A Mildly Special Christmas Edition

The holidays are a time for family and friends to get together and immerse themselves in the season, to indulge in the joys of food and company, and ideally to forget about all the pressures of modern life.  This time of year also brings a thick and gooey sense of nostalgia, a focus on things won and lost over the year.  Unfortunately this holiday season was, for most people, one of somber reflection as 2011 saw the abrupt and shocking end of our Family Füd Blog.  Each bite of boiled goose was slathered, not in a traditional jellied-egg gravy, but in salty tears as Americans, and even some Canadians, mourned the loss of their beloved blog.  “Where will I go now for amateurish food photography and recipes ripped from other people’s websites?!” screamed the distraught masses into the face of any psychoanalyst or DMV receptionist that would look them in the eye.  


As one half of Family Füd, I feel partly responsible for shutting of the proverbial light of happiness on so many billions of people, but she who is really to blame for this debacle is Karen because she moved to Portland in July and we could no longer get together to cook.  Sure, we talked about trying a long distance version of the blog, in which we would collaborate on a menu, then cook in our respective locations and write about the experience, but just as we were primed to pursue this exciting new venture, the unthinkable happened: we hung up the phone and just kinda forgot and then never did any of that. 

Oh my, how I've missed this.  A chill of excitement ran through my body as I read that momentous intro and a smile of pure exuberance sits upon my face as I prepare to respond.  Yes, Tony and I are once again cooking in the same location, making food that is pleasing to the palette and filling to the tummy.  It's wonderful to cook and share a meal with loved ones, but that's not what I'm really excited about.  What I've really missed is the arguing.  Few things excite me more than a good debate amongst people who are evenly matched in passion, knowledge (or lack thereof), and ability to withstand repeated hittings with spatulas.  There's nothing like arguing with the people who know you best and are still required to love you despite your stubborn assertion that, "PETA is only pretending to save animals so that they can eat them all themselves."  That said, let's get back to Tony's accusation that I ended the blog.  Prepare to get yer ass handed to you, bro, dance-off style!

Just kidding.  I'll use my words.


What my dear brother fails to mention is that although I did pick up and move to Portland, he himself had been planning to move out of LA for quite some time prior and scuttled* off to Berkley less than a month after I relocated.  Aaaaaaaand, he failed to mention that I pleaded, implored, beseeched, and begged him to move to Portland with me so that we could continue this blog and other writing endeavors.  He still refuses this request even though I've been trying to tempt him with all of Portland's beer and food offerings for months now ("They got beer and foods here, bro!").  Therefore, he is the one who has torn this blog asunder and should be flogged.  In the face of his callousness I have started a petition entitled Make Tony Stop Being a Turd and Move to Portland.  Any comment or "like" on this post will be taken as a signature on this petition.  I appreciate your support.

 *I have never scuttled anywhere.  EVER. 

Anyway, one more thing before we get to the actual food part of this food blog.  A few things have changed since our last post.  So as not to confuse and discombobulate our reader(s?) I'll clarify some glaring changes here:


Change #1 -  We are no longer cooking in my apartment in Los Angeles, but instead are located in the kitchen of our home in Las Vegas.  You may notice as you peruse this entry certain Easter eggs in the photos such as baby pictures, politically polarizing bumper stickers, empty Miller Lite cans, slightly inappropriate aprons, and random piles of "junk."  I hope this gives you, fair reader, a little added insight into our childhood and why we are the way we are.


Change #2 -  My hair is now large and poofy whereas Tony's has shrunk in length and volume.  This is because I spent our time together in LA gradually syphoning Tony's "hair power" and building my own reserves.  My hair power is now at full capacity and anyone brave enough to challenge me to a "hair battle" will surely meet their "hair demise"!  I imagine this battle would render my challenger completely squeaky bald while I would automatically have giant 1980's Tina Turner hair (something I've always coveted).


Change #3 -  Our food pics may not match the impeccable quality you've come to expect from this blog.  Any impressive food photography in our previous entries was due solely to my roommate's amazing camera and not to my or my brother's artistic talent.  Since we no longer have access to that camera, I will just say that our photos may lack a certain mouthwatering appeal.  We'll try to compensate with more biting sarcasm and cheese jokes than in previous posts.

For the few people that made it past that long-winded intro, welcome to the section of the food blog where we actually talk about food.  Unfortunately, I’m the last person involved in this meal who should introduce it because I didn’t come up with a single dish.  As I recall, which I often do and with great accuracy, one morning I ambled bleary-eyed into the kitchen clutching a warm Coors Light to find my mother and sister dressed in sleek business attire pouring over the kitchen table upon which lay elaborate blueprints.  It was all set to go, a real cut and dry meal, in and out, no complications: curried butternut squash with turkey meatballs, mashed sweet potatoes with a brown sugar pecan crust, salt-roasted beets, and a whole roasted chicken.  


“What have you got, kid?” my mom requested.  I belched a salty Coors Light burp and stuttered out an indecipherable response.  
“Ugh,” said Karen disdainfully, “can you at least do something with the beets?”
“Yeah yeah yeah!” I responded.


And just like that, I was once again tasked with the thankless job of providing the one healthy element for the meal and beets, nonetheless, a vegetable that I don’t even particularly like.  But damn it, I was determined to make one hell of a salad.  

However, having spent the previous night watching my friends play craps until 3:30am, I wasn't in fighting mode right away.  So I played sous chef and spent a while hitting pecans with a knife.

I like how Tony condescendingly states that he provided the only healthy part of the meal, even though my contribution was sweet potatoes, which we all know is a superfood!  We all also know that "superfood" is a totally made up phrase with an unclear meaning, the use of which is not sanctioned by nutrition or health experts, but it sounds super!  So, let's say sweet potatoes are good for you, especially after you add maple syrup and half a stick of butter.  


