sweet potato fries

Yeah. Hey. Bleh.

All sorts of bullcrap happened this past year. Let’s just let it come out naturally over the course of the next several many posts. Like, oh, look at the pictures – that kitchen looks different, doesn’t it? Interesting! Uh huh.

Also, this recipe is a total joke. Basically, I needed to get myself to post again and in true Julie fashion, my one idea I had for a simple ease-back-into post got thwarted in a last minute effort to obtain the ingredient that actually isn’t all that simple to find and required a special trip to the farmer’s market where the damn rancher didn’t even have it. But posting again has been weighing on me for such a long time and I thought, well, fine. I’ll just use whatever the hell and make a stupid post just so I can get back into the swing of it. So here we are. Sweet potato fries. Like you haven’t ever fucking made stupid sweet potato fries. And it’s not like I even have some sort of secret way of making them that makes them like the kind you get in a restaurant. They’re probably identical to every attempt you’ve ever made. And you’re going to stop reading this blog because why the hell would you bother reading about sweet potato fries and oh wait, you don’t read this anyway because I haven’t posted in like a year.

sesame summer squash salad

Tired of summer squash? Too bad, time to eat more. Can’t say I’m tired of it, because I don’t have any  in my garden (yet). But if I did, this salad would be a perfect way to plow through those ceaselessly proliferating plants. Or you could not pick them, let them get gigantic, then leave them on your patio table, hoping that they’ll turn into dried out ornamental gourds. I’ve def done that a few times.

tomato and onion salad with curried okra chips

Things are starting to fall into place here, I suppose. After I found out our landlord doesn’t want me planting anything in the front of the house, which is the south side, I looked at a few community gardens nearby. I picked one that seems decent, though there’s always worry that neighborhood brats will steal or ruin veggies from the garden. It’s the best option I have, since the landlord seems to prefer to keep the front yard devoid of anything other than weedy ground crawl and unartfully curved metal edging that edges out the weedy ground crawl in favor of debris strewn dirt. So I’m going to start planting for the fall this week, which is exciting! I’ve already got fall (yes fall) tomatoes planted in pots in a patch of sunlight in the back yard. I guess other than that I don’t have much else in my life in place, actually. I signed up for a month at Joe’s Gym. JoesGym.info. I just don’t know what to do about a stupid Crossfit gym. So in the meantime I’m just going to meathead body building gym, getting major weird stares while I try do my old gym’s workouts. Even my cats are in a funk. They kind of just sleep all day, which is what I want to do. I have to snap out! Have to be productive! My funk is sucking at my productivity and my will to be productive. What a terrible cycle.

celery root salad

I’m completely smitten with old cookbooks and reenactment cookbooks…well, historical cookbooks, because they’re often not reenactments so much as modern interpretations on historical recipes. I only wish they were reenactment ones; maybe just explained a little more thoroughly than old ones. I have this one interpreted historical cookbook from the City Tavern, which almost makes me cry because I want all of the recipes so badly to be exactly what olde timey Philadelphians would have eaten at that restaurant so that I can taste something exactly the same. But there are some recipes in the book that aren’t too modernized. It’s refreshing at least to see lard used as the fat of choice in some recipes. This celery root salad is one simple little dish that I’ve been eyeing for a while from that book. There are a fair amount of vegetable recipes in it that are prepared nice and heavily. Don’t get me wrong, I like a good, crisp summer salad, but I’m not going to say I don’t really love fat-laden vegetables. I should have been born in Minnesota, I guess.
Celeriac is one of my absolute favorite roots. To eat. Some how or other, though, I’ve avoided it raw. Mashed, boiled, roasted, but not raw. Come to think of it, I’ve also never had raw beets I don’t think. I asked for a mandoline for Christmas and this was the first time I used it to julienne something. Pretty sweet. I’m sorry if you don’t have one and you have to julienne the root by hand. No, I’m not, because I’ve had to julienne everything by hand before this. You can do it. You’ll be a better person for it. You could also use a box grater, though the result won’t be as elegant, but whatever. I’m not really elegant, either.

