Ratatouille Revisited

About nine years ago, I posted about my first time making ratatouille, based Emeril's recipe. I've more or less winged it since then, after quickly checking that initial recipe for reference, achieving decent results several times and screwing up once or twice. (I remember one version being "death by thyme." But I was getting ready to move and I didn't want to have to pack fresh thyme, so ... anyway.)

Yesterday, I made a yummy version of ratatouille that was loaded with ingredients that aren't listed in the recipe. So, maybe it's not really ratatouille. Since it was just for me, I figured no one would judge me if I just put in what I wanted, and that was a lot of stuff. But now I'm telling the internet about it, so I guess I'll be judged after all. Whatever.

I went shopping for the ingredients on Wednesday and started prepping when I got home from work on Thursday. I was unsurprised (having done this before) that the prep took about an hour. I snacked a bit between tasks and while the dish was cooking, since dinner was coming up later than usual for me. And of course, I knew that I'd end up with enough food to feed six, or myself from Thursday through Tuesday, so it wasn't as if saving my appetite was crucial. Nevertheless, when I dug in, I found it pretty darn good.

Of course I got all (well, most) of the orthodox ingredients: a small eggplant, a yellow squash, a zucchini, four Roma tomatoes, a medium yellow onion, bell peppers (one each red, yellow and orange), a couple bulbs of garlic, and a bunch of ... oops. Here's where my brain farted, and I brought home a bunch of fresh rosemary instead of thyme. It's hard to reckon how I made that mistake. But I intentionally omitted the parsley and basil because I felt that the one herb would be plenty.

And then, I went a little mad and bought several things that aren't in ratatouille as it has been transmitted down to me. I figured where you have onions in French cookery, you may as well also have carrots and celery. And on a lark, I also bought some mushrooms that I imagined would be close to eggplant in consistency. That made for a good deal more prep work, though, and by the time I got around to them, I was too sick of chopping to give them due care and ended up cutting them up into bigger chunks than I really should have. And of course, I seasoned everything with salt.

While I'm dwelling on should-have beens, I also wish I had redesigned my mise en place. Going by memory of the Emeril recipe, I divided the chopped ingredients into four bowls, based on what stage of cooking I meant to throw them into the pan. If I recall correctly, Bowl 1 was the eggplant (peeled and chopped into roughly 2/3-inch cubes) and a couple of carrots (not peeled but cut in half lengthwise and then chopped into pieces of similar size). I now think I should have either julienned and more finely chopped the carrots or started them first, by themselves in a pan drizzled with hot olive oil. As it was, I couldn't give them the time they needed to soften without risking the eggplant dissolving into nothing.

Bowl 2, going in a few minutes later, was the onion and garlic. After the onion started to soften and the garlic released its aroma, I threw in Bowl 3, containing the pepper (I ended up chopping only the orange bell, pith and seeds removed), celery (three stalks, sliced in half lengthwise and then chopped to a similar size as the carrots), both kinds of squash (peel on, quartered lengthwise and cut into roughly similar cuboids), and the shrooms (sliced but not too thin). The lid went on the pan, except for the occasional stir.

When I started to worry about it being done before I had added Bowl 4, in went the tomatoes and the rosemary. I'd actually tried, for the first time, the "dip in boiling water for 10 seconds, then de-stem and peel" method before quartering the tomatoes and chopping them into about 1/3-inch dices. Of course, I de-stemmed the rosemary, about 3 branches worth, which I'm sure is quite conservative considering how much food I was adding it to, but I was mindful of "death by thyme" and chose the long way around to avoid repeating that type of mistake. In a more perfect univserse, I would have given more effort to the rosemary, but I was at the end of my resources by that time so I gave up after just a few feeble chops; I would only regret that a litte, later.

Stir. Lid on. A couple more stirs. At the last moment I remembered to grind some black pepper over the pan and to cut off a quarter of a large lemon and squeeze its juice in there. (I actually plated a serving of it before I remembered the lemon, so I had to shake a few drops of the juice onto that, too. I can scientifically say that a little lemon juice really is essential.)

And then I ate. Despite being meatless and untouched by such animal products as butter, cream, cheese, broth or stock, it turned out to be a thick, chunky, savory stew with just the right amount of herb flavor (not death, but life by rosemary); exactly enough salt (if not, in a few bites, just a shade too much – and all that was from the prep stage); a good chew on the mushrooms, yellow squash and zucchini; and some tender, bursting-with-flavor morsels of orange bell pepper and celery. Also, the dish was a feast for the eyes, full of bright colors; and speaking of brightness, that squeeze of lemon brought a welcome shine to the top end of the dish, like a soprano note that lightens an otherwise muddy chord.

Regrets, I had a few – but they weren't big ones. The eggplant pieces were softer than I wished, but they hadn't completely mushed out, so I guess that was half a win. Like I said, next time they'll go into the bowl with the squash, and let the carrots hang out by themselves in Bowl 1. The onions and garlic lent flavor, but they pretty much disappeared in the texture – which I guess is fine where garlic is concerned (and may I also mention, I have yet to perfect my garlic peeling technique; that leg of my prep marathon was the slowest and most miserable). But I kind of missed sinking my teeth into the onion pieces; so, maybe Bowl 2 and Bowl 3 should go in at the same time, another day. I definitely need a separate bowl, however, since most of my mise en place bowls are plastic and I didn't fancy washing garlic and onion funk out of a plastic bowl; ceramic for that one.

My final quibble: as I mentioned before, I should have remembered thyme, rather than rosemary; perhaps that would have lent more success to my herb-chopping efforts, such as they were. As it is, the last few bites of my dinner came with big chunks of rosemary that stayed in my mouth no matter how much I chewed, and I had to spit into the kitchen trash multiple times to get them out. Another alternative might be just to throw whole branches of the herb (or herbs) into the stew and fish them out when cooking was over and their purpose was served. A next time there will be, however; just not very soon, because I still have two multi-serving containers of leftovers from this batch cooling in the fridge.