If you have even the tiniest affinity for sweet potatoes you absolutely must must MUST make this recipe: Mashed Sweet Potatoes with Brown Sugar and Pecans.  I made them this past Thanksgiving then again for a Christmas party, and the dish elicited not just one but several Holy crap!'s upon tasting.  It is definitely a crowd pleaser in addition to being super simple to make.  You can prepare the topping first a few hours in advance.  Just chop up some butter and pecans and add a big ol' cup of brown sugar.

Awwww yeah, that's gon' be nice and crunchy and caramelized on top uh them taters after an hour in the oven.  

Next, peel and chop some sweet potatoes or "yams" as people who enjoy being correct call them.  I'm torn on this topic because while I do greatly enjoy being right, I also find the word "yam" totally unappealing.  It makes me think of a toothless old person gumming fictional Dr. Suess meat.  In any case, the recipe calls for 5 lbs of sweet potatoes, but I have yet to make that large of a portion.  2-4lbs works just as well and sort of fudging the amounts of the other ingredients is hard to screw up too badly.  Don't be afraid to guesstimate.


After boiling the taters until tender, I just mashed them by hand instead of using some new fangled food processor (because we don't have one).  Then added the eggs, syrup, vanilla, lemon, and salt and beat with a mixer.  You could just as easily mix by hand with a big spoon.  I dunno why these recipes always insist on dirtying up a beater.  Have they ever tried to clean beaters?  It's bollocks.

*Tony note: If you imagine the mixer has eye sockets and that the beaters are protruding from them, well then that's pretty funny looking, huh?

Glop the mixture into a baking dish and sprinkle with the prepared topping.  

I haven't ever heeded the part of the recipe where it tells you the size of dish to use.  The bigger the dish, the more delicious topping you get to add.  Pop that guy in the oven at 350˚ and you got yourself a delectable treat that's almost sweet enough to be dessert, but just "real food" enough to justify still eating pie after the meal.


Here's Tony doing his part by eating a salad half-way through dinner preparation because of his "fast metabolism" or whatever.  Sometimes Tony is just the worst.

It's a serious condition!  Don't look at me like that. 


It wasn’t simply hunger that compelled me to have a salad; I had to bravely test the Citrus Vinaigrette that I whipped up for the beet salad.   


This slice of pizza I ate a few minutes later, now that I can not excuse.

Back to that vinaigrette.  I just winged it with this thing, mixing together orange juice, fresh squeezed grapefruit and lemon juice, a little lemon zest and then adding salt, pepper and olive oil.  I love salad dressings, the more flavor the better in most cases, but sometimes a simple, fresh tasting vinaigrette is the way to go, as I felt was the case here.  Odd, considering my goal was to most effectively subdue the taste of beets; that taste being “dirt.”  People use the term “earthy” to describe beets, but what they really mean is, “Hey, this is like I’m eating dirt!  Am I enjoying this?”  


Anyway, I digress.  I admit that roasted beets, in concert with other flavors (namely, a strong cheese and some toasted nuts), are quite delicious.  My finished salad was composed thusly:
- Bed of crunchy lettuce (romaine, red leaf, tempura, etc.)
- Sliced beets (the thinner the better.  Thick sheets of dirt?  No, thanks)
- Caramelized onions
- Blue cheese (goat cheese is the popular pairing these days with beets, but then you’ve got “earthy” AND “gamey” and you might as well just eat a farmer’s sock. There, I said it.)
- Toasted pistachios
- Basil
- Citrus vinaigrette 


Nothing too special, really . . . 

. . . but then BAM!  I went all Frank Lloyd Wright on this beet tower, and it made everyone think the salad tasted way better than it did.  People are such idiots.  

One more note on beets, which I do love, despite their dirt flavor.  My mom introduced me to salt roasting them and I've never looked back.  Cover the bottom of a baking dish with about 1/4" salt, plop your beets on top, cover with tin foil and roast at 400˚ for 90 minutes.  Cool, peel, and enjoy.  They really soak up flavor if you make them a day ahead and then marinade them in whatever dressing you'll be using for your beautiful beet salad.  

Mom, by the way, was doing some serious cooking in her corner of the kitchen, as well as dropping everything to help us hunt down any item we mentioned.  At one point I thought about “pepper” and turned to find her holding five different varieties.  She was chopping up squash and mixing curry powder and making meatballs.  She even managed to get the chicken prepped and in the oven while Karen and myself were rather shamefully napping in the middle of the day.  We’re obviously out of cooking shape.

I'll admit I have very little idea what mom did with the entrees while we children whipped up our dinky side dishes.  The first thing she did was roast a whole chicken.  I have never attempted this in my life and therefore would not presume to provide instructions on the process.  You're on your own there.

While I have roasted a few whole chickens in my life, my memories are now merely frantic gruesome montages of chicken viscera and panic, so I can't help you out either.  But I would like to add that my mom garnished the roasting pan with kale, resulting in morsels that were half crunchy and half soaked in rosemary-infused chicken fat.  And 100% eat-them-off-the-floor-of-a-Petco good!


Tragically, our patience with the inferior camera dissolved almost entirely by the time that beautiful bird came out of the oven and we have no good pictures.  So Karen commissioned me to do an artist's rendering of the event:

I give to you: 
A Fowl on the Eve of Our Lord's Birth, 2011
Pixellated paint on digital canvas

Excellent portrayal, worth every penny.  All zero of them.  


So next thing I know Ma Green's making turkey meatballs which, again, I have no idea.  It looked something like this:

I encourage you to go do that.


