Chocolate Pistachio Fudge

Fudge is delicious but it takes forever, right? Wrong! Not when it’s done the Nigella Express way.

Nigella’s Chocolate Pistachio Fudge
from Nigella Express

12 oz semi-sweet chocolate, chopped
1 14-oz can condensed milk
pinch of salt
1 cup shelled pistachios
2 Tbsp butter

Melt the chocolate, condensed milk, butter, and salt in a large, heavy-bottomed pan over low heat.

Put the shelled pistachios in a freezer bag and bash them mercilessly until broken up into both big and little pieces. To prevent turning some to dust and leaving others intact, move the bag around as you bash and pause occasionally to see if any are escaping altogether; go after these ones personally with the quick rap from the smaller handle-end of your rolling pin.

Add the nuts to the melted chocolate and condensed milk mixture and stir very well to mix.

Pour in to a 9×9 or 8×8 square aluminum foil pan, smoothing the top. Nigella says use a 9×9 but I misremembered when I was at the store and bought an 8×8 pan. This worked out quite well, as the recipe should yield about 64 pieces, and from an 8×8 pan that’s 1-inch squares and easy to cut. As it was, I cut 2×2 squares and then cut each of those in quarters as I plated and served them. I am pretty sure I was able to get 64 1×1 squares from this approach, even if Jim did sneak some of the larger pieces whole before I could cut them. I’m pretty sure my strategy is sound.

Let the fudge cool, and then refrigerate until set. Once cut, you can keep it (for as long as it lasts!) in an airtight container in the fridge or freezer. No need to thaw, just take out and eat right away.

Crab Cakes

What do you do when you have so much leftover mashed potato that you’re pretty sure you’re set til Judgement Day?

You make crab cakes, that’s what you do.

The obvious answer to my leftovers dilemma was shepherd’s pie, but I was looking for something new but simple. I scoured the internet looking for a crab or fish cakes recipe that involved cold homemade mashed potato as a main binding ingredient, in order to make a dent in the extra that we made the night before. I came up with many recipes with various types and amounts of fish (usually flaky white fish such as cod or bass) or crab for protein, and various proportions of fish-to-potato, although the most common proportion I found was equal parts protein to potato. The crab cake recipe I eventually went with is simple, straightforward, and if you have the mashed potato you probably have all the ingredients on hand except for the crab, unless you either have a very well-stocked pantry or have planned well in advance for this dish (which is what I will do the next time around).

UK-Style Crab Cakes (Croquettes)

8 oz mixed crabmeat
8 oz cooked mashed potato*
2 oz (1/4 c.) plain dry bread crumbs
1 oz oatmeal, NOT instant
2 beaten eggs, separated
1/2 small onion, finely minced
1 Tbsp fresh chopped parsley
1 Tbsp lemon juice
pinch of cayenne pepper**
salt and pepper
flour
oil for frying***

*We theorize that thicker mashed potato is better than mash that has been thinned out too much by milk, cream, or butter; it should be a better binder for the cakes. Ours didn’t hold up to a lot of handling or keep their shape particularly well. Jim likes thinner mash so he got a little carried away when he was making them. Next time we’ll plan ahead by either making thicker potatoes, or by setting aside potato for this recipe before continuing to make regular, creamier mash.
**Not having cayenne pepper on hand, I substituted a bit of chile powder and a fair amount of paprika.
***We used grapeseed oil as suggested by Nigella for the goujons of sole, as it has a high smoke point and can be gotten up to a good temperature for pan-frying without burning. Also, grapeseed oil has an almost non-taste and makes for light, non-greasy frying with extreme crunchy texture.

In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine the crabmeat, mash, parsley, onion, lemon juice, cayenne (or other spices), and salt and pepper to taste. Add one of the beaten eggs and mix well until the ingredients are bound.

I find that it helped at this point to refrigerate the mixture for a while to help it firm up. Give it another good mix before shaping the cakes.

Meanwhile, mix the bread crumbs and oatmeal in one shallow bowl or dish (seasoned with some freshly ground black pepper if you like), and have the second beaten egg in another shallow bowl or dish. We had a good assembly line set up on the countertop: the bowl of crab mixture, the egg, the bread crumbs/oatmeal mixture, then a clean plate for placing the formed cakes.

Flour your hands and make 8 or 9 crab cakes from the mixture. Dip each cake in the beaten egg, then in the bread crumbs/oatmeal mix, then arrange on the clean plate. I found that again I benefitted from putting the plate of formed cakes in the freezer for a few minutes while the oil heated up, to firm them up.

Heat the oil and gently fry the crab cakes, turning once, until they are brown on both sides.

