Pasta Bolognese

I think my first try with this recipe must have been before I started this blog. I hauled it back out again recently, and it was a big hit with the kids. I've made it both with and without the mushroom soaking liquid, and preferred it without, but your mileage (and mushroominess tolerance) may vary. Cook's claims this serves 4-6, but that would be a WHOLE lot of sauce per person. My family easily gets two dinners out of one batch, with next-day lunch leftovers each time to boot.

Weeknight Bolognese
adapted from Cook's Illustrated May/June 2003

1/2 oz dried porcini mushrooms
1 1/4 C sweet white wine (Gewürztraminer, Riesling, or white Zinfandel)
1/2 small carrot, peeled and roughly chopped (about 1/4 C)
1 rib celery, diced fine
1/2 small onion, peeled and roughly chopped (about 1/3 C)
3 oz pancetta, cut into 1-inch pieces
1 28-oz can whole tomatoes with juice (I use the 26-oz box of Pomi tomatoes, which don't have added firming agents)
1 1/2 T unsalted butter
1 small garlic clove, minced or pressed
1 t sugar
1 1/4 lb meatloaf mix, or some mixture of ground beef, ground veal, and ground pork
1 1/2 C 2% or whole milk
2 T tomato paste (Amore in the tube is best)
salt
1/8 t freshly ground black pepper

1. Cover porcini mushrooms with 1/2 C water in small microwave-safe bowl; cover with a small plate and microwave on high for 30 seconds. Let stand about 5 minutes for mushrooms to soften. Strain mushrooms from liquid and set both aside.

2. Bring wine to simmer in large nonstick skillet over medium heat, then reduce heat to low and simmer until reduced to 2 T, about 20 minutes. Scrape into a small bowl and set aside.

3. Meanwhile, pulse carrot in food processor until broken down into 1/4-inch pieces. Add onion and celery and pulse until veggies are in 1/8-inch pieces. Transfer to a small bowl. Process softened mushrooms until well-ground, scraping down sides of processor bowl as needed. Transfer mushrooms to bowl with other veggies. Process pancetta until pieces are no larger than 1/4 inch, then transfer to a small bowl. Pulse tomatoes and juice until chopped fine.

4. Heat butter in large skillet over medium-high heat; when foaming subsides, add pancetta and cook, stirring frequently, until well browned. Add veggies; cook, stirring frequently, until veggies are softened but not browned. Add garlic and sugar and sauté another 30 seconds. Add meat, breaking into one-inch pieces with wooden spoon. Add milk and stir to break meat into 1/2-inch pieces; bring to simmer, reduce heat to medium and continue to simmer until most liquid is evaporated and meat is sizzling, 18-20 minutes. Stir in tomato paste and cook one minute. Add tomatoes, reserved porcini liquid, 1/4 t salt, and pepper; bring to simmer over medium-high heat, then reduce to medium and simmer until liquid is reduced and sauce is thickened but still moist, 12-15 minutes. Stir in reduced wine and simmer to blend flavors, about 5 minutes.

Serve over cooked pasta with grated parmesan!

Apple Bacon Cheddar Scones

Back in October, Burgerville's seasonal menu items all involved local apples. My far-and-away favorite of these was the Apple Bacon Cheddar Scone. I hope they'll bring them back next year, but in the mean time, I thought I'd try my own. Saturday was my first stab. I made my favorite scone recipe (adapted from Sheila Lukins' All Around the World Cookbook), adding sautéed bacon, caramelized diced apple, and grated cheddar cheese at the end. Next time I'll make it with a slightly smaller proportion of bacon and apples, and cook the apples a little less--they were caramelized enough to be chewy.

