Bright green!

Apparently you all love Anne Burrell! Who knew? She rocked the poll last week with her book Cook Like a Rock Star.

As I mentioned in my review of this book many months ago, I really love the book in theory. The problem comes when you actually want to cook from it. A lot of the recipes require pretty rare and/or expensive ingredients.

So I tried to pick a recipe that would be accessible to people.

The pasta recipes called out to me. She really knows her pasta and while she pretty much always recommends making fresh pasta, a lot of the recipes can be easily adapted to use dried pasta.

This recipe caught my eye this week so I went for it. It turned out to be really interesting and delicious.

Arugula Walnut Pesto

Yield: Enough for 1 pound of pasta.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 cup walnuts
3 cups baby arugula
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup Pecorino cheese, grated
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup olive oil
1 cup hot pasta water
1/2 cup heavy cream
Kosher salt
Big fat finishing oil

Helpful Equipment:
Food Processor

Directions:

1) Lay out walnuts on a sheet pan and roast them for about 6 minutes at 350 degrees. Watch them closely and turn them once half way through.

2) Combine walnuts, arugula, cheeses, and garlic in a food processor and pulse until it's a rough paste.

3) Drizzle in olive oil and pulse again.

4) Add pesto to a small pan and add about 1 cup of hot pasta water to the pan. Stir well.

5) Bring to a simmer, stir in cream, and continue to simmer. Season with salt and pepper.

6) When pasta is done, drain it and add it straight to the pesto.

7) Serve with a drizzle of finishing oil and extra grated cheese.

Recipe from Cook Like a Rock Star.

The Basics

A normal pesto recipe is based on buckets of basil, garlic, Parmesan cheese, and pine nuts. A lot of times I won’t even follow a recipe for it. I’ll just kind of wing it with those ingredients.

This is a very similar recipe in theory but substitutes arugula for the basil and walnuts for the pine nuts.

Speaking of nuts, I’m pretty sure Anne Burrell is one. Under this recipe in her book she writes in big bold type:

“I love the feel of nuts in my mouth!”

Ok Anne. I don’t really know what to think about that so here’s a photo of some nuts just so we can make sure we are on the same page.

Love these!

Anne recommends, and I agree, that you toast these bad boys before using them. Just lay them out on a baking sheet and bake them at 350 degrees for about 6-7 minutes.

I recommend setting a timer and watching them closely because these will go from perfect to burnt in about 30 seconds.

Making the Pesto

Arugula is no where near as flavorful as basil so you really need to use a lot of it for this recipe. Don’t worry about over-doing it.

No basil needed.

Once your walnuts are toasted, add them to a food processor with a good amount of arugula, grated cheese, and some minced garlic and you’re ready to go!

Ready to blend!

Pulse this down until it’s a rough paste and then drizzle in your olive oil and continue to pulse.

Perfect paste.

Finishing the Pesto

The key to finishing this pesto, which is now way to dry to really use, is to make a sauce out of it.

To do this, add the paste to a medium saucepan and get it cooking over medium heat. Then add about a cup of hot water from the pasta that you’re cooking straight to the pot!

This water will be salty and starchy and really help make this pesto into something useable.

Magic ingredient.

Once you get the pasta water stirred in, go ahead and add some cream and your sauce will really come alive.

The color of this is amazing!

Love the color.

Put this back on the heat and keep it warm until your pasta is done.

The Pasta

Anne’s big on homemade pasta and so am I. I kind of think of homemade pasta as a special occasion thing though and not an every night situation.

So I just used some dried linguine and it worked great.

Homemade pasta would be best...

Big Fat Finishing Oil

In about 25% of the recipes in this cookbook, Anne recommends finishing the dish with what she called a “Big Fat Finishing Oil.” What she means by this is a really good quality olive oil (read: expensive).

You would never actually cook with this stuff because the heat would immediately break down the flavors. You just drizzle it on right before you serve the dish.

I’m not an olive oil expert, but I picked out a nice bottle that definitely tasted a lot fresher than the stuff I use to cook. It worked great to finish the dish.

Big Fat Finishing Oil?

Once the pasta is drained just stir it into the sauce and then serve it up!

Extra grated cheese and a good drizzle of the nice oil rounds out the pasta perfectly.

Really tasty!

I’m was really surprised by the flavors in this pesto. They were very different from normal pesto.

It was a great change and Betsy and I both gave it two big fat finishing thumbs up!

Well, this was just fantastic.

Betsy and I went to a very fun birthday party a few weeks ago that was a fondue party – great idea for a party. A few people were in charge of bringing large quantities of cheese and everyone else brought booze or things to dip in the cheese.

The standard fondue recipe is normally based on Gruyere or some other swiss cheese mixed with white wine and cooked until melted and smooth. It’s very good, but also a bit on the pricey side.

So, I thought it would be fun to try to come up with a fondue-ish dish that’s a bit easier on the wallet but still delivers in the flavor department.

The secret: Port wine cheese.

The second secret: Stout.

Port Wine Cheese Fondue

Yield: Serves 8-10.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

24 ounces port wine cheese
1 12 ounce stout beer
1/2 teaspoon fresh nutmeg, grated
Crusty bread for dipping

Helpful Equipment:
Microplane

Directions:

1) Pour stout into a medium pan and heat over medium heat.

2) Once stout is steaming, start whisking in port wine cheese in 3 batches. Once one batch is melted, add the next one.

3) Whisk the cheese regularly. It might look as if it is separating but eventually it will melt together with the stout and form a smooth dip.

4) Add nutmeg and turn heat down to medium-low.

5) Continue to simmer until fondue thickens, about 10 more minutes. Serve immediately with cubes of crusty bread. It reheats really well also.

Port Wine What?

Port wine cheese is not the most popular of cheeses and this is a huge travesty in my mind. Granted, it’s a bit on the processed side, but the ingredients aren’t all that bad.

It has things like cheddar cheese, cream, and yes… even port wine in it.

Really just two things.

Normally, you just eat it at room temperature because it’s spreadable, but I figured it would be just as good melted in a big pot.

I made a bunch of this, but you could easily half the recipe.

Just for cost comparison, 8 ounces of port wine cheese will run you about $4 while 8 ounces of Gruyere will run you about A MORTGAGE PAYMENT.

Processed.

Doing the Fondue

This can barely be called a recipe. Basically you just toss all the ingredients in a pot and whisk them until they are smooth and melted. Done.

