WELL FED

KITCHEN UPDATE: Sink & Faucet

Well the kitchen renovation is chugging forward.  All the appliances have been purchased.  My cabinet maker is working away in his shop.  The electrician has installed recessed lights in the kitchen and done the preliminary wiring for halogen, under cabinet lights.  

Wall switches have been moved to more convenient locations and outlets relocated to feel more inconspicuous.  Here in the breakfast room, an outlet that was originally directly under the window has been moved down.  

Since the windows in the room are sort of high up, I'm thinking of getting either a rectangular bar height table or a stainless steel restaurant prep table which I plan to pair with vintage swiveling drafting table stools.  On either side of the door to the breakfast room there will be shoulder height bookcases, future home to all my cookbooks and food magazines.

One end of the kitchen used to be a laundry room.  Previous owners moved the washer and dryer to the garage to free up some space, but the water and gas hook ups were still present, sticking out like a soar thumb at the end of the room.  Those have now been capped off and will soon be drywalled over.  

The plan is for this wall to be painted with chalkboard paint and I have a vintage school clock that will get hung right in the center.

The plumber has run a line for the new refrigerator's ice maker.  The original faucet came out of the wall just above the sink.  The plumber lowered it so it'll come out of the counter, just behind the sink.

Although the cabinets I'm having made will look more vintage, more in keeping with the age of the house (it was built in 1928), the faucet and sink have a decidedly more modern fee.  The sink is a large, undermount style made of thick stainless steel.  Very restaurant/industrial.  

I chose it because of its depth and width, and particularly because of the fact that it's not divided into two. The sink in my apartment is just slightly larger than a bar sink and has been a real challenge when trying to wash anything larger than a dinner plate.  That will certainly not be a problem with this one.

As for the faucet, in keeping with the restauranty feel, I selected one that has a high sort of flexible goose neck with a spray nozzle at the end.

Once assembled, it'll look like this:

I love the sort of refined industrial feeling it has, but what I really love is the functionality, being able to pull the nozzle out of the holder and really be able to spray down every corner of the sink.

I have given notice on my apartment and last weekend, moved all my stuff to the new house.  As such, it looks like the bucatini with clams was the last meal ever cooked in my old place.  It's sort of fitting since at the end of the meal, every surface in my microscopic kitchen was covered with dirty pots, plans, glasses and dishes and as I cooked, it felt like the walls were closing in on me.  I sort of wish I'd known that I would cook nothing else in this place.  I might have made a bigger deal out of it, maybe invited some people over.  Instead it sort of slipped by with no fanfare.  I have to admit, as small as the kitchen was, it did function very well.  I mean, it really is where I took my appreciation of food to the next level.  It's where I went from doctoring Rice-A-Roni with chunks of frozen chicken breast to making my own pasta.   I'm going to miss it.  Sort of.  Well, maybe not.  Well maybe a little.

BUCATINI WITH CLAMS, FENNEL, WHITE WINE & THYME BREADCRUMBS

Looking over the recipe I wondered whether it would be a good idea to add some pancetta.  I mean, what dish isn't made better by the addition of some form of bacon.  I'll give you the answer.  NONE.  In fact, there is a new restaurant here in LA called Animal which is run by two stoner types who had their own Food Network show that lasted about five minutes, and they have bacon in almost everything on the menu.  They have a fantastic whole roasted branzino with a bacon vinaigrette and they even feature this dessert that has bacon crumbled over the top.  It's a sort of high end Kit Kat, with thin, crispy wafers covered in really good chocolate.  Believe it or not, the chocolate and the bacon work really well together.  That whole salty sweet combo, like chocolate covered pretzels.

Anyway, I strongly considered adding bacon, but taking into account that Suzanne Goin wrote the recipe, and chose NOT to include bacon, made me take pause.  The lady won a James Beard award.  If she felt that the dish would have been better with bacon, I'm sure she would have included it.  She herself says in Sunday Suppers at Lucques that she's a lover of all things pork and finds ways to put it in everything.  But why not the bucatini with clams?  Clams plus red onion plus fennel plus pancetta?  I mean how could that not work?  I IMed Jessica to get her thoughts.  She too felt it would work, but wondered if maybe it would be a little "busy."  I can see that.  On my way home, I pondered calling Lucques to get to the bottom of why pancetta is not in the recipe but in the end, I just followed the instructions.  I know food should be improvisational to a degree, and usually I'm not so slavish, but whenever I cook from this cookbook, I tend to follow the recipes methodically.  The book has proven itself over and over again to be very reliable.  Who am I to think I can improve on Ms. Goin's vision?  And yet, as I chopped and sauteed and stirred and reduced, I was haunted ... by bacon.

