Spaghetti with Crab, Lemon and Chili

For some reason on our last trip to Cost Co I decided to pick up a can of jumbo crab.  I say "for some reason" because I am not actually a huge fan of crab meat in things.  I love crabs.  But I think that, at least for me, the whole experience of cracking and picking apart crabs smothered in Old Bay and drinking a beer is what makes crab worthwhile.  It should be messy and un-refined.  I also really enjoy a good Dungeness crab from time to time, but again it's the experience of eating the whole crab that I really enjoy.  I will also occasionally eat crab cake, but I am very picky about my crab cakes.  Growing up in Maryland can turn people into total crab cake snobs.  I also love soft shell crabs in a number of different preparations (fried Asian soft shell crabs rock my world).  But crab on pasta just didn't do it for me.  I have wanted to try a pasta with chilis and crab for a long time.  And maybe we just didn't do a very good job with it.  But I thought the flavor of the chilis totally overpowered the flavor of the crab and the basil.  It was fine (and we both cleared our plates), but I wouldn't make it again.  Luckily we have just under a pound of crab meat leftover so I think we are going to make some crab cakes for dinner.  Here's hoping that the crab cakes turn out better than our pasta...

Recipe after the jump!

Grilled Swordfish with Lemon and Oregano

 

This swordfish was the last of the fish I picked up at Citarella last Saturday and it is probably the last seafood dish we will make this year.   It isn't the most successful seafood recipe we have tried this year, nor is it the most successful swordfish we have ever made.  But it was light, fresh and very easy to put together.  Speaking of the other fish recipes we made this year, my favorites were probably the Swordfish with Chile Pesto, the Pistachio-Crusted Halibut with Spicy Yogurt (this halibut was my favorite new fish recipe of the year) and Mark Bittman's Roasted Salmon with Butter.  If we broaden the category to include seafood other than fish, one of my favorite recipes from this year I have to mention these Moroccan Baked Scallops.  But this was a nice seafood recipe to close out the year with and it was an excellent counterpoint to the duck breasts we are going to have tonight and the pork belly we had last night for dinner.  I bet if we had a grill and had been able to grill the fish to give it that extra smoky flavor, it would have made a big difference.  It is the type of fish dish that it is reminiscent of lazy evenings at the beach in summertime - I think it's the bright/summery combination of the lemon, herbs and evoo.  I have never been to Greece but the swordfish feels like it should be eaten on a white sand beach in Greece. 

Recipe after the jump!

Pear, Basil and Pecorino Toscano Salad

Fall is here (or almost here)!  And with fall - apples, pears and the very beginning of squash season.  This is my favorite time of year at the farmers' market because you still have a lot of the great summer produce (although fresh corn and basil will be disappearing shortly), but honeycrisp apples and acorn squash are making their debut.  It is so exciting.  To celebrate I decided to make this pear salad for breakfast along with some hoe cakes.  There is a story that goes with the hoe cakes, but you are going to wait until we post them to hear that particular story.  Anyway, I thought this salad was really interesting - the juxtaposition of sweet pears and basil with salty, nutty cheese totally worked for me.  It made a really nice breakfast/brunch dish.  We made the pears with hoe cakes, blending an Italian salad with a very traditional Southern dish, but I think it totally worked!

P.S.  Alex pointed out that you can see the reflection of the building across the street on the plate in our picture.  Living in an NYC apartment means that we don't exactly have a lot of options for taking pictures of our dishes, particularly not when we want natural light.  Our choices are basically the windowsill (like this picture) or the coffee table.  But I think this is the first time that we caught a reflection like that!

Recipe after the jump!

