We're back from South Carolina. We made a quick stop elsewhere over the weekend, which I'll tell you about as soon as I can remove the red eyes from some seriously exciting pictures.Happy Memorial Day!!! Cook for a veteran today, if you can, or take a moment to thank them for their service.
It was entirely appropriate that Air Force veteran, Sunny Anderson, appeared on GMA this morning, cooking in front of sailors and other service people in Times Square during Fleet Week.
As usual, her cooking was easy and breezy. Her Flank Steak Fajitas looked seriously delicious and I loved her tip for knowing when flank steak is done. Sunny says it should feel supple like your bottom lip, not like the cartilage on the tip of your nose. (I usually use the nose test for knowing when chicken is done, though.)
I'm going to try her Mexican Street Corn, too. I would serve mayonnaise at every meal if I could, so slathering it on grilled corn sounds good to me. By the way, that mayonnaise mixture is basically the same thing I love to dollop on a Spanish tortilla. I leave out the garlic salt and use LOTS of lime juice and chili powder.
Following Sunny was baking whiz Buddy Valastro, whose new show is premiering tonight on TLC. I have a feeling many of Jon and Kate fans (detractors?) will catch Buddy, since he's sandwiched between 2 viewings of the hounded family's first episode of the new season.
At first, I wondered how this show about a master baker with his strong Joisey accent could possibly compete with the fantastic Duff...and his crew of crazies, but I think Cake Boss may be a good one.
It's a tale of an Italian-American boss of a family-run business with a wife, son and daughter living, loving, working and fighting in the wilds of New Jersey, not too far off the turnpike. Sound familiar? There are differences: The business is a bakery. His daughter is a beautiful, sweet six years old and little Buddy junior is a precious four...so I'm hoping that the bloodshed will be kept to a minimum and only involve serrated knives and Disney band-aids.
I've held off watching a preview episode, I'll watch tonight. Let's see how Buddy and his family do under the glare of the lights. I sure hope they have better luck than those other folks.
Emeril was on GMA this morning, touting their newly revamped website, which he called the food engine of ABC news. Emeril says his recipes on the site go back to 1995. He acts as our webmaster/guide to the upgraded page and he's particularly thrilled about being able to print the recipes in different formats. Uh, Emeril, that IS mind-blowing, but it's kinda been around for AGES. But I am all for an easy to use, easy to navigate websites.
I decided to look around. I clicked on a Sandra Lee video (I needed a laugh) and, for some reason, she had 2 straight-backed chairs sitting next to the dem bench. It looked like she was going to start doing squat thrusts right there and then, but no.
She was giving us a “decorating” tip. I still don’t know what the tip was, except that she took a pillow case, put it over the back of the chair and tied the corners. Maybe that’s what you do if you accidentally spill (or throw up) some of her food down the back of a chair…
Almost as annoying as the fruitless decorating advice was when Chris
handed out samples of Aunt Sandy’s Ham and Cheese Casserole and made a big fuss in the audience WHILE she was talking...not that I usually mind the focus being taken away from a Sandra Lee recipe.
Anyway, what I was trying to discover was if every recipe has an accompanying video. The Today Show seems to, for current ones anyway, but I don’t know how far back the videos go. Here’s a really cool recipe from Today, by the way, that I just found. The answer? No, and GMA videos by themselves aren’t that easy to get to.
Another slightly annoying thing on the GMA recipe site:
While searching for a flourless chocolate cake, I came up with this. Great, I thought, and it’s in 3 layers with icing in between, which I thought would be good to serve lots of people.
Well, NO, that’s a stock photo that has NOTHING to do with that recipe, which is made in a single 9 inch springform pan and served with confectioner’s sugar or cocoa powder and NO ICING.
I guess I should have realized what was going on when I saw the same chocolate cake picture for several chocolate cake recipes. The reason is probably because, as Emeril told us, they have recipes going back to 1995, and obviously they don’t have picture for each recipe. But NO picture is better is than the wrong picture.
