blog permanently "moved"

The url has stayed the same, but I've switched to WordPress as a publishing platform.

http://thezenkitchen.com

pizza napoletana @ home

No way, right?  There's no way that you could replicate the intense heat of the wood-burning ovens of Naples, Italy, right?  I mean, Jeffery Steingarten tried:

Not long afterward, I slid a raw pizza into a friend's electric oven, switched on the self-cleaning cycle, locked the door, and watched with satisfaction as the temperature soared to 800°. Then, at the crucial moment, to defeat the safety latch and retrieve my perfectly baked pizza, I pulled out the plug and, protecting my arm with a wet bath towel, tugged on the door. Somehow, this stratagem failed, and by the time we had got the door open again half an hour later, the pizza had completely disappeared, and the oven was unaccountably lined with a thick layer of ash. I feel that I am on to something here, though, as with the controlled use of hydrogen fusion, the solution may remain elusive for many years.

That was just one of his attempts and his concluding advice really doesn't give a good, replicable method that anyone could achieve at home.

I had tried for a while to recreate the pizza I had in Naples.  Pizza stones, quarry tiles, broilers, grills, grilling then broiling, par-cooking the crust, you name it -- but nothing came close.  My oven gets to around 550F, which makes a nice pizza flavored casserole (I have actually turned out very, very good Chicago-style "pizza"), but it doesn't give you that charred and blistered bottom, bubbled and puffy crust, and puddles of melted mozzarella sitting atop a few dollops of very plain but transcendent tomato sauce.  You can't do it without the heat.

And then Comcast gave me about 30 new HD channels.

Green HD -- who even knew about this channel?  But as I was flipping through the channels, I noticed a program called "In Search of Perfection."  It features England's biggest name in cookery (sorry Gordon Ramsay), Heston Blumenthal.  This particular episode had him in search of the perfect Pizza Napoletana.  He investigated cheese, dough, tomatoes, basil, and, most interestingly, method.  He tried the old Weber kettle grill (with the addition of his wife's oscillating fan blowing fresh air in through the bottom), but that left him with a burned bottom and undercooked top.

Finally, he hit upon genius.  A 12" cast-iron skillet, heated over a full blast flame for 20 minutes, then inverted and placed under your broiler (maybe 3 inches from broiler to bottom of the pan).  You slide the pizza onto the pan bottom, close the oven, and 90 seconds later -- yes 90 seconds! -- your pizza is done.  Folks, I tried it and it works.  Charred bottom.  Bubbling cheese.  Crisp crust.  You couldn't want for a better pizza from your home oven.

I only made one pizza tonight, as my wife went for a "Mom's Night Out."  I wonder how well the second pizza would turn out had I continued?  My guess is that I would have had to refresh the skillet on the stove for a few minutes, but probably not 20.  Cast iron is an inefficient conductor and thus retains heat very well.

You probably have a recipe for pizza dough but here is mine just in case you need one (makes enough for one 10"-12" pie - double, triple, or quadruple as you need):

100 g bread flour
2 g instant yeast
1 g table salt
5 g honey
3 g olive oil
55 g water (room temp, about 72F)
1 TB olive oil for the rise

Mix everything but the last tablespoon of olive oil together in a bowl until the dough comes together and is no longer a shaggy mess.  Briefly knead on a counter (no flour necessary) -- maybe 10 turns.  Coat with the olive oil and place in a bowl, covered in plastic wrap.  Allow to rise for about 2 hours at room temperature.  It probably won't double, but that's fine.

About twenty minutes before you're ready to eat, place your empty 12-15 inch cast-iron skillet over a high flame and turn on your broiler (as high as it goes -- about 550F if you have a choice).

Just before you're ready, flip the skillet and place under the broiler.  The bottom should now be facing your broiler.  Quickly stretch your dough into a rough round shape, leaving about a half inch border that's thicker than the rest.  Add your toppings*, then slide on top of the skillet.  Close the door and set a timer for 90 seconds.  If you can see inside your oven, you should watch, because it's an awesome sight.

Timer goes off, slide the pizza onto a cutting board, wait a minute so you don't burn the roof of your mouth, cut into 4 pieces, and inhale.

