Liquered Up

As if I didn't already make enough things from scratch around here, I have now decided to take on homemade liqueurs. They're not difficult, just a little time-consuming, in that you have to wait a month or two to consume!

I have been fascinated with limoncello since a good friend of mine in St. Louis had me sample some on a night on the town. It is very much a special-occasion thing to me and worth every second of the immediate buzz I get upon the first few sips! The recipe below is outstanding and quite worth the wait as well (it needs about a month "stewing" time). Go ahead and splurge for the fancy hand-made gnocchi or ravioli at your local gourmet shop when your limoncello is ready to go. It'll be one of the best dinners and after-dinner drinks you've ever made.

At a recent get-together, Zesty Lemon recently graced me with the presence of his homemade amaretto. I won't divulge his recipe, since it came from a friend of his, but I can pass this one along that he sent me after our evening hanging out. This one uses real almonds and takes a little more time than the limoncello, but if it's anything like the speedy version he gave me, it's got to be good!

Last but not least, I highly recommend the book Infused: 100+ Recipes for Infused Liqueurs and Cocktails. Unfortunately, it's out of print, so it's only available used. I did find it at my local library, but then realized I was copying so many recipes, I figured I might as well buy it. It does use the same general rule of thumb throughout, which is a certain percentage of fruit, vegetable, or essence to a certain amount of alcohol, so maybe you won't really need the whole book once you've made a few.

Or maybe you think I'm insane that I'd take on the task of liqueur-making with everything else I insist on not purchasing ready-made. Isn't pie crust, buttercream, and granola from scratch enough?

Limoncello

Adapted from A Table in the Tarn: Living, Eating and Cooking in Rural France, by Orlando Murrin

5 lemons
4 1/4 cups vodka
1 3/4 cups water
1 cup sugar
5-6 clean 12-oz bottles

Rinse the lemons and soak them overnight in cold water. Drain and dry. Zest the lemons using a vegetable peeler, zester, or grater. (I used a vegetable peeler, making half-inch-wide strips and breaking those into 2-inch pieces.)

Stuff the zest into a 1.5-liter bottle. Pour the vodka into the bottle, seal, and shake well. Leave for a month in a dark, dry place, and shake once a week.

Heat water and sugar on medium-high heat until dissolved. Boil 1 minute and allow to cool (you are making a simple syrup). Pour vodka out of 1.5-liter bottle into bowl, and mix in simple syrup. Using a funnel and strainer, strain into clean bottles. Seal tightly and store in freezer. Shake well before serving. Serving size: 1 oz. Makes two 750-ml bottles or about 5 1/2 12-oz bottles for gift-giving!

We Are All Probably Screaming for Ice Cream Right About Now...

Chicago just went from cloudy, rainy, damp, and 40-something to hot, humid, and 90--in about a week. That's nothing new around here, a city that can see a 40-degree spread in a single day. But I've gone a little crazy lately with making ice cream and sorbet in order to debunk the heat, and I need to share the fun!

If you don't have a countertop ice cream machine, now would be a great time to get one. Most quality brands are $50 to $70 for the season, and many companies are offering rebates right now. I own both a Cuisinart 1-1/2-quart Ice Cream and Sorbet Maker and the freezer attachment for my Kitchen Aid stand mixer. Both work really well and require only an overnight freeze of the mixing bowl. If you have a deep freeze or chest freezer, you can just store your freezer bowls in there all the time. Unfortunately, I cannot report on the old-fashioned ice-and-rock-salt electric or hand-crankers, as I've never worked with one, but I highly recommend a small electric one if you have the cabinet or counter space. They're affordable little workhorses (I've had my Cuisinart for more than 10 years), and you can purchase additional freezer bowls so that there's always one frozen and ready to go, making it easy to freeze multiple flavors at a time. It has recently gone through a redesign, and Cuisinart has also since introduced a 2-quart version, which I highly recommend. Most ice cream recipes, especially when adding mix-ins, tend to "enlarge" through the churning process, and so it's nice to have the extra bowl capacity. The Kitchen Aid attachment is pricier, but for those of you who already have a 4- to 6-quart stand mixer parked on the countertop, it's nice to just be able to purchase an attachment instead of a whole new machine. Please note though, with small electric makers and attachments, ice cream requires an additional setting time in the freezer for a couple of hours or overnight. I have heard from ice-and-rock-salt owners that you can eat it right out of the bucket when churned. Just know that those machines require purchasing the special salt and having lots of ice on hand to get started.