cilantro-lime fish cakes

I feel like salt cod is haunting me. I think it started with my blogger friend Mark’s post on salt cod that I mentioned back when I last posted about cod. Then in New York, I ate salt cod croquettes at Casa Mono. Even the Whole Foods we went to had salt cod in a bulk bin. Well, I’m sorry to announce that no, this recipe doesn’t utilize salt cod. It’s like my own recipe is jeering at and taunting me. I’ll just go hang out at allrecipes.com. Start posting there instead. Watch, they probably even wax on about bacalao there, too. User grandma_knitter64 is all about making her own salt cod and making the best salt cod croquettes, ’cause that’s just so here and now, ya know. Well screw you guys, I’m making plain old fish cakes with fresh cod and some mashed taters (and some lime zest and cilantro because, heck, I’m not in New England anymore).
There are about as many types of fish cake recipes out there as there are stupid blogs like mine with posts on them. I’m not sure I’m comfortable saying mine’s definitive in any way – either for me or in the world of fish cakes, but it’s pretty great. It’s crispy on the outside and super soft and fluffy on the inside with flecks of just crunchy enough red onion. Lime zest and cilantro make them kind of addicting and squeezing fresh lime juice on top before you eat them is just what I needed to get through yes, another snow storm. Accompanied by kale and cabbage slaw, it’s all a pretty great antidote.

roasted winter squash with tahini and za’atar

I lost the homemade candy contest. 3rd place out of 3. That’s okay, I guess the judges just preferred marzipan squeezed from a tube with shitty chocolate melted on top. Actually…I probably deserved it. I gave my friend some of my toffee and there was a hair in it. Maybe the judges got a hair piece, too. How embarrassing. How am I supposed to make cookies for people for Christmas? I should be in exile.
I’m really not feeling like writing much here. I had all sorts of wonderful things written down, then I accidentally deleted everything and whenever I do something stupid like that, I freak out and make everything worse. So instead of ⌘-Z-ing, I clicked somewhere else on the page to really confirm that I had deleted everything, thus really truly confirming the delete. Idiot. I don’t even remember what I had written. Other than griping about losing the candy contest. And probably Christmas, something, something, cookies. Trying to rewrite what you’d deleted is such an awful feeling. Even when it’s something as silly as a blog post. It makes me want to pull my hair out.

celery root and onion rösti

I’m having a real crabby week. And it might have started Saturday. A high school kind of moody, little things are getting me down kind of week. I had a meltdown at the gym. That was real cool. I am sick of my bum wrist… both bum wrists and I don’t want to have to think about them anymore and I’m tired of getting setback in trying to get betterstrongerfaster. I’m going to be the worst old person, when all sorts of things start to ache and give me problems. Saturday I got mad when I tried to make this recipe. I burnt it. And I got mad at our stupid stove whose biggest burner isn’t big enough for my cast iron pan so the rimmed edge hangs off and doesn’t allow the pan to heat evenly. The edges of the rösti were only lightly browned, and the center was black, but I still ate most all of it. It’s pretty great, so I remade it on Sunday for some friends I had over. I don’t think they thought I was too weird for taking pictures, and they gave it their thumbs up.

spaghetti squash and caramelized onion cakes

fallfallfallfallfallfallfallllll!
In other news, I might move to Dallas. I am not happy about it. Joe is looking at a company down there for a job. I don’t know. We’ll see. But I can bet you their fall sucks. What the heck am I supposed to cook down there besides bbq (oh that could be good…). Do winter squash even grow? DO THE LEAVES EVEN CHANGE THERE. It’s just a hot, humid, flat wasteland. I’m too afraid to look back at my blog posts around the time of the Denver move. I think I didn’t want to leave Boston, either. I’m apparently inflexible. It’s hard to even get me to go out at night.

swiss chard and leek potato cake

I’ve just come off a long weekend of utter food debauchery. Samantha and her boyfriend Mike came to visit for what were the best four and a half days I’ll probably have until I make it back to visit them in Boston. I.love.themmmm. But wow, did my stomach not. Mostly, I screwed myself over with eating ice cream every night. Oof. But we really ate some pretty awesome food from some awesome restaurants. I love food. Joe loves food. Mike and Samantha love food probably more. It was epic. Mike kept telling me, “It’s alright, you can make it. Just another few meals to go.” Ha.
Some highlights included:
Chicken leg confit with collard greens full of pork chunks and some heirloom corn grits at The Universal. Best f-ing chicken ever. Holy cow. And it was for breakfast. That’s my kind of breakfast. I’d been there before and asked them to cook my eggs in bacon grease and the chef was not just willing to oblige, but excited to do so. Love that place.