Apple Bacon Cheddar Scones
4 oz apple-wood-smoked bacon, sliced thinly, slices halved lengthwise and cut crosswise into 1/4" pieces
1 medium baking apple, peeled, cored, and cut into 1/4" wide wedges (I used a Pink Lady; Braeburn was my runner-up, and Granny Smith would work in a pinch)
1/4 C sugar
2 C all-purpose flour
1 T baking powder
3 T sugar
1/2 t salt
1/2 C unsalted butter, chilled and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
1 large egg, lightly beaten in liquid measuring cup
milk added to beaten egg to reach just above 1/2-cup line
4 oz. grated cheddar cheese (I used medium because I had it; I think sharper would be even better!)

Mixed diced apple with 1/4 C sugar (adjusting as necessary depending on tartness of apple). Sauté bacon over medium-low heat until most fat is rendered and it is crisp but not overly browned. Scoop bacon pieces onto a paper-towel-lined plate, and pour bacon grease in pan into a heat-proof container, leaving a small skim of melted fat in the pan. Add sugared apples and cook over medium-low heat until apples have softened, puffed, and started to brown. Scrape apples into bowl and toss with bacon pieces.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Put dry ingredients in bowl of food processor and pulse a couple of times to blend. Scatter butter pieces over flour mixture and pulse until mixture is slightly yellow and no pieces of butter larger than pea-sized remain. Pour 1/2 C of egg-milk mixture over other ingredients (leaving a couple of tablespoons liquid in measuring cup) and pulse until dough is starting to form curds but has not fully come together. Dump contents of food processor into a large bowl, add reserved apple and bacon and grated cheddar (reserving a little cheddar to sprinkle on top of scones), and mix gently with your hands, just until the extras are mostly evenly incorporated and cohesive dough has formed. Do not overwork. Divide dough into equal halves and form each half into a round, flattened disk about 3/4" thick. Use a pastry scraper to cut each round of dough into six wedges. Transfer to parchment-lined baking sheet (prepared scones can be chilled and held at this point as long as overnight), brush with reserved egg-milk mixture, and sprinkle with reserved cheddar. Bake about 15 minutes, then cool a little before serving.

DIVINE Chocolate Cake

We celebrated the Wizard's birthday tonight in the back yard. Once again we had pulled pork sandwiches* with cole slaw, corn on the cob, watermelon, a few chips, and some delicious baked beans brought by friends (need to get that recipe!).

Dessert, though, oooooohhhhhhh. I made a recipe that's been in my queue for quite a while: Chocolate-Buttermilk Layer Cake. It appeared in Portland Monthly in February of 2008. Instead of both filling and frosting it with ganache, I cut the cake into four layers and used ganache for all three layers of filling, and frosted the top and sides with Fluffy Cream Cheese Frosting. We also had The Cupcakes, also with cream cheese frosting, because we had enough guests that just one dessert I thought would not be sufficient. As it turned out, just the cake would have been enough if I had cut it in the small pieces its richness warranted. The size pictured is too big even for a chocoholic like me, and even with vanilla ice cream to cut the richness.

Chocolate-Buttermilk Layer Cake
adapated from Portland Monthly Mag

3 C unbleached all-purpose flour
2 1/2 C sugar
1 1/2 T baking soda
1/2 t salt
1 C cocoa powder, sifted
1 1/3 C canola oil
1 1/2 C buttermilk
3 large eggs
1 1/2 C freshly-brewed, extra-strong hot coffee (I made instant coffee at about 150% the strength recommended on the jar)
1 t vanilla
16 oz bittersweet chocolate (24 oz if using for one layer of filling and top and sides of cake)
1 C heavy cream (1 1/2 C if using for one layer of filling and top and sides of cake)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat two 9-inch round cake pans with nonstick cooking spray and line the bottoms with parchment paper.

2. Put dry ingredients in bowl of stand mixer, and mix with paddle attachment at low speed to combine. Keep mixer on low speed and add oil, buttermilk, and eggs one at a time. Add hot coffee in a thin stream, pouring down the side of the bowl. Add vanilla, scrape sides of bowl with rubber spatula, and mix just until smooth. Divide between pans and bake until a toothpick comes out of the center with moist crumbs, 40-45 minutes (original recipe says 30-35, but the cake wasn't close to done at that point). Let cool in pans 10-15 minutes, then transfer to wire rack to cool completely, peeling parchment off bottoms of layers but putting cakes right side up on rack.