Last word: Prep may have been a pain, but cleanup really wasn't that bad. I used three nesting bowls for the mise en place, plus a ceramic soup mug for the onions and garlic; one wooden cutting board for everything, which fit nicely over one side of the sink so I didn't have to clear counter space for it; a big, heavy, hardened-nonstick pan and its lid for the stewing; a medium-small saucepan for the 10-second boil on those tomatoes, along with a wire scoop to fish them out of the water; one big chopping knife for almost everything; and a paring knife for just a couple things (like de-stemming the tomatoes and peeling the eggplant). Somehow, a wire-mesh strainer got dirtied, though I can't now remember what I needed it for. And a dinner plate.

The star of my armaments was an old, hard-plastic spoon with a metal handle and a hard-plastic grip, which I rescued from my old office when it was being packed up and moved to a new location that doesn't have a kitchen; the kind of thing you can't seem to get anymore, but that ran circles around the bendy plastic stirring spoons, spatulas, etc. that fill most of my kitchen counter tool jug. I used it throughout the preparation of this dish, from stirring the stew to plating to scooping the leftovers into to-go (into the fridge) containers. This is the kitchen tool I've wanted for years and it finally takes a rushed, office-moving, disposing-of-used-kitchen-junk party to bring it to hand. It's an ill wind that blows no good.

Stuffaletta, or Anti-Hero Sandwich

I've never been to New Orleans, but I've lived more of my life in St. Louis than any other single city and it's the next best thing in many ways, including Mardi Gras and the Muffuletta sandwich. Since I moved away, however, the closest I've come to the good old muff is the Italian hero sandwich that was briefly featured at the local Subway restaurant. Today, I decided to improvise with what I had in my fridge and see how close I could come to it, without necessarily having all the required ingredients. So I submit to you the Stuffaletta, a.k.a. Anti-Hero Sandwich.

You're supposed to start with the particular kind of bread for which the sandwich is named, something vaguely like a ciabatta roll. I used two slices of cottage bread, with mayonnaise on one slice and my own, improvised olive salad on the other. For the salad, which I wouldn't exactly call a tapenade but maybe more of a crapenade, I chopped up four jumbo garlic-stuffed green olives along with the garlic cloves they came with, and a small can of sliced black olives, and stirred them together with a flatulent squirt of spicy brown mustard out of a store-brand squeeze bottle. Half of this mixture went on the bread; the rest I saved in a tiny, covered jar in the fridge, so I can do this again tomorrow.

Lacking the traditional Italian meats, I used some deli-sliced smoked ham, a couple slices of Oscar Mayer bologna, and a couple sandwich-sized slices of pepperoni. I also didn't have any cheese on hand except American slices, so I slapped on a couple of those. I didn't feel up to grilling it. Seriously, I'm in a rush here. I have to go back to work in a few minutes. So, I ate it cold. It was good. It was interesting. It had a certain ring of familiarity to it that did remind me of the good old days in St. Louis. It went down, stayed down, and filled the spot I needed filled. So, crapenade-stuffaletta though it may be, and antiheroic as hell, I'm pleased with the result.

Leftover Cookery

I'm not a big fan of keeping leftovers. I'm more of a "heat up what I need right now" kind of guy, and when it comes to those last couple slices of baked-from-frozen pizza, I'm a bit of a "throw away whatever is left when I'm full" guy, too. (Not a fan of leftover pizza.) Considering how little I do in the kitchen these days that's really creative or, apart from heating up frozen stuff, counts as cooking in the strictest sense, it's actually surprising how much use I've made of leftovers during the last week, thanks perhaps to being cooped up in my apartment all alone by COVID-19.

I should note that when I do really cook something – anything that may involve browning meat, boiling water, chopping vegetables and/or pressing ingredients into a baking dish – I do put up leftovers to eat during the next day or two. And this week, I've economized cooking time and ingredients to the extent of using some of the same leftovers two different ways, and combined the "heat up something frozen" approach with actual cookery.

To trace the chain of leftover use, let's start with the jar of spaghetti sauce that I opened one night when I was heating up a couple of frozen, breaded chicken patties. I spread the sauce on a couple pieces of toast, topped them with the oven-hot chicken patties and then added a slice of swiss cheese (sorry, I was out of mozzarella) to each open-face chicken parm sandwich. I zapped them in the microwave for 15 seconds just to put a little melt on the cheese, and I was very happy with the result. I have to admit, those frozen chicken patties tend to taste a bit nasty unless you dress them up. This bit of microwave-aided improv covered that up well.

So, the remaining seven-eighths of the jar of marinara went into the fridge. It was joined the next night by half of a jar of Indian curry simmering sauce that I had picked up on clearance some time ago, and about which I was starting to worry as to how long I should keep it. What did I use the first half of the jar on? Well, let's see. I opened a can of chunk chicken and a bag of frozen "seasoning blend" (diced, frozen onions, green and red peppers, celery and parsley) and browned up half of each in a small frying pan. Then I added the half-jar of simmering sauce, covered the pan with a saucepan lid, and left it simmering on low heat while at the same time preparing a package of Mahatma-brand saffron rice – to which, I'm sure, the word "saffron" applies about the same way as the word "smurfberry" in Smurfberry Crunch cereal. When the rice was done, I stirred in the curry/chicken/vegetable mixture and, by golly, ate it. I may, in fact, have divided it into two servings and saved one for the next day's lunch.

So by now, I had most of a jar of marinara, half a jar of curry sauce and half a can of chunk chicken (covered with cling wrap) in the fridge, and half a bag of seasoning blend (mirepoix?) sealed in a ziplock bag in the freezer, leftover-wise. The next day, I went grocery shopping and decided to get a package of Barilla-brand ready-to-bake lasagna noodles and the ingredients I would need to follow the recipe on the back of the box. These included a pound of ground beef, a 15-ounce tub of ricotta cheese and a 4-cup resealable bag of shredded mozzarella.

Back at home, I sauted the remaining seasoning blend in a larger frying pan, then crumbled in the whole pound of hamburger. But now I realized that I would have to halve the recipe, because I don't have a 9x13-inch baking dish; the nearest size that I do have is a scaled-down oblong, maybe 7x11. So, in a separate bowl, I blended half the tub of ricotta with a small amount of mozzarella and a bit of the grated parmesan that I already had on hand. I pulled out the mostly full jar of marinara that was already open in the fridge, nonstick-sprayed the pan, and layered in the sauce, noodles, ricotta mixture, mozzarella, and meat mixture as directed by the recipe on the box – only, instead of each layer having three full sheets of stiff lasagna, they only had two with the ends broken off and the extra fragments arranged along one end of the pan.

