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Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Paula Deen and my fatness rant

January 18, 2012 by Mary Frances 9 Comments

Ok, I have to get on my soapbox now. Paula Deen has Type 2 diabetes!!! Duh!!! Are you kidding me? I mean, really, you are what you eat and if she’s surprised after eating all the butter, cream cheese, fried food and sugar she eats, she’s nuts. And believe me, I’ve spent a lot of time in the South. Southern cooking is not all that, or just that.

First of all, the fact that she hid it from her audience and fans  for three years is despicable. She had to get all her ducks in a row with whatever diabetes drug she decided to take, make the deal to negotiate to endorse it, and get the money from them. This is incredible! I think she is scum. (I won’t hold back.)

I have always told my children, look at the chef whose recipes you’re making. James Beard’s recipes were always loaded with butter, cream, mayo and everything fattening. He was huge. His recipes were incredibly tasty and frankly, not all of them were fattening. In fact, I still use his Canadian method for cooking fish as a standard.

Never to put her name in the same category as James Beard, as she is not a chef, I was watching Rachel Ray two weeks ago while making dinner with one of my sons. She was promoting four weeknight dinners with pork, each dinner for four people had a full stick of butter!!! That’s ridiculous. That’s two tablespoons of butter per person, per day, not counting the fats from the sausages and other cuts of meat, because she doesn’t drain the fat. Look at Nigella Lawson – I love her personality and I like a lot of her recipes – but you can’t eat like that all the time. Maybe just a few times a year. I splurged with Bobby Flay’s Nacho Burgers I made two weeks ago.

Now Melissa Clark and Mark Bittmann, they are both average-sized, slim people and their recipes speak to it. The article in The Times today talked about all the butter used in Michelin star restaurants like Bouley. But you don’t eat at Bouley but maybe once a year for a special occasion – at least for me – and these people – Paula and Rachel are encouraging folks to eat like this every night of the week. It’s absurd! And by the way, Thomas Keller of The French Laundry and Per Se is mighty thin, as the portions at his restaurants are small too. All of his dishes are just one or two bites. Chef Anthony Bourdain said that Paula Deen’s fatty food made her “the worst, most dangerous person” on the Food Network. It’s true, because she’s got all of America listening to her.

I even try to use less oil whenever possible. And I do love my olive oil. But if a meat recipe that calls for browning, calls for three tablespoons of olive oil, I try to do it with two. I even have a recipe for four chicken breasts that calls for one teaspoon of olive oil to brown the skin side, and believe me, it works!

Take a look at the line up of people waiting to get in to Paula Deen’s restaurant. You’re not surprised, are you?

Deen

Filed Under: Dinner Tagged With: (Anthony Bourdain, Bobby Flay, Bouley, Canadian method, Chinese herbs, James Beard, Mark Bittmann, Melissa Clack, Michelin stars, Nigella Lawson, Paula Deen, Per Se, Rachel Ray, Southern cooking, The French Laundry, Thomas Keller, Type 2 diabetes

Eat right, eat healthy!

January 17, 2012 by Mary Frances 2 Comments

From the gothamist.com – this is terrible that half of Americans will be obese – obese – not just overweight by 2030!

Planes, Trains And Automobiles Struggle With Fat Americans

2012_01_obeseseat

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

In Sao Paolo, there are “fat seats” for obese transit patrons

Shortly after learning that half of all Americans will be obese by 2030, the Times has decided to investigate the pressing issue of fat Americans on public transportation. It’s a real problem, you guys! Just ask Kevin Smith.

New Jersey Transit is adding new trains cars with 2.2-inch wider seats, a move that will change the configuration of the entire train from three seats on one side and two on the other to two on both sides. Amtrak is introducing “designs that will be able to accommodate the larger-sized passengers” next year. The Federal Transit Authority is proposing changing bus testing regulations to “more accurately reflect average passenger weights.” Metro-North is attempting to trick fat passengers by making the middle seats look larger with a center seam instead of arm barriers, though they’re not actually making the seats bigger. (Not all passengers are pleased with this: “They are just as uncomfortable as before,” said Jim Cameron, chairman of the state-created Connecticut Metro-North Rail Commuter Council. “Anything they did on the M-8’s to give the illusion of more space cannot deny the physics of time and space.”)

