Fish, Basque style

I think that making something "al Vasco" or "in the style of the Basque" just means that you use a lot of stewed peppers and onions. As this is a traditional dish, there are a million ways to make it. My version uses saffron, smoked paprika, thyme, and a little hot pepper to give the dish a really rich, warm taste. A lot of times, Basque style dishes include piquillo peppers. I didn't have any, but if you can get them, you might want to try adding them to the dish.

INGREDIENTS (for 2)

• 1 whole fish (branzino, trout, snapper, etc)
• 1 onion, cut in half and thinly sliced
• 1 red bell pepper
• 1 green bell pepper
• 1 tomato, seeded, and diced
• small potatos (enough for two servings)
• 4 cloves garlic
• 1/4 cup white wine
• 1/2 to 1 cup chicken or veggie broth/stock
• a pinch of red pepper flakes
• a pinch of saffron
• 2 tsp smoked paprika
• 1 tsp dried thyme or 2 tsp fresh thyme
• 1 T tomato paste
• parsley
• lemon
• salt
• pepper
• olive oil
  

Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and preheat the oven to 400F. Cut the potatos in half or quarters, depending on the size, and boil for 5 minutes. Remove and let drain.

Cut the bell peppers in half and core them. Toss the potatos with a little olive oil, salt, pepper, thyme and two cloves of minced garlic. Place the potatos and the bell peppers, separately, in the oven and roast for 30 minutes.

Slice up the onion and cook with olive oil over medium high heat. Once the onions begin to cook down, reduce the heat to medium or medium low and let cook, stirring occasionally for another 20 minutes or so. You don't want them to fry, so pay attention to the heat and keep it low. You want to really bring out the sweetness.

When the peppers and potatoes are done roasting, set the potatos aside and place the peppers in a paper bag or a bowl covered in plastic and let sit for a couple minutes. Once they are cool enough to handle, peel off the skins and slice into long thin strips. Add to the pan with the onions along with two cloves of minced garlic and the diced tomato and cook on medium heat for a couple minutes. Add the wine to this mixture and turn up the heat to reduce it. Add the red pepper flakes, paprika, and tomato paste and mix everything together. Add about 1/4 to 1/2 cup of stock along with the paprika and let simmer over low heat for about 5 minutes. Adjust seasoning with salt and pepper. You may also want to add a teaspoon of red wine vinegar.

While the stew is simmering, season the fish with salt and pepper and cut vertical slits along both sides of the fish. Once the stew is done, place it in a roasting pan or oven safe dish large enough to hold the fish and mix together with the potatos. Add more broth if this mixture looks too thick. Place the fish on top of the potatos, and cover with some of the pepper mixture. Roast at 400F for 30 minutes.

Carefully remove the fish to a cooking sheet. Again, be careful. It is really easy to break the fish here. Place the fish under the broiler for a couple minutes. Keep an eye on it. You want to crisp the skin, but it goes from crisp to burned really quickly. While the fish is broiling, mix 1 to 2 teaspoons chopped parsley into the peppers. Transfer everything to a serving dish (if you didn't just cook it in the serving dish), and place the fish back on top. Squeeze a bit of lemon over everything, garnish with some more parsley, and eat it while its hot.

Classic paella

I've made paella on this blog before, but it makes another appearance for two reasons. First, Sharlene got abby and I a nice paella pan as a wedding gift, so we had to have her over and give it a spin. And, second, the last time I made paella there was definitely room for improvement. The last attempt was a sort of vegetarian version in the sense that I, used a veggie broth, cooked everything separately, and served all the meat in side dishes. This isn't the best way to do paella. What makes paella great is the flavors that the various ingredients infuse into the rice, especially the shellfish. To do this, you need to either cook the shellfish with the rice or use the broth from cooking the shellfish to flavor the rice.

I used a recipe that I got off the internet, I don't remember the link, but the ingredients were rice, onions, garlic, tomatoes, peas, saffron, chicken stock, clam juice, chicken legs, jumbo shrimp, scallops, mussels, clams, spanish chorizo, salt and pepper. Just google Paella for a more precise recipe.

