Last Days, First Days and Chocolate Chip Cookies

Yesterday was Calvin’s last day of school, so today is the first day of summer for us. To most people, summer starts Memorial Day weekend, so we get a one-day jump on it. Summer means no alarms (at least for Calvin), lots of reading and lots of playing in the kitchen, of course.

We usually give homemade gifts to Calvin’s teachers at the end of the school year. Last year we gave each teacher a stack of homemade chocolate chip cookies. Calvin decided he wanted to do the same thing this year. And he wanted to make the cookies himself. Of course we waited until the last couple days of school to do this and time was working against us. Calvin had time to make the dough Tuesday evening and I baked them the next day, while he was at school.

Note to self: make sure the kid can read your notes in the family cookbook if he is working by himself. The cookies were a little flat because Calvin couldn’t decipher my scribbles that indicated the dough needed extra flour. But they tasted as fabulous as they always do, so to school they went. Calvin reported compliments all around, so they were a success.

All the cookies went to school, and I forgot to take pictures of their crisp, buttery flatness. You will have to imagine the above cookies a little flatter and darker brown. If you make them as written, they will look like the pictures. If you only use two cups of flour, they will be flat and crispy. I understand there are actually people who prefer them that way. I have even met a few of them, and they seem perfectly normal. Can you tell I am in the tall, soft cookie camp?

No matter how you like them, chocolate chip cookies are always a hit no matter where you take them. If you are short on time, press the dough in a sheet pan and make cookie bars. Pick up a few bags of chocolate chips the next time you are at the grocery store. Summer is here and you never know when you will need a quick dessert for a spur of the moment backyard barbecue, or teacher gifts, if school isn’t out already for you.

Download or print the recipe here.

Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted from Nestle Tollhouse Cookies by The Cook’s Life
4-6 dozen, depending on size

You can use all-purpose flour in place of the white whole wheat, but it adds a nuttiness to the cookies. Everyone who tries them will wonder what your secret ingredient is.

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, room temperature
¾ cup granulated sugar
¾ cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup white whole wheat flour*
1½ cups, plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1½ cups chocolate chips, semisweet or 60% dark

*White whole wheat flour can be found in the baking aisle, next to the other flours. Store any unused flour in a zip-top bag in the freezer to keep it fresh for up to a year.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat butter, sugars and vanilla at medium high speed of a mixer until well-combined and fluffy. Add eggs and beat until fluffy again. Add white whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking soda and salt and beat at low speed until mixed. Stir in chocolate chips.

Scoop dough onto ungreased cookie sheets by teaspoon, tablespoon or 2 tablespoons. Flatten larger cookies slightly before baking. Bake 7-8 minutes for smaller cookies, 9-11 minutes for medium and 11-13 minutes for larger cookies. Remove cookies from oven when they are lightly browned, but still slightly soft in the middle. Let cool on sheets for a few minutes and then remove to racks to cool.

Corn and Browned Butter

Most of the time I keep vegetable side dishes very plain, either steaming them or roasting them with just a little olive oil. Occasionally I like to spice things up a bit with a more involved dish – corn and browned butter is one of our favorites. It is sublime with in-season fresh corn, cut off the cob just before cooking. It also works with leftover corn on the cob, again in season. Outside of the summer months, the recipe is perfectly fine with frozen corn. Of course, when browned butter is involved, just about anything tastes pretty good.

My dad’s family used to make fried corn whenever we had a big family dinner. It was always delicious – warm golden corn flecked with brown toasty spots. Mine was never as good. A few years ago I read a recipe for fish with corn sauce by Melissa Clark in her book, “In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite.” She used browned butter to make the corn for the sauce and it was a true “aha moment.”

I had only ever used browned butter to make desserts, and not often. I decided to try frying my corn in browned butter. There was no way combining corn and butter was going to be bad, so I had nothing to lose. I did learn that you don’t need a lot of butter at all, or the corn is greasy. And I learned that I needed to be more daring when browning the butter. It truly needs a few minutes to get really brown and develop the toasted flavors.

