too legit to quit

Last Wednesday I hosted a legitimate dinner party. As in, were you to ask any of the 5 people who attended the event how they spent their eveing, I'm quite certain that they'd say, "I went to Merril's dinner party," and not merely, "I had dinner at Merril's." Legitimate. Dinner. Party.

The evening was successful; the menu well-planned. When you are preparing food for people outside of the ring of unconditional love that only your blood relatives can provide, you really need to make sure to choose dishes that you know you do well. Either that, or be prepared to accept criticism with grace. I'm not very capable of the latter, so I always opt for approach #1. In other words, if you've never made coq au vin before, one hour before a dinner party at which your boss will be in attendance does not qualify as an optimal time to make a first attempt. In the words of Biggie Smalls, "Try to keep it as real as possible." What he meant was, if spaghetti and meat sauce is what you do extremely well, serve spaghetti and meat sauce. A 2006 survey found that 8 out of 10 people would prefer a perfectly executed spaghetti and meat sauce to an overcooked and half-rancid lobster tails poached in butter. Go figure.

So last Wednesday, I stuck with what I know, and what I know is relatively difficult to screw up. I made a wild mushroom risotto, but stepped it up by drizzling white truffle oil into it at the end. I pan-seared rib eye steaks, cooked to a perfect medium-rare, and made a silky red wine pan sauce to serve it with. And finally, plain old Breyers vanilla, disguised as something more precious with the help of a homemade blueberry coulis. Legitimate. Dinner. Party.

breaking the silence

For 15 years of my life, I was duped into believing that making frosting from scratch was an abominably difficult thing to do. When I was 10, I convinced my mother to buy me a small tub of Duncan Hines Chocolate Buttercream frosting, 10 minutes after convincing her to buy me a box of yellow cake mix. And over the course of the remaining years of my childhood, my adolescence, and my teenage years, I convinced my mother to buy me many boxes of things like semi-instant scalloped potatoes and fettucine alfredo, assuring her that all of these things would make for very interesting side dishes to pair with her kalbi and pot of kimchi jjigae.

Then I grew up, which meant that I stopped thinking that transforming a cup of boiling water, a small slab of butter, and a boxful of flakes into a steaming pile of mashed potatoes was a very wonderful thing. And even more significantly, I developed a love for reading recipes. I really do believe that most of the people who think that cooking is difficult must have read fewer recipes than those who think that cooking is easy. (Yes of course, there are other obvious factors to consider - e.g. he who reads more recipes is likely to be more interested in cooking and more likely to have put more effort in and/or engaged in cooking more frequently - this is also not a doctoral thesis but a blog.) I'm pretty sure that one of the main reasons why Betty Crocker is still in business and Semi-Homemade with Sandra Lee has any viewers at all is that Betty and Sandra are keeping hush-hush about the fact that many things, including frosting and mashed potatoes, are not difficult at all to make from scratch!

Last week, when I took on the task of making a birthday cake for a very special boy, I made cream cheese frosting, which is both very easy to construct from scratch and very delicious. The below recipe is totally foolproof, so try it, and spread the good word.

Cream Cheese Frosting with Toasted Coconut

Cream cheese frosting is a heart-warming complement to a simple but rich chocolate cake. For my special occasion, I made the Old-Fashioned Chocolate Layer Cake from The New Best Recipe.

-ingredients-
1 8-oz. block cream cheese, room temp.
1 stick unsalted butter, room temp.
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1 tablespoon brown sugar

-preparation-
1. In a pan, melt 1/2 tablespoon of butter over medium heat. Add the coconut and brown sugar; stir occasionally until the coconut is toasted and has taken on a deep golden color. Remove coconut from pan and set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, beat butter with a mixer on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add cream cheese, and beat until well-combined and fluffy, about 2 minutes more. Add sugar and vanilla, and beat until combined, about 2 minutes. Fold in coconut.

sweet dreams of pesto

When I hear that someone doesn't like something as faultless as pesto, I must say, I become a little bit concerned about the current and future state of our world. I always thought pesto to have that rare combination of qualities that characterize those things that I like to call “objectively good.” Pesto, puppies, and buy-one-get-one-free offers. Objectively good.

So tonight, something crazy happened. I made a pesto that really is more than just a pesto. Correction: I made a pesto that is more than even a pesto. I made a pesto that I would like to go ahead and call “objectively amazing.” As in, this pesto is so amazing that I have had only a pea-sized amount of it, and I swear to God, that is all that I need. (At any rate, it’s 2:45 in the morning, and eating more than a pea-sized amount of pesto would be even weirder than making pesto at 2:30 in the morning, right?) Really though, I’m not joking! (It really is 2:45 in the morning.) The tiniest bit of that pesto, and the toasty, garlicky charm of the taste it left behind in my mouth, will surely inspire sweet dreams for me tonight.

Objectively Amazing Pesto

This recipe, only slightly adapted, comes from The New Best Recipe, of which I am henceforth devout, devout follower.

-ingredients-
1/4 cup pine nuts
3 medium garlic cloves, unpeeled
2 cups packed fresh basil leaves
1 cup packed fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
7 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
pinch of pepper
few tablespoons grated Parmigiano-Reggiano (optional)

-preparation-
1. Toast the pine nuts in a heavy skillet over medium heat, stirring frequently, until just golden and fragrant, about 5 minutes. Remove nuts from skillet.
2. Add the garlic cloves to the empty skillet. Toast, shaking the pan occasionally, until fragrant and the color of the cloves deepens slightly, about 7 minutes. Let the garlic cool, then peel and roughly chop.
3. Bruise the basil and parsley using a mortar and pestle. Alternatively, put the herbs into a heavy-duty plastic ziploc bag and pound the bag with the flat side of a meat pounder or rolling pin to bruise the leaves.
4. Blend the nuts, garlic, herbs, olive oil, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and pinch of pepper using a food processor or hand blender. Process until smooth but slightly chunky. (I don't like my pesto totally pureed down.) Mix in Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese if desired.
5. Taste; season more with salt and pepper as desired.







Picture: Cover the pesto's surface with either plastic wrap or a thin layer of olive oil if you want to store it in the fridge for up to 3 days.