July 2018 – Table For Two

July 28, 2018July 28, 2018

Mamma Mia! Chicken

Mama Mia! Greek is the new chic. In honor of Lily James’ new film “Mamma Mia Here We Go Again” we made chicken souvlaki with tzatziki sauce over Cesar salad. Our version has no carbs in sight because we didn’t have any pita bread, making this a totally gluten free version great for people on low to no carb diets. For those of you who don’t want to use chicken, this can also be done with potatoes. Scrummy Lane uses basically the same concept of oil, herb and heat in this similar recipe, “Best Greek Potatoes“. It even uses the same herb profile.

First off, I was worried about it going south for how frozen it was at first. After the microwave method half-worked, we chopped, marinated it for 2 hours and grilled them so that they could have an even cook time. You see, when frozen things like chicken go below the freezing temperature, the heat melts the ice before actually increasing the temperature, breaking down molecular bonds. When you rush to cook it without fully thawing the chicken first, it rises in temperature in such a short amount of time that by then, the outside is cooked deceivingly golden brown, but the inside is icy cold. It seems like a magic trick.

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Salmonella hands — Salmonella is a true problem if ingested. **ALWAYS WASH YOUR HANDS AFTER WORKING WITH RAW MEAT!!** Keep it kosher!

For spices, we put in a little salt, dill, black pepper, a squeeze of lemon, a few shakes of oregano and our favorite ingredient, you guessed it, raw garlic cloves! Hey, what can I say? Nothing turns around a bland pile of meat chunks quite like a generous handful of herbs and an acid kick in the head. Don’t forget the olive oil so that everything stays together and they have less chance of sticking to the grill. These little chunks cooked through very quickly, as soon as we laid them all down on the indoor flat cast-iron grill top, they were nearly ready to come back off.

Olives and Greece go back to roughly the 5th century when they were grown in the valleys among the grapes by small landowners and tenant farmers from Roman Italy. My own great-great-grandfather Giovanni Montera had a farm in Italy full of figs and olives. We’re using purple ones for our Ceasar spin-off salad. We used only spinach, feta and purple olives. Usually, they come in Maleficent’s signature green, purple and black colors. More importantly, the oil was used in the ancient Olympic games to coat the athletes bodies as protection from the elements and as a way to glorify the male physique, if sculptures weren’t enough.

I was in command of the TSAH-zee-key sauce. Yes, that’s the proper pronunciation. It’s just a mesh of cucumber chunks, dill, plain Greek yogurt and grated garlic. However, there are 2 versions, Ottoman and Greek only differentiating in the yogurt. The Ottoman version is called by the Turkish word “Cacik” and uses cow milk in the yogurt. The only true Greek “Tzatziki” is uses sheep milk yogurt. I never knew how mushy garlic could be when it’s grated on a planer. It brought such a big bite to the sauce. It was practically spicy in a horseradish sort of way, very different from traditionally spicy peppers. The creamy cooling effect of Greek yogurt was aided by cucumber slices patted dry before use. We chose to keep the skin on, but if you want to slice off the skins and put them in your water for flavor and a “Gillyweed” look, go right ahead.

Now, about the chicken…we were not stingy by any means. I was calling it “Chicken Mountain” in my best Cookie Monster voice. (Not as good as our photographer Nick’s impression though.) As much as they could stand on its own, we couldn’t stop dipping it into the sauce as a way to balance such thick juicy meat with garlic spice. We give this and the movie 5 shining stars.

The songs were catchy with easy-to-learn choreography for you sing and dance along fans. It made me think about how fun it is to be adventurous and try new things, even if you aren’t sure things will work out in the end, much like trying new food and cooking a new recipe. Try a different style sometime. Pick a random fruit or meat and see what you can do with it. All and all, Donna’s free-style carefree Greek escapade-turned business reminded me to take a bite out of life and not be so caught up in the work-work-work. Heck, I was voted “Dancing Queen” in Shenendehowa’s high school class of 2011. One of the most important things we understand about how cooking relates to life next to sanitation is to have fun!