INGREDIENTS

2 1 1/2 cups fresh breadcrumbs

2 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves

1/2 sprig rosemary

2 chiles de arbol, plus 1 teaspoon sliced

2 cups red onion, diced 

2 cups fennel, diced

2 bay leaves, preferably fresh

1/4 cup thinly sliced garlic

1 pound bucatini (you could also use regular old spaghetti or linguini)

3 pounds small Manila clams

3/4 cup dry white wine

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 lemon

1/2 cup parsley, chopped

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

METHOD

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

Next, clean the clams by placing them in a large bowl filled with cold water for 10 minutes.  Add a small handfull of cornmeal or a splash of milk to encourage them to spit out any sand.  Every few minutes, give the clams a stir.  Drain and return to the bowl and cover with some ice and refrigerate until needed.

Spread the breadcumbs on a baking sheet and drizzle with 2 tablespoons of olive oil and scatter over 1 tablespoon of thyme.  Using your fingers, toss the breadcrumbs to evenly coat with the oil.  

Place in the oven and bake for 8 to 10 minutes, stirring once or twice, until golden brown.

Bring a large pot of water to a boil.

Meanwhile heat a large dutch oven over high heat for two minutes.  Pour in the 1/2 cup olive oil and toss in the rosemary sprig and crumble in the 2 chiles de arbol with your fingers.  Let them sizzle in the oil for a minute or two and then turn down the heat to medium.  Add the red onion, fennel, bay leaves and remaining tablespoon of thyme.  Season with 2 teaspoons of salt and several grindings of black pepper. 

 

Cook for 5 minutes, stirring often.  Add the garlic and continue to cook for another 3 or 4 minutes until the vegetables are translucent and soft.

Now, season the boiling water with a small handful of salt and drop in the pasta.

Add the cleaned clams to the vegetables and stir to coat well.  Pour in the wine and cover the pot.  Cook until the clams open, about 5 minutes or so. (After a couple minutes, lift the lid, gently stir the clams to help redistribute the heat, and re-cover the pan)

When all the clams have opened, remove the pan from the heat and use a slotted spoon to transfer the clams to a large bowl or rimmed baking sheet.  Discard any clams that haven't opened.  If you like, you can remove most or all of the clams from the shells to make it easier to eat upon serving.  Or you can just skip this step.

When the pasta is al dente, RESERVE one cup of the pasta water (I forgot), and then drain the pasta.  Return the dutch oven to medium-high heat, and add the pasta to the vegetables, tossing the noodles well.  Cook 3 to 4 minutes to reduce the juices and coat the pasta.  If the noodles seem too dry, add some of the reserved pasta water.  Add the butter, a big squeeze of lemon juice, the sliced chile, the clams, most of the parsley, 1/4 teaspoon of salt and a couple grindings of black pepper.  Toss well and taste for seasoning.

To serve, pile the pasta in a large bowl in on a platter and sprinkle with the breadcrumbs, a little more parsley, and maybe a drizzle of good olive oil.

A word of warning.  Be SURE to save that pasta water.  It's very important.  I totally forgot to do so and as such, my resulting dish wasn't as stellar as it potentially could have been.  Not that there was anything really wrong with it, but the starchy cooking liquid should combine with the white wine, lemon juice and butter to make a light, silky sauce.  My sauce was fine, just not at rich.

Anyway, this is a really nice version of the classic Linguini Vongole, but with little twists that make it, in my opinion a little more interesting.  The addition of the red onion and fennel is a notable improvement over the original, adding two different layers of sweetness as well as giving the dish a little more substance.  The bucatini has a fantastic texture, thick and chewy which contrasts the delicate clams.  It's totally worth seeking out if it's not readily available at your local grocery store.  Then the toasted, thyme scented breadcrumbs finish the dish with a light, crunch.  As you know, I'm a big fan of dishes that have a variety of textures, and this certainly falls into that category.  I still think pancetta might be a welcome addition.  I'll have to give it a try next time, not matter what Suzanne thinks.

This is the kind of dish that needs to be prepared last minute, but it is quite fast to prepare, so if you have guests it's totally the kind of thing were you can be watching over the pasta while guests hang in the kitchen drinking wine and eating cheese and olives.

Serves 4 generously as a main course or 6 as a pasta course

KITCHEN UPDATE: The Demolition

This past weekend, Mark and I gathered a hard working group of friends at the new house for a little pizza and beer fueled demolition derby.  The goal was to make the entire existing kitchen vanish.  A subgoal, but an important one nonetheless, was to see if we could rip out the tile countertops, back splash and cabinetry without harming the hardwood floors, which had just been redone.  Yes I know, I'm sort of doing it backwards.  Logic would suggest demolition and then refinishing.  My logic drove me to have the floor throughout the house redone asap so we could start moving our belongings in and not have shuffle them from room to room as the floors were sanded, stained and varnished.  See?  That makes sense in a way.

Anyway, prior to the arrival of our rag tag team of demolition enthusiasts (I hesitate to call them experts), I started to prepare.  Using a gutsy little tool my friend Blake, a recent kitchen renovation survivor, suggested call a FUBAR, I pried the doors off the cabinets with gusto and tossed them noisily into the dumpsters we rented.  Mark was on cleanup crew, making sure nothing that could scratch the floor was left laying around.

Soon our friend Simon arrived, then Annie and Pierson (a sledgehammer in tow), and then a friend of Mark's named Nate.  Smashing ensued.

