SHH! I was never here.

But I really, really, really hope to be back soon.



Cheddar Grits with Black Beans, Lentils, Sausage, and a Poached Egg
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, diced
1 large jalapeño chile, diced
Kosher salt, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
¼ teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 packet taco seasoning mix
3 cups low-sodium beef broth
1 (14.5-ounce) can crushed tomatoes
2 (15-ounce) cans black beans, drained and rinsed
1 cup dried brown lentils, rinsed
10 ounces hot smoked sausage, cut into bite-size pieces
Instant grits
6 to 8 ounces freshly grated Cheddar cheese
White wine vinegar
4 large eggs
Garnish: Chopped green onion

1. Heat olive oil over medium-high heat in a stockpot; add onion, jalapeño, and red pepper. Season with salt and pepper, and sauté 5 minutes or until onions become translucent. Stir in garlic and taco seasoning mix, and cook 2 more minutes.

2. Add beef broth, tomatoes, beans, and lentils; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 1 hour or until lentils are tender.

3. Sauté sausage in a dry pan until browned. Stir into cooked lentils. Cover pot, and keep warm over low heat.

4. Prepare 4 servings instant grits according to package directions. Stir in cheese. Cover pot, and keep warm over low heat.

5. In a small saucepan, bring water to a gentle boil. Add a splash of vinegar. Crack 1 egg into a small bowl. Stir boiling water vigorously with a spoon to create a small well in the center, and carefully add egg to center of pan. Cook 1 to 2 minutes or until whites are set but yolks are still very runny. Remove from pot with a slotted spoon. Repeat with remaining 3 eggs.

6. Divide grits among 4 serving bowls; top with lentil-sausage mixture and poached eggs. (There will be lots of lentils left over.) Garnish, if desired. Makes 4 servings.

This recipe is not for the faint of heart—really, it might kill you. There is an inordinate amount of butter in there. I'm not usually one to go for gravy with mashed potatoes; as a personal preference I fall firmly in the "cheesy" camp when it comes to my spuds.

This, though, seemed awfully rather dreamy and ingenious—by broiling the potatoes in the gravy, you get a crispy, brown top and a rich, bubbling sauce that keeps the mash super moist and tasty. I thought the potatoes could have been a touch creamier, but that might be my fat-loving American palate getting in the way. I suspect it all depends on the starchiness of your particular taters.

The secret to this-here gravy, what elevates it above the usual gloppy beigeness, is in the full two teaspoons of black pepper. I prefer the already ground stuff in this incarnation; it keeps things smooth and eliminates the chance of chomping into a big piece of peppercorn (which I think tastes like taking a bite out of a charred cast-iron pan). The original concept calls for something listed as "beef gravy or drippings, or beef cubed," which I wasn't sure about, so I omitted it. Instead, I subbed beef broth for the chicken broth because that's what I had on hand, and hoped it would do the work of both ingredients. I don't think the end product suffered, though it's hard to remember because it disappeared so fast.

All credit for this recipe goes to the amazing Seasaltwithfood, a blog I'm guilty of stalking mercilessly.

Alongside I served simply sautéed salt-and-pepper chicken cutlets. On a whim, I just added olive oil to the gravy pan after I'd poured out the gravy, but without cleaning the pan first. That way the chicken browned while picking up leftover gravy bitlets.

Yes, it's a word.

The other revelation? Ina Garten's Brussels sprouts. I first discovered them about a year ago, and they are transformative.

(I also love Savour Fare's bacon-braised Brussels sprouts with cream, but with the gravy bubbling away on the stove, I made a game-time decision not to send myself into full cardiac arrest.)

How good are these Brussels sprouts? A 40-year-old man and a 16-month-old child almost came to blows over them, that's how good. How easy are these Brussels sprouts? Almost shamefully easy. The only tricks are to remember to salt them liberally, and to not take them out of the oven when you think they're burning. They're not; they're just taking on insane amounts of roasted, blistering flavor. When you cut the bottoms off the sprouts, you'll probably end up with a board full of leftover leaves—sprinkle those around the pan, as well. (They become unbelievable crispy sprout chips.)

There's not a lot to this plate—everything sort of takes care of cooking itself, and aside from the potato peeling there isn't a lot of agonizing prep work—but it is about as homey and satisfying as they come.



Mashed Potatoes Baked in Gravy with Salt-and-Pepper Chicken
2 pounds Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and chopped
6 tablespoons cream or milk
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
11 tablespoons butter, divided
2 garlic cloves, minced (optional)
6 tablespoons all-purpose flour
¼ teaspoon onion powder
3 cups reduced-fat, low-sodium beef broth
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
4 chicken cutlets
2 tablespoons olive oil

1. Boil potatoes until fork-tender; drain. Mash potatoes with cream, salt, and 4 tablespoons butter. Set aside.

2. In a large, deep skillet, melt 6 tablespoons butter over medium heat. Add garlic, if desired, and sprinkle with flour; cook, whisking constantly, 1 to 2 minutes or until flour is golden. Whisk in beef broth and pepper, and cook until gravy thickens. Pour gravy into baking dish, and return pan to stovetop. (Do not clean pan.)