*Toppings? Buy some good tinned tomatoes (I actually prefer Pomi in a tetra-pak), smear it on lightly and sprinkle with sea salt and olive oil.  Buy a hunk of buffalo mozzarella and tear into large shards.  A few leaves of basil.  But stray from perfection if you dare...fig/prosciutto/manchego cheese maybe? Yumm...

romaine lettuce soup

I recently had to replace my blender (a KitchenAid department store model) because its drive mechanism was made of hard rubber and just stripped totally bare.  I wasn't blending anything funky, it just all of a sudden died!  Anyway, I did some research and figured that I should aim a little higher.  I was having an internal debate about the virtues of the Vita-Mix 5200 vs. the BlendTec Total Blender.  Both get high ratings and do pretty much the same thing.  They're also both exceedingly expensive, which is why when I found the BlendTec on sale at my local Costco, the debate was settled.

I've run a couple of their recipes through the blender and they all turn out well, if a little sweet for my tastes.  The ice cream is not a bad healthy alternative, though I am going to experiment with freezing milk instead of using ice cubes as suggested.  I was a little skeptical of having so many pre-programmed buttons (the Vita-Mix just has a variable speed knob), but the programs do what they're supposed to.  It's loud, but that's to be expected.

Anyway, after using it for a week, I found myself standing in front of the fridge wondering what to make for a healthy snack.  I had a nice head of romaine lettuce, but wasn't really in the mood for a salad.  I had seen a lot of recipes for blended greens in the BlendTec recipe book, plus I'd heard Mark Bittman (NYTimes Minimalist) and Lynn Rosetto Kasper (APM's The Splendid Table) wax poetic about cooking various lettuces.  So, I decided to try a pureed romaine soup.

I wanted to keep it simple, so I just tore the head of lettuce with my hands and dumped it into the blender carafe.  I added a half teaspoon of kosher salt and poured on 2 cups of boiling water.

The BlendTec handles hot soups pretty well -- the lid has steam vents, though I think I was supposed to remove the center cap and cover with a towel to be safe.  Regardless, I had no issues with explosions, but your mileage may vary.  Back to the recipe.


After pressing the "Soup" button, the machine sprang into action and made a ridiculous amount of noise for 80 seconds.  You see, the soup cycle is designed to heat whatever is in the carafe by virtue of its high RPMs.  Since I already put boiling water in, I probably could have stopped it after 10 seconds, but I let 'er rip anyway.  I then dropped a tablespoon of butter into the soup and pureed for another 10.

The soup turns out creamier than it deserves to be and has a very comforting, vegetal taste.  I tried adding a squeeze of lemon to sharpen up the flavors and it was good, though I think I prefer the version without acid.  Maybe a dollop of greek yogurt and a sprinkling of chives?  Anyway, it's light and satisfying and makes good use of my expensive new toy!

my sous vide supreme has arrived

I just received my Sous Vide Supreme and am looking forward to cooking/experimenting/having lots of fun with my food.  If you haven't been watching Top Chef, Iron Chef, or any of the other food shows that have used this culinary technique before, I offer you these links to explore:

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sous-vide
• http://amath.colorado.edu/~baldwind/sous-vide.html
• http://www.sousvide.org/

If you're interested in what other bloggers are saying about the Sous Vide Supreme, check here:

• http://blogsearch.google.com/blogsearch?client=news&um=1&cf=all&hl=en&q=sous+vide+supreme

This article from J. Kenji Alt-Lopez (of Serious Eats and Cook's Illustrated) goes into great detail about what you can do with the SVS (I've provided the link to his extensive slideshow as well):

• http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/12/new-sous-vide-supreme-machine-review.html
• http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/12/new-sous-vide-supreme-machine-review-slideshow.html

To catch some video of  what others have done with the SVS, here's a link from YouTube:

• http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=sous+vide+supreme

I've posted about trying sous vide at home (via a carefully monitored slow cooker) before:

• http://www.thezenkitchen.com/2007/10/sous-vide-steak.html

I'll be cracking open the package and blogging about my achievements soon!

biscotti base

I love biscotti in just about every form, from sweet to savory. This is my go-to base for a sweet biscotti dough; you can customize it to your liking with almost any mix-in you desire. Any type of nut, dried fruit, chocolate chip, or combination will work -- just keep it to the specified amount.

You may wonder why I choose to use olive oil instead of butter. It's simple -- this recipe makes so many biscotti that it takes me a while to eat them all. Using olive oil helps them to keep longer without tasting "off" while the butter slowly goes rancid. Olive oil is also heart-healthy and brings an interesting fruity/peppery flavor to the cookie.  If you're not into the flavor of EVOO, you could sub some or all of it with canola oil (or any other oil for that matter). You could also use melted butter, but up the amount to 4 TB (since it's only 80% fat). Try browning your butter - this, too, makes a spectacular biscotti.

