Happy Friday, SUCKERS. How’s the Lenten fasting going? How’s all those lentils and broth treating you? I bet it never even occurred to you that you could spend your entire Lent feasting on the most sumptuous, opulent dishes imaginable! And all it takes is to be a fairly crappy Catholic!
That is the route we took this week. So, sorry about your custody of the eyes and whatnot.
SATURDAY
Burritos, chips and queso
Friday night, Damien and I zooped away to Vermont and had two entire nights at a rustic cabin at Camp W. It’s a summer camp and adult retreat venue, but they rent out their cabins in the winter, and we snagged a lovely one. This little cabin had electricity and a pellet stove, but no running water. It snowed on and off, and we were nearly alone on the side of the mountain, except for six lively and friendly outdoor cats, and the sound of various wind chimes, and the wind. We ate a lot of candy and listened to music and read our books and did very, very little.
We did go snowshoeing on Saturday. Snowshoeing is hard, and I was like, why are we doing this thing that makes walking harder? I keep stepping on my own feet! Then I clomped right past a footprint that was about 18 inches down into the snow, and I realized I was clomping along right on top, rather than 18 inches down. So that’s why you do it!
Later, we drove into town and got beef barbacoa burritos at Tito’s Taquieria, and holy cow, that was one of the most delicious things I’ve ever eaten.
SUNDAY
Ragu and fettuccine, salad, fresh bread, sorbetto
Sunday morning, I woke up early in the cabin and thought there was a fire truck outside, casting a red light on the wall. So I got up and stepped outside to investigate, and it was the sunrise!
A really blessed spot. When we were snowshoeing, we found some way more rustic cabins that are part of the summer camp. They are were just three sides of a shed with built-in bunks, and the fourth side is open to the east, except further up the mountain than we were. Imagine waking up to this! It would be life-changing.
We packed up somewhat reluctantly and had a hair-raising skiddy slide drive down the mountain, and made it to Mass at St. Michael’s church, which was our adopted parish several years ago. Nice to be back. Then we had some breakfast in town, got home and did some whirlwind prep for a visit from my friend, Danielle McLellan-Bujnak, who is something of a globe-trotter but happened to be in the New England.
For dinner, Damien made a big pot of his delicious ragu. He more or less follows this recipe, and this time he used veal, pork, and beef. I started some bread dough rising
Jump to Recipeand threw together a big salad, and got the bread in the oven just before Danielle came. We snacked on crackers, grapes, and a nice mango cheese from Aldi while Damien finished cooking, and then we had a really lovely meal. Which I took zero pictures of, and also zero pictures of Danielle — which is how you can tell we were having a REALLY interesting conversation.
And then we collapsed like bunches of broccoli! Quite a weekend! The kids did great. They fed themselves, did their chores, cared for the pets, and got to Mass all on their own. Amazing kids.
MONDAY
Meatball pizza
Monday I made three pizzas, and Damien and I agreed that meatballs only get better as they age, so I topped one pizza with meatballs from Elijah’s birthday, which was . . . kind of a while ago. Delicious.
The kids just had cheese pizza, though. Cowards!
TUESDAY
Irish breakfast, banoffee pie
Tuesday was St. Patrick’s day, and everyone in the house except me is Irish, but I think I’m the only only who likes corned beef boiled dinner. So I went with the alternative meal: Irish breakfast, modified. Baked beans, roast mushrooms with parsley, roast tomato halves, bacon, oven fries, fried eggs, and big hunks of toasted bread. It involved a LOT of moving pans in and out of the oven and microwave, but I got it all hot at the same time, and I was proud of that.
Extremely yummy meal.
I made my annual crack about how I don’t now what the Irish were complaining about; seems like the eat really well. No one laughed, which no one ever does, which is why I keep saying it.
I also, on a whim, made a no-bake banoffee pie, which is not strictly Irish, but it’s pretty popular in Ireland, and it’s something we don’t usually have. I kind of fudged the recipe, and made a graham cracker crust (half a box of graham crackers pulverized and mixed with three tablespoons of sugar and a stick of melted butter, pressed into a pie plate and baked for ten minutes). For the last few minutes of baking the pie shell, I sprinkled some white chocolate chips on the bottom and let them heat up, then took it out of the oven and spread the melted chocolate over the bottom.