Start cooking the proteins separately. You don't want to cook everything to completion since you will finish off the paella in the oven. I roast the chicken with some olive oil, salt and pepper.
And saute the shrimp, chorizo, and scallops. If you cook the this stuff in the paella pan first, you minimize the dishes that you need to clean, and all of the leftover drippings will stay in the pan and help flavor the rice. Cook the chorizo last since it will leave a red oil that will stain that shrimp and scallops. If you want to, you can also steam the mussels and clams separately. This is what I did. An advantage of this is that you can use the liquid from steaming the shellfish to flavor the rice. A drawback is that you finish the shellfish long before the rice is done, so by the time everything is complete, the clams and mussels are a little dried out. The next time I make this, I might just try adding the clams and mussels when I throw the paella in the oven and baking it long enough for the shellfish to open up.
After you are done cooking the shrimp, scallops, and chorizo, add the onions and garlic to the paella pan and saute over medium heat until translucent. Stir in the rice and tomatos until everything is coated with oil.
Meanwhile, heat up some liquid (I used a mix of chicken stock and clam juice) with a healthy pinch of saffron. Add the liquid to the rice mixture and cook, stirring occasionally until the rice is al dente. Keep adding liquid if the rice dries out. When the rice is ready, stir in the chorizo and peas and arrange the shrimp, scallops, chicken, clams, and mussels around the pan.
Finish cooking in the oven for about 10 minutes before serving.

Pollo al ajillo

This is a simple Spanish recipe. Start by seasoning bone-in skin on chicken thighs with salt and pepper and browning in a large pan with some olive oil. Once the skin is crispy, remove the chicken and pour out all but 4Tbsp of olive oil. Add an entire head of garlic (for 8 chicken thighs) and cook over medium heat. You don't want to brown the garlic, so keep an eye on it. Add a splash of white wine and lemon juice and stir in a bunch of chopped parsley. Return the chicken to the pan and cook, covered for another 15 minutes.

Casa Mono

Abby and I saw Avenue Q last night - which was absolutely hilarious - and stopped by Casa Mono by Union Square for a quick meal beforehand. I went here for the first time with Heb and Joe last summer and loved it. The second time back didn't disappoint. I've been to a few tapas places in the U.S. (maybe 10 to 15), and this one is by far the best. The space is really cozy, which can make it hard to get a table at times. We got there a little after 5:30, so their were plenty of empty seats when we arrived. We grabbed a couple seats at the bar, so we were able to see the chefs putting everything together right in front of us. If you are going here with just two or three, this is the way to go. It's really fun to watch them work.
We ordered four different tapas and enjoyed every one: fried pimientos,
foie gras on a crouton with five preparations/variaties of onions,
pork belly with spring onions (we were so excited to dig in, I forgot to take a picture of that), and sweetbreads with baby fennel and an almond vinaigrette. I had only had sweet breads once before, at Jaleo (another one of my favorite Tapas places), and wasn't a huge fan. They were stewed and had a sort of mealy texture to them. These sweetbreads, though, were really, really good. They reminded me of big fried oysters.

Sharlene's second cooking lesson

At the beginning of the summer, Sharlene and I had grand plans to do a number of regular cooking lessons. One month into the fall, we got around to cooking lesson number two. This time around, she made paella. Here she is, looking like quite domestic.

And here is the finished product.
We made vegetarian paella that had artichoke hearts, tomatoes, red bell peppers, peas, carrots, and a healthy dose of saffron. We served the other components (chicken, chorizo, clams, mussel, and shrimp) on the side so everyone could mix and match according to their own preferences. You lose some flavor cooking paella separately like this, but the flexibility it provides makes it a great dinner party dish.

Pollo al Vasquo

Basque chicken is a really great, simple meal. We had just about all of the ingredients kicking around the fridge, so it was a good use of left overs. Unfortunately, the picture isn't that great, but it does taste good (as does all Basque food, for that matter).

Here are the directions:
Julien a couple of bell peppers, slice one spanish onion, and cut a few (3 or 4) tomatoes into wedges (or dice them). It is preferable to peel the tomotoes first. The easiest way to do this is to score an X on the bottom of the tomato and drop it in some near boiling water for about 10 seconds. The peels should come right off after than. Start by cooking the onions and 2 or 3 cloves of minced garlic over medium heat in a big pan or dutch oven. After about 10 minutes, add the peppers and tomatoes, throw in a cup of white wine, some salt, sugar, and, if you have it, saffron (this is not essential). Let this cook away for a while at a medium heat. At the same time, sear the chicken (w/ olive oil) over really high heat. I think that chicken thighs and drumsticks work best for this dish. Let them cook until the skin is a nice golden brown color (probably about 4 min per side). Add the chicken to the pepper mixture and let it simmer, covered, on med-low heat for about 45 min. If the heat is too high, the chicken will dry out. When it is done cooking, mix in some vinegar or lemon juice. Serve with rice or roasted potatoes.