Muffin Top

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

Warning: This post may induce clogged arteries.
While I find it doubtful that some people have never heard of fried green tomatoes thanks to the novel and movie, I do find that lots of people have never had them. And that, dearhearts, is a crying shame.

When I was about ten years old, my next door neighbor showed me how to make fried green tomatoes. (Yes, it was around the time when the movie first came out.) She was my grandmother’s best friend, and she was from Kentucky, and I thought she was the best cook in the world for quite some time. I don’t think I’d ever even considered that a tomato could be something other than red, or that you could fry it. When she and I went into the kitchen and dusted her fresh-from-the-garden unripe tomatoes with cornmeal, I thought that this might possibly be the coolest thing I’d ever done. They tasted like potato chips, but better, and I could have eaten them every day.

We made them once or twice after that, but she moved and I grew older and since we didn’t grow our own tomatoes, we didn’t have green ones. And, up until I moved and started going to a farmer’s market regularly, I didn’t see them for almost a decade. One morning, I walked past a wooden box of green tomatoes, shiny and hard as rocks; I bought four praying I remembered the recipe. I searched online, and found recipes that baked them (they aren’t “baked” green tomatoes) and coated them with breadcrumbs (what??) or panko (hell no!). So I played around with what I could remember.

They’ve gotten to be more popular fare at both soul food hole-in-the-walls and at upscale places like Georgia Brown’s in Washington, D.C.. A few years back I realized that a bistro around the corner from me served fried green tomato BLTs, and I started going to that place more regularly. (more…)

The Edible Schoolyard, an Alice Waters landmark of gardening and good eats in Berkeley, is holding its annual spring plant sale. I noticed this sign while picking up pizzas at Gioia’s yesterday–I’m tempted to go there and pick up some more vegetables to plant–maybe you’ll be tempted, too?

The sign reminded me of my own vegetable garden, newly started this year–yesterday, I finished my planting of fines herbes (parsley, tarragon, chives, chervil) by planting some chervil. Ah, I felt strangely satisfied! Visions of scrumptuous food danced through my mind.

But for now, reading about using herbs, fresh from the garden, has to suffice: for example, Pinch My Salt’s herbed tuna salad post makes me salivate, as I watch my garden grow.

What do I have planned? I’m thinking herb tempura with the Korean perilla leaves! Pesto with the basil! Soup with the sour garden sorrel. Kimchi with the Korean radish. North Korean eggplant stew with the Korean eggplant. Oodles of possibilities with my fines herbes, and nibbling on lavash and tarragon sandwiches. Eating carrots fresh out of the earth, raw and sweet. Tea with the chamomile, tea with the mint! And maybe mojitos with the mint! Infused cocktails with the anise hyssop. Chicken soup with dill. Yogurt with dill.

The possibilities seem endless.

I actually take of sort of sick pleasure in organizing the fridge, but my husband’s been out of town, and we had a Cinco de Mayo fiesta last weekend so I’m rocking a bachelor fridge - booze and condiments! 

Normally, I do all my grocery shopping on Saturdays (farmer’s market, butcher, fishmonger, bakery, etc.) but didn’t go the past three Saturdays.  (I’ve kept some of my greens, especially the herbs, fresh by standing them upright in water in a glass container, loosely covered with the plastic bag they came in.  Trim the stems and change water every few days) However, I constantly tinker with food experiments, hence the fruit pits, the preserved/pickled items, the vodka infusions and the animal fats.  Also, I’m actively trying to clear out my freezer (must. finish. ice-cream!), so many of our meals were defrosted the night before; if I were to open it right now, everything would tumble out, which is why you won’t see a picture of it.  Tonight, I pulled out my wok and scrambled some egg, sauteed some bok choy and onion, and tossed in some frozen peas, leftover roast duck and green onion with a few squirts of soy sauce, fish sauce and sesame oil to make fried rice.  Tomorrow, I’ll probably take some of that defrosted pasta sauce and adapt that penne pasta dish with red pepper flakes, onion, parsley and salt pork from the Babbo cookbook.  On Thursday, I’ll complete the vichysoisse by adding cream and chopped chives and accompany it with a hunk of bread (um, no croutons) and a salad.

Maybe when I get back into my normal routine, I’ll take another picture.  If you think the contents of my fridge are weird now, wait til you see it when I’m back to “normal”.

Mai here. As per C(h)ristine’s directive, here is my unedited fridge as of 2pm today. It has mostly fruit (mangoes, cherries, strawberries, lemons), vegetables (onions, bell peppers), water (still and carbonated), eggs, bacon, smoked salmon, half and half, and cheese (smoked gouda, goat cheese, petit basque and jack).

I put things in “strategic” places, so my boyfriend can see that we have certain items (like the sliced smoked gouda next to the mangoes). If I don’t, he’ll either buy duplicates or it will go bad.

I usually buy items right before I make a meal with the goal of not wasting ingredients or holding too much in the house. This mostly works out. Right now I have everything to make a salmon quiche, but it feels too hot to bake. Maybe tomorrow.

Christine here! And that above is my fridge as of 9:00pm this evening.

Sam, over at becks & posh, has asked, “What is in your unedited fridge?” and her question has hit a nerve–everyone’s hopping on that confessional wagon!

It’s exhilarating to see the fridge contents of other foodies–especially UNEDITED fridge contents (no you may NOT neaten or straighten up the items of your fridge). You may notice things I’ve blogged about previously, such as organic maraschino cherries, or hummus .

