cooking @ home

As some of you no doubt know Harry had been ill for some time with a serious heart problem. He very much wanted to continue with this blog
but the truth is he simply didn’t have the physical or mental energy after he came out of the hospital.

Sadly Harry Kenney died on January 15th 2009. This cooking blog was his baby. He loved to cook and he loved telling you all about his recipes. With that in mind we have decided to continue with Cooking at Home. The style might be a little different, nobody could write quite like Harry, but we will do our best to carry on his passion and his love of food.

©2008 Harry Kenney

Well, I’m back after my “hiatus”. My initial thought was to put up one of the maybe dozen new dishes I’ve made over the past several months. Instead, I’m starting back up with my most very recent meal. I got a bit more adventurous the other night, making something competely new for me and it turned out so well I’m going to share that one first.

But before doing that I want to talk about taste or maybe it would be more accurate to call this the “conveyance of taste”. Now I consider myself as having a pretty good palate. Mind you, I haven’t yet taken any blind food tests — although to sate my own curiosity I have a friend who promises when she gets a chance that we’ll do one. I always watch Hell’s Kitchen and each season it’s amazing to see how trained chefs can’t tell the difference between an apple and a piece of potato when blindfolded. Ok, I’m on a bit of a tangent; let me get back to the heart of the matter here, which is, in this case arugula.

Now, believe it or not, until recently I’d never tasted it. How can that be? I don’t know. There’s too many things in the world. What’s normal for one isn’t for another. For me there’s still what seems like hundreds of cheeses and dozens of greens and other delicious food items still awaiting my taste buds. I see that as a great adventure awaiting me. Anyhow, arugula is one of those favs of television cooks it seems. (By the way, if you have ever heard a British cook talk about a green known as “rocket” … yes, apparently that is their name for arugula.) And I’ve always heard those cooks say it tastes peppery. Just as I keep hearing Mexican orgeano has a minty flavor, Thai basil has a licorice or anise taste, and olive oil is often described as “fruity” and brown butter as “nutty”.

Not sure about you but, while I do know what they’re getting at, I don’t taste olive oil and go “ah, fruit!” Do you? I don’t taste browned butter and yell out “Wow, it’s nuts!” So I was surprised when finally I tasted arugula and thought “ok, where’s the pepper at?” All these years and I start to wonder if the cooks we rely on are a little bit whacky, and a shared whackiness at that. Again, I think — and I’m starting to question slightly — if my palette is as good as I’ve always thought. It must be as I can usually go to a restaurant and divine various ingredients in a new sauce. But I’m not tasting the fruitness, nuttiness or pepperiness in any of these items. Or am I?

So what makes me wonder is, when cookbook authors and television chefs describe something a certain way, maybe they’re just trying to talk about a slight delicate thing? Or maybe someone came up with the idea and they all copy each other. I think if I had never heard those adjectives described about these foods, that I would not necessarily come up with the same descriptions. To put it another way, I would be very hard pressed having never heard of the peppery arugula description or the fruity olive oil description to convey to someone exactly what they actually tasted like. That is an exceptionally difficult task. How do you describe a color to a blind person? Or a musical note to a deaf person? So how does one describe food with it’s delicate nuances to someone who has never had that particular food?

I will tell you this, whatever description one gives to arugula, I definitely like the taste. It’s similiar and yet different from lettuce. It’s definitely not like fresh spinich, although it similiarly can be used in a salad instead of lettuce, which gave me the idea for this meal in the first place. I thought to myself, if arugula has a slight peppery taste what’s a nice offset from that? Lemon vinaigrette came to mind. So did using either capers or olives; I ended up choosing olives, and my favorites, the dark Kamala ones not the green ones. After that everything was just keeping things simple but doing that little balance, red onion for kick, olive for bite, lemon for acidity and freshness plus while it might counterpoint the arugula it would also compliment the chicken.

The grilled portobello caps is something I’ve been dying to do for a long time. To be candid, I have no idea if the balsamic vinegar and grated Parmesan was all my idea or if I had seen it on a television show before. It would not surprise me if I’d seen it on TV as the simpler you make a meal, the more easily it can either be copied or a that a ton of people can have the same idea. In a lot of ways, this is a very simple meal, but I think still rather elegant. Yes, I love bold, complex flavors as you’ve seen from my barbecue dishes; at the same time I like the “other side” too, when something simple and basic and few ingredients can be so tasty. The salad is five ingredients plus the dressing. As said the portobello mushroom is pretty much the star and the very slight cheese and very slight balsamic are barely supporting players. To be candid, while I find the balsamic defintiely adds an interesting dimension and it’s good that way, I found I actually liked the porotbellos caps better without — just the seasoned mushroom and the light dusting of cheese on top.

In my case I used the indoor cast iron two-burner grill. This would have been an excellent one, both the chicken and the bello caps, to put on the outside grill, but since it was a 99 degree day I passed on that. I’m sure the charcoal would have served as an incredible “seasoning” of it’s own and brought something else special to the meal. Btw, I used vegetable oil not olive oil on the caps as, firstly, I wanted to better taste the mushroom and secondly, when it comes to grilling you might recall vegetable oil has a higher smoke point that olive oil does.

Before I forget to mention this, for myself, for the salad, I had it the first night with the olives, arugula and red onions just a tad chilled from the refrigerator and the mushrooms and chicken warm. It made for a wonderful combination having that little chill and that little warmth together as counterparts. It also meant the warm ingredients gave ever the slighest delectable wilting to the arugula too. Since I was cooking for two and it’s one of those meals that serves four or five I naturally had leftovers. If you also end up having leftovers my servng suggestion for the second day is, well, two ways you can have it. chilled from the fridge or you can let it sit out for 30-60 minutes beforehand and serve it at room temperature. I preferred the latter, but either way it’s still going to be delicious.