One suggestion – have a chocolate cake drawing icon type of thing next to recipes for which they have no picture. That way there’s no confusion and we know instantly it’s a cake recipe. Or simply have a sweet and savoury icon to indicate those types of recipes. On closer inspection, that's exactly what they did do! Those two identical chocolate cake photos turn out to be from the same recipe just listed more than once. Are you confused? That makes two of us.
To compare the search functions of the two morning shows, I looked for the same thing on both sites. GMA came up with 208 results for the flourless chocolate cake, including many multiple listings of the same recipe. They also had other recipes like Lemon Lovers White Chocolate Cake , which has plenty of flour from the cake mix in the recipe, and an Incredible Melted Ice-Cream Cake, which has NO chocolate and again included plenty of flour in the form of a white cake mix.
The Today Show’s search function bears much better results. They only came up with three recipes, but each one was spot on.
To be fair, a second search for “Butterflied Chicken” wasn’t quite as successful on the Today Show site. The third recipe (of five) was Slow Cooked Fish (with a non-working link) and number five was lamb, but the other three were indeed chicken and they WERE butterflied.
GMA gave me 220 recipes and there was ONE authentic butterflied chicken. (Okay, I only checked out the first page, but if that’s not accurate, the other 22 pages won’t be either, although the VEGETARIAN Pumpkin Orange Soup with Parmesan Toasts, page 10, looks good.) I wonder if I searched for pumpkin soup, I’d come up with more butterflied chicken recipes.
The truth is, though, that both sites are still heads and tails above the Food Network website, which continues to be a source of such frustration that I really loath EVER going to it. Just finding the recipes connected with each show is often an exercise in futility. So…good for GMA! Congrats on the upgraded website! And if you find a few more flourless chocolate cake recipes, that actually have chocolate and no flour, let me know.
Just last night, I was thinking that I wanted to make proper yeast risen cinnamon buns for Christmas morning and then this morning Ina was on GMA demonstrating a quick and easy version, using puff pastry.
The Contessa was full of fun and instructive as always, but while she was doing her segment, Chris Cuomo - who is becoming increasingly annoying and so full of himself that it’s hard to watch - was making a commotion and lots of noise in the audience. Fine, if he wants to hand out the cinnamon rolls during the last few seconds of the segment, but not halfway through! Who does he think he is?!! Kathee Lee? What a dolt!
It definitely took away from Ina’s appearance, although she was unflappable. AND he promo’ed her as EENA Garten! Puleez! What a mo’!
Diane was lovely and did give her the proper attention, as Ina demonstrated how to make quick sticky buns with puff pastry. Basically, you roll up the puff pastry with melted butter, spices, raisins and sugar, cut it into slices and bake in a muffin tin with butter, sugar and pecans in the bottom. The resulting buns looked genuinely yummy.
She moved on to a lovely fruit juice combo, adding, “Just because it’s breakfast, doesn’t mean we can’t have cocktails.” She didn’t add the vodka then, but said we could. She also told us about this omelet, which would be a delicious addition to a festive breakfast. Then she showed a beautiful fruit platter. Ina said it’s a wonderful substitute for fruit salad AND it can be used as a centerpiece, so you don’t need flowers. Great idea. Great recipes. Great Ina and Irksome Chris.
Just Not Together Several of these cooking segments could be characterized as being at opposite ends of the spectrum: Yesterday, Aunt Sandy had an appearance on Good Morning America and, this morning, Nobu was on Regis and Kelly. Miami Nobu's Chef Thomas Buckley also contrasted rather sharply with Paula Deen.
Sandy showed us how to make a good, budget friendly meal. (Wouldn’t that start with taking Sandra Lee out of the equation?) She made panko crusted chicken breasts, which, honestly, didn't look all that bad, since the only “Sem-Eye Homemade” things in it were frozen raspberries, raspberry jam and mustard. How it’s budget friendly is another issue. I think her point was that, in general, it’s cheaper to cook at home than going out.
Things went down hill when she showed off a quick dessert. On the show, she layered some canned pumpkin pie filling in a glass with jarred caramel sauce and crushed cookies. The website recipe calls for canned apple pie filling. Gawd! Premade pie filling eaten out of a glass isn't my idea of dessert. It's rubbish.Thankfully, no tablescapes were shown or even discussed and Sandy herself had a pared-down, sparsely made-up appearance, except that her hair was done in a (Palin inspired?) partial up-do with a lot of mess at the back.
