03.22.13
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ROAD EATS 2 :: MARCH 2013

Out of Arizona and into Las Vegas

Las Vegas coming up…

We went on a Road Trip, Carol and I. Our main objective was Giants Spring Training in Scottsdale AZ. We got down to Scottsdale expeditiously — bypassing Las Vegas as we headed south and spent a swell six days in Arizona.

So we leave Arizona and embark on the Las Vegas eats part of the recollection.

TUESDAY March 5th
Out of Arizona.
An IHOP was located conveniently in the parking lot of our hotel. I looked carefully over the menu to try to find something appealing and the right size. IHOP specializes in “way too much.”

2 eggs with bacon and two pancakes with fruit compote. “What kind of compote?” I asked. She told. “Can I substitute just plain fruit?”

“What’s your favorite?”

“Pineapple.”

“We have pineapple chunks.”

“Great.”

A spare and odd, but fine IHOP breakfast.

I borrowed some browned shredded potatoes from Carol’s breakfast to help with the eggs. We need to drive north on Scottsdale Road and find a gas station.

We soon find ourselves on Rt 74 going west through Joshua Tree National Forest. By now, we’re in a nice highway driving mode. We take a pit stop at a McDonald’s in Wickenberg. 140 miles to Kingman, we can catch lunch there. NOT.

What happens is Rt 93 joins I-40 and you fly by Kingman. Try and think of a fast food chain that’s not at one of the three exits. We got gas on Rt. 93 in Kingman going south, there must be a greasy spoon or mom and pop once we get off the interstate and on to 93. Nope. What we find is no town and no food.

There’s an exit for Bullhead City that promises a Sonic (2 miles). We take it. The next civilization is Boulder Dam, 80 miles away.

Well, it’s more than a couple miles and we pass a couple of mom-and-pops and reach SONIC. You know those Sonic commercials; 2 guys sitting in a car eating a burger and suckin’ on a shake? (I hate those.) So we drive up to Sonic and they have these 1950’s stations where you drive up and order and presumedly a car hop comes out and clamps one of those trays on your window.

Carol went in… no service inside… the idea is you eat in your car. HELL NO.

We went back the road to Caroline’s Cafe. HooBaby, we’re in luck. The special is open face meatloaf sandwich with mashed potatoes and brown gravy. I’ll have some of that! Carol had the Paddy Melt with sweet potato fries. What we have here is down home cookin’! Eat your heart out, Sonic.

Ready to dig in.

Caroline’s Cafe

Back to the joys of 93 North.
Out of Arizona.
Frankly, I’m glad. I didn’t find Arizona user-friendly. Even in little ol’ Reno, driving downtown I’ll pass a number of restaurants; the ones I’ve sampled are pretty good, almost none are chains. Good luck with that in Phoenix. And the signs along the roadside aren’t particularly informative. They might have cautioned us, “last chance to eat for 80 miles.” And the roads we traveled were string straight and not very pretty.

As far as I got today. Stay tuned… more stuff to come.

03.11.13
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ROAD EATS :: MARCH 2013

Giants Spring Training
plus Las Vegas on the way home

Ahhh… Spring (it is in Arizona)

We went on a Road Trip, Carol and I. Our main objective was Giants Spring Training in Scottsdale AZ. Every year, I’ve talked about going to spring training and every year Carol would say, “I can’t take time off at that time of year.” Carol retired — WooHoo — so this year, we bought the Giants Spring Training package. Tickets to 3 games and hotel for three nights, tee shirts, caps and other goodies. We’re going to spring training! We will meet our friend and Carol’s former colleague, Sarah and her friend Scott in Scottsdale.

We decided to make it a Road Trip, and decided to rent a car for the trip for two reasons: a) we have enough *Miles* to cover a 10 day car rental, b) our Altures road trip mishap; and c) why put nearly 2000 hard miles on our fabulous 2008 VW GTI? That’s 3 reasons. All the better.

We planned to get down to Scottsdale expeditiously — bypassing Las Vegas and spending the night in a town to the west — and stop for two days in Vegas on the way home. If you reduce your map enough Reno to Scottsdale is pretty much a straight line.

Reno NV to Scottsdale AZ

This is the eats part of the recollection. Not all our meals were great… the first one is kind of ugly, but I decided “warts and all” was the way to go. Not every meal was perfect… although some neared perfection. You can skip the ugly one or two if you want but we couldn’t.

WEDNESDAY February 27
We ate breakfast at home before leaving at 8:30am. Don’t remember what we ate.

Lunch at El Marquise, Tonopah NV $31

My Carne Asada with a side salad

Our Guidebook described “a dark, comforting room and good food.”