This recipe is for a pretty hard - but not tooth-crushing - biscotto; intended for dunking, though I eat them out of hand without a second thought.

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ratatouille lasagna

We've been trying to heed the advice of many nutritionists by cutting back on the amount of meat we're eating. Mark Bittman makes the case for "vegan before dinnertime", but we found that a little too restrictive since we like the occasional cold-cut sandwich for lunch. So we've modified the philosophy by trying to eat meat at only one meal per day; so far it has worked out pretty well.

Stuck on what to do with a boatload of veggies the other day, I realized I had everything I needed for ratatouille. As exciting as stewed vegetables sound, we wanted something a little more substantial for dinner. As it happened, I also had no-boil lasagna noodles -- hmm, would subbing ratatouille for the meat in my lasagna recipe work? As it happens, it works marvelously!

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my nephew, the baker

I'd like to think that I had a huge hand in shaping my nephew, Alex, into a KWLTC (kid who likes to cook), but his mom actually has done a great job by including him in lots of cooking activities.

My sister, Lauren, shot this video (in two parts). Enjoy watching a foodie in the making!

PS - He only bakes from scratch with me. I have to teach Lauren how to abandon the boxes :-)

The videos after the jump...

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pizza rustica (caution: this ain't pizza)

For as long as I can remember, my family has had big Sunday dinners. Singing, dancing, and plenty of eating are a common theme. Lots of antipasti are served, including this ricotta cheese pie (known as pizza rustica in Italy). The fillings are interchangeable and you can leave some of the meats out if you don't have access to them all. The dough is a little bit sweet, which makes for a great foil to the intensely salty meats and cheeses in the filling.

This pie is very traditional for the two days buttressing lent -- "Carnevale" (the day before Ash Wednesday) and Easter Sunday. I imagine that good Catholic Italians stay away from it during lent because it doesn't exactly speak to "sacrifice." We enjoy it year-round. C'est la vie. It's wonderful warm, room temperature, or even chilled.

A trick for those who are pie-averse because of the dough: just buy 9-inch deep dish pre-made pie shells. My supermarket even sells them in a sweet variety, which mimics the sweetness of this dough. However, I encourage you to try the homemade version here -- you don't have to roll it out, you just press it into a greased cake pan. What (other than the pre-made shells) could be easier?

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[photo of the day] my nephew eating ice cream

he's terribly cute, no?

banana bread, but not that kind of banana bread

So here's the situation: I had an unexpected two days off of work due to Tropical Storm Fay and a few overripe bananas sitting atop my refrigerator. Normally, overripe bananas get turned into banana "bread." I chose quotations there because it's really more like a cake even though it is technically a quick-bread. Sweet, sometimes spiced, sometimes with nuts -- old-fashioned banana bread is equally at home on the breakfast table as it is for dessert.

But I didn't want something sweet. Couple this with the fact that I had some time on my hands and I thought to incorporate bananas into a yeast-raised recipe. I consulted my cookbooks and wouldn't you know it, Rose Levy Berenbaum already had a recipe for just such a thing.

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[tip for bloggers] easy-to-print posts in blogger

I was stumbling through cyberspace and found a page with a recipe I wanted to try. It was obviously hosted by Blogger, like mine, but had some sort of tweak that allowed you to print the pages without the side columns. This made me so excited that I forgot about the recipe and the website! I had to figure out how to do this...

I searched online and found some sites that gave me some ideas, but individually they were coming up short. Some would print just the first page, all of them were leaving on the navigation bar at the top of the page, and others included the comments section in the printed version. I ended up -- through lots of trials and many errors -- with this bit of CSS code that works for me (and should work for anyone else using Blogger/Blogspot):

<style media='print' type='text/css'>
#header-wrapper, #header, .header, #sidebar-wrapper, .sidebar,
#leftsidebar-wrapper, #rightsidebar-wrapper, .date-header,
.post-meta-data, .comment-link, .comment-footer, #blog-pager,
#backlinks-container, #navbar-section, .subscribe_notice,
#navbar, #Navbar1, #comments, #comments-block, .post-footer,
.noprint {display: none !important;}
#main-wrapper, #footer-wrapper {width: 99% !important; text-align: justify;
text-justify: auto; word-wrap: break-word !important;
overflow: visible !important; font-size:70% !important;
line-height: 1.4em !important;},
</style>

You simply insert it after the

<head>

tag in your Blogger template HTML and BAM! -- whenever someone wants to print a post, it will automatically include just the text of your post and any footer text (copyright info, etc.) that you have on your page. If they do it from your home page, it will print all entries on that page, but from individual post pages it will print just that singular page.