Festivus Chocolate Salami

Once upon a time my parents and I used to go to a restaurant called Il Pizzico in Rockville, Maryland for all special occasions.  Actually, when we first started going to Il Pizzico it was more of a cafe than a restaurant and it wasn't restricted to special occasions.  But as time went by it became fancier and more expensive, so it was relegated to the special occasion category.  But back when we first started going there they had this desert called chocolate salami that I used to love.  The first time I ordered it the waiter had to convince me that it was a legitimate dessert and not some weird meat product.  The dessert looked like 3 or 4 chocolate cookies in a small puddle of creme anglaise (or a similar sauce).  I loved it.  Unfortunately, as the restaurant got fancier the chocolate salami disappeared from the menu.  I guess it wasn't fancy enough.  I recently decided that I wanted to try and recreate the chocolate salami I remembered from Il Pizzico at home.  But once I started playing around online I realized that there were all sorts of different chocolate salami recipes out there.  Giada De Laurentis's recipe uses walnuts, almonds, coffee, orange zest and biscotti, La Mia Vita Dolce's recipe uses rum, hazlenuts, almonds and pistachios, Pink Bite's recipe uses raisins, cognac and condensed milk...  I could go on forever, but I think you get the picture.  The only constants in the recipes that I found online were butter, egg, cocoa, sugar, and some sort of cookies. 

In the end I decided to go with the "Festivus Chocolate Salami" recipe that I found on the Saveur website, not because of any enduring love of Seinfeld or the Festivus holiday, but because it sounded the most interesting to me.  I really think it was the cocoa nibs and the orange liqueur that got me.  Anyway, I really thought the chocolate salami were yummy.  It had good texture and really good flavor - chocolately, sweet (but not too sweet) with a hint of orange.  The gingersnaps we used had a really strong ginger flavor that almost made the chocolate salami taste... minty.  I know that doesn't make sense, but both Alex and I noticed it.  We served the chocolate salami thinly sliced (and you want to make sure it is thinly sliced, otherwise it is a little too much) with some strawberries.  I wish I had made some creme anglaise or something else to go with the chocolate salami to provide some creaminess and sauce, but it worked pretty well with just the strawberries!  I think if you had a small pool of creme anglaise under the chocolate salami, along with the strawberries it would have been a really elegant, yet fun dessert appropriate for a dinner party.  One of the best things about it is that you don't have to bake it so it works really well for the summer when turning on the oven is the very last thing you ant to do! 

Recipe after the jump!

Veggie Ciabatta Pizza with Spicy Basil-Mint Pesto

This dish came about as a way to use up some of the large bunch of basil that I picked up at the farmers' market.  But we wanted to do something a little different.  So I decided to throw in some mint.  And then I saw a Mario Batali pesto recipe online that used a serrano chili, so I threw that in as well.  We also got the idea to throw in fennel seeds from the Batali recipe.  We were out of pine nuts and I wasn't feeling like pistachios or walnuts, so we used blanched almonds instead.  Alex wanted to use the pesto for sandwiches, but I thought that pizza sounded like a better idea.  I just wasn't feeling sandwich-y.  And then I started thinking that if we were going to make a pizza, we should make it a vegetable pizza with lots of produce from the farmer's market.  I love the farmers' market.  So we defrosted a ball of pizza dough.  And then I started thinking that a ciabatta pizza would be even better than a typical pizza.  So we picked up a loaf of ciabatta at the farmers' market.  And we will use that ball of pizza dough to make another pizza later in the week - I'm thinking pizza with zucchini and speck.  When I told Alex my idea for the zucchini and speck pizza his response was "don't you ever eat normal pizza?!?!"  Whatever.  I have tried that combination at a restaurant near my office called Pizzarte (where the zucchini and speck pizza is their signature pizza) and it's delicious.

The thing I loved about this pizza is how easy it was to put together and how tasty it was.  The veggies were fresh and flavorful and made me feel virtuous, even though I was eating pizza.  And I really liked how the ciabatta got nice and crusty and crispy.  The dish was also mildly nostalgic - it reminded me of the french bread pizzas I used to eat.  Alex's favorite thing about the pizza was the pesto.  It was very flavorful - a little spicy, a little salty, and nicely herbaceous.  I think the pesto worked wonderfully here, but it would work really nicely on sandwiches and on pasta too.  I always find pasta with just pesto to be a little boring, but this pesto is a little kickier than most, so it might work. 

Recipe after the jump!

