I almost never make dessert because I’m not a baker of any sort. But, I lifted this plum and sloe gin sorbet from a Jamie Oliver cookbook I have and I couldn’t have been happier with the result. It takes only a handful of ingredients and a couple of simple steps to impress your guests!

Keep in mind that you could substitute pretty much any kind of fruit – paired with an appropriate fruit based liqueur – in the below recipe.

Sloe gin is a liqueur made with sloe (or blackthorn) berries, gin and a few additional flavours.

To make the sorbet, cut the plums in half and remove their pits. You are going to blend the plums with the other ingredients so putting them in the freezer first will give you a more slushy, less juicy texture for the sorbet. Place the plums in a freezer bag and put into the freezer for at least 2 hours or until frozen solid. An hour before you want to make your sorbet, put a serving dish into the freezer to get really cold.

Once you’re ready to roll, put the plums into a food processor with the orange zest, sugar and sloe gin and pulse until smooth. Scoop into your frozen bowl or dish and use a spatula to smooth out the surface. Throw that in to the freezer, and bingo bango!

Once you’re ready for a flavour explosion, remove the sorbet 5 to 10 minutes before serving so it softens slightly. Serve in big scoops, with a  swig of sloe gin over the top if you like.

Buccatini and meatballs is a classy spin on an old classic. I don’t think I’ve met anybody who does not like a good ol’ bowl of pasta and meatballs. For me, it’s one of those few meals that I crave if I go too long without. I guess that’s one of the defining characteristics of comfort foods in general…

But I have to say, this is one of the best bowls of pasta that I’ve had in a long time – at a restaurant or at home! In the past year or so, I’ve started to try and remember my favourite types of pasta. I still love the classics – spaghetti, linguini, penne – but there are so many interesting kinds, it’s easy to find a few other favourites.  If you can get your hands on buccatini, I would highly recommend it. It’s basically just like spaghetti but with a hole in the middle, making it a tube.

I almost always have some of this tomato sauce in my freezer. It’s a good starting point for a pasta dinners and marinara sauces and can just be defrosted the day before.

The meatballs can be made ahead of time to save some trouble, or just thrown together before you start cooking – my typical M.O. The lemon zest in the meatballs here really brightens up the pasta and works perfectly with the bit of heat from the chilies.

To make the meatballs, mix together all of the meatball ingredients and form in to large marble sized balls. As I’ve said before, unless you’re making meatloaf, you do not need to mix the meat too much. Just fold it over enough times to incorporate the ingredients. The more you smash up the meat and play with it, the more dense it will cook. The idea is to get tender meatballs that fall apart, not mini-meatloafs. The same goes for rolling them – just enough to shape them. To help them hold their shape and to help you roll them, run your hands under cold water every few meatballs.

Once you’ve rolled the meatballs, add a little olive oil to your pan of choice and heat over medium-high. Cook the meatballs until they are browned on all sides (about 6-8 minutes). It is not necessary to roll and shake the meatballs around constantly. You want each side to get some colour, which means letting it sit without moving. You only need to roll the meatballs around 3 or 4 times for this step. When finished, remove to a plate with paper towel while you deal with the sauce.

If you’re using dried pasta, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil and cook to your liking. Buccatini, like all pasta, should be cooked to al dente.

Add the sliced mushrooms to the pan the meatballs were in and cook until softened, about 3 minutes. This is a good point to add more garlic if you’re so inclined. Otherwise, add your tomato sauce to the pan with the mushrooms and get your meatballs back in to the sauce. Allow the sauce to heat all the way through and wait until the meatballs are cooked through to turn off the heat, about another 8-10 minutes. Taste the sauce and adjust for seasoning if need be. You may want to add more salt, pepper or chili flakes to your taste.

Drain the buccatini and reserve a bit of the cooking water. It is always a good idea to keep a cup of the pasta cooking water as it can help to loosen up the pasta and sauce if it is too ‘sticky’. Toss the pasta with the meatball sauce and add a spoonful of butter, the Parmesan cheese and half of the ripped up basil leaves. Add a splash of the pasta sauce if you like.