3. Sprinkle chicken cutlets with salt and pepper. Heat olive oil in pan, and sauté chicken 5 to 6 minutes on each side or until golden brown and cooked through. Remove pan from heat, and cover with foil to keep warm.

4. Top gravy in baking dish with reserved mashed potatoes; top with dots of remaining 1 tablespoon butter. Broil 6 to 8 minutes or until potatoes are golden brown and gravy is bubbling. Serve with chicken cutlets. Makes 4 servings.

Ina Garten's Roasted Brussels Sprouts
1 pound Brussels sprouts, washed and trimmed
2 tablespoons olive oil
Kosher salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Toss Brussels sprouts on a baking sheet with olive oil, salt, and pepper; roast 35 to 40 minutes or until sprouts are crisp on the outside and tender inside. (They will be very deeply brown.) Sprinkle with more kosher salt, and serve immediately. Makes 4 servings.

This week I learned a very valuable lesson, namely that one should not let too much moss grow under a recipe whipped up on the fly, particularly if one has the attention span of a fly. (It's easy to forget how in the heck you made a dish come together if you don't write it down, it turns out.)

Last week, I got the rather distressing news that the county would like to take my house—or, if they can't have it, they'd like to tax me out of it. I am not in the habit of going down without a fight (and by "fight," I mean "temper tantrum"), so I railed against the man until he said thank you very much, I appreciate your position, hand over your paycheck, por favor. To which I was all, "Oh. Umkay."

Power to the people!

All of which is to say that in the intervening period between March's paychecks No. 1 and No. 2 (whom I love dearly and do not want to see go, amen), I was on something of a budget. And when I say "budget," I mean "less than $19.80 a day." Not a terrible per diem, to be sure, unless you're someone who likes to cook something new every night. Then it's just limiting and cranky-making.

Or is it?! I decided that this arbitrary $19.80 could make for a fun and motivating (albeit still unwelcome) project. I wanted fresh spinach in this dish, but for some unfathomable reason, my grocer was fresh out. So I had to opt for frozen—while I would have preferred the fresh, I'll admit the frozen chopped version was all but free, and I think the flavor difference was inconsequential. Taste the sauce along the way and adjust the amount of mustard to your liking—I wanted this to be really deeply tangy and mustardy, but it's all a matter of taste. (A good-quality mustard is key, though. I used Grey Poupon, which I already had in the larder.) The same is true of the chicken broth; you can add more or less depending upon how thick you prefer your cream sauces. Some of these ingredients I had on hand on the Woodside, but when all was said and done I managed to cobble this together for less than $12.80.*

*Sometimes, when a girl has been roundly slapped by the local tax commissioner, a girl needs a $7 bottle of wine.



Creamy Chicken, Spinach, and Tomato Penne
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 to 1½ pounds chicken cutlets, cut into strips
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
4 garlic cloves, minced
4 tablespoons butter
4 tablespoons flour
2 cups half & half or heavy cream
¼ cup spicy brown mustard
8 ounces Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, freshly grated
Hot sauce (optional)
16 ounces penne pasta
1 cup fat-free, low-sodium chicken broth
1 pint grape tomatoes, halved
1 (10-ounce) box frozen chopped spinach, thawed and wrung out well in a clean dish towel

1. Heat oil in a saucepan over medium heat; add chicken, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Sauté until golden brown and cooked through. Remove chicken to a plate, and set aside.
2. Add garlic to pan, and sauté about 1 minute or until fragrant. Add butter; when melted, sprinkle over flour, and cook, stirring, about 2 minutes.

2. Add cream to pan, whisking constantly until sauce bubbles and thickens. Reduce heat to low, and stir in mustard, Parmigiano cheese, and hot sauce, if desired.

3. Meanwhile, prepare pasta according to package directions. While pasta cooks, stir sauce occasionally, adding chicken broth, ½ cup at a time, until sauce reaches desired consistency.

4. Stir tomatoes, spinach, and reserved chicken into sauce until heated through; toss with cooked pasta. Top with additional grated Parmigiano, if desired. Makes 4 to 6 servings.

Cheesy Garlic Bread
1 medium baguette, sliced in half lengthwise
Reduced-fat mayonnaise
Garlic powder
Sliced provolone cheese
Freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese

Top baguette halves with mayonnaise, garlic powder, and cheeses. Broil until cheese is melted and browned. Makes 4 to 6 servings.

