Corn Cookies

I recently discovered the most interesting cookie recipe I've come across in a long time. While reading the second issue of Lucky Peach, I was intrigued by the corn cookies by Momofuku Milk Bar pastry chef Christina Tosi.

Just Tomatoes brand freeze-dried corn

Corn cookies may sound odd, but before you dismiss them, consider this: imagine the sweet taste of late summer corn-on-the-cob, think about the sweet richness of really decadent corn bread, now imagine that translated into the buttery goodness of a freshly baked cookie. Do I have your attention now?

Freeze-dried corn ground to powder

I was even skeptical while making them, but after the first bite, I knew all bets were off. This is one amazing cookie. I used kosher salt, which I don't normally do in cookies, but its larger (and thus less diffused) salt crystals delayed the salty taste a bit. So first you taste the sweet, then the salty, making each bite a multi-part taste sensation.

10-minute creaming of butter, sugar and eggs

I couldn't find the freeze-dried corn in any stores, so I ordered it from Amazon. Don't skip this ingredient: it's what gives the cookies their intense corn flavor. Corn flour alone will not cut it. Speaking of corn flour, I wasn't quite sure what that was, so I used finely milled corn meal, which worked fine and I think may in fact be the same thing.

Ready for baking, trying out Silpat for the first time (worked great)

This was the first baking recipe I made measuring some ingredients by weight rather than volume, having recently acquired a kitchen scale. Tosi's recipe includes both types of mesures, so I was monitoring if there were any differences. By weight, I used slightly less sugar than I would have by volume, but otherwise they were all pretty close.

Fresh from the oven

Corn Cookies
Adapted from Corn Cookie by Christina Tosi of Momofuku Milk Bar

65 g. freeze-dried corn (about 2/3 cup when ground, if you buy the Just Tomatoes brand, it will be about half an envelope, since an envelope contains 112 grams)
8 oz. unsalted butter, room temperature (I use the European style butter, Plugra, which is also what Momofuku Milk Bar uses)
300 g. sugar (slightly less than 1 1/2 cups)
1 large egg
225 g. flour (about 1 1/3 cups)
45 g. finely milled corn meal (or corn flour, about 1/4 cup)
3/4 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1. In a food processor, grind the freeze-dried corn into a fine powder.

2. In a stand mixer, beat the butter and sugar together on medium-high for 3 minutes. Scrape the sides, add the egg and beat on medium-high for another 7 minutes.

3. Add flour, corn flour, freeze-dried corn powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt and beat on low speed until just combined, no more than 1 minute.

4. Portion the dough into rounds about the size of 3 tablespoons onto a parchment or Silpat-lined baking sheet. Chill in the refrigerator for at least an hour (up to 1 week).

5. Preheat oven to 350 F. Bake cookies for 18-20 minutes until browned on the edges but still bright yellow in the middle. Cool cookies on sheet pan and then transfer to airtight container to store.

Asparagus and Snap Pea Pasta

I saved this for last in my series of spring pasta recipes, since it is my favorite of the group. Cooking the pasta like risotto is an ingenious idea for developing a creamy sauce without the need for actual cream.

The flavors in this dish are so fresh and tangy, with the mint, lemon, asparagus and snap peas combining to create an ideal spring-flavored pasta.

America's Test Kitchen's technique for cooking pasta like risotto creates a creamy “sauce” without the addition of cream. I adapted the recipe by substituting fresh sugar snap peas for frozen peas, using shallots instead of leeks, and omitting the chives.

An interesting part of this recipe is the stock, which consists of vegetable broth further enhanced by flavors in this dish by simmering it with the tough asparagus ends, which would normally just get pitched, and some of the snap peas.