Farro Pasta with Roasted Beets, Beet Greens and Pine Nuts

We got the idea for this pasta as a combination of two recipes that I found on Epicurious - Farfalle with Golden Beets, Beet Greens and Pine Nuts and Farro Spaghetti, Beets, Brown Butter, Poppy Seeds.   I wanted to make an easy vegetarian dish that would take advantage of the beet greens on the cute little beets that I picked up at the farmers' market today.  Usually the greens on beets from the super market look a little pathetic.  But these were bright green and lovely.  I had another beet recipe for Maple Horseradish Glazed Beets that I really wanted to make, but we ended up going for this one because the other one didn't use the greens.

The thing I liked most about the recipe was that all of the ingredients had a purpose.  Every element was a crucial component - nothing felt gratuitous.  As we were eating I mentioned to Alex that toasted pine nuts often feel gratuitous to me, but in this dish the texture and buttery, rich flavor they added were just what the dish needed to elevate itself.  The sweetness of the carameliontrzed onions and the roasted beets contrasts nicely with the salty, nutty cheese and the slightly nutty farro spaghetti.  The beet greens lend a little volume (plus some vitamins) and have a very mild flavor similar to Swiss chard.  I thought they might be a bit more bitter, but I'm glad that they weren't.  Another plus with this recipe is how easy it is to prepare.  It is a little time-intensive since you have to roast the beets and caramelize the onions and both of those things always take forever, but it doesn't require a ton of effort or ingredients to produce.  And if you use red beets, the pasta ends up looking all beautifully pink and delicious.  In my opinion that's another reason to make the dish.

Recipe after the jump!

Panzanella Salad

I know this recipe isn't exactly original or innovative.  Recipes for panzanella salad are everywhere.  Some add bell peppers, capers, olives or cheese, but all of them are made with bread, tomatoes, basil and cucumbers.  We didn't try for anything new and exciting here - we just went with the staples and made ourselves a standard panzanella salad, although we used a lemony vinaigrette, rather than red wine vinegar, which I tend to find a little harsh.  And then we added some seeded and minced jalapenos for a little something new.  I really enjoyed it.  But I love bread, tomatoes and basil.  And what could possibly be better at the height of summer?

Recipe after the jump!

Penne with Spinach and Ricotta

I love fresh ricotta.  And the fresh ricotta we have in the fridge has been begging for another use.  I had various ideas about what to make with the ricotta, but I settled on a simple pasta recipe.  I thought about making gnocchi or gnudi, but then decided to go with a simpler recipe.  I also thought about making some sort of baked pasta with ricotta, but it's too warm to bake pasta right now.  In the end I picked a recipe on Food & Wine from Lidia Bastianich because it looked easy and we had everything we needed, except the spinach and the sage, in the fridge.  I was originally thinking of making up my own pasta recipe using spinach and ricotta with lemon zest, but I decided to try this recipe instead.  The recipe actually called for pappardelle, but we had penne in the cupboard.  So we went with that instead.  

This pasta isn't going to win any awards for being new and original, or unbelievably delicious.  And if all you have is grocery store ricotta I would steer clear.  But with the wonderful fresh ricotta we picked up from the farmer's market it was actually quite good!  The fresh ricotta gave it a very pleasant creaminess and richness and the Parm-Reg gave it some more robust, salty flavor.  I never would have thought to pair fresh sage with baby spinach, scallions and fresh ricotta.  When I think sage I think Thanksgiving or butternut squash.  I don't think fresh ricotta and spinach.  But it worked.  The only problem was that the ricotta didn't cling to the pasta very well so some bites were essentially plain pasta, whereas others were full of spinach and ricotta.  Oh well. 

Recipe after the jump!

