Fried Green Tomatoes

No, this isn't about the movie "Fried Green Tomatoes." But it is about cooking them.

From my birthday gift garden, this week I had some tomatoes that were still green with no hope of ripening with the advent of dropping autumn night and day temperatures. So rather than waste the tomatoes I went in search of a recipe to use them and found one from fellow a fellow contributor to Examiner.com.

Examiner, by the way, enlists contributors from a variety of interests. I write about Baby Boomers. My fellow Examiner Chef John contributes recipes, including this one for Fried Green Tomatoes. This includes a spicy remoulade sauce as a garnish:

Ingredients

4 slices (about half inch each) of green tomato

1 cup flour

2 eggs

2 tablespoons milk

3/4 cup bread crumbs

3/4 cub corn meal

Salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste

Cayenne

Vegetable oil

1 tablespoon butter

Directions

1) On a rack, salt the tomato slices and set aside;

2) In a bowl, create the breading mixture of the bread crumbs and corn meal, adding some pepper, salt and the cayenne to taste;

3) In another bowl, beat the two eggs with a splash of milk;

4) Put the flour in another bowl;

5) Use a paper towel to wipe the moisture from the tomato slices;

6) Take each slice through the breading process -- first dredge with flour, then dip into the eggs, then fully coat with the bread crumb/corn flour mix;

7) Let sit for about 10 minutes;

8) In the meantime, to make the remoulade, combine equal parts sweet relish and mayonnaise in a small bowl. Add hot sauce to taste and mix;

9) In pan over medium heat use about an eighth of an inch of vegetable oil and add butter;

10) When the butter is bubbly, cook slices 3-4 minutes on each side;

11) Serve with dollop of sauce.

They're perfect as a side to just about any meal. I increased the yield and we had them with Ground Turkey Enchiladas the other night, then I had the leftovers with a ham and cheese omelet for lunch the next day.

Here's a video of Chef John's Green Fried Tomatoes:

Fried Green Green Tomatoes from Foodwishes on Vimeo.

Clam Dip

This week's contributor, Sue Rorke, loves to cook but isn't one to follow recipes. "Either I misread them, don't have the exact ingredients, or don't like the exact ingredients -- so I wing it a lot," she said.

Her favorite meal to prepare and eat is pasta and she can turn just about anything from the kitchen into something to toss with pasta, except, she admits, popcorn, which was a recent challenge from her daughter. But it's her clam dip that is requested most often.

"While I am a really excellent cook, and constantly cook food that I love, this is really the only recipe that anyone requests," she said. "My family has been pigging out on it ever since I remember.  Every bowl is a race to the finish."

At stay at home mom in Medway, Mass., she has a start-up business called PhotoMoves, which produces DVD slideshows, poster collages, and website design and set-up. 

Ingredients

1 can of minced clams -- 6.5 ounces

1 package of cream cheese - 8 ounces (Note: the 1/3 less fat versions are okay, too)

1 or 2 teaspoon minced onions

(1 grated carrot)

(1 teaspoon basil)

 

Directions

1) Put cream cheese in a bowl and sort of break it up with a fork. Let warm to room temperature to soften;

2) Add minced onions. Stir with a fork until smooth and creamy;

3) Drain the clam juice into a cup. Add about half of the juice slowly to the cream cheese until the correct consistency;

4) Stir in the carrot and basil;

5) Add the clams and stir until well mixed;

6) Grab a bag of chips and dig in.

Sue recently modified the recipe by adding the grated carrot and basil and said it makes it better.

Teriyaki Marinated Beef Steak

By Paul Briand

Sometimes it's nice to let someone else figure out a dinner menu for you, especially when a hurry-up day doesn't give you much time to think about or even prepare a dinner for four.

Lots of grocers have seen the need to help harried consumers and have come up with prepared or semi-prepared meals. I recently tried one from Hannaford, a large grocery store chain in this part of the country. Hannaford describes these meals as "a cooking show to go: everything you need -- fresh, pre-cut and measured for a fantastic meal you make at home."