3. Put cream and chocolate (chopped if necessary) into a microwave-safe bowl and microwave on high for one minute. Stir well, then microwave for an additional 30 seconds. Stir until all the chocolate is melted and the mixture is glossy and dark, zapping another 15-30 seconds if absolutely necessary. Let cool to room temperature, stirring occasionally.

4. Trim cooled cakes just a little, so they're not too domed, then carefully cut in half horizontally with a serrated bread knife. Before separating the layers, cut a small notch in the side to line up when reassembling the layers after filling, since almost no one cuts that perfectly. Put one bottom layer on a cake plate, placing strips of waxed paper under the edges. Top with one-third of the ganache, and spread to within one half-inch of the edge. Place matching top layer, lining up notch, and top with another third of the ganache. Repeat with second split layer of the cake. Put filled layers of cake in fridge for 15-30 minutes to set ganache a little before icing.

5. Apply crumb coat of cream cheese frosting to sides and top of cake. Refrigerate for 15 minutes more, then spread remaining frosting on top and sides of cake. Refrigerate a couple of hours before serving.

*You don't need a recipe for the pulled pork, right? I bought a boneless Boston butt (big pork shoulder roast) from our favorite farmers' market pork purveyor, and coated it with a little oil and salt and pepper. I made a big fire in one side of the grill (charcoal, of course) and seared the snot out of it last night, then moved it to the cool side for 60-90 minutes. Around midnight, I put it in a roasting pan, covered it tightly with foil, and moved it into a 250-degree oven overnight. At 9 this morning I wrapped it tightly in foil and put it into a cooler to rest and cool slowly until this afternoon. It was just cool enough to handle, so I separated out the fat and the crispy parts with my fingers, then shredded the meat with two forks. I mixed in a little sauce, and served more on the side. This time the sauce was bottled (Cook's Illustrated's top choice, Bulls-Eye, now made without HFCS!), but last year I made a ketchup-based sauce from a Cook's Illustrated recipe. The coleslaw was made using the recipe on the side of the bagged coleslaw package. Maybe for a future year (we'll have this for the Wizard's birthday every year as long as he goes along) I'll make a fancier scratch coleslaw, and bring back that scratch sauce.

Mixed Bag

I should have made it on New Year's Day, of course, but I got around to making Hoppin' JaneAnne, and this time I took pictures! It was only a mixed bag because Newton didn't like the squash, the Wizard didn't like the black-eyed peas, and Cindy Lou was pretty dubious about the whole thing. I thought it was delicious.

The black-eyed peas, a little overcooked because I forgot to turn the crock pot to low before going shoe shopping.


The bacon.


The butternut squash, peeled and cubed.


The onion, chopped in the Cuisinart.


Sautéeing the bacon.


Sautéeing the onions and celery in a little bacon grease.


Carrot, julienned with the mandoline.


Baby spinach, stemmed and roughly chopped.


Spinach sautéed with the wilted and browned onion and celery.


Toasting the rice in a little bacon grease.


Simmering the rice, carrot and squash covered in chicken broth.


The finished product, after folding in the bacon, sautéed veggies and black-eyed peas.

Stuffed.

Somehow I've made these twice without remembering to take any pictures. Big hits with everyone and nary a leftover morsel to be found:

Pork Chops with Spinach-Three Cheese Stuffing
adapted from Cook's Illustrated May/June 2005

Cook's always brines their pork, and I never do. If you want to brine them, go ahead, but they turned out perfectly fantastic without it (insert usual disclaimers about the quality of meat involved here). For this recipe you'll need one-inch-thick bone-in rib chops, the ones with the bones along two sides and a big unbroken eye of meat. Two of these are enough for our family (even with boys who often eat adult-sized portions), though the original recipe is for four chops.