Braised Broccoli Rabe with Olive Tapenade

This has been the perfect weekend, capped off with what I think of as the perfect lunch.  But more on that later.  Someone asked me recently what would I do on the perfect weekend in New York.  My answer was that I would do nothing.  But that is totally deceptive.  By doing "nothing" I mean going to Central Park with Brady and Alex Saturday morning for leash off where we would meet up with friends.  And then we would get coffee before I ran off to the gym.  Saturday afternoon we might go to the Union Square farmers' market or lunch.  Or we would just wander around the city.  Saturday night we would go out for dinner at a fabulous but moderately low key restaurant (no Meatpacking or crazy trendy restaurants for me on Saturday night), followed by a drink with friends.  Sunday morning we would head back to Central Park for leash off, followed by coffee and a jaunt to the farmers' market behind the Museum of Natural History.  After that, we would make lunch at home using some of the wonderful food we picked up at the farmers' market.  Sunday night we would make dinner using more of the fresh produce.  That is my perfect weekend.  Every once in awhile I want to throw in a Broadway show, a food festival, a cooking class, some serious shopping or a big night out with friends.  But for the most part, my perfect weekend is taking advantage of the things that NYC has to offer that I enjoy - Central Park, farmers' markets and delicious restaurants.  This weekend was one of those weekends.  We tried out a great restaurant called Whitehall Bar & Kitchen last night.  They had a fantastic cocktail list with a focus on gin and delicious food.  I highly recommend it.  And then today we made my favorite kind of lazy Sunday lunch cobbled together with fresh bread, fresh produce and other farmers' market finds.  I decided today to pick up some fresh ricotta from the farmers' market and make simple crostini on fresh bread with the ricotta, a drizzle of good quality evoo, sea salt and pepper.  The fresh ricotta was sweet and lush, not as watery as grocery store fresh ricotta.  It would be the perfect ricotta to make cheesecake with or serve with strawberries and balsamic.  And then we braised a gorgeous bunch of broccoli rabe and served it all with some mole salami from Mario Batali's dad's store Salumi Artisan Cured Meats that we picked up at Gastronomie 491. Everything was delicious.

The broccoli rabe was salty and spicy and a good counterpoint to the creamy sweetness of the crostini.  We used a Mario Batali recipe for inspiration, but we improvised a bit.  Our broccoli rabe was young and a lot more tender than the broccoli rabe that you find at the grocery store so I didn't want to braise it for a long time.  And we didn't have small black olives, so Alex suggested throwing in some green olive tapenade.  I also briefly considered adding some red wine to the braising liquid, but decided that I was too lazy to open a whole bottle of red to just use 1-2 tbsp of it.  The broccoli rabe was good, but I'm curious to see how it would taste with actual olives instead of tapenade.  When I checked out the same Mario Batali recipe online I saw that it called for anchovies, as well as olives.  That sounds a little too aggressive for me, but who knows?  Maybe we will try that next time too!

Recipe after the jump!

Garlic Knots Two Ways

The problem with making Jim Lahey's No-Knead Pizza Dough is figuring out what to do with the remaining dough.  We used one ball of dough to make our White Pizza with Ramps, but we had 2 more balls of dough left in the fridge.  I knew right away that I wanted to make a batch of garlic knots and I was thinking about making a calzone with the other dough, but we couldn't decide what kind of garlic knots to make so we decided to make two batches of garlic knots and save the calzone for later.  The Emmentaler and Caraway Garlic Knots were inspired by the cheesy garlic knots that John Fraser's temporary restaurant What Happens When.  We were both obsessed with the garlic knots he served the two times that we ate dinner there.  The Gouda and Cumin Garlic Knots were inspired by a cumin-flavored gouda cheese that was part of the cheese platter at Vandaag.  Alex suggested the second flavor combination and preferred that flavor combination, but I think that his preference is mostly due to the fact that he is not a huge fan of caraway seeds.  I really liked them both and I keep trying to pick a favorite, but I can't.   That's not a bad thing.  The garlic knots had a nice crispy exterior and a really fluffy, moist interior.  They were so good that we had garlic knots for dinner last night and then I had another few for breakfast this morning.  They are definitely best fresh out of the oven, but they aren't bad the next day!

Recipes after the jump!

