in a stainless steel pot. For this recipe, I used a 1/2 gallon.

Stirring frequently, add 1/2 tsp of citric acid and 1/2 tsp of Kosher salt. Then heat the milk to 195 degrees F. Soon you will start to see the curds forming, which (at least to me) is very exciting.

After the curds and whey begin to separate and the milk reaches 195 degrees F, let it sit for at least five minutes. While that's happening, you can prepare fore the next step.

Line a colander with a thin-weave cheesecloth (muslin works well) and ladle the curds into it. Finally let the ricotta drip through for about 30 minutes. I got a little impatient and tried to squeeze mine out. Don't do this. The whey is very hot.

Once separated you will have delicious ricotta cheese and a whole bunch of protein whey, which is not just a by-product; it's totally useful. I made some pizza dough with mine, but the possibilities are endless.

*Well, to be perfectly honest, I was going to start with mozzarella, but I ran into several problems. The largest of which being the only stainless steel pot in my possession was only capable of holding a half gallon, meaning I had to halve the recipe and no one wants to try and cut a rennet tablet into eighths. No one.

Cabbage Soup

I'll chalk the invention of this soup up to Nonno. He's the one who deciphered the ingredients, at least. This fact partially explains how this recipe got passed down to me the way it did: as a list of ingredients and nothing more.

This is not an uncommon problem with the recipes I've acquired from my family. Plenty of recipes in The Cookbook have an annotation that essentially tells you to call someone else who might have an idea of the baking temperature or how to combine things, etc. Unfortunately, many of the people referred are also no longer with us.

Luckily in this case, I still had people around who could make heads or tails of things.

We start with a simple head of cabbage and shred it.

Then add the rest of the ingredients to the pot. Seriously. That's all you need to do. Well, that and simmer for about 4 hours until the cabbage cooks down.

Cabbage Soup

[Ingredients]

1 head cabbage

onions, chopped

meatballs

tomato sauce

1 cube beef bouillon (or one cup beef stock)

salt

pepper

oregano

rosemary

basil

Prozia Celi's Chocolate Chip Cookies [The Cookbook]

For many a year, I have been on a mission to find the perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe and for many a year, I have failed miserably. My mother's suggestion to "Just use the recipe on the back of the chocolate chip bag" only yielded cookies so flat that they might have been good substitutes for hamster frisbees.

I've heard countless suggestions:

• Use bread flour
• Use double the amount of flour
• Use only brown sugar
• Use only cane sugar
• Stir the dough as little as possible
• Use applesauce

The list goes on and on. I still have yet to produce chocolate chips that rival the Toll House ready-bake ones (and I am -seriously- ashamed of this) or my mother's, both of which taste chewy and lovely like they were made by an actually competent baker.

So, of course, when I discovered a chocolate chip recipe in The Cookbook, I simply had to try it. If anyone could solve my chocolate chip cookie dilemma, it had to be Bisnonna.

In some ways she did. These cookies definitely did not turn out flat. They were nice puffy little balls of tasty. They are a little denser and more cake-like that other chocolate chip cookies that I have made in the past, however. I am definitely going to keep this recipe in my arsenal, but the search goes on.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

via The Cookbook (attributed to Prozia Celi)

1 c. crisco, 3/4 c. brown sugar, 3/4 c. white sugar, 1t vanilla, 2 eggs, 3 c. flour, 1 t baking soda, 1/2 t salt, 1 6oz package chocolate chips, 1 c. nuts

Bake 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes

Madre adds: If you want the other recipe for the chocolate chip cookies that Grandma made, look on a bag of chocolate chips. When she didn't use this recipe, she used the original Toll House recipe. 

[Apparently I'm just incapable of recreating the bag of chips recipe.]