I've only recently discovered the joy of Soup As A Meal, largely because I have very high expectations for it—there needs to be, above all, plenty of texture; I have a deep-seated and possibly irrationally enthusiastic distaste for anything that smacks of "drinking my dinner."

(Exceptions may be made for large bottles of Cabernet, if they are accompanied by snacks made of cheese.)

The classic grilled-cheese-sandwich-and-tomato-soup combination has always failed to excite me, mostly because I find tomato soup so dimensionless. It can be spicy, yes, or herby or rich or velvety, but there's no ... well, chew.

Don't even get me started on smoothies. If I don't need my teeth, it's not food.

This soup, on the other hand, hit all the right notes—chunky and hearty and satisfying, and certainly NOT possible to be consumed with a straw. The recipe, adapted from Food & Whine (genius), has all of the spicy warmth that I love from the coconut soup at my favorite local Thai restaurant, with a few surprising additions—lemongrass, tomato paste, Worcestershire sauce—that keep you with your head buried in the bowl.

I picked up a packet of cilantro in the fresh herbs section of the grocery store before coming home to find out that I would have to surrender my gold star for reading comprehension for the day. It was actually something called "culantro," marketed as having a similar flavor to cilantro but the shelf life of a much more robust herb. I ... sorta hated it. The flavor was lovely, to be sure, but the cactus-like spininess was off-putting.

Remind me to start that herb garden I keep not following through on.



Thai Chicken-and-Rice Soup
3 tablespoons butter
2 cups basmati rice
1 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sunflower oil, divided
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 small red bell pepper, diced
1 cup sliced mushrooms
4 cups fat-free, low-sodium chicken broth
2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, diced
2 tablespoons lemongrass paste
1 teaspoon fish sauce
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 cup half & half
½ cup lite coconut milk
2 teaspoons red curry paste
1½ teaspoons chili paste or sriracha
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon cornstarch
Garnishes: chopped cilantro leaves, sriracha

1. Bring butter and 4 cups water to a boil. Stir in rice and salt; cover, reduce heat to low, and cook 20 minutes. Remove rice to a large bowl.
2. Return pan to burner over medium heat, and add 1 tablespoon oil. Sauté mushrooms until just softened. Remove mushrooms from pan, and set aside.
3. Add remaining 1 tablespoon oil to pan, and sauté onion and bell pepper just until softened. Stir in reserved mushrooms, chicken broth, and chicken, stirring until heated through.
4. Stir in lemongrass, fish sauce, and Worcestershire sauce, and simmer 5 minutes. Stir in half & half and coconut milk; cover, reduce heat to low, and simmer 2 more minutes.
5. Combine curry paste, chili paste, tomato paste, cornstarch, and 2 tablespoons water in a small bowl; add to soup, stirring until it thickens slightly. Stir in 2 cups cooked rice, cover, and simmer 5 minutes.
6. Serve soup with remaining cooked rice; garnish, if desired. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

As a personality, I tend to get attached very quickly, fervently, and loyally to things—people, places, pets, situational comedies about three post-menopausal women living together in Miami with a wise-cracking octogenarian—and when I first tasted this pizza, I knew I was a goner.

The recipe is the brainchild of one Foodimentary Guy, née JBSH, who has a habit of throwing ingredients against a wall and seeing what sticks that I often admire. (Less so when he does whackadoodle things like putting mayonnaise in the mashed potatoes. Gack! Sorry, Foodimentary Guy ... )

Picture it: a late-summer afternoon. A day spent treading water in a fruitless effort to mitigate the 12,000 calories of Lake-A-Ritas (TM) consumed since lunch. Happily tired muscles and lightly pink skin. Time screams by, as it does on Sundays, racing toward return to the mainland, and the work week, and the grind. The dogs can barely muster the energy to wag their tails or lift their heads as you pass by, and the shadow cast by the boat's awning says it's almost time to hit the road. Half-hearted packing, some hurried but ultimately disappointing calculations (is there any way to stay another day?), and it's time to face the truth: The weekend at the lake is over.

That's when this came out of the kitchen. We huddled around it like delighted starving people—eating fast at first, because we didn't realize how hungry we were, and then faster still long after we'd become full, because we didn't want to lose a single bite to any of the other grabby hands in the room.

Since then I've wanted to attempt to re-create it, knowing that it really lives only in the Foodimentary Guy's brain and even then maybe only vaguely—it's the sort of meal that just happened organically, putting a little of this delicious with a little of that amazing until you end up with a pizza that haunts your dreams.

OK, enough hyperbole.



The "recipe," such as it is, relies pretty heavily on a local chain—Zoë's Kitchen—and its signature feta cole slaw. Unfortunately, my neighborhood Zoë's was fresh out of slaw, so I relied pretty heavily on some Internet research and some hope for the best, and tried to whip up my own. It was a passable substitute, but improved overnight, as the cabbage had time to soften a bit more under the weight of the vinaigrette.