To make the pocket for the stuffing, insert a sharp paring knife into the meat from the side of the chop, near one of the bones, until you hit the bone on the far side. Keeping the opening no more than about an inch across, swing the tip of the knife through the meat to make the pocket, then turn the knife around and swing it in the other direction.

Spinach-Three Cheese Stuffing

1 slice white sandwich bread, torn into quarters
1/4 C toasted pine nuts (instead of fresh bread and toasted pine nuts, I substituted a few tablespoons of a bread-crumb/hazelnut mixture I had in the freezer--some time when I'm feeling less lazy I'll do it according to the recipe)
1 T olive oil
2 medium garlic cloves, pressed
6 oz spinach leaves, washed (who doesn't buy pre-washed any more?) and stemmed
2 oz shredded fontina
1/4 C ricotta
1 oz grated Parmesan
1 med lemon, cut into 4 wedges
1/4 t salt
pinch ground nutmeg
ground black pepper

1. Pulse bread and pine nuts in food processor until evenly ground.

2. Heat oil in 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat until shimmering. Add garlic and cook until just fragrant, then add spinach, turning with tongs to coat with oil. Cook until just wilted, then remove from pan. Transfer spinach to colander and squeeze to release excess moisture, then cool until just warm. (I did it this way the first time. The second time I transferred the spinach to a paper towel on top of a cutting board, then topped with another paper towel and pressed. I also chopped it a few times so it would mix into the cheese better. I preferred how it turned out the second time.)

3. Mix together fontina, ricotta and Parmesan in bowl. Add spinach and bread crumb mixture and mix to remove clumps. Stir in 1 T lemon juice, salt, nutmeg and pepper. Cut some of the white pith off the lemon wedge rinds to make little rectangular sections, about 3/4" by 1.5", to close the stuffing hole in the side of the chop.

The recipe didn't give any particular instructions for getting the stuffing into the chops. I found it worked well to have the chops in a bowl next to the bowl of stuffing, hold a chop up on its side, and use one finger to shove the stuffing deep into the pocket. The proportions of meat and stuffing are such that the chops will be really bulging when you're done. When you've got all the stuffing in the chops, insert the lemon rind pieces to seal up the gap. (The second time I made this I forgot to put in the rind stoppers, and the stuffing stayed in one chop and flowed pretty heavily out of the one in which I had inserted my temperature probe. So I recommend using the rinds.)

Preheat your oven to 450, then heat a little vegetable oil in an oven-safe skillet until just beginning to smoke. (The recipe calls for a regular skillet, then transferring it to a preheated roasting pan in the oven, but I just couldn't see the need for getting another pan dirty.) Brown the chops well on both sides, then transfer to oven and cook until center of stuffing is 135 degrees, 15-20 minutes, flipping halfway through cooking time. Transfer chops to a platter and tent with foil to rest for 10 minutes.

Nights of Spain

Of a recent Friday night, we had friends for dinner with a Spanish theme. No, I've never been to Spain (though one of my brothers went there on his mission)--I just had some Spanish chorizo in the freezer I wanted to use up. So, paella it would be. We started with a spread of Spanish cheeses, fig-almond paste, bread and crackers, and olives (the olives aren't in this picture, but you can see them in the first picture of the big table--there were medium-sized anchovy-stuffed ones, and little tiny ones).





Then the paella. It's not really that short on ingredients, but when you're making basically a one-dish meal, you get a lot of bang for your food-prep buck. I've never made a traditional recipe (this was my first paella), and I don't know why I'd bother when Cook's Illustrated has already done the paring down, and this one was so tasty!