©2008 Harry Kenney

Warm Grilled Chicken & Arugula Salad

2 medium to large skinless, boneless chicken breasts
5 oz fresh baby arugula, washed and dried
1 medium red onion, sliced very thin
2 oz Kamala olives, halved
10-14 medium button mushrooms, sliced

salt, pepper, garlic powder (optional) to taste
vegetable oil

Lemon Vinaigrette

4-5 tbsps lemon juice
tsp fresh lemon zest
tsp dried oregano
tsp dried basil
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Prepare the salad, in a large bowl place the argula, onion and olives and place in refrigerator to chill slightly. Take sliced mushrooms and into a small pan, brown well, adding vegetable oil as needed, salt and pepper half way through, then set aside.

On a plate oil salt and pepper the chicken then place on oiled grill top (indoor or outdoor.) Flip only once (or as little as possible) Roughly 5-7 minutes per side. Cook until you get a reading of 170-180°F inside. Let site for at least five minutes then cut into bite-sized pieces. Make the dressing by, either in a blender or a small bowl placing lemon zest, lemon juice, orgeano and basil and then slowly whisk in (or in blender, pour in) olive oil until you get an emulsion.

Take salad bowl out of refrigerator. Add warm chicken pieces and warm mushrooms. Add to salad salt, pepper, and (optional) garlic powder and toss. Pour half vinagrette, toss, then remainder toss again and serve. Makes 4-5 servings.

Grilled Portobello Caps (optional side)

5 large portobellos caps, cleaned
balsamic vinegar (optional)
grated Parmesan
vegetable oil
salt, pepper to taste

Clean five large portobello caps. Taking out gills is optional. (You would need to take them out if you were filling the caps, but we’re not.) On place oil on top, salt and pepper, then place on grill cap side down. Season and oil the inside of the mushrooms if you haven’t already. Add oil as needed. Roughly 5-6 minutes for the cap side to grill. Then another 4-5 minutes for the underside. Just before serving, (optional) lightly drizzle balsamic vinegar and sprinkle of grated Parmesan. Serve warm.

It’s nearly time. Both for Independence Day and for me coming back here finally. Funny. I’ve been wanting to start back for a couple weeks now, and even though this time I’m not going to go back to my crazy schedule of before (of 3 to 4 new recipes a week and a new article every week or two), and this time keep it “easy”, it’s really difficult to get going again. Guess it’s the commitment thing. I know when I start I’ll have to keep going. And while that’s a good thing, a very good thing, as said, surprisingly difficult to get that “start off” momentum going.

That said though I did do something interesting the other day I didn’t think I’d do. I love my giant super duper grill-smoker. But for two people and small meals it’s too heavy (that is 20lb grates and my condition) and too much work to contstantly cook in. So my little ol grill is now also on my patio. I know with it’s small space and comparatively light weight parts I’ll be more into grilling things more often. Anyhow looks like I’ll start posting again in July. Thanks for waiting!

… when I start up here again. I had hoped May. But that was not to be. I’m averaging a good real meal and something “new” maybe once every two of three weeks. If you count that back from April it means I have two, maybe four dishes I’ve made new, wrote down the instrucitons and shot photographs of or for. When I feel that I can do this every week is when I figure I’ll resume here.

For now, let me tell you I got the grill cleaned and for Memorial Day weekend had a couple of close friends over. Kept it small and intimate. Same with the menu. Cooked pork spare ribs because …. mmm … I haven’t had them since last October on the grill done by my own hand and I so needed that fix. Plus for appetizers I grilled some 16-20 sized shrimp and made (this is the new item) some nice grilled potato quarters. I’ll be sure to get that up with my first four or five recipes. Till then, thanks for keep looking in and looking at the “old” stuff.

I’m still around and still recuperating. Some days I feel like I can lift mountains (ok, that’s usually only for a few hours a day on those rare days), and most of the other days I feel like I can’t even lift a can opener. Most days it’s Butoni frozen bags or something simple. On the good days I cook something more “normal” but usually nothing too complex. Meanwhile it’s nice to come on and see folks reading the older recipes I’ve done.

Just wanted to drop a note here saying again when I can get a chance I’ll be picking back up on this blog again. No doubt on a more normal once a week manner than the crazy four recipes plus and article, five times a week schedule I did for eight months. Til then, then.

Seven to eight months and constant updates, but, as you see, none lately. Been in the hospital. Some very serious stuff too. And still not over it yet. (I have another test to get done as an outpatient).

… Only been out slightly over 24 hours as I write this btw, and I don’t see myself able to cook even a bag of rice in the next few days. When I can continue, I will and you’ll know it. Plenty to puruse here in the meantime though. Talk to you soon.

Quick note! Based on my writing articles on television shows including now reviewing tv shows such as this cooking show roundup here I’ve decided to do a second new blog!

While you’ll still find new recipes with photos as well as articles on cooking right here at cooking @ home, you can find new television show reviews as well as the latest news on your favorite cooking show host, tv cook, and celebrity chef. We’re covering their shows, their cookbooks, their travels, their new restaurants and even any cookware or spice or sauce they come out with. So whether it’s Gordon Ramsay or Rachael Ray, Guy Fieri or Wolfgang Puck, you’ll find all your favorite celeb chefs at the brand new TV Chefs Blog.

©2008 Harry Kenney

One thing you know about the way I do things, for those who follow me, is that besides pointing out tips I point out the rough spots, the mistakes that I’ve made on a previous version or how to correct mistakes if they’re made. What you don’t see (though I sometimes talk about) are the once in a while big flops.

Yes, I have them too. We all do. (You might find some comfort in that.) Maybe I made a silly mistake that flopped the whole thing. Once in a while the technique I used was the downfall — as when I tried too tough a cut of beef for shish kabobs. Sometimes I misjudge as with a recent braised Swiss chard recipe where by (having not used it before) I totally miscalculated the amount of shrinkage and so the other ingredients in the dish came out in too much proportions.