Did the original Lake Martin version have bacon on it? I don't remember, but I assumed that with JBSH as its creator, that was a pretty safe bet. I ate the finished product by my lonesome, but shared the leftovers. I don't know how faithful anyone thought it was to that warm, peaceful, lakeside day, but I hope it was a reasonable enough facsimile.

I know it made me want a Lake-A-Rita (TM).



Chicken-Bacon-Cole Slaw Pizza
¼ cup red wine vinegar
¼ to ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon granulated sugar
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
1 small head green cabbage, thinly sliced
8 ounces crumbled feta
8 green onions, chopped
1 (11-ounce) can Pillsbury thin-crust pizza dough
2 chicken breasts from a prepared rotisserie chicken, chopped
Ranch dressing, to taste
Provolone cheese slices
8 bacon strips, cooked and crumbled

1. Whisk together first 5 ingredients. Combine cabbage, feta, and green onions, and toss with vinaigrette. Chill cole slaw at least 1 hour.
2. Preheat oven to 400. Unroll pizza dough onto a lightly greased or foil-covered baking sheet; bake 5 minutes.
3. Toss chicken with 1 tablespoon ranch dressing. Remove dough from oven, and top with chicken mixture and provolone cheese slices; bake 5 to 7 more minutes or until edges of crust are golden brown and cheese is melted and bubbling.
4. Toss cole slaw with a little more ranch dressing, to taste, and top pizza with slaw and crumbled bacon. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

Read the rest here. It's like someone read my innermost thoughts and made them funny and matched them with entertaining doodles.

(Thanks to SuFin for the heads-up!)

This is a weird one, folks. Because I made hot dogs. Problem? I hate hot dogs.

I have no idea why—it's not a snobbery issue; I have well-documented proof that I adore all manner of trashy foodstuffs. It's not even a squeamishness issue. I know wherefrom hot dogs come, and it's not any scarier to me than a lot of the other pork products that I happen to adore.

There's something about the way a hot dog pops when you bite into it ... and that intense saltiness ... I shrug. Put them next to donuts and watermelon on the list of things I inexplicably can't stand. (This is a particularly frustrating reality for someone who is obsessed with the almighty sandwich. How can anything between two slices of bread be unwelcome on the Woodside?!)

I adapted these from In the Wabe, because it seemed like the least troublesome (I have never made hot dogs before)/most delicious (all things being relative)—baked, not steamed, and smothered in chili and cheese. I omitted the pickle relish because it's not everyone's taste, and substituted dill pickle potato chips because they are indescribably good.

To each her own!



Baked Chili-Cheese Dogs
8 hot dog buns
Light mayonnaise
Spicy brown mustard
8 all-beef franks in natural casings (I used Nathan's.)
1 (15-ounce) can chili with beans
½ small onion, diced
Colby Jack cheese

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spread hot dog buns with mayonnaise and mustard to taste. Top with hot dogs, and fit snugly into a 9- by 13-inch pan.

2. Divide chili among hot dogs; sprinkle with onion, and top with cheese. Cover pan with aluminum foil, and bake 45 minutes or until cheese is melted and buns are lightly crispy. Makes 8 servings.

It's Monday, everyone, which means a whole host of things—not the least of which is that I left my camera's USB cord at home, making photo transfer impossible. So to keep you company, I bring you a bit of much-needed fabulousness courtesy of Swanson Vineyards, which has a super kicky, fun Web site design.



And some perfectly lovely, cheeky varietals.



Now if only they could ship to the Woodside ... Silly Bible.

Scanwiches is a collection of "scans of sandwiches for education and delight."



What an incredibly good idea.

I can't get enough of the sweet, how-to baking illustrations over at Diamonds for Dessert. (And oh my word, the PENGUINS!)



Now all I have to do is learn to bake. And draw. And find time to blog while getting a major in biology and a minor in French. Thanks for not setting the bar too high, Susan.

How do I not own this?

There are several things in the kitchen that frighten me—grilling, roasting whole birds, serving fruit with meat—but few are as daunting as frying. There's just something about roiling oil that doesn't seem particularly friendly to my unique brand of clumsiness.

As a rule, though, not having deep-frying skillz as part of my repertoire hasn't been too limiting; because I love my bread with butter and my grits with cheese, my body isn't protesting that I lack fat-giving prowess in that one area. I happen to be fussy about my fried foods, anyway—though French fries are among my most favorite guilty pleasures, I don't have that Southern affection for fried okra, country-fried steak, or big, bone-filled pieces of fried chicken.

I do, however, in the not-so-secret recesses of my brain, carry an unrelenting torch for boneless fried chicken—thin, cutlet-size pieces of breast with super crunchy, super spicy outsides. I don't have much use for it if it isn't assaulted with cayenne pepper; I'm never going to be someone who orders the chicken fingers off restaurant menus, but I will walk over hot coals listening to Ann Coulter's voice for a Wendy's spicy chicken sandwich.