Meals are offered to cook four or two, the the store provides handouts listing a two-week menu, so that you can decide on Thursday, for example, you might want the chicken thighs with leeks, olives and orzo, or you might want to wait until Saturday for the Caribbean tilapia with toasted cabo coconut with jicama slaw.

I decided to try the teriyaki marinated beef steak with citrus sesame summer slaw. Indeed everything is self-contained. Ingredients are measured and cut, then bagged or put in a container. Then it's all packaged in a convenient, easy-to-carry cardboard box. Cooking instructions are contained within the label that's taped to the box. Here's a look at what was inside (which you could duplicate on your own):

Ingredients

1 1/2 pound beef loin grilling steak, marinating in a 1/2 cup of teriyaki sauce

12 ounces sliced Chinese cabbage

2 1/2 cups shredded carrots

1 small sliced red onion

4 teaspoons chopped cilantro

2 teaspoons dried ginger

2 teaspoons granted orange peel

2 teaspoons sesame oil

1 cup orange juice

1 teaspoon lime juice

3 ounces wonton crisps

Directions

1) On a preheated grill cook the steak 5 - 8 minutes or until medium rare, transfer to cutting board and let sit 10 minutes. (If cooking under an oven broiler, cook 7 minutes per side or until desired level of doneness.);

2) Place vegetables -- cabbage, carrots and onion -- into a large bowl;

3) Combine ginger, orange peel and sesame oil and mix thoroughly then combine with orange juice and lime juice in a small bowl and mix all together;

4) Pour dressing over vegetables and toss to thoroughly coat the slaw;

5) Thinly slice the steak against the grain;

6) Divide slaw among plates, top with sliced beef and wonton crisps.

The directions go so far as to suggest a complementary wine: a Pinot Noir.

This meal was ready in 20 minutes and was a real time saver given the extent of vegetable and dressing ingredients' preparation that would have been necessary had you done this on your own.

All in all it was very tasty, though I thought it was a little heavy on the red onion. I would have used maybe a half a red onion rather than a whole one.

For more information go to: http://www.hannaford.com/cookingshowtogo.

Mac and Cheese with Scallops and Bacon

By Paul Briand

In last week's post, I wrote of how great it was to eat a variety of great seafood at a local seafood festival my wife and I attended. In particular, I had the chance to munch scallops and bacon on a stick.

I confess to a passionate love for scallops and bacon. It is my favorite appetizer. Any cocktail party that serves scallops and bacon is a hit in my book. I'm the guy with the toothpick chasing after the server with the scallops and bacon tray, knocking aside whoever and whatever is necessary to get to them.

In that vein, I was moved last week to cook my own scallops and bacon but with a twist -- combined with homemade macaroni and cheese.

Ingredients

1 pound sea scallops -- numbers about 12

1 pound package of thick cut bacon

2 cups elbow macaroni

2 cups milk

3 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons flour

2 cups grated sharp cheddar cheese

1/2 cup Italian fontina cheese

1/4 cup minced onions

Dash Tabasco sauce

Pepper to taste

Splash of white wine

1/2 cup bread crumbs

Directions

1) Start by cooking the bacon in a large skillet, set aside on paper towels to drain (break into pieces once cool enough);

2) Retain some of the bacon fat and in the same skillet sear the scallops, browning on all sides;

3) Add a dash of white wine to deglaze the pan, set scallops aside and cut in half;

4) Cook elbow macaroni in 4-5 quart pot of boiling water about 6-8 minutes or until just tender (macaroni will cook more when it's baked);

5) While the macaroni cooks, prepare the cheese sauce in saucepan by first heating milk but not letting it boil;

6) Melt butter in large saucepan and stir in flour;

7) Gradually stir in heated milk, stirring constantly until sauce thickens;

8) Add onion and cheddar cheese, stirring until cheese melts;

9) Add dash of hot sauce and pepper, stir;

10) Combine cheese sauce with cooked macaroni;

11) Stir fontina cheese into mixture;

11) Combine halved scallops and crumbled bacon into mac and cheese;

12) Spoon entire mixture into large greased baking dish;

13) Top with bread crumbs;

14) Bake in 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.

