Literate Epicures of Newtown

October 2011

Boo!

Yes, it is October and the Literate Epicures of Newtown have gathered on a crisp autumn evening. Fortunately, it was toasty and warm in the Newtown Bookshop, and there was fun and food to be shared. We had a great turnout – I would like to thank everyone in advance for making this our largest gathering to date and I am looking forward to meeting even more friends next month. We chose Mad Hungry Cooking for Men and Boys by Lucinda Scala Quinn and everyone found something delicious to make even if they weren’t cooking for a houseful of guys.

We began with Brenda’s Cold Sesame Noodles. She used Tahini, which should be readily available at most grocery stores and mixed up the tasty sauce for the noodles. The recipe called for linguini, which we found interesting, most of us had only had this dish with narrow noodles. Needless to say, this is a dish we have all had many versions of and there are a ton of recipes out there, some are more successful than others. Despite following the recipe to a tee, and even adding a little extra water when it seemed a little dry, this was one recipe that would have benefitted from adjusting the proportion of noodles to dressing. We all agreed the flavor was good, but it seemed a little dry.

Next up was the Spanish Frittata. Janet had a left over baked potato which was perfect for the recipe. As frittatas go, and as with a quiche, a lot of the flavor comes from the “add-ins”. This was a great recipe and a super canvas for adding all sorts of wonderful ingredients that have character. Bacon, cheese and fresh herbs all would have been welcome. As it was, it was very tasty, but the flavors were so subtle it was almost too plain. The method is foolproof so it is perfect for a brunch, lunch or snack but be sure to use your imagination to add some interesting ingredients to bump it up a notch.

Marianne made the Spinach Feta Pocket Pies. This was an ambitious undertaking since it required not only making the filling, she also had to make the pastry. She got the pastry together and chilled it overnight as the recipe suggests, then the next day put together the filling. The spinach feta mixture reminded me of Spanikopita and is wonderfully tasty. If you don’t have time to put the pastry together, this would be a great filling for an omelet or mix a cup into the Frittata egg mixture! Rolling out pastry dough can be challenging, but this is a nice dough that is pretty easy to work with. Once she got the pocket pies together, she realized she had quite a bit of dough left over so she ended up making more pocket pies with apple and cinnamon filling. Talk about a fantastic recipe that lends itself to lots of uses, this is one that everyone should have whenever a dough is needed.

Margie made a couple of dishes. The Cornbread is really good and spicy and we loved that it was studded with whole corn kernels and bits of jalapeno. It makes it very pretty as well as super tasty. Everyone really liked it and she said it was easy to put together. This might be the perfect side for a bowl of chili, and now that the weather has cooled, this could become a staple on a lot of tables. She also made a Brown Rice and Chicken with Napa Cabbage that I think came from Lucinda’s Blog. It was really interesting in that the chicken was poached in a soy sauce mixture. This let all those yummy flavors permeate the chicken and gave it the lovely mahogany color. It was tossed with shredded Napa and brown rice to make a really nice fresh tasting dish that everyone loved.

Debbie made the Pork with Won Ton Noodles that also came from the Mad Hungry Blog. This was an ingenious use of Won Ton wrappers – cutting them into ribbons and dropping them into the sauce to cook. Won Ton wrappers are found in the refrigerator section in the produce department of most grocery stores, and are extraordinarily useful for many different types of dish. Members offered ideas for their use from Ravioli to dessert cups. She also ad-libbed a little celery and again, everyone agreed the added crunch and flavor were really great. Debbie did mention that she would probably make it using ground turkey or chicken in the future to cut down on the fat content. Very tasty and worth seeking out.

Gerri made the New Orleans Red Beans. She thought they may have turned out too watery, but we all agreed they were fantastic. This is definitely a plan ahead dish since the beans require soaking, and several hours to cook, but the combination of flavors was really good. It starts with the usual elements of onion, celery and green pepper, but is soon elevated to sublime when the garlic, ham bone, herbs and hot sauce are added. Definitely one to make again, maybe cut back on the water a bit?

Toni brought the Spanish Rice. This is home cooked comfort food at its finest. She opted to leave out the ground beef and add crumbled bacon at the end which was a nice twist on the usual. I think everyone remembered a version of this dish from childhood, and if you haven’t made it in a while (or ever) then you need to bring it back to the top. This is the culinary equivalent of a hug. It just makes you feel good and it is a delicious well rounded meal.

I brought the New Orleans Style String Beans and they were killer. I had to sneak them out of the house before my family ate the entire dish, so you know I will be making them again and often.  If it wasn’t enough that they were sautéed in olive oil with garlic, then the seasoning mix of Cajun seasoning and honey was added to glaze the beans and, brace yourself for this one, they are finished with a flambé of cognac. They can be served hot or room temp and if you put these on the table for Thanksgiving, no one will ask where the green bean casserole with mushroom soup is – they are that good!

There was a wealth of desserts to pick from and each one was tastier than the next. Lisa made the Pumpkin Flan and it was truly “flantastic”. Velvety smooth and wonderfully rich with cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg to compliment the custardy pumpkin, this is definitely a “flantastic” way to end a meal. She found it interesting that the sugar was caramelized in the pan in the oven, a method most of us had never heard of, and mentioned it took much longer for the sugar to melt than is indicated in the recipe. Plan accordingly, because the end result is absolutely worth the time!

Leslie made Dolly’s Chocolate Cake for us to try. She really had no choice since she shared that her husbands nickname for her is Dolly – well it was a perfect selection. She made a lot of substitutions on the recipe and they all worked. Who knew you could use Greek yogurt and Earth Balance instead of buttermilk and butter and that soy creamer would work in place of heavy cream? She even took it over the top by adding amaretto for part of the liquid. Everyone who tried it liked it a lot.

 (no photo - my camera ate it)

Colleen made the Busy Day Chocolate Cake. We all agreed that one can never have too much chocolate and this recipe is fast and easy everyone should always have all the ingredients on hand. Bonus – you mix the ingredients right in the pan! What is not to love about that!? Just think – fresh homemade vegetarian/vegan friendly chocolate cake with all natural ingredients in the same time it would take to open one of those box things! Love love love it.

Liza brought the Crisp Chocolate Toffee Bars and we were all very thankful she did. These are not your back-of-the-bag chocolate chip cookies. If the back-of-the-bag ones went to a Swiss finishing school they might approach the level of these bar cookies. Crisp, buttery, and very grown up we agreed that the hint of salt that makes the toffee sing is the perfect complement to the chocolate chunks that were sprinkled through these cookies. These are so good, even if you have a bite without a chocolate chip, you don’t even miss it.

Over all we all really liked that there weren’t any exotic ingredients that were hard to find, the recipes are straight forward, have a broad appeal and are not difficult. The only negative comment that came up over and over again was, “The photography is so disappointing! I made this dish and it looks MUCH better than the one in the book.” Buy the book – skip the pictures.