Then there’s this dish. Over half a year ago I tried something like this. I was going to call it a California salad. It has pineapple and avocado and other ingredients. I also attempted to make some kind of yogurt dressing, though I forget now what was in it besides the yogurt. It was a miserable flop. The dressing and salad didn’t work individually and they worked worse together. I’m still not sure what I did wrong.

Point is, many months later I made a Greek yogurt dressing and it came out nice. And then I made a tropical salsa and it came out excellent. With more time and experience behind my belt, I once again decided to make this salad. But I didn’t take what I did before in to account on purpose. I didn’t try, that is, to go to the same blueprint and make corrections. I just went at it anew with whatever my gut told me to do. You see my gut, my experience had grown more since then, I just let it guide me.

In short, it worked. (If it hadn’t the recipe wouldn’t be up and it you wouldn’t know about it.) So, if you think I cook a lot now judging be the recipes you see on this site. Well sometimes things go wrong behind the scenes and I end up wasting food and my time and taking photos. (Fortunately my flops are few and far between, but they happen.) I don’t feel bad, that is, we all make mistakes. Look at Top Chef, look at other shows … did the winner of the competition ever have a bad dish or were they perfect from day one? They all, even the best of chefs, have a bad day, a bad dish. In fact, if you experiment — and you should — this will always happen; it’s part of the game. So I don’t let it get to me. Again, we often learn from our mistakes.

One thing I do want to mention briefly is that while I’m not sure what happened to that first attempt of a salad similiar to this, my best guess is it was just the wrong mixture and/or proportion of flavors to each other. I like making complex dishes at times. I like the harmony, the interplay of tastes. You know this from other dishes like BBQ sauce. You’ve heard Bobby Flay talk about this. Ming Tsai has made a career out of these balances. The yin and yang. The sweet to offset the sharp; the sharp to liven it up; the hot to give it bite; the oil to clam it down; the tang against … You get the idea.

You might recall one of my very first articles here, Secret to Great Cooking: A Harmony of Contrasts, where I talked about “combining to create a unity of opposites”. That’s what this particular dish — both the salad and the dressing, and more so the two together — really is about. Last time out, my “grasp” of this was off a bit, and that was just enough that it didn’t work. This time my understanding of combining these disparate elements was better and I was successful. Point is, try things. Fail, get up, learn, try it again. Maybe you can figure it out and get it right the next day, maybe eight months has to pass by. Either way, don’t force it, but don’t give up.

One final thing. Not only is this one delicious salad, but the dressing is one of the best I’ve ever made. You will be very surprised how absolutely fantastic it tastes. I’ve made this with both extra-virgin olive oil and at another time with vegetable oil and both work fine, though the olive oil is preferred as it adds an extra fruity dimension to it. Enjoy!

Avocado Salad
©2008 Harry Kenney

2 avocados, peeled and chunked
1/2 medium red onion, chopped
1 pint (16 oz.) cherry tomatoes, leave whole
1 corn cob (roughly 1-1/2 cups), cooked, kernels seperated
1/2 cup fresh pineapple, chunked
1/2 cup fresh papaya, chunked
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, finely minced

Simply mix above together well and serve with dressing.

Cilantro-Lime Vinaigrette
©2008 Harry Kenney

1/2 cup cilantro, finely chopped
2 tbsp lime juice
2 tbsp honey
extra-virgin olive oil (vegetable oil also works)

Place first three ingredients in a blender (can be an old ordinary bar blender, doesn’t have to be a new super powered one). Take off blender top and while mixing, pour in olive oil from top to emulsify. Use approximately 3 parts olive oil to rest of ingredients or until looks right consistency. Taste. Add more if needed until happy with result.

Add by tablespoons over avacado salad (or other salad of your choosing) and mix in well. Serve.

Note: Keep this in refrigerator in a conventional wide-mouthed leftover container; do not bottle. Refrigeration will combine mixture into a thick gelatin-like consistency. To reuse simply mix well with fork for 15 seconds. If needed you could add 1/2 teaspoon of both water and oil.

Today I look at the latest new food and cooking shows of this winter season. Give a nod to some of the best shows that have been on a while, and look forward to the first signs of Spring. Seems Punxsutawney Phil came out of his burrow, saw his shadow made by a creme brulee torch, and predicted two of our top favorite shows will be returning in just a few weeks.

Oh and with this article, I start the first ever reviews complete a star rating system. That said, let’s begin with the latest crop of new programs. Are they feast or famine?

The New Winter Shows

Ultimate Recipe Showdown (The Food Network)

Hmm. This show I’m ambivalent about. First and foremost … I love food competition shows. Iron Chef America is a never miss. The various “Challenge” specials (Ok, I’m personally not as interested in those candy design things. First because I’m sure as heck never going to make one. Second, I hate to watch someone make something for 12 hours and then it falls over and shatter in a million pieces). That said, both the chef ones and the “regular people” food challenges are quite enjoyable. And yes, the Bobby Flay Throwdowns, I enjoy those as much. And so yes, definitely when the home cook gets to compete, I love it. It evens the playing field, that is, you have ICA for the top top and the Ultimate Recipe Showdown balances things.

I also love to see that the average home cook can win $25 grand. Marc Summers isn’t bad and Guy Fieri is charming as always. I do have to say the show is in a variety of ways boring though. This could be cleaned up over time, not sure how, but it could. Mind you I see a lot of effort went into making this as least boring as possible. I recognize that, and yes in many ways this achieves that. In other words, this could have been a total sleeper easily, but it’s not.

Still, and again not sure how, but there is a boredom factor. And where it is is when the cooks come out to the kitchens. They all look as though they are moving in slow motion, avoiding the camera and are semi-comatose. I’ve never seen people stir things so slowly in my life. It’s no race but that said I know these folks wouldn’t be stirring things so slowly in their own kitchens. Again, I know, a good cook or chef is not a television personality. That said, could these people, I dunno, behave more real in the kitchen segment? Maybe even talk or acknowledge they’re on a television set, or even in their own kitchen, but not in a dream world? Again, a little work here is the only part needed. The rest of the show has decent if not great pace. The very necessary kitchen part though the show grinds to a halt. Btw, the recipes are on the website, which is more than I can say about the Iron Chef one’s which never get published.

