Amy's Food Adventures

Salmon Croquettes are Nostagia Food

At our house salmon croquettes and macaroni and cheese are nostalgia food. That's because both our mothers' made them. How they achieved their results is lost in the mists of time, but we agree that the salmon croquettes and macaroni and cheese served Chez Wohl is the best comfort food to be had.

Salmon Croquettes

There are two tricks to this recipe. Don't improve it with fresh salmon -- we've tried that route and it isn't better -- and don't use any bread crumbs or flour -- they spoil the delicate texture.

There are five steps:

(1) Empty a one-pound can of pink salmon into a bowl, draining and discarding the liquid. Remove all the skin and bone. Flake what's left into small flakes.

(2) In a blender, combine one egg, one small onion, peeled and cut in half, a large handful of parsley, and four or five dashes of Tabasco Sauce. Blend until smooth.

(30 Combine fish and onion-egg mixture, mixing well and make into four cakes, placing on a flat platter. This is enough for two hungry eaters. If you need more, double the recipe.

(4) Now, put the plate in the freezer for 30 minutes. These cakes are very fragile and you want them to set up (even get a little frozen) before you try to handle them.

(5) Heat 1/2 inch of vegetable oil in a large skillet. When the oil is hot, ease the croquettes into the oil (I use a skillet to gently place each one into the pan). Don't touch them until each has had a chance to form a firm, very crisp and well browned bottom. Turn and equally brown the other side.

Serve with lemon wedges and catsup. (It's the only thing I eat catsup on; trust me, it's a requirement.)

MACARONI AND CHEESE

It's easy -- well not as easy as Kraft in the Blue Box, but you didn't want to eat that, anyway.

Bring a large (four quarts or more) pot of water to the boil. Add 2 cups of elbow macaroni (it could be anything but elbows are traditional) and cook until just tender. Drain

In the meantime, melt two tablespoons of butter in a 2-quart saucepan. Blend in two tablespoons of flour (I use a whisk). Add two cups of whole milk, gradually. (The point is to blend a little of the milk into the flour at a time so there will be no lumps.) When it starts to thicken, whisk in 8 ounces of grated sharp Cheddar cheese (yes, you can cheat and buy the pre-grated kind.) If I'm feeling fancy, I add a handful of crumbled blue cheese, too. Add a few dashes of Tabasco and four or five grinds of nutmeg.

Add the drained macaroni to the pot of sauce and mix together. Put the whole thing into a buttered (or sprayed) casserole (5x8 works well here) and put into a 350 degree oven for about 35 minutes until firm and golden brown. If you like, you can sprinkle it with buttered bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, or a mixture of both before it goes into the oven.

This is enough for four -- or one very hungry teenager.

Fall Arrives!

When the air becomes crisp and the leaves turn color, it's time to think of warming dishes. We had the perfect occasion. Our cousins came for lunch and pleased us, at the end of a long, luxurious afternoon of relaxing and talking, by staying for dinner.

It was time for an easy welcome to fall. I put a boneless pork loin (these come in almost any size, but you should figure about eight ouonces per person and about 20 minutes per pound in a well-heated 350 oven (mine usually goes into a cold oven so I figure on 25 minutes or more per pound). You can rub a bit of olive or vegetable oil into the pork and sprinkle with your seasonings of choice -- sage, salt, and pepper is a good combination. The pork comes out succulent as long as you don't let it dry out. We let it rest a few minutes and then sliced it into 1/3" slices and served with a chutney.

If you're ambitious, you could use the pan juices, a half cup of broth (chicken), and a few tablespoons of port, to make a nice sauce. Just scrape up the pork bits, add firsst the broth and then the port, and cook it until it's a bit syrupy. Season to taste.

We had an easy side dish -- yams baked in the oven with the pork. I usually serve them with butter, but my cousin Melinda said she always sprinkles hers with cinnamon sugar, so a bowl of cinnamon sugar (I keep a jar in the kitchen) went to the table -- it was a big hit.

This would go well with a crisp salad, perhaps cucumbers in cider vinegar with some sugar, paprika, and a bit of onion and Tabasco Sauce. I'd let them marinate for 30 minutes or more.

I baked apples, filled with bits of butter and sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, sitting in some water (you could use apple juice or apple cider), but no one was hungry enough to eat them -- we'll save them for tonight!

Light and Low Carb

We're still being careful but you'd never know it from the enthusiastic reception dinner got.

It was a return to our old favorite, the Stir Fry, judiciously edited, and served topped by grilled giant Diver Scallops. It also only takes ten minutes to cook (but 20 to prepare -- so you might want to do that ahead of time).