Paella
adapted from Cook's Illustrated, May/June 2005
serves 6 (for our crowd of 10, I basically 1.5xed this recipe, and it was just right)

1 lb extra-large (21/25) shrimp, peeled and deveined
table salt and ground black pepper
olive oil
8-9 medium garlic cloves, pressed
1 lb boneless skinless chicken thighs, trimmed and halved crosswise
1 red bell pepper, roasted, skinned, and cut into strips (I served these separately because of an allergy among our guests)
8 oz Spanish chorizo, sliced 1/2" thick on the bias
1 medium onion, chopped fine
1 14.5-oz can diced tomatoes, drained, chopped, and drained again
2 C Valencia rice
3 C homemade chicken broth
1/3 C dry white wine
1/2 t saffron threads, crushed
1 bay leaf
1 doz mussels, scrubbed and beards snipped
1/2 C frozen peas, thawed
2 T chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 lemon, cut into wedges, for serving

1. Preheat oven to 350 (since I was using a cast-iron dutch oven, I put the lid in the preheating oven so a cold lid wouldn't slow down cooking later). Toss shrimp, 1/4 t salt, 1/4 t black pepper, 1 T oil, and 1 t garlic in medium bowl; cover and refrigerate. Season chicken with salt and pepper and set aside.

2. Heat 2 t oil in large dutch oven over medium-high heat until shimmering. Brown chicken pieces in a single layer (not moving them while they cook), then transfer to a bowl. Reduce heat to medium and add chorizo to pot. Cook, stirring frequently, until quite browned and beginning to render fat, then transfer to bowl with chicken.

3. Adjust fat in pot to equal 2 T and heat until shimmering. Add onion and cook, stirring frequently, until softened, then add garlic and cook until fragrant.

Stir in tomatoes and cook until mixture begins to darken and thicken slightly, about 3 minutes. Stir in rice and cook until well coated. Stir in wine and cook until evaporated/absorbed, then add broth, saffron, bay, and 1/2 t salt. Return chicken and chorizo to pot, increase heat to medium-high and bring to boil, uncovered, stirring occasionally. Cover pot and transfer to oven; cook until rice absorbs almost all liquid, 15 minutes (or so). Pull out pot and uncover. Scatter shrimp over rice, nest mussels in rice hinged side down, arrange pepper strips in pinwheel pattern, and scatter peas over top. Cover and return to oven, cooking until shrimp are opaque and mussels have opened, 10-12 minutes (mine needed a bit more time on both cooking segments, probably because I was making a larger batch).

4. Let stand, covered, 5 minutes before serving. Toss any unopened mussels, sprinkle with parsley, and serve, passing lemon wedges at the table.

We had Izze sodas to drink: pear, pomegranate and clementine.





After the paella I served a simple salad of mixed greens, aged Spanish Mohan cheese, and grape tomatoes, dressed with EVOO and sherry vinegar. For dessert, fresh strawberry ice cream!

"The Perfect Dinner"

Or so Number One said, per Mavis (I didn't hear it when he said it, and true to form he wouldn't repeat it). I don't know if I liked it better than the previous night's chicken (and the prep was a bit more complicated), but it was delicious and worth making again.

Crunchy Baked Pork Chops, Apple Slaw, steamed broccoli, roast Russian Banana fingerling potatoes.

Crunchy Baked Pork Chops
adapted from Cook's Illustrated Jan/Feb 2008

4 boneless center-cut pork chops, 6-8 oz each, 3/4 to 1 inch thick, trimmed of excess fat (I had some random tenderloin ends instead, about the size of chops, so I just cut off the silver skin and went for it; I'll probably use chops next time)
4 slices hearty white sandwich bread, torn into one-inch pieces (I had a random collection of crusts in the freezer leftover from some other recipe. I had originally thought yesterday's homemade bread would have enough left over for this recipe, I didn't feel like buying a whole new loaf, and this stuff was at least white)
1 small shallot, minced (about 2 T)
3 medium garlic cloves, minced or pressed (about 1 T)
2 T vegetable oil
ground black pepper
2 T grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 t minced fresh thyme leaves
2 T minced fresh parsley leaves
1/2 C unbleached all-purpose flour, divided
2 large egg whites
2 T dijon mustard (Cook's calls for 3 eggs whites and 3 T mustard, and a little bit more flour, which I think would be possibly too much and wasteful; in any case I had plenty)