Nobu Matsuhisa was on R & K today to promote his new cookbook - Nobu Miami: The Party Cookbook. He made Black Sea Bass with Jalapeño Miso. Miso, sugar, saki and jalapeño go into a pot to make a marinade. Substitute co-host, Anderson Cooper, asks if that would make you drunk. Nobu said, "The fish, yes."
He talked about traveling to Dubai to open his latest restaurant, number 21. Next year, he opens ones in Mexico City and Moscow.
Nobu pours out the miso mixture into a dish and adds the fish. Anderson Cooper asks, “You fry it…you grill it?” wondering if it’s cooked BEFORE it’s marinated. Nobu pauses and looks at him like he’s an idiot.
Then Nobu says to marinate it overnight and Anderson, in his best reporter mode, says “It doesn’t go bad?” Gelman shouts from offstage, “Keep it in the fridge…moron”. (The last part is my editorial comment, but YOU KNOW he was thinking it.) The fish goes into the oven for 10 minutes. (The recipe is fairly incomprehensible. Apparently, it’s broiled for 5 minutes on each side.)
After a break, Kelly comes over to taste with Anderson. They love it.
Nobu also shows off a gorgeous sashimi doused in hot olive oil and Baby Scallop Ceviche plus Octopus Carpacchio. Kelly likes the key lime juice with the scallops. Nobu says it’s clean tasting and he likes to use fresh ingredients. (Hear that, Sandy? FRESH.)
Lastly, he shows them a little drink – a Sea Urchin Mojito with extra saki and something floating in the glass...oh, it’s sea urchin. They make Anderson drink it, he survives. I don’t really blame him for being skeptical. I don’t like formerly living things that are now dead in my cocktail either.
Funnily enough, over at The Today Show today was Nobu’s co-author on the Miami book, Thomas Buckley, who is pictured on the cover with Nobu. Luckily, Katheeeee Leeeee wasn't there, so he got a word in edgewise with Hoda and Billy Bush.
Chef Buckley says he knows fat is flavor, showing off his own portly self and the short rib Wagyu beef. (WHERE is his accent from? Oh, Brighton. My goodness, he’s as un-understandable as his co-author. They must really talk funny there. I was born in the Bronx, so I know about tawwwking funny.)
He’s making Marinated Short Ribs. He makes a delicious mix to put the short ribs in and then they are refrigerated overnight. He says to put the closed captioning on if you don’t understand him. I thought he was talking about his accent, but no, it’s all the unusual ingredients. (You need the book to make this, even with the recipe, because several of the components have to be made separately or at least be explained - Shallot Tosazu and Macadamia sauce, for example. I know Tosazu is a Japanese vinegar, but then what?)
He puts the marinated short ribs on a hot grill and then turns it down immediately, because the mirin will burn. If you’re using conventional short ribs, you have to poach them (in the marinade?) for 3 hours and then grill.
After they’re cooked, Chef Buckley pours over the reduced marinade. Hoda and Billy rave. He tells them the cow gets a beer and a massage before being slaughtered. Hoda doesn’t want to hear about it. (I don’t really blame her, but that's "whole nother" ball of wax.) They rush through showing the other dishes.
One more cooking spot on morning television :
Paula was on The View making kids’ dishes. After I turned the sound down, I really enjoyed her showing two little girls how to cook. She made green eggs and ham. She does add a bit too much salt, but she uses an adorable salt shaker. She shows Lindsay how cook her green eggs with diced ham. That DOES look gross.
She moves on to “Punkin” Bread, no, wait, she said Monkey Bread. She has another little girl, Jill, cut up refrigerated biscuits into quarters. Those get dumped into a “greezed” bundt pan, after a dunk in cinnamon and sugar. Melted butter and sugar are poured over.
Then Paula takes a cooked Monkey Bread and fearlessly unmolds it, almost holding it right over her head. She says the “bundt pan” prayer and it comes out perfectly. No one noticed the tiny piece that was stuck on the bottom that she quickly jammed back into place. It looked fantastic, even knowing that it is unremittingly total, complete garbage. It’s one thing to make something like that from scratch, where, at least, you’re using a real dough, but refrigerated biscuits are junk. Sorry.
