I’m taking the week off and doing something different – staying safe at home like I always do only … I’m calling it a week off. That means that instead of a new menu, i’m doing chores and spending a lot of time on the couch not doing chores. That’s why this weeks newsletter is a look back at some of your favorites from the past few months.
Yeah, it’s that most dreaded of sit com episodes … a clips show. Stay tuned next week for a very special episode. No really. It’ll be good. It involves homemade tortillas and - like all “very special episodes” should - a sad story.
From your comments, emails, shares and tweets, here’re a few of your favorite recipes from this year.
September - White Bean Soup with Kale
My memories of bean soup aren’t good. Let me explain. My alma mater’s hippie-packed cafeteria made some real horror-show attempts to provide vegetable protein to a student body with a large percentage of vegetarians. Most were downright awful. Some were worse than that, and don’t even ask me about the “Lentil Loaf” they served. There’s a reason I often ate three kinds of potatoes in one day. Now, both being older, fancier, and free of the constraints of tray based meal choices, I really enjoy bean soups. This dish, a simplified take on the classic Ribollita, has become a staple in our kitchen – sometimes spiked with sausage, sometimes with tomato added, sometimes made with leftover roast chicken. It’s satisfying, warming, and frozen and reheated ends up as a lot of fall/winter lunches.
Serves 4
3 hours plus overnight soak, 30 minutes active
1 cup dry small white beans
½ tsp baking soda
4 cups water
1 tsp Kosher salt
4 cups chicken or vegetable stock
1 bunch Cavolo Nero (aka Dino Kale or Lacinato Kale)
¼ cup loosely packed celery leaves
4 cloves garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp red pepper flake
1 sprig fresh thyme
1 sprig fresh rosemary
1 small bough fresh basil
1 bay leaf
Salt and black pepper to taste
Soak the beans overnight in 4 cups of water with ½ tsp of baking soda and 1 tsp salt. This will soften the skins and improve the texture of the soup.
Peel, trim, and mince the garlic.
Mince the celery leaves.
Add the olive oil to a heavy bottomed, lidded pot over medium heat.
Add the celery leaves, garlic, and 1 tsp red pepper flake.
Sauté until the leaves are dark, the oil is slightly red, and the garlic is soft, but do not brown the garlic.
Drain the beans and add to the pot along with the chicken stock.
Using a short length of string, tie the herbs and bay leaf into a bouquet garni. You can simply add them all to the pot but tying them up makes it much easier to fish out later. Add this to the pot.
Bring the pot to a low simmer and cook 1-2 hours, or until the beans are soft.
Separately, blanch the kale for 30 seconds in vigorously salted water, the shock in ice water. Drain he kale and squeeze out as much water as possible. Blanching is optional, but it will help keep the kale’s color and flavor.
Chop the kale into 1-inch pieces and stir into the soup.
Simmer for 30 minutes.
Serve with chili oil and a sprinkling of fresh parsley or celery leaves.
To make chili oil, add 1 tbsp red chili flake to ¼ cup of oil and gently heat for 15 minutes or until the oil is red and fragrant. Strain, and use as a garnish.
October - Sauerkraut Balls
Sauerkraut Balls. Yes. They sound like a hilarious joke. Like a line from a Simpsons episode where one of Marge’s sisters offers up a strange concoction, or a dish that Aunt Mabel made for Thanksgiving one year that everyone’s joked about ever since. But Sauerkraut Balls are amazing. Pork sausage, kraut, cheese, all breaded and fried into a heart stopping delicious nugget of Midwestern perfection.
Supposedly, Sauerkraut Balls were invented in Akron during the great depression. I don’t know if that’s true – the few sources I could find offered no backing evidence. I do know that I’ve never seen them outside of Ohio and that really should change.
The recipe is simple but three step breading can take a little practice. The accompanying mustard sauce is my favorite, but around Ohio you’re as likely to find these served with ranch or thousand island dressing. Choose your favorite, and grab a tall boy.
2 Wisconsin or Ohio style Bratwurst*
1 cup well drained Sauerkraut
8 oz shredded swiss cheese
1 8oz package cream cheese
½ cup flour
1 cup breadcrumbs
2 large eggs
Remove the bratwurst sausage from the casing. Crumble and cook, breaking into small pieces with a wooden spoon. Drain fat and allow to cool.
*Choose uncooked Ohio or Wisconsin style coarse ground pork bratwurst. Real german styles, finely ground cooked sausages, etc won’t work well for this recipe.
Using a stand mixer fixed with a paddle attachment, combine kraut, swiss cheese, cream cheese, and cooled bratwurst bits.
Refrigerate 15 minutes.
Beat the eggs well.
Set up a three step breading station with separate bowls for four, eggs, and breadcrumbs.
Form filling mixture into 1 ½ inch balls.
Roll in flour, dip in beaten egg, and finish with the breadcrumbs.
Rest in refrigerator for 15 minutes for breading to hydrate.
Fry at 350 until brown and heated through. If you prefer a dark crumb, consider freezing the balls for 1 hour before frying.
