Barefoot Bloggers: Meringues Chantilly

I'm a couple of days late on February's second challenge for the Barefoot Bloggers, but to tell the truth I think I might have been even more late if this dessert hadn't turned out so spectacularly well - I just couldn't wait to tell you all about it!

Ina's Meringues Chantilly, chosen by BMK of Reservations Not Required, are composed of a simple vanilla meringue base topped with orange-scented whipped cream and stewed mixed berries. Certainly a lovely combination on their own. But in my part of the world, its still winter, and not only are berries not exactly at their best right now, but I'm in desperate need of food that evokes memories of warmer weather if I'm going to make it to spring without a serious case of cabin fever. So, I opted to take a more tropical approach to this dish, and man oh man did it work.



I followed Ina's directions for the meringues (which, from past experience and a lot of research, could use some clarification in parts - there's an awful lot of subtlety involved when making meringues, and her recipe as-written doesn't address a lot of the more common tips and tricks and pitfall advice that I've seen in more thorough recipes) though I only made a half batch. For flavoring, I replaced the vanilla extract with coconut and ground up a 1/4 cup of Just Tomatoes brand dried mangoes in my coffee grinder to mix with the sugar that would be added to the egg whites.

If you've never had Just Tomatoes dried fruit, I really recommend checking them out - these aren't soft, chewy dried fruit like you normally find in the grocery store. They're crisp and crunchy with no moisture left in them at all, with an intense fruit flavor that you just can't get otherwise. (If you've ever had Special K Red Berries, think about what the strawberries are like - that's basically what these are.) They can be eaten out of hand or added whole to other things (cereal, yogurt, oatmeal, or baked goods come to mind) but what I'm starting to experiment with is grinding them up to make intense fruit powders. Imagine mixing dried raspberry powder with ground coriander and ginger to make a spice rub for pork, or shaking up some strawberry powder with aged balsamic and olive oil for a super smooth and flavorful salad dressing, or stirring some peach powder into white chocolate ganache for truffles. The possibilities for applications are endless, especially considering the variety of fruits and even vegetables on offer from the company. Don't get scared off by the price - the potential for unique and creative recipes is endless.



The ground mangoes were absolutely perfect here - after the meringues had their long slow bake and even longer drying time in the oven, the mango flavor had intensified and bloomed, yielding a crispy airy bite with the unmistakable sweet-tart flavor of mango and a subtle aromatic whiff of coconut underneath. Some of my meringues came out a bit chewy in the middle, which I think was partially caused by a slightly truncated bake time (forgot to set my oven timer at first and had to guess to make up the time) and some difficulty whipping the egg whites to their proper soft peaks. I really think that Ina has you add the sugar too early, and that the use of regular granulated sugar was a mistake - it was too heavy and weighted down the meringue so that no matter how long I beat it, it never got quite stiff enough. That's why my meringues didn't come out with those nice ridges as well, despite being piped with a star tip - once they hit the heat, they couldn't hold their shape (though at least they didn't spread much).

No matter, the flavor was perfect and that's the post important thing, especially since they would just soften up later anyway under the fruit and cream toppings.



To go along with my tropical mango meringue shells, I decided to make a pair of fruit toppings: a very simple blackberry sauce made with a half-pint of blackberries (the only kind that looked good at the store), a bit of white sugar, some lemon juice and lime zest; and a fresh mango salsa dressed with lime juice, brown sugar, and some fresh basil and mint cut in a chiffonade. The whipped cream topping also got a hit of lime zest and a tiny splash of coconut extract to bring the whole thing full circle.

I assembled them as per Ina's instructions - a dollop of blackberry sauce on the plate, spread out a bit so it'd peak out beneath the meringue that was set on top of it. Top the meringue shell with a dollop of whipped cream, then a big spoonful of the mango salsa and another drizzle of the blackberry sauce. Finish with a small spoonful of whipped cream and some fresh mint, and dessert is served.