It was that. The guidebook did not say the food was picturesque.
I had the Carne Asada and a salad.  Carol had a Taco Salad with chicken.
Carne Asada — pork with green chili sauce, refried beans and rice — is my go-to dish in a Mexican Restaurant. Despite its looks, the pork was extremely tender and the beans just right. I’m not a sandwich lover and a taco is a sandwich, a particularly messy sandwich. Carol loved her Taco Salad, she always does.

As with many roadside restaurants, the servings were way too big.

 

We arrived at Pahrump, a town uglier than its name just before 5pm. Not bad, this was the longest leg of our trip.

The Best Western is nice enough and their companion restaurant, Wulfy’s, is a sports bar kind of place.
Dinner Wulfy’s Fried Chicken + Pizza $31.

Our swell car at the Best Western

Carol had a 9-inch pizza. Mine was the deep fried chicken — choice of wing and thigh or breast — I chose the former. The food was okay, moist and everything, just not seasoned. When I complained, Carol said, “You want good, well seasoned fried chicken, go to KFC, they built a business on their seasoning. MacDonald’s fish is pretty good too… or Jack-in-the-Box burgers.”

 

my fried chicken with a side of cole slaw

 

“Yeah,” I responded, “but they have bright lights, hard surfaces, moms with kids and no beer. At least this place with just okay food has good lighting, the Warriors on the TV and Fat Tire on draft. Also salt, pepper and ketchup to apply to taste.”

THURSDAY February 28
Best Western offered a complementary breakfast at Wulfy’s, and it was good. Almost anything you would want for breakfast except eggs-to-order. I had scrambled eggs, sausage links and fried potatoes. The potatoes were particularly good. They had been cubed, roasted and then deep fried. Crispy outside, creamy inside. Carol had the same, except a warm biscuit instead of potatoes.

About 290 miles southeast of Pahrump on US-93, we stopped at Wickenburg for lunch. Believe me, there is almost nothing in Arizona between Boulder Dam City and here except straight roads and horizons; mountains in the distance. (More on that when we travel north.) Continue reading →

02.24.13
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Oven Bacon

I hold a pack of bacon in my hand, but don’t feel like going through the rigor of frying it. “Carol, isn’t there a way to cook bacon in the oven?” She was at the breakfast table reading from the SF Chronicle on her iPad.

She made a few taps. “This guy on his blog says to line a pan with foil, put on the bacon and put it in a COLD oven. Bake at 400°F for 17 minutes, but WATCH. Bacon thickness, your oven behavior and so on and can vary the timing.”

I put the bacon in our Countertop Convection Oven, set it for 400, turned it on and set my timer for 8 minutes. It took 5 minutes for the oven to tell me its at 400. The bacon started to sizzle at that point. I took a peek and it was all wrinkley and sizzling. By the time my timer dinged, it looked nice and soft done, but not crispy. I turned off the oven and put the bacon on paper towels on a plate. Put those back in the warm oven, poured the bacon fat in my frying pan to cook four slices of apple and two slices of baked potato.

 

Bacon is cooked.

Apple and potato cook. (That’s a really swell OrGREENiC non-stick skillet we got at Bed Bath Beyond.)

Served.

Breakfast! Yum.

This is not news… just the first time for me.

01.24.13
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Turkey Left Over

I’m just getting around to writing about our leftover Thanksgiving turkey.
If we don’t serve a turkey on Thanksgiving, Carol likes to buy one anyway, just to have turkey leftovers. I’m no fan of sandwiches — as you must know by now — so I’ve made Turkey Pot Pie which is pretty good, and other kinds of soups and stews. This year, I was attracted to the Dish it Up column in the Reno Gazette Journal (RGJ) for Turkey Barley Soup. That column is written by Nancy Horn, owner of Dish Cafe and Catering in Reno. As you shall see, she writes about home-style food that tastes good.

The RGJ has a really good food section that appears on Wednesdays. It usually has five full pages and covers things interesting enough that I usually read it all. This week — January 23 — for example:

Do they cut the Mustard: We blind taste 11 national brands…
Dish it Up: Pantry Raid! Southwestern black beans
Courtney’s Kitchen: Chicken won tons, Orange beef by Courtney Barnes of Gourmet Rooster
In One Ear: Tidbits, sightings and buzz from Northern Nevada’s food and drink scene.
Tilapia steamed with soy sauce, ginger by Sara Moulton (AP)
Sweet potatoes loaded with cheese and kale by Elizabeth Karmel (AP)
Poached eggs over ricotta and arugula by J.M. Hirsh (AP)

Surprise! The the Dish It Up column for the week of November 27 was for Turkey Barley Soup. I wouldn’t be writing this if the soup weren’t incredibly good and EZ and the leftovers great. It seems as though it would freeze well, but ours wasn’t around long enough to try that.

start chopping… onion, celery, carrot

Continue reading →

01.07.13
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Salad and Sugo

How do you like YOUR salad?

