who's the new guy?

Hello,

Thanks to Nick and Brie for the invite.

I'm Matt, and I have been cooking professionally for about 5 years now. Nick and I have nerded it up with food ever since we met many years ago, he was just smart enough not to get into the food industry! Truth is I love my line of work, and I love thinking, talking, and learning about food, so its great to have a new outlet like this blog. Plus i'm always curious what people with normal lives outside of professional kitchens eat on a daily basis.

I've been super inspired lately and cooking my ass off at home and at the restaurant where i work, so i have alot of meals i'd love to share and discuss on here, but first its food-related xmas wishlist time:


Wine glasses - as much as i want fancy riedel glasses, i just need some decent, large and thin red wine glasses. anybody know of a good source?

Urban Italian by Andrew Carmellini. This book looks awesome. He was the chef at Cafe Boulud for some time, then opened A Voce, an upscale Italian restaurant in manhattan. Now hes unemployed, hoping to open another place in NYC soon. In the meantime, him and his wife wrote this book, about cooking simple Italian food in a tiny new york apartment. Ive been on a serious italian food kick lately so all of these recipes, especially the short ribs braciole, make me super hungry. I guess theres some pretty unreal kitchen stories too which is probably the real reason why i want this.

Balsamico. I mean like really old, really small bottle, really concentrated. I've never had a really exceptional one, save for the Villa Manadori, which is great. I've been cooking alot with saba lately, which i love, but i want that special bottle of the good stuff.

Razor Clams. I have never cooked with these, and can never seem to find them in markets. I think we can get them through city fish at the restaurant where i work, but i really want a shellfishing license so i can go out and get my own, now that i live so close to the shore. One of my favorite things to eat in NYC is the dish of razor clams at Casa Mono, Mario Batali's spanish tapas restaurant near Union Square. They are thrown, split and with the shell still attached, onto a hot flat top (they call it a plancha in spain) until they carmelize and firm up nicely, meanwhile the cook mixes a vinaigrette in a bowl, just lemon juice, tons of garlic, spanish olive oil, chopped parsley, and salt and pepper. The clams are just piled on a plate and the vinaigrette is poured over. Extremely simple, delicious and fun to eat.

Iberico Ham. Speaking of Spain, if anybody has ever had this type of ham, they'll understand why i want this so bad. The product of a very special breed of pig, raised in a very special way in the Extremadurra region of Spain, this dry cured ham is some of the best in the world. The best hams, called Bellota, are taken from black footed pigs who graze solely on acorns, their flesh and fat become perfumed by that nuttiness. It only became legal to sell in the United States last year or earlier this year i believe. Amazing flavor and texture, too bad its so goddamn expensive. Anyone want to go in on a whole ham?

Chitarra. A Chittara is an old fashioned device used for cutting pasta. It looks like a board with a bunch of guitar strings attached. The dough is rolled over the surface of the wires and is cut into the desired shape, usually spaghetti.

How about y'all?

Just Plain Terrible

Breakfast: Oatmeal (make it with milk, not water. tastes better that way).

Lunch: A diesel piece of yellow cake with vanilla frosting. Carrots.

Dinner: I tried to make red-wine braised beef, but it came out so gross. I'm talking, "let's-go-get-a-slice-of-pizza-instead"-type gross. To be fair (to myself?), the reduction was on point: the wine, aromatics, and beef juice reduced into a nice little sauce. But the beef...yuck! I was told that a chuck roast works well for this type of cooking (the connective tissue and fats break down nicely when cooked slowly in a liquid), but for whatever reason mine cooked to fast and was hella chewy. After I seared it, I put in the liquids etc., then covered it and stuck it in the oven at 300 degrees (probably even cooler in my old oven). Half an hour later it felt almost done cooking, which seems like way too quick for such a big piece of meat. What did I do wrong? Only thing I can think of is too much liquid, since I'm pretty sure <300 isn't too hot.

What am I missing?

'Tis the Season

A lot's been going on, peeps! There's a new administration in town, the holidays are upon us, people are getting married, things are in the oven (ha!), and my friend Marisa just informed me that New Haven has its very own traveling cupcake truck - brilliant! Such excitement! On top of all that, I think I've convinced a certain someone that we should put up a Christmas tree!

The weekend before Thanksgiving was something of a baking frenzy compared to how things have been around here. We *finally* used the stash of fresh Cape Cod cranberries had been waiting ever so patiently in my refrigerator for their moment to come. And it did, in the form of a Meyer lemon and cranberry scone recipe from Smitten Kitchen. We basically followed the recipe except that I skimped a bit on the lemon zest and used a regular lemon instead of a Meyer lemon - and they were delicious! We cut them into scone shapes and baked half, then froze the other half for those days when you want to walk out the door with a fresh, hot baked good in your hand (wait, that's every day...)

