Family Feast August 2012

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August 18, 2012
Oakland

Daiquiri de Pepino
Chips and Salsa
Olives and Almonds

Mixed Green Salad with Grapefruit, Beets, and Queso Fresco

Corn and Zucchini Budin
Grilled Baby Artichokes
Tacos with Chipotle Crema:
Beef or Chicken or Poblanos, Onions, and Wild Mushrooms

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Veggie Burger in Turtles All the Way Down // Cook Your Books

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In this  Cook Your Books  series, I had chosen 15 books to read in 2018 based on somewhat arbitrarily chosen categories; I failed. I failed not to read (I read a ton), but I failed to blog.  So I reignited the quest in 2019. My theory (bogus it might turn out to be) is that all 15 of these books will somehow connect to food.  And I plan to write about that food.   It turns out that these entries are a sort of long-form blog-post. So settle in.  This  first for 2019  installment is  a novel about anxiety. About a year ago, I sat around the dinner table with part of my family and I asked for four recommendations for book categories, and this (a book about anxiety) was one of them. And I have to tell you, outside of non-fiction, this was a tough one. A lot of fiction may include anxious characters, but not many where the anxiety rides front and center, but John Green's young adult novel, Turtles all the Way Down , does just tha...
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Cookbook #45: Mastering the Art of French Cooking

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Adapted from Cookbook #45:  Mastering the Art of French Cooking (1961, my edition is 2001) Recipe: Filets de Poisson Bercy aux Champignons (Fish Fillets Poached in White Wine With Mushrooms) Well, here we are with The Cookbook.  Not just any ole cookbook, but The One.  Oh, Julia, how we love thee.  Julia professed she was no fan of blogs that went in for stunts , such as the infamous Julie Powell blog.  Stunts were too flimsy for our Julia.   So I guess that she would suppose this stunt of mine to cook page 210 from every cookbook is too flimsy.  But so be it.  Let the flimsy stunts carry on.  Join me, will you? So under Julia's watchful eye, I made a lovely poached fish with butter, cream, Swiss cheese, and more butter.  How could it not be amazing?  And it was. While this is a deceptively simple dish, you might want to save it for more special occasions, if for no other reason than you'll need to diet for three...
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Ottolenghi's Lemon and Eggplant Risotto

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Risotto is such a delightful dish. Comforting, creamy, simple, stable.   And I am a huge fan . As in, I will make me a risotto any chance I get, with any sort of ingredient you can imagine. It doesn't matter--any season.  Spring--lemon and peas;  Summer--tomato and parmesan;  Fall--mushroom;  Winter--butternut squash and pancetta.  If it's in your fridge, you can put it in this Northern Italian rice dish. However, you will want a very specific kind of rice--a high starch, medium- or short-grain rice--in order separate this delicacy from any other rice dish. The high starch means that as you cook it, it releases its starch, making that requisite creamy smoothness to risotto. The most popular risotto rice in the United States is, hands down, Arborio rice. This short-grained rice isn't as starchy as some of its popular Italian counterparts, but it is the most easily procured. However, a...
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