The Maltese Bacon

A Little Bit of This, a Little Bit of That

Sunday nights can go two ways. They can hang rather dull, tinged with the anticipation of another work week. On the other hand, they can be perfectly cozy like putzing around in your striped socks with a cuppa tea when it's cold outside. Yesterday fell into the second variety - a nice and easy cooking party/potluck dinner at Joanna and Horaci’s sweet new place. They had just moved to Park Slope to get ready for the arrival of a baby girl.

The potluck was a free for all but not as crazily incoherent as one might expect from a group that represented a cracked U.N. cafeteria of America, Australia, Spain, India, China and Vietnam.

On the menu:
Cold Vichysoisse (Joanna)
Cod Brandade (Horaci)
Cilantro chicken (Pooja and Harshad)
Plantain cakes (me)
Fried eggplant (Yogeeta and Hrishi)
Tofu & avocado salad and ganache icing cupcakes (John)

I’ve never had a vichysoisse cold. Very refreshing. Horaci made a yummy cod brandade to eat with bread. He usually makes it with salt cod, like a good Catalan would do, but he couldn’t find salt cod being a newbie in the neighborhood, so he used fresh fish. He was telling me about a more traditional Catalan version that uses mashed potatoes instead of béchamel which sounds intriguing.

Here is his recipe for last night’s dish in his words:

Brandada de bacallà
With the fresh cod (1 pound yesterday), you just have to boil it. Put it in cold water, and when the water starts rippling, remove and let cool. Then mush it with the blender.
On the side, make a béchamel with olive oil instead of butter. Yesterday’s had half a wine glass of olive oil and a full water glass of milk, plus 4 soup spoons of flour (sorry for the weird Spanish units of measure.)
While the cod and the béchamel are warm, mix them well and add the cream (to your taste, I forgot how many soup spoons it was, but I ignored it anyway).
Add parsley and serve on thin slices of fried bread.

The Best Black Eyed Peas

It is 10am and Pooja presents to me a container of black eyed peas that she made the night before. The dish is made with coconut oil and is so rich and flavorful, I am savoring each bean as slowly as I can. The recipe is courtesy of her mom, Mrs. Rao, who had delivered a knock-out blow dinner one night when she was visiting here from Bombay. I still need to get the recipe for her chicken curry.

Black Eye Peas in Spicy Coconut Curry (Adapted from Mrs. Rao)

The recipe was originally intended for masoor dal but Pooja made it with black eyed peas.

3 cups black eyed peas (soaked and cooked so that they are still a little firm) or 2 cans
1 tablespoons of coriander seeds
6 dried red chilies
2-3 grains fenugreek seeds
2 teaspoons of coconut oil
2 cans unsweetened coconut milk
1 tablespoon of tamarind
¾ teaspoon mustard seeds
5 curry leaves (torn into smaller pieces, for more flavor)
A pinch of asafoetida
coconut oil (if you don't have coconut oil, which can be found at an Indian grocery store, you can use olive oil)

Saute one onion in some olive oil . Set aside. Add 2 teaspoons of coconut oil to the pan, set to medium heat. Wait for the oil to heat up and add 1 tablespoon of coriander seeds, 6 dried red chilies and 2-3 grains of fenugreek seeds. Pour the spices into a blender along with the coconut milk and the tamarind. Blend to a fine paste. Then in a pan put 1 teaspoon coconut oil and add the mustard seeds, curry leaves and a pinch of asafoetida. When it splutters add the black eyed peas and the coconut milk paste. Bring it to a boil. Serve with rice or chappati. (Note from Mrs. Rao: Dad would have added a small piece of jaggery to make it tastier. Jaggery should always be preferred to sugar - good for health.)

...

I'm sorry I haven't been around this week. I won't have anything for you until hopefully next week. Sayonara!

Zurich is dead, but steak ain't.

What happens when family comes to visit? Lombardi’s is planned for Thursday. Saturday dim sum is planned by Tuesday. Reservations for a steakhouse are made for the night before, without your knowledge (thank you Tina). Basically, the food blogger, who is usually asked “Where should we eat?” to exhaustion is no longer asked this question. She is taken on a tour of food and force fed, to her delight. By Sunday, with my cousin Chi Thu and her husband Steve safely in the air, I was just hoping for a serving of cantaloupe and some cottage cheese.

The steakhouse in question was Del Frisco’s Double Eagle, a reputable chain that started in Dallas. I’ve never been to a steak house in New York so I was super excited. The place is dramatic - soaring ceilings and windows overlooking 6th Avenue in Rockefeller Center. It was not as packed as I would have thought. (Was subprime tamping down the Amex action?) On the menu, it says they are not responsible for steaks ordered well done. Good for them. I ordered the bone in rib eye steak, medium. The rib-eye is the fattiest and most delicious cut. Vroom vroom vroom, it was good. It had a nice salt and pepper crust to it, and it was very tender. We ordered the gnocchi (too big and creamy), the creamed corn (v. good) and the asparagus side (whatevs). The steak was the star and that was okay. I took the 2 bites that I had left home and gnawed on the bone in the morning before I left for dim sum.

On Saturday, the cousins wanted Italian food. I decided to meddle this time. Try making reservations at an Italian restaurant downtown on a Saturday night, hours beforehand. I called a handful of places in the West and East Village. Every place was booked to the gills, unless I wanted to eat at 6:30pm or 10:30pm. And then I dug up a name from long ago, Via Emilia, a quaint place that I hadn’t revisited since I worked in Gramercy. They didn’t take reservations. Perfect! They had gotten a nice makeover since I last went. Specializing in the food of Modena, they offer tigelle, a flat bread shaped into discs that you eat with prosciutto, coppa, salami and cheese. Most of the pastas there are lovingly handmade. There was a beautiful corn and tuna soup. A non-boring bruschetta.They keep the prices modest, so they don’t take credit card.

Del Frisco’s Double Eagle Steak House
1221 Sixth Ave., New York, NY 10020
at 49th St.
212-575-5129

Via Emilia
47 E 21st St. New York 10010
Btwn Bway & Park Ave.
212-505-3072