Yes, it takes a few more minutes to make than microwaving a bowl of frozen corn, or boiling corn on the cob, but those few minutes elevate corn from an everyday side dish to a vegetable worth savoring – until you fight your family members for the last kernel in the bowl. Yes, it is that good.

Download or print the recipe here.

Corn and Browned Butter
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4

1-2 tablespoons butter
2 cups corn kernels, fresh or frozen (no need to thaw frozen)
salt
pepper

Melt butter in a small skillet over medium heat. Continue to cook butter, stirring occasionally, until it starts to darken and smell toasty. Keep an eye on it and continue to cook until the butter is medium brown. Don’t let it get too dark or it will taste burned (I have never had this happen, but it is possible). The whole process should take 5-10 minutes, depending on your stove. Add corn and stir to coat with butter. Cook corn over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until hot and slightly browned, about 5 minutes. Serve immediately, with salt and pepper to taste. Leftovers reheat well.

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Doughnut Bites

I realized that I only posted savory recipes last week. I was so excited about the stuffed chicken, and the ingredients that went into it, that sweet baking got the short shrift. I can’t let the situation go on any longer, so today we will turn to doughnut bites.

We usually take the time on Saturday mornings to bake something special for breakfast. I wanted to make something new this past Saturday, but I wasn’t sure what. I wanted something simple and quick, but on the decadent side. I scrolled through my archive of recipe PDFs gleaned from blogs and recipe sites and Mini Donut Muffins from Natalie at The Sweets Life caught my eye. They fit all the criteria – quick, easy and decadent.

The original recipe was for a nutmeg doughnut rolled in cinnamon sugar. I decided to change them, as I almost always seem to do with recipes. I like nutmeg, but usually only mixed with other spices in pumpkin pie or spice cake. I decided to change the nutmeg to cinnamon, and to increase the amount. I also switched the white sugar to brown sugar, just because I like it with cinnamon, and I like the caramel notes it adds to baked goods. I added a bit of salt and used white whole wheat flour for half of the flour.

I happened to have whole milk on hand, which I rarely do. The whole milk gave them an extra richness that I think baked goods made with my usual skim milk sometimes lack. I might just have to keep a little whole milk on hand for baking. And it’s pretty good in my hot tea and coffee too.

I rolled the doughnut bites in white sugar instead of cinnamon sugar since they had plenty of cinnamon inside them. I dipped the first ones in melted butter before dipping them in the sugar, as directed in the original recipe, but I skipped the butter after the first few. The sugar stuck just fine, which saves a few calories. As if we were counting calories with these.

I was surprised how well the doughnut bites turned out, given all my changes. They were tender inside and crispy outside, contrasting nicely with the slight crunch of the sugar. We ate an embarrassingly large portion of them on Saturday and Calvin finished up the rest of them at Sunday’s breakfast. Rich and I had oatmeal.

Download or print the recipe here.

Brown Sugar Cinnamon Doughnut Bites
Adapted from The Sweets Life by The Cook’s Life
Makes 24

½ cup packed brown sugar
¼ cup butter, melted
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ cup milk (I used whole, but whatever you have will work just fine)
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup white whole wheat flour*
½ cup all-purpose flour

Topping:
⅓ cup granulated sugar

*If you prefer, use all-purpose flour instead of white whole wheat flour

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a 24 cup mini muffin pan and set aside.

Combine brown sugar, melted butter and cinnamon in a large bowl. Stir to combine, making sure to break up all the lumps in the brown sugar. Add milk and stir well. Add baking powder, salt, white whole wheat flour and all-purpose flour and stir gently to combine.

Divide batter evenly between the muffin cups. Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until lightly browned and firm when pressed.

Toss hot muffins gently in granulated sugar to coat. Serve warm or at room temperature. Store any leftovers at room temperature in an airtight container for a day or two. Freeze for longer storage.

Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto and Goat Cheese

I came up with this recipe while I was running errands last week. I had been thinking about a recipe we used to make that called for cutting pockets in boneless chicken breasts and filling them with a mixture of sautéed onions, rehydrated sun-dried tomatoes and goat cheese.