The scallops are easy. Just rinse them off, dry them with paper towels, and grill them to a crusty brown outside but a barely done center in a just oiled skillet. Keep warm.

The stir fry has two parts: bowls of cut up veggies and a bowl of garnishes and liquids. Timing is everthing.

First the prep work. Cut up or measure:

In one bowl:
3 medium zuchinni, halved lengthwise and sliced thinly
1 red pepper, seeded and sliced into 1/4" julienne
2 stalks of celery, sliced into 1/4" slices (on a diagonal looks pretty)
1 small onion, peeled, halved, and sliced vertically

In another bowl
a big handful of snowpeas, stemmed

In another bowl
5 scallions, peeled, trimmed, and sliced in 1/4" slices, including some of the green

In another bowl
1 Tablespoon bottled chopped or pureed Garlic
2 Tablespoons bottled chopped or pureed Ginger
5 Tablespoons Lite Soy Sauce
5 Tablespoons Sherry
Something Hot (we use 1 teaspoon Vietnamese Rooster Sauce but you could use half a teaspoon of Tabasco)

Heat a large skillet over high heat and cover the bottom thinly with vegetable oil (2 tablepoons should be plenty). Heat the oil and then add the zuchinni, red pepper, celery, and onion. Spread out, turn in the oil, and let start to cook. In two minutes, add the handful of snowpeas, stir, and follow with the liquid ingredients and seasoning, stirred in their bowl and then stirred into the hot pan. Stir everything together, turn down the heat, cover the pan, and cook for 2-3 minutes until all the vegetables are crisp tender. Remove the lid, stir in the scallions, and serve.

If you're not being very good about carbs, you may add white or brown rice.

Slices of tropical fruit (we had pineapple and mango), with a squeeze of lime juice, make a perfect dessert.

Low Carb Tonight

My husband and I have so far not bought into the low carb lifestyle -- we believe that calories count -- but some medical tests required that he eat a high protein, low carb diet for a few days so we have been experimenting. We have found that an amazing number of very good things can be enjoyed on a low carb diet, even if you want to be less than totally carefree about how much butter and cream you enjoy as some low carb dieters seem to be.

For example, my husband traded in his usual Sunday-at-the-Diner breakfast treat of Corned Beef Hash, Eggs, Fried Potatoes, and Toast (too many carbs to even count) for an omelet with onions and smoked salmon, a dip of cottage cheese, and a bowl of fresh fruit (mainly low-carb melon).

Watching a football game at our daughter's house, he enjoyed shrimp (but no cocktail sauce), sharp cheese, and a little fruit.

For dinner, we cooked a meatloaf that was full of vegetables and herbs but no breadcrumbs at all, a very big salad, and his first taste of pureed cauliflower.

The Perfect Meatloaf:

This meatloaf started out with my mother-in-law's Russian-Jewish recipe. We're pretty sure it had one clove of garlic in it. Ours is obviously a 21st century version. Chop two very large yellow onions and peel and coarsely chop a head (yes, a whole head) of garlic. Saute the onions until transparent, add the garlic, and continue sauteeing until the onions are pale brown. Remove half to a bowl. Continue sauteeing until a deeper shade of brown, but don't let the garlic burn. Mix the deeply browned onions and garlic into 4 pounds of ground lean beef together with the juice from a large (28 ounce) can of whole peeled tomatoes. Season liberally with salt and pepper and mix together lightly. Turn into a large (11x17") pan and form into a loaf in the center of the pan. Mix the rest of the onions in the tomatoes (break them up first), together with an 8-ounce can of tomato sauce. Pour the tomatoes and onions over the meatloaf. Cover with foil and cook in a 350 degree oven for 90 minutes. Remove the foil and cook for another 30 minutes. Let rest, covered, for about 10 minutes before cutting. This is best if made the day before -- then the gravy can cool in the refrigerator and any fat can be removed before it's reheated to serve over the meat and accompanying mashed potatoes. We usually serve one hot meal from this and use the rest for incredible sandwiches.

Pureed Cauliflower: We cooked two heads of cauliflower until just tender, pureed it in the food processor in batches with a spoonful of its cooking water and a tablespoon of butter, and added lots of pepper. I'm not sure he would have known it wasn't mashed potatoes if we hadn't assured him he could eat it.

Dinner tonight will be grilled steaks, another salad (fennel and oranges this time), and a reprise of the cauliflower. Strawberries (another low carb star) with some sour cream will be an excellent dessert.

And we haven't gotten to really cooking yet. We're checking out the new low carb pastas and the desserts that Splendra (which can withstand the heat of baking) now make possible. The possibilities look endless!