My favorite books on the subject include The Ultimate Ice Cream Book: Over 500 Ice Creams, Sorbets, Granitas, Drinks, and More, by Bruce Weinstein, and The Perfect Scoop: Ice Creams, Sorbets, Granitas, and Sweet Accompaniments, by David Lebovitz. I've actually lost count of the number of recipes I've done from the Weinstein book. Even the mix-ins (he provides sometimes up to 10 variations of several of the recipes) are amazing crowd pleasers. Favorites around here from that book include the ice creams cheesecake, corn (yes, kinda crazy but GOOD!), key lime pie, green tea, coffee, peanut butter (add some chocolate chips--he doesn't suggest it, but mini-chocolate chips are a great mix-in), peach, pumpkin, and white chocolate. And the sorbets banana, honeydew, and coconut. Weinstein provides two types: standard custard-style (heavy on the eggs, so very rich) and egg-free Philadelphia-style, which is much lighter and often has less sugar. Just a warning though... Philadelphia-style requires at least overnight in the freezer after churning, to make sure it's frozen solid enough for scooping. This most likely has to do with the lack of eggs, which provide a lot of structure and intensity to custard-style ice creams. Lebovitz's is a little more gourmet, with things like pear caramel and goat cheese, but he offers a lot more sauces, toppings, and mix-ins than the Weinstein book. Both authors take cooks through the custard making process rather efficiently, and you can churn/freeze according to your maker's manufacturer's directions. I am not as well-versed on gelato (which contains more milk than cream and is often viewed as lower in fat content as a result), and neither book really tackles that subject. I might be able to include an addendum to this entry, after I take the gelato class I enrolled in at Canady Le Chocolatier later this month. So stay tuned...

Both the Weinstein and Lebovitz books include sorbet and granita recipes, sauces, cookie recipes for making ice cream sandwiches, and lots of other ice cream accompaniments. I've been cooking out of the Weinstein book for as long as I've owned my little Cuisinart, and I'm nowhere near done with everything I could make out of it!

If you're a cone lover like I am (the extra crunch of a sugar cone really makes the treat for me), you might want to consider getting a pizzelle or waffle cone maker. You will need to purchase cone rollers (most pizzelle makers don't include them but some waffle cone makers do) in order to make cones, or you can make (rather large!) ice cream sandwiches.

I'll leave you with an absolute must this season--hot fudge sauce! This is an easy recipe that cans and freezes well, and reheats perfectly. You can even steep spices (cinnamon sticks, ginger) or herbs (lavender, basil, orange or lemon zest) in the heavy cream at the heating stage to add flavor. So go on... scream for ice cream! You deserve a cool blast this already-hot summer!

Hot Fudge Sauce

3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/3 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons sugar
1/3 cup light corn syrup (Karo makes a 33% less fat version)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a microwave-safe container, heat the chocolate and butter in the microwave on half power in 30 second intervals until melted. Set aside to cool.

Heat cream in medium saucepan over low heat. Add sugar and corn syrup and stir until sugar dissolves completely. Add cream mixture to melted chocolate and return to pot. Continue to heat mixture over low heat, stirring constantly. Add the vanilla and serve hot. Makes about 1 cup. Can be pressure canned or frozen for later use.

Eat This, Rachel Ray

If I were to pen a modern-day Dante's Inferno, I'd reserve one circle of hell for Rachel Ray. I detest her faux-cheeriness and false charm. She may sauté chicken in e.v.o.o., but it will always be olive oil to me. While Julia Child elevated her audience, Ray cooks like everyone else. And a top-rate meal in 30 minutes? Puh-leeze. That's not possible without quality-reducing shortcuts, subpar, premade ingredients, and often in Ray's case, unwashed fruits and vegetables. Speed and quality go together a lot like fat-free and ice cream: It's possible, but a lot gets lost in the process.

Italians might disagree. Yes, Italy is home to the Slow Food movement, which aims to be everything fast food is not. Many of its culinary treasures, such as the long-simmered Bolognese ragu, aren't exactly ideal for busy Tuesday nights. And other than on the road—riding in a car with an Italian driver is often a white-knuckle experience—many Italians don't appear in a hurry to do much of anything. Yet most Italian dishes don't require complicated techniques and take little time to execute. The idea is to use few ingredients and maximize each of their flavors.

There's no better embodiment of this principle than Marcella Hazan's tomato sauce with onions and butter, whose name tells you all the ingredients you'll need. (Hazan, by the way, did for Italian food what Julia Child did for French in her masterful Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking.)

Here's what you need: A 15-ounce can of plum Italian tomatoes, 5 tablespoons of butter, and a medium onion, peeled and cut in half. Oh, and of course, salt. In a saucepan, combine all the ingredients, bring them to a slow, steady simmer for about 30 minutes (or maybe 45, if you listen to Marcella). Occasionally stir, breaking the tomatoes with the back of a wooden spoon, which gives the sauce a smooth texture. Once it's thickened, test for salt, and that's about it. There's no need for further embellishment, though I've found a healthy dash or two of heavy cream will do it no harm.

