Results tagged “recipes”

          

Roast chicken is the perfect fall dish - It's hearty, it warms up the kitchen and it uses only root vegetables that can be stored in your fridge for months. It's a great dish for a workday evening because there actually isn't very much effort involved - your oven does most of the work. Roasting a chicken is one of the easiest things that you can do in the kitchen, and somehow it's been turned into a complicated and magical process by cooking magazines and recipe books. Follow the pictures (the instructions are in the captions) and you'll be set to roast a great bird.

Tickets to Stephanie Izard's Wandering Goat dinners are the most coveted in town, with the first two dinners selling out almost as fast as they went on sale. For the next dinner, Izard and Red Eye are giving three lucky people a chance to cook with Izard.

• Casting is underway for the next season of "Top Chef." If you have serious kitchen majicks get to Wells on Wells (1617 N. wells) from 10a.m. - 2 p.m. on October 26 with these forms. Oh, and have a valid passport; if you're chosen, you might have to go abroad. [Inbox]
• "The Jungle" - 21st Century Edition. A harrowing New York times story on e.coli tainted beef. [NYT]
• The food at greatest risk for e.coli? Greens. [Tribune]

       

We were fortunate enough to score an advance copy of Get Cooking by Mollie Katzen, author of Moosewood Cookbook, a cookbook that we've had and used for years - along with the Moosewood Restaurant Low-Fat Favorites (the fragrant jasmine rice recipe is fantastic). Katzen's latest book is geared toward getting people who do not normally cook into the kitchen. Chapters include: Soups, Salads, Pastas, Vegetarian Entrees, Burgers, Chicken Fish & Meat, Sides, Party Snacks, and Desserts.

For the last two weeks, we've been trying to get in as much grilling as possible before the weather turns into a frozen mess. Unfortunately, there's only so many hot dogs and steaks we can eat before we start longing for something more interesting. This recipe is a great use of the grill, and works as either an appetizer for 4 or a dinner for 2. If you want more, just increase the amount of steak - the amount of marinade/sauce can work for much more meat.

As much as we love eating beets, apparently we love buying beets even more. There always seems to be some lying at the bottom of our refrigerator’s crisper drawer. Since we’re averse to wasting good produce, we had to come up with something new to do with them.

   

This wonderful "San Francisco in June" we've been experiencing has its advantages. Among them is having the ability to fire up an oven and bake a pizza without turning the kitchen into a hot and unbearable pit of Hell. We also like making flatbreads on the grill and, rather than spend a small fortune on ready made pizza dough, we like to make our own and don't give a damn about having the dough formed in a perfect circle, so much as it's crispy when the baking's complete.

Heirloom tomatoes are finally starting to roll into farmers markets throughout the city. With that comes some pretty outstanding cocktail recipes. First, there's the always busy Adam Seger of Nacional 27. Seger's monthly cocktail class was the subject of a cover story in the New York Times style section yesterday. The Paper of Record also published Seger's Heirloom Tomato Mojitonico recipe for Anthony and Rob to try at home.

   

A week has passed since we threw 8 pounds of pork belly into freezer bags full of salt, sugar, cracked black pepper, fresh oregano and thyme and some pink salt, for some. Yesterday it was time to hang that pork belly and let it dry age.

We really enjoy baguettes here at Chicagoist's test kitchens. Unfortunately, there always seems to be 3-4 inches of dry, stale bread left over after a couple of days. After years of tossing these in the garbage with a sigh, we started experimenting with ways to use them up.

After a short hiatus, we're back in the kitchen! This week, we've cooked up a light, tasty summer supper which could serve as a main course (served alongside a salad and a big loaf of bread) or an appetizer served by itself. This is one of our favorite dishes, because it allows us to deceive our friends. It looks so fancy and tastes so fancy, but it is sinfully easy to make. The whole costs about $8, even if you buy the mussels at Whole Foods - they sell for between $4-5 a pound. It has a fancy French (or Belgian, depending on who you believe) name, which gives you an instant air of snobbery. Plus, you can use some of that dead bottle of white wine that's been sitting in your fridge for a month.

Beets have finally arrived in the farmer's markets! Beets are an under-appreciated and extremely versatile food, and while our first impulse was to turn them into pasta, we decided to try something new. Roasting beets is a classic way to prepare the sweet, burgundy lovelies, and this salad combines the earthy sweetness of the beets with a tart lemon/vinegar dressing and a light, fresh sliced pear.

  

We were explaining the guanciale experiment and process in making it Saturday night to Benjy's lovely wife Ella. Mrs. Lipsman asked all the pertinent questions about making one's own charcuterie, most important among them, "What if you get food poisoning?"

Now that the farmer’s markets are filling up with tomatoes, it’s time to start finding great recipes to use them up. At this time of year, we prefer relatively simple, unadorned recipes - all the better to show off the freshness of the produce. This recipe is an adaptation of an old standard, usually made with vodka and a ton of cream. We use much less cream, to allow the flavors of the tomatoes and shallots to come through. Using grappa, instead of vodka, gives the pasta a kick AND some extra flavor. If you don’t have any grappa, we’d recommend using brandy.

