Mama | vmac+cheese

Friend and Foe

Posted on November 3, 2009 by vmacandcheese

I really love grapefruit. I really don’t love fennel. Who knew that when you put the two together, you’d get something revelatory?

They’re an odd pair, to be sure, but I think my respective love and loathing of each ingredient is even odder. I mean, grapefruit is a really polarizing fruit. Bitter, tart and powerful, grapefruit is probably the least liked of all citrus — or as Joe likes to say, it “tastes like a cross between an orange and a monkey’s butt.”

But since I was a little girl, I’ve loved that monkey’s butt (wait, what?). My mother was never a fan of orange juice, but she loved starting her morning with either a glass of cranberry juice or grapefruit juice (and especially grapefruit juice when I was sick. She used to insist that grapefruit juice was the only citrus I consumed when I had a cold.). Back then, it was hard to find grapefruit juice in anything except a big can. I’m surprised my tooth enamel didn’t erode more given how much grapefruit juice I drank. Texsun RRGF 46oz

Mom didn’t stop at grapefruit juice either. She showed me how to halve a grapefruit and slice between the pith (those perfect, pre-determined guidelines) to form little wedges you could pop out with a spoon. In the mornings before school, I was allowed to sprinkle the top of the fruit with granulated sugar; a sweet-sour treat to start my day.

And my love for grapefruit doesn’t stop at eating it. Much to Joe’s dismay, I tend to love grapefruit scented things — in soaps, lotions, cleaners. It just smells so fresh and luscious!

Fennel? Well, let’s just say that anything flavored like licorice has never held a special place in my heart. I didn’t even taste fennel until I was in college, but similarly flavored ingredients — black licorice, anise — have always tasted awful to me. Red Twizzlers? Fine. Black Twizzlers? Bad. Like my other nemesis, raw celery, raw fennel still makes me go “blaaarrgh,” but recently, roasted or caramelized fennel has been palatable. Only just.

[Aside: I know pastis is the thing in Provence, but I think I'm just going to have to stick to rosé while there. I don't want to be THAT American who turns their nose up at the Pernod.]

But they say that the older you get, the more you should re-visit foods you thought you hated, since your palate is always evolving (and usually for the better). So when I saw this tee tiny little fennel bulb last weekend at the market and the first pink grapefruits of the season, I was inspired to see if the two could make merry. A thick, meaty filet of halibut later, and I had a plan.

First, I preheated the oven to 375°. I wanted to try out this nifty technique from the Pioneer Woman, where you pan roast the fish and don’t flip it, so the oven had to be called into service.

Next, I cut one lovely pink grapefruit into suprêmes, and put the cut fruit and the juice from the remnants into a small bowl. I cored my itty bitty fennel bulb, then julienned it. Into the saute pan it went, with a bit of brown butter, olive oil, thyme leaves, and sliced shallot. I turned the heat up to medium high and caramelized the goods. A splash of white wine to deglaze, a sprinkle of kosher salt and black pepper, then the whole mixture was tossed with the grapefruit. It looked like this: (more…)

Filed under: Feel Good Food, Fish/Seafood, Food, Mama, Recipes | 2 Comments »

A sign of the times

Posted on November 7, 2008 by vmacandcheese

In an effort to save what little money I have and get back in the kitchen, I’ve been cooking at home a lot lately. Sometimes my relationship with cooking goes through weird phases; make no mistake, I always love to eat, but there will be times — days, or even weeks — where I just can’t muster up the energy to get in the kitchen and make something spectacular. This is when we end up eating a lot of salads, pasta, crudites and sandwiches from the deli down the street. Eventually, there is a house revolt and I’m forced to make margaritas and Mexican food for a certain someone.

But earlier this week, even before the enchiladas and our new president (!), I made a meal completely evocative of fall, and of my childhood: grilled pork chops with mustard sauce and roasted acorn squash. My mother used to make that exact dinner when I was a kid, except her approach was a bit more minimalist. She liked thinner cut shoulder chops, and would broil them with nothing more than a bit of salt and pepper. The squash was cooked in the microwave.

I told her about this dinner a few nights ago, during one of our bi-weekly chats. “Hmm,” she said greedily, thinking over the components of the meal in her mind, “I sure wish I could’ve been there.”

Me too, mama.