This, people, was the best dessert I have ever made in my life. I'm calling this restaurant-worthy.

The combination of flavors was exactly what I wanted, tropical and summery and reminiscent of a hot day in the Virgin Islands, with a nice balance of sweet and tart, verdant herbs and bright citrus, aromatic fruit and creamy dairy. The interplay of textures was exciting - slightly crisp meringue becoming chewy and toothsome under the fruit and cream, tender sweet morsels of mango, smooth cool whipped cream, slightly crunchy seeds in the blackberry sauce. Totally perfect. I do think it tended a bit too much to the sweet side of things, which I would remedy next time by cutting down on the sugar in the meringues, the blackberry sauce, and the cream. The mango in the salsa was also a bit underripe so it wasn't as soft and juicy and intense as it would be in the summer. But even with those small shortcomings, this was excellent. Mouthwatering. Craveable. Totally deserving of a spot at the end of a fancy dinner party, or as a regular offering on a restaurant menu. Honestly, it's THAT good.

And I get to have it again tonight.

I love my life.

Why We Don't Go Out For Thai

Consider, for a moment, the plight of the peanut-allergic American. If you don't have to worry about dying from accidental contact with this particular legume, you probably don't even realize how much it's used in everyday foods. Cereals, snacks, candies, and convenience foods often contain things like peanut flour or peanut oil when you'd least expect it. Even those which do not intentionally include peanut products in their ingredient lists will frequently carry that potentially life-saving warning, "Manufactured in a facility which also process peanuts." While this means that your granola bar probably does not contain, nor has it come in contact with, a peanut or its byproducts, it also means that it MIGHT have, and you'd just better not take the chance.

Then there's fried foods, which have at least a 50/50 chance of having been cooked in peanut oil, and sometimes its almost impossible to tell. I often wonder how many unaware folks with peanut allergies get sick every year from innocent trips to Chick-Fil-A. (Because yes, they fry just about everything in peanut oil, and the warning signs in their restaurants are notoriously small and easy-to-miss. I had a close call there myself a few years back.)

If you don't have to think about it, you probably don't realize just how dangerous the world can be for someone with a severe peanut allergy, and how limited the options become when you really take every step possible to keep yourself. And no matter how hard you try to protect yourself, there is still always the slight possibility that, under the wrong circumstances, you just might get hit with an allergy attack seemingly out of nowhere due to a chance encounter of your purse with a peanut shell on the ground.

And possibly worse than all that is the fact that it is damn near impossible to go out for Thai food.



As you may have determined, I am one of those unlucky 1.5 million Americans whose bodies cannot process the proteins in that beloved of all "nuts", the peanut. I've learned as I've grown up how to best avoid accidental ingestion of the evil little beans, and know to be very careful when eating out or trying new foods. However, in my younger days I was sometimes a bit more reckless than I should've been, and it was during those years that I first discovered Thai food.

I suppose I was lucky. There were a lot of Thai restaurants in New Haven County in CT, where I grew up, and I went to at least three different places where I was able to enjoy untainted Thai food, probably due to some extreme care and consideration by the restaurants' chefs and servers. Through these visits I learned to love Thai cuisine, its unique, fresh, and vibrant flavors, colors, and textures, and I became a regular customer to the restaurant closest to home, craving their food constantly between visits.

And then I moved to NY, where there must be a thousand Thai restaurants to try. And it was then that I had my first bad experience in a Thai restaurant, one which must not have taken such impeccable care in keeping their kitchen clean and their peanut products quarantined, because despite having ordered a dish that I knew full well should contain no peanuts whatsoever, I had a reaction and was sick for days.

Since then I have not set foot in another Thai restaurant, other than the one back home that I know is safe.

Just try to imagine not being able to go out for your favorite kind of food because, well, it just might kill you. I probably don't need to spell it out, but I will: IT SUCKS.