Then we made these chocolate toffee cookies. MMMMMMMmmmmm. All I can say is, there is a LOT of chocolate in these guys. They are practically all chocolate. Which means that they are extremely rich and extremely scrumptious. The only change I would recommend is adding more toffee - yes, that's right: more toffee. I have been on a bit of a toffee kick lately, and it adds such a great twist to the cookie - a bit of crunch, a bit of nutty caramel with a hint of saltiness - that underscoring that flavor could only heighten the cookie experience, if you know what I'm saying. I highly recommend them.

The days before Thanksgiving were also noteworthy for the consumption of a delightfully easy and warming potato leek soup, a soothing and earthy butternut squash and mushroom soup from Judies, and lots of wine. Thanksgiving itself was a feast for another post, featuring a delectable turkey, braised onions, Mom's kicky horseradish cranberry sauce, seared green beans, stuffing, creamy mashed potatoes, and more. Hopefully this week will mean a curry squash soup and a chocolate caramel cheesecake... and The Office! Stay tuned!

The Benefits of Working Late

Tuesday sucked. Though I'm all for working hard, 9am-10pm is just too much for me. And, since I was expecting a short day, the surprise call at 6pm did not leave me happy at all. That said, a wise man once told me: when life gives you coconut milk, make Thai curry! No curry recipes today, but I do have a related story:

As my coworker (Kevin) and I rolled our eyes about having to stay late (unexpectedly), there was a part of each of us that thought: "Now what should we order?" Our boss loves curry, so we decided to humor him by ordering from a Thai restaurant (on the client, of course). The way it works is we each have a $25 limit on the food. Naturally, then, ordering from a standard Thai place meant lots of food, especially considering that we knew our boss wouldn't eat much. The bill came out to be $74.88 on the following order:

1. 3 types of curry.
2. 3 orders of jasmine rice, 2 orders of brown (get those whole grains!)
3. 1 order Pad Thai.
4. 1 order Pad Siew
5. 1 order Thai BBQ Chicken
6. 1 order fried bananas with ice cream.

My boss ate half an order of curry, and Kevin and I made off with lunch for the rest of the week!

Hot Hot Beverages

Since I seem to be somewhat fixated on hot beverages with the onset of winter, I'd like to add an addendum to my last post.

What is your favorite hot beverage? I'm picturing apres-ski (or shovel), frozen fingers wrapped around the mug, steam rising and a roaring fire, or a hot morning drink in the cold sunlight with slippers and robe...

Winter has arrived

My culinary life has not been too exciting as of late. Exams are coming up, the student loan check is dwindling, and I think winter has officially set in (although it hasn't snowed yet). I've been dreaming of fireplaces, warm baths, and hot tea. The tea is easy and so comforting. For breakfast, chai or Earl Grey (still working on my supply!); in the afternoon, something refreshing like mint, spicy like cinnamon, oranges, and cloves, or bracing like Assam. At night before bed, it used to be chamomile, but lately I've gotten back to peach, which is fruity, calming, and uplifting.

What do you guys do when you don't have a lot of time to buy/plan/cook your meals ahead of time? Do you wind up eating out? Do you have favorite default meals, home-cooked or purchased? I tend to grab a turkey sandwich with cranberry chutney from the deli for lunch and either soup from Whole Foods (mmmm) or enchiladas verdes from the Mexican place in my neighborhood for a quick, tasty dinner. Here is Tuesday's rundown:

Breakfast: Kashi black currant and walnut cereal (SO good, but breaking the bank) and chai.
Lunch: Tomato & mozarella salad from Whole Foods, slice of potato and roasted red pepper frittata, Coke.
Snack 1: Heath bar (I'm totally feeling the English toffee these days)
Snack 2: coffee
Dinner: Greek lemon chicken soup with orzo, leftover butternut squash, mushroom and celeriac risotto. Peach tea.

Ciao e molto amore amici!

Oh snap!

Breakfast: macchiato. oatmeal with brown sugar, cinnamon and raisins.

Lunch: herb flatbread from acme bread (wouldn't be jazionesque without one of these!) in the ferry building with dry wine-cured salami. water.

Dinner: curried butternut squash soup. garlic bread.

Dessert: hot cocoa.


For all you working folk, how often do you bring lunch to work? I try to always do it, but as I weigh the pros ($$$-saving, home-made healthiness) and the cons (time, getting out of the office, and trying new restaurants), I'm not sure it's as clear cut as I imagined. Thoughts?