We like to eat. We like to cook. We like to play games. Why not write a blog about it? Especially with this title, i mean come on. We couldn't waste that!
Photos and Writing by Karen & Robert Steele
Showing posts with label America's Test Kitchen. Show all posts
Showing posts with label America's Test Kitchen. Show all posts
This recipe calls for a 6-inch cake pan. I do not have such an item, but I do have a 7-inch pie pan!
It's pretty straight-forward. Goo up some apple slices in a skillet with butter and brown sugar, then put into pan. Whip up some cake batter, pour on top of the apples, and voilá! Apple upside down cake!
Right side up? Or up side down?
The only hitch came when all the apple pieces didn't fit in the pan. In the vernacular, that pan was full-up. But that's not a problem, because the cake batter will fill in all the spaces and fit nicely, right? Right? Well...maybe not. At least we didn't have any spill-over.
Upside down? Or right side up? Things get tricky when upside down is right side up.
Maybe there were just a few too many apple slices for the ideal cake. I'm not complaining, though.
Jealous yet?
What: Apple Upside-Down Cake
Where: America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2011
Here's a pretty tasty variation on rice and beans. Brown rice, black beans, and corn concoction topped with a tomato and green onion salsa.
Dinner, deconstructed.
It does take a while, brown rice being brown rice and all. I suppose you could make it with quick brown rice, if you really wanted to - or even frozen brown rice that comes in the steamer bag you put in the microwave. The frozen brown rice is super easy and surprisingly tasty, but not nearly as cheap as plain brown rice.
Dinner, constructed.
Did you notice how healthy it was? Brown rice, beans, vegetarian (or to be more precise, vegan) or at least it would have been if I hadn't used chicken broth. I will definitely make this again, and possibly some of the variations: skillet brown rice with chickpeas and coconut milk, spanish-style skillet brown rice and chickpeas. It's going to be hard to beat the black beans, though.
What: Skillet Brown Rice and Beans Where: America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2011 Results: Pretty good. Will make again. The salsa really improves the dish.
I've never made apple strudel before, so I have no idea what the non-quick version involves. Maybe making your own dough instead of using frozen phyllo dough?
Counter-clockwise from top: raisins, sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon. Mise en place!
Our filling consisted of apple, cinnamon, a little lemon juice, sugar, and golden raisins that had been plumped by microwaving them in a liquid. The liquid suggested was apple brandy, or apple whiskey, or apple cider, but you could use apple juice or probably even just water - the one tablespoon of liquid gets poured off after performing its moisturizing duties.
Raw strudel - looks promising!
Roll up filling in 5 buttered and sugared pieces of phyllo, cut some venting strips, and bake. Frozen phyllo can be fussy, and there's a whole lot left, even if you end up tearing and throwing out a bunch of sheets. Perhaps frozen puff pastry would be a good substitute. Would that make it not a strudel anymore? What part of the strudel makes it a strudel and not some generic apple-filled pastry?
The finished product, plus burned goo.
The strudel was super fantastic! A little bit of goo leaked out and started burning, so we pulled it out of the oven before the top was golden brown, but Mr. Pots and Pawns pulled out the crème brûlée torch and golden browned the top. Yes, I just verbed golden brown.
Yes, it is as delicious as it looks.
This recipe came from America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2011. Having meals that are sized for two is okay - 1) there are rarely left overs, but delicious left overs are not a bad thing, and 2) when things don't work out it's not nearly as traumatic. However, deserts for two is about the best thing ever, for obvious reasons, including the fact that they tend to be incredibly cute.
What: Quick Apple Strudel
Where: America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2011
Firstly - this was supposed to be a recipe for farro risotto. That was the first problem. Farro.
It sounds good in theory. It's super healthy and purportedly tasty and toothsome with a nutty flavor. I imagine something like brown rice crossed with barley. It's also incredibly hard to find.
Target had some precooked farro in a vacuum sealed bag. I passed this up reasoning that the starches from cooking were necessary for proper risotto. At Whole Foods, there was no bulk farro to be found, and the shelf space for farro was bare. However, a "helpful" employee told us that spelt was pretty much the same thing and would work just fine in a risotto. So we go spelt.
Here's just some of ingredients used. That's spelt over there. Weren't there cherry tomatoes?