“It’s clear that the U.S. population is getting heavier,” said Martin Schroeder, chief engineer for the American Public Transport Association, in what could be the understatement of the century. “We are trying to get our hands on that and figure out what is the best average weight to use.” Or, as Cameron puts it, “Why subject my girth to other people?”

Contact the author of this article or email tips@gothamist.com with further questions, comments or tips.

Filed Under: Dinner Tagged With: Amtrak, fat Americans, Gothamist.com, Metro North, NJ Transit, obese

Football snacks

January 15, 2012 by Mary Frances 3 Comments

This past week, we had some dear friends over for cocktails and appetizers and then had dinner together at the Red Rooster restaurant, just open a year now, but famed and always crowded. It’s nice!

Charlie Rose was at the table next to ours, (poor guy, he spilled wine all over himself) and the star chef/owner Marcus Samuelsson stopped by and chatted with us. As usual, the Swedish meatballs and fried chicken (yardbird) were great!

I’ve mentioned before, I don’t think I do appetizers well and this opportunity of only having to serve just that and not a whole dinner, was unusual for me. So I wanted to make them different, not too filling, (because I knew dinner would be), and fresh. I think I achieved that.

Crackers, nuts, vegetables, and creamy dip.

I relied on my friend Margaret’s recipe for tonnato, a really creamy, bursting with flavor dip. Combining tuna, anchovies, capers and mayo and you can’t go wrong. Throw in parboiled green beans, fresh fennel and red pepper sticks and you’ve got a delicious combo. I also included a marvelous true English cheddar from Todd English’s Food Court at the Plaza Hotel, some crackers, pistachios (Susan loves) and corn nuts.

It worked out great and I think this would also be great for game watching today. Let me know what you think!

TONNATO
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 olive oil
8 oz Italian tuna in oil, drained (or use 1 ½ cans of water packed white albacore tuna, drained – I actually think this is better!)
5 anchovy fillets, packed in oil, at room temperature, drained and patted dry with a paper towel
3 tbs. lemon juice or a bit more to taste
2 tbs. capers, drained
Salt and pepper to taste

Combine all ingredients in the food processor and process until smooth and voila, you’ve got one tasty dip! Do taste before you add any salt and pepper as you may not need any salt at all.

For the green beans, trim the one end, drop in boiling salted water for 2 minutes. Drain and immediately put in an ice water bath to stop the cooking. Pat dry and let air dry. When dry, wrap in a paper towel and place in a ziplock bag in the refrigerator to chill.

Fennel and red pepper strips should just be raw. You could also use carrot, celery or cucumber strips too.

Filed Under: Appetizers Tagged With: anchovies, capers, Charlie Rose, English Cheddar, fennel, Food Court at the Plaza Hotel, football, Giants, green beans, lemon juice, Marcus Samuelsson, mayonnaise, Plaza Hotel, red peppers, Red Rooster restaurant, snacks, Todd English, tonnato, tuna

For Football Sunday

January 13, 2012 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

Or shall I say, how to love your man and make him ADORE you.

I made this for dinner last Sunday and my husband was so so happy, and the Giants won!! So maybe it’s also our good luck burger. Now I don’t usually make things like this – too rich, too fattening, too, too and not special enough for a Sunday dinner, but Steve was so excited about the game last week, we had to rush home from the country and be here in Manhattan to see it. We don’t have TV in the country – just Netflix on the Internet, which by the way, the selection there stinks, and DVD’s on our old Sony.

But I saw this Bobby Flay Nacho Burger recipe on the cover of the January issue of Food and Wine and it just seemed so right for the day. It was really good. Really.

However in my inimitable way of constantly tinkering with recipes, if I were to make it again, I might do ¼ lb. sharp cheddar and ¼ lb. Monterey Jack cheese in the sauce, instead of all Jack. And I thought the salsa was too sweet. Rather than the pickled jalapeños on top, I think I would put in ½ of a fresh, thinly sliced jalapeño, with the seeds, directly in the salsa and skip the pickled ones all together.

I have also switched the order of his process – you need to make the cheese sauce first so it cools and gets thick.

Let me know what you think.

GO GIANTS!!!