But, not being one to take my eating limitations lying down, I resolved that I simply had to be able to make my own Thai food at home, where I knew it would be 100% safe for me to eat. And after introducing J to my beloved "safe haven" Thai restaurant in CT and turning him on to the stuff, he was more than willing to take on the challenge with me.

Since then we have made several soups, stir fries, and noodle/rice dishes from various cookbooks and online recipe sources, some more successful than others but all of them better than no Thai food at all. We will continue to experiment until we have a retinue of reliable, delicious, and authentic (as close as possible, anyway, working within the no-peanuts limitation) recipes that we can turn to whenever we feel that particular, special craving that no other food can satisfy. But for now, the one recipe we've come back to time and time again has been this, my favorite Thai noodle dish and one of my favorite things to eat, ever: Pad See Ew.



A relatively simple dish of wide rice noodles stir-fried with Chinese broccoli or gai lan, egg, and thin strips of chicken or pork with a sticky, sweet soy sauce, pad see ew is a popular lunchtime street food in Thailand. It is hearty and incredibly flavorful, and like so much of the Thai cuisine I've tasted, incredibly well balanced. Sweet, savory, peppery, and tangy flavors meld together into a truly perfect sauce, binding the tender chicken, soft eggs, crunchy broccoli and chewy rice noodles into what I can only describe as the ultimate noodle dish. Seriously, I could eat this stuff every day for a week and not get bored with it. It is amazing to me that such a simple dish with such basic ingredients can taste this good.

The recipe I follow for this dish is slightly non-traditional, but it achieves the same flavor that I fell in love with back in CT, and for that I don't mind breaking the rules a bit. I always use chicken and have never had it with pork, even though I'm pretty sure that pork is the standard protein in Thialand. I also use regular-old broccoli florets instead of Chinese broccoli or gai lan, because frankly I have access to neither. It doesn't matter. Because really, the star of this dish is the noodles; wide ribbons of chewy, starchy goodness that soak up all that delicious sauce and become almost unbearably addictive. I bet you won't be able to stop at one plate.



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Pad See Ew
Adapted from a bunch of recipes that I can't really remember all mashed up together; technique adapted from Pim's Pad See Ew for Beginners.

If you can't find fish sauce, rice wine vinegar, or dark sweet soy in stores near you, try ordering them online from any of a number of Thai ingredient suppliers. That's what we did, and unless you cook Thai every day, they'll probably last you a good long time.

12oz flat, wide dry rice noodles
1 large boneless skinless chicken breast, sliced thinly (you could substitute pork or even tofu here if you wanted)
2 cups broccoli florets (one large crown should do fine)
1 egg
6 cloves of garlic, smashed and minced

Marinade:
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1 tsp toasted sesame oil

Sauce:
1 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp soy sauce
3 tsp dark sweet soy sauce
2 tsp rice wine vinegar
1-2 tbsp white sugar
1/2-1 tsp black pepper

Vegetable oil for cooking (Choose something with a high smoke point like safflower or grapeseed oil or, if you aren't allergic like me, peanut oil. I won't even bother giving a measurement because it depends on too much - the seasoning of your wok, the type of noodles you use, how hot your stove gets, etc. - just be aware that you will probably use a lot.)

30-60 minutes before you intend to start cooking, mix together the ingredients for the marinade and pour over the slices of chicken in a large bowl. Toss around to coat each piece with the marinade, then cover with plastic wrap and let stand until you are ready to cook.

Place the rice noodles in a dish and cover with hot water (I bring my tea kettle up to just shy of the boiling point) and let stand long enough for the noodles to become pliable. You'll want to move them around every so often with a fork or tongs to keep them from sticking together and forming one giant noodle clump. 5-10 minutes will probably do it, depending on how hot the water is. Just don't let them get soft or mushy, or you'll be setting yourself up for failure later. They need to be able to finish cooking in the wok. Once the noodles are pliable, drain them in a colander and rinse well with cold water, then let stand to drain completely.