I used a whole bottle of good stout. You’re saving some money on the cheese. Don’t use Miller Lite to make this.

Action shot!

Put this over medium heat and just start adding the port wine cheese in chunks until it’s melted.

A whisk helps to stir everything well.

As your port wine cheese melts, it will go through this phase where it looks like maybe it’s separating. Don’t fret. Just keep whisking and eventually it will combine with the stout and be smooth and delicious.

Melt and whisk and repeat.

The only other ingredient in this fondue besides cheese and beer is fresh nutmeg. It adds a nice, subtle spice flavor to the fondue.

I guess it’s optional, but if you happen to have some, grate it in.

Always good in fondue.

That’s pretty much all there is too it. Once your nutmeg is in, just keep simmering the cheese sauce until it’s the thickness that you want.

I simmered mine for probably ten minutes, whisking pretty regularly, and then called it good.

You can serve this with lots of stuff to dip, but cubes of good crusty bread were my personal favorite.

This makes a lot.

The nice thing about this fondue is that since you start with spreadable cheese, the fondue is actually useable even at room temperature.

This is not true for traditional fondue which turns into a big block of cheese if you take it off the burner for a few minutes.

Dip. Eat. Repeat.

I’m a huge fan of traditional fondue, but this was a really delicious (and cheap) alternative.

Even if you’re not a Wall Street Executive, now you too can enjoy the fun of dipping things in melted cheese!

Hard to get healthier than this!

After a weekend of over-indulgence, I’m always in the mood for something that’s really quick and healthy.

I definitely don’t want anything with meat or cheese in it. For once.

This recipe was inspired by a recipe that was in the most recent Bon Appetit. I say inspired because I changed almost every main ingredient except chickpeas. The original had chicken in it, but I felt like keeping it veggie packed so I nixed the chicken and added in a few potatoes and some kale.

The bonus piece of cutting out the chicken is that it also trims about 20 minutes off of your prep time.

Thirty Minute Chickpea Stew

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

2 15-ounce cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed
1 1/2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cubed
1 small bunch kale leaves, chopped
1 quart vegetable stock
1/2 cup roasted red peppers, chopped
1/4 cup olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
2 bay leaves
3 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons ground cumin
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
Crusty bread
Salt and pepper

Directions:

1) Add olive oil to a large heavy pot over medium-low heat. Add minced garlic and red pepper flakes. Cook for a few minutes until fragrant.

2) Add in cubed potatoes, tomato paste, and cumin. Turn the heat up to medium and cook for 5 minutes, stirring regularly.

3) Add in vegetable stock, chickpeas, bay leaves, roasted red peppers, and a pinch of salt and pepper. Bring to a simmer and simmer until potatoes are soft, another 10 minutes.

4) Stir in kale and lemon juice. Season with salt and pepper.

5) Break up some crusty bread in the bottom of a bowl. Ladle stew over bread. Serve immediately.

A Basic Stew

I think one of the best things you can learn as an at-home cook is to master the simple veggie stew. Learn how to balance the spices and flavors in a stew and you can usually make a fantastic meal with a few fresh veggies, a few canned foods, and some simple stock and spices.

For this version (and for a lot of stews that I make), these are some of the basics.

Just some basics.

I was worried that by cutting out the chicken, my stew wouldn’t have enough body to be really filling. I’m not sure if that’s entirely true because there’s still bread in the soup also.

But, I decided to add in a few chopped potatoes at the last minute.

I liked the potato addition, but I also think it would’ve worked fine without them.

Gives the stew some body.

Canned chickpeas makes this stew super-quick. It would add on at least an hour to use dried chickpeas and I’m not sure you would get much for your extra work.

Just be sure to drain and rinse the chickpeas well.

I think I’m almost in the market for a new strainer…

Rinse these guys pretty well.

Making the Stew

To start the stew, we need to infuse some oil with two really flavorful things: garlic and red pepper flakes.

Two of my favorite things.

The key to doing this correctly is cooking the garlic and pepper flakes over fairly low heat for a few minutes. If you crank the heat to high, you’ll completely char the garlic.

Instead, just add them to the olive oil over medium-low heat for a few minutes. When it starts to get really fragrant, you know it’s ready to go. The garlic shouldn’t even be browned really.

Low heat is important..

Next, add in the potatoes, tomato paste, and cumin.

This will immediately start to smell amazing. Stir it all together and let it cook for a few minutes. You can turn your heat up a bit to medium at this point.

Already smellin' good.

After a few minutes of that, just pour in the vegetable stock, add the bay leaves and chickpeas, and bring the whole thing to a simmer.

At this point the stew is pretty much done when the potatoes are cooked through which will probably take another 10 minutes or so.

Love that color...

Finishing the Stew

There’s a few ingredients to add to the end of the stew that completely make it in my opinion. First, roasted red peppers. Honestly, I’m not sure that I’ve ever had roasted red peppers in a stew before but they worked great and paired really well with the chickpeas.

Next, I added some chopped kale. You could also use something like swiss chard if you wanted. A leafy, sturdy green really helps the stew out though.

One of the most important ingredients is lemon juice. The acid just makes all the flavors really pop. Don’t forget it!

Gotta toss in some greens.

Once all that stuff is stirred in, just season it with salt and pepper and you’re ready to go.

This stew took me about 30 minutes to make and I was taking photos and stuff. You could probably make it even faster!

Serving the Stew

The stew tastes good as-is, but to really turn it into a meal, just put about 1/2 cup of torn bread into the bottom of your bowl before you serve it. Any super-crusty and slightly stale bread will work great.

Hidden bread!

Then just ladle on the stew with some of the broth and you’re all set.

Hard to beat in my opinion.

Betsy and I devoured this and we had plenty for leftovers also.

Give this a shot this week if you are crunched for time and looking for something healthy and filling!

Better than it looks. Promise.

The first time I saw tempeh in the store I thought that whoever first made it must have been very hungry. It doesn’t look too appetizing.

The first time I ate tempeh I thought that whoever first made it was a freakin’ genius.

I think it’s one of the most under-rated foods around. Trust me. It’s not just for vegetarians and health nuts. It’s for anyone who likes really good food that easy to make.

Tempeh has more flavor and texture than tofu and is about ten times easier to make.