I made a kind of caramel from sweetened condensed milk, brown sugar, and butter heated up slowly in a pan, and then I spread that on top of the crust and stuck it in the fridge for a few hours. Then at dessert time, I cut up a few bananas and spread the pieces on top of the caramel, and whipped up some heavy cream, sugar, and vanilla, and spread that on top of the bananas.
It was . . . not beautiful. The pictures I took honestly made it look gross, so I’ll skip those. It was pretty good! Insanely sweet, of course. The kids said they’d rather have just plain banana cream pie going forward, and that can definitely be arranged.
Looking at the calendar, I see we had a meeting with the school in the morning (and while we were there, got a phone call informing us that we had forgotten another meeting somewhere else at the same time, whoops) and then the kids were supposed to do a “wax museum” history project in the evening, so no wonder I was a bit stressed about getting that cooking done. As it turned out, the kids were too sick to go out anyway. Everyone has been taking turns getting sick and then re-sick this week. Late winter’s last revenge, I guess.
WEDNESDAY
Bossam, rice, roast broccoli and cauliflower
Wednesday I sadly realized I had forgotten to dry brine the pork the night before, so we couldn’t really have proper bossam. I had a pork loin rather than a shoulder anyway, so I was already treading on thin ice with this dish. I skulked around for a different recipe, couldn’t find the hoisin sauce, got mad and took apart the entire refrigerator and scrubbed the whole thing out and yelled at everybody, and decided we’d just go ahead and have second rate bo ssam for dinner.
So I let the meat brine in salt and sugar for a few hours, anyway, and then started cooking it in the early afternoon. I cut it into pieces, thinking maybe increasing the surface area would . . . something something, I don’t know. Then I cooked some rice on the stovetop, because my Instant Pot briefly started working again but then I dropped it, and now it definitely doesn’t work. I found some broccoli and cauliflower in the back of the fridge and cut it up, tossed it with olive oil, sesame oil, salt, and garlic powder, and roasted it. It came out looking like it had seen God
and it tasted pretty okay. By which I mean some of the kids picked out the broccoli and ate that, and I had a giant bowl of both so I could ride the fart train all night, not that I need any help with that.
The meat turned out, eh, fine. The magic of salt and sugar, not to mention an additional splash of brown sugar, cider vinegar, and sea salt toward the end, went a long way for the outside of it
but it was, unsurprisingly, quite dry. Oh well, it was a hot meal with a protein, a starch, and a veg.
Somehow we survived.
THURSDAY
Suppli, ragu and fettucine, salad and olives, prosciutto bread, zeppole de san giuseppe
St. Joseph’s day! St. Joseph is our family’s patron, and even though I’m a little fuzzy on how the Italians got involved, we always have a big Italian meal on his day. I was, frankly, exhausted, and did not have the energy to put together a fancy antipasto plate like I usually do. We had tons of pasta, ragu, and salad in the house, and Lucy had a half day, so she made her yummy suppli (arancini).
Jump to RecipeI did want to make zeppole, though, because I LIKE zeppole. They’re so fancy and cute, and actually quite easy to make, although there are a lot of steps. I use this recipe from Sip and Feast, which is a baked version, rather than fried. First you make a choux dough, which comes together very easily. Then you pipe a disc with a ring on top for each pastry, and bake them.
I wish I had left them in the oven for another 2-3 minutes, but I was so afraid of burning them! So they were the tiniest bit damp in the very middle, oh well.
Anyway then you make the custard filling, which is simple but requires a lot of stirring. You chill it, and then fill the pastries with a piping bag. I do it by cutting the tops off, filling the inside like a sandwich, putting the top back on, and then adding a little extra bloop of custard on top. Then you sift powdered sugar over the top, add a cherry, and there they are.
I think I could have made the custard a little thicker and it would have piped prettier, but they were quite nice as is. I used duck eggs for the first time this year, and they are so rich and bright!
Oh! Speaking of ducks, I took this picture on Thursday morning.