For it’s giving the home cook a chance, the format, the hosts, the places where it’s done it’s best to cut out the boredom, and for it’s current boredom factor that is there. This show gets 3 stars. As the format is brand new, I can foresee this show might correct the boredom factor, or that I might grow to like this more overtime. So this has the definite possibility of rising to 4 stars down the line.

THE HEAT with Mark McEwan (Fine Living)

While this is not as new as the others, I had mentioned previously that I hadn’t gotten a chance to see this show. So made the concerted effort and have now looked at several episodes. And I hate to say it. This show on the Fine Living network makes Ultimate Recipe Showdown look like an exciting hockey game. What’s the problems? First let me list the positives. The chef is charming and engaging. I like him indeed. (And the women think he’s a hunk.) And the show has slick, professional direction, editing, pacing, all that. Ok, that’s the end of the positives, alas.

There’s two huge problems with this show. One, it can’t hold a candle to Dinner: Impossible. Once you’ve seen Robert Irvine “MacGuyver” a meal for 200 out of sticks and chickenwire, or make 17,000 appetizers in six hours, or cook on a moving train from a kitchen smaller than a Manhatten efficiency apartment … and compare it to this show, it’s Snoresville. so sorry Mark, but having “problems” with being short a few waiters while working in a normal functional facility, well the “so called drama” doesn’t cut it at all. Oh my goodness, there was also the episode that revolved totally around “will the blue-tail tuna he promised the client get there in time” … gasp!? Will the opera house empty out 10 whole minutes early? This minituae while reflecting real life is still one major Yawn City compared to the trials and tribulations Irvine goes through where you hear him intone: “The guests are arriving by boat in 30 minutes and I have no fire to cook anything” or “I’m supposed to make 10,000 pieces of fried chicken but there are no deep fryers anywhere” or “I can get the meal done, but the reception area is a mile away on the other side of the campus”. You just can’t compete with that.

What’s as bad or worse. No recipes! Most of the time only a few of the dishes being served are ever mentioned by name, or briefly shown on camera. The bulk of the dishes aren’t mentioned nor shown at all. Forget what ever went into them. Uh, Hello? This is allegedly a food show, remember that? Apparently not. Sorry, there’s but a single food show on TV that can get away without showing recipes and that’s Ace of Cakes. We want to see the design and we want to see it get to the client in time. In fact, Ace of Cakes has sincerely more drama that “Heat”. When a speciality cake falls apart in the delivery van and the celebration is 45 minutes away and it took a week to make … Now that’s drama, baby. Heat can’t hold a candle to any of the things that go wrong for Duff or Irvine. And even were there no comparison to other shows this still would not change thngs; this is a boring show featuring very little food and zero recipes! That’s just insane. Come on. What’s the sense of watching? None. Oh, and just to see if maybe, maybe, to help give a couple of points here at least, that maybe the recipes might be on the website? A bit of a saving grace? Nope. Nada. Figures!

Sorry, but the so-called THE HEAT (yes the show has the tenacity to put this in big capital letters, just makes you want to heave) definitely needs to be renamed “the tepid” (in all lower-cased letters). For the magnetic host who could really shine in a very different television series, a rating of slightly better than a goose-egg, a single star.

Down Home with the Neely’s (The Food Network)

Well, Lordy! Black people can cook! Hey hey, that’s not news to me, but it is apparently the new-found revelation of the Food Network. That’s right. Just why it has taken the Food Network until late in 2007 (Ingrid Hoffmann’s Simply Delicioso) to finally have a Latin cooking show? And not until 2008 to have a cooking show where the cooks are black? I mean, really! (No, sorry, Al Roker eating diner food does not count. I said cook, not eat.) Ok, let me chill. Past is past. Let’s just call it pasta water under the bridge for now. But I had to get that out. It’s been gnawing inside for way too long.

In any event the hosts and cooks, Pat (the hubbie) and Gina, make for fun watching. Mind you, they have big personalities and are totally wild. This might not appeal to a few folks, though I’d rather see someone’s personality “spice” up a show than watch the other extreme, the boring and the bored. Since Rachel and Paula also have big personalities I’m confident these two are likewise going to be a hit. It really is fun to watch them in a kitchen, and to be candid this is probably the first time I’ve seen a two-host, two cooks in the kitchen show actually succeed. They both are good on their own and together they have great chemistry. And you can tell the affection and fun they have is genuine; it’s just impossible to ever script this.

Do they get a tad too silly? Sometimes. Does it get a tad too sickening sweet? Almost, but a) they draw back from the edge and b) because you know they’re sincere, being themselves it works. Alright, so enough with personality, let’s get down to it: How’s the cooking? He and his brothers own Neely’s which has two locations in Memphis and one in Nashville, and I’ve seen their restaurant many many times over the years as among the best BBQ joints in the nation. In fact you literally cannot do an American barbecue show without mentioning them. So they both can cook and cook well. Two shows I’ve seen now and I definitely want to eat and make the dishes they’ve come up with. (Check further below where I talk about FN Dish to see a video of The Neely’s.) What’s the verdict? It took way too long, FN, but at least you got it right the first time. Neelys make delcious food and you have a fun time watching them do it too.

Last Restaurant Standing (BBC America)

Not sure why, but having heard the premise I didn’t think I would like this new reality competition food show. So much so it delayed my watching it, missing the first episode or two. I can report I was happily mistaken. Sometimes it’s in the editing, the pace, the coverage. Whatever, this show has it. For one, the completing folks here (usually married couples, but there are two twin sisters) have a real restaurant. I thought they were going to jam these people in “faux” restaurants, you know, the way they do the restaurant challenge segment every year on Top Chef. But these are real. And not even next to each other or stuck in one place. They’re 50-100 miles (I guess being Britain I should say kilometers) apart in some cases. As I said it’s real. And I was putting off watching this not expecting that, and delighted it is.