Make sure the rest of your ingredients are prepped and ready to go - cut up your broccoli florets and put them in a bowl. Do the same with the garlic. Scramble the egg in another bowl, adding a touch of soy sauce if you like. Finally, make the sauce, whisking all of the ingredients together to help the sugar dissolve. I used the full 2tbsp the last time I made it and felt it was a little too sweet for my tastes, so next time I'll cut it back to maybe a heavy tbsp, but season it according to your tastes. Same goes for the pepper - I like a lot, but use as much as you like.

You should now have a bowl of chicken in its marinade, a colander full of flexible but not-exactly cooked rice noodles, a bowl of broccoli, a bowl of garlic, a bowl of egg, and a bowl of sauce. Now get out your vegetable oil and a big wooden spoon or spatula, and make sure everything is within easy reach of the stove; its time to start cooking, and it's going to move quickly.

Place a large wok over high heat and preheat for at least 5 minutes to ensure the whole pan is heated evenly. Add a tablespoon or two of oil to the pan, enough that you can swirl the pan around and coat as much of the sides as possible. Let that heat up for just a few seconds, then dump in your marinated chicken and garlic. Keep the chicken and garlic moving around the pan by swirling the pan gently and tossing/stirring the meat with your wooden spoon or spatula, letting it cook on all sides without burning. You'll probably get some smoke and some spatter, so just be careful when you move the pan. Once the chicken is cooked and browned in places, remove it and the garlic back to its bowl. Wipe out the pan with a couple of paper towels and replace on the heat.

Now, the broccoli. Add some more oil to the wok, then dump in your broccoli and cook the same way that you did the chicken, though you probably won't need to move it around as much because it wont be as likely to stick as the chicken was. Cook until the broccoli is bright green and slightly softened but still crisp in the stems, and the florets have gotten brown and crispy in spots. Remove from the wok back to its bowl, and replace the wok on the stove. No need to wipe it out this time.

Drizzle some oil over the noodles in their colander and toss around gently so that all of the noodles are individually coated with oil, then add a bit more oil to the wok. This is where things can get tricky, as rice noodles tend to stick like crazy and will break apart and completely lose their structural integrity if they do, so although it goes against my usual healthy sensibilities, use as much oil as you need to keep that from happening.

One the noodles are coated and the oil in the pan is hot again, dump in the noodles and get them moving in the pan immediately. The longer they stay stationary, the more likely they are to stick. Stir fry them until they start to show crisp, brown spots. Now, this is the only part that I still have trouble with - move the noodles up the sides of the pan where it will be cooler, creating a well at the very bottom of the pan, and pour in the scrambled egg. Resist the urger to start shoving it around in the pan the way you have every other ingredient - the noodles at this point should be lubed up enough that they won't stick, and the egg needs to cook without being fooled with for awhile so that it can actually set up. You want to be able to break it into pieces once its cooked, not turn it into a coating for the noodles.

Give it just a minute or two until it looks mostly opaque, then get in there and stir to break it up a bit and toss it with the noodles. Now dump the chicken, garlic, and broccoli back into the pan, toss it all together, and finally pour in all the sauce. Do your pan-shaking/hot-food-tossing bit until everything in the pan is coated in sauce, the noodles have absorbed most of the liquid, and the heat has thickened up anything that's left, just a minute or two. You should get a bit more caramelization and browning during this step. Remove from the heat and serve immediately, with an extra shake of black pepper and a drop or two of soy sauce as a final flavor boost.

Greek. Again.

I shouldn't be so hard on myself about the Greek-food thing - truthfully, we haven't made anything remotely Greek in weeks, so I guess I'm not THAT obsessed. And if I've gotta be addicted to a particular cuisine, at least this one is pretty healthy. It could be worse - at least I don't have an insatiable hunger for bad Americanized Chinese food. Right? Right.