The turkey meatballs were part of a curry butternut squash recipe my mom got from a coworker that really was delicious.  It involves a secret spice mixture that goes like this:


Curry Spice Mix
1/4 cup sun-dried lime
1/8 cup black cumin
1/4 cup paprika
1/4 cup turmeric
1/4 cup sumac
1/4 cup yellow (or golden) curry
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 cup cinnamon
1/4 cup coriander

We searched high and low in Whole Foods, but couldn't find sun-dried lime or black cumin, so you might have to hit an Asian market for those ingredients.  The dish turned out delicious regardless, but I wonder what could have been.  If only . . .   

Once you've got all that mixed up you can start on the recipe proper.


Curry Butternut Squash
1 butternut squash
2-3 shallots, thinly sliced
olive oil
raisins (we added some dried cherries as well which I highly recommend)
walnuts
1 lb ground turkey (for meatballs)


Peel and chop squash into cubes.  Microwave squash until half way cooked.  Sauté shallots in olive oil until tender, add squash and coat in spice mixture.  Cook through.  Add raisins, nuts, and turkey meatballs.  Cover and bake at 350˚ until fragrant.


I apologize if that seems a haphazard recipe.  That's how it's done when you've got the cooking experience and intuition my mom has.  She just knows . . .

While Karen and mom were busy doing stuff, I took the time to stop and smell the roses.  Or, in this case, great big pink flowers that I guessed were penstemons.  I had no idea if that was correct, but Karen was thoroughly shocked that I could think of any flower name at all.  Gee, thanks.  When I discover my own flower I will name it “You’re a jerk, Karen.”  And it will smell like enchiladas.  

New life goal: Create a new species of flower through cross pollination or selective breeding or whatever and call it "You're a jerk, Karen" just so Tony can't do it first.  My flower will smell like beets and triumph.


The pièce de résistance of our almost-finished mildly special Christmas meal was the delectable gravy that my mother whipped up like it was nothing more than snapping her fingers.  She really should have her own food blog.  I watched this whole process wide-eyed and so I feel I can expound on it a little.  Apparently gravy is made by skimming of bit of the fat from the top of your left over meat juices (in this case chicken juices) and adding it to a pan to heat.

Sift in a few pinches of flour and stir until this mixture thickens and gets a few shades darker.  Then pour in the rest of your meat juice, stirring constantly so the flour doesn't clump up.

We added some pepper and soy sauce at Tony's suggestion and had ourselves some delicious thickened chicken secretions.  I mean . . .gravy.  Yum.

To borrow a phrase from Guy Fieri, that gravy was money!  In fact, should the Euro collapse, I think those folks could do a lot worse than a gravy-based currency.  But more on that in my  forthcoming political treatise Soggy Wallets: The demise of the Euro and the rise of the Gravy State.  


But seriously, the gravy had a wonderful herby taste due to the thyme/marjoram/rosemary combo in the chicken.  I forgot how amazing rosemary is until Thanksgiving left me with a huge cache of it.  I put it in pasta sauce, on Italian salads, on bacon with brown sugar and pepper.  You just can't go wrong.

Here we have the product of all our work in muted unappetizing tones.  We had a nice pinot grigio with the poultry-heavy meal.  Everything was truly delicious, though my dad did his best to pretend the beet salad didn't exist. 


There you have it, folks, another meticulously planned and expertly prepared meal consumed in less then 5 minutes with only a few barely audible grunts exchanged between diners.  Ha, just kidding.  We may not be the perfect family (not like them Kardashians, am I right?  They're so fancy!), but we do genuinely enjoy each other's company.  I'm so grateful we were able to be in the same place this holiday season and I hope our merriment shows through all the sarcasm.  Thanks so much for reading our inane ramblings.  


Here's wishing you and yours a Joyous and Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from the Greens. 

Yup, here we are, the whole Green family staving off starvation for a few more moments in order to capture this photo.  Fun fact: Karen actually had to hide her hand under the table to conceal the chicken drumstick she grabbed in a hunger frenzy.  


Haha, very funny.  Man, I'm glad I live 600 miles away from this little boogerface and don't have to hear his whiny voice go on and on about quinoa and the World Wide Organization of Organic Farms anymore.


*Remember to sign the Tony is a Turd and Should Move to Portland Already petition by commenting or liking this entry.  Or just bug him in real life.  He won't mind.

The Pies That Bind Us

Growing up in the Green household, Friday night was pizza night.  Case closed.  Friday is that superb night of the week when you've just finished five hellish days and nights of school and/or work, but you don't yet feel the pressure to go out and have "fun" like on dumb ol' Saturdays.  You can feel justified in ordering a greasy pizza, downing some soda, and sitting on the couch with your loved ones (or your cat).  Friday is the best night of the week, always has been, always will be.  From the childhood days, I mostly remember ordering thin crust half cheese/half pepperoni pizzas from Pizza Hut (I'm not sure if this was what we ordered most frequently, but it was my favorite, so it's stuck in my brain vault) and drinking a whole lot of Pepsi (I don't drink soda anymore, but Pepsi will always hold a special place in my heart).  I also remember a few nights, in my teenage years when my mom, Tony, and I decided to make our own pizzas.  We would pop some ingredients in the bread machine and an hour or so later, crank the oven up to its hottest and each add our own favorite ingredients.  At the time, I'm sure I stuck mainly to cheese, red sauce, and pepperoni while my mom tried more adventurous fare, and Tony, I'm guessing, put cut up hot dogs and ketchup on his.  But whatever we chose, it was amazingly delicious at the time and so satisfying to have created our own pies.  So this Sunday (it's the new Friday), Tony and I attempted to recreate that magical pizza-rific time from days gone by.  Here's how the phone conversation went:


Karen:  Hey, dude.  So how about we just make a pizza tonight?
Tony:  Ooooh, dude.  I'm kinda hung over and that sounds awesome.
Karen:  Dude!  Me too!  That's totally why I suggested it.
Tony:  Awesome.