BUT none of that matters with Paula. It’s not about the actual recipe. (And good luck finding the recipe on the pain of The View website, which is even worse than the Food Network site for finding anything.) It’s about her joie de vivre. It’s about making everyone within 200 miles of her feel comfortable, happy…and well-fed. You can’t help but love her to pieces. And, dang, that monkey bread looked good.
Gordon Ramsey was all over ABC this morning. First Charlie (Charles when he does the evening news) Gibson (back for a quickie hosting gig at his old haunt at GMA) incorrectly identified Gordon’s show Hell’s Kitchen as being on the Food Network. Amazingly, Gordon didn’t correct him.
Then Gordon set about demonstrating a chicken dish from his book Fast Food, talking so fast that I had to put the closed-captioning on. Even then I could only catch every other word. He browned some chicken pieces and added sherry vinegar*, soy sauce and then honey to the pan. It looked okay, but not spectacular. Oh, some lemon slices went in too. He served it with mashed potatoes that he calls Champ, which is a mashed potato dish of Irish origin.
Later, Gordon bullied Regis so much during a cooking segment that it became tiresome. He did do an interesting recipe, however, where he POACHED lamb, which got rid of a lot of the fat and served it with barely smashed (or even cooked) peas. The lamb did look beautiful, but I think he could have minded his manners a bit more. Plus I would have liked a bit more highlights in chef’s hair…
*I JUST had an unfortunate experience with Sherry Vinegar. For a vinaigrette, I added it to the blender AFTER my French Maille mustard. Then I got a whiff of something really foul. Luckily, I tasted it (I really shouldn’t have, when it smelled that bad) and it had in fact turned. The lesson? Store it in the fridge and always add it BEFORE your precious mustard.
Mario taught us more in his few minute segment on GMA this morning than many current FN hosts teach us in an entire season of mediocre food shows.He looked very robust as he showed us some Italian home-cooked recipes. The soup he did was based on leftover ingredients - a full bodied vegetable soup. The most important part of the soup is SWEATING the onions. Mario! You SO know what you're talking about! It almost doesn't matter what goes into the pot next, if you have a full flavored base. He adds the remaining vegetables, stock and liquid and then simmers it for 25 minutes. This soup is thickened with bread that Mario has soaked in water and black pepper. (The black pepper isn't in the recipe on the website.) But think about it. How brilliant is that addition of pepper to the bread - adding a bit of punch, layering in some additional flavor - to a simple, simple recipe? I LOVE that idea. Mario is awesome in his knowledgeable-ness.He also shows off a couple of other finished dishes. The radicchio looked like a wonderful accompaniment to a big Christmas main course. Mario talked about the Shrimp Marsala - Housewife Style and made a point of mentioning that, in Italy, "housewife" is a term of pride. It's "not a menial job. It's the most loved job." I must say that Chris Cuomo did a better job hosting this segment than many actual food professionals would have. He had looked up the recipes and was able to comment on them in a well-informed way. He actually added something to the discourse. Mario served the soup with this very jazzy ladle. He then expounded in a succinct few sentences on the geographical underpinnings of Sicilian cuisine. Mario pointed out that it's closer to North Africa than Milan, hence its reliance on currants, pine nuts, fennel and hot chilies in Sicilian cuisine. We got all we needed this morning. We got a quick view of cuddly Mario, a couple of easy to make delicious recipes, and a bit of food history thrown in.
I'm so mad that I only saw this recipe on Good Morning America, after I had already baked for my friend M's cookie exchange. (More about my cookies another time.) They would have been a quick and easy additional contribution. Sara Moulton made these triple thumbprint cookies, called Trios.Basically, Trios are three little balls of dough wedged next to each other to make kind of a triangle. You flatten them slightly with the back a wooden spoon and then use the handle (or your thumb) to make a depression. You can put a different jam in each hole, which I think is a brilliant idea. They don't have a picture of these particular cookies in the story, but they look like little jewels.