What a difference a week makes. And a lot of salt, pepper, sugar and thyme. The pork jowl has been cured (compare the shot above to how it looked before curing last week) and looks like it's well on its way to becoming rich, savory bacon.

In the weeks leading up to our anniversary party Saturday night, Whistler mixologist Paul McGee was in touch with Sonja and Derek Kassebaum of North Shore Distillery to work on the cocktail that many of us downed in large numbers. McGee came through with flying colors with an eponymous, deceptively potent concoction with North Shore No. 6 gin as the base spirit. "I like the botanicals in No. 6, which is one of North Shore's lighter gins," McGee said.

   

Our love of bacon has come to its logical endgame: we're making our own.

We’re not ashamed to admit it - we love broccoli. To be honest, it’s probably our favorite vegetable, barely ahead of that other childhood favorite, Brussels Sprouts. Are we crazy? Vegan? Chlorophyll Deficient? No - we simply believe that, properly prepared, these are some of the tastiest veggies around.

There have been some amazing mushrooms at early farmer’s markets around the city; consequently, we’ve been on the hunt for new recipes. Stuffed mushrooms are a classic appetizer, and this recipe adds a few twists. The type of prosciutto doesn’t really matter, as it’s being sautéed, so this is probably not the recipe to splurge on the $20/pound imported meat. Domestic prosciutto will do just fine - and buy extra, because you will snack on some while you cook.

After buying some beautiful Portobello mushrooms at Green City Market last weekend, we decided that this would be a great opportunity to start spring off right and break out the grill. Ok, the grill pan - sometimes, an urban cook has to improvise. But we could smell the charcoal of April in our minds.

On our first visit to Mercat a La Planxa, we asked to taste this strange-sounding concoction before we committed to an entire $30 pitcher. We were completely taken with the flavor, and have ordered it every time we’ve been back. The folks at Mercat were good enough to give us the recipe, which we’ve adapted for your home use. After looking at the effort required to make it, we’re less shocked by the price tag.

For a digestif at Uncommon Ground Devon Saturday night we ordered a honey liqueur that paired well with the chocolate chip banana bread pudding and the whiskey gelato that topped it. Almost too well. Given that there was a slight chill in the air, that honey liqueur would have also made a nice addition to some tea or hot water, with lemon.

In today’s soup, we move onto an entirely different set of flavors. Rather than onions, celery, crushed red pepper or sausage, this soup has some new ingredients: curry paste, coriander seeds, coconut milk, ginger. The end result is a creamy broth that, depending on your taste, can be as spicy or as savory as you like. Play with the optional ingredients, try something new, or substitute something familiar - this is a very versatile soup and a good introduction to some basic Thai spices. We bought all of our ingredients at a normal grocery store - the “Thai Kitchen” brand is usually reliable.

This winter, we’ve been on a real root vegetable kick. We’ve re-discovered beets, come to love turnips and remembered that we don’t really like parsnips as much as we think we should. In our kitchen, root veggies have been steamed, roasted, pickled and turned into pasta. But, aside from last week’s Onion Soup, they haven’t really been turned into soup.

Onion soup is one of the recipes that every cook should know. It’s cheap, easy to make, hard to screw up and will make all of your guests very, very happy on a damp night. We’ve seen an infinite variety of onion soups all over the interwebs, including everything from the simplest (sauté onions for 5 minutes, dump in beef bouillon cubes) to the most complex (roasting ingredients overnight in a slow oven). We like to think our recipe is somewhere in the middle.

We’ve already mentioned many times in this column our love of cozy, informal restaurants with great food. We don’t mean greasy diners or burger joints, though they certainly have their charm. We’re looking places with a stylish décor, unique and well-prepared food, a good bit of booze and a bill under $50 for two. La Madia fits the bill perfectly.

Here at Chicagoist Cocktail Labs, we’re somewhat skeptical about new spirits. All too often, they are artificially flavored grape-root beer-blue raspberry malt liquor concoctions masquerading as fine “vodka” with price tags to match. Believe us when we say VeeV is different. This stuff is tasty, addictive and compatible with tons of cocktails or sippable on it’s own.

This spicy soup is perfect for those of you who prefer a lighter winter soup. No potatoes, no cream, nothing too rich - just good hearty sausages and tender red peppers. Oh, and enough garlic to wake the dead.

Potato soups form an important part of any good cooks’ repertoire. They’re cheap, filling, easy to make and can be left on the stove while you go do something else. This particular soup combines the thick heartiness of potato soup with the rich flavors of onions, garlic, butter and basil. The addition of broccoli introduces a little bit different texture - use more or less at your discretion. The best part? Total simmering time needs to be no more than 20 minutes.