Another thing you should know: this was a Test Kitchen recipe. Those guys really know their stuff, and their recipes always turn out well if you follow the recipe. ALWAYS FOLLOW THE RECIPE. Once you deviate from the recipe, all bets are off.
I'm a good enough cook that I'm usually confident about changing a (non baking) recipe around if it suits me, but this time I was working with two unknowns: 1) grains I am completely unfamiliar with and 2) risotto, which I have eaten before but never made. Red alert! Danger! We have gone from trying to solve a two-body problem to trying to solve a three-body problem.
Here are the cherry tomatoes! They were busy getting quartered. But not drawn.
The first clue I had that all was not well happened while cooking the grain. I was supposed to "simmer and stir often until all the liquid was absorbed or evaporated, about 20 to 25 minutes." I have a hard time with reducing liquids as it is - I get impatient. I almost never let a sauce reduce as much as it needs to in order to get properly saucy. However, after 40 minutes of simmering and frequent stirring, I simply poured off the excess and continued on my way.
The results weren't terrible. The flavor was quite good. You see, after cooking the grains, I stirred in cherry tomatoes, baby arugula, lemon zest, lemon juice, butter, and parmesan. Tasty stuff. However, the grain was quite chewy and not at all risotto-esque. And when I say the grain was quite chewy, I don't mean in a bad way, just in an out-of-place way. I think spelt would work well as a salad topping, for example.
See? Not bad looking, just not risotto...
Here's how I'd fix this recipe. Forget fancy new healthy grains. Forget risotto. All that tasty stuff that got added to the grains? Add it to brown rice or maybe just noodes. Yummy, easy, and solves the problem of waiting for liquid to disappear.
On the plus side, I discovered another reason to love Cooking for Two. When a new and experimental recipe doesn't turn out as expected, there's less food to be disappointed by!
What: Farro Spelt Risotto Source: America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2011
Results: Veto. *Maybe* try again someday with real farro.
My process for writing posts is as follows:
1) Try to remember to take pictures of cooking things or playing games
2) Do other things. This step can take days, or weeks!)
3) Decide to write a post
4) Import photos from camera. Look at photos and say "oh yeah, that happened!"
5) Write post
This week has been super full of the "other things" mentioned in step 2. It was so full, that no menu was made, no groceries shopped for, no new fun recipes were made. There was an emergency game night, but no pictures were taken. Fortunately, there are pictures from over a week ago in the camera.
Soup! Cheese! Avocado! What's not to love?
This is another slow cooker recipe from America's Test Kitchen Slow Cooker Revolution. I've made it before, but this time was special. The cooking time is only 4 to 6 hours, which means it's not great for starting in the morning and coming home to after an 8 hour day at the office (or school). The solution? Mr. PotsAndPawns started it while I was out. I came home to magic soup! (Magic because I didn't have to cook it.) Hooray, soup!
All dressed up! See how I put a chip in it? Very fancy...
This soup made plenty of left overs, but it was so tasty that we didn't try to freeze any. We just ate it all over the next couple of days.
What: Chicken Tortilla Soup
Results: Tasty, and spicy! Watch out for those chipotles in adobo sauce!
Source: America's Test Kitchen Slow Cooker Revolution
Have you noticed that lots of grocery stores only carry apple cider in October? Or at least, they only display it in areas that are easy to see in October. I have noticed, because my brain says "Look! Apple cider! You should make Chicken with Apple Cider Sauce!"
The ingredients! No, I think the lemon juice looks fine. It must be your monitor.
I came across this recipe years ago living in my first house with cable (and the Food Network!) We had cable because my roommate got it. I guess that How to Boil Water was on at a convenient time, because they made this recipe and they made it look super easy. So I tried it, and it was awesome. In fact, I made a whole dinner with roasted asparagus and rice pilaf.
Look! I remembered to take pictures while cooking! I'm pretty fancy.
I just checked on the internet and the show is still running! Wikipedia says it's been going since 1993. Crazy! Here's the link: Chicken with Apple Cider Sauce.
Ta-daa!
Notes: Even though you use cider to make the sauce, it's not particularly apple-y or cider-y. You will feel silly for buying a huge thing of apple cider and only using half a cup.
Secrets: Pan sauces make you look (and feel) super fancy, but they are really super easy.