By now, I’m resigned to the fact that I usually eat differently than other folks. You’ve seen plenty of examples in my BKFST posts. Now for salads.

I think my best salad experiences were in Jerusalem, where Israeli or Arab salads were the norm. As you can see, the wikipedia definition for each is pretty similar. Indeed, chopped tomato and cucumber is the base salad. In practice, many small plates of chopped vegetables often found our table, and one would take something from each. At breakfast in the hotels, the buffet followed the same principles.

I’m not a fan of lettuces or greens (derisively called leafs, by some non-foodies); although a good ceasar salad, properly made, is pretty hard to beat. At the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in San Francisco — oh, how I miss that — hearts of romaine were available most of the year, and endive — crunchy and mildly bitter — for much of the year. Those kept well in the crisper drawer of our refrigerator and formed the basis for salads that I made. Arugula and frisee and radicchio — especially grilled — are okay, too.

Carol’s sugo with spaghetti and my salad

Last night, Carol got a container of her Sugo out of the refrigerator and said, “We have two endive, why don’t you make a salad for dinner?” At about the time to put pasta in water, I chopped the endive, threw it in my favorite wooden two-person salad bowl and rummaged around to see what else to throw in. I sliced some red radishes and tiny baby carrots we get from a guy at the winter market — Sundays 10am to 2pm, indoors at the Garden Shop Nursery. Reno is cold just now, but there is plenty of sun and he grows his vegetables (including chard) in a heated cold frame.

those baby carrots and radishes

Core, peel and cube a pear, that’s good for something sweet. If I didn’t have a pear, an apple would do. Slice in a couple of scallions and cube a fabulous pickled yellow beet.

I tossed all that together and put on a little more than a tablespoon of Marzetti Simply Dressed Ranch Dressing, just enough to coat and moisten everything, but not add a lot of taste. If I hadn’t had that, I would have used Newman’s Own salad dressing — or my own concoction of vinegar and oil and lemon juice. I seasoned with salt and pepper and just a pinch of sugar to make the beets and pear happy.

You’ve seen these beets on my breakfast plate. We get them at the Great Basin Coop, roast them for about 50 minutes at 400°F, cool, peel and put them in a jar. I mix 1/2 cup fresh orange juice, 1/4 cup red wine vinegar, 1 tablespoon sugar, 1 ounce Pastis and a good pinch of salt and pepper mixture in a saucepan, heat to boiling and pour over the beets. Refrigerate for a day and they’re ready to eat. (That’s for the yellow beets, for red beets the vinegar of choice is balsamic.)

the next morning’s breakfast of egg, beet and leftover salad

12.18.12
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Scallops: Marvelous: EZ

Scallop Pan Roast

I am a lover of scallops, and am always up for a way to prepare them other than the “sear and dress” methods.

Back in ought-eight Melissa Clark wrote about the way the Oyster Bar in New York prepares scallops. I made the recipe, filed it as Scallop Pan Roast and didn’t open it again until now. How silly of me. This time, I opened the recipe and re-read the story and prepared those wonderful scallops.

She starts:

A PAN roast at the Oyster Bar, like cheesecake at Junior’s and frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity 3, is one of those dishes New Yorkers love to champion, even if we haven’t tasted it in decades.

She goes on to write about those scallops and how she might bring the recipe up to date. Her story is so lyrical and charming that I’ll include the whole thing at the end, but first, the recipe, which I rewrote for the way I cook.

Scallop Pan Roast
based on a recipe by Melissa Clark in The New York Times, January 2, 2008.
Yield: 2 servings.

PREP
Put out 3 Tbsp butter, milk, cream, scallops to come to room temperature.
Make toast.

COOK
1. In a heavy saucepan [chicken fryer] over low heat, combine 1/3 cup bottled clam juice, 2 tablespoons butter, 2 Tbsp Heinz chili sauce, 1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce, 4 tsp gin, 1/2 tsp sweet paprika, 2 dashes celery salt and 1 dash <strong>Tabasco; bring just to a simmer.