Preheat oven to 350. (Cook's calls for brining the meat, which I never do. If you want to--and if you are using injected/seasoned supermarket pork you unequivocally SHOULD NOT--they recommend 1/4 C table salt in 1 qt water in gallon zipper-lock bag. Squeeze air out of bag before sealing and refrigerate 30 minutes. Then rinse under cold water and dry thoroughly with paper towels.)

Pulse bread in food processor until coarsely ground, making about 3 1/2 C crumbs. Put crumbs on rimmed baking sheet with shallot, garlic, oil, 1/4 t salt, and 1/4 t pepper. Toss with your hands until oil coats crumbs and other ingredients are evenly distributed. Bake until browned and dried, about 15 minutes, stirring every five minutes. Remove baking sheet, but do not turn off oven. Let crumbs cool to room temperature, and toss with Parmesan, thyme and parsley.

Put 1/4 C flour in one shallow dish. In another, whisk egg whites with mustard until smooth, then mix in 1/4 C flour until fairly well blended but not entirely smooth.

Increase oven temperature to 425. Cook's calls for using a wire rack in a rimmed baking sheet, but I only have the one rimmed baking sheet and no rack to fit it, so I used a nice broiler pan (with pointed ridges and therefore less contact with the meat). Season chops with pepper (oops, forgot that). Dredge each chop in flour, then use tongs to coat with egg white/mustard mixture, letting excess drip off. Coat all sides of chops with bread crumb mixture, pressing gently to help adhere, then transfer to broiler pan.

Bake until center temp of chops is 150, 17-25 minutes (20 was just right for mine). Let rest 4 minutes before serving. (Cook's serves with lemon wedges, obviously because they didn't have the following Apple Slaw recipe.)

Apple Slaw
from Real Simple, who knows how long ago

I think if I were serving this as a condiment, this recipe would make too much. That was my initial thought. But if you take it as a salad (and it works quite well as one), this is just the right amount. I think any firm and tart apple would work about as well as the Granny Smiths--this fall I hope to use the winesaps from my own tree.

2 Granny Smith apples, cut into matchsticks (I started out using a knife and quickly switched to the julienne blade on my mandoline)
2 celery stalks, finely chopped
1 T fresh lemon juice
1/4 C sour cream
1/4 C chopped flat-leaf parsley
1/2 t salt
1/8 t pepper
1/3 C toasted pine nuts

Oink Oink

Mavis had a birthday this week, and requested something piggish for dinner. I told him to check in the basement freezer, and from the available options, he chose a pork loin roast (other alternatives were a Boston butt, chorizo and andouille sausages). I then gave him the option of herb-crusted or maple-glazed, and he opted for the herbs, with a side of polenta and peas.

No pictures, sorry--the camera batteries were dead and I was disinclined at that moment to fetch more. Besides, it tasted better than it looked.

I used a recipe from the March-April 2007 Cook's, deviating slightly, which in retrospect I wouldn't recommend. Well, I also deviated in not brining the meat, which I don't regret in the slightest. I get my pork from a guy who raises heirloom pigs, and this roast was heavily marbled and not in the least lacking in moisture or flavor. Where I shouldn't have deviated was in trying to take a shortcut in making the crumb mixture for the top of the roast, which shortcut resulted in a kind of bread paste instead of a crumb coating. Tant pis.