If you want to toy with it, here's some extra info...everything that comes before the .noprint line gets excluded from printing, so you can customize what gets printed. For example, to add comments into the printed page, simply remove the correct section labels (#comments, #comment-block). You can also adjust the output text size, line height, and any other attributes you're comfortable editing by changing the settings after #main-wrapper, #footer-wrapper. Want bigger text? Change the 70% to 85% or even 100%. The more you know, the more you can do, but this will get you started.

Oh, one more thing...

PLEASE BE SURE TO SAVE A BACKUP COPY OF YOUR TEMPLATE BEFORE EDITING!

PS - A lot of people asked for the code to put a "Print This Post" button in their posts.  Here it is:

First, you have to "Expand Widget Templates" in the Blogger HTML editor and
add the following code:

<b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == "item"'>
<form> <span class='noprint'> <p align='right'> <input
onClick='window.print()' type='button' value='Print This Post'/>
</p> </span> </form>
</b:if>

after this line:

<p> <data:post.body/> </p>

It should still keep the "noprint" settings from the edits I suggested
in the blog post.

Thanks to David Zetland for pointing out that the printed page might cut words off of the right margin. This was added to make that happen -- text-align: justify; text-justify: auto; word-wrap: break-word !important; and is reflected in the code above.

easy mango sorbet

I was one of the lucky people who won a copy of Lynne Rossetto Kasper's The Splendid Table's How to Eat Supper over at Serious Eats. It's a great book -- tons of quality weekday recipes and great mini-anecdotes from lots of people in the food world; I couldn't stop flipping through it.

In it, she offers up a recipe for a pineapple sorbet that seemed quick and easy -- perfect for a summertime dessert. It calls for frozen pineapple to be quickly pureed in a food processor with lemon juice, sugar, and a bit of fresh ginger.

For some reason, though, my supermarket was out of frozen pineapple, so I decided to whip up a batch with frozen mango instead. I tweaked a bit further and came up with this -- a Mexican-inspired mango sorbet that you can make in a snap!

easy mango sorbet

21 oz. frozen mango
juice and zest of one lime
1/4 tsp almond extract
5 TB granulated sugar
pinch of salt
1 bottle of your favorite tequila

Get your food processor running and drop the mango through the feed chute a few chunks at a time until it's all in. Stop the processor. At this point, you'll wonder how this is going to become sorbet, as it looks like a bunch of finely chopped mangoes. Fear not.

Add the juice, zest, sugar, salt, extract, and 3 TB of tequila to the mangoes and puree until it is smooth and creamy. While this would make an excellent slushy, it's not yet a sorbet.

Pack this bright-orange slush into a tupperware-esque container, place plastic wrap directly onto the surface, and cap it with the appropriately sized tupperware-esque lid. Plunk that into your freezer and polish off the rest of the tequila with friends (lime and salt optional). By the time you're done getting hammered (4 hours?), the sorbet will have sufficiently solidified in the freezer. Alternatively, you can do this a day ahead and save yourself a hangover, but what fun is that?

Even after a day in the freezer, the sorbet is still scoopable -- the sugar and alcohol help ensure that. Serve it with grated lime and another shot. Cheers!

36 hours for cookies?

About two weeks ago, the New York Times Food Section published a story about one author's quest for chocolate chip cookie nirvana. In it, David Leite interviews several cookie pros in and around the Big Apple to identify some tips that could help home bakers find The Way with cookies:

1. Rest your dough. Leite recommends at least 24 hours but mentions that 36 are even better.
2. Under-bake your cookies. The key to a chewy cookie is to make sure it isn't cooked all the way through.
3. Don't be afraid of salt. Coarse salt in and on the cookies makes flavors "pop."
4. Make 'em big. Larger cookies can provide for cascading textures from crispy on the edge to chewy/gooey in the center, provided you pay attention to Tip #2.

Intrigued, I made a batch of these and waited. And waited. And waited. 36. Long. Hours.

