Some people make Christmas cookies. I make chocolate covered pretzels. My great aunt Helen would send us a tin of chocolate covered pretzels every year, and I will forever associate them with Christmas. Plus, they are insanely easy to make!
The 3 things you need to make chocolate covered pretzels: chocolate, pretzels and wax paper. Do not forget about the wax paper, or you will be eating pretzel bits you chip off your plate.
Also, buy more pretzels than you think you’ll need — about a third of any bag will be broken ones. I also look for a slightly thicker pretzel (like Utz Sourdough Specials), so they don’t break during dipping.
You can melt your chocolate in a double boiler, but I have always had better luck with the microwave. It only takes 45 seconds to a minute to melt half a bag of chocolate chips in my microwave. Underheat, don’t overheat! If the chocolate gets too hot, your pretzels will have white marks on them.
The bowl and chocolate are both hot. The top chips will still look dry when there’s plenty of heat to melt the whole bowl. Start stirring. If all the chips don’t melt, run the microwave in 10 second intervals until they’re all melted.
Once you have a bowl of melted chocolate, start dipping! Dip one side, then the other. Make sure you have chocolate all over (I tend to miss the top edge if I’m not being careful.)
Clearly, I am not an ace dipper. That’s OK!
That is why they invented sprinkles! I’ve used jimmies, pralines, nuts, and sea salt (yes, really.) You could use crushed up candy canes, Nerds, Heath bars, Oreos… you are limited only by your imagination. Never has misdirection been so tasty!
Chocolate covered pretzels
1 bag pretzels
12 oz. (one bag) chocolate chips
Microwave the chips for 45-60 seconds. Dip the pretzels in chocolate until they are covered. Decorate. Lay on a wax paper covered cookie sheet, and refrigerate. Makes 25-30 pretzels.
Winter is here, and I’ve been laying in provisions almost instinctually. (bda has accused me of stocking the freezer so I know he will eat while I am traveling, but that’s not true. I know he’ll just order Domino’s.) I’ve made chili, I’ve made curry, and now it is time to tackle the mountain of meatballs.
When I was a kid, I thought meatballs were gross. That is because I was eating spheres of baked ground beef, with nothing else added. And that is gross.
A good meatball should have lots of flavor elements, starting with some nice fat. (I was not very surprised on the burger tour to learn that all of the burgers were 80% meat, 20% fat.) I get 85%/15% ground beef at Whole Foods. Would I get 80%/20% if they sold it? Probably.
To that, I add bread crumbs, eggs, onion and plenty of salt and pepper.
Having a sack of homemade meatballs in the freezer is a beautiful thing. Babies love them. You can pretend you went to the super-tasty version of IKEA. Throwing in some meatballs even makes jar sauce feel more special. (You should stop eating jar sauce. Really. But if you still do, at least you can give yourself some homemade meatballs.)
Traditional Beef Meatballs
2 lbs. 85/15 ground beef
1 cup breadcrumbs
2 eggs
1 small onion, minced
salt to taste (at least 2 teaspoons)
pepper to taste
1 tablespoon canola oil
Place all ingredients in a large mixing bowl, and knead until well combined. Roll into balls roughly 2 inches in diameter.
Heat the canola oil on medim-high heat in a large frying pan, just enough to keep the meatballs from sticking. When the pan is hot, arrange the meatballs in the pan. Squeeze them in tight enough that they will hold each other in place, but loosely enough that you can still turn them.
After one side has browned (about 2-3 minutes), begin turning the meatballs. Turn every couple of minutes until they are browned all over. Remove from heat; they are ready to eat.
Makes approximately 40 small meatballs. Can be frozen for up to 6 months.
Thank goodness for restaurants! Usually, when I eat something really tasty, and I look up how to make it, I come away thankful that there are so many people in this world who exchange their cooking expertise for money. (See: soup dumplings)
Sometimes, though, you catch a break, and your tasty dream dish can be made at home with virtually no effort.
I will order a dish based on it having a side of plantains, so why did it take me so long to try cooking them? Simple and tasty, this is sure to be a new regular side for me!
Fried Plantains
1/2 to 1 plantain (per person you want to serve)
frying oil
powdered sugar or grated queso blanco (optional)
Heat a large frying pan on high, filling with canola or other frying oil to a depth of 1/2 inch. Peel the plantains, and slice diagonally into rounds 1/4 to 1/2 inches thick.
Place the plantain pieces in the oil, taking care not to overfill the pan. When the edges are browned (2 to 3 minutes), turned the pieces over. Remove from the cooking oil when nicely browned on both sides (about 5 minutes) to a paper-towel lined plate.
Cook in batches, if necessary. Top with powdered sugar or grated queso blanco, if desired.
All summer, I’ve been struggling with what to do with my CSA peppers. This week, I was merrily prepping roasted turnips, onions, garlic and potatoes to go with the poussin (which looked eerily like a headless lady) when I nearly kicked myself. Of course. I will roast them.