Serve up the pasta in large bowls and top with the rest of the basil leaves and grated Parmesan.

Buon appetito!

For the tomato sauce:

In a large sauce pan, heat the oil over medium heat. Add onion and garlic and cook until soft and slightly coloured, 8 minutes. Add the thyme, carrots and chili and cook until the carrots are quite soft, about 5 minutes more. Add the tomatoes by crushing them by hand into the pan. You can just grab them out of the can and squish them through your fingers, making sure to get all the juice in the pan as well. Bring this to a boil, stirring often. Lower the heat and simmer for 30 minutes. Season with salt to taste.

This will keep in the fridge for 1 week or in the freezer for 6 months.

This is the fist of a new series I’m going to appropriately name You’re $#!*ing Me?!

Basically, I will attempt to shatter your perfect world with little gems of BS and other remarkable food facts from the world. (A side note: I disapproved of the word “remarkable” and use it here only to illustrate how not to use it. For some reason, people generally use it to describe something pretty amazing that happened to them. To me, the fact that most people wear socks is remarkable. Buses are remarkable. Simply worthy of remark. That’s it. I’m going to blow your mind with these posts, which is better than remarkable.)

Our first You’re $#!*ing Me?! moment is brought to us by Baby Carrots. You know, the baby carrots that many people think are actually baby carrots and not just shaved down versions of big carrots?

Those little cute carrots you buy in little cute bags for 3x the price of regular carrots actually start out for the most part as big, crooked, deformed carrots.  Those heinous excuses for vegetables are thrown into a big machine designed to chew them up and spit out as perfect little bite-sized morsels of veg. Since your kids won’t eat crooked, deformed carrots and you don’t feel like cutting a carrot into four sticks, “baby” carrots account for the majority of (overpriced) sales.

Sorry to cut this short, but I’m going to grab my iPod mini and head down to the market for some “big” carrots. Now where’d I park my Mini Coop?

You’re $#!*ing Me?!, right??

Pickling never really crossed my mind until recently. I guess I’ve always felt that anything involving canning, jarring or preserving was for grandmas, you know? Great to have on hand for the apocalypse, but otherwise, just too much work. Turns out, it couldn’t be easier. Now that I’ve made these pickled onions many times I can see the slippery slope ahead of me. I suspect that within two months I’ll be eating nothing but vinegar soaked veggies.

In North America, “pickle” almost always refers to a pickled cucumber. The word actually comes from the Dutch for “brine”, and almost any vegetable, or any perishable food for that matter, can be “pickled”. I’ve never actually gone through the trouble of jarring these since I always use them within about two weeks.

It is important to point out here that, much like most of the cooking I do, nothing is exact. Especially with pickling. You can use whatever spices you want and have on hand. Most recipes for pickled red onions use only white vinegar, but I really like the sweet tanginess that red wine vinegar imparts on the onions, so I use a mix. The only reason I mix it is because white vinegar is much cheaper. In the end, you just need enough vinegar to cover to the top of the onions in the pot you’re using. If your onions are larger, use more if you need it!  I like to slice the onions whole – I think the full rings look better for serving – but cut the onions in half first if it’s easier for you.

Add the vinegar, sugar, salt and spices to a pot on medium-high and heat until the sugar & salt are dissolved. Add the onions to the pot and stir them around for about 3 or 4 minutes. You only need to blanch the onions and soften them up. Allow the onions and pickling juice to cool enough to safely add to a jar or airtight container.

Since the first time I made these onions, I’ve had a jar in my fridge at all times. I’ve served them with all kinds of grilled meats from pork chops to jerk chicken to steaks. They’re great with burgers, hot dogs, fish tacos or even just with a spread of meats and cheeses!

