Eating on Jitneys

I really didn’t want this to turn into a pastry school blog photo show-off…but honestly, that is all i have been doing lately. That and scrounging for food. So here are pictures of pastry school, and explainations of what it’s like to be someone that loves grocery shopping that hasn’t had time or means to go grocery shopping in three weeks.

First, the sad stuff. Literally, I haven’t been grocery shopping in three weeks. I accidentally went to Costco with FVD two Saturdays ago which was probably the biggest mistake of the New Year. Costco…sucks if you don’t have at least 4 people in your household. I bought some Diet Coke because yes, I like Diet Coke. I am no longer ashamed. I also bought Orange Juice. Everything else just seemed like a rip-off. Also, driving to Costco on a Saturday is definitely the worst possible idea that could ever happen.

On to other topics. Since I have been working and in school I have had about 1-3 hours of personal time a day. I usually like to spend those hours showering, checking email, having some red wine, and watching TV. That sounds lame but when you only have a very small amount of free time in your day and it is 1 degree outside, please try and tell me that that is not what you would do too. Come on. Because of this lack of time, you might wonder…Eating on Jitneys…what are you eating? Well, I ask myself that every night while I’m walking back from the train. I have realized that it’s all about stocking up and hiding food from yourself. If I hadn’t bought that sweet potato 3 weeks ago or hidden those toasted (whole!) almonds from myself this summer I would be starving tonight. Being busy leaves to to make small egg sandwiches (scrambled eggs inside toasted bread, spread with mustard and cream cheese and sprinkled with diced artichoke hearts) and have boiled sweet potatoes for dessert.

Speaking of dessert…here are some pastry school pictures. I tried not to include these, but I am so proud:

First off, I am the proud owner of eatingonjitneys.com. I took the $15 plunge last week and haven’t looked back once. Not once! You don’t need to update any bookmarks, though. Because of magic.

Now, down to business. While in Pittsburgh with FVD over New Years I went to a restaurant that was library themed. It was called…The Library. I wasn’t expecting too much but it was great! They did a good job with not overkilling the theme. The tables had book pages under a layer of envirotex. Their menus were made of old books, but they didn’t tear out the pages. The books were still there! We got a Golden Book Encyclopedia for the drink menu and felt lucky.

The menu also utilized the Dewey Decimal System. Holla!

Each meal is inspired by a book, such as Wings of Icarus, One Fish, Tofish, Where the Wild Things Are, Peter Pan Fried Provolone, and the Hunter S. Thompson.

Dark Green, Bright Red. A scallop dish that was really good, but not as good as the scallop dish that Ellen and I made. I’m just sayin’.  

Animal Farm (Turkey, Bacon, Cheese, Fried Egg. Pickle.)

Salmon Salad Sandwich (really tasty but actually not certain how this pertains to a book. Nevertheless, Salmon, Dill, Cucumbers, Almonds, Dates, Yogurt.)

They call their sweet potato fries “Edgar Allen Sweet Potatoes.” Aww. We were really excited about our food before, during, and after the meal. I would call that success.

Anyways, this Stone Soup business crossed with going to The Library crossed with some conversations with my brother crossed with reading a lot more lately have gotten me seriously thinking about the possibilities, rather than impossibilities, of Imaginary Food Menus. I don’t want to give too much away, but for now, think about it. Streganona style.

The longer I don’t write something the harder it is to start. So many holiday meals have passed since the last entry but obviously I was busy. It was the holiday season. Duh. So to start things off, I thought it most appropriate to document for you the most memorable, and possibly most tasty meal of all: Stone Soup.

Two of my brothers and my sister came over the weekend before Christmas for a dinner party. Many themes for this dinner party were discussed, from 19th century prisoners’ diets to imaginary foods. Eventually, and I’m not sure how but it happened, we settled on Stone Soup. Imaginary, meager, cheap, and fun.