Yup, just like when we were kids.


Ah yes, I remember waiting for the doorbell that would signal the arrival of our pizza.  I would rush downstairs (or upstairs if I was working in the subterranean cryogenics lab that evening), making sure I was the first to intercept the pie, because who knows what might happen if I let Karen or Dad handle it.  Idiots.  I would grab the cash placed on a nearby table, throw it in the face of the delivery dude and grab the warm pizza box and metal platter of freshly baked cookies.  That taste is still fresh in my mind: dunking a gooey chocolate chip cookie into warm marinara sauce.  I’m so glad DiGiorno has recently released it’s ode to the grand American tradition of delivering pizza and cookies to your doorstep.

It's not delivery, it's DiGorno trying to convince you that pizza and cookies are a natural combination. 

Karen and I did happen to make pizza and cookies, though.  If you're an avid follower (read: real friend), you may recall that we had planned to make cookies on empanada night, a recipe for South American style alfajores, a sandwich cookie with dulce de leche in the middle.  This plan was dashed by the realization that making dulce de leche is similar to making diamonds, in that it requires three hours and constant stirring.  While these cookies would have worked better thematically with empanada night, screw it.  Pizza and cookies sounds great.


All right, Tony's been throwing around the phrase dulce de leche as if everyone just automatically knows what that is.  Well, we don't, Tony!  We don't know what it is.  We don't all speak Spanish!  Is it caramel?  It looks like caramel.  Why don't you just call it caramel?!?  As it turns out, dulce de leche is what happens when you take a can of sweetened condensed milk (not to be confused with evaporated milk) and heat it up for a while, allowing the sugars to caramelize (although it's still not caramel).  What you get is a thick sauce that is basically sugar.  It's thick sugar sauce.  That's it.  Many of the recipes out there on the interweb will tell you to stick the still-sealed can into some water and heat it for about 8 hours with the disclaimer that you may or may not explode your kitchen that way.  I chose the non-explosion route of pouring the contents of the can into a double boiler and stirring it ever so often for 2 1/2 to 3 hours.  Works like a charm.  The condensed milk will go from a snot-like consistency of this color:

To a slightly more viscous substance that looks like this:

Now just set that guy aside and let it cool a bit before the cookie spreadin' begins.  And stop dipping your finger in it!  I saw that!


Oh come on, Karen, have some faith in our readers.  Even someone that doesn't speak Spanish can figure out that dulce de leche means "sweet of milk," and from there, the rest is obvious.  


All right, so pizza dough.  I have tried many a dough recipe in an attempt to get something akin to what they serve at them fancy wood-fired pizza establishments we all love so much.  So far I have come up with . . . flattened bread.  I mean, the pizza crusts have not been bad, it's just that there's a difference between light, fluffy, crumbly bread and the chewy, crispy, slightly denser baked good that we know as pizza crust.  So I decided to try yet another recipe and in my search for "thin crust pizza dough" I came across this gem on several different cooking blogs: White Wine Pizza Dough.  A pizza dough with wine already in it!?  Sold.  I mean, a couple food bloggers can't be wrong.


I'm glad I tried it because this recipe is definitely as close as I've come to matching professional pizza dough.  It has a whole lotta flavor and that nice crispness on the outside, but not so much as to be crunchy.  And the best part is that a crust this thin means that your pizza will only take like 8 minutes to cook.  Eight minutes!  Pretty great.  Plus I got to use my rolling pin, the love of my life.  Don't ever leave me, rolling pin.

I always like to brush the outside of my dough with olive oil.  I'm not really sure what this adds.  Maybe it makes the cheese stick better whilst sprinkling?  I dunno, but I like it.
  
While Karen wrestled with the dough and pondered the finer points of a flaky crust, I pursued a task more within the limits of my hung-over capacity: I threw a bunch of onions in a hot pan and lied down on the floor.  Actually, I first browned the onions, then added a hearty fourth cup of balsamic vinegar, turned the heat down and let them cook nice and slow.  Don't be overprotective and stir these too often, just let them live their lives; they'll make the right choices.  And if they don't, if maybe they sometimes drink too much and turn out kinda crusty and dried out and dim witted the next day, you'll still love them.  Right, mom?  

Here's me forgetting whether I measure out a fourth cup before or after pouring it into the onions.

In lieu of a sauce, these onions, which turned out delicious, acted as the moist base for our pizza.  And acting as the salty meat layer of our pizza was some delicious prosciutto, courtesy of Trader Joe's:

We set out with pancetta in mind, fixin' to saute it up and then toss it on the pizza, but couldn't find any.  Prosciutto turned out even better though because it required only chopping and was just as salty, which is what my body was craving.  This might also explain why I went from lightly salting the alfajores (to bring out the caramel taste, don'tcha know) to rolling them in salt and finally to chasing each cookie with a mouthful of salt.

While Tony was shriveling up like an earthworm in Arizona, the pizza assembly had begun.  

Layer of gooey onion first,  followed by the prosciutto.  We figured we didn't want that to be on top or it might get too crispy on the edges, so this way it would be all covered in protective cheese.  But not just any cheese, my friends, oh no.  It was Trader Joe's crumbled blue cheese.  Of all the blue cheeses I have had in my life, TJ's patented fromage stands out as the creamiest, tastiest, and fairly priced-iest blue cheese yet.  If you haven't tried it, it's a must.

Come on, would this face lie to you?  Or seduce your aged, wealthy grandmother with a flamenco dance, and then abscond with your sizable inheritance?  Surely not.