In fact, one of my favorite tacos to this day is my crispy tempeh tacos. This is actually kind of a riff on that dish made as a breakfast instead of a dinner. I ate this breakfast two days in a row which is pretty rare for me. It was just that good.

The Tempeh Scramble

Yield: Serves 2.

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

4-6 ounces tempeh, crumbled
1/2 red or orange pepper, diced
1 jalapeno, seeded and minced
2 scallions, diced
2 tablespoons salsa
4 large eggs, scrambled
1 teaspoon vegetable oil
3 ounces pepper jack cheese, grated
1 avocado, sliced
Cilantro
Flour tortillas
Salt and pepper

Helpful Equipment:
Cast Iron Skillet

Directions:

1) Crumble tempeh and dice all your veggies. Mix the veggies in a bowl with salsa.

2) Add the small amount of vegetable oil to a cast iron skillet and get it hot over medium-high heat.

3) Add the tempeh and cook until it's well browned, about 5-6 minutes.

4) Stir in veggies and salsa and season with salt and pepper. Cook for a minute or two until veggies are soft.

5) Scramble eggs and add eggs to skillet. Stir vigorously so eggs mix with other ingredients. Cook until eggs are almost all cooked, probably just a minute or two.

6) Add on grated cheese and stick the pan in a pre-heated 350 degree oven for about a minute just to melt the cheese.

7) Serve scramble with warm tortillas, cilantro, and avocado!

Tempeh Tempeh

I’ve already raved in this post about my love for tempeh, but the reality is that it might be kind of hard for you to find. I only know of one health food store in my town that sells it.

Most grocery stores don’t carry it unfortunately. Maybe the demand isn’t quite there yet. But call around to a few places and you should be able to find it somewhere.

If you’re curious what tempeh is, it’s basically just fermented whole soy beans that have been mixed with other flavors like flax seeds or, in this case, random vegetables.

The nice thing about tempeh is that you can prepare it a million different ways. You can slice it thinly or just crumble it up. I thought for a scramble like this, it would be better to just crumble it.

Super easy to use.

The Veggies

While I listed specific vegetables in the recipe, I’d just encourage you to use what you have in your fridge. Some kind of pepper is good and something like an onion or scallion is a good idea.

It’s pretty flexible though… kind of like an omelet.

A few chopped veggies.

Whatever veggies you are using, dice them up and then stir them together with some salsa. This will give the dish a nice Tex-Mex feel.

Adding a tex-mex element.

Cooking the Scramble

I used my cast iron skillet for this dish, but you could use any large skillet really. I do recommend using one that is oven-safe so you can transfer the pan to the oven at the end and melt the cheese quickly.

The first step is to brown the tempeh. Add a small drizzle of oil to the pan and then add all the tempeh. Over medium-high heat, it’ll take 5-6 minutes to brown nicely. It’s pretty hard to burn this stuff. It’s very sturdy.

Way easier than tofu!

Once the tempeh is browned, add in the veggies and salsa and cook for another minute or two until the veggies are soft.

Then pour in your scrambled eggs!

Already smells good.

Everything will cook pretty fast at this point.

Just stir it all together and let it cook until the eggs are almost completely cooked.

This is about perfect. It looks like a hot mess, but it’ll smell great.

Not sure how many style points I get here...

Top the whole scramble with some cheese and stick it in a hot oven for a minute or two just to melt the cheese.

Can't forget the cheese.

You could just eat this as-is or serve it as a side. If you want to make a really good meal out of it though, serve it with some flour tortillas, avocado, and maybe some fresh cilantro.

Delicious breakfast.

There’s a lot of nice things about this meal. For one, I guarantee you that you won’t miss the meat. The tempeh is very flavorful, filling, and has a great texture.

The other nice thing is that this whole thing takes less than 30 minutes to make. You could also easily double or triple it and feed a crowd.

This is a great introduction to tempeh if you’ve never tried it before so hunt some down and give it a go!

Yes please.

I thought it was going to be a close poll last week, but a dip of some sort won by a landslide!

I’m big believer in the general philosophy that almost any appetizer can be made into a dip of some sort. It’s really just simple physics. If it tastes good on it’s own, it’ll probably taste good processed down, baked, and put on a piece of bread or chip.

Sometimes, the dip is even easier to make then the original appetizer which is an added bonus.

That’s definitely true for this recipe.

There are two ways to make jalapeno poppers that I know of, both of which are delicious but a bit of work. This recipe pushes both of those methods aside and just mashes a metric ton of jalapenos with cheese.

How could it not be delicious?!

Jalapeno Popper Dip

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound cream cheese
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup cheddar cheese, grated
5-6 jalapeno peppers, minced
1 poblano pepper, minced (opt.)
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 cup Panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup butter, melted
Tortilla chips, for serving

Directions:

1) Mince jalapenos and poblano. Leave the seeds in.

2) Add olive oil to a skillet and saute peppers over medium heat for about 4 minutes until they soften.

3) In a large bowl, mix together sauteed peppers with cream cheese, grated cheddar, and mayo. Stir well to combine.

4) In a small bowl, mix together Panko, butter, and parmesan cheese.

5) In a 1 1/2-2 quart buttered baking dish, scoop in the dip and spread it evenly in the dish. Top with panko topping.

6) Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees until cheese is melted and topping is browned.

7) Serve immediately with tortilla cheese or toasted bread.

Adapted from a Tablespoon recipe.

Pepper Overload

I know. This recipe has a lot of jalapenos in it. In fact, I’d bet that the only recipe you would ever make that has more jalapenos is if you were to make actual jalapeno poppers.

The truth though is that there is so much creamy stuff in this dip that the heat of the jalapenos is really reduced. If you only did one or two, you wouldn’t get any heat at all from them.

And don’t worry about seeding the things. Just wash them and dice them up. I like to quarter mine into segments and then dice them.

Leave the seeds.

I threw in a poblano in my batch just for fun, but I’m not really sure it gave the final dip much flavor. You can leave it out without too much worry I think.

Once you have all your peppers diced, saute them in a skillet with a drizzle of olive oil over medium heat for a few minutes. You just want them to soften a bit and cook off some of the liquid.

Just a few minutes will do the trick.

Trust me on this.

Mixing the Dip

There’s a lot of creamy stuff in this dip. No doubt about that.

I just did the full fat version because, hey… this is for the Super Bowl!