White Pizza with Ramps

This is recipe number 2 from our experiment with ramps.  And I have to say that this one was more successful than the first.  Alex actually said that this might just be the best white pizza he has ever eaten.  I was stunned.  If I am not mistaken, my response was something along the lines of "Really? Wow."  And then I think I looked at him dumbfounded.  But let me back up a few steps.  Yesterday I went to the farmers' market down at Union Square during my lunch break.  I was just poking around to see what vegetables were available, but when I saw the ramps I had a hard time resisting them.  And once I had them in my shopping bag I started thinking about pizza.  I was thinking about this pizza recipe from the new Jim Lahey cookbook we just bought - the bird's-nest pizza (a white pizza with asparagus and quail eggs).  I was going to just toss a few ramps in with that pizza and call it a day.  But then I started thinking that a white pizza would be a better way to feature the ramps.  So I found a recipe from Food & Wine by Tony Mantuano for a White Cheese Pizza with Ramps.  I used that as the base recipe, but used Jim Lahey's no-knead pizza dough recipe for the crust because he makes amazing breads and pizzas.  Plus we had the new cookbook so I had to try it out.  I have to say that the pizza was one of the best we have ever made at home.  Everything about it worked.  It had the perfect ratio of cheese to topping, the crust was delicious, and it cooked up like a dream.  And the flavor of the gentle, garlicky ramps was fantastic.  I was thinking about adding some crushed red pepper flakes, but I am so glad that I didn't because the pizza was perfect as is.  Man was it good.  I have to admit that I wasn't sure what all of the fuss was about with ramps in our first attempt at making them at home, but now I totally get it.  Yum.

Recipes after the jump!

Winter Caprese Salad (Take #2)

I know that I have already posted a few different Mario Batali recipes for caprese salad, including another one called Winter Caprese Salad.  Apparently his names for recipes aren't very creative.  Then again, how many different names can you come up with for caprese salad?  He already has a Summer Caprese Salad as well.  I have been thinking about caprese salad ever since it started getting warmer out and greens started re-appearing at the farmers' market.  But local heirloom tomatoes won't be around for awhile yet, so I figured we had to go with one of the caprese recipes using roasted tomatoes.  Luckily we had a bunch of Roma tomatoes leftover from the other evening that I had bought to make salsa.  And with Zabar's and Salumeria Rosi nearby I always have a ready source of fresh mozzarella and/or burrata.

This recipe actually calls for mozzarella but I was in a burrata mood so we did that instead.  As you can see in the picture above, burrata is a lot creamier and oozes a lot more than regular mozzarella.  I thought it was a really lovely take on caprese salad.  I might slightly prefer Mario Batali's other Winter Caprese Salad recipe (and I think my all-time favorite might be his Summer Caprese Salad but that might just be because I love heirloom tomatoes fresh from the farmers' market and no matter how delicious a roasted Roma tomato is, it just can't compare with a fresh in-season tomato) because this one was a little sweet for me.  Roasting the tomatoes already intensifies their natural sweetness and then adding the agrodolce might have pushed them over the edge of too sweet for me.  But I am being really picky with that criticism.  It was still a wonderful dish.  The man really is a genius.

Recipe after the jump!

Broccoli Rabe with Mozzarella Crema

I used to hate broccoli rabe.  Actually, I used to hate all bitter greens.  Hate is pretty strong - let's just say I disliked them.  I disliked all bitter greens.  I just couldn't understand why anyone would want to eat them when there are so many other more palatable options.  But I kept trying them and trying them and trying them because I have this thing about wanting to like good food.  If someone says it's good, I want to like it too.  And then one day I tried a pizza with sausage and broccoli rabe at Keste and surprisingly, I really liked it.  I'm still somewhat particular about broccoli rabe - simple sauteed broccoli rabe with garlic and evoo just doesn't do it for me.  I need some crushed red pepper flakes or some red wine vinegar, or something else to amp up the flavor and counteract some of the bitterness.  But anytime you combine it with Italian sausage I find that I really enjoy it (granted, a lot of vegetables are probably better with a little sausage).  But most of the broccoli rabe I buy comes straight from the grocery store so I acknowledge that I haven't been eating broccoli rabe at its best.  This past Saturday I saw some broccoli rabe at the farmers' market that just looked so beautiful.  I had to buy it.  The stalks were smaller and the leaves were more tender.  I knew it was going to be delicious.  So I decided to try to find a simpler way to prepare it where the flavor of the broccoli rabe wouldn't be masked too much by sausage.  After a little hunting through various cookbooks, I narrowed it down to two different Mario Batali recipes, this recipe and another recipe for Braised Broccoli Rabe in the Style of Puglia.  Once we realized that we didn't have black olives, this recipe was the only one left standing.