Asparagus-Snap Pea Pasta
Adapted from Spring Vegetable Pasta, Cook’s Illustrated

1 lb asparagus, cut on the bias into ½ inch pieces
1 lb sugar snap peas, string removed and copped into ½-inch pieces
3 shallots (1 coarsely chopped, 2 finely chopped)
4 garlic cloves (2 smashed, 2 minced)
4 cups vegetable broth
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
4 tablespoons olive oil
1 lb. casarecce pasta (can use farafelle or penne—any bite-size pasta will do)
1 cup white wine
2 tablespoons chopped fresh mint
2 teaspoons lemon zest and juice from ½ lemon
Salt and fresh ground pepper to taste
Ricotta salata, shredded

1. Bend asparagus stalks to break at their natural breaking point and chop the thicker stalk ends (the ones without the tips) into 1-inch pieces. Add chopped asparagus stalks to a large saucepan with about ¼ the of sugar snap peas chopped in half, one shallot coarsely chopped and 2 smashed garlic cloves. Add 4 cups vegetable broth and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer covered for about 10 minutes. Strain broth into an 8-cup liquid measuring cup and press on solids to retain as much stock as possible. Add water as needed to the measuring cup to total 5 cups of liquid. Return stock to pan, keeping warm over low heat. Discard solids.

2. In a large, deep saute pan or dutch oven heat 2 tablespoons butter over medium heat. Saute the finely chopped shallots about 4-5 minutes until softened. Add asparagus and snap peas; cook another 4 minutes. Add 2 minced garlic cloves and cook another minute. Remove vegetables from pan.

3. In the same pan, heat 4 tablespoons olive oil over medium heat. Add pasta and cook stirring frequently for about 5 minutes until pasta starts to brown. Add wine and cook, stirring frequently, until wine evaporates—about 2 minutes.

4. Add vegetable stock (all at once) and bring to a boil. Cook, stirring frequently, until stock is mostly evaporated to form a thickened sauce with the pasta—about 8 minutes later. Turn off heat. Add cooked vegetables, mint, lemon juice, zest, and salt and pepper to taste. Serve in pasta bowls topped with ricotta salata.

Rigatoni with Sausage and Swiss Chard

I use Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything app a lot, but I rarely use my other iPhone cooking app: Mario Batali Cooks! Compared with Bittman's, Batali's app has far, far fewer recipes and a fussy interface. That aside, Batali is a well-known chef and restauranteur, so I decided to dive in and find a recipe I liked.

His Pasta con la Bietola looked promising. "Bietola" is Italian for Swiss Chard, and this simple dish made with whole-wheat rigatoni, greens and fresh bread crumbs is seasonal and hearty.

I decided to add some meat, so I picked up a couple of Italian chicken sausages from Whole Foods. Their chicken sausage is really quite good, as good as their regular pork Italian sausage. These are not those cardboard-y pre-cooked kind with little red flecks posing as sundried tomatoes. These are real sausages made of raw ingredients and spiced with fennel seed. I use them all the time and they are great.

Figuring out how to make the fresh bread crumbs was a little challenging. The app doesn't include a recipe for it (and I couldn't find one online, despite seeing fresh bread crumbs in other Batali recipes). 

There is a video though, and the process is pretty easy: cut the crusts off half a small loaf of Italian bread (save the other half for something else, such as eating with olive oil), tear bread into pieces, pulse in a food processor until you've achieved an ideal crumb size, then toast the crumbs in a dry frying pan over medium heat until the crumbs turn dark brown (but not burnt). 

After browning the sausage in a little olive oil, I added the vegetables--red onion and the chopped stalks of the Swiss chard, which I figured could use the additional cooking time with the onion rather than with the chard leaves. 

Adding the chard leaves to the pan was a bit of a challenge, despite making this in my largest deep-sided saute pan. In just a short time though, the leaves cooked down to a manageable size. Batali's recipe calls for chopping the leaves into 1/4-inch strips, but I just ripped them by hand and tossed them in.

Rigatoni with Sausage and Swiss Chard

Adapted from Mario Batali's Pasta con la Bietola

1/2 small loaf Italian bread
1 lb. whole wheat rigatoni

2 tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil

6-8 oz. mild Italian chicken sausage

1 medium red onion, halved and sliced

1 lb. Swiss chart, stems separated and diced, leaves torn into 1- to 2-inch pieces
3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
Salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste
Parmigiano-reggiano

1. Cut the crusts off the bread, tear into large chunks and pulse in food processor to reach desired crumb size. Heat a medium frying pan over medium heat and toast bread crumbs until browned (should be a dark brown). Set aside.

