Apartment Dining

I admit it: I have not been spending a lot of time in the kitchen over the past few weeks. Trips up north and many visitors in town have led to nights away from my stove, and when I do cook, it’s using simple, tested recipes from the past. This will be rectified after Independence Day weekend, but in the meantime, I wanted to share my stand-by recipe for basil and chive pesto. Summer is not the best time to simmer tomatoes for a pasta sauce and this pesto is a great alternative, requiring just fresh ingredients and a food processor or other blending device.

Basil and Chive Pesto
-1 cup tightly packed basil leaves
-1/4 cup chopped chives
-2 peeled garlic cloves
-1/3 cup walnuts
-1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
-1/3 to 1/2 cup olive oil, depending on your taste
-Salt and pepper to taste

1) Add basil, chives, garlic, and walnuts to the food processor and pulse a few times to roughly chop. Add olive oil and pulse 3-4 more times. Add Parmesan cheese, pulse until blended, and then add more olive oil if necessary.

2) Taste and add a dash of salt and pepper if desired. Serve on pasta or use as a in place of marinara sauce on homemade pizza.

Remember the classic children’s book Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, about a town where food falls from the sky for each meal? I found out recently that they’re turning it into a computer animated movie. Although the creators of “Clone High” have written and directed it, I highly doubt it will satisfy a generation for whom the book carries such strong feelings of nostalgia. I don’t know about you, but for me the book inspired many crayon drawings of houses and trees covered in a variety of foodstuffs. (I also understand they’re aiming for the twelve and under set rather than the jaded twenty-somethings in my peer group. The studios are betting we’ll all just go see the film version of Where the Wild Things Are, drawn in by a Dave Eggers screenplay, Spike Jonze’s direction, and a trailer that includes an Arcade Fire song. They’re betting right in my case, but such is life [link probably NSFW].)

Looking up information on a movie about meatballs falling from the sky naturally led me making meatballs in my kitchen. I’ve made meatballs only once before and while they turned out okay, they were far from great. After seeing a number of recipes around the web that combined ground beef with a number of other meats, I decided to try mixing ground beef and pork to create a more flavorful meatball. An additional twist was my use of whole wheat breadcrumbs instead of the traditional Italian breadcrumbs, which I believe added a very subtle nutty and sweet flavor. The recipe and more photos after the jump. Warning to vegetarian/vegan readers: raw meat photos ahead. » Read the rest of this entry «

Quick breads are what simple breakfast dreams are made of for me. Defined by their use of chemical levening agents like baking powder or soda in place of yeast, quick breads can be thrown together in a matter of minutes and baked for about an hour, resulting in a dense, cake-like treat. They’re typically made up of just liquid, butter, egg, sugar, flour, and a leavening agent, so chances are good you have all of the ingredients for some sort of quick bread in your kitchen right now.

When my boyfriend Ramsey mentioned his love of banana bread a few weeks ago, I realized I had never actually made what may be the quintessential quick bread. I’d made pumpkin in the fall, but had yet to attempt banana. Thus, I went on a hunt for a classic banana bread recipe that would bring back memories of childhood breakfasts.

I first tried Mark Bittman’s recipe from How to Cook Everything, and while good, it wasn’t quite as moist as I wanted. I’ll try it again soon and modifying a few things, but in the meantime, I found what may be the easiest, fool-proof recipe on Simply Recipes. I’ve made it twice since finding it over the weekend and it doesn’t even require a mixer! Dishes are also easy, with just a loaf pan, bowl, fork, and spoon left to clean when all is said and done.

I woke up extra early on Sunday morning to do some cooking. At 10 AM, you would assume I’d be up making a dish for brunch or perhaps baking muffins, but instead I was prepping and roasting a whole chicken. It was a component for that evening’s dinner, the ultimate comfort food: chicken pot pie. The combination of flaky pastry, seasoned gravy, and vegetables that appeared on plates throughout my childhood make it an ideal winter Sunday meal. 

The whole chicken provided not only the meat for the pie, it also provided the chicken broth after a few hours of simmering the carcass on the stove with vegetables and seasonings. The best part was that the three pound free-range organic chicken cost only ten dollars and some change at the store the previous day, which is a bargain in Brooklyn. 

A guide to making chicken broth and the pie are after the jump. » Read the rest of this entry «

Risotto seems to be one of the most feared kitchen basics. It involves a lot of stirring, a careful eye on liquid absorption, and around six cups of chicken broth. Although a rice dish with a few embellishments seems like it should be simple, I’ve heard a number of risotto-related horror stories with frightening endings such as:

“…and after all of the broth was absorbed, the rice was still raw!”
“…but then I stirred the rice to find the bottom was COMPLETELY BURNED.”
“…by the time I was done, I had finished the rest of the bottle of wine and just fell asleep.” 

(That last one is a lie, but still, a possible mistake while making this dish.)

I consulted a number of different sites and a few of my cookbooks to put together what would be my first attempt at the dish this afternoon. The result was a Risotto with Thyme Chicken and Mushrooms. You can embellish risotto with just about anything, use vegetable broth for a vegan or vegetarian option, or even sweeten it for dessert. Here’s the recipe. » Read the rest of this entry «

Bread is just about as basic as it comes, and yet people are scared to make it. They think it’s going to be a lengthy, complicated process, but in reality, it requires a small amount of prep time and a bit of waiting around. You probably already have all of the ingredients sitting in your kitchen, just waiting around. Really, when was the last time you used any of the yeast from that three pack of Fleischmann’s you decided to pick up a few months ago? 

If you’re looking to make a lot of dough and have it at the ready for two weeks or more in the fridge, I highly recommend the Simple Crusty Bread recipe, featured here in the NYT, but originally from Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day. If you only want to make a plain white loaf the old-school way, tea towel and all, here’s a simple recipe. » Read the rest of this entry «

If you’re looking for a way to organize a small apartment kitchen, you only need to glance out your window for inspiration. It’s easy to draw parallels between limited kitchen space and the limited amount of land within New York City’s borders that’s available for development. The solution New York (and all other urban centers) found was going vertical, so why not apply that to the kitchen?   » Read the rest of this entry «