In short a famous French chef now in England, Raymond Blanc, who’s rolling in the dough gives nine sets of folks their chance to open a restaurant. We follow them each week. Besides how they do — do they loose patrons, do they make a profit — they are also given assignments, for instance this week it was “now that they are open, create cocktails and desserts and push them”. You see, this is where the money is made, not off the entrees as much. These are the things that keep restaurants in business and help them make a profit. We watch as the competitors each deal with their own struggling new business, new week problems, each other, and the new challenge. Each week a restaurant is closed down until one remains on which the main chef guy finds is worth his investing in. In short, they win.

Nice idea. Cameras in each restaurant. Case managers to check in. Well executed. It all comes down to, do I care to see what happens next week? And indeed I do. I’m looking forward to it. That’s the mark of any show, but especially the hallmark of a reality competition show. Another score for those folks across the Pond. If I find at the end of the season it stayed high, it could rank from me a rare five stars. As it’s new and I’m not yet addicted (and not sure if I will be or not) for now, a still excellent: 4 stars.

Not reviewed this time out: Everyday Baking on PBS from the folks (Martha Stewart actually) that bring us Everyday Food. Why? I keep missing it. Yeah, I know “Tivo it”. Soon as I get one. Will review this in the future.

The FN Dish

One new show isn’t on television. It’s a weekly webcast. On The FN Dish (love the play on words) food blogger makes good. Adam Roberts, The Amateur Gourmet, and now author, interviews various FN stars and takes us behind the scenes. (Btw, since it’s a webcast and an interview show, I’m skipping the rating system for this one.)

Existing Shows Mini-Reviews

: 5 stars : a sumptuous feast time and time again
: 4 stars : so good you want second helpings
: 3 stars : a decent meal but it needs spice
: 2 stars : brown-bag lunch with stale bread
: 1 star : a TV dinner from the Sixties
: 0 stars : I’d rather have salmonella

Note: This time ’round this isn’t a cross-sampling but a list of the best out there, ergo the high ratings.

Wolfang Puck (Fine Living) When this show first began the opening out-of-kitchen segment involved Puck going to his food sources: an artisan farm for tomatoes, La Bria bakery for fresh bread. Great idea … one that lasted only a few episodes. Since then, every opening segment is about the fellow celebs Wolfgang rubs elbows with; vignettes of him smoozing with fellow Austrian, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger or Whoppie Goldberg or whomever. In short, bring back the food segment, Wolfgang, cause it’s the only thing keeping you “down” to a four-star rating. The rest of the show is priceless and this is a must-see.

Iron Chef America (Food Network) It’s the grand dame, the Super Bowl-and-Spoon, the ultimate cooking sporting event. Overall they get everything right. No one but Alton Brown could ever look at the bizarre things the chefs out out on the counter and immediately know what they are. They even have their own “Simon Cowell” in the form of frequent and minuitae-picking judge Jeffrey Steingarten The fact FN makes this the single show they refuse (why?) to publish the recipes on the website is majorly annoying though.

America’s Test Kitchen (PBS) An excellent over-all job, great tips, I love the kitchen corner comparisons too as no one but they do it (though still getting hopped up over $150 dutch ovens as “bargains” makes me fell that they sometimes forget their audience is home cooks not Michelin-star chefs making Michelin-star money.) This show is great because behind the scenes they test things six ways to Sunday and then film the best. As a side note, the fact some of the recipes on their website they wont show you unless you pay them seems rather miserly.

Dinner: Impossible (Food Network) Super entertaining while it keeps the focus on food, see how it’s prepared, recipes are shown during the show (and found on the website). Chef Robert Irvine is an amazing talent he really does do the impossible. And he has a great sense of humor. There is nothing not to love about this show, and from a sometimes picky critic, that’s a lot to say.

Take Home Chef (TLC) While there are some fans who gripe about the new format — where he goes to viewers who sent in letters or videos — instead of randomly picking up folks from the same cities all the time, I enjoy that he’s now travelling to other places and therefore giving more folks a chance. Other than that it’s the same old show. Which in this case is a good thing. The women love hunky Curtis and more important to me, I love his cooking and style and variety. If only they would get the recipes up on the website more timely as well as lose that hokey listing by person’s name style (again on the website).

Simply Ming (PBS) Love the blending of east meets west defined by two pairing ingredients from each side of the earth .. and he’s entertaining as well, plus excellent guests (parents included). And he fills a major niche. Sure there are and have been other Asian cooking shows with top chefs, but often one is made to feel you can’t do that, it’s too out of your realm. Ming Tsai has a way of doing the opposite. Maybe some of the recipes are a bit strange, but that’s the idea, opening up your mind and your tastebuds. And he does it in a way that makes you feel (correctly) that you can do it too.

Throwdown with Bobby Flay (Food Network) Between the research segment (when there is one), his experimenting in the kitchen and one he’s going up against, you end up wtih two or three top notch variations on a recipe. Spotlighting a certain dish each week. Bobby is always entertaining, and the contest always interesting. Glad Bobby has changed his former style of answering every single challenge (and he was often losing at the time too) by adding blue corn meal and hot peppers. He’s won more contests by tossing that out and even though he still goes back to that frequently it’s not every week. How can you not love an Iron Chef who not only duels his contemporaries on ICA but also shares the limelight with home cooks and small restaurant owners?

Late Winter – Early Spring Preview

One new program and the return of two faves premiere over the next several weeks:

Rescue Chef (Food Network) premieres March 1st.

Expectation: High. Usually if someone can help others, he’s pretty learned. I still enjoy the reruns of Tyler Florence’s Food 911 where he showed great versatility. The host on this new reincarnation of the genre is Danny Boome, advertised as a hockey player, runway model chef. Yuck. Great promoting — Not. These commercials turn me off as they showcase what seems to be a guy who just picked up his spatula for the time.