We went to the store and picked out the meagerest ingredients possible. Don’t you kind of love when you go to the grocery store and you look into your basket to find that you are buying eggs, milk, bread, and butter? Now imagine looking down and finding this in your basket (cabbage, turnip, jimaca, a single large carrot, beet, and something simply labeled “root”):

I suppose I can ruin the secret of Stone Soup. Keep in mind that it can be whatever you want it to be (like so many great things). At first, I imagined Stone Soup to be water and stones, boiled for hours. But more and more roots vegetables were chopped and some onion was sauteed (along with the rocks and single shell) and from this, unbelieveably awesome tastes were created. I am not shitting you when I say that this was the tastiest soup of the year.

Ingredients

Stones
1 head cabbage
1 jimaca root
1 other various root
1 turnip
1 beet
1 very large carrot
1/2 onion
1 clove garlic for each stone
water
pinch of salt and pepper

First of all, you need to boil some water with some stones. They should boil together for…at least a couple of hours. The longer the better. I mean, you do need that amazing stone taste. I would assume?

While this is boiling, have a drink. Or a snack! It will take a while. Whenever you are ready, start chopping and slicing vegetables. If you want to get crazy, use cookie cutters on the roots. We did.

We decided to wanted a slightly stronger taste to the soup. I know, save the lectures….it’s Stone Soup. It should have little to no taste. We went through this. However, since this was our actual dinner, we decided to sautee some onion and garlic. It really is best if you take the stones out of the boiling water and sautee them with the onions. If you are really starving, add some garlic like we did.


That’s…pretty much it.
Here was the feast:

We also made Wassil and Cabbage Water (tastes how it sounds, yet surprisingly good):

Here we are enjoying the fruits of our labor:

After dinner, Lindsay provided Invisible Pie (it was so good) and she told the best story ever:

Next up:
tales of me and FVD’s trip to Detroit/Pittsburgh, and my first week of pastry school!

**Special Thanks to Gaper’s Block Drive Thru for mentioning this old blog today.

November 11, 2007 will forever have a special place in my heart. On November 12 I felt sadder than I have felt in at least a year, because November 11th was over. Last Sunday, Ellen and I completed the semi-impossible: a hitch-free elaborate dinner party for 12 people. Despite the fact that there was serious drama the day before (involving a hit-and-run) and a late start, literally nothing went wrong.

While I have had dinner parties before, they have been more centered around the party rather than the dinner. This one required…ok maybe not required but at least took a month of planning. The planning was so fun! Luckily we agree on just about everything (like having lavender and chocolate for dessert, ditching the idea of making terrines at the last minute, infusing vodka for some signature cocktails, etc) which made the process stress-free. We even got together and made some invitations using some polaroid transfers, paper, a printer, and a sewing machine. I know, right??

I have been hestitating to write about the dinner party because, well, it has become so special to me. So perfect. I’m not joking. I’m already looking up pretty matching cloth napkins on etsy that I might want to purchase for the next dinner party (with the theme of “Gourmet Mexican”).

This dinner party did not have a Mexican theme. This was a fancy French dinner. Here was the basic menu (picture me crying while I type this, because I might as well be):

to start
-French Cocktail with two kinds of personally infused vodkas (vanilla and raspberry)

-Amuse-bouche de mer: Scallop seared in butter, atop cucumber spread with beet horseradish
-Amuse-bouche de courgettes: Zucchini fritters with oil, lemon, and egg sauce
-Olives

upon seating

1. cream of cauliflower and brie soup
2. salad of green apples and arugala with parmesan-thyme crisp and toasted pumpkin seeds.

main course

1. a variety of miniature quiche
2. potato tower
3. brussel sprouts and bacon

cheese course


(only a taste of the 6 types of delicious cheeses, paired with Chicago Co-op honey and Conchord grapes)

dessert

1. lavender cookies

2. 2 kinds of truffles, dipped in cocoa and almond

coffee

We both agreed this was the most fun we had had in a long time. Unfortunately we couldn’t invite everyone we wanted, because this wasn’t a rager. It was a serious dinner party because we are serious about food.