Lamb is so cute. How can it taste this good? I’ll tell you how…cumin and paprika and some herbs and some spices fired under a broiler with a crisp refreshing salad to dance with.

As far as I can tell, lamb is an all-or-nothing food. Like cilantro. I don’t know anybody that sort of likes lamb…it’s either love it or hate it. It is a fairly strong tasting meat, but Kefta is a bit milder than, say, a straight up lamb chop given the mix of flavours in the meat. Give these a try if you’re not sure about lamb. Or, if you love it!

Skewers are a good family style meal and great finger food. A couple of these left over Kefta would make a great next-day sandwich with some thick yogurt, cucumber and pickled onions!

Kefta – Put  all ingredients except meat in a food processor and pulse briefly. Add the meat and pulse again until mixed. Alternatively, grate the onion, chop the parsley and cilantro finely, and mix with the other ingredients.

Divide into 18-24 pieces and roll each into a little ball. Mold each ball around a metal skewer, pressing the meat gently yet firmly into a sausage shape. Do NOT use wooden skewers as you’ll be putting these under the broiler and you’ll burn your house down.

Place under a preheated hot broiler and cook for 3-5 minutes on each side until browned. The crunch and flavour you will get from the char on the outside of these Kefta is amazing!

Salad – To make the dressing, put the garlic, salt, and mint in a mortar and pound with a pestle until creamy. Gradually incorporate the lemon juice and oil. If you don’t use a mortar and pestle, you can just throw the ingredients in to one of those little choppers or food processors and give it a buzz.

Put the onions, tomatoes, bell pepper, cucumber, and parsley in a salad bowl and sprinkle with pepper, if using.

Add the dressing and toss well before serving with the lamb Kefta on top and garnished with a sprig of fresh mint.

My fiancee used to tell me that she didn’t like sandwiches. To me, that’s a bit like not liking drinks or music or recess. There’s got to be some kind of sandwich you can dream up that would get you going. Start with your favorite meal, slap it between two pieces of bread, and call it a night.

I, on the other hand, love sandwiches. I rarely make veggie sandwiches, but this one is a gem. If you do require your daily dose of meat, a decent Ham is the best way to go here.

Despite her aversion, Kate made a sandwich like this last year, loosely based on a sandwich from a Montreal restaurant. I’ve made it a bunch of times since then and it’s great every time.

You can use whatever kind of bread you like for this sandwich, but I prefer a thinly sliced bread that is toasted well to contrast the soft texture of the ingredients. While the bread is toasting, fold together the pesto and the cottage cheese. When ready, spread the cream cheese on one slice of toast, the red pepper jelly (available at most large grocery stores near the jars of peppers) on the other and top with pesto-cottage cheese mixture. I finished the sandwich with broccoli sprouts (alfalfa sprouts are great too) and some sliced banana peppers for extra kick.

If you want to take the sandwich to go, you’ll need to make sure the bread/toast doesn’t get soggy. So, use lettuce to line the toast before piling on the rest of the ingredients.

Serve with a good dill pickle and chips to make it a meal.

Hello all and a good Thursday to you. I’ve changed the look of the site a bit, and will keep working at improving the look and feel when I have time. While I do, I’m back to some regular posting, starting with some food news from around the world.

• Zagat released it’s 2011 New York City Restaurants survey yesterday and includes street food this year!  [Zagat]
• Wow. Meat paste, huh? Gross. Looks fun to play with though!   [Huffington Post]
• Nice try, kids. You’ve already commandeered chicken fingers. I’ll be keeping Spaghetti Tacos for myself, thank you.  [NYTimes]
• To be fair, maybe all the starving people that are watching Man v. Food before bed should stop paying for cable.  [Grub Street New York]
• What kind of man is your beer? Hm. Is Bacardi Breezer a beer?  [Gastronomista]
• Are mushrooms the new plastic? Very cool new technology that’s been a long time coming. Wow, science is hard.  [Ted]
• Foodspotting is an amazing, award winning site. Kind of a social food networking tool that allows you to find and share good restaurants around the world. Check it out.  [Foodspotting]

Enjoy the weekend Canadians!

