summer dinners with a boy

My boyfriend was off climbing mountains in Colorado, and now he’s livin’ it up in chicago. I’m v. jealous (by which I’m v. sad I’m busy taking Biochemistry and couldn’t tag along) and also missing him just a bit.

So, I thought I’d recap some of the culinary fun we’ve been up to of late. Eating meals with Steve is really great, because instead of hemming and hawing about what to order, worrying whether there’ll be too much food, and so on; or when at home instead of limiting meal plans to one or two items; I have the thoroughly impressive appetite of Steve at my disposal. There can be enormous piles of food on the table and it matters not. All will be eaten and savored.

Steve’s second to last day in town we decided to have ourselves a proper date. First we took a looooooooooong walk along my favorite trail, stopping along the way to pick lotsa raspberries (the insane amount of raspberries appearing here in Virginia will definitely get their own post). On the outset of our walk, the sun shone brightly in the sky, but then ominous clouds began lurking across the horizon. Suffice it to say that we ended up sooooooooooaked to the skin. Drenched! Drowned rat looking!

However, as abruptly as the rain had begun, it ended, and we made our way back into the town of Vienna, where we’d parked, to have a nice early dinner. The sun semi-dried us along the way, and we also simply wrung water out of our clothes as we could.

We ended up at Alegria, which turned out to be an AMAZING Mexican restaurant. The area where I live is wonderfully diverse. If you fancy Korean barbecue, Peruvian chicken, or Vietnamese pho, you’re set. However, for whatever reason, likely having to do with immigration trends, Mexican restaurants are woefully lacking. This is a wonderful exception to that.

Loved the menu:

 

Loved the look of the space- dramatic arches, vaguely industrial looking yet beautiful light fixtures, neat paintings and ornaments hanging about. Pretty flowery whatsits. Bricks with character.

The open kitchen made for an entertaining view as we waited for our meals to be served.

I think the caliber of a Mexican restaurant can often be determined simply by tasting its salsa. (Though Taco Bell does have that delicious fire sauce…)

Both of these salsas were SPLENDID. The green (verde) one had clearly been prepared using fresh tomatillos and burst with favor. Not too spicy, just really fresh! The one on the right had that slow-cooked, intensely flavorful chipotle fabulousness. Heavenly. And of course the chips were freshly fried.

 

Alegria has a happy hour with not extraordinary deals but at least interesting options. Depending on the day of the week, you can get various flavors of margaritas (the day we went the option was tamarindo, and though for one semester of college I had a Mexican roommate and tried to sample the tamarindo candy she brought from home with gusto, I think it’s one of those flavors upon which you have to be raised to truly appreciate it). You can also get a food special each day, and this particular day there were taquitos. The boyfriend was right on that.

 

I only had a taste because I just didn’t feel like eating anything fried (fairly shocking for me; perhaps the endless procession of deep-fried awesome in New Orleans finally satiated that urge for a bit?) but anyway, they were delicious. An impressive quantity of shredded, flavorful beef and wonderful crema atop.

Then it was time to go to TACO TOOOOOOOOOOOWN! (That video pretty much sums up my boyfriend. When together, we quote it at least once a day.)

I was SO pleased with my order. You get three tacos for $12, which is a pretty good deal if you consider the caliber and size of these tacos. And of course the overall classiness of the restaurant :)

Remember that thing I said about not feeling like fried food? Clearly joking. The first taco I consumed, and possibly my favorite (though all were delicious) was the fried fish taco. The PERFECTLY fried fish taco. The astonishingly crunchy beer-battered awesomeness on the outside, zippy slaw beneath perfectly balancing the flavors, lovely and tender and flavorful fish taco.

In the center, the fish taco a la plancha, with the fish grilled, accompanied by the most wonderful, satisfyingly non-mushy veggies, with a zippy sauce atop.

And the dark, poorly lit one is the grilled portabella mushroom taco, complete with caramelized onions and a delightful crunch from pepitas.

Rounding out the plate was some rice and beans on the side, which I mostly gave to Steve.