The chicken always sounded so much better than it turned out. I never let the onions cool long enough, resulting in a melting goo of goat cheese and sticky tomatoes that I wrestled to fit into the too-small chicken pockets. And I never diced the tomatoes small enough, so the chicken was full of chewy, assertive sun-dried tomato chunks. Despite the issues, we liked the flavors and I wanted to duplicate them in a format that appealed to us more.

I started with making a sun-dried tomato pesto instead of using chopped sun-dried tomatoes. That worked beautifully. I decided to use caramelized shallots instead of sautéed onions, for a mellower flavor. The goat cheese I kept the same, though I reduced the amount, to keep its sharpness from taking over the dish. I flattened and pounded the chicken, then spread on the filling ingredients before rolling it up. This worked much better than cutting pockets. The end result was everything I had envisioned – tender chicken wrapped around thin layers of tomato pesto, sprinkled here and there with pockets of sharp goat cheese and sweet shallots.

If you follow along regularly you read Monday’s post on caramelized shallots and Wednesday’s post about sun-dried tomato pesto. And if you are a loyal and obedient follower, you made each of these recipes the day I posted them. Now you are ready to make today’s chicken recipe.

Seriously, though, I made both the caramelized shallots and the sun-dried tomato pesto right before I made the chicken. Would I recommend this? Probably not, but it is certainly doable. Just be sure to factor in the time required when you are deciding what time to start. We didn’t eat dinner that night until 7:30, despite my best intentions. Nothing about the recipes is difficult, but you can’t exactly hurry the shallot caramelization process, unless you want to turn it into the shallot burning process.

To simplify things, you can make the shallots and pesto earlier in the day, or a few days ahead of time. The recipe will be a piece of cake if you already have the shallots and sun-dried tomato pesto waiting for you in the fridge.

Download or print the recipe here.

Chicken Stuffed with Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto and Goat Cheese
From The Cook’s Life
Serves 4

3-4 boneless chicken breasts
3-4 tablespoons sun-dried tomato pesto (homemade or purchased)
2 caramelized shallots (about ¼ cup cooked shallots), or more to taste
OR
¼ cup minced onion or shallot, sautéed until soft
2 ounces goat cheese, thinly sliced or crumbled
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt
pepper
¼ cup white wine or water

Special equipment:
Gallon-size zip lock bag
Meat mallet, rolling pin or heavy skillet
Toothpicks

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a medium casserole dish (8-inch square, 11 by 7 inch or equivalent). Set aside.

Trim any visible fat and gristle from chicken breasts.

Working with one breast at a time, using your sharpest knife, partially separate tenderloin from breast and open it up from the main part of the breast like a book (the tenderloin is on the left side of the picture above).

Start to cut into the thickest portion of the breast, across from the tenderloin side, opening it like a book as you go (the tenderloin is now on the right side in the picture above). If you start to get too close to cutting all the way through, change the direction of your knife to get back into the meat. Open the two sections of chicken like a book. You should have a large flat piece of chicken.

If necessary, cut into thicker parts of chicken, almost all the way through, to make as large and as thin a piece of chicken as possible. Let the shape of the chicken breast guide you. It might look kind of strange (see above), but when you pound it, the chicken will flatten into one big piece.

Place each breast in the zip lock bag, one at a time, and pound gently with the meat mallet, rolling pin or skillet. You want to make the meat a little thinner and tenderize it, but you don’t have to pulverize it.

Place each flattened breast, pretty side down, on a plate. Set out your sun-dried tomato pesto, shallots and goat cheese next to the plate. Have the baking dish next to your workspace. Have a few toothpicks handy, just in case you need them. You don’t want to have to search for ingredients once your hands are contaminated with raw chicken.

Spread each breast with about a tablespoon of tomato pesto, getting as close to the edge as possible. Divide shallots evenly between breasts. Top with slices or crumbles of goat cheese.

One at a time, roll each breast up long ways, like a cinnamon roll or pinwheel cookie. Place each breast in the prepared casserole dish, seam side down. If chicken won’t stay rolled, secure with a toothpick or two.

Drizzle chicken with olive oil. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Pour white wine or water in the bottom of the dish.

Bake breasts for about 30 minutes, uncovered, until chicken is cooked all the way through and tops are starting to lightly brown. Let chicken rest for 5-10 minutes before serving. Leftovers reheat well in the microwave.

Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto

I was wandering the produce section of the grocery store last Friday, in search of sun-dried tomatoes – they have rearranged since the last time I bought them. I finally found them, hiding behind the grapefruit. Alongside the packages of dried tomatoes were jars of sun-dried tomato pesto and other tomato based spreads. I was tempted, since I had never bought the pesto before, but I decided to make my own after looking at the ingredients on a jar – water, sun-dried tomatoes, garlic, sugar, salt and various thickeners. I figured I could make my own and it would be better, and cheaper.

I whirled the dried tomatoes in the food processor, along with two cloves of garlic. I ended up with a processor full of tiny, sticky bits of tomatoes. I added olive oil and whirled it again. Now I had a processor full of tiny, oily bits of tomatoes. The pesto definitely needed more moisture. I didn’t want to make it too oily by adding more olive oil, so I thought of adding boiling water to rehydrate the tomatoes. Probably if I had been smart, I would have done that as my very first step. My way worked, after many tries of adding a tablespoon of water and processing and then adding another tablespoon. I think I was too hesitant at first. I used almost a half cup of water, but I ended up with a lovely, smooth paste. I tasted it and it was flat and one-dimensional.

After adding a pinch of sugar to offset the acidity of the tomatoes, as well as a little salt and pepper, it still needed something. Traditional basil pesto has pine nuts, so I figured I should add a few nuts. I didn’t have any pine nuts and pecans seemed a perfect partner for sun-dried tomatoes, so I threw in a few and whirled it again. Pretty much perfection – intense, almost meaty, tomato flavor, with richness from the pecans. The garlic was a little sharp, so I will probably use only one clove next time. Especially if I am going to use it raw, as a spread for bread or tossed with hot pasta.

I ended up with more than a cup of tomato pesto and a little goes a long way – I am looking forward to figuring out how to use my stash. I already used some as a layer inside stuffed chicken (post coming Friday) and am planning on spreading a thin layer on pizza instead of our regular tomato sauce. And then I might make crostini with a layer of the tomato pesto and a sprinkling of goat cheese or Parmesan cheese. I tried a version of that right after I made the pesto, and it was good, but it would have been better after a minute under the broiler to toast the bread and melt the cheese.

What would you make with sun-dried tomato pesto?

Download or print recipe here.

Sun-Dried Tomato Pesto
From The Cook’s Life
Makes about 1 cup

Use in chicken dishes, as a different kind of pizza sauce, stirred into hot pasta or spread on crostini for an appetizer.

Adjust the garlic and olive oil amounts to suit your tastes. Two cloves makes it very garlicky, one will be milder. More olive oil will produce a richer paste. Feel free to use any nuts you prefer – I like the rich sweetness of pecans with the tomatoes.

3 ounces dry packed sun-dried tomatoes
1-2 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons pecan halves
salt
pepper
1-2 teaspoons sugar, optional
2-3 tablespoons olive oil
¼-½ cup boiling water, approximately

Whirl tomatoes, garlic and pecans in a food processor until finely chopped. Add salt, pepper and sugar, if using, to taste, along with 2-3 tablespoons olive oil and process again. If tomatoes are really dry, and you just have oily bits instead of a paste, add about ¼ cup of boiling water and process again. Continue adding water and processing until you have a mostly smooth paste. Store in the fridge in a tightly covered container for up to a week. Freeze for longer storage.

Caramelized Shallots

I recently discovered how much I like caramelized shallots. We have used them in everything from pizza to calzones to chicken dishes in the past few months. I love the deep and toasty, yet sweet, flavors they give to everything. They might be my new favorite, running neck and neck with roasted garlic.

I had been making just enough shallots for whatever dish I wanted to use them in. I finally got smart and made a larger batch of caramelized shallots on Friday, so that I could keep them in the fridge, ready to use at the drop of a hat. As with onions, the caramelization process isn’t quick, but it is hands-off, mostly.