I also had to adjust the cooking time, but the dish turned out great. However, I had enough for three meals on my hands, so two-thirds of it went back into the fridge and got eaten the next day at lunch and dinner. Meanwhile, I still had about a third of the meat mixture left over (which went into the fridge in a spare glass jar). I also put back half of the ricotta and a little less than half of the mozzarella, which I still haven't found a use for, and perhaps half of the lasagna noodles. Maybe I'll just have to get some more meat and do another tray of lasagna; I already have another jar of pasta sauce.

Yesterday, I worked out how to use up some of the leftovers still abiding in my fridge. For breakfast, I had an omelette that used up about half of the leftover mixture of browned meat and seasoning blend, plus some cheese (not the mozz, though). For dinner, I heated up a plastic pouch of jasmine rice (90 seconds in the microwave), a steamer bag of frozen peas (5 minutes in the microwave), and meanwhile combined the leftover meat mixture, chunk chicken and curry sauce in the small frying pan and simmered them under a saucepan lid. When the peas came out of the microwave, I combined all the other ingredients in two bowls and, to save myself from more leftovers, ate both bowlfuls then and there.

Imagine if I'd had to put away one of those bowls for later: half of the components had already been saved as leftovers once, and the mirepoix had gone round twice (once while still frozen and once after being cooked).

Macatouille?

I tried to make a ratatouille for a church potluck this past Sunday. Not the movie "Ratatouille" version with alternating thin slices of eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash, and Roma tomato fanned out in a spiral formation in a baking dish and broiled in a piperade, but the Emeril version with the ingredients cooked al dente in a pot on the stove. Also in the recipe are sweet peppers, onions, garlic, rosemary, thyme, basil, salt and pepper, a dab of olive oil to start, and a goodly squirt of lemon juice to finish. It's one of those recipes that makes you feel like you're really cooking, because of the amount of time you spend slicing things before anything goes into the pot, and because there's a precise order of battle as to what goes into the pot and when.

I've been making it long enough to do it without looking at a recipe, and it turned out rather well, except that I got a little overenthusiastic with the fresh thyme and rosemary. That, and the fact that some people apparently expected there to be some kind of meat in the dish, perhaps explains why only a couple people at the potluck tried it. I ended up with a potluck-sized potful of leftover ratatouille, which I am still eating at home.

Last night, to shake things up, I decided to combine one of the few dishes I make from all-fresh ingredients with an old bachelor-chow standby, boxed shells-and-cheese macaroni - the kind with the packet of ready-mixed cheese sauce that you can heat up in the same boiling water as the noodles. I've combined a lot of different things with boxed shell or elbow mac and cheese; things everybody has tried, like tuna, peas, and cream-of-mushroom soup, or canned chili without beans; things most people would know better than to stir in, like leftover spaghetti sauce and meatballs; and things few people have even thought of adding, like Italian clam sauce or a spicy Indian entree. Most of these mixers are pretty much on the order of adding junk to more junk. But it turns out that adding homemade, leftover ratatouille to the shells-and-cheese both elevated the mac and broke the monotony of a week of eating a stew of perfectly cooked but over-seasoned summer vegetables.

While I'm confiding my culinary transgressions, here's another bachelor chow tip I just discovered this week: You can make instant oatmeal with the Keurig machine in your office's break room. First, empty two serving-size packets into a soup mug (because, face it, one is never enough); put the mug under the nozzle of the K-cup machine. Then, whatever your Keurig model requires to get it to run 4 ounces of hot water into the mug, do that twice (once for each packet of oatmeal). Stir and let stand for a couple minutes. It's actually faster, less messy, and tastier than the microwave way that you, I, and the wall have been practicing lo, these many years.

Based on this picture, I am apparently not the first person to realize this. But if you're behind me on the Keurig learning curve, you're welcome.

Bacon-of-the-Sea Melts

Today I made something for dinner entirely using ingredients and utensils that I had acquired for other purposes.

The skillet, sized to allow one to cook up a batch of Hamburger Helper, I mostly bought so I could fry eggs or make pancakes. I intended the spatula mostly for turning eggs or hamburgers. The bowl usually serves the purposes of eating breakfast cereal. Even the fork, usually employed as an eating utensil, did unusual service as a masher and puller-apart of a tinful of smoked herring fillets, like the one pictured here.

As for the ingredients, there were, of course, the kippers, which I meant to serve on crackers as a late-night snack. There was also a tin of tuna, purchased either to make tuna salad sandwiches or to add a bit of protein to a saucepan of macaroni and cheese. I sacrificed two eggs that had been bought with the promise of a morning omelette or a fried egg sandwich; some bread crumbs and powdered tomato bouillon, both bought with the intention of making a crust for fried chicken or pork chops; and the bread, mayo, and sliced kosher dill pickle that had come home from the store as companions to a package of bologna. Even the puddle of vegetable oil I started preheating in the skillet, before doing anything else, was acquired with other things in mind - such as that fried chicken again.

All right, so I started preheating the skillet with some vegetable oil on it. Meanwhile, I spread the mayo on the bread, and arranged a couple pickle slices and half a slice of sharp cheddar on one side of each sandwich-to-be.

Next, I mixed some of the bread crumbs and a little of the tomato bouillon in the bowl, beat in two eggs, and added the canful of tuna, drained. (The cat enjoyed the tuna water in a saucer on the floor.) I started to think two eggs might have been one too many, because the tuna mixture was very thin; so I opened and drained the herring filets, then mangled them with the fork while stirring them into the mixture. I added a bit more of the bread crumbs to get closer to the consistency I wanted - basically, an oily, sticky mush.

I formed the mush into six balls, flattened them into disks a little smaller than my palm, and dropped them onto the hot, oily skillet. As they started to sizzle, it occurred to me that smoked herring should be called the bacon of the sea. It smelled that good.

I turned the patties after a while. When they were nicely brown on both sides, I took them off the heat. I wrapped up three patties for later and made sandwiches out of the other three. I recognized it would have been a good idea to melt the cheese right on the patties while they cooked, but it all ended up in the same place regardless.