(SHAME. I feel shame.)

I love this recipe, which I adapted from Food.People.Want, because it's sort of infinitely forgiving. I managed to have the wrong size pot, not enough oil, and a propensity for knocking the candy thermometer into the floor with every ungainly movement. (Truly. I stopped counting after it skittered across the kitchen for the 11th time as I scrambled out of the way in my best attempts to avoid a 325-degree projectile.) But with the right guidance, and a little patience, I came away with four delicate, subversively spicy, sinfully crispy pieces of chicken.

I won't give the recipe for the haricots verts you see here, because it amounted to shallots + garlic + beans = undercooked blahness. I will, however, reveal my secret to luscious, creamy, stick-your-whole-face-in-the-pot mashed potatoes:

PEEL POTATOES.
CHOP POTATOES.
BOIL POTATOES.
MASH POTATOES.
SALT POTATOES.
BUTTERMILK.
BUTTER.
DIE.

I didn't marinate the chicken overnight, and while I think it would be even more spicy and tenderized if I had, it was still delicious without the extra soaking time. I topped the chicken with a little chopped tomato and a spritz of lemon juice to balance the richness, plus a drizzle of ranch dressing to temper the heat and ... add more richness.

Oops.

I will be making this again, and often. Please don't tell my mother. Or my mirror.



Spicy Fried Chicken Cutlets
1 cup buttermilk
2 teaspoons cayenne pepper
4 boneless skinless chicken cutlets
1 tablespoon paprika
1½ teaspoon kosher salt
1½ teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
½ teaspoon dried oregano
½ teaspoon dried thyme
2 eggs
2 teaspoons hot sauce
1 cup self-rising flour
1 teaspoon black pepper
Vegetable oil
Lemon wedges
Garnishes: chopped tomatoes, ranch dressing

1. Whisk together buttermilk and 2 teaspoons cayenne pepper; add chicken, and marinate at least 1 hour or overnight.

2. Combine paprika and next 7 ingredients. In a shallow dish, lightly beat eggs with hot sauce. In a separate shallow dish, combine flour with 1 teaspoon black pepper. Remove chicken from marinade, and sprinkle both sides of each cutlet liberally with paprika mixture. Dip chicken in egg mixture, and dredge in flour mixture, shaking off excess flour.

3. Heat oil over medium-high heat until temperature reaches 325 degrees on a candy thermometer. Fry chicken, in batches, 4 minutes or until golden brown. Keep warm in a 200-degree oven until ready to serve. Sprinkle with lemon juice, and garnish, if desired. Makes 4 servings.

To my mind, there aren't many things that fill, comfort, and satisfy quite like a sandwich. There's the ohskrewit-ness of eating with your hands, the infinite possibilities for ingredients, and the textural coup that's almost impossible to achieve with anything else.

The genius is in the simplicity of the formula: 2 pieces [carbohydrate of choice] plus whatever you want. When I'm planning to feed any group of unknowns—a crowd, strangers, anyone with dietary constraints, picky picky picky people—I almost always default to the sandwich.

There should be some attention paid to balance, but it's not a difficult trick to master; you want something crisp, something crunchy, something hearty, and something creamy, but those can be in any combination you desire:

romaine lettuce + tomato + Monterey Jack + avocado
iceberg + bacon + smoked turkey + fried egg
arugula + whole-grain mustard + roast beef + horseradish mayonnaise
cucumber + red onion + smoked salmon + cream cheese

See? Easy! (Note: This is the only kind of math I'm comfortable with.)

I like a certain rawness to my sandwiches—I'm less attached to toasted bread and melty cheese, although of course there is absolutely nothing wrong with either. There is just something devil-may-care about eating with your hands, biting into something that's a perfect package of all your favorite things.

This one, actually, isn't my favorite. It comes courtesy of Giada de Laurentiis, and I love it because of its unexpected inclusion of egg crepes. (Stay with me.) She serves these on focaccia, and I think they would have been vastly improved by it if my grocer only carried it. I settled for a seeded Italian bread; the flavor was nice, but it was too densely chewy and tough. Also, she calls them "Mini Italian Club Sandwiches"—she's marketing them as appetizers—but they lack a few of the things I love best about club sandwiches, namely lettuce and tomato. I used reduced-fat pesto here, but it was doomed from the start: Pesto has a delicate flavor that is probably nice with the Giada's choice of bread, and the reduced-fatness would likely have passed by unnoticed, but in this case it never had a chance. The taste was sucker-punched by the bread, and in the end it wound up playing an almost invisible role.