2. Bring a large pot of water to boil, add salt and cook pasta two minutes short of package directions for al dente. Reserve 2 cups of pasta water, drain pasta and set aside.

3. Heat olive oil in a large saute pan. Add sausage and brown, breaking up with a wooden spoon. Add onion, garlic and chopped chard stems and saute until softened, about 5 minutes. Add swiss chard leaves and cook for about 12-15 minutes until the chard is very tender, stirring occasionally. Add pasta to saute pan and a cup of reserved pasta water. Toss thoroughly to combine and add the other cup of water if needed. Season with salt and fresh ground pepper and serve topped with toasted breadcrumbs and shavings of parmigiano-reggiano.

Farfalle with Pancetta and Peas

Fresh peas and spring go together like, well, two peas in a pod. Peas also go nicely with bacon, as well as pancetta, which is Italian bacon, similar to the American version but made a little differently.

This dish is like a lighter version of pasta carbonara, the creamy pasta dish with bacon and eggs. It has a touch of cream, but the pasta is only lightly sauced.

Monitor the peas while cooking to ensure they do not turn gray, which signals they're overcooked.

Use a vegetable peeler to make large, thin shavings from a block of parmigano-reggiano

Farfalle with Pancetta and Peas

1 lb. farfalle (bowtie) pasta
3 oz. pancetta, cut into lardons (thin strips)
2 shallots, minced
Olive oil (if needed)
2 garlic cloves, minced
16 oz. fresh peas
1 cup white wine
2 tbsp. heavy cream
Salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste
2 tbsp. fresh parsley, chopped
parmigiano-reggiano shavings

1. Boil pasta in salted water to al dente according to package directions. Drain and set aside.

2. Heat a large frying pan over medium heat. And pancetta and cook until browned a crisp. Remove with a slotted spoon, reserving about 1 tbsp. of rendered fat in the pan (add olive oil if needed). Add shallots and garlic to pan. Saute until softened, 3-5 minutes. Add peas and wine and saute about 3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. Add cream and cooked pancetta. Cook for another couple minutes to heat through and thicken sauce.

3. Pour pancetta-pea sauce over pasta and stir to mix. Spoon into bowls and top with parsley and parmesan shavings.

Food (Section) Fight!: Week 17

Food (Section) Fight! is my weekly look at The Washington Post's Food section and The New York Times' Dining section with my verdict on which section had the better content for the week.


Washington Post
Great variety of stories on the front page today: Tim Carman looks at the (rather disturbing) trend of all-you-can-eat seats in sporting arenas and Bonnie Benwick has an inspiring profile of an underprivileged but talented teenager who will soon be realizing her dreams of attending culinary school thanks to the Careers through Culinary Arts program. My favorite front-page story though is Valerie Strauss's feature on the joys of red wine vinegar, which she explains can be used for more than just salad dressing, such as Noodles with Spicy Sauce.

Some great recipes this week, too. In addition to the aforementioned noodles, another vinegar tie-in, the Warm Salad of Slow-Roasted Tomatoes With Almonds, sounds quite good. Thanks to Stephanie Witt Sedgwick, I have the skewered chicken recipe I've been looking for this week, specifically Cilantro-Lime Chicken and Pineapple Skewers. And Bonnie also provides an interesting Dinner in Minutes recipe, Pan-Seared Shrimp With Sweet Soy-Ginger Glaze, which features kecap manis, a type of sweet soy sauce (during today's chat, she said hoisin is an acceptable substitute).

New York Times
Dining had two great stories on the front page today. Jeff Gordinier did a captivating piece on how Chef Wylie Dufresne of WD-50 is completely remaking the menu of his Lower East Side molecular gastronomy mecca. Someday I hope to try some such cuisine (as well as try my hand at making it).

There's also a nice story from David Tanis on the joys of seasonal asparagus. The accompanying recipe for Asparagus With Mustard Vinaigrette served with hard-boiled eggs sounds really good; I think I will be adapting it for breakfast soon.