This dish feeds 6-8. I like the fontina cheese as an addition because it combines a complimentary taste to the cheddar and has the stringy, cheesy quality of mozzarella.

Sweet Corn and Crab Bisque

I had the occasion during the weekend with wife Jane to attend the annual Hampton, N.H., Seafood Festival. Certainly as the name implies, it is a festival devoted to seafood and we certainly got our fill as we trolled the food tents, assessing the offerings from a variety of restaurants from throughout the New Hampshire seacoast region.

I got more than my fill with lobster stew, scallops and bacon on a stick, and lobster roll. It also inspired me to try something new in the kitchen for dinner, which I'll talk about next week.

The festival included some cooking demonstrations, and we watched Ron Boucher, a restaurant owner and instructor, show how to prepare his recipe for sweet corn and crab bisque. Boucher (pictured here, photo courtesy of his web site) owns Ron's Landing in Hampton, N.H., and Chez Boucher, his French cooking school.

Here is the bisque recipe he presented at the festival:

Ingredients

12 ears of corn on the cob, hulled (Save the used cobs, you'll need them later.)

1 each bay leaf

1 stick unsalted butter

1 sprig fresh thyme

1 each Vidalia onion, diced

16 ounces crab meat

8 cups seafood stock (Boucher recommended the clam juice that you can buy bottled at your local food store.)

1/2 cup heavy cream

1 package fresh basil, stemmed and chopped

2 ounces butter

2 ounces sherry

Directions

1) Hull all of the corn off the cob and reserve;

2) Melt butter on low heat in a large soup pot. Add the diced onion and hulled corn kernels, cover and sweat on medium low heat for about 12 to 15 minutes. (In the demo, he talked of the importance of sweating to covert the starch of the corn into sugar.);

3) Add the seafood stock and blend well;

4) Tie all of the fresh basil stems together along with a bay leaf and fresh thyme and drop them into the pot along with the corn cobs;

5) Bring the soup to a slow simmer and once at a simmer cook it out for 20 to 30 minutes;

6) Remove the corn cobs and fresh herbs. Puree the soup with a stick blender to a pulpy consistency;

7) Add the crab meat, chopped basil and heavy cream. Bring the soup back to a simmer, adjust the seasoning with salt and white pepper;

8) Optional: Finish the soup with a little butter and splash of sherry if desired.

Easy Chili

By Paul Briand

My son David called the other evening from college, not about money or his courses, but about my easy chili recipe. I've used this recipe often and cooked it with him most recently when we were together for a few days toward the end of his junior semester in London. We made this chili in his dorm kitchen and shared it with the friends he'd made during his semester at King's College.

He was entertaining again and couldn't remember the specifics of the recipe. So here it is for David and you.

Ingredients

1 1/4 pounds hamburger

1 onion

1 green pepper

Several cloves garlic

16 ounce red kidney beans

Chili seasoning mix

24 ounce jar of salsa

Beer

Directions

1) Chop onions and green pepper;

2) Peel and mash (or rough chop) the garlic. Use more to satisfy your own particular garlic need, by the way;

3) In a large skillet at medium/high heat, sautee onions, peppers and garlic in heated olive oil;

4) As the vegetables just begin to soften (about three minutes) add hamburger;

5) Cook hamburger thoroughly and drain excess grease from pan;

6) Add chili seasoning mix and completely stir through the mixture;

7) Add kidney beans undrained and completely stir through;

8) Add salsa, stir through and reduce heat to low/medium;

9) Add a bottle of your favorite beer, a little at a time to control the foamy head;

10) Heat through, about 10 minutes, stirring as needed;

11) Serve with any number of toppings -- sour cream, shredded cheese and sliced jalapenos for example.

Now, there are about a billion chili recipes out there. Okay maybe not that many, but do a Google search of "chili recipes" and you'll get 690,000 results.

What I like about this recipe, besides the fact that it's quick and easy, is its versatility. The versatility comes with the salsa, because, once again, there are about a billion salsas out there. You can choose a mild, medium or hot salsa. You can use a thin salsa, a chunky salsa, or a southwestern style with some beans and corn in the salsa. And there is versatility in the beer you use. With some darker beers the hops and caramel will add a certain nuttiness to the chili, less so with lighter beers. And, of course, you can elect to cook without the beer and add up to 1 1/2 cups of water instead.