Proto-apple dumplings
Still reading? We had apple dumplings for desert. These were pretty easy, too. This recipe came from America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2009. You basically bake apples in a pastry dough, then cover with a cider syrup. I made one major departure: the recipe called for puff pastry, but they were sold out at the store. What they did have was single sheet crescent roll dough, so I used that instead. It worked great!
Apple Dumpling with cider syrup
What 1: Chicken with Apple Cider Sauce Notes 1: Pretty good. Let sauce cook down more, use less butter
Black beans, or bleans, are one of the tastiest beans out there. While I am sure there are many fantastic vegetarian black bean soups out there, this is not one of them. This is a very porky black bean soup. Apologies to vegetarians and pork-averse readers.
Black beans! From the Wikimedia Commons
One of the things a slow cooker does very well is to cook weird pieces of meat and make them tender and delicious. What makes a piece of meat weird? Well, here are some things that are not weird: boneless skinless chicken breast, ground beef, ribeye, and boneless skinless chicken thigh. Things that are weird: anything with skin still on it, anything with the bone still in it, and anything that I don't immediately know I can find at Super Target. Chicken parts: weird. Whole chicken: super weird. Smoked ham hock: what?
Super weird Japanese thing. Watch all the mameshiba videos on you tube!
This specialized ingredient was not at my normal grocery store. This is not the first time this has happened. The first time, I was looking for something called blade steak. I went to the fanciest grocery store I could think of, approached the expansive intimidating meat counter, and made my request.
"A what?"
"A blade steak"
"Um...let me go in the back and ask someone."
They never came back out. The was a learning moment for me. All the celebrity chefs say to talk to your butcher, find out what's fresh, they'll have helpful tips on how to best cook certain cuts of meat, make friends with them, take them out for drinks. Okay, maybe not the last part so much. Anyway, it was at that moment I realized there was probably very little butchering going on behind that fancy meat counter. Actually, the learning moment was spread out over the 20 minutes I was waiting for the meat attendant to come back. Now my tactic is to look at two or three places, then find a substitute.
Look, they even have Mameshiba plushies!
This time I found a smoked ham shank instead of smoked ham hock. Close enough.
Mmm...soup! Is sticking a spoon on it at all like putting a bird on it?
The soup turned out good, if a little smokier and a little meatier than when it has ham hock. Garnish with sour cream, red onion, and hot sauce.
Mameshiba coin purse! Squee!
What: Black Bean Soup
Results: Good. Smokey, meaty
Where: America's Test Kitchen Slow Cooker Revolution
The weather has taken its first chilly turn of the season, which can only mean one thing. Soup! And what's the easiest way to make soup? In the crockpot! Or slow cooker, as they say these days. So go blow your nose on a facial tissue, bandage your boo-boos with adhesive bandages, and store your food in resealable plastic bags. Actually, I think my slow cooker actually is a Crock Pot, so I'm off the hook.
This looks exactly like my *ahem* slow cooker, except for the Rival label. Found at nu-spoon.com
Tonight's recipe came from America's Test Kitchen Slow Cooker Revolution. I know you're shocked that I've made another Test Kitchen recipe. I get in phases. My previous phase was Alton Brown. Before that it was Mark Bittman. The Joy of Cooking was my undergrad cookbook. Betty Crocker was my high school cookbook. Of course, there were plenty of other cookbooks mixed in there as well. Anyway, this is my Test Kitchen phase. Deal with it.
The important thing to realize about this recipe is that it's not easy, at least not by my standards. There is a lot of prep work to do, and it calls for cooking some of the stuff in a skillet before it goes in the slow cooker. Yep, you read that right. Cook it in a pan, then cook it in a slow cooker. I was *very* resistant to this idea at first. You should just be able to dump everything in and turn it on, right?
The thing about Test Kitchen is that they are very good at describing why they made the choices they made about a recipe. You can only read that browning the meat in the pan first *really* improves the flavor before you start to believe it, and before you know it, you're pulling out the skillet along with the slow cooker to try it out. *Even though* it's a whole extra dirty pan that you have to wash by hand. That's faith.
Oooh! Ahhh!
The other important thing about this recipe is that it is delicious. I have no idea if it freezes well, but I do know it makes good left overs. The 6 to 8 servings it makes always disappear within a few days.