Verdict
Washington Post. Close this week. Nothing blew me away, but both sections had good stories. On balance, I think the Post had a few more.

Score
The New York Times: 9
The Washington Post: 8

Truffled Mushroom Mac & Cheese

Spring isn't just about vegetables. With many farmers markets returning from winter hiatus, it's an opportunity for mushroom lovers too. For this recipe, I used cremini mushrooms, (and admittedly not ones from a farmer's market), but you could use any type or combination of mushrooms you enjoy.

One type of mushroom you likely won't find at the farmer's market is the truffle. Resistant to cultivation and hard to find (they grow underground), truffles are a culinary luxury akin to caviar, foie gras or traditional balsamic vinegar (no, you're definitely not going to find that at the grocery store). In Ruth Reichl's Garlic and Sapphires, in which she describes her experience as the New York Times' restaurant critic, truffles are shaved over her meals left and right.

Although truffles themselves are available in some specialty supermarkets, they are quite expensive (2 oz. of black truffles from Sabatino Tartufi is $64; 2 oz. of white truffles is $420; told you it was a luxury item). However, there are a couple of affordable options for infusing some of that earthy, meaty truffle flavor into dishes. In addition to selling whole truffles, Sabatino Tartufi (and other companies like D'Artagnan), offer truffle products like truffle butter and truffle oil, both of which are available at Whole Foods for about $10 and $15 respectively. Truffle butter contains flecks of actual truffle, while truffle oil is a creation of the flavor industry (albeit a convincing one).

I had intended to use only truffle butter in this recipe, but I had only 2 tablespoons and Whole Foods was sold out of it, so I used both that and a little truffle oil. The result is subtle, but it's definitely there.

Fontina is softer than cheddar or gruyere, but will still shred in a food processor, particularly if well chilled first

To prevent the truffle flavor from being overpowered by the cheese, I used mostly fontina, an earthy cheese that pairs well with truffle flavors and has a milder flavor than my usual blend of sharp cheddar and gruyere that I used for the traditional mac & cheese, from which this modified recipe comes.

Truffled Mushroom Mac & Cheese

1 lb. elbow macaroni (or other type of small pasta)
Salt
1 tsp. truffle oil
8 oz. cremini mushrooms, sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tbsp. olive oil
1/2 tbsp. unsalted butter
1/3 cup plain panko
2 tbsp. truffle butter
2 tbsp. flour
2 cups whole milk
8 oz. fontina cheese, shredded*
4 oz. gruyere or sharp cheddar cheese, shredded
4 oz. parmigiano-reggiano cheese, grated
Dash of nutmeg
Pinch of seasoned salt
Fresh ground black pepper to taste

*Like most cheeses, there are a variety of fontinas. I used the traditional Italian Fontina Val d'Asota, which is harder than some of the other varieties and is said to pair well with truffles.

1. Boil pasta in salted water to al dente according to package directions. Drain pasta and set aside in large pot. Add truffle oil and stir to coat.

2. Melt 1/2 tbsp. unsalted butter in a small frying pan over medium-low heat. Add panko and stir to coat panko with butter. Remove from heat before panko browns.

3. Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add mushrooms and saute until browned. Remove from pan. Add truffle butter and, when melted, add the flour. Whisk to combine and cook until lightly browned.

4. Add 2 cups whole milk to butter/flour mixture, whisking to incorporate. Increase heat just past medium and cook until sauce is lightly bubbling and thickened. Season with nutmeg, seasoned salt and fresh-ground pepper.

5. Reduce heat just below medium and add shredded and grated cheeses, a handful at a time, whisking to incorporate as cheese melts. Pour sauce over cooked pasta, add mushrooms and stir to combine ingredients. Return sauced pasta to large frying pan and sprinkle buttered panko evenly over pasta. Preheat broiler on high setting and broil pasta in frying pan about 6 inches from broiler until the panko topping is lightly browned.

Pasta Primavera

Happy May Day! We're halfway into spring now and I'm kicking off the month with a series of spring-themed pasta recipes. To start, here's the quintessential spring pasta: Pasta Primavera.