But generally, it’s one big gorgeous mess! Sadly, there is MUCH more in that fridge than meets the eye. Hidden in the back are treasures like leftovers of galbi jjim as well as plugra clarified butter, organic tahini, homemade limoncello, and bottles of lillet.

My fridge is DEFINITELY not one of those fridges on MTV Cribs, where some celebrity opens up his/her fridge to neat rows of Evian water and Snapple, arranged like Westpoint cadets in marching formation.  Oh, with one bottle of ketchup and oranges or some other generic fruit to “round it out.”  Seriously–I scoff at those fridges.

I didn’t show the freezer–everything’s frostbitten in there, and everything will just fall out onto the floor once I slide out the door anyway. Yes, things like Viccolo’s frozen pizza, frozen Korean mandoo, frozen pita, various meats, and ice creams.

Would love all the other Muffin Top writers to show their unedited fridges in separate posts! You don’t have to, but you wouldn’t mind, would you?

What alcoholic drink are you? I’m apparently a martini drinker who doesn’t like a flavored martini, even though I’ve professed my love of cosmopolitans, kamikazes, and french martinis here before…

Still, a fun little quiz.

You Are A Martini

You are the kind of drinker who appreciates a nice hard drink. And for you, only quality alcohol. You don’t waste your time on the cheap stuff. Obviously, you’re usually found with a martini in your hand. But sometimes you mix it up with a gin and tonic. And you’d never, ever consider one of those flavored martinis. They’re hardly a drink!

What Alcoholic Drink Are You?

Tyra Banks has a muffin top:

“I don’t want to sit in front of you and be soap-boxy and fake and say, ‘I love myself, I’m beautiful, it’s great,’” says Banks, who is 5 feet 10 inches tall. “I still feel hot, but every day is different. It’s when I put on the jeans that used to fit a year ago and don’t fit now and give me the muffin top, that’s when I say, ‘Damn!’”

GOOD for HER!

Sorry, I could not resist posting Tyra Banks’ mention of her muffin top.

stuffed cabbage, originally uploaded by c(h)ristine.

Stuffed cabbage leaves are another food from my husband’s family (the Polish side of his family); it’s a staple dish in our house and one of the first dishes my mother in law taught me how to make. This is always a favorite for anyone who comes over for a meal–often people wonder, “What is it STUFFED with?” and are pleasantly surprised to discover rice and beef in the middle of the tomato sauce and cabbage. The cabbage leaves are savory with just a hint of sweetness that complements the beef and tomato sauce–no wonder this has been a family favorite for generations.

The little cabbage rolls are pretty whimsical on a plate, little pockets of tasty goodness. The most difficult part of this recipe is boiling the cabbage leaves–and it’s real fun rolling them up with the filling. If you mess up a bit, it’s okay, you’ll get the hang of it. And besides, it is going into a baking dish where worse comes to worse, it can be a “casserole”

This dish is, by the way, even yummier the next day reheated.

Recipe follows after the jump….

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Food based Friday Five!

1. Given a choice, and imagining that money and time were no object, would you rather cook dinner, eat out or order in?

Depends on my mood. I go through spells of eating out a lot, and after a while, I just want to eat something simple, like a fried egg with a bowl of rice and soy sauce. And takeout is nice if I’ve been really busy, I’m tired and I don’t feel like interacting with other humans.

2. What is the most elaborate meal you’ve ever prepared yourself or purchased at a restaurant?

I’ve prepared many multicourse meals at my friend Justin’s house, but I can’t remember them all now. I know that out of the French Laundry cookbook, we made butter poached lobster and lobster bisque. When Anne and I were practicing for an Iron Chef contest, we made something like 12 dishes for our guinea pigs… savory egg custards in their own shell with morel ragout (also out of French Laundry), pasta carbonara, strawberry pavlova with mascarpone sorbet, white and yellow nectarine and prosciutto salad, duck sausage with dried nectarines, nectarine and cardamon rice, nectarine chutney, nectarine ice cream, corn risotto, polenta cookies, corn ice cream (yech)… My own kitchen is tiny, so I don’t often prepare multicourse meals for guests. If I do, I stick to uncomplicated dishes so I can entertain. A common dinner party menu would be something like oysters on the half shell, cold vichysoisse, a tossed salad, seared duck breast (the only thing that’s not prepared ahead of time), lentils, a cheese plate and some kind of tart with homemade ice cream. If I do make something more complicated, it’s labeled as a “project” that produces excess product to share or eat later on, like cassoulet, braised oxtails, fresh pasta, puff pastry, macarons, etc. But the most complicated meal I’ve ever eaten at a restaurant is probably Pierre Gagnaire. Dude had some pretty bizarre stuff!

3. What food do you find yourself making and/or eating way too much?

I actually *like* repeating recipes over and over, and making subtle adjustments each time. After a while, the recipe become my own. But I probably eat too much chocolate and pastries.

4. What was your most disastrous cooking/eating out experience? The molten sugar incident.

5. Would you rather cook for someone else or have them cook for you? I’d rather cook for someone else. It’s pretty difficult for me to go into someone else’s kitchen while food is being prepared and resist meddling. Also, I’m just a control freak in the kitchen. It gets pretty obnoxious - “Ack! The mirepoix should be diced smaller! Those cookies need to be spaced evenly apart! What do you mean, you don’t have a microplane zester! Don’t you know that chervil is integral to fines herbes? We can’t use extra virgin olive oil to saute! “