If you wanted to make this somewhat healthier though you could:

1) Cut the mayo amount in half.
2) Substitute the mayo entirely for Greek yogurt.
3) Sub out a quarter to half of the cream cheese for whipped silken tofu.

The third one might change the texture slightly, but I doubt it would be very noticeable. It’s a substitution that I frequently use in dips like this.

The creamy business.

But like I said… this is for the Super Bowl so why not just do it all the way?!

Once your peppers are done cooking, just stir everything together. Pretty straightforward!

This will even smell spicy.

The Topping

Probably the most common type of jalapeno popper is the fried ones with a golden crust. To get the same effect in dip form, just mix together some Panko bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, and melted butter in a bowl.

If you don’t have Panko, you can definitely use normal bread crumbs.

Butter is important.

Baking the Dish

In a medium-sized casserole dish, scoop in your dip mixture and top it with your bread crumb topping.

I’d recommend buttering the dish before adding the dip just to make sure it doesn’t stick badly. It would be horrible to lose some dip!

Don't forget to butter the dish!

Bake this whole thing for about 25-30 minutes at 350 degrees.

It’s done with the cheese is all melted and the topping is nice and browned.

Really nicely browned.

Serve this sucker as soon as possible with lots of tortilla chips or toasted bread.

The chip to dip.

This is about as easy as a dip gets. It’s definitely way easier than making actual jalapeno poppers, but the flavor is really very similar.

If you happen to have leftovers, let me tell you a little secret. Put a few spoonfuls of it in a rice and bean burrito. Amazingness.

Looks like blood... tastes like awesome.

When Betsy and I took our honeymoon to Italy, we stayed a few nights at this quaint little farm in Tuscany. It was a cute town and just very relaxing.

The farm owners would have wine tastings and snacks every day and one day they brought out this homemade stuff called “Mosto Cotto” that they served with hard cheese.

Betsy and I actually brought some back from Italy and enjoyed it later on a date night.

Since then, it has been in the back of my mind to try and recreate the stuff. So this is my version!

I took one shortcut which I will acknowledge is most definitely cheating, but it still turned out pretty awesome.

Red Wine Syrup

Yield: 1.5 cups

Prep Time: 45 minutes

Total Time: 2 hours

Ingredients:

3 cups full-bodied red wine
1 1/4 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon guar gum + 2 tablespoons sugar
1 pound hard cheese (pecorino is good), cubed for dipping

Directions:

1) Add sugar and red wine to a pot and bring to a simmer. Simmer, stirring regularly for about 30 minutes over medium-low heat.

2) In a small bowl, whisk together guar gum with some sugar.

3) While vigorously whisking syrup, slowly add guar gum mixture. Whisk the syrup constantly for 5 minutes until guar gum is well dissolved.

4) Continue to simmer for another 5-10 minutes until the mixture is very thick. When foam or bubbles form, they should stay at he surface briefly even if you remove the pot from the heat.

5) Remove the syrup from the heat and let cool for a few minutes. Once it's cooled slightly, transfer to a bowl and allow to cool slowly.

6) If you notice that the syrup is getting to thick and starts to actually gel, stir in another tablespoon of red wine to loosen it up.

7) Once syrup is thick and room temperature, pour it over hard cheese or dip cheese in the syrup.

Boiling Wine

I remember asking the farm owner in Italy how they made the Mosto Cotto that we loved so much. From what I could tell, this is how they did it:

1) Take a huge amount of red wine – like gallons.
2) Boil it for about a day, stirring it regularly.
3) Bottle it

The problem is that the wine has to reduce so much to make a syrup that if you just did one bottle, you would simmer it for hours and hours and be left with maybe 1/2 cup of syrup.

And come on… who wants to stir something for a day? Not this guy!

So I upped my ingredient list from one to three.

At first I felt dirty about this, but later on, as I was enjoying my awesome red wine syrup, I became comfortable with the scandal.

Sugar and wine basically.

GUAR!

This stuff is not named after the sweet metal band. It is named after a simple legume that has some pretty amazing powers.

It turns out that guar is some of the most powerful natural thickener around. It’s crazy how little you have to use to get some serious thickening. You can find this stuff in most grocery stores these days. I found this bag in my normal everyday grocery store. You can also order it online.

Crazy stuff.

Starting the Boil

While you could just basically add the guar to the wine and have instant syrup, I still wanted to boil it for a bit just to melt some sugar in it and also boil off most of the alcohol.

So just add the sugar and wine to a pot and bring it to a simmer.

Red red wine!

I recommend cooking this on medium-low heat for about 30 minutes to cook off the booze and also dissolve the sugar completely.

It won’t be even close to thick enough to make a syrup at this point though.

Like I said, you could continue simmering it and it would probably take 90 minutes to boil it all the way down, but you would be left with very little syrup.

Just a quick simmer...

Adding the Guar

Adding the guar gum to the liquid is actually a bit tricky. This stuff is so powerful that if you where to just add it in its pure form, it would gel to itself and just form annoying little balls that would forever live in your syrup.

That is not ideal.

The way to avoid this is to mix the guar with some sugar to thin it out a bit. You can then add this mixture to the syrup without worry.

Doesn't take much.

When you’re adding the guar, whisk the syrup constantly and add the sugar/guar mixture in a slow stream.

Keep stirring and whisking like crazy once the guar is added so it dissolves completely. It will look like a ridiculously small amount of guar for this amount of liquid, but trust me… it’s more than enough.

After about five minutes of simmering, you’ll notice that your mixture starts to thicken quickly. It’s done is when bubbles form on the surface that stay on the surface. Even if you remove the pot from the heat, the bubbles will stay for a few seconds meaning that the syrup is pretty thick.

Sturdy bubbles.

Cool it Down

Add the syrup to a small bowl or dish and let it slowly start to cool down to room temperature.

Quick Tip: Wash your cooking pot immediately! Any syrup that’s left in the pan will pretty much solidify on it and be very hard to clean off once it has cooled.

Meanwhile your syrup will continue to thicken…

Really thick!

Too Thick!

Guar gum is hard stuff to work with because it’s so powerful. It’s like trying to mow your lawn with napalm. It’ll work, but probably too well.

As your syrup cools, if you notice that it’s getting too thick and starting to gel into a solid, stir in a tablespoon or two of fresh red wine and that will loosen it up. I had to do this with mine because I was worried that it was getting too thick.

I really loved my finished texture though. It was smooth and silky, but still pretty thick. It would stick to stuff easily.