Serve hot with a green salad or other sides. We had a Caesar salad. I also made Jamie Oliver’s marie rose sauce (from his recipe for prawns with old-school marie rose, which I made back in August) as a condiment, with the addition of a few drops of Tabasco — not too much since I didn’t want to overpower the flavor of the crab cakes, but just enough to add a bit of zing — for a twist.

These reheat fantastically for the next day’s lunch at one minute in the microwave.

photo by Rachel

Alice White Lexia

Lexia wine is a muscat-like sweet wine from Australia. The tasting notes for the Lexia are “A delicious white wine with fragrant apricot, orange blossom and lilac aromas and round, pleasingly sweet, mango and melon flavors balanced by a crisp, refreshing finish.”

I never thought we’d find one, but we’ve come across a self-described sweet wine that even Jim doesn’t like. The mango-like sweetness is very strong, but the finish is not all that complex — the flavor just sort of cuts off at the end of the taste, which is what I find disappointing. This could also be contributing to Jim’s impression that the wine is “too” sweet, since there are no underlying, complex flavors in the flavor profile. Except maybe a little chemical twinge at the very end of the sweetness. I don’t mind trying it, and I don’t even think I would mind it occasionally if paired with food, particularly spicy Asian and Indian cuisine, but it definitely isn’t going to be our regular, every-day, house wine.

Guinness Chocolate Cake

Three words to make your mouth water. Guinness. Chocolate. Cake.

You may recall that back in July, I made Guinness Cupcakes. That was all well and good, but I had yet to make the Guinness Chocolate Cake that the cupcake recipe was based on. I knew an opportunity would come. I might not be a Guinness-drinker, but the flavors do magical things in baked goods.

So we were invited to a friends’ house for Christmas dinner. The chef is an eminently talented former restaurant chef, so when I volunteered to bring dessert I knew it would have to be something that really stood up to what I knew would be an ambitious, tasty dinner. I immediately had my options down to two choices, both from fantastic Nigella: a Boston-cream-style Victoria sponge, and Guinness cake. The Boston cream Victoria sponge was simple in flavor, elegant, and Bostonian; the Guinness cake seemed to encompass all the flavors and spices of Christmas, the richness of the season, and the darkness of winter nights. Plus, it seemed to me a cousin of the traditional plum pudding with hard sauce that I’m used to on Christmas.

I decided to try the Boston cream Victoria sponge to see how I could get it to turn out. It was mostly a success, but very involved. I’m sure I could conquer it after a couple more attempts. I hemmed and hawed for a day or two, wondering what to do and wondering if I hadn’t gotten in over my head, but then I decided I’d just go for the Guinness cake. After all, I’ve done Guinness cupcakes with fair success.

The recipe is available on Nigella’s website, but it requires metric conversions and I never have faith in my math. It’s also in her book Feast, which amazingly neither I nor my partner-in-culinary-crime have. So I searched the web for it, and found it on a Washington Post blog A Mighty Appetite with Kim O’Donnel. She compares the Guinness cake to a dark gingerbread or Caribbean black cake, which I guess is a sort of very dark, moist fruitcake based on English plum pudding and usually eaten at Christmas and at weddings. These are two comparisons I hear quite often, and though I have never had Caribbean black cake, I thoroughly agree with the parallels to plum pudding.

Even if you don’t like drinking pint upon pint of Guinness, get yourself a 4-pack and make this cake as soon as you have a semi-plausible excuse. This cake is especially tasty when eaten accompanied by a cup of hot coffee, or as we had it, with so-called Spanish coffee, a mix of 151 rum, triple sec, Kahlua, and coffee in a wine glass with a caramelized sugar rim, with a dollop of whipped cream.

photo by Rachel

Guinness Chocolate Cake

For the cake:
1 cup Guinness stout
1 stick unsalted butter, sliced
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 cups granulated sugar
3/4 cup sour cream
2 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

For the icing:
8 oz package cream cheese
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
1/2 cup heavy cream, or heavy cream as needed

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a 9-inch springform pan by buttering the sides and lining the bottom with a circle of parchment paper.

Into a very large saucepan, pour Guinness, add butter, and heat gently until melted. When the butter is fully melted, whisk in the cocoa powder and sugar. In a separate small bowl, beat the sour cream with the eggs and vanilla and then pour into the brown, buttery, beery mixture. Whisk in the flour and baking soda.

Pour cake batter into greased and lined pan and bake for 45 minutes to an hour (check at 45 minutes for doneness, poking a skewer in center). Leave to cool completely in the pan on a wire rack, as it is quite a damp cake. Take the cream cheese out to allow it to soften.

When the cake is cold, gently peel off parchment paper and transfer to a platter or cake stand. Place softened cream cheese and confectioners’ sugar in a mixing bowl, and whip with an electric beater, until smooth. Add the heavy cream in small pours until the icing reaches a good spreadable consistency.