So so so so good!

Now let’s talk home cooking. In Steve’s apartment, now vacated, he had a cute little patio outside and a cute little tiny Weber grill on it. We spent many a relaxing evening out there, having dinner or sometimes just a glass of wine.

In lieu of deck furniture, we just moved the coffee table outside!

 

(Note: forgot my camera and Steve was nice enough to let me use the phone on his camera. The scene was too pleasant not to capture, but the light was a little dim!) 

This particular evening, Steve took the lead on the menu.

It included:

- Grilled peppers stuffed with a flavorful rice mixture, topped with cheese
- Grilled corn on the cob

- Foil packets, placed on the grill, one of a DUH-LICIOUS dill and butter and potato combination; and another of squash with herbs 

- Homemade pico de gallo (two variations, one of which included a mango habanero hot sauce that Steve picked up in New Orleans). Lettuce wrappers in lieu of chips, to make whatever exciting combinations we felt like.

Quite the feast!

Another, indoor meal (likely there were too many bugs and/or there was too little light). I’d been eyeing this Cooking Light recipe for chilled butter bean soup ever since I’d gotten the June issue in the mail. A trip to HMart later, I had fresh fava beans (mmmmmm) rather than the butter beans called for, but I felt no fear.

This was WAY good! The relish gives it a nice welcome chew and fresh basil makes everything more delicious.

Speaking of fresh basil, I used this as an opportunity to make the first PESTO of the summer! Always such a wonderful milestone. (I also had my first tomato salad of the summer last week, and that was an absolute joy as well!)

This pesto was particularly amazing for two reasons, both involving Steve:

1. It was served atop Steve’s homemade pasta, which he has become a BEAST at making! I have a pasta maker inherited from my cousin (who inherited it from my grandmother) that I rarely use, but with which Steve has fallen in love. He’s been making pasta at least every week, often more, and has come up with the most delicious variations (with a sweet potato-flax incarnation being particularly noteable).

2. I made a blenderful of pesto [oh, oh, additional good thing about Steve- he always has pine nuts!] and it was a big ol’ batch so I was thinking we’d have some on the pasta and have some leftover. Well, Steve, as a nonbeliever in leftovers, just dumped it all on the pasta. So it was essentially equal parts pasta and pesto. If you love pesto (and how could you not?!) this is a really delicious idea.

Helpful Steve also took on cheese grating duty

tamales 101

Whoo friends, you are in for a TREAT!

‘Twas 12 days before Christmas, and all through the casa,

Chef-types were digging their hands into masa.

We went to my family friend Carolyn’s house. Her house is RIDIC. Her husband Michael is one of those I Know How To Make Anything types, so they have, oh, a PIZZA OVEN IN THEIR BACKYARD WHAT?! Living the life of Gwyneth Paltrow, these two.

    

Our mission for the day (Carolyn, myself, my boyfriend and I, with the occasional support via alcoholic beverages from Michael) was to make tamales. Some back story: Carolyn and I started talking about cooking (as I am wont to do with everyone) and she mentioned that she made tamales, via a family recipe from her Mexican heritage, the previous Christmas. Being a tamale lover (duh), I grilled her for information and learned a lot, and then she just said, “I’ll call you around Christmas. We’ll make tamales.” Imagine my surprise when that actually happened.

So perhaps in the past you thought of a tamale as a self contained packet of deliciousness. Yes, yes it is.

HOWEVER.

It is so much more.

The meat.

The broth in which the meat was cooked.

The chiles that infuse the broth in which the meat was cooked (which then is used to make the masa dough)

The sauce made with the chiles that flavors the meat.

The masa dough that encloses the meat mixed with the sauce which is flavored with the broth in which the meat was cooked that is flavored by the chiles.

The husks that enclose the masa dough that encloses the meat mixed with the sauce which is flavored with the broth in which the meat was cooked that is flavored by the chiles (okay okay I’m done.)