Anyway, you make a crumb coating with about 1/2 C bread crumbs, a minced shallot, a couple tablespoons of grated parmesan, salt and pepper and about a tablespoon of olive oil. You also make an herb paste with a couple cloves of garlic, about half a bunch of fresh flat-leaf parsley, one sprig's-worth minced rosemary, about ten sprig's-worth minced thyme, 6 T grated parmesan, 3 T olive oil and salt and pepper. You butterfly the roast (I used a boneless blade-end loin roast, as specified in the recipe, though the proportions on mine were different than the one pictured in the article), and spread about 3/4 of the herb paste inside. Tie it with a few pieces of string, then brown all over in hot oil. Then the recipe says to remove the strings (which I don't think I would do again--it kind of flopped apart in the oven as it cooked), spread the rest of the herbs on top and cover with the bread crumb mixture, then roast at 325 until the thickest part measures 145.

It was delicious, and a side bonus was that I figured out and got to use the meat probe that came with my stove. Very nice not to have to keep opening the oven to take the meat's temperature with an instant-read, when instead you can just check it on the oven's display.

For the polenta, I use this stuff from Bob's Red Mill, a local miller whose products are widely available. The package has instructions for both a slow, traditional cooking method, and a quick, easy one. Guess which one I always use? Then just stir in a bunch of grated parmesan, some unsalted butter, and frozen petite peas after taking off the heat, and voilà.

On a completely unrelated note, I had a great sandwich for lunch today, a salmon egg salad made from a couple ounces of leftover roast spring chinook, an Easter egg, chopped capers and dill, mayo and a squeeze of fresh lemon juice. Mmmmmm.

I don't care if spring is just around the corner . . .

I've been feeling like SOUP. Earlier this week, a lazy dinner involved getting three kinds of soup and a baguette from Elephants Deli (lamb with barley, turkey rice with fennel and butternut squash, and mulligatawney with chicken and apple), but I felt guilty (as I frequently do) for buying something I am very capable of making myself. So I went to the cookbook shelf, and started (as I often do) in my amassed issues of Cook's Illustrated (organized not chronologically but seasonally: all the January-February issues together, etc.--and I rotate them as each new bimonth rolls around, so the most seasonally appropriate recipes are easy to find). Now, with my family's dietary restrictions (Number Two is allergic to cow's milk and does not tolerate cooked tomatoes very well), and my own dislikes (I cannot abide mushrooms), a number of otherwise good-sounding possibilities were eliminated right off the bat. But when I got to the recipe for Split Pea Soup with Ham in the March-April 1999 issue, I knew right away I had a winner--the only ingredients I didn't already have on hand were the ham and the split peas.

So, today after teaching choir to Number One's class at school (we have performances next week), Number Two and I ventured forth in search of the recipe's recommended 2.5 lb bone-in picnic ham (from the shoulder). When I called Gartner's Meats, and they didn't have one, I got the feeling I would probably have to find an alternative. I found what looked like a decent one at Sheridan Fruit Co.: a 2-lb bone-in ham shank, meaty and dry (not shrink-wrapped and watery). A pound of split peas from the bulk section at the supermarket, and I was ready to roll.

I put the ham shank in a dutch oven with 3 qts of water and four bay leaves, then simmered it for about 2.5-3 hours. Then I pulled out the meat and put it on a plate to cool, and put the peas in the broth to simmer for about 45 minutes. Then I chopped two medium onions in the Cuisinart, chopped three carrots and two celery ribs on the cutting board, and heated two tablespoons of olive oil in a nonstick skillet until shimmering. I sauteed the vegetables over pretty high heat until they were getting browned, then reduced the heat to medium-low and added two cloves of garlic (minced--actually run through a garlic press), 1 T butter, and a pinch of sugar. Then I continued to saute the vegetables until they were nice and brown.

After the ham had cooled enough to handle, I picked off and hand-shredded the meat. I peeled and cut into 3/8-in dice two medium russet potatoes. Then I put the meat, vegetables and potatoes into the pot and continued to simmer until the potatoes were tender. I adjusted the seasonings with fresh-ground black pepper and a couple of teaspoons of balsamic vinegar (no additional salt was needed), and served it with multigrain artisanal bread. Yum.