At a certain point the thought crossed my mind, while I was scarfing down the second of my three sandwiches, "I'm not sure I'm going to have room for the third sandwich." Then I looked down at my plate and realized it was bare. I was already finishing my third sandwich. So I can verify that not only were they filling, but they were so absorbingly delicious that I lost a bit of time somewhere between the second and third sandwich.

So, there you have it. Bacon of the sea. Sandwiches. With cheese.

Yum!

Doesn't this look gorgeous? It's my stepmom's recipe for Italian salad. We whipped it up this morning so I could take it to the office Christmas party this afternoon. It's got cauliflower, broccoli, red onion, grape tomatoes, whole black olives, mushrooms and Italian dressing in it. Simple, but yummy!

Food Stamp Gourmet

You're on a ridiculously tight food budget. Say, you've been on food stamps for half a year because your income dropped to below the amount you pay in rent (just hypothetically). And say your food stamp benefits have been cut by about 10% because the state found out about the $125 stipend you collect four times a year (which doesn't quite cover the overdraft in your checking account after paying the rent). How do you make mealtimes interesting?

Well, not to make a meal of it (ha, ha), you combine cheapo store-brand boxed dinners with crappy generic processed-meat products in creative ways.

The other day, I decided to try cutting up a couple of jumbo Polish sausage links (which I have been dying to get rid of) into a pan of macaroni and cheese (the type with the sauce already mixed in a foil-and-plastic pouch). Results: dismal. Halfway through my dinner, I realized that I didn't like the taste of Polish sausage enough to justify letting it dominate the so-called cheddar flavor of the sauce. Desperate for something to off-set the Polish-sausageness of the dish, I ended up stirring in several spoonfuls of sauerkraut (a jar of which turns out to be a necessary fixture in my refrigerator). Though this improved things a bit, I don't think the experiment was a success.

Today I was discouraged to find lots of Polish sausage still in my fridge. A zip-lock baggy full of the links, even. Why do there seem to be more of them in there every time I look? Is this some kind of perverse recap of the miracle of Zarephath?

Chastened by my recent mac-and-kielbasa debacle, I decided to try cutting up a couple of the links into a pan of instant cornbread stuffing. And surprise! This time it worked! Who would have thought that a preparation mostly of stale bread soaked in water would out-flavor a meat byproduct that had already proven too pungent for mac-and-cheese? I suppose one must never underestimate the power of sage and related spices, combined to excess as they generally are in box dinners of this sort. The flavors balanced perfectly... or as close to that as prevailing conditions allowed.

Bachelor Chow Fish Sandwich

When I see a customer buying an interesting product at the supermarket, I often make a point of asking her what she plans to do with it. That's how I got the idea for this recipe, which I tried today for lunch. The product I spotted and asked about, in this case, was canned mackerel.

STEP ONE: THE MUD
Scoop about 1/4 cup of seasoned bread crumbs or crushed crackers into a bowl. Beat in two fresh eggs, and let the resulting beige gunk sit for a few minutes, stirring as needed to keep it mixed.

STEP TWO: THE STRAW
Drain the brine off from a 15-oz. can of mackerel in brine. Using a fork to pull the fish apart, stir it into the egg mixture. (Option: Add a bit of shredded carrot, onion, celery, or whatever.)

STEP THREE: THE KILN
Heat a spoonful of olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat, to cook one patty at a time; or heat a couple spoonfuls on a large electric skillet, to cook them all at once.

STEP FOUR: THE BRICK
Form the mackerel mixture into four balls (+/-), then squash them down into a flat patty shape, being careful not to spread them so thin that they break apart. Fry each patty in the oil until well browned on both sides.

STEP FIVE: THE WALL
In the meantime, toast enough slices of bread to make the desired number of sandwiches. Spread them with your choice of salad dressing, ketchup, pickle, coleslaw, or tartar sauce. As patties are done cooking, build your sandwiches and enjoy!

This variant of the salmon patty, which I remember my stepmom making for many a family dinner when I was a teen, tastes similar and by no means inferior to the original salmon version. And I'm pretty sure it's cheaper, too. Plus, it is so easy, the children of Israel could have made it when they were in bondage to Egypt. Providing, of course, someone had invented the can opener by then.

IMAGE: Somebody else's mackerel patties. I don't take pictures of my food. I'm too busy eating it!

Shepherd on a Shingle?

You get home late from a gruelling shift keeping watch over your flock by night. You're too tired to peel potatoes, shell peas, brown meat, or even whip up a light roux. Being a working-class bachelor, your other options don't include kicking back while a domestic slave caters to your ravenous hunger. So what do you do? Maybe you make what I made this evening, which might be described as an all-processed-food mash-up of shepherd's pie and S.O.S.—provided that, immediately after the collision, the paramedics took the shingle away, and the vehicle has been shattered beyond all semblance to a pie.

Step 1: Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Rip open a 2-pound bag of frozen tater tots. The store brand costs $2.00 these days. There's no need to go any fancier than that. Pour about half of the taters into a rectangular cake pan and pop it in the oven, starting a timer for about 24 minutes. Seal up the rest of the taters in a zip-lock freezer bag and put it back in the freezer.

Step 2: Scrape the contents of a 10.5-ounce can of condensed cream-of-mushroom soup into a saucepan. Refill the can with milk and stir with intent to scrape the remaining bits of soup off the sides of the can, then add it to the pan.

Step 2a: Tear up about half of a 2.5-ounce jar of chipped (dried, sliced) beef into tiny pieces and stir them into the soup mixture.

Step 2b: Heat the soup slowly on a medium flame (or electric whatnot), turning the heat to low as soon as it starts getting simmery. Don't cover the pan. You just want to keep it warm until the taters are done.

Step 3: When the alarm goes off, take the taters out of the oven and use a plastic or wooden spoon to loosen them off the bottom of the pan.

Step 4: Drain a 15-ounce can of sweet peas and stir the peas into the soup mixture. Turn the heat back up towards medium and let it come back to a simmer.

Last step: Spoon the taters into a couple of soup bowls. Cover them with the mushroom soup-chipped beef-peas mixture and serve. A handful of saltines on the side make it just about perfect.

Bachelor Chow Lentil Soup

Cooking for one can be a drag, especially if you hate leftovers as much as I do. The package directions on virtually everything assume that you're cooking a family sized meal, and if they offer single-serving measurements, the proportions seem best suited to those wee people who actually need to refrigerate the uneaten portion of a six-ounce cup of yogurt. So, in effect, you're torn between the risk of overeating by doubling the proportions and eating the same thing at every meal for three days because you cooked the whole package.

