restingmotion

Make This

This week I cooked this (not my photo):

chicken with clementines and arak (courtesy Jonathan Lovekin via wsj.com)

It was fabulous and I will be making it many times this clementine season, and hopefully next week for family dinner night, when both of G's children are here with their families.  The recipe is from the new book by Yotam Ottolenghi that I wrote about last week, Jerusalem, but this particular recipe is available all over the web, at epicurious, and in a Wall Street Journal article from this past September.

 

Probably the only tricky ingredient in this recipe is the Arak, but as the recipe states you can substitute Ouzo or Pernod.  If it were me, I think I would chose Pastis before Pernod, as I personally find Pernod too sweet and the dish is already sweet enough, but that is just me, and I find that both Ouzo and Pastis have a drier herbal anise flavor and are less sweet than some of the other anise liquors.   Since I do have Arak, and I have to thank my lovely step-daughter and her husband for bringing some to me last summer after their visit to NY, it is not an issue in my house.  There are quite a few things I cook with Arak, so it has become a kitchen staple, but It is one of those things that I erroneously believed were available everywhere, as it was widely available in the Hudson Valley, only to find there is no Arak in Knoxville.  There are a lot of things I thought were widely available, and now I realize how truly spoiled I was, culinarily at least.  That, however, is another story.

 

Anyway, I didn't make this exactly as written, although my modifications are quite small.  The original recipe called for 3 tablespoons of brown sugar, but when I went to the sugar jar I only had two tablespoons left and I use a fair-trade dark brown sugar that I find has a wonderfully rich sweet flavor that is more pronounced than standard supermarket brown sugar.  (yes it is true, I buy everything based on how I think it tastes; no detail is too minor to ignore.)  I could have used some other kind of sugar, but felt that the dish would probably be sweet enough for my taste, given all the citrus flavors, and I left it out.  The original recipe also calls for 3 tablespoons each of orange juice and lemon juice, and I omitted the orange juice.  I am sure the original is wonderful, perhaps even more wonderful than my version, but the final dish had a rich luscious citrus flavor and was plenty sweet for our tastes.  You will have to make your own judgements.

 

Roasted Chicken with Clementines and Arak

serves 4

modified from Jerusalem by Yotam Ottolenghi

6 tablespoons Arak

4 tablespoons olive oil

3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

2 tablespoons grainy mustard

2 tablespoons dark brown sugar

2 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt *

1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper

2 medium fennel bulbs, cut in half lengthwise, then each half cut in quarters

2 pounds bone-in chicken thighs. **

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves, minced

4 clementines, unpeeled, thinly sliced

2 1/2 teaspoons fennel seeds, lightly crushed

minced parsley for garnish

Put the first five ingredients in a large mixing bowl and add 2 1/2 teaspoons salt and 1 1/2 teaspoons of black pepepr.  Whisk well and set aside.

Add the fennel, chicken pieces, clementine slices, thyme and fennel seeds to the liquid and stir well with your hands.  Place chicken in the refrigerator to marinate for at least a few hours and up to overnight.  The authors say it is fine to skip the marinade step if you are short on time.

Preheat the oven to 475° F.  Transfer the chicken and its marinade to a roasting pan or baking sheet large enough to accommodate everything comfortably in a single layer.  The chicken skin should be facing up.  Once the oven is heated, put the pan in the oven and roast for 35 to 45 minutes, until the chicken is colored and cooked through.

Lift the chicken, fennel, and clementines from the pan and arrange on a serving platter; cover and keep warm.  Pour the cooking liquid into a small saucepan and place it over medium-high heat.  Bring the liquid to a boil and simmer until the sauce is reduced by one-third, so you are left with about 1/3 cup.  Pour the hot sauce over the chicken, garnish with the parsley, and serve.