The egg crepes are easy, and worth it. It helps to have a little extra egg at the ready so that you can try one or two to determine how your stovetop idiosyncrasies are going to affect the outcome. Don't let them brown; soft and creamy is the way to go. They add a lovely, unexpected layer of texture that makes even an addict like me forget there's no mayonnaise.

They're also beautifully elegant and will make people eyeball you as though you are a kitchen genius, so ... there's that.

Too many substitutions and alterations sort of conspired to make this version a little less-than, but I highly recommend trying the recipe as written. (I've done that before, and they turned out deliciously.)

Or just slap everything in your pantry and refrigerator between two pieces of bread for instant happiness.



Giada's Italian Club Sandwiches
10 bacon strips
3 large eggs
2 tablespoons heavy cream
¼ teaspoon salt
Pinch of freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
2 (8-ounce) round loaves focaccia bread (7-inch diameter)
1 cup prepared pesto
½ pound thinly sliced turkey
4 ounces thinly sliced provolone cheese

1. Preheat oven to 425. Place bacon on a foil-lined sheet pan, and bake until browned and crispy. Set aside.

2. Whisk together eggs, cream, salt, and pepper until well blended. Heat a 6-inch nonstick skillet over medium-low heat. Brush the skillet with some butter. Pour enough egg mixture into the pan to just coat the bottom of the pan, swirling to distribute evenly. Cover and cook 2 minutes or until egg crepe is just set. Invert a plate over the skillet and turn the skillet over, allowing the egg crepe to drop onto the plate. Repeat to make 4 crepes total, brushing the skillet with melted butter as needed between crepes.

3. Cut the focaccia in half horizontally, and place directly on oven rack in center of oven until lightly toasted. Spread pesto over the toasted sides of each halved focaccia. Divide the egg crepes, turkey, provolone, and bacon equally among two pieces of focaccia; top with remaining two pieces of bread. Cut each sandwich into bite-size pieces. Makes 6 servings.

Tikka masala, from what I understand, is a mostly British invention, one that—aside from the flavor profiles—doesn't have a whole lot to do with authentic Indian cooking. I happen to love authentic Indian cooking, or what passes for it in the Deep South. (Although I'm pretty sure the dishes are closer to the homeland in more diverse metropolises; I once ordered the spiciest dish on the menu at an Indian restaurant in DC—not out of false bravado, but because I thought it sounded good—and the waiter good-naturedly refused to bring me more than one glass of water because he didn't think I could handle the heat. It was insane, and amazing, and blistering, and I was high for hours afterward.)

Still, I'm not sure why some people turn their nose up at anything that deviates from tradition. If I love something, chances are I'm going to love its bastardization just as much! If not more! See Mexican Salad Pizza, for heaven's sake. Most of the Mexicans I know would be all, "Take our name off that, por favor."

This, like most popularized perversions of culinary conventions, is quintessential comfort food. I prefer an adaptation of Pastor Ryan's version, courtesy of The Pioneer Woman. There's heat here, to be sure, but it's not the eyes-watering sort. (My 15-month-old niece loved this, after grocery store limitations forced me to omit the jalapeños.) The cream—and there is plenty of it; comfort food comes at the expense of waistlines—mitigates any aggressive spiciness and leaves behind a soothing warmth that's perfection on cold nights after stressful days.

I usually do add a jalapeño, and I find that my chicken has to be much closer to the broiler than Ryan suggests to get the blackening effect (which is delicious). I use Greek yogurt, because I like the gentle sourness and the easy way it sticks to the chicken. The turmeric in the rice isn't necessary—I don't find that it adds any flavor, particularly—but that electric color is spectacular. You'll want the peas, too, which Ryan says are optional; they cut some of the richness. I can live without the sugar, because I generally think canned tomatoes aren't that acidic, but I'll leave it in the recipe for those who want an extra touch of sweetness. Don't be put off by strange words like "garam masala"—it's a spice mixture that, if you can find it in my neighborhood market, you can find anywhere. Aside from broiling the chicken this is essentially a two-pan meal, so it's perfect for a weeknight dinner. And it's easy to adjust the quantities depending on how many people you need to feed.

LSis tends to call this "chicken marsala," which confuses me because that's a dish of a different color, but I will say to you what she says to me when I correct her: "Whatever," tikka masala. I love you, ya crazy bastard.



Tikka Masala
3 to 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
Kosher salt, to taste
Ground coriander, to taste
Ground cumin, to taste
½ cup plain fat-free Greek yogurt
6 tablespoons butter, divided
1 tablespoon turmeric
2 cups basmati rice
1 large onion, diced
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 (2-inch) piece fresh ginger, peeled and minced
1 jalapeño, minced
3 tablespoons garam masala
1 (28-ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 tablespoon sugar (optional)
1½ cups heavy cream
6 ounces frozen peas
Fresh cilantro leaves

1. Preheat broiler to high heat. Season chicken breasts with kosher salt, coriander, and cumin. Dip chicken breasts in yogurt, coating all sides. Place on a baking sheet under broiler, and cook 5 to 7 minutes per side. (It should have slightly blackened edges.) Remove from oven, and let cool slightly.

