Thoughts On Food, Insights, and Another Recipe
Food has always been an interest of mine which of course is sort of a stupid thing to say since … well … food is of interest to everybody. It is not like there is a group of people somewhere on the planet, say maybe a Mexican gang of bandits from the Old West, who are going …
Food? Food? Wee don't neeed no steenken food!
Everyone is interested not just in food, but food that tastes good. Doesn't really matter what the food is or what your dietary preference is. Although I can't say that for certain but I don't even think a vegetarian goes… No, no ... not the broccoli in the sesame seed teriyaki glaze please. I would rather have something that actually tastes like crap instead of something I find tasty, thank you very much.
Now my passion for food is another matter. While I have always been exposed to good food and cooking I do have to say that I didn't always have a passion for it. Or an open mind about different types of food and styles of cooking. Actually my family used to call me "Fred Finicky" since when I was young I didn't even like Pizza and scraped cheese off of cheese burgers. Yes, me not liking cheese do you believe it?
Of course I didn't hold the market on the "finicky gene" in my family. My brother was "Phil Finicky" and my sister was "Ferda Finicky" which was of course much worse than I or my brother being finicky. She was not only finicky but she was also magically transformed into a German at meal time. Which usually is only good a thing if you are planning to invade France after dinner or want to try out for the East German swim team (of course after counting to 100 Mississippies before enter the water) or are going out to a club later that only plays techno music . Then again I might be a tad bias on the whole German thing and letting the fact that I was constantly heckled by a roving pack of drunk and disorderly German Mercenaries (Landsknechts) over the years at various Renaissance Faires be influencing view about Germans. Oh, and btw, did you know that Microsoft Word actually has the correctly spelling for Landsknechts in it? I mean really doesn't Microsoft have more important things to do? I can see it now, the meeting where the Microsoft engineers had to choose between focusing on getting Vista working correctly or making sure that "Landsknechts" was in Microsoft Word's spell checker.
Enough about Germans though and their constant harassment of non-Germans. (especially those with Russian or Polish or French ancestry). Now back to finickiest. I do have to say that I was probably the finickiest of all us when we were young (even if I did not morph into a frauline like my sister at dinner time). Not only did I hate pizza but yes, I actually did live that classic 50s sitcom situation of refusing to eat my spinach as probably shown in some episode of "My Three Sons" or "Leave It To Beaver" or insert any 1950s TV series here. No I took it one step farther than what was shown on those shows … "If you don't eat your spinach you don't get dessert!"
That would be too pedestrian, to gosh, not dramatic enough, this was real life so that would just not do. So what happened when I did not eat my spinach? "If you don't eat your spinach you will sit at that table until you do!"
Needless to say I sat at that table from like 6pm to around 11pm before my mom gave in and let me leave the table. Have I mentioned that I am stubborn? Bad combination being stubborn and finicky and it does come back and bite you in the ass eventually.
It has only since I started traveling over seas that I have really opened up to trying different cuisine and ingredients which before would make me gag and cause a scene that would rival the worst outburst of a four year old told that Santa is not coming for Christmas. Amazing what hunger will do to you, huh? It trumps finickiest every time.
Now by no means have I turned into Andrew Zimmerman .. sorry there is still certain things that I just won't eat (rocky mountain oysters comes to mind .. and basically most everything else he eats on his TV show).
I have though opened up immensely I believe in my outlook on things and willingness to try exotic things instead of being so rigidly conservative and vanilla. I have eaten exotic things now like whole baby octopus (they were mixed into a seafood dish I had at a great place in Rome .. they just sat there in the dish, tiny white, and with their tentacles all curled back like some fort of strange wilting flower .. but I was hungry and dove in, they were good) to trying more normal things that I used to refuse to eat just several years back.
By refuse I mean throw a world class snit where the fuss and racket I raised could only be matched by throwing a cat and raccoon into a closet, dumping a bucked of water on them and then slamming the door shut on the ensuing howling and outrage.
Now I actually enjoy things like asparagus and mayonnaise (although home made not the store bought) to just name a few things. All of which I am still kicking myself over being so stubborn and refusing to even taste over the past umpteen years but instead of being rigidly convinced they must taste awful. I am not really sure what brought this about. Whether is just getting older and I just don't have the energy to get worked up over unchallenged convictions or if it stems from me traveling over seas and that travel really does broaden your horizons and makes you more accepting of different things (of course when your are hungry and abroad you can't really order takeout from Pizza Hut). Maybe it is a combination of the two, of not getting worked up and trying to pedantically convince everybody that I was right and they are wrong and travel making me try things or look at things differently because really when you are surround by the things outside your norm you can't just shut them out but have to to at least consider the new options around you. Whatever it was I no longer go… Me: "Mayonnaise is evil I tell you evil!"
A Friend: "Look you like eggs right?"
Me: "Yes."
A Friend: "And you don't have a problem with olive oil or mustard do you?"
Me: "That is correct."
A Friend: "Well mayonnaise is just eggs, olive oil, mustard, and salt-"
Me: "Speak not to me infidel!!! You have been corrupted by Satan and will burn in a fiery pit of brimstone and mayonnaise since it--"
A Friend: "Have you even tried it?"
Me: "No. But I don't have to do .. is was created by Satan!!!"
A Friend: ::sigh::
That took a lot of energy out of me just to type that can you imagine how much energy it took to actually believe that all these years?
I think I have made progress and now am more accepting not just about cuisine and food but other things as well. However, I still think Cauliflower was created by Satan!
Anyway what set off this culinary theme introspection is that my friend again brought up a recipe she tried. Now while making your own rice cakes doesn't sound all that interesting to me, then again I am a male and what male would admit to going … "Rice cakes, yum, that sounds interesting."