Sooooo. Nothing like a six week hiatus to make me feel bad about myself. Apologies for the lack of updates here on The Saucy Coq in the past several weeks. A lot on my plate to get the new decade rolling in the right direction. Back on track now!

Like every Christmas, my family’s go-to gifts for me fall in the kitchen & cooking genre. And, rightly so…I’m always up for experimenting with new foods and techniques. This year, my sister got me a blow torch with some nice ramekins. The next gift I opened was some Vanilla beans from Madagascar. Then, she let me know that there happened to be a dozen fresh eggs and cream in the fridge. “Merry Christmas” she said, “I want crème brûlée”.

Crème brûlée, French for “burnt cream”, is a dessert consisting of a rich custard base topped with a contrasting layer of hard caramel.  This was actually my first attempt at making the rich dessert. For starters, as I’ve mentioned many times, I don’t bake. Secondly, even though crème brûlée is a pretty basic affair, it’s always remained a restaurant dessert for me. Enter the blow torch. If you weren’t a fan of Home Improvement in the ’90s, you wouldn’t understand, but the torch makes me feel a bit Tim Taylor-esque. Grunting, looking around the kitchen for anything that will volunteer to be torched.

For now, it’s just this custard mix. For the future, I’m scared.

Crème Brûlée

3/4 cup sugar
4 large egg yolks
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 large vanilla bean

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.  If you have a whole vanilla bean, use the tip of your knife to open up the bean length-wise, then press the knife down at an angle and scrape it along the length of the bean to remove the seeds. It actually looks like a brown paste inside, but what you’re extracting are all of the seeds, and, all of the flavor.

Place the cream, vanilla bean and its pulp into a medium saucepan set over medium-high heat for 10 minutes, but do not bring to a boil. Remove from the heat, cover and allow to sit for 15 minutes. Remove the vanilla bean.

In a medium bowl, whisk together 1/2 cup of the sugar and the egg yolks until well blended and it just starts to lighten in color. Add the cream a little at a time, stirring continually. If the cream is still hot, it’s important to add the cream in small batches so as not to cook the eggs.

Pour the liquid into 6 ramekins. Place the ramekins into a large cake pan or roasting pan and pour enough hot water into the pan to come halfway up the sides of the ramekins. Bake just until the crème brûlée is set, but still jiggles in the center, approximately 40 to 45 minutes. Remove the ramekins from the roasting pan and refrigerate for at least 2 hours and up to 3 days.

Remove the crème brûlée from the refrigerator at least 30 minutes prior to browning the sugar on top. Divide the remaining sugar equally among the 6 dishes and spread evenly on top. Using a torch, melt the sugar and form a crispy top. Allow the crème brûlée to sit for at least 5 minutes before serving.

Sooooo good.

Leaving for the holidays tomorrow for a week means we’ve been spending the last couple of days trying to piece together meals and snacks from the food on hand in our kitchen, rather than buying food that will go bad. Knowing I wasn’t going to want to wake up this morning and head out in the snow for food, I needed a plan last night. We had a few eggs, a bit of the homemade Basil Pecan Pesto and some parsley on hand…just needed a medium to serve the eggs on. Typically, I’d pick up a nice fresh baguette from the store, but we weren’t about to eat a loaf of bread in one sitting. So, I headed to the store and bought two huge portobello mushrooms and a few slabs of 1/4 inch thick pancetta.

We have a little indoor grill that I used to cook both the mushrooms and the pancetta, but if you don’t have one, you can use a grill pan or even the oven.

