What's Cooking (Take Four)

I think I have once, in all these years, encountered a Thai restaurant that actually used holy basil. Their kaprow was amazing.

The name of the place? Holy Basil.

I've never seen Holy Basil around here. Have you tried growing it?

The pad prik gai bai krapow I made last night showed why the Thai prefer to use holy basil in the dish. It turns out OK with European basil, it's good with Thai basil (horapa), better with Thai basil and a little dried holy basil thrown in, but by far the best with only fresh Thai basil.

I've never tried growing holy basil myself. I live in a condo and can't keep a garden. I've grown mint before and basil is closely related. If so it should pretty much grow itself and the biggest concern would be to prevent it taking over the lawn.

-Paul W.

Breakfast this morning is a slice of jalapeño, cheddar, sourdough, toasted and smeared with Peruvian Pepper Jam, topped with avocado slices, and a very fast-fried egg cooked over medium heat, with a tight lid on the pan. It is done when you hear a lot of popping sounds, and the edges are browned, and the yolk is still runny...yum. Fresh, organic strawberries on the side are from Watsonville, CA.

[Jenise]

Tonight I'm preparing grilled pork chops that have marinated all day in soy sauce, chili oil, and sesame oil with a dollop of vinegar and some sugar for the sweet-heat combination that I so long. May serve that with Taiwanese cauliflower.

I'm also in prep for two other events this week. I'll be cooking the main for Bill's lunch on Thursday, a NYT recipe that they advertise as a 30 minute prep and yes you can do it in that amount of time, but like most things it's better longer--the alcohol needs more time to cook out and blend. I've made it several times before, and highly recommend it:

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/102 ... artichokes

And then I'm in the planning stage for the birthday party I'm cooking for my husband next Saturday. He's not here, of course, but four couples will join us to enjoy some of his favorite things and I've been working on the menu all week. Guests will be served Bob's favorite cocktail on arrival: a negroni. It will be prepared as per the recipe given me by the bartender at Spago Maui, which is where we both experienced that drink for the first time and fell in love with it. I'm pairing that with one of Bob's favorite things: quesadillas, but I'll be elevating them with a tropical twist fitting of the origins of our negroni fandom, fresh mango, jack cheese, diced fresh jalapenos and a few drops of habanero sauce. Bob's place at the table will be secured by a large canvas print of Bob drinking a negroni on a Seattle rooftop. There will be a salad of course, the main will be lamb shank osso buco on a truffle risotto and kumquat gremolata, and dessert will be chocolate-coconut marble cake. Willing guests will also be served a 1946 brandy at the end of the night. That's all I know so far, but I'm pretty excited about it.

Breakfast: Eggs Benedict with a side of sauteed, sliced bananas with a touch of Seville orange marmalade and a pinch of Vietnamese cinnamon. Easy, peasy.

Breakfast: Eggs Benedict with a side of sauteed, sliced bananas with a touch of Seville orange marmalade and a pinch of Vietnamese cinnamon. Easy, peasy.

I love that, must try, thank you.

Guests will be served Bob's favorite cocktail on arrival: a negroni. It will be prepared as per the recipe given me by the bartender at Spago Maui, which is where we both experienced that drink for the first time and fell in love with it.

I like negronis, too. What's Spago Maui's way?

[Jenise]

Equal parts Hendricks gin, Antica Caparno vermouth and a blend of Aperol and Campari vs. Campari alone which really electrifies the color and flavor, which was further enhanced by sitting in Hawaii facing west at sunset and drinking a drink the color of same in a large round stemless bowl with a single perfectly round ice cube in it.

Equal parts Hendricks gin, Antica Caparno vermouth and a blend of Aperol and Campari vs. Campari alone which really electrifies the color and flavor, which was further enhanced by sitting in Hawaii facing west at sunset and drinking a drink the color of same in a large round stemless bowl with a single perfectly round ice cube in it.

Noted!

I was busy in the kitchen yesterday:
-- I made almond bark a new way for me: pralinee the almond slices in the oven first, then mixed them into melted dark chocolate and turn them out as clusters.
-- I made a large pot of imam bayildi using the recipe that Paul located. Smells really good.
-- I made a half a dozen crab cakes using blue crab, dill, chive, and panko. Fall-apart tender; I am not a fan of bready cakes. (I froze four of them for later.)

Wow, Jeff - hope you had plenty of help in eating all of that!

Having just returned from being gone for a month, I'm easing back in the kitchen. Last night, we had roasted chicken, roasted fingerlings, and sauteed collard greens.

The bark is for nibbling. I froze the remaining crab cakes. The eggplant will last all week - equivalent to 6 portions. (I've still got a little soup and half a lamb roast from last week to eat! It's nice, during the work-week, to have easy dinners.)

I enjoy doing my weekly cooking on Saturday mornings. Then, all during the week, I can sit down at cocktail time and relax knowing I have good, healthy food waiting in the fridge.

Tonight, I made Chicken Marsala from Daniel Gritzer's recipe on the Serious Eats site. I've made it a bunch of times and it never fails. We had roasted asparagus and couscous on the side.

[Jenise]

The bark is for nibbling. I froze the remaining crab cakes. The eggplant will last all week - equivalent to 6 portions. (I've still got a little soup and half a lamb roast from last week to eat! It's nice, during the work-week, to have easy dinners.)

