Category Archives: I Cook, Too

Some of my favorite recipes.

Gazpacho

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A nice summer soup.

GazpachoMike is a huge fan of gazpacho, a tomato-based, chilled vegetable soup. We’ve tried a bunch of recipes and, as usual, have come up with our own variation. I just made a batch today; we’ll have it for dinner tonight.

Ingredients:

  • 4 large ripe tomatoes
  • 2 medium cucumber
  • 1 medium pepper. Most people use green peppers, but I prefer yellow or orange, which have a milder flavor and don’t make me burp peppers for the next six hours. Today we had 1/2 of each leftover from another meal, so that’s what I used.
  • 4 green onions. If you like a sharper onion flavor, use 1 small onion or 1 medium sweet onion.
  • 2 cloves garlic
  • 1/4 cup olive oil
  • 1/3 cup red wine vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar. Mike really likes b-vinegar.
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 1/8 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
  • Tabasco (if desired) to taste. We don’t use this; we prefer a mello gazpacho.

Preparation Instructions:

  1. Chop the first 4 ingredients. Put half of each in a blender or food processor (we use a blender) and the other half in a mixing bowl.
  2. Add remaining ingredients to the blender or food processor.
  3. Puree until very smooth. The mixture should have a pinkish color.
  4. Add pureed mixture to mixing bowl with chopped ingredients. Mix well.
  5. Cover and refrigerate for at least two hours but not more than 3 days.
  6. Enjoy cold.

And if you see a gazpacho recipe that looks good to you but includes bread and water, just omit the bread and water. (The idea of including soaked bread in a soup really grosses me out.) As you’ll see, you don’t need bread to make the soup hearty and delicious.

New York Egg Cream

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A refreshing and simple drink for the whole family.

When I was a kid growing up in New Jersey, my grandparents had a bakery in our home town of Cresskill. Across the street was a soda fountain named Dave’s — a place where you could go in for a soda or ice cream or ice cream soda or a variety other things. The counter was formica — I seem to recall it being yellow — and there were swivel stools in front of it. We’d go in with some loose change and walk out with whatever we could afford.

One of my favorite soda fountain drinks was something Dave called a “Gizmo.” It was a mixture of chocolate milk and seltzer. Many years later, I learned the real name for this beverage: an egg cream.

Egg creams are hard to get outside the New York area. They’re probably hard to get inside the New York area these days, too. After all, soda fountains are disappearing, replaced with fast food joints or vending machines. You can’t get an egg cream in a vending machine.

The recipe is easy:

  • 1 part milk
  • 1 part seltzer
  • generous helping of chocolate syrup

Take the milk and the chocolate syrup and mix it together to make a very dark chocolate milk. While still stirring (and this is important) slowly add the seltzer. If you stir just right, it won’t overflow the glass. Drink with a a straw.

A real New York egg cream calls for U-Bet chocolate syrup. I don’t think that’s available around here and, even if it was, I wouldn’t buy it. I never did like U-Bet. I prefer Hershey’s syrup, in the plastic squeeze bottle. Don’t get the “light” version — it’s terrible.

I actually keep straws on hand at home just for drinking egg creams.

I’m having one now. Quite refreshing.

I’m not sure where the name egg cream comes from. Someone told me that they used to put eggs in this drink. I can’t imagine that. I think it might have something to do with the creamy top that appears when you make it just right.

Asian Martini

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For unwinding on a lazy weekend afternoon, when driving (or flying) is not in your immediate future.

Ingredients

  • 3 oz premium vodka – don’t use junk liquor; you’ll be drinking this almost straight
  • splash of plum wine – for an extra dry version of this drink, use a teaspoon; if you’re the kind who likes white zinfandel wine, make that a generous splash
  • ice – I use cubes, but that’s because I don’t have patience to wait for the icemaker to crush the ice

Mixing Instructions

  1. Add all ingredients to a martini shaker (with strainer).
  2. Shake for 60 seconds.
  3. Pour through strainer into chilled martini glass.

Enjoy.

BTW, in some Japanese restaurants a 50-50 mix of vodka and plum wine served over ice is known as a Samarai. It’s a killer drink and not intended for the designated driver.

Atkins Eggs

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I go back on Atkins…and eggs.

I’m tired of being overweight. I’m tired of having only one pair of jeans that fit comfortably. And I refuse to buy new clothes in a bigger size.

So I’ll either have to continue to suffer, wear my Chefware pants all the time, or lose weight.

That said, I went back on Atkins today. While you’re free to use the Comments feature to tell me how bad Atkins is for me, I’ll probably ignore what you have to say. I lost 15 pounds on Atkins in a month two years ago and I’d like to see if I can do that again.

So here’s my very easy recipe for what I call Atkins Eggs.