I have done mine both in the oven and on the stovetop and I can’t say which I like better. The oven is even more hands-off than the stovetop version, but I think the flavor isn’t as deep and complex. Maybe I just didn’t take mine dark enough. I was rushing to get them done to use them in our calzones that night. Now that I am smarter, I will make mine ahead of time from now on. At least I am saying that now – best laid plans and all that.

Stay tuned for a lovely chicken recipe on Friday that uses the shallots. Make yours now so they will be ready.

Download or print recipe here.

Caramelized Shallots
From The Cook’s Life
Amount varies

Make as many shallots at a time as you like. Be sure they are in a fairly shallow layer in the pan or baking dish to make the process go faster.

1-2 teaspoons olive oil for each shallot
shallots, peeled and sliced thinly
water

Stovetop method:
Heat olive oil in a skillet over medium low heat. Add shallots. Add about 2 tablespoons of water and cover with lid. When most of water has cooked away, stir the shallots. If they are starting to stick to the pan, add a little more water and continue cooking, covered.

Shallots will gradually turn golden brown and be very soft. Lower the heat if the shallots start to brown too fast. When shallots start to brown, stir them more often, and leave the lid off. Keep cooking until they are the color you like. I stopped with golden brown, but you can go to a deep brown, if you like. Be sure to watch them closely as they get darker – they can go from brown to black in no time. The whole process will take 30-45 minutes. Don’t try to hurry things by turning the heat higher – you risk burning the shallots.

Oven method:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a casserole dish with a lid. Add olive oil and shallots. Toss to coat shallots with oil. Add about 2 tablespoons of water and cover casserole. Bake for 15 minutes.

Check shallots and see if they are starting to brown. Add a little more water if they look too dry, or are starting to stick. Cover and return to oven for another 15 minutes. Check again. Repeat until shallots are golden brown and soft. Or cook longer until they are dark brown.

Use caramelized shallots on pizza or in your favorite recipes. You can use them in any recipe that calls for onions or shallots. Store in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week.

Books and Food – Michael Pollan’s “Cooked”

Last night I attended a book chat with Michael Pollan about his new book, “Cooked – A Natural History of Transformation.” I haven’t read it yet, but I now own the copy that was included in the ticket price for the evening. In the book, Pollan explores cooking as related to the four ancient elements – fire, water, air and earth. In each section he explores different ways of cooking – barbecuing with fire, boiling in water, raising bread dough with air and fermenting foods with bacteria.

A local independent bookstore, Left Bank Books, sponsored the book chat, along with Maryville University. The host of the local radio show, St. Louis on the Air, Don Marsh, conducted the interview, but it really was more of an informal chat, complete with audience questions. It was interesting to hear Pollan talk about the book in person, in a room full of people passionate about reading, cooking and eating.

I have heard of Michael Pollan, and his books before, including, “The Omnivore’s Dilemma.” I haven’t read any of his other books, but I have heard several interviews when he had new books published. To be honest, I was hesitant to read them because I knew they would make me face the problems with our corporate farms and industrial agriculture. I didn’t want to feel guilty every time I went to the grocery store instead of the farmers market. Now I think I have been missing out on some thought-provoking ideas that I need to explore.

I tend to listen to NPR podcasts while I work around the house or in the yard. No surprise, I listen to The Splendid Table, Good Food and food related stories NPR compiles. I also listen to Science Friday to try to expand my horizons beyond food just a little bit. Michael Pollan was on all of these, including Science Friday, in the last few weeks, talking about “Cooked.”

I was intrigued by the different takes each interviewer took toward the book and Pollan. Good Food had a two part interview, and I have only heard the first part, but it talked about fire and the importance cooking meat over it played in cultural changes. On The Splendid Table they talked about the role of cooking in everyday life, and how it has changed since World War II. Science Friday went into the science behind fermentation and the role that bacteria, fungi and other microorganisms play in both cooking and digestion. They delved deep into the mysteries and fascinations of the symbiotic organisms that live in our digestive systems and how we need to eat to help keep them healthy, which, in turn, makes us healthier.

I came home from the book chat ready to dive into the book and read the details behind the tantalizing tidbits I have heard so far. I think it will provide some food for thought (pun intended), and some inspiration in the kitchen. Stay tuned – I’ll post a review soon.