I enjoyed the broccoli rabe. It was incredibly simple and fresh.  You didn't get a ton of flavor from the mozzarella, but mozzarella isn't exactly a pungent cheese.  I tasted the nice grassy evoo we used more than I tasted the mozzarella, but the mozzarella did lend the dish a certain level of creaminess.  And I think the simplicity of the dish worked really nicely with the young, tender broccoli rabe.  If we had been using older broccoli rabe I think the bitterness of the green would have totally overpowered the mozzarella crema and the dish would have been far less enjoyable.  In Alex's opinion the broccoli rabe was just "fine" (which I knew he was going to say), but I like broccoli rabe a lot more than he does.

Recipe after the jump!

Pasta with Caramelized Cabbage, Anchovies and Bread Crumbs

First things first - I have some friends to thank for this recipe.  I didn't find this recipe on my own.  Usually I am in charge of tracking down recipes, but this one was emailed to me by my friends Jay and Verna.  Thanks guys!  They told me it was a really hearty/homey recipe.  And they were right.  Those are exactly the words that I would use to describe it.  I feel like cabbage is inherently hearty and homey.  I'm not sure I can picture an elegant or refined dish that is cabbage-based (which isn't to say that cabbage isn't delicious).  If you think about it, cabbage usually features in dishes like sauerkraut and coleslaw, not fine dining.  But I'm not usually aiming for fine dining on a random Thursday night.  What I really want during the week (for the most part) is to come home from work and cook a nice, not too complicated, tasty meal.  It doesn't have to be fancy.  And this pasta isn't fancy.  It is comforting and homey, but it has great flavor.  You get to experience the sweet cabbage, the salty/nutty bread crumbs, the spice from the red pepper flakes, the rich fruity taste of the evoo and the bite of the cheese.  Yum.  Alex says it reminded him of a pasta dish his mom used to make him with caramelized onions, only with more flavor (red pepper flakes and anchovies pack a wallop, one that neither of our parents experimented with regularly but one that we both enjoy).  I was actually sad that Alex claimed the rest of the pasta for lunch today because I wanted it.  And you know a dish is good when I go to the trouble of fighting Alex for the leftovers.

As a side note, I'm going to go ahead and call this recipe vegetarian, even though it contains anchovies.  If you don't want anchovies you can leave them out, but I really like the salty, nutty flavor they impart.  Speaking of anchovies, we are on a real anchovy kick this week because we used them in our Simple Roasted Cauliflower with Garlic, Onion and Anchovies earlier in the week.

Recipe after the jump!

Penne with Cauliflower and Bacon

Sorry everyone.  I know I have been a little delinquent.  Again.  But in my defense, last week was a very busy week at work (although we did find time to cook a few meals that I am finally getting around to posting now).  So I'm hoping to get three posts up today - this pasta, some skirt steak tacos, and a yummy quinoa, spinach and mushroom dish.  If you have the time, stay tuned for more posts!

I'm posting this pasta recipe first because I think of the dishes we have made in the few weeks, this one made me the happiest.  It was a combination of items in our fridge/pantry - leftover homemade Italian-Style Bread Crumbs, pasta, bacon, parsley and cauliflower.  And have I mentioned that I have been obsessed with cauliflower lately?  No?  Well I totally am.  It's delicious.  And I am equally obsessed with those Italian-Style Bread Crumbs.  They are fairly easy to make and make such a difference in your cooking.  Anyway, this pasta was quite tasty and easy to put together, which made me very happy.  We just threw together a bunch of ingredients in the fridge/pantry and voila!  The combination of flavors really worked together nicely.  In each bite you got a little heat from the red pepper flakes, some salty bite from the cheese and the bacon, the wonderful porky flavor of the bacon, and a punch of flavor and texture from the bread crumbs.  Yum.  It was a fantastically hearty, yet delicious dish, one that I will definitely make again in the future. 

Recipes after the jump!

St John's Eve Pasta

 

As you can see, there has been something of a blog post backlog of late.  I only managed a paltry 11 posts in December (which I believe is a new all-time low).  Work was insane and with the holidays and everything it was hard to find the time.  So I am now on a pace to post 4 recipes in one day, some of which we made yesterday or Friday and some of which we made today.  This pasta for instance was today's lunch.  For some reason I have been wanting to make this recipe for a long time.  I'm not sure what drew me to the recipe - it's a fairly basic recipe with tomato sauce and an anchovy-breadcrumb-almond topping.  Actually, I know exactly what drew me to this recipe - it's a Batali.  The man knows his pasta.  When I decided that I wanted pasta for lunch I immediately thought of this recipe.  The name just sounds festive, which seemed appropriate for New Year's Day.  According to my research the dish is traditionally eaten on June 24 - St. John's Eve, but since when has tradition ever stopped me?

