Cheesy Meal

My friends R and S, of the Night of Two Souffles and the 2016 Ottolenghi Dinner, and I had been kicking around ideas for another themed feast for a while now.  S mentioned she'd been wanting to make a feta cheesecake from Honey & Co. and I said, half jokingly, well, we could do an entire meal around cheese.

And then that's what we had to do.

I'd been wanting to try making gnocchi for a long time. I recalled a Cook's Illustrated ricotta gnocchi (or in Italian, gnudi) recipe that sounded fun and cheesy.  Like the insides of ravioli, without the outsides.  Or, "nude" ravioli.

I made the dough, and we did the cutting and cooking together.  It was sticky, and I can't say they were terribly pretty.  And in another strategic error, we were pretty hungry, so I think overly enthused about dumping a whole lot in the pot at once rather than a few at a time. So while the batch you see cooking here turned out great, many of the ones after this ended up a bit clumpy.

Still, though, with a brown butter, shallot, herb sauce, it's hard to find any nits to pick. 

 Here's the final dish.

 

I started with the gnocchi because it was the main event, but for an appetizer we made a very cheesy stuffed mushroom recipe -- melty taleggio, Parmesean, etc., from Ottolenghi's Plenty.  I think I went too easy on the taleggio -- the picture in the cookbook is definitely way more cheesed over than ours turned out.  Lesson learned.  Also, the recipe didn't call for scraping out the portobello, just piling the filling on top of them.  I think it would be better with some scraping out.  So I'll try that next time.  



It must be said though that the stuffing was amazing. I was skeptical reading the recipe, along the lines of "you want HOW MUCH sun dried tomato in there???" But it was rich and flavorful and the leftovers made some tremendous scrambled eggs the next day. Definitely the kind of thing I could see just making and using kind of like a condiment.  I feel like it would improve everything it touches.

There was also a very nice, simple goat cheese salad, which I didn't take a picture of because even in these photo-happy food memorializing times, sometimes I just forget.  And a small cheese plate to start.

And finally the cheesecake.  It was beautiful and utterly light and divine.  I quibble just a little bit with calling it "cheesecake," I think it was more of a mousse.  But whatever one calls it, it was definitely the high point of a very cheesy evening.

The Christmas Babka

 

Way more photos than usual in this entry, but (a) this was a pretty involved thing, (b) I'm inordinately proud of my Christmas babka achievement, and (c) I was joined by a very special sous chef for this Hawaiian holiday cooking adventure, my niece Bella, who is 5 and a half.

Let's rewind.  When I first saw Ottolenghi's Krantz cake recipe in Jerusalem, it was the kind of recipe where my immediate reaction was "no way will I ever cook that."  Partly that's because I don't have a stand mixer, but partly it just looked hard.  And for all that I'm an ambitious and sometimes even daring cook, I'm also fundamentally a pretty lazy one.  Hence no-knead bread.

But I'd had it in mind, and when I was thinking about what I might want to try out on my family over the holidays, and my mom said we were volunteering to bring dessert for Christmas dinner, it seemed an opportune moment to attempt the Ottolenghi babka.

I don't know why I do these things, it's the height of arrogance or dumbness to try something, especially something complicated, for the first time for other people.  But, I was on the hook, so away we went.

'Twas the night before Christmas, and dough needed making.  

Were it not for the Kitchenaid, much time 'twould be taking.

Here it is freshly mixed, and again after resting

With much sugar and flour and some lemon from zesting.

We'd be making two babkas, not three and not one,
The first filled with chocolate, the other, cinnamon.



It was Xmas day and the babka dough rolled
When into the kitchen my little niece strolled.

She surveyed the scene and my own furrowed brow,
And she said "Uncle Joe, can I help you somehow?"

So together we decorated the freshly flat dough
With nuts and the toppings strewn to and fro.

And carefully I rolled a tight babka cigar,

And a split and a twist and voila there we are.

Into pans for a rest and a rise then the fire

All the work and attention had caused us to tire.



It was messy but easy, well, less hard than I thought,

And in the end vastly better than had we store bought.

Admire the crumb, look at that great braid
And this my dear readers, is how a babka is made.

Humble apologies to Clement Clark Moore and Dr. Seuss both.  I didn't really think I was going to end up in verse the whole way through.  And thank you to my sister Joelle, who documented the event.  And to Bella, for being a great assistant. Merry Babka!

Ottolenghi Roasted Vegetables & Tahini Cookies

Had friends over for dinner last night and sous-vided (that's a verb by now, right) a pork tenderloin for the second time.  That may become my go-to main course for company.  So simple, cooks perfectly, and it gives me an excuse to show off the immersion circulator.

Anyway, to balance the easy main, I broke out Plenty and made Ottolenghi's roasted vegetables with vinaigrette.

I had an mild disagreement with a friend recently who complained that his recipes are too involved and she finds herself cutting corners when she makes them, with results that are just about as good. To which I say, is that a criticism or a compliment?  In my mind, if a recipe inspires you to combine flavors you might not have otherwise, or try a new technique, then it's done its job. 

I expect that any of us who are good cooks automatically adapt or alter just about any recipe we make.  Add more of a favorite vegetable, substitute away from an herb we're not partial to or don't have on hand. Reduce the salt or butter or whatever. Or change it if something doesn't quite make sense--for example this dish called for 4 red onions, which can't possibly be right--are American red onions way bigger than British ones? Ottolenghi encourages adaptation and alteration -- he usually suggests ways to change or simplify himself in the recipe intros.

Anyway, red onion overload notwithstanding, this is a terrific recipe. I roast vegetables just fine, thank you (in addition to red onion, this combined sweet potato, parsnip, cherry tomato, and a whole head of garlic along with sprigs of rosemary and thyme). But I've never bothered making a dressing for them before. Ottolenghi tosses these with olive oil, lemon juice, capers, maple syrup and Dijon mustard. Which I almost certainly would not have thought to combine on my own, but wow.  So much flavor, and yet without overwhelming the inherent flavors in the vegetables.  I can't wait to try this again, and I'm actively looking forward to tweaking it.  And as with so many of his dishes, it's beautiful--great color and gusto and verve, and half a head of garlic always adds visual as well as flavor appeal.  And it combined super-well with the pork, too.

I did a variation on his spinach salad with dates, nuts, and pita croutons, which I've made so many times I don't even look at the recipe anymore.  At this point, I think I can claim it as my own, or at least a "Joetolenghi" creation.

Finally, because I was feeling ambitious, or maybe because I opted not to bake bread, I also whipped up a batch of his Tahini Cookies, from Jerusalem.

 

Exactly as one might expect, they are peanut butter cookies meet halva, a very shortbready sort of crumb with a really nice sesame flavor. About as simple as could be to make, and yet impressively unusual and tasty just the same.

Eggs With Everything Good

Brunch yesterday was Ottolenghi’s (of course) recipe for baked eggs with ground lamb and pine nuts and tomatoes and cilantro and yogurt sauce and an amazing array of spices. 

Really, this is probably the most beautiful dish that’s ever come out of my kitchen.

And that’s saying something.