Finally, I popped the dough balls into the oven, six at a time (they're big, don't forget). When they emerged from the oven, they were as advertised -- golden all over, rich, buttery, and with that variegated texture that Leite promised. My only substitution was for Ghirardelli semi-sweet (60% cacao) chocolate chips rather than Valrhona chocolate "feves" (which are flatter), mainly because that's what I had on hand. I don't think the cookies suffered, but I'm willing to give the feves a try one of these days.

Was the 36-hour wait worth it? Yes and no. The cookies were wonderful, but certainly not spontaneous. I think they were more uniformly golden than my usual batch of chocolate chip cookies, but the texture bit really stems from under-baking (I should really call this "properly baking" your cookies, as they aren't raw, just less done than the typical home baker makes them). The biggest selling point of this recipe, to me at least, is that you can make the dough and bake off a cookie or two at a whim, up to 3 days later according to the article (but probably as long as a week later if you wanted).

making pizza in naples, italy

My wife and I just got back from a 2-week vacation in Europe. We went to Messina, Venice, Dubrovnik, Florence, Pisa, Rome, Cannes, Nice, Barcelona, and Naples -- it was a whirlwind! Perhaps my favorite memory from the whole trip, though, is getting a pizza-making lesson in Naples. Here are some pics:

The Pizzaiolo at Les GaGá, GiGi.

He didn't speak a ton of English. Mostly GiGi's instruction was, "not-ta too much-a." He uses only San Marzano tomatoes in his sauce, plus buffalo mozzarella, extra virgin olive oil, and basil to top his pizza Margherita. This is good, since it is actually against the law to do otherwise.

He was very precise about the dough, too. "1 liter of water makes 15 pizza, each one weighing 250 grams. Only other ingredients are yeast, salt, and time, about 8 hours."

GiGi and I wave for the camera while the pizza cooks in the background. Seriously, this takes only about a minute. That oven is really, really hot!

The masterpiece! It tasted great. I should have taken pictures of the next three that GiGi made himself, but we were too invested in eating at that point. They were a little bigger (he was better at stretching the dough than I was) and soooo good. I know there is really no chance of reproducing this type of pizza at home without a wood-burning oven, but it was fun to get tips from a master!

[video] conan o'brien learns about wine

Caught this video and couldn't help but crack up:

Check out Gary's Homepage and learn a lot of interesting things about drinking wine at tv.winelibrary.com.

[recipe redone] triple-coconut granola

In the past year, several of my go-to food blogs have shared their favorite recipes for granola. The ingredient lists and techniques have all been similar, but a small tweak here and there seems to make a big difference in the texture and flavor of the end product. I've tried a bunch of them and they're all delicious, but I kind of have a thing for coconut. With that in mind, I decided to tweak some of their recipes and come up with a coconut-intense version of granola to call my own. Yes, several years ago people were scared to death of coconut (mainly because coconut oil is full of saturated fat). But new studies have shown that coconut oil is actually a heart-healthy oil. Regardless, it's delicious in this recipe.

1/2 cup, packed (100g) brown sugar
4 Tablespoons coconut oil* (virgin has the most flavor)
1/4 cup (60ml) water
1/4 teaspoon table salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 lb. (125 g) quick oats
1/2 lb. (125 g) coconut flour* (Bob's Red Mill is a brand carried by Whole Foods)
1 cup (100g) shredded unsweetened coconut
1/2 cup chopped almonds
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 cups dried fruit, chopped (apricots or golden raisins are excellent)

Preheat oven to 300 F.

In a small bowl, combine the brown sugar, coconut oil, water, and salt. Microwave on high for about 3 minutes; the mixture should be bubbling vigorously. Stir in the extracts and set aside to cool.

In a large bowl, mix the remaining ingredients (except for the dried fruit) together until well-combined. Pour the brown sugar syrup over the dry ingredients and fold until fully incorporated.

Spread the mixture over a half sheet pan (17 x 13) and bake for 25 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and toss the granola, breaking up any huge chunks. Return the pan to the oven and bake another 15 minutes. Repeat this again (if necessary) until the granola is uniformly browned and very crispy-crunchy. At that point, remove the granola from the oven and allow to cool. Toss in the dried fruit and serve with milk or yogurt - or just munch it by the handful!

* If you don't have coconut oil, you can substitute an equal amount of butter. You could also substitute oat flour, ground flax meal, or almond meal for the coconut flour. At that point, you might as well take a look at this recipe from the Traveler's Lunchbox, which is what I based mine off of.