2. Bring 4 cups of water, 4 tablespoons butter, turmeric, and 1 tablespoon kosher salt to boil in medium saucepan. Stir in rice; reduce heat to low, cover, and cook 20 minutes.

3. In a large, deep skillet, melt remaining 2 tablespoons butter over medium-high heat; add onions, and sauté until lightly browned. Stir in garlic, ginger, and 1 tablespoon kosher salt; cook 30 seconds. Stir in jalapeño and garam masala until well mixed; add tomatoes. Stir in sugar, if desired. Reduce heat to medium, and simmer 5 minutes.

3. Reduce heat to low, and stir cream into sauce. Chop cooked chicken, add to sauce, and cook until heated through. Stir in cilantro.

4. Add peas to cooked rice, stirring until heated through. Top rice with chicken and sauce, and garnish with more fresh cilantro leaves. Makes 6 servings.

Every time I watch Giada de Laurentiis make something on her show that requires pizza dough, she says (Food Network chefs are notoriously repetitive), "Use your favorite pizza dough recipe, or do what I do—go down to your favorite local pizzeria and just ask for some dough."

Is that strange? It seems more than a little odd to me. I'm not going to go to my local hamburger joint and ask if they can just give me a few patties for tonight's dinner.

The problem with pizza dough, though, is that it requires all the chemistry and grace of baking, PLUS yeast, which, of course is my nemesis. I don't know how it's supposed to work, because it never has for me. And then there's all that proofing, the put-it-in-a-warm-place-to-rise business that's far too demanding yet inexact for me. The Woodside heat is set firmly at 60, there is no warm place to be found.

What I have discovered, much to my intense delight, is that my Publix bakery makes kick-ass pizza dough. They sell it in bags, in the bakery section, with only the directive to let it sit out for an hour before you do anything with it.

Now THAT I can do. I have been an expert sitter for my whole life.

I created this recipe as an homage to the tostada pizza at California Pizza Kitchen (TwinFin, amirite?), where I first discovered that pizza didn't know what it was until it met salad. The CPK version is vegetarian, but because I'm often feeding devout carnivores, I add rotisserie chicken. All of the ingredients here are incredibly flexible; this is pizza, after all. I know a certain someone who'd go nuts for a version with Italian meats, provolone cheese, banana peppers, and a salad with red wine vinaigrette. A Cobb salad pizza has promise, too, or a Caesar version. Go nuts!

If there's Mexican food in the house, or anything with a Spanish accent, there's probably going to be K's Trashy Queso, too. I am fully, passionately devoted to Queso-Melt brand, after many years of research. (Most other brands, when combined with anything else, tend to separate. Shudder.) The fact that it's made from prepared melted cheese is what makes this trashy, but what makes it mine is the ratio—40% cheese to 60% everything else. That means lots and lots and lots of tomato and red onion and fresh jalapeño. You can stir in anything else you love, too, chorizo or beans or ground beef, but this is the trio I love. I use the jalapeño-flavored queso, because I always think hotter is better, but the regular variety works just as well for a milder flavor. Hot buckets of deliciousness, people.



K's Trashy Queso
1 (10-ounce) container Queso-Melt jalapeño-flavored cheese dip
2 tomatoes, chopped
1 fresh jalapeño, minced
1 red onion, diced
Tortilla chips

Stir together first 4 ingredients over medium heat until melted and bubbling. Serve with tortilla chips. Makes 1 serving. (BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Nope, not sharing.) OK, Makes 5 servings.



Mexican Salad Pizza
1 portion prepared pizza dough, at room temperature
1 (15-ounce) can reduced-sodium black beans
½ cup jarred salsa
1 avocado
¼ cup reduced-fat sour cream
1 romaine heart, chopped
2 tomatoes, chopped
Lite ranch dressing, to taste
8 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated
2 chicken breasts from prepared rotisserie chicken, chopped
½ cup frozen whole-kernel corn
Lime-flavored tortilla chips (optional)
Lime wedges

1. Preheat oven to 400. Stretch or roll out pizza dough onto a lightly greased baking sheet or pizza pan; bake 10 minutes.

2. Meanwhile, mash beans and salsa in a medium bowl. Mash avocado in a small bowl, and stir in sour cream. Stir together romaine, tomatoes, and ranch dressing in a large bowl. Set aside.

3. Top baked pizza dough with cheese, and bake 5 more minutes. Spread with black bean mixture, top with chicken and corn, and bake 5 more minutes.

