Mock Pizza

Adapted from Nigella Kitchen

Almost Pizza

Well, calling this a pizza is a bit of a stretch – think of it more as a pizza flavored Yorkshire Pudding. Nigella calls it Crustless Pizza, but this could possibly be misleading to pizza purists.

But the point is that it’s really yummy and it WILL make you happy.  It’s great as a snack, or with a salad for lunch. It’s a bit naughty and makes you feel like a kid, or I suppose if you’re not in the refuse-to-be-a-grown-up camp, this would be a great meal FOR the kids…

It’s easy and quick and cheaper than ordering real pizza, and you can change up the flavorings any way you please.

Make. Happy.

Eat!

Ingredients

1 egg

2/3 cup flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

pinch of dried oregano

1 cup whole milk

1 cup grated cheese

2 oz pepperoni or turkey pepperoni slices

Method

Preheat oven to 400. Grease a pie dish with butter, oil or cooking spray.

Whisk together the egg, flour, salt, spices, milk and half of the grated cheese. Pour into the pie dish and bake for 25 minutes.

Remove the pie dish from the oven and arrange the pepperoni slices over the crust. Sprinkle over the remaining cheese.

Place the dish back in the oven and bake for 5 more minutes.

Allow the pizza to cool slightly before removing from dish and slicing.

Serves 1 or 2 very happy kids or kids-at-heart.

Overlooking The Ordinary

As John Lennon so rightly said – life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.

Usually, those other plans are the big things – some day I’ll be famous, rich, married, published and generally so fabulous that people will be falling at my feet and showering me with rose petals every hour on the hour.

Mm hmm. Right.

In the meantime, there is life. The quiet overlooked moments. The dishes in the sink, the trillionth re-run of America’s Top Model, the tattered t-shirt you refuse to throw away, the yet un-read pile of books on the nightstand, and recipes like this one for Chicken Noodle Salad.

So ordinary that you overlook it. Not special, not trendy. No one’s tweeting about it and it’s not going to win any awards. People might even wonder what kind of an imbecile would post such a recipe (because clearly, people have nothing better to do).

But the fact is, these recipes are what happen while you’re busy making plans for bigger, more spectacular, award-winning, attention-grabbing, book-proposal-launching recipes.

Like when you’re too tired to think and you just want a bowl of starchy rice with some soy sauce and hot sauce splashed on top for dinner.

Or butter. And pasta. Sprinkle of parmesan.

Leftover chicken stir-fried with rice, chilis, peas and crushed bouillon. Yes, I said bouillon. Get over it. It’s not the enemy and works in a pinch. Because I walk to and from the grocery and those freakin’ cartons of chicken stock are heavy.

Ramen. Endless ramen. Veggies, scrambled eggs, soy. Will remain your friend long after your twenties have come and gone.

Fried egg and bacon sandwich with mayo and hot sauce. And chips. And Diet Coke. (Excuse me, you DO save calories from Diet Coke, okay?)

I love those non-recipe recipes. The ordinary “recipes” of daily life. What we eat while we’re watching stuff on Top Chef that most of us, probably, will never eat or attempt to make.

To me, those overlooked eating moments are not throwaway. They are more deeply revealing of who you are than the fanciest recipe you make from following someone else’s instructions. That food speaks more truly to the soul of your kitchen than anything else.

Not many food writers go into that kind of thing – Nigella refers to it a lot which is why I love her. You only have to see one of the midnight fridge raid portions that close her TV shows to relate immediately.

These aren’t the kind of recipes you’ll ever be known for, perhaps it’s not even the kind of recipe you want to write about, but it is still a recipe with a story and a more intimate, revealing story than all the buttercream recipes ever compiled in the world.

Because it’s just what you do in your kitchen, by yourself, that neither you nor anyone else would even notice.

And that’s where life happens.

Chicken Noodle Salad

I think what I had in mind while I was half-consciously tossing this together were the cold noodle salads I used to get at my school cafeteria. Now I know cafeteria food is normally the kind of thing you want to forget, not re-create but just call it one of the perks of going to school in Bangkok. There was a noodle stand where we would buy hot bowls of “sen-mee lukchin” or white rice noodles with meatballs (what the meatballs were actually made of were a source of great debate amongst  7^th graders).