And NO, we are not soulless corporate blogging pawns paid by Trader Joe's to peddle their products.  And YES, we would love to be!  So if you're reading, Joe, hit us up. 

So Trader Joe's blue cheese it is, followed by some parmesan I had lying around that needed usin', then sprinkle on a bit of fresh thyme and you get this:

Arguably my artsiest food photo to date.  Thank you, I'm very proud of it, but not as proud as I am of how awesome this pizza was.  It's basically just the saltiest ingredients we could find all piled onto that delicious crust and damn if it wasn't a good combo.  From here we cranked up the oven to 500 degrees and, like I said, the pizza will only take about 8 minutes.  Just keep an eye on it and when the crust is golden brown it's time to take it out.  The finishing touch would of course be a massive pile of arugula just like they do it in Italy where people are better than us.

As if that wasn't enough greens for ya, I actually came up with my own kale salad concoction for the meal.  Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the first ever original recipe here on Family Füd:

Karen's Tony-Approved "Holy Crap That's Good" Kale Salad (aka Karen's Kale Salad)

1 bunch kale

Juice of 1 large lemon

1/4 olive oil, plus extra for drizzling

1 tablespoon chopped rosemary

2 cloves garlic, minced

parmesan cheese

croutons

salt and pepper

Rinse and chop your kale, removing stems, place in a large bowl.  Drizzle kale with olive oil and half of your lemon juice (about 3 tablespoons) and massage until it begins to wilt, about 2 minutes.  Set aside.  In small bowl add the rest of the lemon juice, garlic, and rosemary and muddle.  (It helps if you have an actual muddler, which is a good investment because it's also useful for making mojitos.  Hey, Tony, why haven't we made mojitos yet?) ANSWER: we prefer alcohol that comes pre-muddled and ready to ingest, such as wine, beer and moonshine. Add salt and pepper, a few shakes, or pinches or whatever, and drizzle in olive oil while whisking.  I sort of estimated the amount of olive oil, it may not take a whole fourth cup.  I would err on the side of less because you can always add more afterward.  Pour dressing over the kale and toss to coat.  Next grate your parmesan cheese over the salad.  I just kept grating and tossing until my kale was sufficiently coated, then add croutons.  You'll get something that looks like this:

Wow!  A Family Füd milestone, indeed!  And can you believe it was Karen?  Making a kale salad?  Instead of me?  Even though I'm the one that introduced her to kale and I'm the one that really loves it and I'm the one that should have a recipe DAMN IT!

Bitterness and plans for revenge aside, this salad is great.  It's got strong but balanced flavors and great textural components.  I tried to make it myself the next day and mine didn't turn out as well.  Not that I cared.  I didn't want it to taste good.  I'm so beyond taste.  Karen doesn't get that.  

After the pizza came out and was smothered in arugula, I decided to further confuse its identity by putting toasted pecans on it, just like it was a salad.  "Now toss yourself!"  I yelled as it wept and wished it was more like the other pizzas.  I'm glad it wasn't though because it was amazing.  Saltiness and creaminess and tartness and bitterness and it all works wonderfully.  My only qualm is that the pecans didn't add much.  I've since become intrigued by the notion of candying the pecans, as the sugar glaze bolsters their crunch-factor and the sweetness would compliment the multitude of other flavors on the pizza.  Then again, it might just taste like crap and this pizza tastes wicked good already.

 

Oh yeah, I completely forgot about the pecans.  I guess because they added nothing memorable to the meal . . . kind of like Tony.  Ooohhh, snap!  Actually I'm gonna eat those rotten words because Tony came up with the entire concept of this pizza, not to mention he introduced me to alfajores.  Remember those cookies we'd been planning on making for over a week?  Yeah, it took me that long to get their name right.  "Hey, are we still gonna make them alfa-jury cookies this weekend?  Alfa-whore-hays?  Them Alfonso Ribeiro cookies?"  Haha, that's the actor who played Carlton on Fresh Prince, for those of you who missed all the funny in that last sentence. 

Again, can you believe the above doofus fell ass-backwards into a pile of ingredients and clambered out with a semi-palatable salad stuck to her?  

Back to the cookies.  Karen and I make no attempt to hide the vastness of our ignorance, so I wasn't shocked to find that the alfajor originated not in South America, as I had assumed, but in the Arab world.  The following is a very ignorant retelling of the cookie's history which I culled from a too-long Wikipedia article: 

The Arabs brought this sweet with them when they conquered Spain, presumably offering the treat as a "Hey, sorry we burned down all your stuff" peace offering.  The Spaniards fiddled with the recipe, adding their own touch, no doubt trying to add some canned fish to the recipe as they are wont to do.  Early versions of the pastry were cylindrical cookies rolled in fruit preserves and various nuts and spices.  Then the Spaniards decided they'd like to conquer some people themselves and since Americans were probably already busy cleaning their triple barrel muskets and inventing the horse-drawn Hummer carriage, Spain played it easy and conquered South America.  So, the Spaniards offered the South Americans a plate full of totally not disease-infected cookies (got 'em again!)  Everyone loved them and the countries throughout the region did some more fiddling until they finally got it right and sandwiched dulce de leche between two shortbread-type cookies.  Fast forward forty years or so, and I find what is undoubtedly a highly authentic South American version on the Martha Stewart website.  The only change we made was to substitute heavy whipping cream for the milk, because it's all Karen had (because only a p**** would use milk in their cereal).  I theorize that this change made the cookies extra moist.  Karen amended this hypothesis with a very smug "DUH."  Also, as mentioned earlier, we sprinkled some sea salt on the filling of each cookie. 