Ice the top of the cake, starting at middle and fanning out, so that it resembles the frothy top of the famous pint.

Makes about 12 servings. Smaller slices are recommended, as this is a cake very rich in both texture and flavor.

A few words on holiday traditions

Not only is Christmas nearly upon us, but my husband and I have also just moved in to a new house. In fact, I just did the final walk-through and turned in the keys on the old apartment this morning. And then I came home and threw myself in to the kitchen. I’ve been baking all afternoon. And my feet are killing me.

The week before we moved, Jim said he wanted to bake (or, wanted me to bake) something to take to our new neighbors’ houses by way of introducing ourselves and making a favorable impression. I said I’d think about what we could do, and we’d do it just before Christmas (giving ourselves a couple of weeks to move in before having to throw ourselves on the neighbors too). Well this past Sunday it snowed bucketsful, and Jim got the chance to meet and introduce himself to the men of the neighborhood (they were all out shoveling together). An hour or so later, the doorbell rang and it was our neighbor-on-the-diagonal on the doorstep, with a basket of holiday desserts (2 of everything: decorated snowmen and Christmas-tree cookies, brownies, and chocolate chip cookies). Now, I’m a firm believer in never returning an empty goody basket, so I immediately started thinking about what to fill the basket with for returning it. I suppose I could have made cookies, or brownies, but clearly my neighbors already had made these things, and probably had some for themselves too. Or, like us, had received plenty of chocolate chip cookies and other sweet snacks from friends, family, and neighbors.

I don’t know how I thought of it at first, but the answer quickly came to me: homemade blueberry muffins. Specifically, the recipe Nigella gives in her book How to Be a Domestic Goddess.
photo by Rachel

I decided we couldn’t make muffins only for the neighbors who’d already sent something over; we should also take muffins to the neighbors on either side of our house, some whom we have met and some of whom we haven’t. So that would be three batches of Nigella’s blueberry muffins, correct?

Well, might as well make four batches. We should have some for ourselves too.

More thoughts about blueberry muffins (and the recipe itself) after the jump.

Mongolian Beef

I can’t even remember how I found this recipe, but you can find it on the web here (elly says opa!), and here (Pink Bites). This is a really easy recipe, and I bet you already have most of the ingredients in your fridge and pantry. I went with the original Pink Bites recipe, reproduced here below.

makes 2 or more servings*

1 lb of flank steak, thinly sliced crosswise (or stir-fry-cut beef)
1/4 cup of cornstarch
3 teaspoons of canola oil
1/2 teaspoon of grated ginger (about 1/2 inch piece)
1 tablespoon of chopped garlic (about 2 -3 large cloves)
1/2 cup of water
1/2 cup of soy sauce (I use low sodium)
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon of red pepper flakes**
3 large green onions, sliced crosswise into thirds

* We got 4 dinner-sized servings from this recipe when paired with generous spoons of steamed white rice.
**I only used 1/4 teaspoon because we (read: I) don’t really like super-spicy foods.

 

Pat the steak pieces and make sure they’re dry; then, toss the steak and cornstarch together.  Be sure all pieces are fully coated, but shake off excess corn starch. Mix together the soy sayce, water, brown sugar and red pepper flakes.

Heat half the oil in a wok at medium-high heat and add the ginger and garlic.  Once fragrant (30 seconds or so), add the soy sauce mixture. Cook for about 2 minutes and transfer to a bowl.

Turn the heat up on the wok and add the remaining oil. Add the beef and cook, stirring until just browned. Pour the sauce back in and let it cook with the meat. Let the sauce thicken to your liking, and then add the green onions in just before plating.

 

This is EASY, this is DELICIOUS, this is everything good about weeknight meals you could ever want. Make it and just tell me it isn’t a fantastic meal — and cheaper than going out for Chinese!

Homemade Corn Dogs

I saw these homemade corn dogs on the recipe part of the Whole Foods website. I have to say, if there is one junk food my dear husband cannot get enough of, it is packaged, frozen, corn dogs. I understand their appeal, really I do, from my days back in the Midwest going to the annual county fair. But as a health-aware (I don’t want to say “health-conscious”) adult, I really can’t justify prepackaged, frozen corn dogs. So when I saw that Whole Foods had figured out a way to do them healthfully, I had to give it a try. If I could figure out corn dogs that I didn’t feel guilty eating, we’d be set for life.

Baked Corn Dogs
8 all-natural turkey or beef hot dogs*
1 1/4 cups cornbread/muffin mix
1/2 cup flour
1 egg, beaten
1/3 cup milk or soymilk

*I’ll bet you might even be able to use tofu or other vegetarian dogs if you wanted to.