Yum.

What to Dip?

This syrup is good on lots of things in my mind: ice cream, some sort of brownie, maybe even pancakes!

I just did one thing with it though… I dipped hard cheese in it which is what we learned to do with the Italian stuff.

Any hard cheese is good.

This is a really fun appetizer and people will gobble it up. Just cube up some cheese and drizzle on a good amount of the syrup.

Really good!

Like I said though, I think this syrup has more applications than just cheese. It’s slightly tangy and sweet and just has a really unique and awesome flavor.

Guar gum is fun. I think I’ll keep experimenting with it since they sell it in huge bags compared to how much you would ever use.

Anybody used guar gum before?

What did you do with it?

Well, this worked!

One of my favorite breakfasts or brunches to make on a lazy weekend day is crepes.

I like them because the batter is very easy to make and once you get the hang of them, I actually think they are easier to make than pancakes!

Plus you can fill them with all kinds of delicious stuff.

The problem I’ve encountered with crepes is that it’s hard to feed a crowd with them. You can only make one at a time and people usually want 2-3 for a meal so if you’re feeding four people, that’s 10-12 crepes!

Then one day the idea of a crepe pie smacked me over the head and I had to try it immediately.

It worked better than I ever thought it would.

Savory Crepe Pie

Yield: Serves 4-6.

Prep Time: 40 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

Basic Crepe Batter:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
2 large eggs
1.5 cups milk
2 tablespoons melted butter (plus some for the pan)

Filling:
8 ounces crimini mushrooms, sliced
1 yellow pepper, diced
1 poblano pepper, diced
1/2 onion, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
6-8 ounces cheddar cheese, grated
Salt and pepper
Butter, for the pie pan

Helpful Equipment:
Large nonstick skillet or crepe pan

Directions:

1) Make your crepe batter by mixing the dry ingredients together in a bowl and the wet ingredients (except butter) in a separate bowl. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Whisk in melted butter. Batter should be pretty runny. Let batter sit while you prep the filling.

2) Slice mushrooms, dice peppers, onions, and garlic. Add mushrooms to a large skillet with a drizzle of olive oil and saute over medium-high heat until the mushrooms release their liquid and soften, about 5-6 minutes.

3) Add other filling ingredients (except cheese) to the skillet and cook for another 4-5 minutes until peppers soften. Season filling with salt and pepper, red pepper flakes, and a pinch of dried thyme. Set filling aside.

4) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

5) Using a large nonstick skillet, or crepe pan, add a small amount of butter over medium-high heat. Pour in about 1/2 cup of crepe batter and swirl it around the pan so it flattens out. Cook for 30-45 seconds on the first side until it firms up, then carefully flip the crepe and cook for another 15-20 seconds. Repeat until you have 4 large crepes. The batter will make 5-6 crepes so you can mess up one without worry.

6) Butter a pie pan and lay a crepe in the bottom of the pan. Add half of the mushroom filling and 1/3 of the grated cheese.

7) Top with a second crepe and 1/3 of the cheese.

8) Top with a third crepe. So the middle layer is just cheese basically.

9) Add rest of filling and cheese to top of the pie and top with the fourth crepe. Kind of crimp the edges of the crepe around the edges of the pie so it is mostly sealed.

10) Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.

11) Let cool briefly and then slice and serve!

The Filling

Over the years, I’ve put together dozens of different crepe fillings. Sweet, savory, fruity, cheesy… you name it, you can probably stuff it in a crepe.

So I don’t want you to get the impression that this filling is the only filling that you can use for this recipe. This is just the one I used and it worked really well.

Good winter veggies.

Rinse and slice up the mushrooms and dice up your veggies. It’s okay to keep them in pretty big chunks. You don’t want the veggies to disappear in the dish.

Great flavors.

Then just add a few tablespoons of olive oil to a large skillet and toss in the mushrooms. Cook them over medium high heat until they start to soften and release their water. Then you can add in all the other veggies and continue to cook until they are soft.

Total cooking time for this will probably be in the 10 minute range. There’s actually a lot of wiggle room in how much you cook the veggies. It is important to saute them though so you can cook off some of the water in the veggies. Otherwise the filling would be very watery in your final dish.

When the veggies are cooked, season the filling with salt and pepper, red pepper flakes, and dried thyme.

Very important.

The Crepes

This is my basic crepe batter recipe. It’s never failed me really. Don’t fix it if it ain’t broken right?

Whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl and stir the wet ingredients together in a separate bowl (minus the melted butter). Then stir the wet into the dry and finally stir in the butter.

Ideally, let this batter sit for a few minutes before making the crepes.

I like to make the batter, then make the filling, and by the time the filling is done the batter is rested and ready to go.

Pretty easy batter.

Like I said, I find cooking crepes easier than pancakes honestly. That said, you might mess up one or two. Don’t worry about it if you do. Since these are going in a layered dish, they don’t have to be perfect.

When you’re ready to cook a crepe, just add a small amount of butter to a large nonstick pan or a crepe pan and then pour in about 1/3-1/2 cup of crepe batter. Swirl it around in the pan so it flows out and forms an even, very thin crepe.

Cook the crepe for about 45 seconds on the first side and then give it a flip. Flipping is always the part that people mess up but just do your best. Like I said, they don’t have to be perfect.

Takes maybe a minute!

You need four crepes to make this dish so just go ahead and make four and stack them up on a plate or something.

Making the Pie

You can use almost any kind of pie dish that you have. Is it important to have something round though so the crepes fit snuggly in there.

To make sure the crepes don’t stick to your pan, butter the thing really well.

Butter is important.

Then lay in one crepe and make sure to push it down so it’s snug against all the walls of the pie pan. Then add about 1/2 of your mushroom filling and 1/3 of your grated cheese.

Bottom layer.

Then toss on the second crepe. For the middle layer, I just did an all cheese layer. So add another 1/3 of the cheese to this layer.

Speaking of cheese, be sure to use a good flavorful cheese for this. You don’t want to use a lot of cheese, but make sure to use good stuff! I used a nice sharp white cheddar.

Just cheese on this layer!

Add on the third crepe and then the rest of your filling stuff.

It should all stack up very nicely.

More of the same.

Put the top crepe on and kind of press the edges down around the sides of the pie pan. Again, don’t freak out if it isn’t perfect.

Stick this whole thing in a 400 degree oven for about 20 minutes.