Sometimes a single element really makes a dish.  In this case, the anchovy-breadcrumb-almond topping was it.  If gave the dish amazing texture and a lot of salty, nutty flavor.  I know that the process of toasting the breadcrumbs and almonds is a little tiresome, but the end result is more than worth it.  Without the breadcrumb mixture I'm sure the pasta would have been fine (if perhaps a little boring), but with the topping it was a total revelation.  I had no idea that almonds and pasta went together so well. 

Recipe after the jump!

Pasta al Limone: Pasta with Lemon Sauce

This dish was one that Alex pulled out of a hat (or off the internet) a few nights ago for dinner.  We had been planning on making something else, until we realized that we had run out of one of the major ingredients.  So this was something of a last second substitution.  And as far as last second substitutions go, it wasn't bad.  It wasn't my favorite, but I didn't think it would be.  And maybe that's beside the point.  It was a perfectly fine and better yet, it was very easy to make.  I think I might have preferred basil to the parsley (or maybe a combination of the two).  My one complaint is that once it cooled down a little it tasted a little oily/greasy.  But overall, not a bad dish.  Not an exciting dish, but not a bad one.  I think if I were to make it again I would throw in some fresh asparagus (when it's in season) for some extra freshness and sweetness.

Recipe after the jump!

Sicilian-Style Swordfish

Swordfish is not typically one of my favorite fish(es).  And yes, I know that fishes isn't a word, but I like it so I am going to use it.  Back to swordfish.  Generally it's too meaty and overcooked and dry.  When fully cooked it reminds me of a well-done steak (aka shoe leather).  Gross.  There is nothing good about that.  The key is to cook swordfish like a medium to medium-rare steak.  You want the outside to be nicely (and evenly) seared, but you want the middle to stay a little rare.  Otherwise you end up with a swordfish steak that is roughly the texture of an overcooked pork chop.  But I have wanted to make this dish ever since I saw a variation on it at Eataly.  I couldn't convince anyone to order it with me, but I had such order envy every time I saw someone else order it.  It was just so wonderfully golden-brown and it smelled so wonderful as they cooked it in the kitchen.  Granted, everything smelled wonderful while they cooked it.  We had the luck to sit at the counter so we could watch everything being cooked.  Man that made me hungry.  Since I couldn't get anyone to order the dish at Eataly with me, I decided to make it at home.  Luckily, Dave Pasternack had a similar recipe (or maybe the exact same recipe, but who really knows) in The Young Man & the Sea: Recipes & Crispy Fish Tales from Esca.  And yes, I checked to see if the recipe was in the cookbook the second I got home that day.

While most swordfish is kind of blah, this swordfish was very moist and tasty.  With just a squeeze of fresh lemon juice on the swordfish, I loved it.  It was fantastic - bright and fresh, with the proper balance of meaty fish to acid to buttery breadcrumbs.  Don't forgo the fresh lemon juice or you will wonder what all the fuss is about.  And you should definitely take the time to make the Italian-Style Bread Crumbs.  They are worth the trouble because they give the swordfish great texture and flavor.  Plus when you make a batch of breadcrumbs you have enough to last you for a little while.  We can usually get at least two dishes out of each batch of bread crumbs and we only make half the recipe.  They are excellent with pasta or as a substitute for regular breadcrumbs in just about any Italian-ish recipe.  The breadcrumbs here helped to preserve the moisture of the swordfish while it cooked, as well as lending it more flavor and texture.  Be careful while cooking the fish because the breadcrumbs burn rather easily if the heat is up too high or if you're just not paying enough attention.  For the record, one side of our fish got a little toasty, but we saved it before it could actually char.  So just keep an eye out.  If you do manage to cook the swordfish without burning the breadcrumbs you will realize something I have known for awhile - Dave Pasternack is a brilliant man.