What: Farmhouse Chicken and Corn Chowder
Results: Delicious Source: America's Test Kitchen Slow Cooker Revolution
Here's a recipe that requires no recipe. Here's the completely unnecessary recipe.
Mini Pizza!
Ingredients:
Bread of above average strength*
pizza sauce**
toppings***
1. Preheat oven to whatever**** suits you
2. Assemble mini pizzas
3. Bake in oven until heated through and cheese is all melty, if you even used cheese.
4. Let cool as long as you can stand it
5. Put it in your face.
Before baking. Left: Canadian Bacon and Pineapple. Right: mini-pepperoni
After baking. Mmmm...melty cheese....
*We used Filone rolls. I hear english muffins work too. What is a Filone roll? I don't know, but we saw them at Target in the fresh bread section and thought they looked about right.
Filone
**Pizza sauce can be anything goopy and tasty. Spaghetti sauce, alfredo, garlic butter, whatever. I used a pretty awesome no-cook pizza sauce recipe that was embedded in America's Test Kitchen's recipe for Thin-Crust Pizza. If you're an Amazon Prime member, you can watch season 12 for free. The no-cook pizza sauce recipe is in there, episode 8. You can also find the recipe on their website for free, but you do have to register.
Pretty awesome no-cook pizza sauce
***Pizza toppings: usual or unusual, meaty or veggie, anything goes!
****Our oven's default is 350, so that's what we went with. However, the oven thermometer (which can also lie) said it was closer to 250. The point is, nobody knows what temperature it was really at, but it was in there for about 10 minutes.
Lighter than what? Who knows? But I think it means the sauce is lighter than a standard tomato sauce.
Here's what it looked like in real life:
Beautiful! Except for, you know, the labels all over it. I'm not really sure who to credit for this. The watermark says "Photo by Carl Tremblay." It's definitely the official America's Test Kitchen photo. I know this because it's the same photo that's in my cookbook.
Here's what our pictures looked like:
Shadowy, blurry...oh yeah, I'm awesome. First, fix the blurry. No more phone pics. Use the tripod. Yeah, I have one of those. Second, I was going to say fix the lighting, but the "enhance" button in iPhoto mostly fixed that problem.
The recipe itself turned out to be pretty good. It's a nice veggie pasta when you're not too hungry. But! It involved browning zucchini in the pan, then transferring to a bowl whose sole purpose in this recipe is to hold the cooked zucchini, and browning more veggies in the pan. I'm against extra dirty dishes.
Here's what needs to happen:
Just skip the zucchini. Save time and dishes. Plus, the recipe only calls for half a zucchini. What are you going to do with the other half?
Double the noodles, because noodles are awesome.
Remember to add the basil.
Note: Fresh basil is awesome. The so-called "living herb" basil that comes with its own little clod of dirt is not awesome. I got some once and it was mostly dead after two days. I swear I followed the directions and watered it correctly, but alas. Someday we'll have a magic garden (magic because it will have to garden itself) and grow herbs and peppers and other delicious gardeny vegetables.
Here's the brilliant plan for the left over half zucchini, half red pepper, and half onion: Nachos!
What: Lighter Pasta with Garden Vegetable Sauce
Results: Pretty good
Where: America's Test Kitchen Cooking for Two 2009
PS - This is similar to another veggie pasta thing I do where I cook whatever vegetables are around in a mixture of butter and olive oil and then mix it up with noodles. Yummy! The biggest difference is that this recipe adds tomato paste (and no butter), which makes it *taste* healthier, but I do *really* like the tomato paste-less version a lot.
This recipe was AMAZING. I started with high expectations (tortilla casserole, hello) and I had some doubts that it would be worth it at about the time I was trying to peel the chicken off the pan (why you stick to pan, chicken?) but in the end, WOW. Bonus - no canned soups! Or cream of X as one of my friends would call it. Maybe she stills calls it cream of X. We haven't talked about canned soups in many years.
I completely forgot to take pictures. Well, that's not entirely true. I forgot about taking pictures until I served it, at which point I looked at the pile of goopy, lumpy, mostly brown looking mush, and I knew that no picture I could take at that point would do it justice.
But, because blogs need pictures, I found some on the internet, just for you.