 

*  I use Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt, which is produced by a different method than most salts with the result that it has half the weight per volume as does table salt or Morton Kosher salt. Therefore a teaspoon of Diamond Crystal salt will taste less salty than Morton Kosher salt because there is less salt per teaspoon. If you use a different brand you will have to adjust the quanitity of salt to your taste.  Diamond Crystal salt does not seem to be available in Knoxville. I tried many other salts before deciding it wasn't worth trying to relearn 30 years of cooking habits.  I did learn that Maldon Sea Salt is a good substitute, as it is slightly lighter per volume than Diamond, but as it costs roughly six times as much, I finally ordered the Diamond kosher salt and am a much happier cook.  I do have a box of Morton Kosher salt which is used only for cleaning my cast-iron skillets.

 

** The original recipe calls for a 2-3 pound chicken.  Chickens are variable things, and I am sure the weight and amount of meat on a chicken can be highly dependent on diet as well as breed, and this varies probably from place to place.  In Hyde Park there was a free-range poultry farm in the next town, and they raised several types of chicken.  Their small chickens (2-3 pounds) were meaty and good.  I have not found a similar locally raised organic or sustainably-raised free range chicken in Knoxville.  The small chickens I have purchased seem to be skinnier cousins of the same birds that are good at 4-5 pounds.  Hence they are all bone with little meat and do not serve 4 people.  The organic chickens sold in the stores are also larger.  If I want less than 4 or 5 pounds of chicken, but still want the flavor bones will add to the final dish, I opt for bone-in chicken thighs.

Lighting up the Darkness

Yesterday evening, when I went outside to turn on the holiday lights**, I looked up and saw the remnants of this beautiful sunset.  I paused and turned the lights on first, then ran inside to get my camera.  

I barely made it in time.

 

Then I snapped another picture as I came back inside.  

This is the first year I have put decorations outside the house, as our previous home was not visible from the road.  I would only decorate if we were having a party, and we had not had a party during the holiday season for many many years.

 

In early November I got really excited about Christmas and holiday decorating.  The last few years had been difficult and I struggled with capturing that hopefullness that Advent and preparing for the winter holidays entails.  Not this year.  I started planning the outside lights early, knowing full well that the covenants of my new neighborhood do not allow lights on the house or large displays.  I wanted something pretty but discreet, and it is possible I erred on the side of over-discretion, but I do like the result. 

 

I knew I couldn't put anything up more than a month in advance, and I have never been among the tribe who decorate for Christmas over Thanksgiving.  In my mind, Advent and holiday lights are combined, and in the past I always aimed for the first Sunday in Advent as "tree day".  Despite my early exuberance, the week after Thanksgiving and the first week of Advent were a little rocky and my hopeful mood slipped behind some clouds.   We pulled ourselves together this week though, and the tree is up and the decorations have been hauled out of the attic and unpacked.  

 

The sunset the other night, combined with the rituals of decorating and lighting, have reminded me, once again, of the importance of slowing down and taking time.  It reminded me of the importance of ritual, and how sometimes ritual can help ease our path to joy.

 

There is no doubt that G is somewhere along the path of his own personal sunset, his own journey through darkness, and I was reminded, as I looked at this sunset, and turned and saw our lights how important it is to take time and celebrate the small joys in each day.

 

What I love about the entire Advent, Christmas, Hannukah, Winter Solstice, or Whatever-you-call-it Season is the emphasis on hope and joy.  In the darkest days of the year we focus on hope and promise and the sharing of gifts; we focus on coming out of darkness and into rebirth.  It isn't always easy.  In fact the culture we live in can make it harder to focus on these small joys as we fight the frenetic pace of holiday traffic and the cult of more.  But the lights still come on.  And joy is waiting if we pause long enough to take a breath.

 

**my lights do have timers, but the timers only run for 8 hours.  If I turn the lights on at night, the house is dark when I leave for the gym at 5:45 AM.  It brings me great joy to see the sparkle of tiny lights in the early morning and is well worth the effort of a twice daily walk with my trusty remote.