roasted eggplant and garlic salad

Roasted eggplant and roasted garlic salad. I don’t know how best to write that. Does the roasted apply to garlic if I only have it in front of eggplant? Is it redundant to write roasted twice? AHH I don’t understand. But rest assured, the garlic is roasted. Sweet, sweet roasted garlic. And it’s mashed around to evenly incorporate amongst the eggplant. God I love this salad. And I can call it a salad because there are some raw elements. Otherwise I would just call it roasted eggplant and garlic. Boring.
I went to two pig roasts the other weekend. Back to back pig roasts. Well, one was a pig smoke. My god were those pigs good. I’m going to have a pig roasting party of my own. Oh yeah, and did I tell you that I went to a hog butchering class? If you followed me on the old twitter you’d know. Anyway, I made a friend at that class, and who also went to one of the pig roasts I went to, and we’re going to make it happen. He’s like a pig maniac and apparently a smoker master. So…I think we’re going to have the best pig roasting party of the year. Be there or be square, buddy.

steamed artichokes + bagna cauda

I feel like I might be the last person in the food blogosphere to get on the bagna cauda bandwagon. And probably the artichoke bandwagon. Not that I haven’t had artichokes before, but gasp! I’d never made one. I feel like such a fraud. Allow me to try to redeem myself with this post, even though steaming an artichoke is like the least interesting way to make one. Sigh. GIVE ME A BREAK.
I’m watching a Nova on “Why Ships Sink”. Why do people go on cruises? They’re disgusting. They’re like my nightmare vacation. My anything nightmare. Fat people. Trashy people. Umbrella drinks. Being stuck in a hotel… because it’s just a giant floating hotel. Sick. Oh honey, I have an idea for a vacation! Let’s pay hundreds of dollars to go someplace where we can sit on our asses, eat mountains of food, watch movies, and be in wonderfully close quarters with other fats – hopefully ones wearing American flag shorts and bejeweled crew neck sweatshirts! Speaking of vacations, my dad has finally started talking about going to South America. I’ve been nagging him for years that we need to go abroad to hike/explore. There is an amazing amount of places and things to see in the US, but I’m dying to go to other countries. I’ve only been to Ireland and it was wonderful. I closetly dream of living there some day.

braised lamb shoulder blade chops + parsnip potato mash

I supposed I could blame my lack of gusto for producing this post in a timely fashion for St. Patrick’s Day on the glorious bout of 70+ degree weather we’ve been having. Burgers and guacamole and grilled veggies have been more on my mind than root vegetables and braises more suitable for brisk 40s-50s spring-ish weather. So maybe just bookmark this for next year’s celebration. Oh wait, and the corned beef recipe I have coming up too. Dammit. Maybe you’ll just have to pretend you’re Irish just a little bit longer. Keep that Erin Go Braughless shirt out for another go around.
I took care of a dog. I have a nascent interest in possibly wanting to want a dog. I thought maybe babysitting one for a day would help me want to want one more. I think I really just want a dog to be a cat that I can take with me on a run and go backpacking with. Or, what I want is a mountain lion that wants to bite me less. Even though I’m pretty convinced all dogs want to bite me just as much as a mountain lion. I think my muscles didn’t relax all day of dogbabysitting. Gotta prepare yourself for that inevitable chomp. Why hasn’t anyone worked on breeding a cat that loves you like a dog, is as big as a dog, and that likes to obey you like a dog? But that still looks like a cat (because duh, they’re way cuter), purrs like a cat, doesn’t wag its tail like an idiot, and does all those cut little rubby things that cats do? Bleh. Maybe it’s just like babies – like they’re alright and pretty cute and stuff, but you don’t ever like someone else’s baby like you’d like your own. So what I need to do is get a little puppy and then next thing I’ll know is that I have a big dog and that I love it because I’ve hardly noticed it transitioning from a lovable cat-sized creature to a big horrible, slobbery, biting, terrifying monster.