Portobello Eggs

Vegetable Oil
2 large portobello mushroom caps
Glug of olive oil
Pinch of salt
2 slices pancetta, 1/4 inch thick
3 large eggs
2 additional egg whites
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
Hot sauce
Fresh cracked pepper
2 tbsp basil pecan pesto
2 tbsp fresh parsley or basil, chopped fine
2 tsp freshly grated Pecorino or Parmesan cheese

Coat a grill or grill pan with a bit of oil. Remove the stem of the portobellos and with a spoon, gently scrape out the gills (dark inside) of each mushroom cap. Brush both sides of caps with oil and sprinkle with salt. Grill mushrooms over medium-high heat until juices begin to release, about 7 minutes per side. Transfer each mushroom to a plate, top side down.

On the same grill or grill pan, cook pancetta over medium-high heat until it begins to get crispy and you get some nice grill marks, about 5-6 minutes per side. I actually placed a big heavy cast iron pan on top of the pancetta for two reasons: it helps the fat render from the meat and it will help to keep the pancetta slices flat, rather than curling up. Place 1 slice bacon onto each mushroom cap (and the other on the plate if you like).

Whisk eggs, egg whites, dijon, hot sauce, a splash of milk and a pinch of pepper until well combined in a bowl. Melt a bit of butter in a medium nonstick skillet and heat over medium-low heat. Add eggs and scramble until cooked through, about 3 minutes. Season with S&P.

Divide eggs among mushroom caps. Drizzle 1 tbsp pesto over each; top with parsley and 1 tsp Pecorino.

Good brunching!

It’s still not officially winter here in NYC as far as I’m concerned. Cold, maybe. Dark early, yes. But winter? No, not if you’re Canadian.  I did however have to break out a scarf a couple of days ago, and it signaled the first day that I really felt I needed a good hearty winter meal.

We were at a great wedding a couple of weekends ago at Frankies Spuntino in Brooklyn. Of the many amazing degustations on hand, there was a spicy white bean crostini that kept landing on my napkin. Since then, I’ve been mildly lovesick for white beans. So, in an attempt to quell my affliction, I made a Tuscan White Bean soup. I happened to have Kale on hand and wanted a good spicy sausage in there…the result is a warm, earthy soup that’s perfect for the next 5 months. The spice of the sausage and sweetness of the beans and carrots make this a well rounded meal with a nice chunk of fresh bread.

Tuscan White Bean & Sausage Soup

1 can canellini beans, drained & rinsed
2 quarts unsalted chicken broth
1 bunch fresh kale, stems removed, leaves torn into small pieces
1 medium onion, chopped
2 medium carrots, chopped
1 celery stick, chopped
1/2 can of diced tomatoes (7 oz), undrained
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 fresh bay leaf
1 tsp balsamic vinegar
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1/2 pound hot Italian sausage, cut to half inch slices
3 inch piece of Parmesan rind
1 tbsp chopped fresh sage leaves
Extra-virgin olive oil, for garnish
Grated Parmesan, for garnish

In a large soup pot, heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil. Add the onion, garlic, and bay leaf. Cook over medium-high heat, giving it a stir, for about one minute. Lower the heat to medium-low, and cook, stirring occasionally, for 15 minutes or until the onions are translucent and just slightly browned.

Add carrots, tomato, celery, Parmesan rind, balsamic and chicken stock to the onion mixture. Bring to a boil over high heat. Lower the heat, cover the pot, and simmer for 12 minutes or until the carrots are tender and easily pierced with a knife.

Meanwhile, rinse the kale thoroughly. Slice off and discard the center stems on the leaves, leaving 2 leaves on both sides. Slice the leaves crosswise into fine strips. Add the kale and beans to the soup. Return the liquid to a boil. Lower the heat, cover the pan, and continue simmering for 10 minutes until kale is tender.

In a skillet, heat the remaining a glug olive oil over medium heat. Add the sausage and cook, turning often, until browned. Add the cooked sausage to the soup with the sage, salt, and pepper. Re-cover the pot and continue simmering for another 10 minutes to combine flavors.

Serve the soup with a drizzle of olive oil and a pinch of grated Parmesan cheese. Nothing goes better with this great winter soup than a nice piece of grilled baguette.

Good winters eve!