 

Experimenting with Winter Salads

One of the things that I found particularly nice about Thanksgiving this year was that I was able to spend time cooking in a relaxed way.  This inspired me to return to my cookbook collection and to purchase a couple of new cookbooks as well, filled as I was with the joy of anticipation of happy hours spent in the kitchen.  

 

My kitchen time hasn't worked out to be quite as stress-free as I had hoped, but I have nonetheless, been playing around with new flavors.

 

This is a roasted cauliflower, celery and pomegranate seed salad from the new cookbook by Yotam Ottolenghi, Jerusalem.  It was quite delicious, and better yet, it was also excellent pureed.  In fact, it may have been even better in the pureed form.  This is my new priority in the kitchen, as long as G still enjoys eating, the food needs to be good for me and enjoyable for him as well.

 

Of course, I was not surprised. Ottolenghi's two previous cookbooks have been great successes in my kitchen, and many of our staple dishes and family favorties have come from them, especially the first, eponymously named book:  Ottolenghi.

 

One of the unexpected joys of this book has been how many salads and dishes there are that employ winter vegetables.  Now that we have returned to that season when I must rely on grocery-store produce, that alone is a great boon.

 

We have also tried, and enjoyed, roasted butternut squash and red onion with tahini and za'atar, which is also excellent left over, as shown here over lettuce (not part of the original recipe).  In fact it works better for G with the addition of the lettuce, which lightens the puree.  

 

I originally served the squash as a side with the recipe for chicken adobo, which I cooked without the potatoes since I was serving the butternut squash.  The chicken is another dish I highly recommend, although it is unfortunately not nearly as photogenic as it is flavorful. 

 

Next up will be a few recipes featuring kohlrabi, one of G's favorite vegetables.  There used to be annual skirmishes in our Hyde Park garden between G and the woodchucks over who would had first dibs on the kohlrabi crop. Now I just have to drive up the road to a local grocery store.

Mundanities

Here I am.  Better late than never I suppose.

(we were supposed to do an initial, but I had to get all fancy and try somethng special with my initals)

I meant to write yesterday, I woke up all focused and raring to go and then got worn down by all the simple and totally mundane stuff that needed to be done:  

    1. Gym

    2.  Have breakfast with my sweetie.

    3. Recycleville (you know the place one takes the cardboard, plastic etc.(It seems by the time I move to Knoxville, the curbside recycling slots had all been taken).  Actually it is a fun trip.  G likes putting the aluminum cans and the cardboard in their respective bins, while I run around with the other stuff.

    4. Audiologists to get a malfunctioning hearing aide repaired.

    5. Lunch with my sweetie: vegetable soup and bacon-wrapped chicken.

    6. Combined Costo and Sam's Club runs. 

    7.  Early dinner with my sweetie (Shepherd's Pie and Mustard Greens)

    8.  Needlepoint class.

Actually I am behind in the needlepoint class.  Not behind on lessons per se, but I am the only one in my section at least who hasn't completed the borders, and that did put me a little behind last week, in that they all learned a stitch that I didn't.  Well I listened and did it anyway.  Now I am back in step.  But I'm going to finish those borders.

 

Once I catch up, we will have Christmas break and I can either start on another project while I wait for the next lesson.  Or I can turn my attentions back to knitting, which I have had to give up in order to keep up with the needlepoint.  Obviously my classmates don't knit while they watch TV, or they have more time on their hands than I manage, or they just watch more TV. Or they just manage their time better than I manage mine.  The latter is the most likely.  

 

In the short term, I am looking forward to stretching my legs out on the sofa and working on this some more tonight.  I overdid something at the gym today and my knees are complaining rather vociferously.  I knew it, and I did it anyway so I have no one to blame but myself.  I just wanted to master a particular move.  Perhaps finding the right balance of mental focus is an issue, as in fitting in time to do the things I want to do, but at the same time not focusing on one thing so intently that I ignore everything else, including warnings that I am over-doing.