1 THE BLOG: What We’re Eating
Fall feast
Issue #29
Five food-loving bloggers dish up easy recipes for an Indian summer dinner party
By Grace Dobush
Published: September 1st, 2006 | 12:00am
Even if back-to-school season is a distant memory, the best way to spend the waning lazy summer days is with friends, preferably with some sangria and snacks. We sought out the best blogging bons vivants to piece together a meal plan perfect for that first evening when a crisp fall breeze is in the air. The recipes from this worldly bunch will make you drool, and you just might find yourself adding some bookmarks to your browser. Martha Stewart, eat your heart out.
THE BLOG: What We’re Eating
THE BLOGGERS: Amanda Simpson, 26, a freelance personal chef and mental-health counselor, and Tyler Durrett, 25, a Web site developer
LOCATION: San Diego, California
URL: whatwereeating.com
IDEAL CULINARY SUPERPOWER: to be “yeast-talkers” — making yeast ferment instantaneously so they can have fresh bread all the time
“There’s only one chef in this kitchen,” Durrett says, confessing his lack of culinary prowess. But it takes two to create the transcribed banter accompanying each of their recipes. Simpson and Durrett have been producing their blog, What We’re Eating, for about a year and have a wealth of inventive dishes to wade through. They offered up this holy grail of comfort food — a stylin’ play on mac and cheese — that’s great for transforming leftovers. The duo offers this party tip: If you know you’ll be short on time the day you want to chow down, prepare everything one or two days in advance. Just stop before baking, cover, and refrigerate. You can toss it in the oven right before you need it.
WHAT WE’RE EATING’S CHICKEN AND VEGGIE MAC AND CHEESE
2 cooked chicken breasts in bite-size pieces
1 zucchini, cut in 1/2-inch pieces
20 grape tomatoes cut in half and squeezed to get the seeds out
1 lb. Creste Di Galli pasta (the ruffled shape shown here) or elbow macaroni
6 tbsp. butter
6 tbsp. flour
3 1/2 cups whole milk, warm
8 oz. shredded, sharp cheddar
8 oz. shredded Havarti cheese
1 pinch of nutmeg
2 tsp. smoky paprika
salt and pepper
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Bring a large pot of water to a boil over high heat. Salt the water liberally once it has reached boiling.
2. While waiting for the water to boil, melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. When the butter has melted, add the flour and stir. Whisk for 30 seconds to a minute. Slowly drizzle in small amounts of milk while whisking constantly, until all the milk is incorporated and the sauce is smooth. If you add the milk too fast or don’t whisk it in enough, your sauce will be lumpy. Bring the sauce to a simmer, stirring frequently.
3. Add the pasta to the pot of salted water and cook until the pasta is al dente.
4. Once the white sauce (also known as a Béchamel) is simmering, add the nutmeg, paprika, and three quarters of the shredded cheddar and Havarti cheese. Stir until the cheese is completely melted. Taste the sauce and adjust the seasoning by adding salt and pepper as needed. Remove from the heat and wait for the pasta to finish.
5. When the pasta is al dente, drain it and add the cheese sauce, chicken, grape tomatoes, and zucchini. Mix until everything is thoroughly coated with cheese sauce.
6. Pour into a glass baking dish and top with the rest of the cheddar and Havarti. Bake until the top layer is bubbly and golden.
THE BLOG: Delicious Days
THE BLOGGERS: Nicole Stich, 32, a multimedia project manager, and Oliver Seidel, 34, a presales consultant for telecommunications software
LOCATION: Munich, Germany
URL: deliciousdays.com
IDEAL CULINARY SUPERPOWER: to be able to cook any meat blindfolded
Stich and Seidel are living the good life with a blog so pretty you could eat it. Their brainchild is about a year and a half old, highlighting beautiful meals and grocery shopping adventures in their city.
Heads up, cube-dwellers: Wasting time at work will never have made you so hungry. With this refined dessert recipe, you can pretend you’re Amelie with three to five of your friends. Stich and Seidel suggest trying out flavoring the crème brûlée with different fragrances. Try infusing the heavy cream with lavender, Earl Grey, or green tea.
DELICIOUS DAYS’ DOUBLE-CARAMELIZED CRÈME BRÛLÉE WITH KAHLUA
1 pint heavy cream
1 vanilla bean
3-4 tbsp. Kahlua
4 egg yolks
3-4 tbsp. white sugar (save some for caramelizing)
1. Preheat oven to 320 degrees. Cook heavy cream with the vanilla bean (the shell and the scraped-out seeds) in a small pot and bring to a boil. Remove from the stove, let infuse for about five to 10 minutes. Remove vanilla-bean shell.
2. Combine egg yolks and sugar, and blend until the mixture becomes pale and thick. Add the warm (not boiling) cream mixture to the eggs and stir well but carefully so that the mixture doesn’t get foamy. Return the mix to the pot and stir over low heat for another five to 10 minutes — do not boil — until custard coats the back of a wooden spoon. Remove from heat. Add the Kahlua and stir until combined.
3. Prepare the ramekins: Pour a teaspoon of sugar into each ramekin and caramelize it with a kitchen blowtorch until golden brown. Be careful, the ramekins can get very hot.
4. Pour the custard into the ramekins and set them in a deep baking dish. Add enough hot water to come halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Bake for about 25 minutes or until set.
5. Remove from oven and chill in the refrigerator for at least four hours, or overnight if possible. Just before serving, add a thin layer of sugar on top and caramelize with the blowtorch.
DINNER DRINK: Grace’s Easy Mai Tai
These makeshift mai tais are easy to mix and great for groups. You can pretend that making them is a really scientific process and impress your guests.
GRACE’S EASY MAI TAIS
1/2 gallon pineapple-orange juice
as much rum as you want
a few splashes of grenadine syrup
1 or 2 limes, juiced
1 lime, sliced
ice and little umbrellas
Add pineapple-orange juice, rum, grenadine syrup, and lime juice to a big pitcher. Mix and adjust quantities until you achieve a satisfactory pink color. Serve in classy glasses with a lime slice, ice, and a little umbrella.
THE MUSIC
Good dinner parties need good music. Try these songs on for size.
Stereolab “Parsec”
Youth Group “Forever Young”
Steven Malkmus “The Hook”
Telefon Tel Aviv “My Week Beats Your Year”
Simon and Garfunkel “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard”
Sugarcubes “Birthday”
Jesus and Mary Chain “Just Like Honey”
JJ Cale “Magnolia”
Don Henley “Boys of Summer”
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