Fortunately I checked out his resume and — whew — thankfully Boome has the food creds. One last thing, one part of the FN website says his show isn’t on until March 1st, another part of the site says it started two weeks ago. As I’ve said often before, the right hand never knows what the left is doing at this network. If it’s not the commercials and the shows don’t correspond with each other then it’s the website and the shows. FN continues to be the brilliant but nutty professor, 90% brilliant and 10% clueless. At least I can live with the percentages in that order.

The Return of Our Favorite Cooking Reality Shows

Top Chef (Bravo) Season 4 starts March 12th.

Here they come, with the four judges we know so well — Padma Lakshmi, Tom Colicchio, Gail Simmons and Ted Allen — and 16 brand new contestants. The only reality show that has the unique talent of stretching itself out into six months. And now Bravo can do it’s usual, drop all it’s other shows and moprh into the 24-hour Top Chef Network again. If this falls into the pattern of previous years, expect the judges to tell the contestants each week that they’re not trying hard enough to think outside of the box and then belittle them for doing it and send them packing. (The greatest repeated stupidity of this other-wise fine show.)

So let’s see if the judges remains inconsistant again this season. If they get me fed up enough I really might drop watching and reviewing it; they really do get me that annoyed at times. I still find the fact that they filmed this last fall and yet won’t announce the winner live until something like August. Must be the only reality show where the final contestants have to wait something like eight months to know if they’ve won. Strange. And yet it works, for us the television audience.

Hell’s Kitchen (Fox) Season 4 starts April 1st.

Ironic date? One thing that is no joke, really, is every single time I watch a Gordon Ramsay show with my nonagenarian mother, the censors beep him and he curses so much and in such long strings that my Mom invariably asks if the phone is ringing! LMAO! That is 100% true.

Yes, it’s the return of one of the most famous chefs in the entire world. And I’m still not sure how much of it is for his cooking and not his notoriously foul mouth. The fact is, despite the flaws, we like Gordon. Not certain why, and yet I’m among those who like him. Maybe it’s because as annoying as he is, he speaks his mind in an age of politically correct people who all seem brain-washed into keeping their mouths shut. Maybe he’s the external avatar of the green demon inside us all yearning to be free.

All of that aside, this show has the best editing and pacing of any reality show out there. And we get interested in the people, from the short order chefs and home cooking divas who think they can be gourmet chefs, to the back-biting, back-stabbing, and in the midst of all this we get to see food dishes too. All I know is it’s a winning formula and for me, when it’s on, it’s the most addictive of all shows. I can never wait until next week. So get ready for the “big boys” and the herd of “donkeys”, the shining stars and the morons. I always like to figure out who will be the “Tom” or “Aaron” of this season. And will there be any sabotaging “Saras” in the bunch. We’ll know in roughly five more weeks.

I’m already awaiting my first course of “you burnt the bloody risotto” followed by an entree of undercooked “you could kill somebody” chicken.

©2008 Harry Kenney

How I came up with this dish has an odd little road to it. A couple months ago I had friends coming over for a get together and I had my cooking itineary planned, complete with an Italian dessert. No, not one of my own. I do do other people’s recipes at times too. Sometimes I make so many changes that they end up turning into something different and my own, but this was one of those times I was going to pretty much go along with the recipe I had. (At least that had been the initial plan.)

Listen up, this will teach you the value of reading something first, and all the way through and thoroughly. I was going to make this chocolate ricotta dessert (forget what, maybe was a cake, I seem to think it was going to be one of those custard things in ramekins. I had read the recipe throught and even did the two hour prep (again this was a while back, Iwrote down the recipe, but I didn’t write down this story, so bear with my fuzzy memory.)

The important thing was, I never apparently read to the bottom of the recipe. (There’s a lesson in there for both me and you!) It said now chill for six hours in the fridge. I could scream. I knew the cooking was to take an hour, the prep two hours, but now if I went ahead the stupid dessert wouldn’t be ready for six hours? Damn I was annoyed at myself. And a tad frantic. The plan was dinner was to be served in an hour and a half, and dessert needed to be ready in two. No time to run the market or the bakery. So I rushed up to my computer and started searching for “chocolate” and “ricotta” everywhere, and looking for something that would be servable in two hours. In short I found an Emeril recipe for Italian Easter Pie that met my criteria and looked delicious and set on that.

When I printed it out and took it downstairs though, I did what I hadn’t expected at the time doing … changing things around. I didn’t like this. I liked that. He had a flour pie from scratch. This I could have done as I had two premade pie crusts in the refrigerator. I didn’t like that it was a normal crust. I also didn’t like that it was two, one on bottom, then a second one making it a covered pie. I knew I also had in the cupboard a premade shortbread and another chocolate crust. Hey, nothing like chocolate in the filling and as the crust I thought.

It was after Thanksgiving and I had sweetened dried cranberries lefover. I knew from past experience this would not only go very well with the other ingredients but would give it a totally new dimension. Long story short, by the time I was done, the look and the taste were so very different from the original that this very much became my own version. As said, that was two or three months ago. I didn’t take photos of what I was doing as it wasn’t originally going to be my recipe but someone elses. I did write down my new recipe afterwards, but no photos. Ah well, it was a great pie, and I knew I would do it again and take the pics at that time. Which I just did.

Ok, so this came from a mistake I made misreading the initial recipe. And then changing around Emeril’s. Thing is, when doing my research for this recipe here, the background, it seems another mistake was made by Emeril. I wanted to see what was the deal with this Easter Pie concept. So I looked around the web and the first thing I came across was how this was supposed to be a savory, not a sweet pie, in Italy. Huh? Seems after the old conservative Catholic fasting of meat during Lent, the idea was to make a cheese and meat pie. Ok, that made sense. But still could the big E get this wrong or what? There must be sweet variations too.