Recipes after the jump!

Pasta e Fagioli

After New Hampshire I craved salad - big mounts of leafy greens topped with all sorts of delicious things.  Alex craved soup with a bunch of veggies.  Clearly we were on the same page with the veggie cravings but had very different ideas on how to fulfill those cravings.  So this was a soup I came up with in honor of his request.  I guess I can't say that there were a ton of veggies in here - there was kale, carrots and celery.  That should count for something, right?  And I have been wanting a soup with cannellini beans since it started getting cooler so I wanted those to be in the soup as well.  And since Alex is a huge fan of bacon, I threw that in too.  As a side note, I can't claim credit for this recipe entirely.  I stumbled across the base recipe online somewhere and then played with it a bit (but now I can't seem to find it online so I can't give a shout out to the source of the original base recipe).  Then we made ourselves some soup.  Really good soup.  Some might say it was the ideal soup for the winter - filling and satisfying, with lots of different (but complimentary) flavors and textures.  Or at least the ideal soup for those who don't particularly like most chili recipes.  It was nice to have bites composed of different ingredients that all worked together so well.  I liked the subtle bacon flavor (as well as the texture of the crunchy bacon in the soup) and the creamy, starchy quality of the beans contrasted with the toothsome quality of the al dente orecchiette pasta.  I also really liked the drizzle of evoo on top to give the soup an extra layer of fruity evoo flavor.  It sounds like a really strange thing to add, but if you use nice high-quality evoo it's a delicious addition.  We served the soup with some nice hearty pane pugliese from Sullivan Street Bakery.  I figured some nice crusty bread, toasted and drizzled with more of that evoo, would be the perfect accompaniment to this soup.  If you wanted to, this batch of soup could easily serve a family of four for dinner.  Throw in a small salad and some toasted bread and you have yourself a meal.  For just Alex and I a salad seemed like overkill so we just did the bread and it was more than enough.  We have enough soup left for lunch later in the weekend sitting in the fridge.  I love fall - such perfect soup weather!


Recipe after the jump!

Broccoli Rabe Orecchiette

I must admit that I am not a very inventive vegetarian cook.  When I start thinking about making a vegetarian entree the first thing that comes to mind is pasta.  Pasta is the best vehicle for vegetarian meals ever.  After pasta I default to soups or a random assortment of items together (for instance, Monday night Alex and I had Momofuku Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Fish Sauce Vinaigrette with the leftover vinaigrette from our Momofuku Roasted Cauliflower with Fish Sauce Vinaigrette and scrambled eggs for dinner).  I was pretty proud of myself for the vegetarian meal I put together last month of Spinach Salad with Walnuts and Grilled Eggplant with Lebneh.  The meal had a theme and I actually thought it through.  Usually it comes down to what we have in the fridge when I decide that I need to give my system a much needed dose of veggies.  And what we have in the fridge tends to be a little unpredictable at best because I'm a spastic grocery shopper - particularly when you let me loose at a farmers' market.  But this time I had a goal for my vegetarian meal.  I was trying to use up the broccoli rabe I bought at the farmers' market AND use up some of our overabundance of pasta.  Our pasta has started exploding out of our kitchen cabinets again because I keep thinking we are out or seeing a new fun type and buying more.  Oops.  So this one time I didn't just default back to a vegetarian pasta meal - I was specifically aiming to make a vegetarian pasta meal.  Only I decided to throw in some anchovies at the last second, so I guess it's not technically a vegetarian dish, but you can easily omit the anchovies.  I did say they were optional afterall.

This pasta isn't going to win any beauty contests.  Nor is it going to win any accolades for being new and inventive.  And if you don't like broccoli rabe, don't bother with it altogether.  It's a very homey and simple pasta that is easy to throw together.  But I didn't have the time or the energy to put something more complicated together.  It was exactly what I knew it would be.  And yet I have to admit that I spent a lot of the time wishing there was just a little Italian sausage mixed in with the pasta.  I really love broccoli rabe with Italian sausage.  But that would defeat the purpose of making a vegetarian meal.  Granted, anchovies probably defeat that purpose too, but somehow they didn't in my mind when I was conceiving of the dish...

Recipe after the jump!