Getting down to business

Generally, I don't watch cooking shows. I'm in too much trouble collecting recipes already. Oh, sure, I'll stop and watch an episode of "Good Eats" if it happens to be on opposite a "CSI: NY" episode I've already seen. I might pause in my champion channel surfing if I hear someone utter a magic phrase such as "now add the melted chocolate..." or there's an immensely appealing visual. But I never actively seek them out, which is why this next recipe is an anomaly in my collection.

A few years ago, on a dreary Sunday afternoon, I lay on the family room floor, aimlessly flipping channels and avoiding all sense of productivity. It was that awful time of year, when football season was over and baseball hadn't started yet. I was giving each of our 107 channels approximately two seconds to catch my attention when I heard the magic phrase: "homemade pasta."

This magic phrase coincided with both an immensely appealing visual of fresh eggs being cracked into a large pile of flour, and my recent receipt of a pasta machine. I hadn't tried the machine out yet and I was more than happy to get a televised demonstration from what appeared to be an Italian grandmother. It was: The show was "Ciao Italia" and the host was getting a fettucine lesson from her mother. At the end, they tossed the pasta in a walnut-parsley sauce, the mom sent the host (and probably the crew) off with plenty of noodles to take home, and I copied down the show's Web address.

I have made fresh egg pasta many times since, usually a mixture of 4 c. flour and six eggs. This makes about 2 pounds; it takes forever, but it's too good to make only a pound at a time, and the results don't suffer any if I use the food processor to make the dough (I do it in two batches). The walnut-parsley sauce, however, was on the back burner until this weekend.

The original recipe for the walnut-parsley sauce dressed a pound of fettucine. As I mentioned, I make 2 pounds at a time, and we cook at least 1.5 right away. My first thought was to double the recipe, then I realized that might be too much sauce. Then I took a closer look at the ingredients and decided I was just going to have to mess with it.

The original started with 2/3 c. extra-virgin olive oil, which didn't seem like a big deal until I measured it out. But doubling it brings you to 1 1/3 c., which is insane, even for heart-healthy olive oil. So I went with just under 1 c. The garlic I upped from three to five cloves -- well, four, but one was gigantic, a big, big clove -- and the walnut and parsley I increased to 1 1/3 c. each.

I sauteed the garlic in the olive oil, then Will stirred in the walnuts and parsley. At this point, the fresh pasta went into boiling water elsewhere on the stove; it cooks in about three minutes, so it's done just before the walnut-parsley sauce, which cooks in five. Drain the pasta and toss with the sauce.

THE VERDICT: Fast. Simple. Tasty. But, too much oil and not enough garlic -- I pressed it instead of mincing and I think the flavor got lost. Keith, who apparently had his heart set on tomato sauce, wouldn't eat it until we offered him Parmesan on top. Alex, with the unfathomable logic of the 6-year-old, said, "I don't know about this sauce... This pasta is tasty because the sauce is so good." He also liked Parmesan on top. Will said he likes walnuts with pasta and said he'd eat it again. I have to make some more adjustments for next time. An easy keeper.



Walnut-Parsley Sauce
adapted from "Ciao Italia"
3/4 c. extra-virgin olive oil
5 large cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 1/3 c. chopped walnuts
1 1/3 c. minced parsley
grated Parmesan (optional)

Heat oil in deep skillet or wide saucepan. Saute garlic until golden. Stir in walnuts and parsley. Cook five minutes, stirring occasionally. Toss with pasta.

The Irish Potato Candy Famine

St. Patrick's Day is one of the toughest holidays for me, culinarily-speaking. Being one-eighth Irish, we dutifully cook our corned beef (a.k.a. New England boiled dinner), although sans cabbage in deference to my cruciferous vegetable problem. That main meal poses little difficulty.

The difficulty is what else to serve with it, or, rather, what to serve to two elementary-school children. For instance, the last couple of years I've had my eye on a chocolate-Guinness pudding. Serves 6. Maybe Will and I can eat three apiece, but I think that recipe is going to have to wait a bit longer. So will others of its kind.

So in the quest for suitable Irish-related sweets, I remembered potato candy. This seems to come in many forms, but the basis is the same: a large mashed potato, an insane amount of confectioner's sugar, and lots of coconut. Will once made a chocolate-coated version, which are called Needhams and apparently pretty popular in Maine. These weren't so bad (I think), and were what I had at the back mind when I set out to make this batch, which I planned to shape into balls and roll in cocoa powder.