Yeah, I don't want to sound too smug here, but I think we totally improved this Martha Stewart recipe.  She may have anal retentive disorder and knowledge of the dark arts, but we've got Tony yelling, "Put salt on that!"  So, yeah, delicious cookies.  So good, in fact, I almost forgot that there is still no chocolate in our desserts!  I know, I know, I promised you (and myself) a ridiculous, chocolate, heart-stopping dessert.  Well, just you wait until next week, folks.  You will not be disappointed . . . 

In summation:  

Pizza is the perfect, hard-to-mess-up, brings-people-together food to make at home.  

Alfajores: Not just for Arabs, Spaniards, and South Americans anymore!  

And Tony's sodium levels are such that his body literally acts as a sponge now.  He's more like a "Grow a Tony" than he is human.  I'd like to put him in a kiddie pool and see if he expands to four times his original size.

Good ol' Pissporter!  I can't believe we forgot about you!  A humble German white wine, I recall it being sweet and . . . that's it.  It couldn't compete with the other taste bud pleasers here, but Karen and I had a ton of fun yelling 'PISSPORTER!' every time we drank it.  Go on, pronounce the name with a Minnesotan accent.  You won't regret it!  I wish more Americans in the medical profession would take after Doctor Beckermann and make alcohol with funny names.  

Don't get me wrong, the alfajores were delicious, but in my passionate pursuit of perfection (hey, I like the way that sounds), I couldn't help but consider how to improve them.  Too much cookie, not enough filling.  If only the components could be reversed, a cookie sandwiched between two sheets of dulce de leche!  No, no.  It can't be done.  I would like to try a more crisp and flat cookie next time, for the added textural aspect as well as the filling ratio improvement.  At FüdCorp, I'm always seeking to improve filling ratio while maximizing textural contrast.  

That's it for this week folks.  I hope you enjoyed our trip down memory lane, through both the annals of childhood pizza ordering and alfajor history.  The pizza has changed, from hot dogs and ketchup to blue cheese and prosciutto, and the cookies from not really existing to shortbread and dulce de leche, but the joy of sharing great food with friends and family remains the same.  If it gets people enjoying food together who normally wouldn't, then maybe DiGiorno and Tollhouse should be commended for their Pizza and Cookies Memory Surrogacy Campaign.   

P.S. Look for FüdCorp's new Taquitos and Snow Cone meal pack in the frozen food section of your local grocer.  Beat the heat and eat some meat with Taquitos and Snow Cone!  Just like when you were kids!

Guest Blogger: Ma Green

Hello, all.  Karen here.  It's been an eventful week in the world of the Green family.  Over the weekend, Brother Tony graduated from Chapman University with a B.A. in screen writing!  Watch for his name  in the future as that brief flicker before one of your favorite, critically acclaimed, and cancelled-too-soon comedy shows (or so I'm predicting).  We're just so proud of him.  The whole family came down to Orange to celebrate the day.  And by "celebrate" of course I mean "eat copious amounts of food."  The entire weekend was one giant meal after the next . . . followed by snacks.  Unfortunately though, between the fine Mexican meal at Cha Cha's and the adventurous fare at Honda Ya, not much cooking got done.  So in lieu of our weekly cooking adventure, we offer you a guest blog written by the one and only Ma Green outlining her food philosophy.  Enjoy!

Ma Green's Food Philosophy. . .


My favorite meal, as a kid, would have to be hamburger patties.  These were generally skillet-cooked and mine would be covered with, no, not ketchup, not A-1, or my mom’s favorite, Worcestershire, but . . . barbecue sauce.  Chris and Pitts barbecue sauce to be exact (or Piss and Critts if you’re amused by that sort of thing).  I don’t think KC Masterpiece had been invented then.  Said burger patty was generally accompanied by canned pork-and-beans (the white glob of “pork” to be avoided at all costs), and a canned vegetable (corn, green beans or peas).  Frozen vegetables must not have been invented yet either.  Of that “vegetable” selection, canned corn (sometimes of the far-less-preferable creamed style) would have been my first choice, followed by green beans (often pleasantly enhanced with bacon grease), and lastly, those icky grey-green mushy peas.  Let’s face it, peas lose a LOT in translation when canned.  Peas are still not a favorite, except when left in the pod, and of the “snap” variety, which are delish.  Yes, times have truly changed (to a certain extent)!   


Surprisingly-or not-ground beef patties (with KC Masterpiece) is still a favorite meal for me (see “comfort food”).  That patty though, is always grilled (with charcoal) and accompanied by a wedge of fresh onion, cottage cheese (with more onion as in “chopped green”) and steamed-or better-yet, blanched-broccoli. 


In the “good-ole-days”, we ate margarine and drank far too much Shasta soda; Shasta being cheaper than Coke and Pepsi.  Their cherry cola was my favorite followed by cream soda.  We never went “out” for dinner (it was too expensive), except for the occasional treat of Jack-in-the-Box burgers, which we never referred to as “fast food”, that term having not been coined yet (I don’t think).  Jack-in-the-Box must have pre-dated McDonalds, in Chula Vista anyway.  


OK, I just looked it up and Jack-in-the Box opened in “San Diego” in 1951.  McDonalds opened in San Bernardino in 1940, closed in 1948 and reopened three months later with a menu reduced to nine items, including a 15-cent burger.


I do like to cook, especially when I have more time (weekends), but I admit that cooking for a family of four could be a real chore when you work full-time.  Bill was pretty easy, but would have loved for me to bake fresh bread every week, like his mom did (yeah, right!).  Karen was not a picky eater and pretty brave, even loving tomatoes.  Tony, by his own admission (and I remember it even better), seemed to think I was trying to poison him.  He didn’t even like spaghetti sauce for cryin-out-loud!  It was chicken fingers or nuthin when he went out.  They all liked “Near East” rice pilaf; it was a staple, as were frozen potatoes in just about any form.  Even Tony, thank heaven, liked broccoli, and we ate lots of marinated/grilled chicken.  In fact, I grilled most all meat unless it was raining.  Speaking of which, salmon too, was pretty much fool-proof.  Tacos are a no-brainer . . . always good (especially if it’s raining).  Cooking on Fridays is against my religion-so to speak-and we always did pizza (not too much sauce, Tony).