I've already discussed how The New Basics Cookbook was my cooking bible as a teenager. Pasta Primavera was another one of my favorite dishes from the book. For someone who had been a picky eater as a child, it's a small miracle that just a few years later I was not only eating but preparing a dish that's loaded with a variety of vegetables.


According to the Cook's Illustrated folks, the dish originated in the '70s at Le Cirque, a Manhattan institution. The idea was to prepare a more healthful pasta dish. Despite its name, even the orignal Primavera wasn't limited to traditionally springtime vegetables. A Primavera true to its name might feature snow peas, fresh peas and asparagus, but broccoli, green beans and zucchini are apparently common too. Really, a Pasta Primavera could include any number of fresh vegetables.

For reasons of nostalgia, I'm partial to the New Basics' combination of red pepper, carrot, zucchini, yellow squash and tomato. Their recipe also calls for snow peas, but since they weren't quite in season when I tested this recipe, I didn't use them. Since I had celery on hand, I did use that, as well as sweet onion and garlic. The white wine and dill combination of the New Basics cookbook works great, so I also wanted to use that.

Use a spoon to carefully remove the yellow squash seeds

In prepping the vegetables, I cut them into julienne, i.e. thin strips between 1/4 to 1/2 an inch wide and no longer than about an inch and a half. I used a spoon scoop the seeds out of the summer squash. Since carrots can take longer to cook, I used a julienne peeler to cut them into very fine strips.

Most recipes I reviewed before making this blanch the vegetables. I decided to skip this and saute them instead. I love the flavor of just-caramelized vegetables, which you wouldn't get with blanching. Sure, I ran the risk of having a less colorful dish, but really, I'd rather have more flavor than color, and in the end, it was still plenty colorful.

I sautéed the onion, celery and garlic first to give them time to break down a bit, then I added the rest of the vegetables except the tomatoes and turned up the heat. Admittedly, I overcrowded the pan, but they did eventually cook down and once their liquid evaporated began to take on some color. Lastly, I added the tomatoes with the wine and dill. Since the tomatoes were cut small, I knew they would cook quickly.

I finished this dish with 2 tablespoons of butter. This may elicit a gasp from the health food crowd, but I had good reason. As this dish is prepared with mostly pieces of vegetable and just a little white wine, there's not much sauce to it. Adding butter at the end provides a unifying element as well as some richness. You could add extra-virgin olive oil instead. Since the oil hasn't been cooked, it will impart fruity olive oil flavor. If you're against adding any additional fat, at least spoon in some more reserved pasta water to keep the dish from being too dry.

Pasta Primavera
Inspired by Pasta Primavera by Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins, The New Basics Cookbook

1 lb. dried pasta (I recommend a stubby pasta, such as gemelli or fusilli, but you could also use linguine or fettucine)
2 tbsp. olive oil
1 medium sweet onion, diced
2 stalk of celery, sliced into 1/4-inch thick strips
2 garlic cloves, smashed
Seasoned salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
1 yellow zucchini (summer squash), cut into julienne
1 green zucchini, cut into julienne
1 red bell pepper, cut into julienne
1 carrot, cut into very thin julienne
1 pt. grape tomatoes, halved
2 tbsp. chopped fresh dill
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 tbsp. chopped fresh chives
2 tbsp. unsalted butter (could use extra-virgin olive oil, reserved pasta water or nothing)
Grated parmigiano-reggiano

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Cook pasta according to package directions. Reserve 1/4 to 1/2 cup of pasta water, drain pasta and add back 1/4 cup of pasta water. Set aside until sauce is done.
2. Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Add onion, celery and garlic and saute until softened, about 5 minutes.
3. Turn heat up to medium-high and add yellow and green zucchini, red pepper and carrot. Saute until vegetables have softened, their liquid has evaporated and they start to brown, 10-12 minutes.
4. Add tomatoes, dill and wine. Continue cooking another 5 minutes until tomatoes have softened. Remove from heat.
5. Add chives and butter (or, if not using butter, extra-virgin olive oil or 2 additional reserved pasta water).  Combine with cooked pasta. Serve in bowls with grated parmigiano-reggiano on the table.