Mustard Sauce
½ cup mayonnaise
2 tbsp stone ground or whole grain mustard
1 tsp smooth mustard
1 tsp confectioners sugar
Combine all ingredients with a whisk and refrigerate 30 minutes before using
November - Chicken Braised with Bacon, Apples, and Cider
I originally posted this recipe over at my other project, The Chicken Thigh Guy. If you follow me there, it’ll be familiar. I’m sharing it here because quite simply, it’s one of my favorite dishes and one I make over and over – particularly when I’m feeling a little low and I just want something really really good that doesn’t require a lot of thought.
This simple dish is essentially chicken à la Normande, a French-style braise made popular in the 1960s. I know it is something that showed up on my parents’ table as a dinner party dish in the ‘80s. It’s rich, produces a wonderful sauce, and is relatively easy to prepare. An easy extra step with green apple peels creates a stunning presentation. Add a simple salad, good bread and butter, and it is downright luxurious on a cool fall night.
This preparation uses an open braise to produce an evenly-browned, slightly crispy skin on top of a lusciously tender braised meat. The cider, apples, thyme, and shallots add layers of tangy aromatics, and the bacon adds a smoky depth. The final addition of cream smooths it all out and brings it together in a sauce that could almost be a dish on its own. Plus, it’s great with crusty bread to mop it up. As always.
You can use either a sparkling or flat hard cider in the dish but do not substitute fresh (unfermented) cider because the unfermented sugars will vastly alter the taste of the dish.
4 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs
1 cup light chicken stock
1 cup dry hard cider
1 oz brandy or apple brandy (opt)
¼ cup heavy cream
2 pieces smoked bacon
1 Granny Smith apple
1 medium shallot
4 sprigs fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
Salt and black pepper to taste
Preheat your oven to 300° F.
Peel and mince the shallot.
Peel the apple, reserving large pieces of the peel in water for garnish.
Cup the apple into ¼ or smaller diced pieces. Discard the core.
Cut the bacon crosswise into ¼-inch strips.
Place the bacon pieces and 1 tbsp of water in a cold, lidded, shallow pan with sufficient space for the chicken pieces.
Over medium heat, render the fat from the bacon and cook until crisp, stirring frequently to reduce pan browning.
Once well-browned, remove the bacon pieces and set aside.
Season and brown the chicken on both sides. When well-browned, set aside. Drain the fat and drippings from the pan, reserving 2 tbsp of fat.
Return the reserved fat to the pan, along with the shallot and apples. Sauté until the apples are slightly softened, and then deglaze the pan with brandy(if using) – flambéing to burn off the alcohol.
Return the bacon and chicken pieces to the pan.
Add stock and cider before tucking the thyme and bay leaf into the pan. The chicken should not be fully covered.
Braise uncovered in a 300° F oven for 1 hour or until chicken is very tender (up to 90 minutes depending on the size of the thighs).
When fully cooked, remove the chicken pieces to a plate, add the cream, and reduce the liquid by half over medium heat.
While braising, use a very sharp knife to cut long, very thin strips of peel. Place these in a cup of ice water. They will curl up like small ribbons.
Return the chicken to the pan to warm through and garnish with fresh thyme sprigs and julienned pieces of bright green peel.
Serve with a good crusty bread.
December - Chips and Dip
I have no idea why I think that this is fancy. For some reason, growing up, I associated chips and dip with parties, with gatherings, with “fancy.” Granted, those dips were almost always either from a can or made with a tub of sour cream and a packet of soup. As an adult, I’ve played around with this from time to time and I’ve even served this exact dip – albeit with a big dollop of caviar in the middle of the dip – for a very fancy meal. It’s like ordering a Shirley Temple as a full grown real adult person. It’s still fun. It’s still fancy.
¾ cup sour cream or Greek yogurt
1 large onion
1 tsp finely chopped chives
1 tsp unsalted butter
½ tsp kosher salt
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
½ tsp ground black pepper
Additional Salt to taste
Peel, trim, and dice the onion into a very small 1/8-1/4 inch dice.
Add the butter to a thick bottomed pan over medium heat.
As soon as the butter is melted, add the onion and salt, and sit well.
Cook, stirring frequently, until the onions begin to brown and caramelize.
Deglaze the pan with small amounts of water (or white wine if you’re feeling fancy) and scrape up any fond (delicious brown bits) forming on the bottom of the pan.
Continue to cook, deglazing occasionally, until the onions are very dark.
Remove and allow to cool.
Mix the onions and remaining ingredients, and allow to meld and thicken in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour before serving.
Serve with homemade chips or good quality “kettle” chips.
How to make homemade potato chips:
Choose good, large potatoes with few or no blemishes.
Peel the potatoes, taking special care that there’s no skin or green flesh remaining.
Use a mandoline slicer to create thin slices.
Soak these slices in cold water for at least 1 hour – changing the water at least twice. This removes the surface starches and makes it easier to cook the chips to a very crisp finish without burning or over browning.
Set up a fryer with a high smoke point oil (canola, peanut, soy, grapeseed) at 350°F
Fry the chips in small batches until they’re crisp and to your preferred color. For the above dip, I use slightly thicker cut chips cooked a bit further for a dark, kettle style chip.