Concoction documentation

Between the disruption of normal routines caused by Christmas (and school summer vacation, and trying to maintain some level of work output notwithstanding) and a kitchen full of holiday food, I seem to be spending a lot of time lately concocting things out of bits and pieces to have for dinner, rather than cooking any of my regular standards, or trying out new recipes. Nearly everything I’ve made recently feels like a one-off, based upon a particular conjunction of ingredients I’ve got lying around.

Some of these have worked out better than others. This one, cooked up out of sheer desperation when I had a guest coming and my dinner Plan A had failed spectacularly, is by far the best of the lot, and worth recording for posterity and replication.

Creamy (and a little spicy) mushroom pasta

Please note that all measurements here are extremely approximate. Also note that butter appears twice; this is not a misprint – you use some at the beginning and some at the end. (I always forget about the second part when there’s one of those ‘divided’ instructions.)

1 Tbsp/½ oz/15 g bacon fat

1 Tbsp/½ oz/15 g butter

1 anchovy

2 slices hot salami, diced

1 small red onion, diced

2 handfuls mushrooms (any kind), chopped

1 lb/450 g pasta, preferably short

½ cup/4 oz/120 ml white wine

½ cup/4 oz/120 ml cream

2-3 oz/60-90 g goat cheese

salt & pepper

1 Tbsp/½ oz/15 g butter

grated pecorino romano cheese, for serving

Put a large pot of water on to boil for the pasta.

In another pan, heat the bacon fat and butter on medium, then add the anchovy, salami, and onion. Cook for 3-5 minutes, stirring regularly, until onions have softened and anchovy has dissolved. Add mushrooms and cook for another 8-10 minutes, continuing to stir regularly, until mushrooms have released their liquid and begun to shrink and darken.

By now the pasta water should be boiling. Add a generous amount of salt and the pasta; stir to make sure the pasta isn’t clumping, and leave to return to the boil and cook for 8-10 minutes. Check and stir every couple of minutes.

Add white wine to the mushroom mixture and stir in, scraping the bottom of the pan to deglaze (get all the good stuff that's stuck on there). When most of the wine has cooked off, add cream and goat cheese and stir through. Lower the heat on the pan to lowest setting while you deal with draining the pasta.

When pasta is al dente, scoop out about 1 cup pasta cooking water and set aside. Drain pasta and return to the pan in which you cooked it.

Return your attention to the mushroom mixture. Taste and adjust seasonings, then add the second installment of butter and toss to mix through.

Combine pasta and mushroom mixture in whichever pan is easiest to mix in, and toss thoroughly. Add a splash or two of pasta cooking water, if you wish, to bring the whole thing together.

Serve immediately. Serves 4 adults with some left over.

Baked ham

Now that I've finished my Paris recap, I thought I should go back and update on how Easter brunch went. According to SP's final count, we served brunch to 63 adults and children, followed by stories, a massive Easter egg hunt, and various other shenanigans. As far as I could tell from the middle of the kitchen whirlwind, a good time was had by all, including me. Serving food to 63 people is a new record for me, and, as always, my worries about undercatering turned out to be ridiculously unfounded.

Baked ham with a sweet and spicy glaze
I concocted this recipe to glaze about 25 lbs worth of ham (in 3 large pieces), so you might want to scale back accordingly--1 cup of liquid total is probably fine for one regular ham.

1 cup wholegrain mustard
1 cup blood orange juice
1/2-1 cup maple syrup
1-2 Tbsp dry mustard
1 tsp cayenne pepper
3 hams, each weighing around 8 lbs*

Mix the first three ingredients in a small saucepan and bring just to a boil, then let simmer and thicken slightly. Taste before adding dry mustard and cayenne to see if the sweet/tart/spicy balance is to your taste; I like mine more on the tart/spicy side, which is why I started with less maple syrup. (I ended up using about 1 cup of it in the end, proportional to the other ingredients.)

When glaze components are balanced to your liking and you are ready to bake your ham, preheat the oven to 275F and place the ham in a roasting pan with the fat side up. Pour glaze over the entire ham, using a pastry brush or similar to coat the whole surface and lifting ham up so that some of the glaze is in the pan underneath.

Cover ham with foil and put in the oven to heat through according to packaging instructions. (I usually estimate 10-15 minutes per lb.)

Slice and serve warm, pouring some of the glaze from the pan over the meat.

Serves a crowd, with leftovers.

* These instructions are for American baked hams, which are purchased already cured and cooked. Adjustments to cooking times will be required for uncooked meat.

Home made

Confession: I haven't managed to do any Cookbook Challenge cooking since I got to Boston. I blame the fact that I've only cooked dinner three times in the past 10 days--and one of those was Christmas dinner, which is about as far from a 30-minute meal as you can get. The rest of the dinners have been in restaurants or in other people's houses, as we make the rounds of people in Boston that we haven't seen for more than a year.

So most of the cooking I've managed to squeeze in has been of the "sheer necessity" or the "food gift" variety. In the former category, I made homemade mayonnaise over the weekend, for only the second time ever, when I realized we didn't have any.* In the latter, to bring to friends hosting us, things like homemade chocolates and, yesterday, these cheesy, salty, spicy treats.

Cheesy nibbles
Adapted from Tamasin's Kitchen Bible by Tamasin Day-Lewis
These have been described as being like "homemade Cheez-Its", but I think that's only because they're cheesy and it's really hard to stop eating them. Texturally, they are like tiny, crumbly cookies, and they taste complex and savory. To me they're more like what Cheez-Its want to be when they grow up.

110 g/4 oz plain/all-purpose flour
110 g/4 oz parmesan, grated**
healthy pinches of: salt, freshly ground black pepper, mustard, and cayenne pepper
110 g/4 oz butter, melted

Preheat oven to 180C/350F. Mix dry ingredients together, then add in butter and stir until mixture has the consistency of breadcrumbs. (Add more butter if necessary.) Make walnut-sized balls*** and place on baking sheet(s) lined with parchment. Bake 15-20 minutes (reversing position of sheet(s) halfway through) until lightly browned. Sprinkle lightly with more salt and black pepper after removing from oven, and allow to cool on sheet(s).

Makes 20-40.

* I also managed to slip this into the latter category, by bringing some of along yesterday as a gift--I thought my hostess would appreciate it.
** I used a mix of mostly pecorino romano and some sharp cheddar.
*** I used a deep teaspoon measurement to make half-balls. They were a good bite size and went further.