(Fortunately we are invited to our friend’s house upstate for this weekend. They have a TV and Margaret is going to make rabbit! A bit more elegant than this!)

NACHO BURGERS from Bobby Flay and Food and Wine magazine

Nacho Burgers.

© John Kernick

Cheese Sauce
1 1/2 cups milk
1/2 pound Monterey Jack cheese, shredded
2 tablespoons freshly grated pecorino cheese
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour

Salsa
3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon vegetable oil (I used olive oil)
Salt
2 tablespoons red onion, finely diced
3 plum tomatoes, finely diced
3 tablespoons chopped cilantro
1 chipotle chile in adobo, seeded and minced (I left the seeds in)

Burgers
Vegetable oil, for brushing (I used olive oil)
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Sliced pickled jalapeños and blue corn tortilla chips, for topping
1 1/2 pounds ground beef chuck
4 hamburger buns, split and toasted

MAKE THE CHEESE SAUCE In a small saucepan, melt the butter. Stir in the flour and cook over moderate heat for 30 seconds. Whisk in the milk and cook, whisking, until smooth and thickened, 5 minutes. Stir in the Jack cheese until melted, then stir in the pecorino; season with salt and pepper. Let the sauce cool until it is very thick and spreadable.

MAKE THE SALSA In a bowl, combine all of the ingredients and season with salt.

MAKE THE BURGERS Light a grill or heat a grill pan on high heat. Form the beef into 4 patties (try to handle the meat as little as possible) and brush with oil; season with salt and pepper. Grill over moderately high heat until browned outside and medium-rare within, about 3 – 4 minutes per side, depending on your heat.

Place the burgers on the buns. Top with the cheese sauce, salsa, pickled jalapeños and chips. Close the burgers and serve.

Filed Under: Dinner, Meat Tagged With: Bobby Flay, Cheddar cheese, cheese sauce, Food and Wine magazine, football, football Sunday, Giants, jalapeños, Monterey Jack cheese, Nacho burgers, nacho chips, Netflix, salsa, Sony

A disaster!

January 11, 2012 by Mary Frances 2 Comments

So I came home last night, all pumped to make this Classic Chicken Teriyaki recipe I had read about in the January issue of Food and Wine magazine.

I have all the ingredients but the sauce seems a little too sweet to me, but then again, what do I know about classic Japanese cooking – nada! However, 1/3 cup of sugar, mirin and sake all at once, with chicken broth and soy sauce sounds like a lot of sugar. So you’re supposed to boil this mixture for 20 minutes and reduce it down to 1/2 cup. Well, at about the 12 minute mark, I had turned away from stirring and was at the sink for a moment and suddenly it started smelling bad – like burnt sugar. I whip around, try to stir this mixture and it is suddenly a hard, dark black mass of concrete!! I take it to the sink, knowing it’s ruined and run water into the pot – it is awful and disgusting and suddenly the room starts to fill up with a thick smoke and smell terribly and I’m convinced that not only have I ruined our dinner but I’ve also completely ruined and charred my All-Clad pot. Booooo. What a disaster!!

And now it’s late and we have no dinner. Fortunately, that was just the sauce but I have to think quick and get moving. So I decide to make a one dish meal, combining the sliced garlic, bok choy, boneless, skinless chicken thighs (which I cut into strips), and red pepper rings all together. I season it with Tamari sauce, 1/2 of a jalapeno pepper sliced thin, and then I add in 3 heaping tablespoons of shallots confit from France that my friend, Mary Beth, brought over one night. I wanted to achieve a salty, hot, sweet combination, and quick! So I was grabbing at what seemed good and was handy.

The dish was amazing! Probably much better than any Chicken Teriyaki could have ever been. Unfortunately this Shallot Confit has a lot of wonderful ingredients like black current cream and wine and olive oil and a touch of lemon juice so I can’t really tell you how to duplicate this recipe unless you have this handmade stuff. But the picture looks pretty, doesn’t it?
Chicken thighs with bok choy and red pepper in a white dish. Chicken teriyaki disaster.

Regarding the teriyaki sauce, I guess the heat was too high and it should have been simmering rather than boiling but still, that’s a little sensitive, don’t you think? My dear husband did manage to get the pot clean, but boy, he scraped out this thick black stuff that was thick and shiny on the outside. It actually looked like car paint. Maybe I invented a new process to make plastic?!?