Anyway, this was the last of a long string of soup-centric meals, and to my mind at least, the best.



I've always seen avgolemono mentioned in the context of a soup, but the name really has a much broader definition. From Wikipedia:

"Avgolemono is a family of eastern Mediterranean sauces and soups made with egg and lemon juice mixed with broth, heated until they thicken but before they boil, so the egg doesn't curdle. Avgolémono is the Greek name, meaning egg-lemon; in Arabic, it is called tarbiya or beida bi-lemoune 'egg with lemon', and in Turkish terbiye." More...

Up until recently, this idea has not appealed to me; my earlier reference to bad American Chinese food is particularly apt, because when I thought about egg being added to soup, I automatically pictured something akin to Chinese egg drop which, quite frankly, makes me gag. The reality, however, is far more pleasant. Rather than ending up with a thick, gloopy broth with ribbons of barely cooked egg running through it, the method for adding the lemon-egg mixture to the soup in this preparation actually tempers and lightens the eggs, serving to only thicken the soup slightly and give it a smooth, velvety mouthfeel. No runny eggs here, my friends, and that's a-ok with me.

Traditionally, avoglemono in its soup form is made very simply, with rice or perhaps orzo and pieces of poached chicken added to the fortified broth. I had intended to actually stick to tradition on this one at first, planning only to add some chopped spinach near the end as well in an effort to get some good green veggies into the meal. However, our spinach went bad before I could cook this (I HATE supermarket veggies...) so I ended up making some other changes and substitutions to compensate. In the end, my version contained chicken, asparagus, and artichoke hearts, with my beloved fregola sardo subbed in for the arborio rice in the original recipe.

And it was good.

Really, really good.



Avgolemono with Asparagus, Artichokes, and Fregola Sardo
Adapted from Avgolemono: Chicken Soup with Egg-Lemon Sauce by Cat Cora

1 large boneless/skinless chicken breast
6 cups chicken broth or stock
1 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 white onion, finely diced
3 cloves garlic, smashed and minced
1 bay leaf
1/2 cup diced peeled carrot
1/3 cup fregula sardo
1/2 cup frozen quartered artichoke hearts, thawed and sliced in half lengthwise
1/2 lb asparagus, woody ends trimmed and stalks cut into 1/2" pieces, tips reserved
1 large egg
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (I felt this was maybe a bit too much - I needed two lemons to get 1/4 cup of juice, so I think next time I might just use one.)
S&P to taste
Lemon slices or wedges, optional

Place the chicken breast in a saucepan and add enough broth to cover. Place over medium-high heat and simmer until chicken is cooked, 15-20 minutes. When cooked, remove the chicken from the pot and set aside to cool. Add the reserved asparagus tips to the pan to blanch for just a minute or two, until they are slightly softened but still bright green. Remove with a slotted spoon to an ice water bath to stop them from continuing to cook, and turn off the heat under the broth. Set aside.

Meanwhile, add the olive oil to the bottom of a larger saucepan and heat over medium-high heat until shimmering gently. Add the onions and garlic and a pinch of salt, and sautee until they are translucent and softened. Add the bay leaf and carrots and sautee for another 2 to 3 minutes, until fragrant.

Pour in the broth used to cook the chicken, as well as any extra, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer about 30 minutes. Pour through a fine-mesh strainer into a large bowl to strain out the vegetables and bay leaf, then pour back into the saucepan and move back over the heat. Don't worry if you still have a few bits and pieces of veg in there - it won't hurt the soup any; in fact, you could even skip this step completely and only remove the bay leaf, if you'd like to make things easier, and it'd be just as good if a little chunkier than this version. I like the simplicity of the finished soup in this recipe, personally - the onions, garlic and carrots are only there to flavor the broth.

Add the fregola sardo and allow to simmer for 10-15 minutes, until the fregola is still slightly al dente.

Meanwhile, whisk the lemon juice and egg together in a bowl and set aside. Cut the cooked chicken breast into cubes, about 1/2"-3/4".

