Category Archives: Kitchens

Spatula! I have two words for you…

Posted on by
Reply

Some people come into your life for a very brief time, but leave you with stories that last forever.

A guy I met a long time ago was a doctor in Memphis, TN. At that time he was doing a rotation in the ER at a hospital down there. While he was a southerner, this particular ER was in a rough neighborhood and provided exposure to people and circumstances he hadn’t experienced during his preppy, private school upbringing on the right side of town.

There was, for example, the woman in the delivery room who upon hearing the doctors mention the placenta, decided that Placenta would be a lovely name for her newborn daughter.

Our doctor friend had a lot of stories….But, perhaps my favorite of his encounters took place not in the hospital, but at a nearby grocery store. While shopping for dinner, my southern doctor friend overheard a mother yelling at her ill behaved daughter. She said, and this is a quote: ‘Spatula! I have two words for you: Be Have!’ We were never sure which was more amusing, the daughter being named ‘Spatula’ or the fact that behave was two words…

Since hearing this story, I can’t look at or grab for a spatula without hearing ‘Spatula! I have two words for you…’ in my head. And, it got me to thinking about how many spatulas I really needed when I downsized from the house to the apartment.

Here’s what I’ve found…I need three. Yep, three spatulas. I need this one from Williams-Sonoma

Silicone Slotted Spatula

Actually, I need two of those. I could live with one..but since most of what I make whether it be breakfast, lunch, dinner or dessert, requires a spatula, one is always dirty. In a smaller space it’s important to clean as you go. Still, if you are cooking frequently, it’s almost impossible to always have a clean spatula available.

I like this spatula because the handle is long, the silicone paddle won’t mar your non-stick pots, pans etc and, mostly, because it comes in many different colors.

And, I need a fish spatula. The fish spatula is good for a lot more than just fish. Its slim design makes it ideal for flipping all sorts of delicate foods – I use mine when I make eggs over easy, for example.

This is the one I bought at Williams-Sonoma:

WMF Profi Plus Fish Turner

That’s it. Just three spatulas. And, yes, you could get away with two, but I don’t recommend trying it.

I really don’t know where my southern doctor friend ended up but the stories of two girls named Placenta and Spatula will stay with me forever.

Gold Medal Egg Cups for the Fab 5

Posted on by
Reply

My niece and I stayed up until after midnight last night to cheer on the US Women’s Gymnastics team as they made history earning the first team gold since 1996.

Last night’s victory was amazing – but not quite as suspenseful as the evening we watched as the US women clinched the gold in 1996. They were leading Russia as each team entered its the final rotation; Russia on floor and the US on vault. Then, disaster struck. It’s as if the team fell apart the second they saw the vault. First, Shannon Miller stumbled and missed her landing, then Dominique Moceanu missed as well. With two missed vaults for the team, the last athlete, Kerri Strug, had to make her vault in order to even have a chance at the win for the US. The weight of the team was on Kerri and Kerri wasn’t known as the athlete who could put it all together and perform under great pressure…. As she prepared for her first vault, the eyes of 60,000 in attendance and the entire country were on her.

She missed. Kerri Strug missed her vault twisting her ankle and landing on her bum.

Kerri fell – badly – and appeared injured. She had one last chance and had to make it. There was no question as to whether she would do her second vault – the only question was how? On a badly injured ankle, while Bela Karolyi screamed ‘You can do it, Kerri! You can do it!’ from the sidelines, Kerri Strug attacked and stuck her second vault. She earned a score of 9.712 and sealed the gold medal for the US women – the first Team Gold for the US ever!

That night is as etched into my memory as the night that Mary Lou Retton captured the first ever gold in the All-Around at the 1984 Olympics with a vault that earned a perfect 10.

This morning, in honor of Mary Lou, the 1996 and 2012 US Women’s Gymnastic Teams, I made Gold Medal Egg Cups for my niece. This is an tweak on Rachel Ray’s Green Eggs and Ham….