The great part about baking this is that the top and bottom crepes actually get a bit crispy which is nice and then the center is just this awesome savory party.

So good!

I was worried that this would just fall apart when I sliced it, but if you let it cool for just a minute or two when you pull it out of the oven, it actually slices really nicely.

You can even make out all the layers.

One of my favorite brunches.

If this is all your serving, assume about 1/4 of the pie per person. If you’re serving this with some other stuff then you could cut it into sixths and be fine.

The good news is that you can make these in advance and then just toss them in the oven if you’re having people over.

This is the right way to do crepes for a group!

Health in a bowl!

I’m a huge fan of instant Netflix. In fact, Betsy and I don’t even have cable anymore.

Currently my queue on instant Netflix breaks down into:

1) Dorky science shows like Mythbusters.
2) Awesome TV series like Breaking Bad and Law and Order: SVU
3) Documentaries or movies that people have recommended to me about food.

Last week, I finally watched a show that a friend recommended to me approximately 6 months ago called Forks Over Knives. I think the movie can be summarized in the title of it, which I didn’t fully understand until halfway through the thing. I thought the title was forks over knives because you use a knife to eat things like meat and forks to eat things like veggies.

The real meaning of it though is that if you wisely choose what you eat with your fork you can almost certainly avoid going under the knife. It argues that as a society, we have put the knife over the fork and now we think that it’s much easier and less drastic to have a few surgeries instead of changing eating habits.

So, as a shout out to what I thought was a really interesting and very well done movie, I decided to cook something that I think the Forks Over Knives crowd would approve of… mainly because it’s from their website!

Spicy Orange Greens

Yield: Serves 2.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

1 bunch greens, like broccoli rabe, kale, or chard
1 red pepper, diced
1/3 cup water
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4-1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon orange marmalade
8 ounces soba noodles, cooked
1 tablespoon sesame oil
Chili garlic sauce (opt.)

Directions:

1) Wash and roughly chop greens and dice peppers and garlic clove. Cook soba noodles according to package. Drain soba and toss with sesame oil to make sure the noodles don't stick.

2) Add water, garlic, red pepper flakes, soy sauce to a large skillet or wok. Bring to a simmer over high heat and cook until garlic is fragrant, just a minute or two.

3) Stir in marmalade.

4) Add greens and red pepper to the pan and cover.

5) Cook for 2-3 minutes until veggies are soft. Stir everything together so the sauce evenly coats the veggies.

6) Serve greens with soba and top with chili garlic sauce.

Adapted from Forks Over Knives website.

Forks over Knives

Based on my post from the weekend, it’s pretty obvious that this movie didn’t turn me into a vegan. But it did reinforce a lot of what I already think. Namely, that through healthier eating, we would drastically reduce some of the health issues we face as a country.

This doesn’t just mean obesity, but even more radical diseases like heart disease and even some cancers. To make huge progress in this effort, the film argues that we have to basically completely eliminate from our diet three things: meat, dairy or other animal products, and processed foods and oils.

The problem that I have with the movie is that it makes the whole situation seem like a switch. It’s either on or off. You’re either eating healthily or you’re on a path to cancer.

I like to think of more as a sliding scale. Sure, if you eat nothing but deep-fried cheesesteak every day, you’re in for a rough haul, but having a slice or two of bacon on the weekends I don’t think is going to set my body into a tailspin.

Of course, Americans tend to have a problem with the word moderation so I can see how arguing for a cold turkey approach might be more effective.

Anyway, so I liked the movie. It has some fascinating statistics and compiles work from two very respected doctors who have been researching this stuff for over 40 years.

But enough about reviews… let’s eat!

Spicy Orange Greens

I wanted to cook something from the Forks Over Knives website after I watched the movie. One thing that I found ironic was that the recipe they posted probably leads to a lot of people breaking one of the main Forks over Knives rules!

The recipe calls for a tablespoon of orange marmalade and about 90% of marmalades in the store contain mostly high fructose corn syrup which the movie is very against. Oh well, nobody’s perfect. Of course, you can find marmalade without HFCS (I did), but I doubt most people would do this for the recipe. They would just grab a jar.

Anyway, this recipe was actually very delicious and takes less than 30 minutes to toss together which is cool.

You’ll need these things to make the sauce!

Good stuff.

One cool tactic that they mentioned in the movie, and that this recipe used, was that instead of stir-frying in oil, try to use water. So basically you make a very flavorful steaming liquid and cook your food in that.

I was skeptical that this would work but it turned out to be great and definitely healthier than cooking the greens in oil which is what I would’ve done if left to my own devices.

Speaking of greens… you can use almost anything for this recipe. You want something hardy like rabe, kale, or chard though. I went the rabe route.

Love the rabe.

To prep the veggies, just wash and roughly chop the ingredients. Pretty simple!

Just a rough dice is good.

Soba Noodles (I bend the rules)

You could serve the greens over rice or something, but the recipe also suggested noodles and that sounded better to me.

So I went with soba noodles which are some of the healthier noodles out there!

One of my favorite noodles.

I really love soba noodles because they are extremely flavorful. They have a really nutty flavor. I also like them because they are very good warm or cold so they make for quick leftovers.

There’s one problem with the noodles that led me to slightly bend the Forks Over Knives rules.

Soba noodles stick together like they are made of Elmers. After you boil them and drain them, if you walk away for a few minutes, they will congeal into one big mass of noodles: like a noodle cake.

These will stick like glue!

There’s one cure for this and it’s not approved by the Forks Over Knives doctors, but whatever.

The cure is oil… specifically sesame oil. For me, I’d rather use a tablespoon of this stuff and have really flavorful (and separated) noodles, but I do not think that the doctors in the movie would approve.

Necessary in my opinion.

Finishing the Dish

Once the noodles are cooked, this dish takes about five minutes to finish up. It’s really quick and easy.

Basically, just add the water, garlic, red pepper flakes, soy sauce, and marmalade to a large skillet or wok.

Water. Not oil.

Bring this to a simmer over high heat and then toss in your veggies.

A quick steam.

Cover this up and cook the veggies for just a few minutes. So basically you are steaming the veggies but with spices and some sweet orange flavors.

When the veggies are done, just toss them a bit so they all get evenly coated with the sauce.

Maybe two minutes later.

I wanted to kick up the heat a bit more on mine so I added some chili garlic sauce as well.