Add 1/2 pound scallops and let cook for 30 seconds without simmering (if you see a bubble, pull pan off heat for a few seconds). Add 1/2 cup heavy cream and 3/4 cup whole milk and continue to heat without simmering until mixture is steaming hot and scallops are opaque, about 2 minutes longer.

pan stew cooking

Place a piece of toast in each of two bowls and then add pan roast, dividing scallops evenly. Float 1/2 Tbsp butter on top of each bowl. Eat immediately. Continue reading →

12.05.12
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BKFSTS: HB Eggs

egg mangled while peeling… the bluish bit to the right is irrevocably stuck to the white (the knife was not used in peeling, it is there to keep the egg from rolling over)

What a mess.

I am a lover of hard-boiled eggs. I make them 4 or 5 at a time to have on hand for breakfasts, or just to salt and pepper and eat out of hand. They are an excellent source of protein, they go with almost anything, and they taste good. What’s not to like?

What’s not to like is that this time of year, with really fresh pasture raised eggs, they’re almost impossible to peel. I get my eggs from Hadji Paul’s Chicken and Feed who come to the Farmers Market at Garden Shop Nursery on Sundays.

HB egg for breakfast with green beans, beet, roasted cauliflower, bits of potato and cheese curds

egg tool, for slicing or sectioning a HB egg.

sliced egg breakfast with castelvetrano olives, red beets, yellow beets and cheese curds

“There are two peculiarities associated with hard-boiled eggs. One is the occasional difficulty encountered when peeling the egg. It turns out that peelability is affected by the pH of the egg white, and so by the egg’s freshness. If the pH is below 8.9 — in a fresh egg it is closer to 8.0 — then the inner membrane tends to adhere to the albumen, whereas, at the figure typical after three days of refrigeration, around 9.2, the problem no longer exists. Exactly what the chemistry involved is, no one knows, though some cooks claim that salt in the cooking water helps.”

On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee, Chapter 2: Eggs

Joy, the egg lady says that to peel, the eggs must be 10 days old. The mangled egg above was one of three I kept for 10 days. Well there you go. But I hadn’t read Harold McGee and didn’t salt the water. Maybe that works. Continue reading →

11.26.12
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Thanksgiving 2012

Reno, Nevada

A sunny day — somewhat chilly outside — the warmth of family in the house. Football on the TV settles into the background. Folks are taking turns in the kitchen on their various dishes. The food, simple, but highly qualified to be described as Thanksgiving Dinner with all the Trimmings.

Gathered at our table, Brian behind the camera.

Carol’s Turkey
Inspired by Tom Colicchio’s Herb-butter Turkey
bonappetit.com

We bought a fresh turkey at Raley’s and ordered it butterflied and wrapped with neck, giblets, backbone, etc. The butchers did a great job and had it all wrapped and ready for us. (hint: wait until the week before Thanksgiving to order. Prices plummet.) 13 to 15 pounds was the size they offered; ours was 14.9 pounds, way too big for four folks, but there you go.

DAY BEFORE
When we unwrapped the butterflied turkey, we found it oh-so-easy to cut in half. We froze half, for a later date. Rubbed the fresh half on all surfaces with Diamond Crystal Kosher salt and put it in the refrigerator uncovered, overnight.

BROTH
Made broth with giblets, neck, backbone and whatever spare parts we had. You know how to make broth, don’t you? If not, see this.

DAY OF TURKEY
Two hours before oven put the 1/2 cup butter and the turkey on the counter to come to room temperature. Don’t wash the turkey.

Preheat oven to 425°F Allow 15 minutes extra so it’s really hot when the bird goes in. Continue reading →

11.14.12
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BKFSTS: grits oatmeal egg

Are grits groceries?
Then oatmeal must be groceries, too. And good for you, they say.
I’ve made grits or oatmeal for breakfast a few ways. They are almost always savory, and almost always involve a poached egg, on top. So, perhaps the subject of this piece is the poached egg.

Here are some savory grits topped by a poached egg.

I can assure you those grits were good, but I don’t remember what I put into them. For another gritty breakfast, I took the opportunity to lay out the ingredients, so there’s no doubt.

Here, I have a packet of instant grits, a bowl of leftover ham, and vegetables, to which I will add the grits and boiling water and stir. An egg to poach, and a saucepan to poach it in.

This is the result.

Thing is, I’m not fond of sweets… oatmeal is often served with sugar or syrup or something sweet like apples and cinnamon. I prefer savory with leftover (LO) bits of meat, fish or vegetables — or all of those. On the other hand, Carol made some baked apples — hollow out the core and stuff the apple with chopped nuts, butter, brown sugar and maybe cream and bake. I would chop up a LO stuffed apple — filling and all — and add to oats. That’s sweetness that I can get my mouth around.

But never mind that, here’s another breakfast with grits, not sweet. Continue reading →