A few little “Piccolini” dishes to bring to my BIG Italian family dinner....

       I get a phone call from my mother earlier this week that my Aunt is coming to town and we are going to have a BIG Italian dinner at a family friend’s place... naturally I’m excited. That means LOTS of Red Wine and LARGE portions of incredible Italian food. Since many members of my family and friends have been supporting my blogging adventure, I naturally must whip up a few things to bring to the dinner. I flip to Chef Burrell’s “Piccolini” section and decide on the first two pages- Mortadella Pate and the Zucchini and Parm Fritters with Spicy Tomato Sauce.

      

       To be completely honest, I had no idea what Mortadella was and called a few local stores to make sure they had it. Funny thing is that some of the delis had no idea what it was either. For those of you who had no clue... I’d like to call it a high end bologna with pistachios in it. The fritters seemed relatively simple to make, but how afraid of frying something was I! So off to the store to get my Mortadella ingredients with extra pistachios and the scary yet delicious Peanut Oil for frying purposes!     

       Since I was sweating from nervousness due to the frying task I was   about to undertake, I slammed a glass of Cabernet (The Cab also gave me a $.10 fuel perks for purchasing it... there’s always great benefits for drinking wine!). I needed to get in the zone, so I started with the Pate. Melted some butter into a sauce pan and whisked in the flour and chicken stock. Next, you puree the large chunks of Mortadella (you have 2 oz diced up Mortadella on the side for later) and the butter mixture. Once smooth and consistent, Chef Burrell has you move to a mixing bowl where you add the diced mortadella and slowly add in the whipped cream until the mixture is well combined. You move it into a serving dish and sprinkle with chopped pistachios. I also toasted some sliced 5 Grain Italian bread to spread the Pate on. This was a very simple appetizer to make and our group really enjoyed it, plus who doesn’t LOVE pistachios??

        

            Now onto the fritters... two different things going on here- 1. The Sauce and 2. The Fritters. For the sauce, Chef Anne’s instructions have you coat a sauce pan with EVOO, 1 chopped onion, crushed red peppers and salt. You cook the onion until “soft and aromatic” and then you add 1 28oz can of San Marzano tomatoes and bring to boil and reduce to simmer and let it cook for about 20 minutes.... just enough time to get it thick and ready for dipping the fritters into! Now onto the fritters, EVOO into a pan and cook 2 chopped onions until what’s those words again?? “Sort and Aromatic” and then add a zucchini chopped. Meanwhile in a bowl you are mixing flour, Parmigiano, and baking powder then adding the zucchini/onion mixture once it cools. Peanut Oil is filled in your large sauce pan over medium-high heat. I clump 1 inch balls of the mixture and dropped them into the pot. No oil gets on me, no horrid noise, no one dies.... it’s not that scary. I did stick my finger into the oil at one point.... I was trying to prevent two fritters from sticking together and the thought that this was high heat hot as heck oil never snapped into my mind.... amateur hour! These fritters were topped with a little fresh Parmigiano cheese and ready to be dunked in the delicious sauce with my family.

            

      Another couple recipes down and at the same time enjoying them with family, friends, and red wine.... all in the name of cooking like a Rock Star!

Killer Mac & Cheese with Bacon... and I mean KILLER!

         When flipping to the page where this recipe lies, there’s a picture that instantly makes your mouth water. You see this little bowl with cheesy macaroni and cheese and bits of perfectly cooked bacon mixed in. You almost feel like you HAVE TO HAVE IT! Not to mention you have probably made macaroni and cheese before. How hard could this be? You just cook some noodles and throw in that cheese packet, right? How misguided I was before this homemade macaroni and cheese. I believe I took a vow that night I made this to NEVER EVER EVER EVER have macaroni and cheese out of a box again.

          As I have said before, my love for cheese is a bit ridiculous. Where most people go for an afternoon snack of crackers, chips, nuts, or fruit, I can easily take down a block of cheese. So, when this recipe called for three different cheeses, I was ecstatic. Chef Burrell lays out the ingredients and instructions so simply again. EVOO, bacon, onion, salt, unsalted butter (didn’t even realize there was a salted nor an unsalted version), flour, milk, 1 pound of short pasta or shells, 2 cups grated cheddar cheese, 2 cups grated Fontina cheese, and 1 cup Parmigiano. Then these two interesting ingredients ¼ cup Dijon mustard and Tabasco... excited to see where these two end up? Because I was! Also to note, I made this on two different occasions so far and both times I couldn’t find Fontina cheese so I replaced with Gouda one time and then Edam cheese the second.... two fantastic cheeses and excellent replacements if you ask me!

         The first time I made these, I used some pasta I received for a Christmas present from the fabulous Marty and Lee (note: Marty is who got me this cook book to inspire me to do this blog... so Marty gets major snaps!). The pasta they gave me is short pasta, but they are in the shape of dog paws and bones... so a cute little touch to this Killer dish!

         I added little Chardonnay to the cooking mix tonight... you start with EVOOing (is that even a word? You get it!) a saucepan and adding your bacon and cook. Then, remove and pat with towels. Leave the bacon fat in the pan. (I think this must be a Chef Burrell secret because I bet this adds a ton of flavouring to the dish) Next, you add butter and onion in that same pan and cook onion until “soft and aromatic”. It’s so nice when Chef Burrell uses those key words because you totally know what she is talking about. Next you add flour and whisk in the milk, and salt. Bring to boil and let simmer until mixture gets thick. Meanwhile cooking your pasta on the side is important. Chef Anne suggests cooking the pasta for 1 minute under what directions say in order to get an al dente pasta.