So let’s jump forward and I will say that food has undergone an absolute RENAISSANCE, which I will sum up in the following (but not-limited-to) list:
Olive oil . . .YES!
Balsamic vinegar . . .YES, again!
So many new cheeses
Farmer’s Markets
Oh, yeah . . .cilantro!


My philosophy, in a nut-shell (see pine nuts, pistachios, walnuts, pecans and peanuts), is that food is fun and cooking with my kids (who can now enjoy wine with the meal) is one of life’s greatest pleasures!
Karen and Tony:  I love you more than pork and beans . . . I mean hamburger patties (or even olive oil), I love your blog, and I thank you for allowing me to contribute to this admirable endeavor.


ALL my love, mum 

Bolsillo Caliente

Hello again.  We're so glad you're back!  Honestly, the tone of last week's blog was so quarrelsome and despondent that I thought we may have lost some people.  On that note, I am happy to report that this week's cookery was the most joyous of adventures.  It was merry, wacky, jubilant, and whimsical.  In a word, it was empanadas.  For those of you who have never heard of or had the immense joy of tasting an empanada, it's a stuffed pastry that can be sweet or savory.  It's of Spanish origin and is widely eaten in Latin America.  Tony's mentioned to me several times that he follows a food blog with some impressive and authentic looking Mexican food.  So I finally popped on over to Pati's Mexican Table to take a look.  Everything appeared delicious as promised, but I took one look at this photo and it was decided.  We are gonna make the crap out of those empanadas.


Nothing excites me like not having to make decisions, so I was ecstatic to find Karen had already chosen a couple recipes.  She had used our leftover plantain from last week and cooked a test batch of "tostones" (which I had suggested last week in place of the chips that ended up sort of sucking) so we decided to do a rebooted attempt at plantains, frying them not once, but twice.  Delicious, no doubt about it, but something about deep fried plantains and dough filled with pork butt sounded a bit filling.  Probably the pork butt part.  So I added my own two cents and suggested we pair this meal with a salad.  Karen grunted a hardly audible sound of consent, and we had ourselves a full fledged meal.   


For the record, I am not opposed to salads.  I just think that they're kind of stupid to eat in a world where sandwiches exist.  Anyway, the empanada recipe was our most extravagant so far.  It has a rather lengthy and varied list of ingredients.  I mean, green olives and raisins together in one flaky buttery pocket!  It's madness!  But Tony and I were really on top of things this week so we popped on over to our local Sprouts and picked up every thing we needed for Empanadas of the Immaculate Conception, an avocado and lime Mexican-y salad, and plantains "Take 2" and made it back to the kitchen by 3:00pm to start the cooking.


The one problem we encountered was that it was not avocado season, meaning that all the avocados being sold in the greater Los Angeles area were plucked not from a tree, but from the nest of an overprotective Dragon holding a machine gun and the prices reflected this.  I was disgusted at having to drop two dollars on a single avocado, but once I have my heart set on this, my favorite of all fruits, I can't be swayed.  And let me tell you, boys, this was an avocado to get your heart set on.  It was perfect.  

No, you hang up first!  That was stupid.  I'm sorry.  I'm just nervous.      

Back in the kitchen, we busted out the aprons, put on some tunes (tUnE-YarDs to be exact), and burst into joyous dance.  No seriously, Tony did the weirdest lankiest lookin' thing with his arms that I've ever seen and I went full on "robot penguin" which consists of sticking your arms straight down at your sides and moving them in tight circles while waddling back and forth.  Yes, we were that excited.  And yes, we are that white.  Here, look:

Glorious.  

The jovial mood only grew from there as I began to make the empanada dough and had the immeasurable pleasure of dumping two whole sticks of butter and an entire packet of cream cheese into my mixing bowl.

If only every meal could begin this way.

There was something fiendish, even terrifying, about the way Karen was gazing into that bowl of butter and cream cheese, as though she saw in it the promise of a new world order, a horrible dystopian future in which every meal begins and ends with butter and cream cheese.  She was in her element, so I let her do her thang and got to work on the meat.  Unable to find pork butt, we settled on some much less hilarious pork shoulder.  I chopped the meat and set it simmering with garlic, onion, carrot, bay leaf, peppercorns, thyme and salt.  I was essentially boiling a bunch of meat, which is not a preparation I'm used to and which produces some very unappetizing grayish brain meat.

I quickly sauteed some onions and garlic and got that brain simmering in tomato sauce.  

Meanwhile, I mixed up the pastry dough faster than you can say "brain meat" and, as Tony mentioned, moved on to the tostones part of the meal.  I couldn't let my tasteless cardboard plantain nuggets be the final word on plantains for this blog, so during the week I'd whipped up some fried plantains courtesy of Alton Brown, damn know-it-all is always right about how to make things delicious.  Anyway, these double fried, garlic-y, savory plantains went over muuuuuch better than the previous week's so I made them again to go along with our latin theme.  Unlike my neurotic brother, I have absolutely no trouble frying any and everything  that I can get my hands on.  I love to hear the sound of sizzling and feel the hot oil splash against my skin.  Actually, no, that part kind of sucks and so I have a habit of throwing things into the oil and then running away squealing and ducking for cover like a hysterical piglet.