Chicken teriyaki disaster on a white plate.

Served plate of “chicken teriyaki disaster”

Filed Under: Dinner, Poultry Tagged With: bok choy, boneless skinless chicken thighs, chicken teriyaki, cilantro, Food and Wine magazine, France, jalapeno, red pepper, rice, shallot confit, sliced garlic

Some interesting tidbits

January 8, 2012 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

Some interesting tidbits compiled by Molly Oldfield & John Mitchinson

Bad cooks – and the utter lack of reason in the kitchen – have delayed human development longest and impaired it most
Friedrich Nietzsche

Cartoon illustration of a male and female toasting whipped cream topped drinks.

Brain food

Cooking is good for the brain. It’s now thought that our ancestor, Homo erectus, first used fire to soften meat 1.8 million years ago. Because the nutrients in cooked food are more easily absorbed, the British primatologist Richard Wrangham has argued that this allowed the human digestive tract to gradually shrink, enabling us to stand more easily.

Cooking also encouraged us to socialize, which expanded our neural pathways and made our brains grow larger. Mouths, once used mostly for ripping and grinding flesh, were able to spend more time talking and singing.

Filed Under: Dinner Tagged With: Brain food, Friedrich Nietzsche, Interesting food tidbits, John Mitchinson, Molly Oldfield

Fruit!

January 5, 2012 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

So after enjoying all these wonderful meals and special treats and drinks during the holidays, I am waking up to discover that I am really fat.

Not really. But, you know, when you put on a pair of favorite pants and think they’ve suddenly shrunk in length (even though they were fine the last time you put them on), then you have to fess up to the fact that it’s the size of your hips that’s hiking them up and you know, Spanx can only do so much. So I’ve gained a few pounds and it feels really uncomfortable.

I’ve now gone back to “clean eating” – less meat, little or no carbs and having a piece of celery or a half of apple if I’m starving before dinner. It’s working. I’ve already lost 3 of the 5 pounds.

I think fruit is a wonderful thing. Some doctors have told me it’s too sweet, it has too much sugar. But it’s a natural sweetness, right? It’s refreshing, satisfying that sweet tooth craving and makes all things “right”, as my mother used to say. She would have a piece of fruit at the end of her lunch every day as well as pack an apple, orange or pear in our lunch for school. I have kept that habit up, only we have a small bowl of fresh fruit salad at the end of our breakfast everyday. What I do is make a very large fruit salad on Sunday morning, and then it lasts us for the week, making it super easy to serve up for a workday morning.

You can, of course, combine all sorts of things but I don’t recommend bananas, unless you eat them right away, as they don’t hold up. Leave your strawberries whole so they don’t break down as quickly and serve them up sooner than the rest. A pineapple is wonderful, along with grapefruit, oranges, apples, and red or green grapes. Blueberries, blackberries, mangoes and kiwi are nice as well, but need to be eaten first too.
Fruit salad with grapefruit, blueberries, bananas, and basil.

And here’s a great tip, squeeze some fresh lime juice all over your salad and then top it off with torn fresh mint leaves. I have found that the mint leaf edges will not darken as quickly if you tear them, as opposed to cutting or chopping them.

So start your new year with fruit!
Fruit salad with kiwi, orange, grapes, grapefruit, and pineapple.

Filed Under: Breakfast, Salads Tagged With: apples, bananas, blueberries, Fruit, grapes, kiwi, pineapple, strawberrires

Last sunset of 2011

December 31, 2011 by Mary Frances 5 Comments

Sunset.

Filed Under: Dinner

For tonight!

December 31, 2011 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

Milk and banana on a white plate.

Before you start drinking, try this!

New Years Eve – the one evening that gives everyone permission to over drink and party hardy. Our family precaution, stemming from my father, was to drink a glass of milk and have a banana before starting your reveling. Does it work? He used to say it would coat your stomach and give you something solid in your belly. He also used to say, “Everything in moderation!”

Whatever, the milk and banana are good for you. Give it a go and let me know what you think.

Happy New Year!!!