         Meanwhile in your pan, add your 3 heavenly cheese and whisk. And now for the two special ingredients, you add the mustard and a “few shakes of Tabasco.” Then you stir in the cooked bacon and pasta and serve immediately! Not only did I make this for some close friends, I brought in leftovers both times for my colleagues to enjoy and all of them were pretty head over heels for this Mac & Cheese! Filling bellies and bringing smiles one Chef Burrell dish at a time.... all in the name of cooking like a Rock Star. 

I’d like to call this blog... I finally found my kitchen fire alarm.

Our fire alarm went off about a million times tonight... and on the 87^th time we finally figured out where that god awful piercing noise was coming from. Before then, yes we had no clue where it was and I was jumping around kitchen spinning my towel like the World Cup fans do. We had moved in July 2011, I mean it’s been like 7 months or so people.  But to not make us look like complete morons... it was hiding underneath the cup cabinet... strange place for it, but whatever we found it!

My man is in town tonight for this dining festivity, so to impress him I must. All the meat dishes in Chef Anne’s cookbook look so delicious, I needed to choose one that could be special for him. As I flipped to “Olive crusted lamb,” I instantly knew we just had to have these tonight. And of course a side... Chef Burrell’s Loosey Goosey Garlic Mashed Potatoes it is!

We head to the store to get the essentials.... love when our local store has wine tastings! Had a few samples and of course it put me in a great mood to get cooking! We headed to the meat section and there they were... precious little rack of lambs. As I gasped at the price (rack of lamb are quite expensive), I just thought to myself “you can’t screw this one up Christa or that’s like $45 down the drain.” On the other hand, Chef Burrell’s recipes so far have been very user friendly and I have yet to screw up on any. So back home we go with lamb, kalamata olives, fresh oregano, lemons, potatoes, milk, garlic, etc.

I started with the potatoes since those usually take forever. I am not going to say I exactly followed her recipe on these. I boiled the potatoes to get them soft and instead of running them through a rice mill, I pounded them with my masher. But used all her ingredients and steps and these garlic mashers were divine!

(The alarm was going off in between the steam from me mashing the potatoes and the browning of the lamb chops, probably more of the fact that I need to clean my oven and there's stuff that was burning in there surely didn't help!!)

Now, onto the lamb... Again we are browning this meat, which is just a delicious idea. So, you brown them on each side in EVOO on the stove top like 4 minutes or so each side. While the lamb relaxes waiting for the oven to heat up, you make your olive concoction that will be brushed onto the browned lamb. I give major snaps to Chef Burrell for this... it was so delicious and something I would have never thought of doing with lamb. You use a cup of Kalamata olives (my personal olive favorite), lemon zest, fresh oregano, and slowly pour in EVOO while pureeing. Then you take this paste and brush it heavily onto your lamb. Then pop these into the oven for 7 minutes. And Boom! What a perfect dish to share with a perfect man. And of course the red wine went down great while cooking this and eating it too! Two great recipes that made a great dinner for me and a very important person.... all in the name of cooking like a rock star! 

Anne Burrell’s Main Event “Seconds” :

Big Brown Braised Short Ribs with Horseradish

               

               Hate to admit it, when I saw the time 3 ½ hours I was a little overwhelmed and nervous. I mean I work until 5pm, I have not prepped yet, and we are looking at a 9pm or later finishing time. Eeek! But what the heck? They look so delicious and I need another recipe under the belt, plus this was my first meat course and my first major entree of Chef Burrell’s. The great thing about making these short ribs is that once you get it prepared and into the oven... you’re time is done. So, you can relax, pop open your bottle of wine, and turn the T.V. on the “The Bachelor” like I did. It was perfect since I had a friend come over and she made it at about 7pm. So the ribs had a little bit of time to go, but I wasn’t fussing in the kitchen and could actually focus on her... which of course was full of gossip and laughter!

                I was a little concerned about making these... I felt like “Man, 3 ½ hours if I don’t do it right these are going to be bad and there’s no other alternative but to warm up some crappy canned soup for dinner!” But again Chef Anne makes the ingredients easy to use. First you brown your short ribs bone in (I did make these with the bone out as well because my local store was having a sale on them and I couldn’t remember bone in or out when I was there- they were just as fantastic either way) over EVOO on high heat. Browning any meat seems to be essential to getting that delicious taste and it always makes my mouth water.

While browning, Chef Anne has you puree your onions, carrots, celery ribs, mushrooms, and garlic; this was a fun step as carrots were shooting out of the top of my blender as I forgot to put the top on (rookie mistake? Or maybe it was my nerves from trying to get this in the oven in due time!).  

                After browning  and removing the short ribs, you add fresh EVOO and add the puree of deliciousness into the pan on the stove top and let this baby cook. Once it becomes a bit brown, you add tomato paste and horseradish and let it cook for a couple minutes. I am usually not a huge horseradish fan, especially on red meat, but dang this was so good!

Next you dump in some red wine(great part about cooking with wine... you are still going to be “drinking” it whether it is in your wine glass or on your food!) You return the ribs to the pan add a bit of water, thyme, and bay leaves,  cover it with aluminium foil (especially the handle, it will melt. Thank you Brandy for that tip!) and you cook this baby for 2 ½ hours checking every 45 minutes.

Oh this meat just fell right off the bone... one of the best meats I’ve ever had in my life and I was able to enjoy it with a good friend and actually spend time with her while this beauty cooked.... another recipe down in the name of cooking like a rock star!