By the noodle stand were several bowls of condiments – 9 or 10 of them. The condiments are key to creating noodle soup and my friends and I would spice up our bowls like they were works of art and then have a taste of each others creations to see who had done the best that day.

Quite a world away from a cold turkey sandwich and an apple.

Some drowned their soup in soy, others liked the tang of a particular condiment made from vinegar and red chilis, I was always partial to the fish sauce with thai bird chilis (nam pla prikinoo). You had to sprinkle with crushed red pepper and of course you got extra points for having the spiciest noodle bowl at the table.

You could also opt for noodles without broth, and you had a choice of egg noodles instead of the thin rice noodles. When I was in an egg noodle sort of mood, I would skip the broth, the noodle lady would put on lots of cilantro and bean sprouts and I would douse the whole thing in soy, nam pla and crushed red pepper.

The noodle salad I created here is a much tamer, sub-conscious version of that memory.

Ingredients

4 oz angel hair pasta

¼ cup sliced red onions

1 cup cooked chicken, shredded

2-3 tablespoons soy sauce

3-4 Thai bird chiles, chopped

Big handful cilantro, roughly chopped

1 tablespoon toasted pine nuts

Method

Soak the red onion in some cold water for 10-15 minutes, then drain and squeeze out the excess water. This takes some of the acrid bite out of the onion.

Cook the pasta then drain and rinse under cold water until the noodles are cold.

In a large bowl, toss the chicken, onions, pasta and soy sauce together. Add the remaining ingredients and toss well.

What can I say, it’s that simple.

Serves 2 extraordinarily ordinary people.

Moody Foodie

The weather has been as moody and stubborn as an angst-ridden teenager lately. And while the strawberries are speaking to me at the market,  the gungey (not sure what gungey means or if it’s even a word, but it seems apropos for the weather) rain-soaked, bleary, stagnantly depressed atmosphere in New York is not putting me in a juicy red strawberry mood.

One needs a sunny day to really appreciate the full strawberry effect, don’t you think? At least I do. Given that I’m more of an emotional cook than a seasonal cook, my mood is syncing right up with the burdened atmosphere. The weather is so bleak lately it feels as though the universe has given up on us and just couldn’t be bothered any longer.

Deep, weary sigh.

But do not despair, for kitchen therapy awaits. Comfort and spice to combat the bleak mood and a good dose of simmering and stirring and pottering about the kitchen. Makes the most of a dreary day.

Speaking of moody – how’s this for a gorgeous moody picture?

That’s granola – chocolate granola to be precise. This was a bit of a disaster though – I wasn’t paying attention, used too much sugar and syrup, forgot to add the sesame seeds, had too hot an oven and burned everything.

See what I mean? The weather is wreaking havoc with my mind.

Never to worry – I will be trying a second batch of these as even the burnt batch was quite good.

For now, since I’m totally thinking “November” even though it’s May, I did a bit of right-on-target seasonal spring cleaning of my fridge and cupboards and cobbled together this Chili Cornbread Cobbler.

Quite appropriate, I’d say, for a spring that’s having a bit of an identity crisis this time around.

Chili Cornbread Cobbler

Chili Adapted from Nigella Kitchen

Cobbler Adapted from Gourmet

The most fascinating thing about this recipe is the chili – which has no onion and no garlic and yet you will not miss it. I normally like highly spiced, highly flavored food, so when I made this the first time I was really skeptical. But surprisingly, I liked the minimalistic take on chili here so much that it is now my go-to chili recipe. The beef is somehow beefier, front and center. The chorizo, itself packed with so much flavor, more than makes up for the lack of aromatics. I think it’s crucial you get a really good quality can of chopped tomatoes though – if they are too acidic, it will ruin the whole thing.

The cocoa powder (unsweetened, of course) is a surprise element but it adds something ineffable to the chili – just makes it better though you don’t know why. The oregano then is the key flavor that comes through here, perfect with the beef, chorizo and tomatoes…simple, but so good.

The cornbread cobbler is a cute idea. I love one pot meals so this really does it for me.