Filed Under: Dinner, First Course Tagged With: banana, celebrating New Year's Eve, hangover prevention, milk, New Year's Eve, reveling, to curb over drinking

Beef tenderloin dinner

December 30, 2011 by Mary Frances 8 Comments

Garlicky Beef Tenderloin With Orange Horseradish Sauce.

© Andrew Scrivani for The New York Times

I want to tell you about our Christmas Day dinner. It was so good and some of you may want to replicate parts or all of it for your New Years Day dinner. I adapted Melissa Clark’s recent recipe in The New York Times and it was delicious. Everyone raved about the meat!!

And here’s a funny story about buying the meat. I had heard a radio ad for Stew Leonard’s whole beef fillets. He was advertising them for $7.98 a pound! I thought, wow, that’s worth a drive to Yonkers. So my husband gets up at 7 am on Saturday to get this. He tried to do it on Friday morning but found our car dead in the garage. We drive a Prius and the engine is so quiet, the garage guys often forget to turn it off. This has happened twice before so we made a sign to tell them to remember to turn it off. But, the last time we drove the car, we forgot to leave the sign in the front seat!

So off he goes on Saturday morning. I tell him to ask the butcher for enough beef for 7 people plus a few leftovers. Well he comes back with this gigantic piece of meat – 6.6 pounds!! Like enough for 13 – 14 people. But then, look at the majority of people who shop at Stew’s – they’re fat! Our country is getting so obese it’s ridiculous. And he paid $11.98 a pound. The $7.98 per pound price was untrimmed with a 30 – 40% loss factor. Talk about a scam to get you in there.

But, this meat was good, so there’s a little redemption.

Here’s my menu.

Appetizers:
Pate de campagne
Truffle duck mousse pate
Cornichons, picholine olives, lightly salted cashews
Artichoke dip – my recipe in an earlier blog post
Assorted brown rice chips, whole wheat pita and sliced French baguette

Dinner:
Pancetta and asparagus soup with black pepper – from Judy Rodgers and the Zuni Café cookbook, served with homemade Polish bread
Beef tenderloin with horseradish sauce– adapted from Melissa Clark and The New York Times
Mashed potatoes with cauliflower and roasted garlic – Lee Bailey – Long Weekends cookbook
Haricot Vert with walnut oil, sea salt and toasted walnuts
Oven roasted plum tomato halves with oregano (they were so good the night before and made the plate look Christmas-y next to the Haricot Vert)

Dessert:
Ethiopian coffee
Christmas cookies, of course
Peppermint chocolates

Here is the tenderloin recipe that I have altered for our taste.

GARLICKY BEEF TENDERLOIN WITH HORSERADISH SAUCE – adapted from Melissa Clark and The New York Times
– serves 12 – 14

1 (6.6 lbs.) beef tenderloin, trimmed and tied
1 1/2 tbs. kosher salt, more to taste
1 1/2 tsp. black pepper, more to taste
1 heaping tbs. chopped fresh rosemary
6 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbs. extra virgin olive oil
1.5 cups crème fraîche
1/4 cup white horseradish
Several dashes of Tabasco

Season the tenderloin all over with the salt, pepper, rosemary and garlic. Cover the meat and refrigerate overnight. Let it come to room temperature for 2 hours before roasting.

Heat oven to 450 degrees. Wipe off as much garlic and seasonings as possible with a paper towel. It tends to burn and the flavors have penetrated the meat overnight.

In a large roasting pan over two burners and high heat, heat the oil. Add the meat and thoroughly brown all over, 4 minutes per side. Brown all 4 sides.

Place the roasting pan on the middle rack of the oven and roast until an instant-read thermometer shows 120 degrees (for rare), 10 to 20 minutes. Let the meat rest for 10 minutes before carving.

In a small bowl, whisk the crème fraîche and horseradish plus a few dashes of Tabasco. Serve alongside the tenderloin.

Assuming your meat is a good quality cut, you will LOVE this!

Now if you want any of these other recipes, do let me know.

Filed Under: Dinner, Meat Tagged With: asparagus, beef fillet, beef tenderloin, Christmas Day dinner, creme fraiche, garlic, haricot verts, horseradish sauce, Idaho potatoes, Judy Rodgers, Lee Bailey, mashed potatoes with cauliflower, Melissa Clark, pancetta, roasted garlic, rosemary, The New York Times, Zuni Café

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