When the fregola is mostly cooked, add in the asparagus, artichokes, and chicken, and continue to simmer until the fregola is completely cooked. Remove from heat and get your egg-lemon mixture.

Using a ladle, add some of the soup broth to your bowl of egg and lemon very slowly, using a whisk to incorporate the hot liquid. You need to do this slowly so that the eggs don't curdle, which would cause that nasty egg drop syndrome. Place your hand against the side of the bowl occasionally to test the temperature of the mix - when it feels slightly warmer than room temperature, you can pour the whole mix back into the pan without danger. Be sure to stir the soup as you add the egg mixture to keep things smooth - the broth should only thicken slightly and should still resemble a broth rather than a sauce or stew. Taste for seasoning and add salt and pepper if necessary. I found that I needed no salt, but added quite a bit of black pepper for just a bit of bite.

Ladle immediately into serving bowls and top with the reserved blanched asparagus tips, garnishing with a lemon slice or wedge if desired.

I think that this could be an extremely flexible recipe; you could add in almost any vegetables you like to cater it to your tastes, or make it vegetarian by omitting the chicken and using vegetable broth. You could experiment with grains, using rice or orzo as is traditional, or perhaps trying something like farro for a nutty, chewy texture that I bet would be especially tasty. And since its reasonably sophisticated on the palate, pretty to look at, and easy to make, I think it would be great for entertaining. Some flatbread or crostini with feta toasted on top would make a great accompaniment. We'll be making this again!

Lessons Learned

I've been a little absent from the blogosphere this week. I'm sorry. Its way too early in the game here at "Table for Two?" for me to disappear for 6 days straight, and I apologize. I'll try not to let it happen again but, well, you know how it is. Life gets in the way sometimes.

That being said, there are a couple of legitimate reasons for my neglect. The first is that the Olympics started last Friday, and I've been watching them just about every night. I've been looking forward to the games for months, and there's been some really great stuff going on this year (Michael Phelps, anyone?) and I just don't want to miss a minute of it if I can avoid it.

The second is that we naively planned a couple of positively epic meals this week, and when we spend 2-3 hours making dinner after a full day of work, its all I can do to sit in front of the boob tube for an hour or so of Olympics coverage afterwards before passing out for the night.

This week did, however, yield quite a few valuable learning experiences which I'd like to pass on.

Mmmm. Melty Mexican goodness.

Lesson #1
Enchilada sauce, or red chili sauce, is shockingly easy to make at home, and tastes SO much better than the canned, store-bought variety that I've always used. J actually made the sauce this first time around, and although he used Emeril's recipe as a jumping-off point, he changed enough as he went along to render the original probably nearly unrecognizable. The end result? Pretty much what I would consider the perfect enchilada sauce: rich, savory, and tangy, with just a bit of warmth from some dried chilis. Poured under and over whole grain tortillas wrapped around smoked pulled pork and black beans, it yielded what J called "the best enchiladas EVAR" but I'll leave the details for a separate post.

Lesson #2
Cleaning your own squid is an absolutely monstrous job, and not at all pleasant. More importantly, its a hell of an undertaking for a weeknight. I don't think we ate dinner until after 9pm that night, and when you're used to eating dinner closer to 7:30pm, that is a seriously late meal.

I volunteered to do the squid-cleaning first, and I have to admit that my knee-jerk revulsion to handling shellfish innards (and having my fingers anywhere near a dead creatures eyes) lessened significantly after the first 2 or 3. I managed to get through about 8 before deciding I'd had enough, and passing the torch to J to finish up. Of course that meant he ended up doing almost twice as many as I did (the package we bought had a shockingly large number of whole squid in it) but he was graciously silent about the clearly unfair division of labor. I think I owe him a 6-pack or something for that.