How are you getting along with that new stove?

[Jenise]

Went car shopping in the next county over with my brother yesterday, and this is where this area's best source for fresh seafood is. So we stopped in, and to my delight I found fresh Monk Fish. I bought a nice pound and a halfer which we took to Chris' house later. I prepared it, studding fresh garlic slices into slits, rubbing it with salt and EVOO, then roasting it fore 20 minutes and serving thick slices with a pan sauce of fresh cherry tomatoes sauteed in butter with garlic and thyme. This dish is GORGEOUS with light red wines, a CdR would do but I served a young Drouhin oregon pinot also picked up in our travels yesterday.

There are a lot of Chinese soups and dishes that use the cooked meat from steamed or boiled chickens. Instead I use the meat from a Costco rotisserie chicken. I made a noodle soup with a Thai twist the other day using half the chicken meat. Last night the other half of the chicken went into a Chinese spiced stew (star anise, black pepper, cinnamon, orange peel) with bean thread noodles. Today the Costo chicken carcass and a bunch of scraps and bones I've been saving will be turned into chicken stock. I'm going to add a package of chicken feet (the supermarket calls them chicken paws). They help provide gelatin.

-Paul W.

How are you getting along with that new stove?

The burners are good. They run hotter than the ones I'm used to but I'll adjust to that. I like that there is more room on top, easier to shuckle pots and pans around.

The oven was out of commission for six weeks so who remembers?

Seriously. Like a lot of things in this apartment, ithe stove is a nice product but it's approx. 10 years old and due for some maintenance. The stove's particular problem was that it would not light. I managed to get it lit a couple times at the end of last year but in January it just stopped working -- lots of clicking, lots of hissing, but no flames. The first replacement part took about 3 weeks to arrive, but, literally on the way up to my apartment, the technician noticed that it was broken. Three more weeks. The tech came while I was out but I heard from the super that he not only replaced the starter but several of the burner jets. (And I can tell you that he did more work than that because I found little bits of stripped wire insulation all over the place later.) And it works now. Far better than it did before.

A lamb roast is not real sensitive to the temperature. I'm going to stop it rare, anyway. But pralineeing the almonds was really irritating: I dampened them first, tossed them with powdered sugar and a little vanilla, spread them on parchment and put them in at 350*F. Ten minutes should have been enough. But the sugar hadn't budged. So I kept going but I added two oven thermometers to the chamber. They showed 300*F. Meanwhile, at 20 minutes I started to suspect that the dampening had not worked so I pulled the baking sheet out and sprinkled the nuts with water. Instant caramel. The nuts are, of course, over-done but they're not burned. Still, I'll like the next batch better.

I'm going to do a batch of cheesey gnocchi this coming weekend.

Had a chunk of the imam bayildi tonight. Wow, that's good. It's basically stewed eggplant, onion, and tomato but all that extra olive oil gives it an amazing texture and lusciousness.

Family faves are on the menu today, although I cook for one these days, I still love to revisit many of my family's special recipes. A rack of baby back pork ribs will be getting a salt and Migonette pepper rub and sitting for a bit. Then, a soy sauce, sherry wine vinegar, olive oil, and brown sugar marinade. They will roast in the oven for 2 -1/ 2 hours. I am cooking Jasmine Rice in Chicken stock. Cilantro, jalapeño pepper, lime juice, salt, and pepper are blended, then added to the rice after cooking. A pretty rice with a lovely green color. I have eggplant, cauliflower, and a yellow squash to use up, so I will put these into a sheet pan to roast up with cherry tomatoes, garlic, and two heirloom tomatoes cut into wedges. I will dress with fresh chives and sweet basil from my herb garden, which has taken off already this season. Then off to my chair to watch a few good movies, until cocktail time, and then pick up the news to watch all the wild and crazy things happening in the world today. My puppy sits on his blanket next to me for his petting time, and gets an ice cube to devour when I make my martini!

[Jenise]

Today is Bob's birthday and I've invited four couples over to help me celebrate.

To begin with, I'll serve Bob's favorite cocktail, negronis, with a tropical version of one of his favorite foods, quesadillas, in honor of Hawaii which we loved to visit and where he tasted his first negroni. The filling will be havarti cheese, diced jalapeno peppers, sliced mangos and habanero sauce. A great California bubbly will be available as an alternative--we met in California, so again, it's meaningful.

Following that will be a marinated smashed cucumber and "Texas Wild" Shrimp salad (Bob grew up in Texas) served upright in martini glasses ( paired with a Washington white Bordeaux blend), followed by lamb shank osso buco with kumquat gremolata and truffle risotto (paired with Felsina Chianti Reserva from magnum, and Reynvaan Washington 'Stonessence' syrah). Lastly chocolate coconut marble cake with ganache and chocolate covered Washington cherries, and finally a 1946 Armagnac.

Had a chunk of the imam bayildi tonight. Wow, that's good. It's basically stewed eggplant, onion, and tomato but all that extra olive oil gives it an amazing texture and lusciousness.

Good enough to make you faint, eh? Imam bayildi is on my list but I've a bunch of leftovers to get through first.

-Paul W.

Sounds like a great meal, Jenise. I particularly like the quesadilla idea - they sound delicious.