Simple and delicous!

It’s hard to deny that it would be good if more people ate meals like this pretty regularly.

I was also impressed by how actually delicious and creative this dish was. The oil-to-water change was a great one and probably one that I’ll use regularly.

So, check out the movie if you’re interested. But, more importantly, make this dish. Some might say that by eating it you’re warding off cancer, but I’ll just say that I’m recommending it because it’s really tasty!

The space in sweet bread is important.

A space has never been so important in a food name. Sweet bread is vastly different than sweetbread.

Sweetbread, of course, being the thymus gland of an animal (delicious in Po Boys) and sweet bread being an actual loaf of bread that happens to be sweet.

It can be confusing in writing, but it’s much more confusing in speech.

A recent conversation I had with Betsy:

Bets: What are you cooking today?

Nick: Sweet bread.

Bets: Awesome! My favorite. I can’t wait to try it!

Many hours later…

Bets: I thought you said you were make sweetbreads?!

Nick: Sorry. I should’ve been more specific. I was making sweet space bread.

It turns out though that sweet bread is also a wonderfully delicious thing and one that I’d never made before it won the poll last week. I was really happy with how it turned out!

Portuguese Sweet Bread

Yield: 2 loaves

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 6 hours

Ingredients:

Starter:
1/2 Cup bread flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
2.25 Teaspoons instant yeast
1/2 Cup water

Dough:
6 Tablespoons sugar
1 Teaspoon salt
1/4 Cup powdered milk
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
2 Large eggs
1 Teaspoon lemon (or almond) extract
1 Teaspoon orange extract
1 Teaspoon vanilla extract
3 Cups bread flour
6 Tablespoons water, room temperature

Egg Wash:
1 Egg, whisked with 1 Teaspoon water

Helpful Equipment:
Stand Mixer

Directions:

1) Start sponge by mixing starter ingredients in a medium bowl. Stir until it makes a smooth batter. Cover and let sit at room temperature for 60-90 minutes, until the sponge is very foamy.

2) To make dough, combine sugar, salt, powdered milk, and butter in large bowl or with a paddle attachment in a stand mixer. Combine until smooth.

3) Mix in eggs, one at a time, and extracts.

4) Mix in the sponge and flour and switch to the dough hook. Mix on medium with the dough hook until the dough is very supple and soft. If it is at all wet or sticky add more flour by the spoonful. Alternatively, you can knead by hand on a floured surface until the desired consistency is reached. This will take 10-12 minutes with a mixer or 15-16 minutes by hand.

5) Add dough ball to a lightly greased bowl, cover and let ferment until it doubles in size, about 2 hours.

6) Remove dough from bowl and divide into two pieces. Form each piece into a tight round ball (a boule). Lightly oil two 9-inch pie pans and place one boule in each pan, seam side down. Cover loosely and let rise for another 2-3 hours, until the dough doubles in size.

7) Brush loaves with egg wash.

8) Bake loaves at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes until they are a deep brown and sound slightly hollow when thumped.

9) Remove from the oven and let cool on wire racks. Let cool for at least 45 minutes before slicing.

Adapted from The Bread Baker's Apprentice.

Making the Starter

Like a lot of real bread recipes, this loaf involves a starter. Don’t worry, this particular starter is really easy and doesn’t take days to make. You just need a few ingredients.

The basics.

Mix these all together with some water and let it ferment for 60-90 minutes until it gets nice and foamy. This also has the added benefit of making sure your yeast is nice and lively.

After the rise time, it should be really foamy and on the verge of collapse.

It's alive!

Making the Dough

If there is one book for which I’m very afraid to alter the recipes, it’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice. The recipes are so specific that I just always feel like I’m committing some sort of cardinal sin if I change them.

So I feel obligated to disclose two changes that I made to this recipe. One I made on purpose and one I made on accident. Neither change made for a bad loaf.

First, I used 4 tablespoons of butter in my recipe while the original recipe called for 2 tablespoons of butter and 2 tablespoons of vegetable shortening. I made this change on purpose because I didn’t have any vegetable shortening!

Second, the original recipe called for lemon extract but I used almond extract in my version. The only reason I made this change is because I apparently cannot read.

Regardless, the one ingredient in this recipe that Mr. Reinhart says you 100% cannot substitute is powdered milk. I get that. It gives the final loaf a very specific flavor and texture. It’s not really negotiable.

Powdered milk is apparently important.

To start the dough, add the butter (or butter and shortening if you’re using both) to a bowl with the salt, sugar, and powdered milk and kind of work them together with a large spoon.

You could also add them to a stand mixer and beat them with a paddle attachment. You basically want to cream them together and I did kind of a piss poor job of it. Ideally, it would be one creamy texture.

Not my best job...

Anyway, then add your eggs one at a time, and the extracts and continue to mix.

Once all that is mixed together, add your starter that has been foaming away along with your bread flour and water.

That starter is cool stuff.

While you can definitely make this recipe with a stand mixer, I went ahead and made it by hand just to be different.

If you do use a mixer, switch to the dough hook after you get your ingredients together and stir it on medium for 10-12 minutes until the dough ball is a nice, soft texture.

If you’re doing it by hand, stir everything together until you get a rough ball. Something kind of like this…

Dough?

Scoop this out onto a lightly floured counter and start kneading! Here’s the bad news… this will take 15-16 minutes depending on your kneading skills. If the dough gets sticky at any point, knead in another spoonful of flour.

The resulting dough ball should be very smooth and soft and easy to work with.

Once you get it there, add it to a lightly oiled bowl so it can rise!

Dough!

The First Rising

Let the dough rise until it about doubles in size. This should take about two hours. This dough is incredibly soft and easy to work with. It actually reminded me of doughnut dough…

Doubling is about right.

A Strange Step

I was a bit confused about the next step. Actually, I’m still confused by it so I shoudln’t use past tense. The recipe calls to divide the dough into two even pieces and form loaves of dough. Makes sense, but then it says to add those boules to lightly greased pie pans.

I’m completely at a loss as to why you have to bake these in pie pans, but here it goes.

No idea why pie pans are needed.

The Second Rising

Once you’ve put your dough balls into the pie pans (seriously you can just use sheet pans as far as I can tell), cover them loosely and let them rise a second time.

Again, they should double in size which will take another 2 hours or so.

Then brush each loaf with a light coat of the egg wash.