For the chops: (more…)

Filed under: Food, Main Courses, Mama, Recipes, Sauces, Squash, The pig | Leave a Comment »

Anything but that

Posted on October 9, 2008 by vmacandcheese

I’m about a week into dealing with a cold, and this one was particularly nasty not because of the myriad of symptoms one might typically endure, but because it completely zapped me of my energy. Yesterday and today, though, I’ve been feeling like myself again, except for one thing — I just can’t seem to shake my congestion.

Last night, Joe and I cooked dinner together for the first time in ages. The kitchen is one of those things that, historically, I’ve been a little territorial over (I know, GASP, right?), and as such he tends to sit his heiney on the couch and wait for dinner to be served (the other reason being that beyond omelets, his culinary prowess is fairly limited). But oh, does the man know how to cook salmon.

Two weekends ago, we’d purchased some filets of Loch Duart salmon and frozen a few to eat over the following weeks. Yesterday we decided to grill some up — simply, with salt, pepper, lemon and herbs — and serve it with some haricot vert that I was in charge of sauteeing.

It hadn’t even occured to me as we were cooking that I couldn’t really smell anything. I went about my business, slicing lemon, chopping parsley and thyme, sauteeing the beans in olive oil. Joe was concentrating intensely on the fish’s cross-hatched grill marks, and once he had plated it up, I was proud of what a lovely, simple dinner we’d put together (yay, teamwork!). We busted open a bottle of pinot meunier, and sat down to enjoy.

I tenderly broke off a piece of the fish, and delicately began to chew. Nothing. I couldn’t taste anything. The texture of the fish was creamy at least, but even with the seasoning and a final squirt of lemon juice, I could barely taste the flesh. Same was true of the beans.

And I got really, really sad.

So it should be unsurprising when I tell you that one of the things I hate most about being sick is losing my sense of taste. (more…)

Filed under: Childhood, Food, Joe, Mama | Leave a Comment »

Welcome to the good life.

Posted on September 22, 2008 by vmacandcheese

I’ve never known my mother to drink a whole lot. A beer here, a margarita there, but as a kid, I can’t recall many instances of her consuming more than one or two beverages in a single sitting. Moreover, it was rare that she ever purchased wine, which would only appear in our refrigerator when my grandmother would come to visit — we’d stock up on white Zinfandel.

So it came as a surprise to me when, one evening when I was in the 9th grade, she had the impulse to browse the wine section at our grocery store. It was a warm fall evening, and my mother and I had been out running errands, with a stop at the market the last of them. We needed something for a quick dinner, as it was already getting late and I still had math homework to attend to.

We’d made it through the produce section and picked up a bag of grapes, when my mother made her detour. I knew nothing about wine at the time, save the syrupy white Zin I’d been drinking with my grandmother since an age that would make most parents blush. I stood to one side, patiently for a moment, without interest, then moved closer to see what she was looking at. She’d been examining the labels, and all of a sudden, turned to me with an idea. (more…)

Filed under: Childhood, Mama, Wine | Leave a Comment »

Where’s the beef?

Posted on August 26, 2008 by vmacandcheese

If you met my grandmother, and asked her whether she loved to cook, I’d doubt she’d launch into a lengthy spiel about her various culinary experiments and jaunts to local farmers markets. In fact, I kind of imagine her giving you a wary eye and then tepidly responding with an “It can be alright,” or her signature disdain-indicating response of “It’s…interesting.” Nevertheless, she’s been known to turn out some pretty good dishes and fabulous parties, whether she’d ever admit it or not. And more importantly, I will always cite her as one of my biggest culinary influences, simply because she allowed me into the kitchen while she prepared meals. She’s also responsible for teaching me two dishes which, for me, are synonymous with comfort food.

One is beef stroganoff.

Creamy and hearty, my grandmother’s beef stroganoff used to be the be all, end all as far as satisfying dinners went. For really special occasions, she and I would roll out a batch of homemade egg noodles, which we’d make in the morning and allow to air dry all day.

Such love did I have for her beef stroganoff, I would crave it the minute I left her home after the few visits I made there each year. Finally, we penned the recipe together on a scrap piece of paper, and I took it home with me, treasuring it, and yearning to cook the dish for myself and the family. (more…)

Filed under: Childhood, Food, Indulgences, Main Courses, Mama, Other meats, Recipes | 2 Comments »