We cleaned out all the bodies (or tubes) so that we could stuff them with a mixture of veggies and breadcrumbs, then bake them in a basic tomato sauce. The tentacles ended up getting discarded because, frankly, they just didn't look that good after being frozen and thawed. But of course, what you really want to know is, was it worth it?

No. Not at all. Never mind the fact that the plate of food up there will never win any beauty awards. It just didn't taste that good. The sauce and the stuffing, taken individually, were delicious. And being that we based it on one of Mario Batali's recipes, I'm not surprised. But the squid itself? Meh. Not impressed. I do think it was cooked just about right, as the finished product had a texture somewhat like al dente pasta. However, I'm used to squid being relatively non-fishy, and this was definitely fishy. I'm not sure if that's because it had been frozen whole and then thawed, or if we just didn't do a thorough-enough job of cleaning it (I suspect the latter, because some pieces were significantly more fishy than others) but quite frankly, I couldn't finish it. It was dsappointing, to say the least, and not something we'll be repeating anytime soon.

Now we've got a bag of about a dozen squid tubes in the freezer that we'll need to use up, though. I'm thinking we'll probably just fry them up at some point. Not anytime soon - I've got some mental scarring from this first fresh-squid encounter that needs to heal before I even look at it again - but eventually.

Lesson 3
Those little mini-springform pans I bought on my birthday are every bit as awesome as I expected them to be. I used them this week to make these delicious single-serving broccoli quiches, and they were really the perfect size for dinner when paired with some sauteed snow peas. The quiches rose in the oven and then held their form perfectly when removed from the pans, and were just perfectly cooked. I can't wait to find more uses for them.

Lesson 4
Sometimes, just sometimes, you want something simple. Something comforting. Something that fills your belly and warms your soul without breaking the bank. Something like... franks and beans. Or as J calls them, beanie weenies (*gigglesnort*). However, just because you're making a dish that your father made for you for dinner in grade school, doesn't mean you can't make it spectacular. We had this deceptively simple meal one night this week and made it amazing by making the baked beans from scratch, using dry beans that were soaked overnight and then cooked for a looooong time (over 12 hours) in the crock pot while we were at work. As a pleasant counterpoint to the squid fiasco, this made for a quick and easy dinner once we got home - all we had to do was crisp up the hot dogs a bit and then toast a couple of hot dog rolls in the rendered fat to have a supremely satisfying and surprisingly delicious dinner.

You know you want some of this. C'mon, don't try to hide it.

Even more surprising is that this particular dish was really not that bad for you - if you skip the bread-toasted-in-hot-dog-fat part, the franks and beans themselves have no added fat (helped along by that pre-cooking step with the dogs). There's a fair amount of sugar though, so diabetics may want to keep away from this sort of dish. The rest of you? Go get some beans soaking. Because I can guarantee there'll be a day this week when you won't want to cook, and this bowl of hot, hearty goodness is sure to soothe you after even the most difficult day.

Lesson 5
I still can't make fried rice. I tried my hand at a thai-style vegetarian fried rice on Thursday, and although it was basically ok, it just wasn't quite right. I'm pretty sure I overcooked the rice the night before, so it was a little too sticky and mushy when I tried to stir fry it, and fried rice just shouldn't be mushy, ever. I also think I used too much fish sauce in the seasoning, because the flavor was just a bit too prominent for me to really enjoy the dish. The basic premise was good, and the bites that got a piece of fresh tomato or pineapple were really delicious, but I couldn't quite finish my serving. J loved it, which I'm glad of, but I just know I could make it better if I could just get the rice part of it right.

Lesson 6
Rabbit is delicious. Also, "deconstructed" dishes are a ton of fun. But, I'll leave those details for my next post.

Bonus Lesson:
My photography SUCKS. Its virtually impossible to take decent photos in this dim-as-hell basement apartment. Normally I enjoy the gentle lighting we've got going on down here, but its not at all conducive to taking attractive photos of our dinners. I've really gotta work on that lightbox...