4. Spread avocado mixture over pizza, and top with reserved salad. Sprinkle with crushed tortilla chips and additional ranch dressing, if desired. Serve with lime wedges. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

It strikes me that my usual approach to knowledge, i.e. learn just enough about any given subject to be dangerous, doesn't always serve me well. See, what we have here at onthewoodside.com is a food Web site with photographs. And though I'm learning more and more about food, what I know about Web sites and photographs could fill a thimble. (I say a thimble because it has the requisite holes in it so that the knowledge can drain out if I need brain space for eating goldfish crackers or studying any of the nation's real housewives.)

Google Analytics, which tracks my site traffic, such as it is, has faithfully reported to me over the past going-on-three years every time 0 to 22 of you lovely people stopped by to make sure I hadn't become a victim of kitchen fires or gravity. But then! I had a photo accepted at foodgawker, and my traffic jumped 1,600%.

OH, THE FAME.

So what I decided to do, you see, drunk with the presence of eyeballs, was bombard foodgawker with submissions over the next few days. Submission No. 1 was already in the bag. No. 2? BAM, accepted. No. 3? A+ GOLD STARS.



Nos. 4 and 5 ... rejected. And rejected again.

Recently, TwinFin, who is some big-name architect-type person, had his amazing house featured over at Apartment Therapy. And many of the commenters said very nice, complimentary things, and some of the commenters said very nice, critical things, and a few of the commenters said nasty things that derided what TwinFin and the SiL read and listen to and choose to have as a pet.

Those people are assholes; Peri is the second-best dog ever.

When I asked TwinFin about how he handled all the loud opinions, he said (and it helps if you know TwinFin a bit here, and how insanely and sometimes infuriatingly laid-back he is), "It just felt like design reviews at school to me!"

And the weird thing was? I wanted some of that. I'm a notoriously AWFUL recipient of criticism of any kind; I have a tendency to become puffed-up and bent out of shape to hide my psyche's mortal wound. (I'm a sensitive perfectionist; what a tremendously attractive combination!) Don't get me wrong—I knew I screwed stuff up all the time. I just didn't want anyone to notice or otherwise confirm what I knew about myself, which was that I was driving blindfolded down the highway of life.

BUT, before (I hope) this takes too pathetic a turn, I will say that once you get older, and you've fallen down in front of enough strangers and rolled your car into a few bumpers and had lots and lots of therapy, you sort of get accustomed to your failures and they make you laugh. Or at the very least learn something.



That first photo, the cookies one, was rejected for "underexposed/lighting issues," which? Touché, foodgawker. That foreground is way too dark. Honestly I'm not sure why I didn't notice it before. The second one had "food composition issues," which if I had to guess has something to do with the fact that it would have been improved by the presence of whole shrimp, and maybe something to do with the fact that I lopped off the left-hand side of the plate.

My bad.

But lookit me! I'm learning. And it didn't make me collapse into a heap and cry salty tears into my Nikon. The flip side? I have no idea why they chose the picture of the first shrimp-and-noodles dish; personally I don't love it. I think I've discovered a kind of criticism I can handle: helpful, instructive, and just a little arbitrary.

I won't be submitting these shots—I just don't like them, and I was underwhelmed by the recipe, to boot. To be fair, I'd just eaten 400 other pounds of Super Bowl snacks before these made their way out of the oven, and they were a smidge too labor-intensive, in my opinion, for the payoff. The original recipe suggested that, if time is of the essence, one can substitute canned chicken, but please—do not ever, ever do that. Canning is for vegetables. And fruits. And fish. Full stop.

They taste a little, LSis says, like balls of buffalo chicken dip. That sounds like an efficient package for something delicious, but a) a little buffalo chicken dip goes a long way, and b) it made the breading process seem inordinately time-consuming. Why not just make buffalo chicken dip? It was all a bit sad in the end, sort of like Fergie's halftime performance. So, you know, I only ate four.

But I'm super-dee-duper proud of that hot sauce swirl.

PROFESSIONAL!



Buffalo Chicken Cheese Bites
2 chicken breasts from prepared rotisserie chicken, shredded
½ cup Frank's Red Hot sauce
4 ounces cream cheese, softened
1½ cups sharp cheddar cheese, shredded
¼ cup crumbled blue cheese
Salt, to taste
Pepper, to taste
Garlic powder, to taste
All-purpose flour
3 eggs, lightly beaten
Breadcrumbs
Ranch dressing

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper; set aside.

2. Stir together first 8 ingredients in a medium bowl until well combined.

3. Roll mixture into balls. Dredge each ball in flour, dip in eggs, and roll in breadcrumbs. Place on prepared baking sheet.

4. Bake 25 minutes. Serve with ranch dressing. Makes about 24.

LSis served these with orzo the next day and reported that they were quite good! Now I have notions of buffalo chicken pasta salad rolling around in my brain ...