Dinner in the Yellow House

Presto Pasta Night: TV Dinner Edition

The title is a misnomer for me, since I don't have a TV and I didn't eat this for dinner.  But it's the type of thing one might eat for a dinner in front of the tube, which is why it appears in the TV dinners chapter of Nigella Bites.  She calls it linguine with garlic oil and pancetta.  My version uses fettucine and, because I didn't have any garlic-infused oil, just crushed garlic cloves. 

This is exactly the kind of dish that appeals to me when I'm eating alone and feeling lazy, but like I need something more heartening than a peanut butter sandwich for lunch.  Depending on how much oil you use, it can be a little messy to eat, so wear a splatter guard.  For the full effect, serve this in a deep Japanese-style bowl that you can hold on your lap.  If you do have a TV, watch it while eating this.  If not, may I recommend the Britain's Got Talent clips available on YouTube?  Have a splatter guard ready for your computer also, and some Kleenex for your eyes. 

To make it, peel about six garlic cloves and crush them a bit with a big knife. Put them in a roasting pan or Pyrex dish with around two tablespoons of good-tasting olive oil (I used a lovely Portuguese one that I bought at Charelli's) and around 4 ounces of roughly chopped pancetta.  The quantities are completely flexible, of course, and depend on how many you're feeding.  I was just feeding my greedy self.  Put in the oven at about 450 degrees and set your pasta water to boiling.  I found that the amount of time it took for my water to boil and then for the fettucine to cook was exactly how long my pancetta wanted.  Your mileage may vary, but the pancetta should be nicely sizzling and crisp-looking. 

If your oven dish is large enough, drain the fettucine and plop it into the dish along with a handful of chopped parsley.  Mine wasn't, but I used a spatula to get all the tasty bits off the bottom of the dish so I wouldn't lose out on any flavour.  Mix well and gobble down.  Nigella suggests no parmesan with this and surprisingly, I agree.  A good dusting of freshly ground pepper is nice, though. 

My favourite part of this was the garlic cloves.  They're not for everyone, I suppose, but I thought they were delicious.  Not quite as sweet and creamy as roasted garlic, but without the bite of raw garlic, and with a bit of the flavour of the oil infused into the clove, in addition to the the oil taking on the flavour of the garlic.  Yum!  Of course, use garlic-infused oil if you prefer or even just regular olive oil if you are not a garlic lover. 

Thanks to Ruth for hosting Presto Pasta Nights.  I have missed the past two weeks but I am back in the pasta-cooking saddle once again. 

Presto Pasta Night: When the Cat's Away Edition

I've been meaning to join in on Presto Pasta Night ever since Ruth started this event six weeks ago, but I never seem to find the time.  Several times I've been halfway through eating some pasta dinner and then, with fork halfway to mouth, thought "Oh shoot!  I should have photographed this when it still looked good!"  But this week, my spouse is away on business and all of a sudden I seem to have much more time on my hands.  And I always thought it was the kids that took most of my free minutes away! 

Anyway, though I miss him, I confess I get a certain amount of pleasure out of my spouse leaving town.  This pleasure is often in the form of highly-flavoured seafood dishes (he might call them "fishy") that I love to eat myself but don't want to inflict on others.  My number one favourite dish to eat when I'm only cooking for myself is Nigella's pasta with anchovy sauce.  Oh man, it's good.

Here is the sauce cooking.  Doesn't that look appetizing?  No?  Well, to me, it's ambrosia.   

Here is how to make the sauce:

Slice an onion as thin as you can manage.  Heat up some olive oil in a pan and add the onion.  Cook for five minutes.  Now add some wine.  Nigella uses Marsala, I never have any.  So I typically use whatever red I've got frozen in a little baggie in my freezer, or I might have an open bottle of our homebrew wine that I am using for cooking, or if I'm extremely lucky, a little bit of real storebought wine left in the bottle from the night before.  Oftentimes, I confess, I use Tosca cooking wine, which I know would make some people swoon, but you know, it usually turns out fine, as long as it's in relatively small quantities.

Anyway, where were we?  Oh yes, adding the wine to the pan.  Nigella recommends 100mL I believe, but I tend to add just whatever amount looks right in the pan.  I want the onions covered, but just.  Because then you're going to leave them to cook on low heat for half and hour with no lid, so that win'es gonna evaporate pretty fast.  So make sure you use enough, or add more if necessary. 