Fried Meatballs

(Editor's note: This week's contribution is courtesy of Dick Schuler, pictured here, originally of Oswego, N.Y., where his grandmother -- his Nana -- was famous in their neighborhood for her cooking, especially her homemade pasta drying throughout the house. Dick is now a resident of Minnesota and is the author of "An Italian Family Cookbook of Family Treasures." He describes his recipes as follows: "Each recipe has is own unique story and the best part is the book open with the family history of my grandparent’s journey from Italy to the U.S. in the early 1900's.")

By Dick Schuler
schuleritaliancooking.com

Nana’s three specialties were her sauce, homemade pasta and the ultimate family recipe, fried meatballs. The unique thing about Italian cooking is each family has a slightly different recipe. Our family sauce had several variations from household to household. Some of Nana’s siblings would use olive oil, some would use pork in place of beef. Nana did not add oil to her sauce so it was always seemed smoother and thicker. She would also change up the meat she would use in her sauce. She would use either ground beef, stew beef or meat balls.

Pasta was served twice a week in our house. I carry on that tradition of having pasta twice a week with my family. Nana would make her homemade pasta noodles the old fashion way. She used an old broom handle and the dinning room table as a work space. She would roll out large sheets of dough with the broom handle and with a knife cut the sheets into long strips. To dry them she would hang them over clothes bars, clothes line and the backs of chairs. The pasta would dry for a day before she would cut it into short lengths and send off paper bags of pasta to our relatives and friends. I can still smell the flour and egg mixture from the old house and hear her hands scrapping the dried dough and flour off the old broom handle between each stroke of the roller.

Our most popular and traditional food is our fried meatballs. For almost 100 years our family has been either frying or adding to the sauce these great flavorful treasures. It was my mother’s job to supply the meatballs at all the family gatherings.

The meatballs were the trademark food from our kitchen on old East Ninth Street in Oswego, N.Y. Everyone wanted to taste the meatballs whenever she made them and most of the neighborhood knew when she was frying them. The aroma of garlic would quickly spread out of the cast iron skillet and into the neighborhood. She was the master of the meatball recipe and my mother was second. My Uncle Joe would try to copy it but he could never get the same taste that came out of Nana’s skillet, I think he was light on the garlic. I was fortunate enough to help them mix and be part of the unique measuring process.

I can get the same results and duplicate the unique flavor to this day. See, the trick is when you add the garlic and you’re not measuring, you would add a little and taste the raw meat mixture until you hit the exact combination and flavor. People tell me I am crazy for eating raw hamburger but this is the only way to tell when you have added the correct amount. But to get this right you still need to know or have experienced the flavor before. Believe me there is no better smell or sound than the sizzling oil in the frying pan than that of meatballs cooking.

Ingredients
3 pounds ground beef
1/2 loaf of stale Italian bread
5-6 teaspoons of garlic power (be prepared to add more)
3 teaspoons fresh ground pepper
1 1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups ground Parmesan cheese
1-2 eggs (start with one, if mix is too dry add a second

Directions
1) Start by breaking up the ground beef in a large bowl;
2) Take the bread and wet with warm water to soften but not saturate, wring any excess water out. Break up the bread into the meat;
3) Add the egg and mix in slightly;
4) Add the garlic, pepper, salt, and cheese. Mix thoroughly using your hands;
5) Now the tough part – taste the mix if you dare to determine if you lack anything. If anything you will need more garlic powder (experience tells me). Shake some in lightly covering the top of the mix and re-mix again. Repeat the test if you like;
6) Use your hands to shape and roll into individual meatballs
7) In a wide and deep frying pan add oil about ¼ inches deep. Preheat on medium and add meatballs. As you add them flatten slightly so they are not a true ball shape, this will allow them to cook more even;
8) Cook for 2 minutes and flip;
9) Once both sides are browned you should be OK to remove and place on a platter or bowl. I usually line the bowl with 2-3 paper towels to absorb any excess grease. Let cool and enjoy.