Well, I've gradually figured out a few handy proportions that have stood me in good stead. For example, I buy rice by the sack and store it in reusable plastic tubs. When I want rice for dinner, I use my 1/3-cup scoop to combine two scoops of rice and four scoops of water in a saucepan. I heat it to a boil, cover it snugly with a foil-wrapped lid, reduce the heat to the lowest flame my stovetop will allow, and set the microwave timer to 15 minutes. That's just ordinary white rice; with something fancier like basmati, I might let the rice stand in the unheated water for 20 minutes before lighting the flame. But basically, the proportion "two parts water to one part rice" has proved to be a handy rule of thumb, and it cooks in the same time whether I'm using the 1/4-, 1/3, or 1/2-cup measuring scoop.

This didn't take much trial and error. It actually came of reading the package directions and doing a bit of math in my head. But I haven't had such good luck with dried beans, peas, and lentils. Generally the time needed to cook them to the desired tenderness was far in excess of what the printed recipe indicated. Sometimes I left them cooking just a tiny bit too long, only to find the beans had totally dissolved into a thick, dry mush that then burned at the bottom. Either I used too much liquid, requiring me to devote hours to reducing it to a smooth slurry of nominally souplike density, or I found myself rushing to add more water. All of these problems arose during one miserable cooking marathon that stretched right through suppertime and into the wee hours of the morning.

And then there were the times when I overdid the seasonings, or forgot that the meat I was adding to the soup was spicy enough without dumping in another load of spices; the number of nuclear pea soups I have endured has led me almost to prefer the times when it came out too bland. These kitchen disasters have tended to discourage me from making much soup of the dried-legume persuasion. And of course, there is always the problem that I have to use the biggest pot in the pantry to cook a whole pound of the dried whatever, all the cleanup afterward, and (God help me!) the leftovers.

And that's kind of sad. Because I have such fond, wistful memories of perfect lentil and pea soups that have been served to me over the years. I would never have believed that reproducing them would be such a pain.

Well, at least I now seem to have some of the basic proportions right. To start, I emptied my one-pound bags of lentils and peas into the same kind of storage tubs wherein I keep rice. Then I dispensed with the idea of cooking a whole pound of them at one time. I started today's lunch with two 1/4-cup scoops of lentil, followed by six identical scoops of water—i.e. three parts water to one part bean. Then, while heating it to a boil, I added about a spoonful of minced onion, about 1/4 spoonful of rosemary leaves, and a slice off a stick of summer sausage cut into roughly 1/3-inch cubes.

I covered the boiling pan loosely (actually, my lid has a steam vent in it) and left it simmering on low heat until a 20 minute timer went off, stirring once or twice in the meantime. I tested a couple of lentils, found them too tough, and set a 5 minute timer. The next time I tested the beans, they seemed just right, so I poured the lot into a bowl and put a spoonful in my mouth... and it was too tough. Back in the pot, on low heat, loosely covered, for another five minutes... and again they tested just right. I ate the soup at this point, though again, once served, the lentils proved to be a bit tougher than when I tested them. They weren't so overly tough that I didn't enjoy the dish.

So I reckon 35 minutes should do it for next time; the same amount of beans and water, no more and no less; and, as a rule of thumb, I shouldn't just nibble one or two beans when I'm testing to see if it's soup; rather, I should munch a whole spoonful of them at once before deciding whether to add another 5 minutes or serve. As for the flavor, I was very pleased. The flavor of the summer sausage combined nicely with the lentil juice and the simple seasonings, which seemed neither bland nor overdone. The fat in the sausage had dissolved into the broth, leaving the meat with just the right texture. After one brimming bowlful I was happily full, and there were no leftovers. Bonus points!

Bachelor Chow Steak Sandwich

On my way home from work today, I browsed the bakery clearance cart at a certain retail superstore and came up with a bag of 8 large, sesame-seeded rolls, marked down because today was their "best if used by" date. Next, I ran by the meat department, planning to grab a four-pack of hamburger patties, but decided instead to get a package of 7 small, thin-sliced steaks. Then, steering a route toward the cash registers that took me through the produce department, I impulse-bought a nice, soft avocado. And to steal again from Emeril... BAM!

When I materialized in my kitchen (sizzle, bang, poof), I sealed up three of the steaks in a freezer bag and popped them in the fridge for tomorrow. I took out two of the seeded rolls and threw the remaining half-dozen in the freezer. I took out my big skillet and, over a medium flame, heated a couple tablespoons' worth of olive oil. I added pepper and a teaspoon of minced garlic, stirred it around a bit, and laid down the four remaining steaks.

While cooking these on both sides (I turned them 2 or 3 times), I sliced open the two rolls. Then I skinned the avocado and scraped the flesh haphazardly, messily, onto the bottom half of each roll. I layered two sizzling steaks onto each mess of avocado, then smeared the top half of each roll with a bit of the "zesty steak sauce" that the local supermarket sells as a cheap alternative to Heinz 57 Sauce.

The results? Tasty. Juicy. Maybe not melt-in-your-mouth tender, but we're talking about round steaks here. What they lacked in tenderness, they made up in thinness. I could bite through them without having to make like a trapped fox gnawing its foot off. The combined flavors and textures made my day. And best of all, I managed this on a tight budget, on impulse, with no kitchen finesse whatsoever. Heck, I even used a plastic knife to cut up the avocado, and I ate the sandwiches off a paper plate. So laugh, ye bachelors! And salivate, Mom!

My First Ratatouille

For years, I have drooled over the traditional French veggie hotdish known as ratatouille, made famous by the movie of the same name. But I never had a chance to taste it until I made it for myself. Which I did just this evening.

Emeril's Ratatouille

Going in, I knew that the dish presented in the movie was not authentic ratatouille, but an original gourmet art work cooked up by one of the movie's culinary consultants. While that looks good, it also looks like a lot more work than the traditional recipe with rough-cut vegetables jumbled together in a bubbling pot.