Oops, I forgot to tell you (this is why I will never be a cookbook author) that you should have set 6 anchovy fillets to soaking in enough fatty milk to cover them before you started cooking the onions.  Okay, so assuming you did that, now chop them up as finely as possible and add them to your onions.  Would it be great for these anchovies to be imported from Italy and to be deboned?  Yes.  Are mine usually?  No.  Is this sauce still amazing  no matter how lowbrow your ingredients?  Yes. 

Okay, now throw in the soaking milk and about a tablespoon of olive oil and stir and cook over medium-low for a few minutes.  Add a handful of chopped parsley, preferably flat-leaf.  I tried curly and it's not quite as nice.  Stir and taste.  Add some more fatty milk, or even, if you dare, cream, or even, if you double dare, WHIPPING CREAM. 

Now for the choice of pasta.  I am basically having a torrid love affair with spaghetti lunghi and eat virtually all sauces with this shape of pasta.  However, anchovy sauce is traditionally paired with bigoli (great photos of this dish, eaten in Venice by The Amateur Gourmet) and I would love to try this one day too.  Here is my photo of the final product:

I have one more night to eat as a I wish before the spouse returns, and I think another choice from How to Eat is probably in order.  I'm going to pop by Neptune this afternoon and get something bivalvish, I think.  Or perhaps prawns.  Definitely something fishy. 

Merci beaucoup to Ruth for hosting this event and encouraging me to write about one of my favourite things to eat. 

Dinner for the Spring Equinox

Ah to be in Venice.  If I were, I might be eating risi e bisi today, on the first day of spring, although March 20th does seem awfully early for peas, even in Italy.  Up here in British Columbia, we won't be shelling peas from the garden for many months.  So instead of a dinner welcoming spring, we had one that was more of an adieu to winter: Nigella's old-fashioned beef casserole and double potato mash. 

I wanted to use what I had, and not go down to the grocery store, so I only followed her recipes loosely, using IPA instead of stout, lemon instead of orange, much less meat than is called for, a leek, and some shitaakes.  I didn't measure the potatoes at all, just used the three sweet potatoes I had leftover from the last SPUD order.  Everything turned out delicious.  I mean, how can you cook beef in beer over a low flame for three hours and not have it be delicious, right? 

This could very well have been our last truly wintry dinner this year, and although I am glad that winter is over, I'm going to miss the food.  I'm sure I'll be craving some slow-cooked beef long before it gets cold again. 

New Recipe Number 18: Nigella's Double Potato Mash (recipe linked above)

New Recipe Number 19: Nigella's Old-Fashioned Beef Casserole (recipe linked above)

Coca-Cola Cupcakes (for Valentine's Day?)

As much as I would like to provide an entire suggested menu for a romantic Valentine's Day dinner here, the truth of the matter is that tomorrow evening I am going to be suiting up in protective gear and getting in some sparring practice at my dojahng.  Once I get home, I have no clue yet what I'll put on the table, but rest assured it won't be romantic.  In the yellow house, we save our romance for two days after Valentine's Day, which is our wedding anniversary.  Stay tuned for a report on our Brasserie L'Ecole anniversary dinner, coming this weekend I hope. 

That said, Valentine's Day is not only for lovers but also for children, and my seven-year-old Sahsez does not eschew the day as her parents do.  She makes her Valentines by hand and likes to bake something red or pink to celebrate. 

So, this weekend she took the heart-covered cupcake holders her Grandma bought her and filled them with Nigella's Coca-Cola cake batter.  She iced them with Coca-Cola icing and put sprinkles on top to make them Valentiney.  They were delicious: chocolately but not terribly so, and very soft.  We had a few for Sunday dinner dessert, gave a couple away, and Sahsez has had one in her lunch each day this week.  You don't need more than one at a sitting, and they seem to last pretty well and taste great with a cup of coffee for a decadent housewives' Monday morning celebration breakfast. 

Don't ask me what that expression on her face is all about.  I think you have to be seven to get it.

New Recipe Number 13: Coca-Cola Cupcakes