But just look at those babies frying up to a nice golden brown.  This recipe is fun because you get to smush the plantains and then fry them again, soaking them in a little garlic salt water in between.  After all that they sort of just taste like really good french fries.  No problem there.

**SPOILER ALERT: Do not look at the platter next to Karen's head!  Those aren't finished empanadas!

Success!  The empanada filling flavors had satisfactorily mingled, or as well as one could hope for at a party with such disparate guests as green olives and raisins.  Fun fact: green olives prefer to be called manzanillas when they are used in a Spanish or Latin American dish.  Don't you forget this, or else you'll have to go to two different stores because the first one didn't even have manzanillas, just these stupid green olives.

A truly inspiring sight, manzanillas, raisins, almonds and pork all hanging out, having a grand old time.  And who's that tree branch looking thing in the back?  Is that cinnamon stick?  Yup, cinnamon stick showed up.  

Done!  Here!  I held up the skillet and demanded Karen turn the meat stew into empanadas while I spent my remaining time hanging out with avocado, maybe making a salad.  Or is it too soon?  Do you think avocado even likes me?  I'm not good enough, AM I?  With a firm backhand, Karen brought me back to my senses, then delivered a proverbial backhand by informing me that we had to actually put the meat stuff into the dough stuff ourselves.  Moi?  I don't bake and this process really towed the line.  However, it can't be that hard, right?  I summoned every bit of knowledge I had on matter and spatial relations, and I managed to do this:

"KILL IT!  KILL IT!"  Karen yelped, as she cowered in the corner clutching her rolling pin, crying what I'm pretty sure were joke tears.  Har har, very funny.  You try it.  You shmuck. 

Yes, fine, ok; Karen's didn't have a gaping hole in it.  And yes, mine looked like a pumpkin spliced with road kill begging to be killed and put out of its misery, but in my defense . . . whatever, I don't even care.  I'm calling avocado, it accepts me for who I am!  

Since this post has been totally and completely out of order from the get-go I'll stick with the theme and talk about rolling out the empanada dough.  Now, you might ask, "Hey, didn't you just stuff the empanadas?  How could you stuff the empanadas and then roll out the dough?"  To which I reply, "How do you know that we don't have a time traveling kitchen?  Huh?  You don't.  And I'll never tell.  So shut it."  The dough had been chilling in the fridge for about an hour while Tony fussed over the stuffing and fretted over how the world would judge him and his unnatural avocado love (harshly, by the way) and I couldn't wait to get it out and start the rolling.  On my list of favorite things to do in the kitchen, using my rolling pin is right up there with apple peeling, bread kneading, and sliding across the floor in my socks.  So I was excited to roll out the empanadas and find a suitable sized circle to use as a cookie cutter.

Rolling pin excitement verging on madness!  Anyway, I grabbed a random piece of tupperware and started makin' some circles, not really knowing how big we wanted our empanadas.  On a side note, this is where I wish there was a synonym for "empanada" because the writer in me feels that I have repeated that word one too many times.  So from now on, I will alternate the use of "empanada" with "Spanish Hot Pocket."

Is this the right size?  I uhknow.  As Tony's mutated drooling first attempt would show us, no, it was not big enough.  But since I couldn't find a better cookie cutter, I cut them and rolled them out a little bigger, so that explains the lopsidedness of the first batch of Spanish Hot Pockets.  Luckily though, and I'm not sure if you knew this, but being slightly lopsided in no way affects the deliciousness of this item.  They did get a little prettier as we got more practice.  Here you can see the progression of prettiness from left to right smothered with egg wash and sesame seeds.

Anyway, they all look good to me once they're baked.  I just wanna pinch their little cheeks.

It was almost time to dish up when I realized I had to make the salad, meaning it was time for avocado and I to . . . errr, ok any attempt to keep up this "being in love with the avocado" metaphor is going to result in explicit descriptions, so consider it abandoned.  I sliced it up and tossed it with romaine lettuce, cilantro, a cumin-lime vinaigrette and feta cheese.  Cotija cheese works even better if you've got it.  This combo is fresh, the flavors complement each other and you can throw a bunch of other stuff in there too like corn, bell pepper, black beans, a taco, whatever.  Ah yes, I also added in some pepitas which, if you read last week's entry, you know is a food that Karen does not respect.  (That is correct.)  I don't know that I changed her mind, but the salad was good.  The Spanish Hot Pockets, on the other hand, were amazing.  Utterly fantastic.  The dough was sweet and buttery, the meat was salty and tender, the olives chipped in a great tang and these things are so portable that you can tuck one into your cargo shorts, overalls or other large-pocketed clothing and hit the town.  

What better way to wrap this meal up than some delicious alfajores, shortbread cookie sandwiches with Dulce De Leche in the middle?  How about not having those because someone (me) didn't realize that it takes a minimum of two and a half hours to make Dulce de Leche?  You'll have to tune in next week to see the alfajores in action.

Let me just reiterate before wrapping this up that these empanadas were friggin' fantastic.  They are hands down the best thing that we've made so far.  While they do take a bit more work and patience and it helps to have a fun cooking partner, they're totally worth it.  And since this blog cares not for linear order or the nature of time, I will let you in on another secret.  We actually cook our meals while writing about the previous week's adventure, meaning that we made these Spanish Hot Pockets last week and this week made a different delicious meal which we'll tell you about next week.  Confused yet?  I only tell you this because I ate one empanada each day for dinner after cooking these and by Thursday when I finished my last one I felt such an extreme feeling of loss and sadness that I knew this recipe was something special, something worth holding on to, worth fighting for.  Worth dying for?  No, that's ridiculous, but worth adding to my "make these as often as humanly possible" list of recipes.  I highly recommend that you try them.  And then freeze one and mail it to me.  I'll wait.