The recipe I ended up following, when it came time to do the actual cooking, was the one featured on Emeril Lagasse's cooking show and published online. Unfortunately, I didn't consult Emeril until after I had assembled the ingredients, by which time I had neither time nor money to go back to the supermarket and correct my purchasing mistakes. So I had to cut a few corners, and the end result probably was not very similar to what Emeril envisioned. Nevertheless, I thought it was good, and I look forward to trying it again.

Now, wouldn't it be nice if recipes actually told you everything you needed to do, in the order you needed to do it? And I mean, starting at the grocery store, when you are trying to assemble the ingredients for a planned meal! To be sure, having the recipe with you at the store would also help. But it would cut through a lot of reading, re-reading, painfully construing, re-ordering of priorities, scribbling, squinting at your scribbles, and swearing venomously when you realize that you've skipped a step that the author of the recipe felt was implied by the string of adjectives embedded in each item of the list of ingredients, and in the past-participles sprinkled among his helpful instructions. Would it kill him to put the steps in order, so that even an idiot like me might get it right in one try?

So here's my memo to myself for the next time I do a ratatouille. Then, perhaps, I will be able to taste what the dish is really like, without a can or two of Ro-Tel covering up the horror of not having as much bell pepper as I thought I did, or pre-soaked dried onion flakes filling in for the onion (which I had used up cooking that runza the other day).

First, the shopping. As you approach your grocery store's produce department, bear in mind that for this dish to be at its best, you will need:

• 1 or 2 yellow onions
• 1 average-sized eggplant
• 1 good-sized zucchini (or 2 dinky ones)
• 2 yellow squash (because, face it, they're all dinky)
• 6 or 8 roma tomatoes
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 green bell pepper
• a bulb of garlic or a jar of minced garlic (unless you still have some at home)
• thyme, basil, parsley, black pepper, olive oil, and salt (if you're running low at home, or feel like troubling with the fresh herbs)

Don't forget any of these things, and if you're planning another dish using any of them, buy extra!

Second, the chopping. Don't bother starting unless (until) you have a clean cutting board, a big sharp knife, a good-sized pot with a lid, and a big cooking spoon to stir with. Rinse off the veggies in lukewarm water and shave off any patches of skin that you have doubts about. Cut off the ends of the eggplant, zucchini, and squash. Slice each in half lengthwise (maybe thirds in the eggplant's case), roll the fruit 90 degrees and repeat; then them chop into mouthful-sized chunks with the skins still on. Cut the stems out of the peppers at both ends; open them up and remove all the seeds and flaky kid stuff; then slice them into long strips the width of your choice, before cutting these strips to the length of your choice. Then slice up the tomatoes (which only need one lengthwise cut beforehand), the onions (probably best if diced more finely), and the clove of garlic (hacked into tiny bits, if using fresh). Set aside the chopped pieces of each fruit or veg in a separate dish. If using the fresh herbs, shred them by hand; or make sure the shakers are handy.

Third, the cooking. This is a nice, friendly dish, in that (per Emeril's advice), you can cook it in 5-minute fits, setting the same timer over and over, and getting everything done on schedule. And you don't have to do much except remember what order to add stuff, stir 2 or 3 times within five minutes, and cover the pot in between stirrings. So, after you warm up about a quarter-cup of the oil on medium heat...

1. Add the garlic and onion to the pot; sizzle and stir for 5 aromatic minutes.
2. Add the eggplant and thyme (half a teaspoonful); cook for 5 minutes.
3. Add the peppers, zucchini, and squash; cook for 5 minutes.
4. Add the tomatoes, basil and parsley (one teaspoon each), salt and black pepper (use your own judgment); cook for 5 minutes.

And presto! You've got a ratatouille!

Some of the other recipes I've seen around call for some extra flavorings, such as a bit of vinegar and/or some anchovies. I happen to have some anchovy paste around, so I might try that option next time—probably adding it at the onion-and-garlic stage.

As for me, tonight, I had a ratatouille, made essentially as described above. Except, you know, with zombie onions and 2 cans of Ro-Tel. I did have some fresh onion and red & green bell pepper, but (as I learned too late) only enough to make a plate of fajitas with—not nearly as much as Emeril's recipe called for. I used them too, dumping them in as they were (i.e., in fajita-friendly strips), at the pepper/squash stage. They didn't cook as well as I would have liked, and together with the excessive spiciness of the Ro-Tel, they turned out to be the least enjoyable part of the dish.

But it was, over all, delicious—a different blend of flavors in each bite, a highlight of eggplant here (and I lurve eggplant), a note of fresh tomato there (which, to me, represents what sunshine tastes like), plenty of herb tangs and onion twangs, and firm pieces of vegetable that I could really feel when I sank my teeth into them. I most definitely will be trying this dish again. And I don't just mean the three 18-ounce tubs of leftovers that I put up in the fridge. Ratatouille, I shall return! And I'm taking this memo with me when I shop for your ingredients!

Best Bachelor Runza

I've discussed runza here before. It's a dish involving (at the very least) meat, onions, and cabbage, covered by a crust of bread or pastry. It is primarily known in Nebraska, where there is a chain of fast-food restaurants named after it and prominently featuring the "enclosed in soft bread" variant on the menu. The recipe circulates among the cookbooks compiled by church women's auxiliaries. It shows up at pot-luck dinners. And it forms a small but lovely part of my memories of growing up (partly) in Nebraska.

I made myself a runza last night. Having assembled the ingredients in a recent shopping trip, I tried a different approach to the dish. The result was the best church-cookbook-variant/bachelor-slob-gourmet version of runza I have ever achieved. I feel it is incumbent on me to share how it came about.

To start with, on several past occasions I have fiddled with the "church cookbook" recipe my mother handed down to me. I couldn't decide whether the recipe should include a tomato-based sauce or some type of gravy. I had tried it both ways, with about equal success—but while these attempts went over all right at pot-luck meals at my St. Louis area church, where Nebraska specialties like runza are a strange delicacy, I thought they were "only OK."

One of my experiments suffered from the fact that, on somebody's urging, I added cheese, only to find out that at least one of the people I was expected to feed could not have cheese. Another member of the party objected on principle to cabbage in any form, which put the dish out of the question for her. And most worrying to me, the sauce combined with the other fixings made the bottom crust limp and soggy. This problem increased, and spread to the top crust, when the leftovers were refrigerated and reheated.

So, as a new experiment, I made last night's runza without any sauce whatsoever. And though the dish required me to do my fair share of cooking, I also did it with a minimum of "prep-cooking."

