Fussy Recipes

If I'm not using one of my slow cookers,
I'm using one of my cast-iron pots.

People often ask me for my recipes. Then they tell me, “Yeah, I’m never going to make that. Your recipes are so fussy!” They’re content to enjoy the dish once and maybe never again, unless I make it for them. I don’t understand that attitude. If it tastes good, why not put the effort into it?
 

I follow America’s Test Kitchen (ATK) slow-cooker recipe for “Old Fashioned Chicken Noodle Soup.” You don’t start with hatching an egg and raising it into a chicken, but very nearly. (Kind of like reading Michener’s Hawaii, where the novel begins at the dawn of time with the creation of the islands and eventually gets to the part where something actually happens.) The recipe includes browning chicken thighs, wrapping the breast in foil so it’ll cook more slowly, pre-cooking veggies, throwing things into the slow-cooker, eventually deboning the meat, and cooking the noodles separately. It’s not your fix-it-and-forget-it style recipe. 

And people love the results.

I have a few recipes that meet the “5 Ingredient” limit many people insist on. They’re fine. But oh, that noodle soup! So good you’ll slap your granny!

Sometimes, while viewing an episode of ATK, even I marvel at the lengths to which they will go to add flavor, texture, crust, a little dash of something at the end of the cooking to “brighten” the taste. I watch pots and pans and dishes and utensils pile up at an alarming rate, knowing my kitchen help is limited to a man who loads the dishwasher because he thinks I toss the dishes in from across the room. He doesn’t wash dishes by hand because the sink is exactly the depth that makes his back ache. This is my father’s excuse also, and he’s shorter than I am. Do they teach this in man school?

So I watch the entire episode, dish piles and all, and enjoy it immensely. And sometimes even I say, “Yeah, I’m never going to make that.”

Trashing the Kitchen

Had a fabulous time talking cooking when my brother and sister-in-law visited. Pam mentioned gadgets and pans (“I have this jalapeno pepper holder for pepper poppers from the grill! Oh, have you ever cooked on wooden planks?”) and we tried to find an open kitchen supply store in Greenville this past Sunday, January 2. No luck—one was closed for inventory, the other just to tick me off.

Pam has the amazing talent of making meals look effortless. You imagine that behind her orderly, streamlined kitchen there’s a real working kitchen, where minions toil silently and ceaselessly, sliding finished dishes through a hidden cupboard. When I cook for a crowd it’s like a cartoon—I knock over pans, stack baking sheets in precarious piles, and dirty more utensils and pots than most people own.

I’m not sure when my love of cooking developed. Early on in the marriage I made stuffed green peppers from The Joy of Cooking, and found no joy in it. “After all that work,” I lamented, “it’s just—stuffed green peppers!” My husband said, “You don’t need The Joy of Cooking. You need the I Hate to Cook Book.” But at some point I began reading and collecting cookbooks, learning more about the science of cooking, and trying more recipes than the few my mother taught me. My collection of cookbooks began to overtake my pioneer history books, my books about writing.

What about you? Love cooking? Hate cooking? Are you messy like me, or so tidy your relatives surreptitiously check your trash for takeout packages?  

Kitchen Disasters

Okay, the "indoor electric turkey fryer" may not have been my best buy.

I love to cook, to chop, dice, simmer, stew and all that fussy stuff, but I also love small appliances and the convenience and versatility they add to cooking. So when a local store put the formerly $130 indoor electric turkey fryer on sale for under $35, I caved. Lugged the thing home, filled it with $20 of peanut oil and proceeded to fry chicken for the family. Except fry isn’t quite accurate—how about petrify?

The coating was ugly—dark, crusty and nothing like the heavenly stuff the Colonel turns out daily in his restaurants. Once we tore off the skin and coating, the meat was tasty, but the experiment was not a huge success. And the house smelled like a fast food joint, not the “grandma’s cooking” ambiance I was going for. One wonderful thing happened, though—my husband, Mr. “She Cooks and I Eat,” helped me with the frying. Yes, his willingness to help cook was fueled by the fear that I would burn down the house, but still, we cooked together. In 37 years of marriage, that may be a first.

But back to the fryer. I don’t give up easily. I remain hopeful that a turkey—no batter coating, just a bird, maybe some injected flavor—will showcase the fryer’s true greatness. And next time, despite its being called an indoor fryer, I’m cooking outside. It’s harder to stink up a whole neighborhood. Although I’ve had neighbors who tried.

What about you? Are you a small-appliance junkie? Are your cabinets filled with bread makers, food processors, hand-held blenders? Which do you like best? Least? Are there any appliance “turkeys” in your house?

Cookbooks—Talking Turkey

Anyone who has visited my home knows I have mad, mad love for cookbooks. I own tons of them, bursting out of their bookcase and beckoning, luring, enticing me to browse. One of my vacation rentals included a kitchen with a row of unfamiliar cookbooks—heaven! My cookbooks aren’t just reading material. I often try new recipes. In fact, my husband will ask, “Can you make _____ again?” I’m like Rachael Ray: 365 and No Repeats.

Often, other women will tell me they love to cook, too, and I always question them; Do you like to cook, or do you like to bake? Usually they say cooking is okay, but they love to bake, especially desserts. I’m the opposite. Give me the main course. Give me seconds of the main course and skip dessert. I’m not attracted to a book full of cakes, cookies, trifles, cheesecakes, pies and candies. Oh, I’ll eat dessert, and make it occasionally, but I love the main course. Beef, pork, poultry, fish, soups, stews, salads, sides—I love making them all.

Every week I sit down with cookbooks, a notebook and pen, and make my week’s supper plans. If we’re having company, I plan out all the meals we’ll have while they’re here. I fill the fridge, freezer and pantry, chop, dice, slice, simmer, braise, sauté, slow-cook and grill. For the last two Thanksgivings, I used Cook’s Illustrated recipes (serious cookbooks—line drawings, no photos, featuring the science of cooking) for my turkey and gravy. I brined the turkey, let it dry out in the fridge overnight, then roasted it in a hot oven (400 degrees), turning that heavy bird three times in two hours to brown it evenly. The gravy was even fussier. The turkey and gravy were the best I’d ever had, moist and tender. (I sound like my mother; “That’s the best meal I ever cooked!”) I admit, my arms and back ached from all the lifting. But maybe if I use the lower oven next year…

See, most people would say, “Never again!” They’d stick the turkey in at 325-degrees for hours and, if it was dry, pour canned gravy over it. And it would be good. But mmm, my turkey was great.

How about you? Are you a cookbook collector? Do you love to cook? Bake? Both? Neither? Are you happy to eat out, or let Stouffer’s and Lean Cuisine cook for you? Let’s talk turkey!