tortilla española

I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time trying to perfect the seasoning on my old Wagner cast iron pan. I can’t tell you how long I’ve spent scraping off ancient food residue, applying too-thick layers of one kind of fat, smoking up the apartment for hours on end, realizing that the too-thick layers make for a horrible, bumpy, sticky attempt at seasoning, trying unsuccessfully to fill in the valleys left by lumpy seasoning, getting frustrated and using oven cleaner to attempt to start from scratch, applying impossibly thin layers of different kinds of fats, smoking the apartment for more hours and hours, burning off successful, gorgeous seasoning when I left the pan unattended on a burner for too long, and finally, where I am now – with a pretty decent non-stick coating that definitely suffers from too-small electric stovetop burners, but that generally loves me back as much as I love it.
Which isn’t to say that it’s used like some people use a commercial non-stick pan, meaning, I happily load up the pan with its fair share of fat. And in this case, olive oil. Lots and lots of olive oil. I mentioned a ways back that I was going to post this recipe. Took me a while, I guess. I remember the first time I saw how to make a Spanish tortilla. Shocked. Completely shocked at the amount of olive oil used. There’s a reason it is so, so, so good. Really, can you not not get it at a tapas restaurant? No matter how many other things are more complicated, fancy, or wonderful sounding, I can’t pass up the tortilla Española. I like to think about European food before their encounter with the Americas. Did the Spanish make tortillas before they got the potato? What did they like to put in them? Don’t even get me started with Italian food without tomatoes. One of these days I’ll get some book on the introduction of New World foods to the Old World, rather than just reading blurbs on Wikipedia. Sometimes I’m overwhelmed with what I don’t know.

long-cooked broccoli

If you think that “overcooked” vegetables are something your grandma would serve with tough, overcooked (no quotation marks) meat, canned corn, and a big ol’ pat of margarine, you might be right, but your grandma might have been on to something with those vegetables. It seems pretty chic to serve all your vegetables al dente, and I do like some crunchy, quick sautéed broccoli. I also happen to absolutely love broccoli like this. And if you think it’s an outdated way to cook vegetables and that it ruins them and that it’s for unrefined palates, you’re wrong. It’s all I can do to not eat three heads of broccoli long-cooked. Seriously shoveling occurs.
There are all these speakeasy bars popping up everywhere. I’m partly really embarrassed for the people who opened them up, and also partly really attracted to go because the food looks generally pretty decent and I like dark bars. But why do they have to be like freakin’ living museums or whatever? Where you go through a stupid secret door and the bartenders wear those olde tymey arm garters. Seriously, just embarrassing. I also don’t like/get cocktails, so I suppose I’m not even their target clientele anyway. They just make me feel so blech in my stomach. So sugary. And every time I’ve asked for some concoction without sugar the bartender is so confused/irritated/befuddled/reluctant that I just don’t even bother anymore. Whatever. I’ll just go eat my broccoli.
There are so many things you could do to spice up this broccoli, if you felt so inclined. Anise and fennel come to mind, since this is kind of Italian-y (and would be awesome using broccoli rabe). You could stir in some cheese or squeeze lemon juice on top, too. I’ve seen some people chop up the broccoli and then keep stirring and cooking it until it becomes almost a purée. I’m sure that’s good too, but I like how despite this being rather mushy, there is still texture to it. Reheating leftovers of this in a sauté pan on medium high with some fat results in crispy burned bits that are freaking awesome. You can serve this with whatever you want – Italian sausages, lemony fish, you know. It’s versatile.

long-cooked broccoli
Don’t feel like you have to make this much broccoli. Three pounds is a lot. But it’s really good… but if you’re not as broccoli-crazed as me, go halfsies.

3 pounds of broccoli
1/4 cup olive oil
12 garlic cloves, about a full head, finely chopped
2 pinches red pepper flakes
1 1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 1/2 cup water or broth

1. Cut the heads off the broccoli stalks with a couple inches of stalk attached, roughly cutting the broccoli stalk in half widthwise. Cut the head into individual florets, set aside in one bowl. With the thick stalks, peel them, then slice into strips about 1/4 inch think and 1/2 inch wide, set aside in another bowl.