First step: the shopping. Knowing that I was going to make this dish, I bought a good two pounds of ground beef (not particularly low-fat; I'm all for saving money, and grease can be drained off). I bought two canisters of Pillsbury croissant dough, the kind prepared as a single seamless sheet. At the produce counter closest to the deli area of my neighborhood supermarket, I bought a small tub of chopped onion—which, as a surprise bonus (I didn't notice until I was opening the tub) also contained some chopped celery. I bought a small bag of Dole plain cole slaw (the kind with mostly green cabbage, a little red and a few shreds of carrot, but no sauce). And I relied on the fact that I already had the utensils and spices that I would need.

Second step: the sauteing. I started with the ground beef. This I had to divide into two batches, breaking the meat up and browning it over medium heat in a medium-size skillet. I ground a little garlic sea-salt over it. I sprinkled on it some black pepper, paprika, thyme, and a little cumin. After each half of the meat was done, I plated it between two wads of paper towel and patted the grease out of it. Both portions of meat being done, I sauteed the onion and celery mix for a minute, then added the cole slaw and drizzled the whole mess with olive oil. I kept stirring this until it stopped being particularly hard to keep it from overflowing the pan—just enough to begin softening the cabbage.

Third step: the baking. I sprayed Pam in a lasagna pan. I spread one of the rolls of croissant dough in the bottom of the pan, then half of the browned meat on top of that, then the vegetable mixture on top of that, then the rest of the meat on top of that, and finally the second roll of croissant dough. Into a pre-heated 350-degree oven went the lot of it. I peeked inside the oven at 20 minutes to see how the top crust was coming. I let it bake for another 3 minutes or so, and took it out just as the crust was turning a nice light brown. I let it cool for a few minutes, then used the edge of a spatula to divide it into 8 servings.

Final step: the eating. My first serving was so delicious that I couldn't resist having another. I didn't miss the sauce at all. If the meat and vegetables lacked anything desirable for flavor or texture, the crispy flaky crust supplied it. Even the bottom crust seemed to be there, at least when the dish was warm out of the oven. I didn't miss the cheese either; with apologies to the restaurant chain, which seems to consider it a requirement.

The servings that I couldn't eat when the pan was still oven-warm, I stored in plastic tubs in the refrigerator. I ate one tubful late last night, one for breakfast this morning, and one for lunch. And it's gone, just like that. And, all right, a certain clamminess did start to set in, especially in the lower crust, so I was well motivated to finish the leftovers promptly. Two minutes in the microwave with the lid of the storage tub loosened, and the refrigerated entree was piping hot. I tried a little ketchup with today's lunch portion, and it did not go amiss.

Dip Duel

Back here, I shared a recipe my Mom sent me for a dip that goes well with Townhouse crackers. Over Thanksgiving weekend, I sneaked a peak at my Stepmom's recipe for a dip to go with (say) Triscuits. We snacked on them at lunchtime this past Saturday. Dad and I used Rosemary and Olive Oil Triscuits. Stepmom used some kind of Ritz thingies. An awesome time was had by all. And I think it is evident that the recipe works equally well with turkey.

Ingredients:

• 1 8-oz. brick of cream cheese
• 5 tablespoons of Frank's Red Hot sauce
• Roasted chicken (or turkey) breast meat

Cut up the cream cheese into cubes, place it in a covered bowl, and melt it in the microwave. Stir in the hot sauce. Pull apart the breast meat and add it to the mixture until you achieve the desired consistency. Spoon onto small plates and shovel it up with your choice of crackers. Could it get any simpler?

IMAGE: Swiped from here. If you object to my use of this image, I'll swipe one from somewhere else.

Dip, Ye Bachelors

Mom is back with another comfort food recipe: a dip that, according to her, is ideal for those extra-thick Townhouse "Topper" crackers, the ones that are like Ritz crackers on one side and pretzels on the other (or something like that).

Mom's SOS Dip

1. Take 2 or 3 dill pickle halves and chop them up fairly fine.
2. Stir them into 1 or 2 bricks of cream cheese, softened in the mixing bowl.
3. Crumble in 1 or 2 packages of shaved dried beef.
4. Add half a cup of sour cream, Worcestershire sauce and garlic powder to taste.

Voila! A dip that my brother Jake approves of, and that my three-year-old niece likes to lick off the blades of the mixing bowl. I just hope my mother unplugs it first...

Thanks to Minnesota Bread for the photo.

Baking at Work

Today I'm making pork chops with wild rice & mushrooms. Right now. At work. Something that requires a couple of hours in the oven & can be shared with some folks coming over towards lunchtime. It's nice to have a kitchen at the office!

I don't know how long I've had this box of Minnesota Wild Rice in my cupboard, but I've been saving it for this. Last weekend I picked up the remaining ingredients, save for the butter, which was already in the fridge at work. I even bought a disposable baking pan, to fill a void in my office kitchen. Today, finally, I got it all organized in one of those zip-up cooler bags they sell at Sam's Club and hauled it to work.

Here's what I brought to work with me today: the wild rice, 4 small cans sliced mushrooms, 1 can cream of mushroom soup, a pillow-pack of 4 pre-cooked, bone-in pork chops, and a shaker of blended seasonings. Plus a carefully folded length of aluminum foil & a 9"x13" aluminum foil pan. And, of course, the photo album full of recipes my stepmom put together when I went away to college. And finally, fingernail clippers. You'll know why in a bit.

Already in the fridge at work: sticks of butter. When I had time to take a break from my morning duties, I quickly breezed through the following steps...

Step 1: Warm a cube cut off the end of a stick of butter in the microwave for 30 seconds at 50% power, just to soften it a bit. Then holding it in a paper towel, smear it around the bottom of the pan.

Step 1.5: Pour a pot of water into the coffee maker, drop in a filter & pour the wild rice into it, then brew a pot of wild rice water. Pour the water down the drain & dump the contents of the filter into the greased pan.

Step 2: Use a coffee cup to measure 1.5 cups of water & pour it over the rice.

Step 2.5: Open the cans of mushrooms & pour them over the rice, juice and all, so that the bottom of the pan is evenly covered with mushrooms.

Step 3: Open the can of cream of mushroom soup & drop spoonfuls of it onto the mushrooms, distributing the glops evenly throughout the pan. There is no need to try to spread it around.