I do have to admit I like rice. So I thought I would post a recipe for a rice dish I have done recently in response to her "make your own rice cakes" blog post. So here it is.
Sausage and Wild Mushroom Risotto over Mixed Baby Lettuce, & Sliced Tomatoes
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 lb Italian sausage (sweet or hot your preference), casing removed, crumbled into small pieces
- 8 ounces of Portobello mushrooms, stemmed, dark gills scraped out, caps diced. /li>
- 10 ounces of shitake mushrooms, stemmed and diced.
- 1 tsp chopped fresh thyme
- 1 tsp chopped fresh oregano
- 1 ½ cups of Maderia
Take the skillet off the heat for like a minute and turned down the heat on the burner slightly so that you don't go over 350. Then put it back on the burner.
Add the sausage and sauté until it beings to brown, roughly 3 minutes. Add all mushrooms (oh and you can use different mushrooms than the ones I list .. I have done this with your standard button mushrooms also), thyme, and oregano and sauté until mushrooms are tender, about 10 minutes.
A lot of people don't like mushrooms or I should say the texture of mushrooms. This is usually because when raw they chew like they are little sponges (a pleasant texture, not); since they are almost all water. So what you want to do is sauté them until they release a lot of their water. You will be able to visibly see the different as they will shrivel up; this is a good thing since they are releasing their water (which you are cooking off), keeping their flavor, and also now can pick up the flavor of the oil, sausage, and herbs.
Add 1/2 cup Madeira; boil until almost absorbed, about 1 minute. Then set the skillet aside because making risotto takes a lot more time. You don't really want to put it on low because you will continue cooking the meat and you don't want to overcook it. Overcook pork is not fun. Oh, and as for the Madeira you can use other wines instead. I think I have used Marsala, port, Cabernet Sauvignon and Malbec before when making this dish. If you don't have Madeira by all means try something else but don't put the whole ½ cup of it in at once. Put a little in and then after a bit taste and see if you like the flavor. If you do add the rest in but if not try a different wine.
Now for making risotto … yes, yes it is rice and you can cook it like normal rice but if you do you won't get the rich creaminess of risotto. You see when you make it as I explain below the rice slowly releases its own starch (and risotto rice is very starchy) and that combined with the stock you are using makes a of rich sauce. Trust me you will like it.
So in another large saucepan bring the stock you are using to a simmer. You can use any stock (and actually do in different risotto recipes like a seafood risotto I have done) but for this one I would stick to a beef stock, chicken stock, or veal stock. I don't make my own stock but use store bought stock (I prefer the brand Kitchen Basics) which works just fine. Just make sure you get a decent store bought stock that isn't high in sodium. Over salting anything is not good .. you want to be able to add in the amount of salt you like to make it taste good to you instead having the sodium from high sodium stock make it taste like a salt lick (or running the risk of tasting like a salt lick if you are not careful)
You can also skip this step but using cold or room temperature stock will just add time onto the whole process (meaning more stirring) but not really impact the flavor of the risotto in my opinion.
Enough said, remove the sauce pan from heat if you do the above step.
Then in another large pot melt butter over medium-high heat. Add a diced onion and garlic and sauté until onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Add rice; stir 2 minutes. Add 1 cup of Madeira (you can skip this if you want .. oh, and I don't recommend using a red wine as a substitute here); simmer until absorbed, about 2 minutes. Add 1 cup hot stock (or cold stock or Luke warm stock or DarthVader warm stock .. I have no idea why I had to work a Star Wars reference in .. lets just all ignore it); simmer until almost absorbed, stirring often, about 3 minutes. Continue to cook until rice is just tender and mixture is creamy, adding more stock by cupfuls, stirring often and allowing most stock to be absorbed before adding more, about 25 minutes. Stir in sausage mixture. Season to taste with salt and pepper and remember to TASTE. You are not only checking the taste but checking to see if the rice is done.
The key here is to trick somebody else into doing the stirring for you. Believe me it is a pain and if you can dupe somebody into doing it .. thumbs up for you. Over at my dad and step mom's house we sort of all act like a bunch of penguins when we know they are doing risotto; Huddling around the door and waiting for somebody else to go in first to see if the risotto is done. Just like penguins waiting to see if there is a killer whale lurking in the water below just waiting to eat the first one in. In our case the first one is the person usually asked to stir the risotto for a half hour or more instead of socializing and snacking on cheese.
As I was saying, you stir it constantly because you don't want it to stick to the bottom of the pot. Also it is how you judge when to add more stock. You want to add just enough to barely cover the rice. Then stir until it boils off (you want it constantly bubbling but not boiling madly .. if that makes sense). Then you add more stock and repeat the process. You do this until the rice is no longer al dente to your taste (some people like al dente rice .. I don't).
When the rice is done then add in the sausage mixture and stir until it is mixed well in. You can also add Parmesan cheese at this point (use a good Parmesan cheese not that stuff Kraft puts in a green cardboard can) and mix it in until thoroughly melted. Right now it is done enough for a side dish or a meal and I have actually jus served it like this. However, I decided to dress it up a little bit more. So I took some baby lettuce (any lettuce will do .. spinach, arugula, Mache .. probably not iceberg but who knows) and put it down on a plate. I then slice a tomato and arrange the slices overlapping on top of the lettuce. Then on top of that I put the risotto and dress it all with a little salt and drizzle of olive oil. In this case I also had some asiago handy so I put some grated asiago over all of it .. more for esthetics than taste I have to admit but food should not only taste well but also be pleasing to the eye when you can make it.
Anyway, enough of me being a food geek for now. Maybe more recipes in the future as I try them .. hmm, I wonder if that makes you all my virtual guinea pigs?