Mushroom Ragout for Pasta

Grace and I were hanging out in the basement the other day with Food Network on in the background, and Rachael Ray made a pasta sauce that was based on portabello mushrooms. I didn't catch the exact recipe, but that night Grace and I tried to come up with something that would be similar. This is what we tried (and it was fantastic over fettucine!).

Portabello chunks

• 6 thick slices smoky bacon, in 1/2 inch slices
• 5 large portabello mushroom caps, in 1 inch by 1/2 inch chunks
• olive oil
• salt
• 1 medium onion (1/2 inch dice)
• 4 cloves garlic (minced)
• 1 tablespoon dried sage, rubbed
• 1/2 teaspoon dried crushed rosemary
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/2 cup hearty red wine (like a zinfandel)
• 14 oz can diced tomatoes (with juice)
• 28 oz can crushed tomato

Warm a pan on the stovetop that is large enough to hold everything (I use the trusty 7.25 quart Le Creuset). Add the bacon and cook over high heat until slightly crispy. Remove the bacon but leave the drippings. [Don't drain the bacon, you'll want the flavor]

Add the mushrooms, garlic, onion and a little olive oil and salt into the pan with the bacon drippings. Cook the mixture (medium high heat) until everything has softened, released much of its moisture, and cooked down somewhat.

Add the spices (sage, rosemary and basil) and the wine to the mushroom mixture. Cook for 5 minutes or so until the liquid has reduced somewhat.

Add the cooked bacon back into the pot, along with the diced and crushed tomatoes, and simmer over low heat for 15-20 minutes until everything has incorporated nicely.

The result is a nice rustic mushroom ragout. Serve over any chunky shaped or flat pasta.

Kitchen Essentials, and Not

Shockingly enough, somebody actually read this blog and asked me "if you like to cook so much, what would be the top things you would want to have in your kitchen if you were starting from scratch?"

That's actually a fun question to think about, and without wracking my brain too much, and in no particular order, I would choose...

Lots of spices

1. A few good quality knives. You don't need too many, and quality over quantity definitely should be the rule here. Shun, Wusthof Trident, Henckels or the like. Large chef's knife, serrated bread knife, santuko, paring knife (perhaps). A long thin slicer is nice too, but the serrated knife can do that. Minimal number but high quality. I'd love to have a set of Japanese carbon steel crazy-expensive knives, but I've successfully lived without for this long...
2. Le Creuset 7.25 quart round french oven. This is a ceramic coated cast iron covered pot that I use for everything, as it looks nice, performs beautifully, and can go from stovetop to oven to table. Any kind of dish that simmers, braises, or starts on the stovetop and ends in the oven uses this pot. Indispensable.
3. A Cuisinart food processor. I don't bother to use mine as often as I should, but for certain things it can't be beat.
4. Calphalon pots and pans (the original anodized aluminum ones). Again, there are only 3 or 4 that I use often, and they need to be hand washed, but the heavy pans are so much better for controlling your heat. Worth the extra trouble. We finally gave away our other set of Revere Ware stainless steel that could go in the dishwasher, and once we cut that cord I have never regretted it.
5. All Clad stainless steel 12 inch skillet. Nice and big and heavy and not non-stick. Sometimes you need a pan that will sear differently than a non-stick.
6. 12 inch non-stick skillet. And sometimes you do want non-stick...
7. A gigantic stainless steel stockpot; 15 or 20 quart. If you have the impulse every now and then to cook a huge batch of chili or something similar, or you like to cook for a crowd sometimes, there is no substitute for this. I don't use mine all that often, but if you don't have one, you just can't do some things.
8. Kitchen Aid blender. A good quality heavyweight one. Some sauces and bases you just can't do properly without a good blender.
9. A good cutting board. We have a large hardwood Boos Block board that is easy on our knives (but we still use a plastic board for chicken and meats).
10. A well-stocked pantry. This is a big item (and perhaps the most important), obviously, but improvising a meal is much easier if you have a good supply of spices and other pantry staples. We have a pretty big pantry, and use most of what's in there regularly. Large spice selection. Canned goods. Pastas. Rices. Oils. Vinegars. Asian ingredients.
11. Edlund tongs. Various sizes. You can use these for everything.
12. Microplane zester/grater. Box graters stink. Bad blades and cannot clean them. Go with flat graters.
13. Instant read thermometer. We also have the fancy electronic probe thermometer with alarm, etc (which is useful), but this is all you really need.
14. Basic range of kitchen utensils - spoons, spatulas, ladles, etc. Basic but cannot do without. I prefer the hard plastic kind that won't scratch anything and can go in the dishwasher.
15. A roasting pan that can also go on the stovetop for making gravies out of pan drippings.

A well stocked pantry (plus too much other stuff)

This isn't a cheap list by any means, but is the kind of quality stuff that you can buy once (or only a few times) in a lifetime if you take good care of it.

Also, keep in mind that my kitchen interests run to cooking, and not baking. If I were a baker (like my wife), the number one item on the list might well be the big heavy Kitchen Aid mixer. It's a great piece of equipment to be sure, and it gets a ton of use in my house, just not by me...

Secondary list of fun and useful but certainly not necessary things:

• "Boat motor" immersion blender. Nice for making sauces and bases in the same pot you cooked the ingredients in. It dirties a lot less things when you can blend in place.
• Nice simple apple corer. You can do this with a knife, but why bother.
• A carbon steel wok. Now that we have a range that puts out enough BTU's to actually stir fry properly, we get a lot of use out of this.
• Breaking one of my own rules below about specialized items, there are some things that only serve one purpose, but are fun enough to be nice to have around. A paella pan. A fondue set. 

Conversely, there are a bunch of things that a kitchen doesn't need. Some of which would be...

• Almost all gadgets. As part of our kitchen remodel last year, we took a long hard look at all of the gadgets we had accumulated and realized that we have no use for most of them, and never ever use most of them. Many are gone (but some are cool enough to keep anyway...).
• Most electric things. Grab a knife or a whisk and do it yourself.
• Most items that serve only a single specialized purpose. If you check out my list of essentials above, you will see that most of them can serve many purposes. Anything that is good for only one thing is probably not useful enough to take up its storage space (with the above exceptions duly noted).

So, take it for what it's worth. Somewhat snobby to be sure, but if I were starting my kitchen again from scratch, and had the money to do so, this is the direction I would take.

Penne with Sausage and Artichokes

Today being the first day of a week-plus in vacation time over the Christmas holiday season, I had the time to try something different. Recipes from Giada De Laurentiis have always been reliably good in the past, so I picked up her Family Dinners cookbook, flipped through it, and found a recipe that looked to be worth trying. We have in-laws coming to stay for the next few days, so an easy dinner that could be thrown together fairly quickly was exactly what I needed. Penne with Sausage, Artichokes, and Sun-Dried Tomatoes (page 147) fit the bill nicely. Prep was minimal, the recipe was quick and easy to follow, and it turned out to be a fantastic meal.

Simmering a sauce of chicken broth, white wine, garlic, artichoke hearts, and sun-dried tomatoes.

Adding the cooked hot Italian sausage chunks and penne pasta...

This was a quick dinner that everyone absolutely loved. The pasta was good, and the sausage and other ingredients made a wonderful rich sauce that would have been good for a much more substantial investment in time or ingredients. Everyone agreed that this recipe was an absolute keeper, and well worth making again. We had it with a simple caesar salad, a good crusty bread, and a nice Mirassou Pinot Noir.

A very good start to my holiday time off...