With so few ingredients, there's nowhere for bad tomatoes to hide. I know of no sauce that so simply showcases tomatoes' irresistible sweetness, but it won't do so if you use under-ripened, highly acidic ones that sadly dominate most supermarket shelves. My favorites are the Italian plum tomatoes from Carmelina, which you can find at Whole Foods. A less-expensive, more-accessible alternative brand is Muir Glen, which packages organic California tomatoes.

This sauce pairs best with stuffed pastas or those with some added personality, such as gnocchi. I prefer to serve it as it is in homes and trattorias in Bologna, Italy, coating meat-stuffed tortellini.

As much as it pains me to admit it, Rachel Ray is right. Sorta. Great food made without a lot of effort is possible in only 30 minutes. But the Italians teach you don't need to stoop to her level to next time you're in a pinch.

Buon Appetito!

Book & Restaurant Reviews: Bobby Flay's Burgers, Fries, & Shakes and State & Lake

It's a two-fer today... Call me a bad Hindu, but I love a good burger every now and then. I personally can't tell a flank steak from a strip steak, so I leave the real meat prep up to the professionals and hardly ever make them at home. However, I am a HUGE fan of Bobby Flay, and so when I stumbled across his newest, Burgers, Fries, and Shakes, at the library, I immediately brought it home and proceeded to salivate.

I dream of throwing down with him one day on his famous TV show, be it cupcakes, cookies, or even my chilis and soups, which many of you have told me are your favorites here at Spoonfoolery. But at least this cookbook has given me some confidence for summer grilling season. His basic burger recipe is the same throughout, but he spins each possibility for between your buns as anything but ordinary. From giant basil leaves in place of lettuce for his Trattoria Burger to a burger variation on the Cubano, today's "It" sandwich, Flay travels the globe in good flavor. Burgers such as the California (avocado, tomato, and watercress--what else were you expecting?), the Carolina (BBQ sauce and slaw), the Cheyenne (shoestring onion rings, bacon, and a to-die-for black-gold of a homemade BBQ sauce recipe that he gives you as well) represent this great nation of beef too. And the fries-and-onion-rings tutorial midway through the book is great for the frying illiterate, such as yours truly. I couldn't even deep fry the Indian stuff until very recently, so it's good to know some foolproof ways to handle a burger's best buddies.

The shakes portion of this cookbook simply made my day! Somehow, Flay makes it seem A-OK to prepare a 1,500-calorie meal at home, even with topping it off with one of these sweet-and-creamy indulgences. I see a Blackberry Cheesecake Milkshake or a Toasted Marshmallow Milkshake in my very near future. I am also realizing how my plan to borrow cookbooks from the library is slowly backfiring, as this is officially the third book I've borrowed lately and then purchased promptly afterward!

Perhaps what made a burger cookbook catch my eye in the first place was thoroughly enjoying one at State & Lake, inside the Wit Hotel in downtown Chicago. This is the quintessential gastropub, with a mighty fine beer list (16 on tap!) and even a reasonably priced wine list (for downtown Chicago). It's standard pub fare taken up a notch, with such recent fancy-pants items on the bar scene as salted cod brandade, savory beignets, and braised short ribs. The mac-n-cheese, which my husband sort of ate (but not really, since stout on draft generally replaces a meal for him in such places!) sports a little truffle oil but unfortunately was not cooked al dente, so I grew bored with it fast. However, my burger was nicely done (for some reason medium well seems to be a hard thing for a lot of places to accomplish these days), and the fries would probably meet Bobby Flay's standard--crispy on the outside, long and skinny enough to cook through well on the inside, with a minimal toss in salt and parsley flecks. Yum! I tend to do only half a burger in the restaurant and take the rest home for lunch the next day, and I must say, it heated up nicely and was just as enjoyable a day later. Now, if only they could master mac-n-cheese, and it'd get my total seal of gastropub approval, but then, I guess there's always Bobby Flay's Four Cheese Burger in the book to make up for that!

All this said about burgers, fries, shakes, and mac-n-cheese mistakes, I'd like to take this moment to introduce our latest addition to the Spoonfoolery editorial staff, Burger King. Burger King is a true connoisseur and hopes to take you all over Chicago (and perhaps this great nation) in search of the more perfect union of meat, bread, toppings, and fries. Look for his restaurant reviews and random research on America's favorite sandwich soon!

Lamb Vindaloo--Woo Hoo!