I have been really self-conscious about my food photos lately.  Sometimes if I’m lucky I’ll get a good one, but more often than not my pictures make my food look gross/soupy/yellowish/bland. The same is true for this one, but tonight I am feeling brave. I don’t care that the melted cheese looks like uncooked egg whites, or that the shot is slightly out of focus. This frittata tasted so good I really don’t care. Plus, words about food without pictures of food are boring.  Here, don’t barf!

I highly recommend baking a frittata when you feel like having eggs for dinner. I made this in a little iron skillet because I didn’t want a ton of leftovers, so these instructions will make one, one and a half, or two servings, depending on how much you eat in one sitting.

My friend made an awesome frittata a while back that used potatoes as a base layer, so I copied. Thanks Ellen!

Mini Baked Frittata
1/4 cup red onion, sliced
3 cloves garlic
olive oil
1 small red (new) potato, thinly sliced
1/2 cup asparagus, cut into 1 inch pieces
1/4 cup mushrooms, sliced (I used crimini but that’s only because that’s what I already had)
1 tomato, diced (or you might want to use cherry tomatoes)
Mozzarella, or goat cheese, to taste (I used about 7 small balls of mozzarella)
1/4 cup plain yogurt
3 eggs
salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Sautee the garlic and onion in some olive oil for about 5 minutes in a small cast iron skillet. Leave about a quarter of the garlic/onion mixture at the bottom of the skillet, layer the bottom of the skillet with potato slices (cutting them further so that they will fit), and spread the other 3/4 of the garlic/onion mixture on top of the potatoes.

Layer the asparagus, mushrooms, and tomato on top of the potatoes. I was going to use red peppers but ran out of room in the skillet. I think they would add a nice sweetness that I hoped for from the tomatoes (but the tomatoes were from the local corner store and were pretty bad). If you are using fresh mozzarella, cut it into small pieces and scatter it over the top.

In a small bowl, mix the eggs well. Add the yogurt and mix some more. If you are using goat cheese, you could add that into the egg mixture. And maybe some chopped spinach?? Add salt and pepper to taste and pour the mixture over the top of the vegetables and potatoes.

Now cook. About 35 minutes.

When this delicious treat comes out of the oven it should be slightly browned on the top, but not burnt. Obviously. Let it cool for about 5-10 minutes in the skillet. This will let the cheese set and make it much easier to cut.

I had my first dinner party at the new place on Saturday and was able to test out a few new recipes and devices. This made me a little nervous, since I knew that at least 12 people were coming, but then I realized that I am the only person that probably cared, especially since the estimated eating time was about 11pm and I think most people were considering this a party, rather than a dinner party. So then I just had fun with it. I kind of got in over my head, but it was worth it when I realized that it had all been eaten by about 3am. The menu consisted of things I like, not really things that go well together. But do I really need to explain myself? I made samosas, spinach and pine nut ravioli (with olive, butter, pine nut and roasted red pepper topping), and pistacchio ice cream. The ice cream was the best by far, but I didn’t get any pictures of it. I did some research on the Cooks Illustrated website and finally settled on a Kreps ice cream maker. It is basically the most exciting purchase I have made in months, and it was very affordable on Amazon.

Ellen brought over some Mushroom Loaf which I didn’t get a good picture of either. I kind of documented us plating our food while everyone else was drinking/not caring behind us. Priceless. Here is one picture of a plate. It actually looks kind of gross, now that I look at it, but both were delicious. I used won ton wrappers this time around, rather than making my own pasta. I was super skeptical at first because I don’t normally like cutting corners like that, but they saved so much time and tasted nice and light. Until I get a pasta maker I will probably keep using won ton wrappers.

Take a look. It tasted way better than it looks: