Tuesday...
Leftover Meatloaf, Slow Roasted Tomatoes, Basil, Arugula, Grated Pecorino and Reduced Balsamic on NY Sourdough Bread smeared with Olive Oil... Fantastico!!!
Wednesday...
Leftover Ribollita Soup garnished with Grated Parmesan and Olive Oil with Crusty Dipping Bread on the side.
Ribollita Soup
2 cups cannellini beans, soaked overnight then cooked well
or...
2 cups canned cannellini beans, rinsed and drained well
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 large onion, diced
3 leeks, white and light green parts only, sliced into half moons
3 carrots, peeled sliced into half moons
3 celery stalks, peeled sliced into half moons
2 garlic cloves, sliced thinly plus 1 whole garlic clove
generous pinch of red pepper flakes
2 sprigs fresh thyme and 1 bay leaf
1/2 pound kale, roughly chopped
1/2 pound cabbage, roughly chopped
1 bunch of fresh spinach or chard, rinsed and de-stemmed
2 tablespoons tomato paste
6 cups vegetable or chicken stock
4 slices ciabatta, toasted
sea salt
freshly ground white pepper
freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
In a soup pan, heat the oil over medium-high heat until hot but not smoking. Add the onion, leek, carrots, celery, sliced garlic, red pepper flakes and herbs. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables begin to soften, about 8 minutes or so. Add the kale and cabbage and cook until the cabbage has softened and the flavors have blended, about 10 minutes. Add the tomato paste, and stir until the tomato paste is caramelized throughout the vegetables. Add the stock and beans and let simmer until the flavors are well blended, about 30 minutes more. Remove from heat and add the spinach or chard and stir. Remove the sprigs of thyme and bay leaf. Season with salt and freshly ground white pepper.
Toast or grill the ciabatta bread until both sides are browned. Gently rub one side of the ciabatta crust with reserved whole garlic clove. Serve the soup very hot in warmed bowls with a slice or two of ciabatta placed at the bottom of each bowl. Garnish with freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano and a drizzle of olive oil.
Thursday...
Leftover Sauteed Chicken Cutlet, Mixed Bell Peppers and Onion Medley, Slow Roasted Tomatoes, Arugula and Grated Pecorino on Italian Bread smeared with Olive Oil.
TGIF...
Leftover Grilled Sirloin, Charred Slow Roasted Tomatoes, Shaved Parmesan, Arugula, Basil and Reduced Balsamic on Ciabatta smeared with Olive Oil.
Sicilian Pesto Bruschetta
Roast Brine Chicken Rubbed with Toasted Spices
Raisin and Pine Nut Agrodolce
End of Summer Corn and Tomato Salad
Apple Blackberry Crumble
For the Sicilian Pesto we married both fresh and slow roasted Romas to achieve a rich complexity of taste that was to die for.
For the recipe...
Become a friend of Chris Coppola Leibner and a fan of Just Simply... Cuisine!!!
]]>Grilled to medium rare perfection, rested and sliced thinly on a diagonal against the grain.
Corn on the Cob...
In a large pot of cold water with a splash of milk... no lid.
Brought to a boil then heat turned off. Lid on until ready to serve.
Garden Fresh Tomatoes...
Cut in bite size pieces and tossed in basil pesto.
Cukes...
Sliced and anointed with red wine vinegar.
Rustic Bread...
Thickly sliced, grilled with a drizzle of olive oil.
Peach, Blueberry and Blackberry Crumble...
with Breyers Natural Vanilla.
Here's Just Simply... Cuisine's recipe...
Caramelized Onions
3 tablespoons olive oil or enough to coat the bottom of a wide bottom pan
3 large "hard when pressed" yellow onions...
peeled, cut in half lengthwise and sliced thickly
1 T vanilla sugar
Sea salt
Freshly ground white pepper
Heat a wide bottom heavy saucepan over medium heat. Add the sliced onions and cook, stirring, until wilted. Reduce the heat to medium low and continue to slow cook, stirring frequently until the onions turn golden in color. Add the sugar and cook until the onions turn deep brown. Season with sea salt and pepper and remove from heat. Serve immediately
Ingredients
Fresh, local green beans
Pecorino cheese
Olive oil
Lemon
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper
To make...
Rinse and stem beans leaving them whole.
Fill a wide bottom pan with water so that it is 2 inches high up the sides. On a high heat... bring the water to a boil and then add a teeny tiny pinch of baking soda... it keeps the color of green vegetables vibrant. Cover with a loose fitting lid.
Turn down heat to a medium and add beans making sure they are fully submerged in the water. Blanch them at a low boil for 3 -5 minutes depending on their size... tasting them along the way to achieve your desired crispness.
Remove beans from heat immediately into a colander rinsing them in cold water to stop the cooking. Drain well and transfer to a serving bowl.
While still warm season the beans with sea salt and freshly ground pepper.
Drizzle with olive oil and add a handful of grated Pecorino. Then... anoint with the juice of a half a lemon... leaving the seeds behind. Toss well.
Serve immediately and enjoy!
Adaptation...
Add fresh arugula and or fresh summer herbs just before tossing.
Every summer I leave our AMAZING teaching kitchen in DC to pass time at our 1965 beach cottage on the Outer Banks of North Carolina. I cross my fingers and hold my breath that the original GE four burner stove top and oven works. And... every summer it does.
I LOVE our 45 year old General Electric stove. Although a challenge to cook on... it turns out our favorites... summer after summer after summer like... Gus's Fried Chicken, The New Basics Paella and Peach and Blueberry Rustic Tart.
He'd caught the fish and needed a refresher on how to cook it like we did in class a few weeks ago.
Here's what we told him...
Clean, scale and gut the Snapper.
Rinse and dry them good. Sea salt and pepper them inside and out.
Then... rub them down with olive oil.
Thinly slice 4 cloves of garlic, 2 scallions and an orange, lemon and lime.
Stuff the fish with your garlic, scallions and citrus and fasten them closed with skewers... saving some of the sliced citrus for later.
Grill Snapper basting with olive oil to avoid sticking.
You'll know when its done if the flesh is white and moist.
Just before serving... anoint with the juice of some of the reserved citrus.
Garnish with the rest of the citrus slices and some chopped flat leaf parsley.
Enjoy!!!
]]>For the Fried Chicken, we followed a favorite of ours here at Just Simply...Cuisine, Gus's Fried Chicken from Gus Vanderbilt's restaurant in Memphis. For those interested, the recipe is in the Saveur Cooks Authentic American Cookbook. If you are ever in Memphis, you MUST visit Gus's Fried Chicken. It is an unforgettable experience.
We soaked the chicken in buttermilk overnight and then we covered it in flour, paprika, cayenne, salt, freshly ground pepper and Old Bay and deep-fried it. The boys loved it!
Next, we made homemade pasta by creating a well of flour and adding beaten eggs into the center. We combined the flour to the egg mixture a little bit at a time until we had a pliable dough. We let the dough rest for thirty minutes and then we ran it through a pasta maker.
We used a very simple Roman sauce, Cacio e Pepe to adorn the pasta. The boys may never feel the same about eating dried pasta again!
]]>Our menu...
Grilled Marinated Skirt Steak Fajitas
Pan Toasted Tortillas
Jalapenos and Onions Roasted in a Grill Pouch
Chipotle Cream
Gan's Blueberry Buckle with Whipped Cream
Just a hint of chipotle peppers in adobe sauce created the perfect amount of fire in our Chipotle Cream garnish for our fajitas. See the recipe below....
Chipotle Cream
1-2 chipotle peppers from a can of chipotle peppers in adobe sauce
The juice of half a lime
½ cup sour cream
¼ cup mayonnaise
½ cup fresh cilantro, finely chopped
Sea salt
Freshly ground white pepper
In a mini food processor or blender, mix the above ingredients until pureed. Adjust seasoning for taste and set aside.
And for dessert...
Gan's Blueberry Buckle
Batter:
¼ cup unsalted butter
¾ cup sugar
1 egg
½ cup milk
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
2 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed and drained
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Butter and flour an 8" square baking pan.
Sift dry ingredients together and set aside.
Beat butter and sugar together. Add egg and beat until incorporated. Slowly blend in milk. Mix in dry ingredients. Gently stir in blueberries.
Topping:
Mix together with a fork...
2/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
½ tsp cinnamon
1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted
Drizzle over batter.
Bake for 35-40 minutes or when center is poked with a knife it comes out clean. Eat warm with vanilla ice cream.
]]>In the meantime... heat a large saute pan over medium heat and add enough extra virgin olive oil to generously cover the bottom.
Add a large pinch of red pepper flakes and a teaspoon or two of minced garlic. Remove from heat and stir.
Add cooked pasta, a handful of freshly grated Parmesan and toss. Season with sea salt and freshly ground pepper. Garnish with fresh basil chiffonade.
]]>
Our senior boys worked to till the soil around potatoes, clean scallions and plant Christmas trees. It was a enlightening experience to see the GREAT amount of work that goes into producing food without chemicals. The boys were all very tired!
After a hard day's work, we were very hungry for lunch so we ate our homemade roast beef sandwiches. We had roasted our own beef bottom-roast to medium-rare with our Landon boys on Tuesday morning which we covered in clarified butter and seasonings. When we told the boys we were packing roast beef sandwiches to bring, they asked where we were getting them from. Much to their surprise, we were not going to the deli to buy their sandwiches, we were making our own roast beef.
The consensus: Just simply...delicious.
We began by making the "Perfect Burger" with our first class. We followed the recipe for "The Perfect California Burger" from Marion Cunningham's cookbook The Supper Book. Ms. Cunningham credits her hamburger-making expertise to Bob Wian, the developer of Bob's Big Boys. In her recipe she calls for hamburger meat with 1/3 part fat. Now, it is incredibly difficult to find any good quality hamburger meat made from happy and well-treated cow, so to FATTEN up our 15% fat content hamburger meat, we added some clarified butter. To our burger mix, we added chopped onions and seasoning. The boys took care of the assemblage and the grilling. It was a great success and we served the burgers with homemade potato fries and sweet potato fries.
Thank you Marion Cunningham for the Perfect Burger!
With our afternoon class, we made Coppola's pizza with homemade marinara sauce and Kate's recipe for Potato Pizza which she brought back with her from Italy.
Potato and Rosemary Pizza
1 container store-bought pizza dough
1 large potato, russet or yukon gold, peeled and thinly sliced
3 sprigs of Rosemary
1/2 cup freshly grated Gruyere cheese (Fontina, Parmesan or Pecorino can be substituted)
Olive Oil, Salt and Pepper
Preheat grill or oven and pizza stone to 475 degrees.
Stretch and roll out room temperature, Place dough on a lightly floured surface. Carefully remove pizza stone from the oven (it's hot!). Place the stretched dough on top of the pizza stone and roll it to the edges of the stone with a rolling pin if need be.
Sprinkle dough with liberally with olive oil and salt.
Layer the potatoes from the outside in, leaving very little room for crust, until the entire pizza is covered.
Then, top with grated gruyere cheese and chopped rosemary.
Bake on the bottom shelf of the oven or on the shelf of your charcoal grill for about 10-12 minutes or until desired doneness. You'll know when it's ready by the smell. Enjoy!
To accompany our Chicken Pecorino, we made oven-baked macaroni and cheese with a mix of Irish, New York and Wisconsin cheddar cheeses. Many of the boys in our class had never had REAL, Homemade mac n' cheese before and unfortunately only knew the boxed macaroni and cheese. If you are going to get boxed mac n' cheese, PLEASE do yourself a favor and buy Annie's. It is made with REAL ingredients, no chemicals.
To start our Mac n' Cheese we made a Roux which we then added the cheese too. A roux is the basis for many classic sauces like Bechamel.
Make your own roux at home!
1 tbsp. melted butter
1 tbsp. flour
1/4 cup whole milk
Melt the butter. Take it off the heat and whisk in the flour.
Add the milk, return to the heat and whisk until it is thick.
To roux we added a little white pepper and dried mustard. Nutmeg would work well also. Don't be afraid to experiment and enjoy!
As an experiment, we bought Italian Bread and Challah to compare which bread would make the BEST FRENCH TOAST.
The jury is still out on that one, as the boys devoured both the Challah and then continued onto the Italian Bread French Toast.
Do your own test at home to see what type of French Toast you like best. Experiment....use cinnamon raisin bread, or if you are feeling decadent, banana or pumpkin bread would be delicious! Let us know what you like best!