Preheat oven to 425°F. Spray a large baking sheet with cooking spray; set aside. Thread each hot dog on to a wooden skewer, leaving about 2 inches extended from one end to act as the handle; set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine muffin mix, flour, egg, milk and butter to make a very thick batter. Moisten your hands with water then press about 1/4 cup of the batter around one of the hot dogs to cover it entirely. Transfer to prepared baking sheet as done then repeat process with remaining batter and hot dogs.

Bake until golden brown and batter is cooked through, about 15 minutes. Transfer to plates and serve with ketchup and mustard on the side.

Jim assembled the dogs because I could just not wrap my smaller hands around them. You have to keep your hands pretty well moistened, or else the corn mix sticks to your hands like cement. We made the recommended amount of corn mix but could only encase 7 dogs; the 8th was sacrificed with some ketchup, mustard, and dill relish for my next day’s lunch. We baked for the recommended time, a little under 15 minutes, but the corn mix lost all of its moisture. It crumbled upon eating, which sort of defeated the idea of replicating a corn dog. I think the next time I might need to use a bain-marie, or tent with a piece of tin foil, in order to help the corn dogs retain moisture during baking. They fared a little bit better upon microwave reheating under an overturned cereal bowl, which I think helped steam them and keep moisture in.

If you give these a try, let me know if you use a different technique and if you have any better luck.

Goujons of Sole with Dill Mayo

Unfortunately, my local grocery store is unenlightened and does not sell sole, filets or otherwise. I had to ask the seafood person what type of fish could be substituted that had a similar taste and texture, and they suggested flounder. So I’m having to use flounder where Nigella recommends lemon sole. I need to find a better seafood counter.

This was my first time using both panko bread crumbs and grapeseed oil and frying anything, so this was a brand-new adventure. Grapeseed oil has a higher smoke point than either vegetable or olive oils, so I decided to invest in a bottle and do this the right way. We love fish & chips and if I can find a good, healthy way to make our own, we’re all better off! Also, Ina Garten has a recipe for authentic fried fish I’d love to build the confidence to try it. So grapeseed oil it is. It heated cleanly and had what I can only call an “efficient” bubble.

The combination of corn starch, egg, and panko bread crumbs was like cement on my fingers, so after dredging and breading each goujon I had to rinse my fingers under some running water.

From Nigella Express.

For the goujons:
2 filets of lemon sole (we used flounder)
corn starch
2 eggs
panko bread crumbs
salt and pepper

For the dill mayo:
1 cup mayonnaise
lime juice
chopped dill

 

In 3 separate bowls, place the corn starch, the 2 eggs, slightly beaten, and the panko. Cut each filet in half, then diagonally in to quarters; you should get 8 roughly-the-same-sized pieces of fish out of each filet. Dredge each goujon in corn starch, then the beaten eggs, then the panko. Place on a cooling rack to rest while you finish dredging the rest of the goujons.

Heat about 1 cup of grapeseed or peanut oil in a skillet (use more or less oil as necessary for the size of your pan). When the oil is hot (I tested the oil by tossing a few panko crumbs in and seeing whether they sizzled or sank), carefully place the breaded goujons in the pan. Be careful not to overcrowd, work in batches as necessary. Using my fairly large skillet I still had to due two batches. Cook each goujons about 2 minutes per side, and keep an eye on them to be sure you don’t overbrown them. They should be ready to flip when the underside is a nice golden brown with a crisp. When the goujons are done, transfer to a plate covered in paper towel to drain and cool a little.

Mix the mayo, lime juice, and dill together as a dip for the goujons. Enjoy while they’re still hot!

Ham Steaks with Parsley

Ham Steaks with Parsley
from Nigella Express

2 tsp garlic oil
2 ham steaks, about 7 ounces or so each
2 Tbsp. white wine vinegar
1/4 cup water
freshly ground pepper
2 tsp honey
1/4 cup roughly chopped parsley

 

In a skillet large enough for both steaks, heat the garlic oil. When the oil is hot, add the ham steaks and cook for about 3 minutes per side. Remove to two warmed plates. While the ham was cooking, I did the next step ahead.

Take the pan off the heat. Whisk the vinegar with the water, pepper, and honey. Throw into the still-hot pan with most of the chopped parsley and swirl and stir and scrape to mix. I let it bubble and thicken a little but don’t take your eyes off it! It might smell too strongly of the vinegar to you, as it did to me, but the flavor is not overpowering-vinegary, the honey goes a long way to balancing it out. Pour the sauce over the ham steaks.

Nigella recommends serving with peas, which we did, and Jim commented that the sauce makes an excellent sauce for the peas. I loved it with the ham, and thought it had a somewhat honey-ham or pineappley scent. Could be served with any vegetable or even ham’s perennial accompaniment in my family, mashed potatoes.

Insanely express recipe. When Nigella says “express,” she means it.

Chorizio & Mushroom Pizza

photo by Rachel