Doesn’t look like much, but it’s exciting because (a) this is the first time the snow has melted enough so they can get out of their little pen. Which is nice for them, and really nice for us, because now we don’t have to lug water for them. They can go get it themselves.
But the MAIN (b) thing is that there are five ducks here. One of them (we think it was Tulip, but we’ve kind of lost track) went missing last Wednesday. We’ve been hearing coyotes, so we sadly assumed she had been eaten up. But on Thursday morning, she turned up again, hollering loudly to be let in! Where was she for six days? How did she, who can barely walk across the yard without stepping on her own feet, survive on her own all that time, especially when there was a heavy snow cover and nothing to forage? No idea! But we have five ducks again, and we are very happy.
Oh I forgot, I also decided to make a prosciutto bread for St. Joseph’s day — also a Sip and Feast recipe. This one was delivered straight into my inbox, so I was powerless. The only hitch is, I didn’t read the recipe ahead of time, of course not, so I was happily mixing the dough when I came across the words “Refrigerate for at least 12 hours, but ideally 24 hours before using.”
Ah, well.
I refrigerated it for four hours and told it to just do its best, which it did.
The recipe is fairly adaptable, regarding what kind of meat and cheese you stuff it with. What I had was a package of stuff from Aldi
plus some decent provolone. So I chopped all that up, peppered the dough good, and pressed in the meat and cheese and sloshed some olive oil over it
because the recipe called for pancetta, plus some of the rendered fat. Honestly I had mostly abandoned the recipe by this point. Anyway I rolled it up. You’re supposed to just make a tube, but for some reason I made a spiral, like a cinnamon bun. Then I twisted it, like you’re supposed to, and then I set it to rise again, and then brushed it with yet more duck egg, and baked it.
It was looking very likely! But it was a little disappointing when I cut it open. I think the spiral rolling was a mistake, and that limited how much the bread could puff while it baked. Although honestly, it had such an abbreviated time to rise, that was probably the main issue. And the extra olive oil probably didn’t help. Anyway, it was rather DENSE inside.
It wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t super bready! Honestly I would have gone bananas over this when I was a kid, but Damien and I are the only ones who even tried it, so I probably won’t go to any lengths to make it a second time and try to correct my mistakes.
Anyway it was quite a yummy meal altogether.
Lucy’s suppli were delicious, and I set out some olives I found, and the ragu had of course only improved with time.
We managed to say the litany to St. Joseph in the evening, so the day wasn’t ENTIRELY about carbs, and that was that. Best patron ever.
FRIDAY
Grilled cheese, tomato soup
Last night I fell asleep at about 8:30, and didn’t wake up until almost 9 this morning. The kids have no school for various reasons, and we have teacher conferences and then adoration this afternoon, and grilled cheese and canned soup sounds like about the right speed. If we can make it through the next week without any feast days, I think we’ll be okay.
Although while I was looking for the link for the prosciutto bread recipe, I saw a recipe for pizza rustica, and oof. It looks so good. I feel like we had it a few times when I was little, and maybe I’ve been wanting it ever since. It’s also possible my brain is struggling through Cheese Overload and am not thinking clearly. Stay tuned, I guess.
French bread
Makes four long loaves. You can make the dough in one batch in a standard-sized standing mixer bowl if you are careful!
I have a hard time getting the water temperature right for yeast. One thing to know is if your water is too cool, the yeast will proof eventually; it will just take longer. So if you're nervous, err on the side of coolness.
Ingredients
- 4-1/2 cups warm water
- 1/4 cup sugar
- 2 Tbsp active dry yeast
- 5 tsp salt
- 1/4 cup olive or canola oil
- 10-12 cups flour
- butter for greasing the pan (can also use parchment paper) and for running over the hot bread (optional)
- corn meal for sprinkling on pan (optional)
Instructions
-
In the bowl of a standing mixer, put the warm water, and mix in the sugar and yeast until dissolved. Let stand at least five minutes until it foams a bit. If the water is too cool, it's okay; it will just take longer.
-
Fit on the dough hook and add the salt, oil, and six of the cups of flour. Add the flour gradually, so it doesn't spurt all over the place. Mix and low and then medium speed. Gradually add more flour, one cup at a time, until the dough is smooth and comes away from the side of the bowl as you mix. It should be tender but not sticky.