Here’s what I did…

1. Heat the oven to 375 degrees

2. lightly butter a muffin tin….use the standard size, a Texas Muffin Tin is too large

3. Cut the crusts off of 12 pieces of bread – white works best here

4. Carefully line each cup of the tin with one piece of the bread

5. Add a few shavings of a favorite cheese to each cup. We used cheddar this morning, but any melty cheese will work

6. Carefully crack one egg into each cup

7. Top each egg with a little salt and pepper and gently add a few more shavings of cheese

8. Bake for :15 minutes until eggs are set. At :15mins the yolks should still be runny.

My love (or obsession) with Olympics Gymnastics runs deep. My niece wasn’t even born when Kerri Strug vaulted the US Team to gold. Thank you 2012 US Women’s Gymnastics team for giving me a gold medal moment with one of my favorite people on the planet!

Side Out Sides

Posted on by
Reply

Image

Destinee Hooker plays for the US Women’s volleyball team…At 6’4″ and 150lbs, she’s an intimidating presence on the team and one of the most talked about athletes at this Olympics. Destinee can jump 12 feet to attack a ball mid-arc.

It was the press coverage surrounding Destinee – well, actually, it was her name which I thought at first that I misheard – that made me tune-in to Women’s Volleyball the other day. I’m not well-versed in the sport. Outside of the accidental inclusion in a gym class game, my best experience comes from cringing when I remember the scene from Meet the Parents. During an intensely competitive game of pool volleyball, Ben Stiller’s character clad in ’70s Speedo slams a ball into the face of his fiancee’s sister breaking her nose just before her wedding. The cringing starts when Ben Stiller emerges from the dressing room in his Speedo and culminates with the super slo-mo shot into his sister-in-law to be’s face. OK…cringing now.

Pain is not really my thing and, as one of my friends aptly put it as we were watching the game (or is it a match in Volleyball???) ‘That looks like it really hurts’.

In addition to learning a good deal about Destinee and her fierce athletic ability, I also picked up a term or two while watching. Side-Out is when the serving team loses the point and must turn over the serve to the other team.

In honor of Destinee and all of the US Volleyball players – especially the men’s beach volleyballers – I am featuring a delicious and easy side dish:

Toasted Corn

Put 4-5 medium sized ears of corn in a large stock pot and fill with water

Put the pot on the stove top with the burner on ‘high’

Add 1-2 pats of butter and a healthy splash of milk

When the pot comes to a boil, turn the heat off and cover the pot

After 12 minutes, remove the lid and extract the ears of corn

Allow the corn to cool slightly

Heat a tsp of Olive Oil in a large frying pan or cast iron skillet

While the oil is heating, carefully slice the kernels off of each cob and transfer to a bowl.

When the oil is just shy of smoking, add the kernels

Stir occasionally as the kernels toast in the Olive Oil

Once toasted to taste – Anne Burrell says ‘Brown Food is Good Food’ and I agree – remove from the pan and serve.

Enjoy! and….Go USA!

Fresh Shrimp

Posted on by
Reply

I spent a spring break in Mexico about 100 years ago. My friends and I had rented a small apartment on the beach. Nestled between two big high rise hotels in Mazatlan, our condo faced the ocean and provided us with incredible sunsets daily. The other perk to our beachfront location, was the proximity to the locals selling their wares on the beach each morning. Every day at 6:30am we would wake to a shrimper screaming up to us: ‘Fre-esh Shri-imp! Fre-esh Shri-imp!’.

I’ve never really liked cooking shrimp dishes as main courses. My rule of thumb was never serve food you can count. I’m not sure why, but I think I have a subconscious fear of starvation – I mean, there was always more than enough food in my life…but, food I can count makes me nervous.

That said, I’ve recently been playing around with lemon shrimp and pasta dishes. Here’s the latest recipe that I’ve liked….With only one pot and one pan being used, it’s also tiny kitchen friendly….