There would be some chilling involved, so I planned to start them the night before. Unfortunately, I also had to go to a meeting, so I asked Will to peel and boil a large potato for me to mash when I got home. What neither of us expected was the meeting dragged for more than two hours and by the time I got home, my potato was pretty cold... but still mashable.

This was OK, or so I thought, because the recipe I was using said it was crucial to let the mashed potato cool completely before mixing in the sugar. Unfortunately, what it also said was to mash in some butter while it was still hot. So we melted some butter and mashed it into our cooled potato. It still seemed pretty cool, so Will went ahead and mixed in the first four cups of powdered sugar and a little vanilla.

We got an interesting soupy texture at first... and it thickened a little bit, but not a lot. We were supposed to be achieving a slightly stiff mixture we could shape into balls. No such luck. So Will and I added more sugar. Slightly stiffer, but nowhere near what we expected and neither of us wanted to add any more sugar. We tried mixing in the coconut and it firmed up a little more, but was still much too pourable.

Decision-making time. This recipe was not working. Will and I started tossing around ideas. Add still more sugar? No. Pour it into a pan, try chilling it, smear with peanut butter and roll it up like they do in the South? No. Pour it in a pan, try chilling it, and pour melted chocolate on it kind of like a Needham? Yeah.

THE VERDICT: Nil.
    I shouldn't say that, really, because I think something threw off the consistency with this batch. It could have been the potato (a russet, I believe), it could have been our misstep with the butter or the inclusion of butter itself. Chilling helped. So did pouring a a cup of melted chocolate chips over the top, although two cups would've been better.
     As for flavor, this was a plus. Keith and Alex both liked it, because "it tastes like Nanaimo bars." Will thought it tasted kind of like Mounds bars, but wasn't crazy about the amount of powdered sugar we had to put into it. It's possible I'll try it again, but then again, maybe not.

Crusty cooking

The last couple of weeks I fell out of the habit of trying new recipes. There was a week I was sick, then a period when we needed to fall back on speedy comfort food, and so on.

This week, the binder re-emerged. Actually, a new binder emerged, as I've been periodically sorting recipes by seasonal appropriateness, with a fifth binder for those recipes that really can be served any time of year. This binder has a larger proportion of desserts, I've noticed. It's also the go-to binder for this in-between period, when it's not spring yet but one is weary of winter. This recipe, for Parmesan and sage-crusted pork, comes from that binder.

It also originally comes from Cooking Light magazine a couple of years ago. (Why, yes, I do sometimes cook light.) I changed it slightly, so my adaptations follow.

First, dredge the pork in flour.

Then, in egg whites mixed with a little mustard. An interesting combination, I think.

Finally, coat it in a mixture of panko, grated parmesan cheese, too-coarsely chopped sage and some store-bought breadcrumbs. Someday, I will get around to making my own breadcrumbs, which so many professionals swear by. Seeing as I killed the can of store-bought breadcrumbs in this dish, that day may come sooner than later. In the meantime, I like the texture I get from combining panko and breadcrumbs.

Let the pork rest while heating a pan over medium heat, swirl in some canola oil, and then fry away. Meanwhile, I cooked a pot of polenta on the back burner, and mentally cursed the poor selection of green things at the grocery store this week.

THE VERDICT: I cooked the pork longer than suggested in the recipe to ensure it was cooked through. As a result, the crust was a little darker in spots than I would've liked for presentation. However, it was a really nice, crispy crust. Still, the whole thing didn't wow me. Will said, yeah, he'd eat it again, but he also didn't seem very enthusiastic (possibly because he's also not wild about soft polenta). The boys didn't say much at all, which makes it sort of in-between.
   I like the technique on the crust and the flavor combination. If I were to make it again, I'd either look for a thinner cut of pork or maybe even try it with chicken. But it's on the fence.

Parmesan and sage-crusted pork
(adapted from Cooking Light magazine)

4 boneless pork loin chops
3/4 c. panko
1/2 c. bread crumbs
1/4 to 1/2 c. Parmesan cheese, grated
6 or 7 large sage leaves, finely chopped
salt and pepper to taste

2 egg whites
1 Tbsp. yellow mustard
flour for dredging
1 Tbsp. canola oil

Trim fat from loin chops. Set aside.
Combine panko, bread crumbs, Parmesan and sage leaves in a wide bowl or plate. Add salt and pepper to taste.
In a separate wide bowl, whisk together egg whites and mustard.
Working with one chop at a time, dredge pork in flour, shake off excess. Then coat it in egg-mustard mixture, let excess drip off. Coat with panko mixture. Set aside.
Heat large skillet over medium heat. Add canola oil. Add the pork chops, cook 3 to 4 minutes each side until cooked through. Serve with polenta.