Blessedly, Carolyn had done some things in advance. Corn husks were soaking. And more critically, the meat was cooked. Carolyn cooked FOUR roasts- three pork, one beef- nice fatty ones, in big stock pots with garlic and onions for eight hours or so the previous day. She then took excess fat off the meat, shredded it, and let the broth hang out overnight.

We used that broth to rehydrate some dried chiles. We used ancho- Carolyn said don’t use anything too spicy or the tamales won’t be good!

My first task was to take the chiles, decapitate them (take off their stems :D), and scrape out their seeds, leaving a big pile of soft chiles ready for the using.

 

 

Then she had me puree the broth to blend in the onions and garlic and make it nice and smooth, ready to use both for the chile sauce that went into the meat and the dough.

We were all set to make the chile sauce for the dough. We pureed the peppers with our newly smooth stock.  

That puree got poured into a big pot with various seasonings, some seen below, in large quantities.

 

And rosemary and oregano and salt. It got all thick and lovely.

    

And it was ready for MEAT! In that went, getting thicker and thicker and awesomer and awesomer!

Elbow grease needed!

But, it smelled like heaven.

I just want to mention that for every step in this process, I’m describing the events that took place in a sentence but they were taking up a LOT of time.

We felt like Maddie the dog. Tired but oh-so-festively attired.

(Who would, bless her heart,  perk up considerably if she thought she could get a taste of what was going down).

 

So as I mentioned, the dry corn husks had already been soaked (incidentally, you can buy those corn husks, as well as the masa flour we used, at any respectable Latin supermarket.)

 

Once we removed them from the water, we had to pat them dry to ensure that the filling would adhere to the dough.

We made a big old pile of husks that were ready (which paled in comparison for the number of husks Carolyn had bought! Girl makes a LOT of tamales!)

The dough was a combination of masa flour, Crisco (yeuuurgh. They’re traditionally prepared with lard and I definitely prefer saturated fat to trans fat), and the flavorful broth that’d had some chiles soaked in it- it gave the dough a wonderful pink color!

Nothing like Crisco floating around.

The goal for consistency with the dough is to get it to make a nice self-contained ball. It reached that phase and then Carolyn demonstrated how one went about patting out the dough into the husk.

You want a niiiiiiice thiiiiiiin layer. She said her Mexican grandmother could just pat it out with a spoon, but she’d never mastered the skill. I was happy to get in there with my fingers.

Then the meat went atop (note that the top was left uncovered by dough or meat).

And a folding operation…

At last complete. And into the pan. To be joined by many tamale hermanos.

 

Rolling the empanadas was by far the most time-consuming part of the process. We attempted an assembly line and I decided to focus all of my efforts on adhering the dough to the husks.

Steve gave up at a certain point and did the dishes.

Michael perked up morale with Manhattans. I tried a sip but blecccch- I am not old enough for Manhattans, Martinis, or Mad Men drinks.

Hours upon hours upon hours upon hours later, we’d amassed a sizeable stack of tamales.

And so they were ready to steam. Tamale steamers exist, but Carolyn’s clever method is simply to place a mug in the center of a big stock pot- so as to surround the tamales around it.

She said 20 minutes butttt…. it was more. Partly I was having a charming hypoglycemic moment since I hadn’t eaten anything for many hours except various selections from the box of See’s Candy I brought as a hostess gift.

But anyway, we chatted and admired the festive table. Michael and Carolyn are classy.

And the tamales emerged from the steamer. Extra meat in chile sauce was heated up, to spoon atop the completed tamales for an extra burst of flavor.

We dug in.

A few parting notes:

- Carolyn found this recipe to be helpful in recreating her family’s tamales. She copied their proportions of masa and fat for the tamale dough.
- That being said, Carolyn’s tamales I’m sure OWNED the ones from that recipe, since they involved homemade broth and real chiles, not chili powder. She also soaked the dried chiles in the broth used for the masa dough, which gave the dough more flavor AND a pretty pink color.
- Carolyn used ancho chiles for this recipe, but there was another kind she said she thought she preferred, after tasting these. Carolyn, comment on this post and tell me which!

Feliz Navidad, friends.