For a nice brown crust...

Baking and Cooling

Bake these guys at 350 degrees for about 50-60 minutes.

After about 30 minutes they will start to get very browned. Have no fear. They won’t burn. Just let them keep cooking until the full 50-60 minutes is up. They should sound slightly hollow when thumped when they are done. If you’re in doubt, let them bake for another 5 minutes.

When you pull them out, let them cool on a wire rack. These are really pretty!

Pretty things!

I loved the crust on these loaves. After you let them cool for about 45 minutes, you can slice into them to reveal a nice crust and a very soft crumb which is awesome.

Makes great toast!

As you might guess, the dough is slightly sweet but also has great flavor from all the different extracts.

This bread is great on its own with some butter but is also good as toast with a dab of Nutella.

I hadn’t made a good loaf of bread in awhile so I was really happy with how these turned out!

There's gin in there...

It seemed like there was a phase in the cooking world, and maybe it’s still happening, when vodka pasta sauce was the freakin’ bee’s knees.

It was the sexiest thing you could do to pasta.

I’ve definitely made it and ate it and enjoyed it, although I’ve never posted on it.

Here’s my problem with vodka sauce: Good vodka is specifically engineered to be tasteless. That’s why it’s great for mixed drinks. It really has almost no taste.

So wouldn’t it make sense to make a sauce with booze that has some flavor? More importantly, maybe booze that has some herbal flavors that would go well with tomatoes and cheese?

Gin has these flavors and it will kick your pasta sauce up a notch.

Gin Penne Pasta

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound penne pasta, cooked al dente
1/2 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 28 ounce can diced tomatoes
1 cup gin
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 cup cream
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup fresh basil, minced
Salt and pepper

Helpful Equipment:
Stick blender or normal blender

Directions:

1) In a medium pot, add olive oil, onions, garlic, and red pepper flakes and begin cooking over medium heat. Cook for 5 minutes until onions are soft and fragrant. Be careful not to brown the onions and garlic. You just want them soft.

2) Add in tomatoes and cook for a few minutes.

3) Remove sauce from heat and blend with a stick blender, or normal blender until sauce is fairly smooth. It doesn't have to be perfect.

4) Add gin and sugar to sauce and bring to a simmer. Simmer for 20 minutes or so until alcohol cooks off from gin. You'll know when it's ready because it won't smell like strong alcohol.

5) Stir in cream, Parmesan cheese, and basil and season with salt and pepper. Keep warm.

6) Cook pasta according to package. Make sure to pull it when it is al dente or has a slight bite to it still.

7) Drain pasta well and add directly to sauce. Stir together.

8) Serve garnished with Parmesan cheese and fresh basil!

Gin Over Vodka

I was a bit worried when I had the idea for this sauce that I would go too far in the other direction. I was worried that gin would have too much flavor and completely overpower the sauce. I started slow and added a quarter of a cup to the sauce, let it simmer and tasted it.

At the end of it, I decided that about a cup of gin is the right amount. Even though gin has a pretty strong flavor on its own, when it cooks down and mixes with the other ingredients, it’s a subtle but nice flavor.

Basically, I think it gives the sauce some interesting complexity that definitely can’t be found with a vodka sauce. Gin after all is made with a fair amount of botanical herbs and spices while vodka is made mainly with… potatoes.

A few basics...

Starting the Sauce

While there is some simmering and stirring that goes on with this sauce, there’s really not much chopping. Just dice up some onion and garlic and you’re ready to start the sauce.

Just a few things to chop.

Add the olive oil to a medium pot with the onions, garlic, and red pepper flakes. Cook this over medium heat until the onions and garlic start to soften and it smells very fragrant.

You don’t want the onions to brown at all. They should just get soft over medium heat which will take around 5-6 minutes.

Try not to brown them.

Then add in your tomatoes and sugar. The small amount of sugar balances some of the acidity of the tomatoes.

Any diced tomatoes will do the trick for this recipe. I went with some fire-roasted Muir Glen tomatoes.

Any kind of stewed tomato will do the trick.

Continue to cook this for a few minutes.

I wanted my sauce to be pretty smooth so I decided to blend it up with my stick blender. You could also use a normal blender or just kind of mash the tomatoes as they cooked and go with a more rustic version of the sauce.

You definitely don’t need a blender to make this sauce, but if you can, I recommend taking it for a spin.

A quick spin.

Big Time Flavor

At this point our sauce is pretty standard, but it’s about to get a big bump in the flavor department.

Starting with the gin. A whole cup. It doesn’t really matter what brand of gin you use, but I wouldn’t use super-cheap stuff.

A whole cup!

Bring this sauce to a simmer and let it simmer for about 15-20 minutes, stirring regularly. Your goal here is to cook off most of the alcohol and reduce the gin flavors.

You’ll know when it’s done because the sauce won’t smell intensely like alcohol!

As a final step stir in some cream which will mellow out some of the flavors and give the sauce a nice, rich texture.

Mellows it a bit.

Any time I’m trying to make a really good tomato-based pasta sauce, there are two ingredients that I almost always include: Real Parmesan cheese, and fresh basil.

Must have flavors.

Add a good amount of these to the sauce and season the sauce with salt and pepper.

I recommend finishing the sauce and then just keeping it warm while you work on the pasta.

This was my finished sauce!

Done deal!

Finishing the Dish

For the pasta itself, just cook it according to the package. While I guess you could use any pasta, I think penne works perfectly for this dish.

Whatever you do, don’t overcook the pasta. Soggy pasta is pretty much the worst.

Steaming hot.

As soon as the pasta is drained, toss it into the sauce (or toss the sauce into your pasta depending on your pot size).

Stir it all together. Even though it will look like a lot of sauce, as you stir in the pasta, all that sauce will get trapped in the penne pasta and you’ll be all set.

These guys will soak up a lot of sauce.

I like to serve pasta dishes like this family style which basically means I just pile it in a huge bowl and add some basil and cheese to the top.

I like to serve it family style.

Surprisingly, even with a cup of gin in this sauce, the flavor is pretty subtle. All of those gin botanicals, most importantly juniper, give the sauce this really complex flavor and fragrance.

It’s one of those dishes that if you were to eat it without knowing what was in it, you wouldn’t be able to put your finger on it, but once you know it’s gin, then it makes sense.

Let it be known: When it comes to pasta sauces, gin is the new vodka.