Ingredients

Chili

3 oz. chorizo sausage, sliced into half-moons

1 lb. ground beef, lean

1/2 teaspoon cocoa powder

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 tablespoon tomato paste

14 oz canned, diced tomatoes

1/2 cup water

2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce

Cornbread

2/3 cup yellow cornmeal

1/3 cup flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup whole milk

1 large egg

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons sharp cheddar cheese, grated

Method

Chili

In a medium-sized, oven-safe skillet, brown the chorizo over medium heat until it lets off its orangey fat. Add the beef and break up the meat with your wooden cooking spoon. Let everything brown. When the meat has lost most of its rawness, add the cocoa powder and oregano. Season with salt to taste. Stir well. Plop in the tomato paste and stir again until the paste vanishes into the meat. Now add the chopped tomatoes, water and Worcestershire sauce. Stir again. Let the meaty, tomatoey pan-full come to a bubble bubble toil and trouble and then reduce the heat to low. Simmer for about 10 minutes.

While the chili is simmering, make the cornbread topper.

Cornbread

Pre-heat the oven to 400.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the cornmeal, flour, baking powder and salt. Measure out the milk in a liquid measuring cup, plop in the egg and the oil and whisk well. Add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and stir to create a golden yellow batter. Add 1/2 cup of the cheese and fold through.

Assemble

Turn the heat off under the pan of chili. Using a biggish spoon, drop mounds of the cornbread batter on top of the chili, creating a cobbler effect. Sprinkle the top with the remaining 2 tablespoons of cheese. Bake for about 15-20 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the cornbread comes out clean.

Serves 4 dreary people who may or may not have S.A.D. (Have S.A.D? Be SAD? Either way, have some cobbler, you’ll feel better).

Wants

When Elizabeth Gilbert was promoting her book Eat, Pray, Love on (where else) Oprah, one of the most profound pieces of advice she gave was to identify what you want. Correction – what you really, really, really want. You have to say it three times.

She was right. There is a subtle but crucial difference between things we want, and what we really, really, really want. For instance, I might want, I dunno – to eat the entire batch of these yummy cornmeal cookies all by myself in one sitting. But what I really, really, really want is to be toned and fit and healthy for life.

Get my drift?

Most of us go through life wanting a whole bunch of random things. The Manolo Blahniks, the Iphones, that cute guy who was checking you out at the bookstore. We get more serious, we venture into the “big” things – a fulfilling career, a happy marriage, kids. Maybe at some point we even get a bit spiritual and say, well all I want is peace, all I want is to give back. Most of these decisions though are nudged upon us from the outside. We want it because other people have it. We want it so we’ll fit in. We want it so we don’t feel lonely. We want it to feel validated.

Those aren’t real wants.

What you really, really, really want comes straight out of your heart. Your heart. And usually, it’s one thing – one big overriding theme that has tagged alongside you your whole life, sometimes quietly, sometimes ragingly. Sometimes we ignore it because it’s too painful, or too out of reach, or too much against the norm, so we’ll end up distracting ourselves trying to fulfill other, less authentic wants. But your true desire never quite leaves you. It’s always there, an integral part of you, waiting for the day you will give it your full attention.

The hard part isn’t always going after what we want. Sometimes, it’s knowing and acknowledging what we want that’s half the battle.

Do you know what you really, really, really want?

Savory Cornmeal Cookies - makes 3 dozen cookies

(adapted from Country Living)

These cornmeal cookies may not fall under the “3 reallys” category of wants, but you’ll want them for sure. They are the crazy love child of a scone, a muffin and a cookie. However they were conceived, they’re delicious – all by themselves or as an accompaniment to soups and stews. Just don’t eat the whole batch in one sitting and cancel out the sweaty 45 minutes you spent trying to convince Jillian Michaels not to kill you.

1 cup yellow cornmeal

1/2 cup all purpose flour

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon cayenne (use 1/8 if you don’t like heat)

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

1 cup sharp Cheddar cheese

2 tablespoons butter, melted

1 large egg

2/3 cups water

Preheat oven to 400. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper

Whisk together the cornmeal, flour, salt, sugar, baking powder, cayenne and black pepper until well combined. Stir in the cheese.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the melted butter, egg and water. Pour the egg mixture into the flour mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until a smooth ball of dough forms.

Drop rounded teaspoonfuls of the dough onto prepared baking sheets. Bake 12-14 minutes, or until golden brown. Cool on wire racks.