2. Heat the olive oil in a large Dutch oven or stock pot over medium heat. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes, stirring occasionally until the garlic is lightly browned.

3. Add the stems and water, cover, and cook for about 25 minutes.

4. Add the florets, cover, and cook for about 1 1/2 – 2 hours, stirring occasionally. You can stir vigorously if you’d like it to break down more. If you like the texture, but you’ve got some broth still in the pot, just turn the heat up a bit and leave uncovered until it’s mostly evaporated. Season to taste with additional salt and pepper.

If you wanna get really crazy, add in some butter. Holy.crap.

baked spanish chicken wings with almond sauce

Considering that, for the past several months, I’ve been instantly dismissing recipes that call for a substantial amount of red wine, it was really odd that I was drawn to making chicken wings, of all things, marinated in red wine. Really, I don’t get it. And it’s not that I don’t like dishes with red wine, it’s just that it’s so prevalent in the winter and I’m tired of braising and stewing everything in it because every dish starts to blur into the last.
But let me tell you, it’s a good thing these little wings came into my life. It’s a good thing that I just happened to have an old bottle of wine that I couldn’t really remember when it was from (hey, it at least didn’t smell like nail polish remover, so I feel okay about it) and figured this would be a good use for it. It’s a good thing that despite loving aioli, I put my foot down about not serving these wings with it. It seems like I get sucked into making it for about every single tapas dish I make and holy crap this almond sauce was good. It’s also a good thing that chicken wings were on sale. Seriously, why are they normally so expensive?? Thighs will be like 89¢ a pound and lousy wings will be $5 a pound. Stupid. (Like I’m really qualified to discuss the validity of chicken’s pricing structure.)

turnip and pork hash

I’m torn about saying this, but it’s not root vegetable season anymore. Winter squashes are long done. In another month or so it’ll be time to start thinking about spring-y stuff. I’m torn because I know that once I admit that heavy vegetables are all coming from like Mexico and that I need to stop making them, I’ll inevitably want to move on to spring before realizing that ugh, it’s March, and the weather isn’t anywhere near warm. So here is an unabashed embrace of all things root. Specifically turnips. It’s not the most attractive dish. It kind of looks like barf when you’re done. Shut up and put a fried egg on top and you’ll be fine.
There was a time a few months back when I was obsessed with hashes. I basically ate some for every meal for like three weeks straight. They make you stink like onions and grease. Small price to pay for eating crispy, sweet browned onions and potatoes, other ingredients optional. I’d be sufficiently happy to eat that with eggs for the rest of my life I think. But, I guess that’d be pretty lame and I like to think I’m pretty unlame and food cool. Seriously food cool. You know I’m really into avocado foam-frosted localorganicwhenpossible ground beef cupcakes. That’s my next blog post.

oven-crisped yuca fries with lime

It’s a little weird when the checkout people at the grocery store routinely have to ask me, with a furrowed brow, what various produce items are that I buy. Then they flip through their produce code book and ask me how the hell you cook xyz. Like yuca. If someone who rings up the groceries of hundreds of people every single day seems to have never seen a yuca root, I can only wonder how long it’s been sitting in the store. I guess that’s why there’s usually wax on the outside of them. Ew. It’s also weird that yuca is poisonous raw. Humans are so strange. Do other animals have to take preventative measures to safely eat foods they regularly consume? I guess my cats have a pretty good barf reflex when they eat something that they somehow know will make them sick. Don’t feed beef to your cats. I don’t know why they can’t eat it, but the barf tells me it’s true.
I’ve had an obsession with yuca for nearly as long as my obsession with plantains. I used to get it at my favorite little Venezuelan place in Boston that was dangerously close to my house. Fried yuca and fried plantains are a freaking amazing bad way to stuff your face. Joe made me dinner the other weekend and he tried to make these cheesy yuca turnover things, but do it newyearnewyou compliant. It definitely turned out not like a turnover, but pretty awesome nonetheless. Boiled, then puréed yuca chunks into this super stretchy, starchy goop and then attempted to pan crisp it with questionable success. It was, and I say this lovingly, a very typical Joe meal of a I told you it wasn’t a good idea turned fuck-it mash-in-a-pan. But I gobbled it up like the starch crazed monster that I am. Starch and salt. And fat. And sugar. I love you all.