-
Lightly grease a bowl and put the dough ball in it. Cover with a damp towel or lightly cover with plastic wrap and set in a warm place to rise for about an hour, until it's about double in size.
-
Flour a working surface. Divide the dough into four balls. Taking one at a time, roll, pat, and/or stretch it out until it's a rough rectangle about 9x13" (a little bigger than a piece of looseleaf paper).
-
Roll the long side of the dough up into a long cylinder and pinch the seam shut, and pinch the ends, so it stays rolled up. It doesn't have to be super tight, but you don't want a ton of air trapped in it.
-
Butter some large pans. Sprinkle them with cornmeal if you like. You can also line them with parchment paper. Lay the loaves on the pans.
-
Cover them with damp cloths or plastic wrap again and set to rise in a warm place again, until they come close to double in size. Preheat the oven to 375.
-
Give each loaf several deep, diagonal slashes with a sharp knife. This will allow the loaves to rise without exploding. Put the pans in the oven and throw some ice cubes in the bottom of the oven, or spray some water in with a mister, and close the oven quickly, to give the bread a nice crust.
-
Bake 25 minutes or more until the crust is golden. One pan may need to bake a few minutes longer.
-
Run some butter over the crust of the hot bread if you like, to make it shiny and even yummier.
Suppli (or Arancini)
Breaded, deep fried balls of risotto with a center of melted mozzarella.
Make the risotto first and leave time to refrigerate the suppli before deep frying.
Ingredients
- 12 cups chicken stock
- 8 + 8 Tbs butter
- 1 cup finely chopped onions
- 4 cups raw rice
- 1 cup dry white wine
- 1 cup grated parmesan cheese
To make suppli out of the risotto:
- risotto
- 1 beaten egg FOR EACH CUP OF RISOTTO
- bread crumbs or panko bread crumbs
- plenty of oil for frying
- mozzarella in one-inch cubes (I use about a pound of cheese per 24 suppli)
Instructions
-
Makes enough risotto for 24+ suppli the size of goose eggs.
Set chicken stock to simmer in a pot.In a large pan, melt 8 Tbs. of the butter, and cook onions slowly until soft but not brown.
Stir in raw rice and cook 7-8 minutes or more, stirring, until the grains glisten and are opaque.
Pour in the wine and boil until wine is absorbed.
Add 4 cups of simmering stock and cook uncovered, stirring occasionally until the liquid is almost absorbed.
Add 4 more cups of stock and cook until absorbed.
If the rice is not tender by this point, keep adding cups of stock until it is tender. You really want the rice to expand and become creamy.
When rice is done, gently stir in the other 8 Tbs of butter and the grated cheese with a fork.
-
This risotto is wonderful to eat on its own, but if you want to make suppli out of it, read on!
-
TO MAKE THE SUPPLI:
Beat the eggs and gently mix them into the risotto.
Scoop up about 1/4 cup risotto mixture. Press a cube of mozzarella. Top with another 1/4 cup scoop of risotto. Roll and form an egg shape with your hands.
Roll and coat each risotto ball in bread crumbs and lay in pan to refrigerate.
Chill for at least an hour to make the balls hold together when you fry them.
Put enough oil in pan to submerge the suppli. Heat slowly until it's bubbling nicely, but not so hot that it's smoking. It's the right temperature when little bubbles form on a wooden spoon submerged in the oil.
Preheat the oven if you are making a large batch, and put a paper-lined pan in the oven.
Carefully lower suppli into the oil. Don't crowd them! Just do a few at a time. Let them fry for a few minutes and gently dislodge them from the bottom. Turn once if necessary. They should be golden brown all over.
Carefully remove the suppli from the oil with a slotted spoon and eat immediately, or keep them warm in the oven.
I was foiled in my planned celebratory St. Joseph meal by a track meet, boo, but I think my kids would love that prosciutto bread and I may try it next year. Or maybe just next time I make bread and can steal some dough. It would be a nice change from pizza. Not that anyone asked me to change up pizza, but I’m the cook, so there.