  • 2 eggs
  • 1/4 cup Atkins-friendly veggies, chopped. I usually use spinach, asparagus, or broccoli. To make it really easy, I buy frozen veggies.
  • 1/4 cup grated or shredded cheese. I usually use a “4-cheese Mexican blend,” which is pre-shredded and packaged in a zip-close bag.
  • Spray oil. I use Olive oil, but you can use any oil you like.

Use the spray oil to coat the inside of a large glass custard cup. Break the eggs into the cup and scramble them. Then add the veggies and cheese and mix well. Microwave the mixture on high for about a minute (to get it going) followed by about 5 minutes on medium. (My microwave is programmable, so I can get the whole 6-minute program in and make my coffee while I’m waiting.)

Of course microwave times vary, so you want to keep an eye on it the first time you do this. My microwave is about 20 years old now (really!) and I think it’s low powered. The idea is to cook the mixture through without drying out the edges.

When it’s done, let it sit for a minute or two in the microwave. That’ll help finish off the veggie cooking, which is especially important if you didn’t chop finely. Then use a potholder to pull out the cup, loosen the contents with a fork, and pop it onto a plate. A little salt and pepper won’t hurt a thing. You can also top it with salsa, if it’s a low-carb mixture. I don’t go for that, but some folks like it.

The good thing about this recipe is you can really alter the flavor of the finished product by varying the vegetables and types of cheeses. I’m going to try some Saga Blue tomorrow morning. You can also add cooked or smoked meat — like ham or Canadian bacon to the mixture before cooking it.

If you try this, let me know how you do. Use the comments link or form for this post.

Maria’s Semi-Sweet Brownies

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I get to use an oven!

I’m home from Howard Mesa, at least for a while. Although our camper (where I was living at HM) doesn’t have an oven, my house does. And today, with a craving for something chocolate, I’m making brownies.

Unlike other people, I usually bake from scratch. That means I measure out all the ingredients, mix them the way they need to be mixed, and pop them in the oven to do their thing.

Today, I made brownies based on the instructions on the Baker’s Unsweetened Chocolate Squares package. I say “based on” because I’ve modified it for my own tastes. Here’s my version.

Ingredients:

4 squares Bakers Unsweetened Chocolate. Now if each square is 1 ounce, that’s 4 ounces. So if you don’t use Baker’s brand, you can figure out how many squares it is for your brand. I’ve successfully made this recipe with semi-sweet chocolate from Trader Joe’s — you know, the kind in the big bar. If you do that, just cut back on the amount of sugar you add.

3/4 cup (or 1-1/2 sticks) of butter or margarine. I used a stick of butter and a half stick of margarine.

1 cup sugar. The recipe calls for 2 cups of sugar, but I think that’s too darn much. Last time I made it with 1-1/2 cups and it was still too sweet for me. So I cut it back to a cup this time around. (Note: After tasting these, I decided that a cup wasn’t enough, even with the chocolate chips. Next time I’ll try 1-1/4 cups.)

3 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

1 cup flour

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate pieces. Yes, I mean chocolate chips. The recipe calls for 1 cup of nuts, but I don’t like nuts in my brownies, so I never put them in. I added the chocolate this time to make up for the reduced amount of sugar.

Preparation Instructions:

The recipe is really easy and only takes one bowl and one spoon. Since the baking pan is foil covered, cleanup is very easy.

1. Preheat oven to 350°F (or 325°F for a glass pan).

2. Line a baking dish with foil. The recipe calls for a 13 x 9 inch pan, but since I don’t have one, I used a 10 x 7 inch pan. Grease the foil. I use spray oil because it’s easier.

3. Melt the chocolate and butter in the microwave in a large microwaveable bowl. 2 minutes should do it. When it’s melted, stir it until it’s well blended.

4. Add the sugar and stir until blended.

5. Add the eggs and vanilla and stir until blended.

6. Add the flour and stir until blended.

7. Add the chips (or nuts or both) and stir until blended.

8. Spread the chocolate batter into the prepared pan.

9. Bake until done. I figure about 40 minutes, but you want to keep an eye on it after 30 minutes. Overbaked brownies suck. You can use a toothpick or knife inserted into the center to check for doneness; it should have fudgy crumbs when it’s done.

10. Cool in pan.

11. Lift out of pan onto a cutting board. Cut into squares or whatever shape your heart desires. (I’m doing triangles this time.)

I find that some of the best recipes are the ones that come on the packaging for an ingredient. I once found an excellent recipe for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies on a chocolate chip package; that’s my favorite type of cookie.

And no, I don’t make recipes off Cool-Whip packages or cakes with pudding in them.

If you try this recipe, let me know what you think.

In the meantime, I’m going to put a glass of milk in the freezer so it’ll be all ready when my brownies emerge from the oven.