Even though I grew up eating it at nearly every meal, I have only recently clued in to the fact that there is actually no such thing as a curry, according to The Food of India, an amazing text and cookbook that every Indian food connoisseur should have. The term comes from the Tamil word kari, meaning black pepper. Dishes are named for the amalgamation of spices used to make them (rogan josh, vindaloo), the cooking method (korma--in cream, or biryani--with rice), or for their main ingredients (saag--spinach, aloo gobi--cauliflower). Curry powder doesn't really exist in India either, with the closest thing being masala (a spice mix). There are hundreds of masala combinations, such as garam and Madras.

I grew up eating traditionally South Indian food, which is not the standard fare served in Indian restaurants. Its mostly vegetarian and includes things like dosa (rice flour crepe filled with a curried potato mixture) and idli (steamed rice cake served with a coconut or cilantro chutney). However, I have come to embrace North Indian selections such as vindaloo because of its combination of all my favorite Indian spices and its serious kick! You can make this spice mixture en masse and keep it around as a rub for just about anything (burgers, roasted chicken--you name it). But it is definitely worth slow cooking a lamb shank in some time. This was almost so good, we didn't want to eat it, for fear we'd be finished with it all too soon! Most of the ingredients can be found at your grocery store or Whole Foods, but if you live in the vicinity of a good Middle Eastern or Indian grocer, stock up on some of the exotics like cardamom pods and bay leaves. They're much cheaper for bigger quantities there.

Lamb Vindaloo

2 T coriander seed
1 T cumin seed
1/4 tsp black peppercorns
3-4 green cardamom pods
3-4 whole cloves
2 tsp black mustard seeds
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cayenne
1 T turmeric
2 tsp salt
6 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
2 inches fresh ginger, peeled and minced
2 lbs lamb shanks, fat mostly trimmed
1 cup red wine
1 medium tomato, diced (or two roma/plum tomatoes)
1 medium Vidalia onion or other sweet onion, finely chopped
6 bay leaves
Fresh cilantro leaves

Lightly dry roast (no oil) coriander through mustard seeds over medium-high heat until fragrant (about 3 minutes). Grind these in a spice grinder or clean coffee grinder until fine. Mix with cinnamon, cayenne, turmeric, and salt. Add garlic and ginger and make a paste. Rub over lamb shanks to coat. In a large Ziploc bag or Tupperware, combine red wine, tomato, onion, and bay leaves. Place lamb in bag or Tupperware, seal, and shake to coat evenly. Marinate overnight in refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 275 degrees F. Empty contents of bag or box into oven-proof pot with lid. Cover and roast lamb shanks with curry mixture for 2-3 hours. (You can check at 2 hours and see if it's fall-off-the-bone tender; if not, leave it in for another 30 minutes to an hour). Serve over rice and garnish with fresh cilantro leaves. Serves 4.

Book Review: Confections of a Closet Master Baker

Yes, you read that title right. Many, many double meanings in that one, my friends. But the book is really about having a dream and making it happen. I'm starting a new feature here at Spoonfoolery--book reviews! I am a cookbook junkie, as you learned when I met Thomas Keller and again when I met Gale Gand, and admitted to owning multiples of her baking bibles as well. So since I read cookbooks as if they're bedside novels, I thought I'd review one that more or less is a bedside novel.

Gesine Bullock-Prado is the younger sister of Hollywood A-lister Sandra Bullock. After years as a studio executive mired in Hollywood shenanigans, Gesine chucked it all to purchase, build out, and run a vintage-style bakery in the middle of Vermont. I felt she was a kindred spirit when I read that she took up baking as an outlet to the insanity that is the most plastic place on the planet (Hollywood). That was pretty much my trajectory from editor to pastry chef. Baking was definitely a release from hoeing the cubicle farm all day for me. Gesine and Sandra's late mother, a true German baker, was another inspiration, and the homage Gesine pays to her mom in the book is very moving. Set up more as a testament to her tenacity to turn a completely different corner and make a homestyle bakery work in the middle of nowhere, Confections of a Closet Master Baker is part biography, part cookbook, part stand-up comedienne routine. Each chapter starts with a sharp, witty look at how exactly something came to be at the bakery or in her life in general, and ends with a famous recipe from her menu, making it hard to decide if this book belongs on the living room shelves or in the kitchen. I loved her laugh-out-loud takes on kitchen disasters (including her sister's wedding cake), and her cynical-yet-dead-on assessments of just the way people are sometimes, especially her customers. She is a distinctly different personality than Sandra, and that's something she's been gunning for her whole life. She just never found that in Hollywood, but I think she's on her way now, by making Montpelier, Vt., the French macaron capital this side of the Atlantic!