Loaded Potatoes, Redeemed

The loaded potato is notoriously awful, health-wise. I mean, if you really didn't clog your arteries with all the butter and sour cream on a normal restaurant-style baked potato, go ahead and add bacon and cheese whiz to put you over the edge. Thanks a lot, T.G.I. Friday's.

Well, it's not the potato's fault that corporate America stuffed it with crap, so I decided to redeem it. There's a little nod to the 80s in this recipe, too, because it is also a twice-baked potato. But not the kind with the piped swirl on top. So, if you also think the loaded potato deserves another chance, do this:

Cube one smallish sweet potato or yam and steam* until tender. Meanwhile, bake up two stuffable-sized potatoes, along with a few whole garlic cloves. Scoop out the inside of the baked potato, keeping the skin intact, and mash in a bowl with the sweet potato, garlic cloves, a bit of grated Parm, and some S & P. When it tastes good, return the mixture to the potato skins. The rest is up to you, but stay away from bacon and tube cheese or you'll ruin everything. I topped mine with caramelized sweet onions and sauteed crimini mushrooms with fresh thyme from the garden, and a very light sprinkling of organic sharp cheddar (a little goes a long way). That goes back into the oven until it's all bubbly and brown. (There's the twice baked part.) And, as if all of that weren't enough, I finished it off with a dollop of fat free plain yogurt and some chives, also from the garden. The tang of the yogurt is a great compliment to the sweetness of the potato innards. The best part about this whole thing is that you can eat it sans-guilt and save yourself the braincells you'd otherwise lose during a meal at a greasy chain restaurant. Thank God it's not pasteurized processed cheese product.

Sprinkle some paprika on top to complete the 80s charm.

We had some leftover guac in the fridge that was also a great topper.

Serve with the Wood Brothers' latest album, Loaded.

*Steaming is one of most nutritious ways to prepare food because it allows the vegetable to retain all those great vitamins and minerals you are counting on ingesting that can otherwise be lost during cooking. Also, the yogurt and sweet potato in this recipe not only make it taste really good, but also add a list of health benefits too long to write out without boring you, so just click on the links to learn more.

Pulled Pork with a Side of Whoop Ass

Did you know that pork butt is not really from the hind region of the pig? It's actually the shoulder. I hope that brings some happiness to your life.

We were on our third 80 degree day in a row, Game 2 of the playoffs was on that evening, and it was Earth Day Eve. Basically, it was a Tuesday just begging for a party, and I got the urge to make pulled pork sandwiches. I've never done this before either. (I know, first the biscuits, now this.) So, instead of trying it once just in case it was a dry mess, I decided to invite a bunch of people over for the game. Nice. I was nervous all f-ing day.

I picked up a nice 5.5 lb boneless pork butt from Gartner's Meat Market, which I highly recommend for all of your Portland area meat needs. My dry rub was something like this:

1 1/2 - 2 tbsp paprika
1 tbsp garlic powder
1/2 tbsp ground ginger
1 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp dry mustard
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbsp kosher salt

I cut some slits into the meat and then I really rubbed it to let the flavors permeate.

I only let it marinate for 2 hours because I wanted to make sure it was done by half-time, or at least in time to call for Thai takeout (in the event of a disaster), but I would have liked to let it go for longer. People say that overnight is best. I baked it in a 275-300ish degree oven, covered, on a roasting pan for about 4 hours. I was expecting it to take at least 5 or 6 hours, but the internal temperature had surpassed 190 F after 4 hours, which is plenty of cooking. Any longer and I think it would have been dry. I was really anxious to assess my success or failure and start pulling it right away, but it must rest for a while. If you cut it right away, all the juices will run out and you'll loose all that good moisture and flavor.

In the mean time, make a barbeque sauce. Mine is a mess of things that I can't begin to address in true recipe form, but I'll just say that it starts with sweet onions that get softened in bourbon. Then there is ketchup, cider vinegar, soy sauce, cumin, paprika, garlic powder, brown sugar, fresh ginger, Worcestershire sauce, Sriracha...yeah, I think that might be it. I'm not telling my secret ingredient. From there I just let it simmer away until it reduced to sticky saucy goodness.

Things were looking good. The Blazers were heading into Game 2 with a new vengeance after the ass-kicking they got last weekend, cornhole was in session in the driveway, and yes, the pork pulled appropriately. Thank God. I didn't get to any of the sides I had in mind, but I did manage to throw together a salad and open some jars of pickled okra and Wickles. I was a few drinks deep by the time the plates were piling, so I only got a couple mediocre photos, but you can at least kind of get the idea.

Overall, I'd say it was a success, but here are my exact notes that I took at the time of consumption:

"Pretty good, marinate longer, more salt."

My friends seemed pretty happy about the whole thing, but that could have just been because Rip City decided to show up that night. Well, and because of the Wickles.

Buttermilk Biscuits to Save My Reputation

I'm embarrassed to say that this was my first attempt at homemade buttermilk biscuits. I come from a long line of feisty Southern belles, so actually this is more than embarrassment. It's like...sacrilege. Even worse is that the only reason I made them was because of a carton of buttermilk in the fridge that was about to turn. Or at least, about to expire. Buttermilk is kind of already "turned," isn't it? I'm a little confused by this.

Anyway, I did some research, made some modifications, and decided on this recipe:

2 cups self-rising flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
a good pinch of salt
6 tbsp cold butter, cut into small cubes
3/4 cup buttermilk

I discovered some great advice in my research that suggested doing this in the food processor. Pulse dry ingredients in the FP, then add butter and pulse again until the mixture looks like the topping for an apple crisp. Note: make sure the butter is cold when you do this. Little bits of butter in the dough equal unsucky biscuits. Next, pour in the buttermilk and pulse just until it becomes dough. (This will happen very quickly, and impressively easily. God bless the FP.) Once this happens, turn the dough out onto a floured surface and press out to about 1/2" thickness. Fold it over on top of itself like twice, but don't mess with it too much. Cut it into 12 pieces with a pastry cutter, or if you aren't that cool, just use a pizza cutter like me. The idea is to handle the dough as little as possible.