Like all my favorite recipes, roasting peppers turned out to be dead easy. You throw them in the oven at 500, and in 40 minutes, they go from this:
to this:
Peeling them is slightly more difficult than peeling peaches, but since it’s essentially the only work you have to do, it’s ok. They flatten out really easily once they’re cool enough to handle, and then you just pull the skin off with your fingers. If you were one of those kids who enjoyed peeling glue off your hands, you may even find this kind of fun, in that “how big a piece can I pull off at once?” kind of way.
Then you plop them in a bowl, add olive oil, vinegar, a garlic clove, and some salt and pepper, and stick it in the fridge overnight. The next day, drain them, and eat! Or stick them in a jar with olive oil to cover, put it in the fridge and eat over the next few weeks.
Roasted Peppers
bell peppers (4 will fill a pint jar)
4 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 500. Place peppers in a baking dish (they will release some liquid while roasting.) Roast for 40 minutes, until well blackened and losing their shape.
Cool for 40-60 minutes, or until cool enough to handle. Discard stems and seeds, and peel off the skin.
Place in a bowl with all other ingredients. For once in my life, I will say, don’t add too much salt. You want to taste the sweetness of the peppers. Refrigerate for 2 to 24 hours before serving.
If you want to store them for later, drain the oil and vinegar. Then, put them in a jar, topped off with fresh olive oil. Poke with a chopstick to let out all the air pockets, and store in the fridge.
There are certain ingredients that it seems like I never finish. I buy scallions for a recipe, or as a garnish, but the rest of the bunch hangs out in the fridge, wilts, then gets chucked. I’ll use them in place of onions. I’ve fried them like mini-onion rings. But it’s never enough. So, when Jenny marched into my place with 3 bunches of scallions, announcing her intention to serve them, my interest was piqued.
Jenny said that a family friend had hosted an exchange student from Mexico, and that he had frequently prepared this favorite family dish. Like most of my favorite items, it’s quick and easy. And I am pleased to tell you that it worked just as well with leeks as it did with scallions. Another CSA item well used!
Grilled Scallions or Leeks
scallions or leeks, in the quantity you would like to eat
olive oil
lemon
salt and pepper to taste
Trim, separate and wash leeks; trim and wash scallions. Toss with olive oil, then salt and pepper to taste.
Grill, turning once or twice. Total time will depend on the heat of your grill; making mine inside, it takes about 5-8 minutes on a hot grill pan.
Remove from the heat, and drizzle with lemon juice. Serve hot!
A few years back, the New York Times magazine ran a recipe for butter. If you’ve ever overwhipped your whipped cream, you already know the recipe. It had one ingredient, one instruction. I had to make it.
After the first attempt, butter became a popular request from Jenn, so tonight, I “showed her” how to make it. That is, I stood around and took pictures while she did the work.
Butter
1 pint heavy cream
Whip heavy cream until it’s butter.
Your raw materials!
The butter will separate into buttermilk and butter. The plastic wrap keeps you from getting splashed.
Your first time, you might think this is far enough. It is not.
Closer, but still not there. Drain off some of that buttermilk!
You can stop there. Now knead it to squeeze out the extra buttermilk, and shape it!
My go-to company dinner is roast chicken. Everyone (except vegetarians) likes it, there are very few ingredients needed and there are no complicated 24-hours-in-advance steps.
Bittman has a great recipe, and so much faster than most. I was forever inviting people over, then serving them dinner an hour later than I intended. Not so with the Bittman technique.
Preheat the oven to 500. Rinse the chicken, and put it in your roasting pan. (Mine has a rack. You don’t really need it.) Put the chicken in the oven, breast side down, for 20 minutes. Lower the heat to 425, and drizzle olive oil on the chicken. Then flip it, drizzle some more olive oil, salt and pepper the skin, and put it back in the oven for another 40 minutes, or until your thermometer 165°F.
It’s an easy recipe to modify, too. Chop up some fresh herbs, and add that with the salt and pepper. Squeeze a lemon on it (or in the cavity.) Add some garlic or onions to the cavity. Use a different liquid, and add stuff to that. Add spices to just about any of the above. And the beauty of nearly every variation is, they add no time.
Add some roasted root vegetables to the pan. I like potatoes, garlic and onions, but I’ve done sweet potatoes, turnips and carrots, too. Or just stick with a classic, and do some mashed potatoes. Or (horrors!) a salad. Since you don’t have to mind the chicken, you can do almost any side, and you’ve got a whole dinner in just over an hour.
What’s your favorite recipe for guests? Meng was always a fan of steak; it’s certainly faster than roast chicken. But I set off my fire alarm about half the time when I make steak, which can put a damper on a gathering.
I never met a recipe I didn’t want to mod. This is maybe the only one I actually follow (probably because there’s nothing to change.) Ok, that’s a lie. Instead of heating the pan on the stove, I just throw it in the oven for about 10 minutes (there are usually potatoes already cooking in there.)
Then you throw down a layer of salt, pepper the steak, and throw it in for 5 minutes. Flip it, and put it back in for another 5. Let it rest for 10 minutes, and there you have it, steak heaven. Bittman, just because I didn’t go see you at the free library last night doesn’t mean that I don’t love you just as much as everyone else.
Note: when making in Helen’s apt, keep the heat at 500. 550 will produce enough smoke to set off the fire alarm, even with the windows open.