More digging around and nope, couldn’t find any. So I went to see if the three most famous Italian chefs in America had versions of this and were they sweet or savory; all three, Mario Batali, Giada De Laurentiis amd Lidia Bastianich, had only savory versions of Easter Pies. Yep, other than Emeril’s there wasn’t a single sweet one to be found anywhere. Hmm. So, no idea where he got the idea from, but, that said, it doesn’t matter. I’m not calling this any kind of holiday pie, I’m just calling this what it is, which is delicious!

Whatever the case then, a big tip of the hat to Chef Lagasse for the inspiration and for “version 1.0″ of this dish. And to you folks, I think you will love this “version 2.0″ emmensly. For now, I’m leaving it with the store bought crust in the recipe but I’ll make a version 2.1 at some point and tell you how to make the pie crust from scratch at some point, til then enjoy. I am 100% once you’ve made this pie, you will make it over and over again as one of your favorites.

Harry’s Chocolate Ricotta Cheese Pie
©2008 Harry Kenney

1 premade 9-inch chocolate pie crust

1-1/2 lbs ricotta cheese, drained well
3/4 cup sugar
5 large eggs
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup shaved almonds
1/2 cup sweetened dried cranberries
1 tsp finely grated orange zest
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp vanilla extract
pinch salt

eggwash (one egg and two tbsps water)

Preheat oven to 325°F. Lightly brush eggwash over premade pie shell and place in oven for five minutes. Remove and let cool.

In the bowl of an electric mixer (note I used my handheld for this, but you can use your big stand mixer if you wish), beat the ricotta cheese with the sugar until combined; this should take 3-4 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition, approximately another 2 minutes. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix in for anoterh 2 minutes. Pour into pie shell.

Place pie on baking sheet (optional). Bake until golden brown, roughly 50 minutes. Let cool on counter for 10 minutes, then place in refrigerator (suggest atop a diviot) and allow to get firm for at minumum 60 minutes, and preferrably 90-120 minutes. Serve. Makes 6-8 slices.

©2008 Harry Kenney

Funny how there are some dishes I’ve created and made for a long time, yet, seven months into this cooking site, realize there are still one’s I haven’t included here. This is one of them (til now). I stumbled into this one of those times when I had salsa left over from a party. You see, I do enjoy tortilla chips and salsa as a nice alternate to the usual potato chip and dip. Thing is, in the days after the party I just don’t feel like eating salsa and chips solo. So I need to come up with something to do with that jar. Several years ago after one party I also found I had forgotten to serve the second half of the shrimp I’d bought. (There was still plenty of food and no one at the party knew or missed it though.) … In short. Boom. Came this recipe.

I know the name seems a tad corny coming from me. No, I swear I’m not turning “Rachel” on you. I promise never to call things in between soup and stew “stoop”. And no, I don’t think any male, no matter how brimming with nor how deficient of testosterone should ever have the word “Yum-o!” come from his lips either. So that’s not happening. So the choice was, call this was I call it around the house as my shorthand “Sorta Jambalaya” or name it something more long-winded like “Chicken and Shrimp in Spicy Tomato Spanich Rice”. The latter is accurate but doesn’t roll off the tounge as well. The first is reluctantly a tad cutsy, but it does convey the concept quickly.

Ok, now you’re asking, where am I going. I’m gourmet one minute, regular the next and now straight out of home ec class. Nope, they’re all me. Have you forgotten my Steak Quesadilla or my Pizza Burger Mac recipes? Shame on you! Remember this is “cooking at home”. And I’ve said it before, you can cook gourmet or home ec and/or anything in between at home. You can use all expensive and fresh ingredients and some exotic ones, or you can take a few boxes of off the shelf stuff and make a meal too. Obviously you (and I) don’t always want to make a many ingredient meal. And there’s always something about doing it fast. Provided (big if here) the taste goes with it. And here it does.

What? You want to try me on one more item? You say I’m big on trying to do things authentic and this isn’t very authentic a recipe, that is in the traditional sense of being true to a region and it’s history. That’s correct it is not. And it is also correct that I am big into history and traditional things. But again, I’m not limited to them nor bound by them. Look at my tropical fruit salsa I made just the other day; it’s somewhat fusion even though there is a true Mexican dish that’s equivalent. But, here’s the thing — I always point that out to you. How about my Pancetta-Wrapped Margarita Shrimp? The bacon is from Italy, the liquor from Mexico. Definie fusion. Notice I never once called it an Italian nor a Mexican dish because it isn’t either one.

Matter of fact, the aforementioned steak quesadilla recipe I have here. It’s 100% American. And it’s 50% Mexican. Ok, what do I mean by that? In the US that is a quesadilla. And in many parts of Mexico that is also a quesadilla. But in the southern parts of Mexico they actually make quesadillas the same way Italians make calzones, they fold over the tortilla with the filling inside, crimp it and overlap the dough on the one side to close it, and then deep fry it. So my way is not wrong, but there is another way too.

Finally about tradition. What gets my goat, annoys me to no end is when a recipe passes something off as traditional and it isn’t. When you read my artilces and these “forwards” to each recipe, I say to you, this is how it’s done, or this is one way how it’s done in such-and-such land. Or I will say, they would put this in to be authentic, but I’m leaving it out. I tell you, this recipe or that recipe is or is not traditional. As I’ve said before I’m neither traditionalist nor fusionist, I am what I am at the moment. Most importantly I tell you what that dish is. And here I tell you this is not real jambalaya, it’s “sorta”. And now you know another reason why I called this dish by that name.

Wait? Aren’t I going to give you a history lesson on jambalaya? Naw. I’ll wait until I do the traditional recipe for that. It will be more germane then. Meanwhile, enjoy this simple, and compartively quick dish which will remind you a lot of jambalaya. Oh, there is one Rachel Ray thing about this dish besides the nomenclature — You can make this in 30 minutes or less!