July 22, 2018July 23, 2018

8 Arms to Cook with You.

Octopuses are regarded as some of the most intelligent creatures of the sea along with the bottle-nosed dolphin. They’ve been taught how to open jars and slip themselves into bottles. Some even live in the abyssal zone of the ocean among bacteria and heat-sensing shrimp while others camouflage themselves along the coral reefs. These poor unfortunate souls however, are going to be our dinner. Don’t worry, they’re not on the endangered list. The New England Aquarium in Boston highly recommends browsing their sister website HERE for information about eco-positive projects in the works to help protect sea creatures from being over-farmed without losing the healthy benefits of protein, Omega-3, vitamin B, iodine, zinc, potassium and phosphorus that we gain from eating seafood.

Essentially, we used the same low heat and long cook-time method of cooking these suckers as we did with our second calamari, drawing from the Polipo in Umido (braised octopus) written in “Lidia’s Italian Table”. Typically, fast and high is best reserved for salads as opposed to an entrée where the flavors need to marinate and harmonize together. Hawaiians and Italians alike know that octopuses can be farmed well and are seriously under appreciated in terms of cooking. It’s such an easy squid substitute.

Octopus on plastic — It actually stuck to the plastic!

In our mise en place, we did a ribbon-like chiffonade on our bock-choy, halved some cherry tomatoes and seasoned with red pepper flakes, sage and a generous sprinkle of pink salt and pepper. These things don’t come pre-flavored other than “seafood”.

I loved getting my hands wet playing around with these creatures. We put down some plastic bags so we didn’t get goop to They feel so cool, smooth and not at all sticky, but covered in bumps and holes. You may consider these a brother or sister to squid. Of course, we’ve bought our 4 from the frozen section at less than $10. Large and fresh may be the best qualities of land meat, but on the contrary, smaller frozen octopus tends to be meatier than freshly caught. Then again, the bigger the polipo, the more you get to beat it with a trusty meat mallet.

They shriveled up in only a matter of 45 minutes in our bubbling cast iron cauldron. More or less, they became palm-sized. Including resting time to let it all, this dish took us only 50 minutes. The cleaned out head piece was the sweetest seafood I’ve ever tasted. I’d akin it to lobster meat. The tentacles however were simply a thicker form of calamari.

We were very surprised at how salty the dish turned out after plating. We only added a pinch, considering as how octopus is a sea creature and may have had some saltiness to it. Actually, the octopus wasn’t salty intrinsically, so we’re stumped as to why we were chugging water afterwards. Overall, it was meaty but not chewy with that special seafood flavor that hits you just right with a flavorful brine. We give this one a 3.5 out of 5 stars. Sea stars that is. Personally, I say my inamorata is a perfect 10.

July 15, 2018April 6, 2019

The Calamari Tales Part 2

This time, we chose a low and slow simmering stuffed calamari so that everything could blend together into one cohesive dish as opposed to having separate components combined at the end. The frozen calamari was already cleaned. All I had to do was pull out the tentacles and rinse.

Meanwhile, I went straight to work on the stuffing. We followed Nona’s Kitchen instructions to a tee. Lauren’s processor worked great on her left-over stale bread heels. I must say, I was unimpressed with the stuffing. She used the same basic stuffing and bread crumbs as every other house cook.

When I think of a good stuffing, there’s more than eggs, parsley and bread crumbs. I want to improvise, like a Thanksgiving turkey stuffed with mushrooms, cranberries and celery. If it were me creating the recipe, I would use leafy greens and carrots to mix it up a little, maybe use some sausage. Her list was dull at best and we found out later that her idea of using milk wasn’t her greatest either. Fish stock really is the way to go. We really missed out not having any fish stock around the house. Moral of the story, it needed inspiration and some minor tweaking. Since vegan eggs are made of a sort of algae, would that have been a more tasteful binder? Regular chicken eggs are a perfect binder thanks to their protein structure, but what does that mean about algae? This implies further investigation at another time.

Stuffing the calamari full - they look like alien eggs — Stuffing the calamari full – they look like alien eggs

A few of the squid bodies were too piccoli to be stuffed, so we simply chopped them up as a little secret ingredient to the sauce similar to the fruite de marre at Francessca’s Restauranti in Boston. Having the pan at a lower heat made it easier for the sauce to marinate. We debated a bit of tomato paste to give it more of a pizza sauce texture, but ultimately saved ourselves the sodium and went without it.