Summer Shrimp & Pasta

Put a large pot of water on high and toss in a palmful of salt. This will be for the pasta. I like to use angel hair…but any  pasta will work. That’s tri-color rigatoni in the photo – it was delicious and also really pretty.

Heat 2 tbsp of olive oil and 2 tbsp of butter in a saute pan over medium heat. Add 1 diced shallot and 2 cloves of garlic minced. Saute, stirring occasionally until fragrant (about 3-4 mins). Add 1lb cleaned, completely peeled shrimp. (Some people like to leave the tails on…not me).

Fresh shrimp can be pretty expensive, but I’ve found that frozen shrimp is just as yummy. Lately I’ve been buying my frozen shrimp at Gourmet Garage on West 66th St.

Add the zest of one lemon and the juice of 2 lemons. Saute until the shrimp is completely cooked – about 6 minutes stirring occasionally.

Remove the shrimp from the saute pan and place aside

Drop 1lb of pasta into the boiling water and cook just shy of the time on the box directions.

Add 1/2 cup of white wine – any dry white wine will do – to the saute pan. Stir with a wooden spoon –  the wine will help to lift all of flavor off of the bottom of the pan.

Add 1 package of frozen peas to the saute pan. Add salt and some pepper – to taste.

The peas will steam quickly in the lemon juice and white wine – about 2 minutes

Stir in 1/4 cup of cream and 4 pats of butter. This will help to thicken the sauce. You may want to add 1/4 cup or less of the pasta water to the sauce at this point if you think you may not have enough or just to thin out the sauce.

Remove the saute pan from the heat and re-add the cooked shrimp. Drain the pasta and add to the saute pan. Pull the pasta through to distribute the shrimps and sauce.

Transfer to a serving bowl. At this point add some halved cherry tomatoes – it’s prettier with the red of the tomatoes. Garnish with parsley and serve.

It’s a quick and easy pasta dish perfect for a lovely ladies dinner. Perhaps I’ll invite my friends from the Mazatlan trip….just don’t tell them it’s not fresh shrimp!

Happy Pixies in My Kitchen

Posted on by
Reply

By far my favorite thing to cook when I was little was Ronnie Rooster’s Cinnamon Toast. I got this recipe from my very first cookbook: The Happy Pixies’ Cookbook. The recipe was exactly what one might think it would be, but I still followed the directions – carefully pre-heating the oven, placing white bread on a cookie sheet, smearing each slice with softened butter (this was pre-microwave, when butter had to be softened by leaving it out on the counter and then…waiting), sprinkling with brown sugar and then sprinkling again with cinnamon.

In just a few minutes under the broiler I had perfectly toasted, buttery, sugary delights!

I made the Ronnie Rooster Cinnamon Toast all the time and often tried different takes on it. If we didn’t have brown sugar, I found that regular sugar worked nicely as well. If you lightly toasted the bread without anything on it first and then added the butter and toppings, the heat of the toast would help to melt the butter and you didn’t have to wait for it to soften on the counter. I even got a little indulgent a few times and did a second layer of butter/brown sugar/cinnamon and re-toasted.

Sometimes getting a recipe right is like working your way through a maze where the dead-ends are just dishes that aren’t yet perfect. And, even though I had strayed from the original recipe, I always kept the book out while preparing the toast.

Everyone has her own comfort food – the one thing she craves when feeling down. For me, that was always Ronnie Rooster’s Cinnamon Toast.

There are things you need if you want to create in the kitchen and there are things that you just don’t really need anymore. I gave away almost all of my cookbooks last year as part of the downsizing of my life. If I need a recipe, I can find it online. Actually, I can find 1,000 variations in most cases. And, living in a small apartment, I love that the Internet doesn’t take up any physical space.

I know by heart how to make Ronnie Rooster’s Cinnamon Toast. And yet, when recently sorting through what to keep and what to give away, I decided to keep my tattered copy of The Happy Pixies’ Cookbook. I like knowing that there are always happy pixies in my kitchen.