Since I'm trying to regain some respect from my Southern ancestors, I baked these in a cast iron skillet. I don't really see why you would do it in anything else, actually. Just like I don't see why you would drink out of a regular glass when you have the option of drinking out of a mason jar or a copper mug. But I digress.

We had to taste one to make sure it was biscuits. It was.

Jesse also loves things in cast iron skillets. Yes, he is always that happy.

We ate them straight up with butter and honey and jam, but I'm looking forward to making them into a slutty breakfast sandwich one morning after a hootenanny, as my friend Brandon would say. Get some Grisman/Garcia on the speakers when you're eating these.

Mangia Lasagna!

Sometimes I wake up and just want to eat Italian food. It was a cold, windy, rainy, all-in-all weather suck fest this weekend and to me, some slow-cooked Italian red sauce and a carb-fiesta is the ultimate remedy. Also, I had signed up to participate in the 8K Shamrock Run the following morning (why, I do not know), so I used the old "pasta dinner" high school athlete trick as my other excuse for the meal. I decided on lasagna and tried to experiment a little along the way.

The first step to most Italian sauces is a good old soffritto. In Italian, soffritto literally means "sub-fried" because of the low temperature used to sweat your aromatic veggies. The most common soffritto in Northern Italy is onions, carrots, and celery, and it is used as a base for many soups, stews, sauces, etc. The onions, carrots, and celery are traditionally in a radio of 2:1:1. French cuisine refers to this combination as a mirepoix, and in New Orleans they replace the carrot with green bell pepper and call it the "Holy Trinity." This is just another attempt at building street cred. I know I could have just said onions, carrots, and celery. But hey, now you have more interesting stuff to talk about in a moment of awkward silence.

So, I heated some olive oil in a large, heavy stock pot and softened up a soffritto of onions, carrots, and celery over low heat. I used one Washington sweet onion, one carrot, and one celery stalk. After they sweat it out and the onions were translucent, I then threw in about a tbsp of chopped fresh garlic and 3-4 tbsp of tomato paste. After everything was incorporated, I added two 28 oz. cans of Italian plum tomatoes (whole), a heavy dose of Italian seasoning, and some fresh basil leaves. I let this simmer for a while so everyone could get to know each other. After about 1/2 hr, I pureed everything (in small batches) until smooth and returned it to the pot. Added a chiffonade of about 8 large basil leaves (see, foreign words make you sound professional!), and tasted it.

Something was still missing...what the hell was it? Then I remembered my dad's words of wisdom:

"Amelia, you want to know the secret to good red sauce? Pork fat."

Well, he's damn right, and I had completely forgotten this important step, so I ran to the store and picked up some mild Italian sausage links. (I prefer half mild, half hot, but they had no hot so whatev.) Took the casings off, tore them in half and plopped them into the steaming pot. I also added some crushed red pepper flakes to make up for the mildness. This did the trick, as always. Thanks, Dad!

Experiment #1: Ameliorated Ricotta Filling

My boyfriend hates white creamy substances in his food. He loves lasagna, but the ricotta/cottage cheese/sour cream part has to be pretty well disguised. So, I decided the make it a little more healthy by reducing the amount of cheese without reducing the amount of filling. We eat with our eyes first, remember. I saw a recipe for parsnip puree recently, so that was my inspiration. Chop 5-7 parsnips (unless they're really big, then use less) and put them in a sauce pot with about 4 lightly smashed garlic cloves. Just barely cover with skim milk, add S&P, and simmer until fork-tender. Puree and season to taste. From there, I combined the parsnips with an equal amount of ricotta cheese and about half a bag of cooked spinach. The parsnips can have a strong flavor, but the ricotta really balances them out and it adds a great background sweetness to your lasagna. "Why is this so good?!" People will say. Never tell them it's because of parsnips.*

Experiment #2: No Boil Noodles

Alright, this wasn't really an experiment so much as laziness that I thought was well-founded. I've tried these before and never had an issue with them. Some people think it's wrong or whatever, but like I said, short cuts that don't disrupt the flavor or quality factor of your food are never wrong in my book. And wow, this really speeds up the process.

It was assembled as follows:
Spread some sauce on the bottom of a 9x13" baking dish. Top with 4 noodles. Top with more sauce, then a few slices of provolone, some grated mozzarella, and your secret ricotta mixture. Repeat until you have used 16 noodles. The top layer should just be noodles, then sauce, then mozzarella and some freshly grated Parmigiano. Now just cover and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, then uncover and bake for another 10-15 minutes until the top is bubbly and the cheese is browned.

I served this to 3 hungry dudes who had just finished a day of skiing/snowboarding on Hood and it was a hit. And two of them have Italian moms or grandmas who have been making this shit for them all their lives.

Oh, by the way, the sausage doesn't go in the lasagna. Just let people take it out of the sauce to enjoy on the side.
I forgot to photograph anything the night we ate this, so I reheated some for lunch the next day and this is it. Notice the mircowave splatter. I was about to wipe this off like a good little cook, but then I thought it looked kind of cool. Maybe reheated sauce splatters are the micro-wave of the food presentation future...

*Some info about the parsnip: it is actually higher in vitamins and minerals than its more popular friend, the carrot. It is an excellent source of potassium and dietary fiber. So, you can use this method to sneak healthy vegetables into things without anyone even knowing about it! Ha!