[quick hit] newpaper food sections

I just added links to some of my favorite newspaper food sections to the sidebar. They are usually updated weekly -- the day of the week depends on the paper. I find these to be helpful when I'm traveling to these cities or even when I just need a different regional perspective on food and cooking.

browned butter "spoon" cookies

The same evening that the December 2005 issue of Gourmet Magazine arrived in my mailbox, I made these cookies. The picture that accompanied the article (at right) initially drew my interest, but the accompanying story by Celia Barbour sealed the deal.

Anyway, I had forgotten these cookies until I had an opportunity to flip through some of my back issues of Gourmet. Not wanting to forget them again, I am sharing the recipe here with you. While the recipe calls for shaping the cookies with a teaspoon, I have found that a teaspoon "disher" (miniature ice cream scoop) does the trick for me.

spoon cookies
2 sticks (1 cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt, slightly rounded
1/3 cup fruit preserves (your choice)

Make dough:
Fill kitchen sink with about 2 inches of cold water. Melt butter in a 2- to 3-quart heavy saucepan over moderate heat and cook, stirring occasionally, until butter turns golden with a nutlike fragrance and flecks on bottom of pan turn a rich caramel brown, 10 to 12 minutes. (Butter will initially foam, then dissipate. A thicker foam will appear and cover the surface just before butter begins to brown; stir more frequently toward end of cooking.) Place pan in sink to stop cooking, then cool, stirring frequently, until butter starts to look opaque, about 4 minutes. Remove pan from sink and stir in sugar and vanilla.

Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt in a small bowl and stir into butter mixture until a dough forms. Shape into a ball, wrap with plastic wrap, and let stand at cool room temperature 1 to 2 hours (to allow flavors to develop).

Form and bake cookies:
Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 325°F.

Press a piece of dough into bowl of teaspoon, flattening top, then slide out and place, flat side down, on an ungreased baking sheet. (Dough will feel crumbly, but will become cohesive when pressed.) Continue forming cookies and arranging on sheet. Bake cookies until just pale golden, 8 to 15 minutes. Cool cookies on sheet on a rack 5 minutes, then transfer cookies to rack and cool completely, about 30 minutes.

Assemble cookies:
While cookies cool, heat preserves in a small saucepan over low heat until just runny, then pour through a sieve into a small bowl, pressing hard on solids, and cool completely.

Spread the flat side of a cookie with a thin layer of preserves. Sandwich with flat side of another cookie. Continue with remaining cookies and preserves, then let stand until set, about 45 minutes. Transfer cookies to an airtight container and wait 2 days before eating.

Cooks' notes:
• Dough can be made 12 hours before baking and chilled, covered. Bring to room temperature to soften slightly before forming cookies, about 30 minutes.
• Cookies keep in an airtight container at room temperature 2 weeks.

[recipe review] eli's chicago-style cheesecake

I usually buy my books online since they are typically much cheaper than in the stores, but my wife got a gift certificate to Borders for Christmas so we were walking though one the other day. They usually have some clearance cookbooks up front but they aren't typically my style. On this day, though, there was a copy of Cook's Illustrated's "Restaurant Favorites" for $4.95. I scooped it up and immediately began flipping through when I got home.

The first thing I noticed was the recipe for Eli's Chicago-Style Cheesecake. My wife is a native Chicagoan and always extolled the virtues of Eli's over any other cheesecake, so I had to give the recipe a try. I served it to a bunch of cheesecake aficionados and they were thoroughly impressed, especially with the shortbread crust. Dare I say that we preferred its lighter texture to the very dense and rich versions from New York? The recipe was terribly easy to put together, so I suggest you give it a try for yourself!

eli's chicago-style cheesecake

crust
6 TB unsalted butter, softened and cut into chunks
1/4 cup (1 ounce) confectioners' sugar
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup (3 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
pinch of salt

filling
1 1/2 pounds cream cheese, softened
3/4 cup (5 1/4 ounces) granulated sugar
zest of 1 lemon (my addition -- optional, but delicious)
1 TB all-purpose flour
1/8 tsp salt
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg yolk
2 large eggs
melted butter for greasing the pan

1. For the crust: In a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter and confectioners' sugar together on medium speed until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. Ass the vanilla and mix until combined, about 30 seconds. Add the flour and the salt and beat on low speed until just combined, about 30 seconds.