fried plantains + avocado salad

I never want to see another Christmas cookie again. Or Christmas cake. Or Christmas pie. Or Christmas giant bowl of whipped cream. But namely the cookies. I baked like a madman and ate like an utter lard. I get to the point where I’ve stuffed myself so awfully and then I start to feel terrible about myself and then I figure aw fuck it what’s another 10 cookies going to do when you’ve already eaten 23. It’s really a pretty dumb mindset. And you’d think after years of reading stupid Shape magazine I’d be a little more rational. I can’t decide if coming to terms with my inability to control my Christmas dessert consumption and just swearing them off, until maybe Valentine’s Day sugar cookies, is a better way to go, or if I should strive to just be more reasonable when and if I do decide to eat some dessert. I guess I’d like to be able to just eat two cookies, but uh, yeah, probably not going to happen.
Anyway, enough about my lard tendencies. I did cook an amazing amount of food, and really awesome food, for Christmas dinner. And I have an amazing amount of leftovers, too. Joe left for the week, so it’s just me trying to make my way through most of a ham, like 4 pounds of roasted potatoes, several pounds of roasted sweet potatoes with a brown butter vinaigrette, and a mountain of my famous brussels sprouts. I’m going to have to make some sort of soup out of the rest of the ham and then freeze it. There’s just no way I’m going to be able to eat my way through it all. I was most excited about presenting to my friends on Christmas Day the roasted potatoes. If you’ve made that recipe I posted, then you know why. If you haven’t, then you’ve been eating crap roasted potatoes and I hope you feel sorry. We were eating at my friends’ house and so we carted all the food over there (they made their share of food too… it was a feast) and in a hurried we-gotta-make-it-over-there-in-a-timely-fashion move, I put the fresh out of the oven potato chunks in a big tupperware and drove over there. Piping hot potatoes give off condensation. Condensation makes gorgeous crispy potatoes soggy and disgusting. GAH. I can be excused for drowning my sorrow in Christmas dessert. I made a brown sugar cranberry walnut gingerbread upside down cake. I’m awesome.

world’s best potatoes

I also have a world’s best brussels sprouts dish. It kind of pigeon holes you into making that version again and again. How could you make another recipe if you’ve already discovered the absolute earthly superlative of a given ingredient? You can, and I will, don’t worry. It’s probably best to make other versions of potatoes because these could become an obsession.
I was prompted to make this, not just because I really wanted to eat crispy roasted potatoes (duh), but because I had a bunch of green potatoes that I figured I should do something with. I know you’re not supposed to eat them, but I have a problem throwing food out. Mold on cheese? Jeez, just cut if off! Shriveled limes? You can still get some juice out! So, I feel pretty good that I minimized my nervous system damage by peeling them pretty well. I should have a bowl of clay lying around so that I can be lazy and not peel my green potatoes and just eat that along with them. Blech. Can I at least put some salt on my clay?

chipotle lime roasted delicata squash

With snow nipping at our heels here in Denver (Arapahoe Basin opened Thursday!), I’m feeling a little anxious to make sure I bask in the relatively warm weather while still enjoying the smells and colors of fall. And that applies to eating too. I don’t really want to eat tomatoes and basil, but I’m hesitant to treat all of my produce with a heavily spiced hand. So let’s merge the two worlds. Bright, spicy chipotle and lime with crispy, warm roasted winter squash chunks.
Now that the weather has taken a turn for the wonderful, I’m starting to get back into running. I couldn’t exactly muster the desire to slog in the blistering heat of summer for miles on end. Biking, another thing. It doesn’t really seem to matter how heavily you’re breathing, the wind on your face always feels better than if you weren’t biking. I suffered through weekly CrossFit Hero WODs in the sun, but that’s like an addiction. Running is weird, I both love and loathe it. Somedays it seems like the most god awful activity invented, and other days it’s so much fun wandering around neighborhoods and ogling old houses that I want to be mine, looking at the mountains, running around lakes and parks, enjoying the anything-but-summer-weather. It also seems appropriate to renew my interest because my gym is doing a 30 day nutrition challenge and I’m all revved up to be wonderful! Perfect healthy eating! Perfect graceful runner!