By putting a cover over the sauce pot, we were able to utilize all 3 forms of heating; conduction from the fire heating the pan, convection from the heat cycling underneath the lid and radiation from the steam within. It was during this time that the tentacles began to curl. Since less heat escaped, the tentacles were able to curl with delight.

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There was a true lack of flavor in the stuffing. We were sure to add salt and pepper, but the seasoning was far too miniscule. Perhaps if we had included cayenne pepper, or some dried herbs, we may have gotten more of a hit, since squid taste so skin-like. It may be rich in vitamin B 12 and riboflavin, but seriously, there is no such tangy, sour, sweet or any sort of flavor to squid. Your seasoning has to be on target or it will be bland. Remember this bit of blunt alliteration: Bland is boring.

Stuffed squid sauteed in a squid marinara sauce

Most of what we did taste was breaded scrambled eggs in squid rolls. It was even squishing and expanding out of their pockets in the pan. Our elementary tomato sauce was loaded with hearty garlic, a handful of onion and some gorgeous fresh parsley. Thank goodness that had so many flavors, or we would have had mush in our mouths. Maybe mixing in some panko would show some improvement. All and all, we give this one a fair 80%.

July 9, 2018

The Calamari Tales Part 1

One of our favorite fruite de marre is calamari. Cephalopods are regarded as the chewing gum of seafood. We’ve had it en salad as a side with sushi, fried as an appetizer in a few venues around the New York capital area and cooked into chunky tomato sauce on Christmas Eve with my family. Jeremy and I have taken the next step in our passion for squid and started a trilogy of dishes in its honor.

Two rings connected together - more delicious than the real thing — We have a real passion for squid.

If by chance you can’t find any, abalone or conch will do just fine. *If you’re allergic to shellfish, you probably should consult your doctor or avoid these critters as they could trigger a reaction. Cephalopods are different from crustaceans, but better safe than swollen.*

Our first endeavor was inspired by our first bite of calamari salad at the sushi section of the grocery store, sort of like a drive-by. Obviously, we couldn’t find any bamboo shoots, so we settled on the idea of instead of adding chicken pieces to a salad, why not use squid?

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Some people go pescatarian for the way they see how factories treat chickens and baby chicks as products rather than living animals. Fish is an excellent substitution for such cases with less hassle in creating proteins combining nuts and specific grains. Not only that, but fish can be farmed in a sense of being raised in a contained unit with the intent to use them as food.

Jeremy speaking. Here’s our typical shortcut salad with a little fish oil dressing on the side.

Throwing the simple salad together - simpler tends to be better — Throwing the simple salad together – simpler tends to be better

Did you know that squid can live up to one year at a time, are sustainable and have ink sacks that can be incorporated into black macaroni dishes. In fact, all but the beak, quill and organs of a squid is edible. Why not use it? With all that having been stated, we’ve chopped every squid body into neat little rings like you find pre-packaged and are ready to cook. We’re not eating these suckers raw. No offense to those who do. Back when I was in China, it wasn’t so odd to sink your teeth into some crawling octopus tentacles freshly chopped, but those have to be thoroughly chewed.

Lauren almost eating squid raw! — In Japan, it’s totally normal to eat squid and octopus while it’s still alive. Since these were frozen first, (kept under 41 degrees Fahrenheit) we don’t have to worry about parasites. Look for “Sushi-Grade” to be sure it was treated first.

This is one of those fast and high heated recipes where it cooks in oil so quickly there’s no time for anything to turn to rubber. I excitedly threw in the tentacles in one by one with the chopped garlic and oil and witnessed the magic of how they curl around into flowery shapes at just the right temperature. They’re so squishy and gooey to hold in your bare hands, similar to worms and my old purple goooze. (Nowadays, kids have to make their own slime with glue and contact solution, but that’s beside the point)

Look at the sight of those ooey gooey morsels!

At this point, we simply scooped them into the salad. I would recommend a small drizzle of balsamic or a vinaigrette on top for dressing as the avocado can be rather fatty. It may be 75% healthy unsaturated fats, but it can feel like a ton after too much. After all, England is famous for their fish and chips with vinegar for the acidic kick in the middle of every bite. Now that we’ve had our salad, on to the main course: Stuffed Calamari courtesy of “Nona’s Kitchen”.