2. Empty the mixture into an 8-inch springform pan (I used an 8 1/2" pan with no problems) and press it evenly into the bottom of the pan. Refrigerate until firm, about 30 minutes. Wash the mixer bowl and paddle.

3. Meanwhile, adjust an oven rack to the lower-middle position and heat the oven to 350 degrees. Prick the chilled crust several times with a fork and bake until golden, about 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack and cool completely. Adjust the oven rack to the middle position, maintaining the oven temperature at 350.

4. For the filling: In a standing mixture fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese on medium-low speed to break it up and soften it, about 1 minute. Scrape down the bowl and paddle. Add half the sugar and the lemon zest (if using) and beat on medium-low speed until combined, about 1 minute. Scrape the bowl. Beat in the remaining sugar, flour, and salt until combined, another minute. Scrape the bowl. Add the sour cream and vanilla and beat for a minute. Add the yolk and beat for another minute. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, and beat for a minute after each addition, scraping down the bowl and paddle as necessary.

5. Brush the sides of the cooled springform pan with melted butter. Set the pan on a rimmed baking sheet to catch any spills. Pour the filling onto the cooled crust and bake until the cheesecake is firm around the edges and barely jiggles in the center, around 50-60 minutes (check at 40 if you are using a larger pan). An instant-read thermometer should register 150F. Transfer to a wire rack and cool for 3 hours then wrap tightly with plastic and refrigerate for at least 3 hours and up to 4 days.

6. Unmold the cheesecake about 30 minutes before you want to serve it. Enjoy with a dollop of whipped cream and/or some fresh strawberries.

medici bread pudding

When my wife and I visited Seattle, I took Rachel Ray's advice and visited Caffe Ladro (twice). The first time I went, I tried a standard latte -- the coffee by which I judge coffeehouses. It was very, very good -- smooth and sweet with a great mouth feel brought about by an expert barista who really knew how to froth the milk and pull a shot. The second time I went, I took RR's advice again and tried their Medici coffee, which is essentially a mocha spiced up with a bit of orange zest. That, my friends, was ethereal. I don't normally "do" sweetened coffee, but this was harmony in a cup.

So it was with this cup of coffee in mind that I decided to create a bread pudding recipe -- a way for me to both memorialize the trip and re-enjoy the simple but wonderful flavor combination of coffee, chocolate, and orange. A word of caution: if you try this, you may find yourself wanting to hop on a plane to Seattle to try the original. They are both that good.

medici bread pudding
7 large egg yolks
3 large eggs
1 cup granulated sugar
1 tsp table salt
6 cups whole milk or half-and-half (I prefer the richness of the half-and-half)
2 tsp powdered espresso (try Medaglia d'Oro brand if you can find it)
12 oz. package of bittersweet chocolate chips (Guittard or Ghirardelli work well)
1 TB finely grated orange zest
1 TB pure vanilla extract
1 1-pound loaf of challah , cut into 1-inch cubes preferably stale)

If your bread cubes aren't stale, dry them out in a 250F oven for 20-30 minutes -- not so much that the cubes turn into croûtons, but enough so that they seem drier and stale. Set aside in a large bowl.

Whisk yolks, eggs, sugar, and salt together until thick and pale and set aside. Warm half-and-half in a saucepan until steaming but not boiling (about 180F). Add chocolate chips, powdered espresso, and orange zest to half-and-half and stir until chocolate is melted and completely mixed with milk.

Slowly whisk the half-and-half into the egg mixture until thoroughly combined. Add the vanilla extract. If you have a touch of OCD, you may want to strain the custard at this point, but if you were careful not to add the milk too quickly, you probably don't have to.

Pour the custard over the dry bread cubes, making sure that the bread is submerged as much as possible. Set aside for about an hour to cool to room temperature. Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan and pour the bread/custard mixture in. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 5 (but up to 24) hours. This allows the custard to penetrate the bread cubes completely so that you have no dry patches in your dessert.

About two hours before you want to serve it (if you want it served hot), cover the pudding with foil and bake in a preheated 325F oven for 70 minutes. Remove the foil and continue to bake until no liquid is visible when you test with a paring knife (maybe 20-30 minutes).

This can be served hot, warm, room-temp, or chilled -- every way has its own advantages. Its flavor is most intense just a few minutes out of the oven, but the custard is firmest when cooled. Any way you do it, dress it up with some whipped cream and a good cup of coffee.