Step 3.5: Shake a generous amount of your spice blend over everything in the pan so far.

Step 4: Arrange the pork chops on top of everything else in the pan. They will probably take up almost all the room.

Step 5: Didn't I mention preheating the oven to 350? Oh, well. Do that now while you unfold the aluminum foil & cover the top of the pan, crimping the edges so that there is a tight seal all the way around. It won't hurt to let the mixture sit on the counter while the oven finishes preheating.

Step 6: Set the microwave to do a 90 minute "kitchen timer" countdown, starting when the pan is in the oven & the door is closed. When it beeps, set the timer for another 30 minutes. Or, you know, make a mental note of the time, add 2 hours and look for it to be done then.

Step 7: You forgot to bring potholders, you ass. All you have is 2 hand towels, one in the kitchen and one in the bathroom. You're going to need them both to get this thing out of the oven.

Step 7.5: Clip your fingernails. (That's why you brought the clippers.) You don't want to scratch yourself when the delicious aroma of baking pork, rice, and mushrooms begins to drive you crazy.

Step 8: Hide the recipe album. Your guests don't need to know that you didn't invent this culinary masterpiece. Heck, you're in Missouri; they've probably never seen wild rice, which used to grow, like, wild where you come from.

Step 9: Take small bites to make this food last. This may be the hardest step, because the meat and rice will be so tender, and the flavors of mushroom, pork, and wild rice so perfectly blended, that you'll be tempted to inhale it.

Step 9.5: Make a mental note to bring 6 chops next time. Then you can enjoy the leftovers as well. This recipe also works with fully-cooked chicken or turkey breasts, by the way.

Eggcellent Comfort Food

My stepmum let me copy these recipes out of her personal archive during the Independence Day weekend, during which she served one of them for lunch...

CHURCH COOKBOOK EGG-BAKE
What You Need:
8-10 eggs beaten
1/2 to 1 teaspoon salt
paprika for color
2 teaspoons dry mustard
3 cups milk
2 cups chopped ham
8 slices cubed bread
1 cup grated Cheddar cheese

What You Do:
Beat the eggs, salt, paprika, mustard, and milk together. Put the bread cubes on the bottom of a greased 9"x13" pan. Scatter the ham on top, then pour the egg mixture over it. Sprinkle the cheese on top. Cover with foil, refrigerate overnight, then bake 45 minutes at 350° F. Uncover and bake another 10 minutes or until it sets (i.e. until a knife stuck into it pulls out clean). Cut into squares, it serves 12.

This first recipe is a lot like the "strata" I fondly remember from many church functions. It can be a little heavy, though, owing to its bread-puddinglike consistency. The next recipe is a nice alternative, omitting the bread and having more of the character of a fluffy baked omelette:

CRUSTLESS QUICHE
What You Need:
3 eggs beaten
1/2 cup Bisquick
1/4 cup melted butter
1 cup half & half
dash pepper
1 cup mozzarella or other cheese
1/2 cup ham (or crab meat or shrimp)
1/4 cup diced green onion
1 small can mushrooms, drained
1/4 cup diced bell peppers

What You Do:
Blend the first six ingredients and pour them into a lightly oiled quiche dish. Add cheese, then ham, then the remaining ingredients, and press them down with a spoon. Bake at 350° F for 45 minutes or until it tests done, as above. Serves 6; though you can also double or treble the recipe and use a 9"x13" pan. Leftovers keep nicely in the freezer, individual portions cling-wrapped to a plate and reheated for lunch.

Memorial Day Tuna Salad

Here's a yummy recipe my stepmom made up to go with charcoal-grilled hamburgers and hotdogs (which, by the way, were served with onions, tomatoes, and pickles lovingly sliced by hand, pretzel-bread buns, mustard, ketchup, mayonnaise, and ranch-flavored potato chips). As often happens with comfort-food recipes, it's missing all the measurements and proportions. It's the kind of music-to-your-mouth that every Mom has to learn to play by ear.

INGREDIENTS:
Whole Wheat Rotini (cooked and rinsed with cold water)
chopped onions
chopped celery
sliced green olives with pimentos
dill weed
garlic powder
salt
pepper
50/50 blend of mayo and white salad dressing
tuna, drained

DIRECTIONS:
Mix the ingredients together. Add 1 can of drained canned peas and mix gently.

Seems simple, doesn't it? And yet it holds its own against the best burgers your Dad knows how to grill. Did you miss your parents' cookout on Memorial Day? Oh, ye bachelors! Weep for shame!

Crock Potluck

Church-Cookbook-Style Cocktail Meatballs, as I witnessed them being prepared this morning in anticipation of a potluck dinner:

Buy 3 bottles of Chili Sauce, a 34-ounce tub of Welch's Grape Jelly, and as many bags of home-style frozen meatballs as you reckon will go into a crock-pot. (If given a choice between "Italian-style" and something else, go with something else.) Let the meatballs thaw in the refrigerator, inside the sealed bag. A couple hours before serving, combine the ingredients in a crock pot and gently heat them so that by dinnertime they are bubbling nicely.

For cocktail weenies, I hear, the sauce is a combination of pineapple and apricot preserves and barbecue sauce. Hmmm. Good to know in case you ever have to cater a large group. Which, believe it or not, I have. Though I'll have to tell you what I served another time...

Have Your Cake, Bachelors

My Mom sent me the following recipe, along with a note saying: "It's a conversation starter! You can't taste the beans! The cake is very good. Unbelievable. You must try it. It tastes like spice cake! Everybody likes it!" I don't know who gave the recipe to her, but it looks like the kind of thing a bachelor could dig into...

PORK 'N' BEAN CAKE
Blend 15 oz. pork 'n' beans, 8 oz. crushed pineapple with juice, until pureed.

Add 2 cups sugar, 1 cup oil, 4 eggs, 2 tsp. vanilla.

Add 2 cups flour, 2 tsp. baking soda, 1 tsp. baking powder (??), 1 tsp. salt, 2 tsp. cinnamon.

Pour in ungreased jelly roll pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 min.

Frosting: 8 oz. cream cheese, 1/2 cup margarine, 1 tsp. vanilla, 4 cups powdered sugar. Thin with 1 tsp. milk if needed.