Sorta Jambalaya
©2008 Harry Kenney

1 box Spanish Rice (I like Goya’s) that makes 2.5 cups rice at final
15.5 oz jar spicy tomato salsa with jalapenos (pick your heat level, I used to do “mild”, now I do “medium”)
1 pound of chicken (I use boneless chicken breast)
1/2 pound 31-40 count shrimp, uncooked, devaned, shell totally off, ends included

You can start with precooked chicken, which I already had on hand. Alternately you can also use a rotisserie chicken from the market. Or you can easily cook the chicken right now.

Begin rice preparation as on box, boiling water in a large stock pot or dutch oven.

If cooking chicken with the meal, cut into chunks, toss into largest frying pan you have (12-13″ preferred) with cooking oil on medium-high heat. Brown slightly on all sides, don’t overcook. Take out of pan.

Into same pan, add more oil and cook shrimp, roughly two minutes or less per side. Reserve and let cool. Cut each shrimp into thirds. Add back to pan with chicken, warm up and stir. Add in jar of salsa to frying pan on medium heat, let cook together about 5-10 minutes with lid on. At this point rice should be done.

Add rice to frying pan (if frying pan is too small, then, instead add contents of pan to stock pot or dutch oven, whichever works best). Mix together on low heat for about three or four minutes with lid on. Serve. Makes roughly 8 servings.

©2008 Harry Kenney

Simple recipe? Yes. Simple ingredients? Yes. Great taste? Hey! That goes without saying. What does need talking about is, simple as these are, what is a sauce? A glaze? A mop? What exactly is Jack Daniel’s? And while we’re at it, where exactly on the steer does a strip steak come from?

According to About.com “Mops are sauces you might (better) know as sop, bastes or mops.” I would have to add “glazes” to that list. (For instance the Asian glaze I use on salmon is like this; whereas the glaze I put on meatloaf stays there the first time, that is, one application and leave it.) First, let’s take a left turn. A marinade is a sauce made of either all wet ingredients or wet ingredients and some dry (spices and herbs), but it’s still basically a wet sauce. And into this marinade, your proteins, your meat, poultry or seafood is placed prior to cooking to add flavor. So all these other things — glazes, mops, bastes — are what you put on immediately before and/or during your cooking — as with this recipe.

Moving on, what the heck is Jack Daniel’s anyways? Why it’s Tennessee whiskey. Which is not to say it’s actually whiskey. Ok, it is, but it’s more like bourbon. To confuse you more it’s a “sour mash”. Here’s the deal. taken from Wikipedia: “Whisky or whiskey refers to a broad category of alcoholic beverages that are distilled from fermented grain mash and aged in wooden casks (generally oak). Different grains are used for different varieties, including: barley, malted barley, rye, malted rye, wheat, and maize (corn).”

Got that? Ok, let’s then look at American whiskeys and Jack Daniel’s in particular. “American whiskeys include both straights and blends. To be called ’straight’ the whiskey must be one of the “named types” listed in the federal regulations”. The most common of which are: “Bourbon, which must be at least 51% corn (maize); Rye, which must be at least 51% rye; Corn, which is made from a mash made up of at least 80% corn (maize).” All straight American whiskeys are defined by law to meet certain criteria (which we’ll skip over here). But not Jack Daniel’s which “is identical to bourbon in almost every important respect. The most recognizable difference is that Tennessee whiskey is filtered through sugar maple charcoal, giving it a unique flavour and aroma.”

Ok, that covers sauces and “Jack”. (Btw, if anyone ever says to you “You don’t know jack”, now you can say you do!) So what is strip steak? It is cut from the short loin (sometimes also called a strip loin), It’s a muscle that does little work, and so it’s extremely tender. Unlike the nearby filet mignon, the strip loin is a sizable muscle, which allows it to be cut into the larger portions to the delight of steak eaters. (See the public domain image here.)

One funny thing about this steak, it has more aliases than most criminals! It is known simply as the strip steak, natch. It’s also known as (big breath): top loin steak, New York steak, New York strip steak, Kansas City steak, Kansas City strip steak, hotel steak, ambassador steak, club sirloin steak, strip sirlon steak, shell steak and even the Delmonico. Yep, a whole lot of names for one single cut. Furthermore, in the UK and British Commonwealth countries this is known as “porterhouse”. But no, this is not the same as American’s are used to, Amercian porterhouse is a different cut, which to avoid any more confusion, I’m not going to get into. What matters about the strip steak is it’s expensive and it’s tender and delicious.

Note: This is a smoke alert dish! As you see in the photo, this baby will smoke. How do they do it in the restaurants? Obviously they have those big hooded exhaust fans directly over their grills and stoves. Whereas cooking at home, some of us do, many of us do not. If you can do this on an outdoor grill, all the better, in fact, that would be best. For me, as it was 16 degrees here in Philly when I did this the other day, I pretty much had no choice. Hey, you know the saying where there’s smoke there’s fire? Well here, where there’s smoke, there’s taste! … And a bit of a clean up. So, you’ve been forewarned.

Grilled Strip Steak with Jack Daniel’s Glaze
©2008 Harry Kenney

Two one-pound strip steaks

1/2 cup Jack Daniel’s
1/2 cup pineapple juice
2 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp worchestershire
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp ground ginger

Combine (whisk) ingredients well. Place into small saucepan on medium-high heat. Reduce volume of liquid down to 1/4. Either get your outdoor grill ready or preheat your indoor grill. Let sauce cool enough that you can pour onto a plate and coat both sides of each steak portion in the sauce then onto the grill. Cook as you normally would. Each time you turn your steak, baste on with brush (or tablespoon if no brush) more of the glaze. Do not add sauce after you take it off, only before and during. Cook to your taste (preferabbly medium or medium-rare). Serve.

Sauce is enough for repeated bastings of both sides of two one pound steaks. Warning if done indoors this will create a good deal of smoke. Therefore outdoors is preferred, but you can certainly do this indoors. Your choice.