Pierson at work on the counter tops.

Annie takes out her aggression as Pierson and Simon look on.

After but a few hours, the kitchen when from looking like this...

To this....

From this...

To this...

During the course of the demolition, little details of the kitchen's past were revealed.  Check out the original flooring.

More updates to come.  Stay tuned...

ANTIPASTO SALAD WITH BOCCONCINI & SPICY GREEN OLIVE TAPENADE

There I stood in the produce department at Whole Foods, crippled with indecision.  Before me sat a shelf full of neat rows perfectly round, pale green heads of iceberg lettuce, wrapped in plastic.  Although the recipe I was shopping for called for iceberg lettuce, I suddenly felt incredibly self-conscious about buying some.  I was after all in the Weho location,the store filled with attractive, toned and well-dressed, hip people, their baskets filled with organic peaches, vegan ice cream, and plastic tubs of kale salad.  I wasn't at the dumpy Pavilions down the street, where it would be totally acceptable to buy such a trashy vegetable. A Whole Foods shopper wouldn’t make a salad out of iceberg. They’d use frisee or mache or arugula or mixed baby greens. An iceberg salad is something you get at a crappy diner or family style restaurant. It’d be adorned with too-thick slices of cucumber, pale wedges of tomatoes and boxed croutons and come accompanied by gloopy ranch or thousand island dressing. Nothing against ranch or thousand island.I love them both, but in secret. 

For a moment I worked through the recipe in my head trying to decide if romaine would be a suitable substitute but in the end, I quickly snatched a head of iceberg and tucked it away in my basket, hoping no one would see and judge. Searching for justification I reasoned that I was making a Nancy Silverton recipe, and if SHE said it was okay to use iceberg, then why should I be so ashamed to buy it.  I mean, she's Nancy-freaking-Silverton.  High priestess of bread and cheese. The lady knows food. Adding to the pressure was the fact that I was buying the ingredients for a dinner Annie and I were making for our dear friend Heather and her new boyfriend Timothy, WHO’S A PROFESSIONAL CHEF. Oh and he only works at one of my favorite restaurants, The Hungry Cat. For those who don’t know, The Hungry Cat is owned by David Lenz, the husband of Nancy-freaking-Silverton’s rival for Queen of the LA restaurant scene, Suzanne Goin!!! And we all know my feelings on La Goin.

The idea of cooking for a chef who’s associated with one of my most important culinary influences was just too much.  For several days I was a nervous wreck.  Fortunately Heather requested grilled pizzas, something Annie and I have done many times and we both are confident in the reliability of the results.  The flavors of the salad I knew would be a hit.  I mean, good salami, little creamy balls of bocconcini and that woodsy, oregano tinged vinaigrette, how can you go wrong with that?  But it was the damned iceberg that kept me feeling uneasy.  Would the new boyfriend silently judge me for using iceberg?

Once Heather and Timothy arrived, Annie and I gave them a rundown on the meal.  I noted that the salad came form Ms. Silverton.  Timothy emphatically stated how much he loved her.  I was instantly put at ease.  I no longer felt insecure.  I knew dinner was going to go well, after all.

INGREDIENTS
(for the vinaigrette)
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
4 large garlic cloves, minced
1 heaping tablespoon dried oregano
1/4 cup good olive oil
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

(for the tapenade)

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons green olive tapenade

1/4 cup finely chopped pepperoncini

1/4 cup good olive oil

(for the salad)

4 cups thinly sliced iceberg lettuce

1/2 pound thinly sliced hard salami, sliced into 1/4 inch strips

5 bocconcini per person

12 green olives

pinch of dried oregano

4 to 6 large basil leaves, cut into a chiffonade

METHOD

First make the vinaigrette.  Stir together the lemon juice and red wine vinegar in a small bowl.  Add the garlic and oregano.  In a slow, steady stream, whisk in the olive oil.  Season with the salt and pepper.

Next make the tapenade.  Stir together the green olive tapenade, pepperoncini and olive oil in a small bowl.

Next assemble the salad.  In a large bowl, gently toss the shredded lettuce and salami with a few tablespoons of the vinaigrette.  Be careful not to over dress the salad.  In fact, it should seem a little under-dressed.

To plate, mound the lettuce and salami mixture on four plate, dividing it evenly.  Arrange five bocconcini close together, like eggs in a bird's nest, in the middle of each pile of lettuce.  Spoon the tapenade around the cheese then drizzle with a little more of the dressing.  Sprinkle with a pinch of dried oregano and shower with the basil. 

The oregano is earthy, the basil fresh and light. The bocconcini are milky and mild, their blandness perfectly balanced by the salty, savory salami. The tapenade, while also salty, has a briney, bright flavor with an undercurrent of heat from the pepperoncini. And as much as I want to deny the appeal, icebergreally does have a great, watery crunch. 

The salad is a great start to a meal, such as the grilled pizzas we did or I can see it being served before a big bowl of pasta, or it can be a completely satisfying meal unto itself.

Serves 4