Mussels from...Milwaukee

We think Milwaukee is totally underrated.  About a year and a half ago we discovered The Iron Horse Hotel in Milwaukee, and since then it's been our go-to when we want to get out of town for the weekend.  We took our third trip up there this past weekend to check out the band Volcano Choir (Justin Vernon from Bon Iver) playing at Turner Hall. Look how cool this place is:

Anyway, Mark should do the we-love-Milwaukee post since he was busy taking pictures all weekend.  I will post on the bounty we brought home from one of our favorite spots in that city, the Milwaukee Public Market -- fresh mussels.


Mussels from Milwaukee
1 pounds fresh mussels, from the Milwaukee Public Market or otherwise, picked over (this left us with about half a pound)
1 large carrot, diced
1 large celery stick, diced
1 medium onion, diced
4 cloves garlic, minced
About 1 cup of wine
About 4-5 cups chicken stock
Sage
Basil
About 2 T butter

Pick over your mussels and toss any that are open already or cracked.  This left us with a little over half out original amount.  Better safe than sorry.  I've heard the horror stories of bad shellfish.  Clean your mussels.  I scrubbed each one, removed any beards that remained, and got them soaking for 20 minutes in ice water.  Then I placed them one by one (Mark was very adamant that I move them one by one...) into another, fresh bowl of water.  Keep them there until you're ready to cook them.

Make your mirepoix by finely dicing the carrot, celery and onion.  Heat some butter and get those sauteing. Once they start to get soft, add the garlic and some salt and pepper.  Saute for another minute or two then toss in a splash of wine.  Let that reduce a bit -- five minutes or so -- and then add the stock.

Here is what that will look like (minus the stock in this pic):

Let that cook for a while and chop your herbs:

 These will go in right near the end.  Gently move the mussels (minus their water) into the pot:

Yum.  Let that simmer for a while until the majority of the mussels open up.  If they don't, toss 'em.  Dish these guys up and sop up the broth with some good bread.  Or decent bread you get at Target, like us...

Of course when you just come from Wisconsin, have a New Glarus Spotted Cow alongside.

Crepes: Sweet & Savory

Neither Mark nor I are much of a breakfast eater.  We’ll do the occasional egg sandwich on a Sunday morning, but, who are we kidding, by the time we get up and organized enough to cook on a Sunday, it really could count for lunch anyway.

So who knows where my inexplicable craving for crepes came from the other week.  Or why I was up and ready for cooking hours before Mark got out of bed, but the stars aligned for Mark to wake up to a crepe breakfast. 

I used Alton Brown’s recipe for crepes because it was among the first to come up on Google.  I may have been awake enough to try out a new recipe, but not awake enough to dig out the cookbooks and look for recipes. 

Crepes – Sweet & Savory

Batter (according to Alton):

• 2 large eggs
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 cup flour
• 3 tablespoons melted butter
• Butter, for coating the pan

*I divided our batter into two: one for savory fillings, to which I added a little salt and other seasonings, and one for sweet fillings, to which I added a tablespoon of powdered sugar

You can add any fillings you’d like.  We used:

Savory:

Ham (I used leftover thick-cut lunch meat)

Shredded Gruyere (leftover from the greens casserole from the last post)

Sauteed red pepper strips

Sauteed mushrooms

Garlic

Chopped green onions

Sweet:

Homemade blueberry compote

Ricotta cheese mixed with a little powdered sugar and lemon juice

Powdered sugar for the top.

Combine all the batter ingredients in a blender and pulse.  Refrigerate for at least one hour.  While the batter was chilling, I got the fillings ready.  You can really add anything you'd like.  Since this was spur-of-the-moment crepe making, I just dug through the fridge.

After the batter has chilled for an hour, I divided into two and added salt and herbs to the batter I was going to use for the savory crepes, and a little powdered sugar to the sweet batter.

Heat a small non-stick pan over medium-high heat and add a pat of butter and swirl it to coat as it melts.  Add about a small ladle-full of batter.  I used a rubber spatula to loosen the edges as it cooked for about 10-30 seconds, then flip and cook for another few seconds.  

I added the fillings just before it was done cooking so they could warm back up and the cheese would melt.  Fold and carefully move to a serving dish.  That's it.  These were so much easier than I would have guessed.

Mushroom and Greens (and Sausage) Gratin

The original plan was to make a meat-free casserole for dinner one Sunday a few weeks ago.  Not for any particular reason, but I’d seen a recipe for a mushroom and greens gratin in the New York Times’ Dining Section and I had mentally filed it.

Then enter Nick Spencer of Spencer’s Traditional Pork Bangers.  Mark and I struck up a conversation with him at the indoor Logan Square Farmer’s Market.  We had a heated debate about whether to buy traditional bangers, herb bangers or back bacon.  We came home with the traditional variety with the idea to add them to the gratin.  So much for the vegetarian dinner aspirations.

I can't find the link to the NYT recipe that inspired this, but we changed it enough that you wouldn't recognize it anyway:

Mushroom and Greens (and Sausage) Gratin

About 1.5 pounds of greens -- I used a big bag of pre-cut collard greens

1 onion, finely chopped

1/2 pound mushrooms (I used baby bellas), sliced

1/2 to 1 pound sausage (or leave out altogether)

3 cloves garlic, finely minced

1/2 cup grated Gruyere

1/2 cup grated Parmesan (split in half since you'll use this in two steps)

1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs

3 eggs

1/2 cup milk

Preheat oven to 375, grease a medium casserole dish

Bring a pot of heavily salted water to a boil and blanch the greens for 3-4 minutes to soften.  Use tongs to move them to a pot of ice water to stop the cooking after this step.  Once cooled, drain and squeeze the water out, chop if your greens aren't already.

Heat some olive oil in a pan and saute the onion and mushroom for a few minutes until the mushrooms soften up.  I, personally, hate raw mushroom, so I tend to let them get nice and brown.  Add the garlic and softened greens during the last few minutes of cooking.  Salt and pepper to taste - but remember you're adding salty cheese and sausage, so don't go nuts.

Mark came into the kitchen around this time (I suspect it was to make sure I didn't short change the sausage) and he cut up and browned the bangers.  They really are good -- a nice little hint of nutmeg (I think?).  If you didn't have the meat police taking matters into their own hands, you could brown the sausage first, drain it, and cook the veggies in the sausage grease.  Just sayin.

Add the sausage to the veggies, which will look like this:

Whisk together the eggs, milk and Gruyere.  Whisk in half the Parmesan, but make sure to save some to mix with the breadcrumbs. Season with a little salt and pepper and mix this in with the veggie/sausage mix.  Spread everything into your greased casserole.

Toss your panko with a little bit of olive oil to coat them so they brown up nice, add the rest of the Parmesan and mix well.  Sprinkle on top of everything and bake for 35-40 minutes.  We ate this up in no time and I'd make it for brunch some time, especially if we get our hands on more of Spencer's bangers.

On Eating More Sweet Potatoes, Take 2

Although we haven't quite met our weekly goal of eating sweet potatoes, we have been pretty close.  Last week we made some great sweet potato oven fries to go with sandwiches and yesterday we made this dish of tilapia with bacony breadcrumbs and garlic mashed sweet potatoes.  It's really tasty and really quick and easy.

Tilapia with Bacony Breadcrumbs and Garlic Mashed Sweet Potatoes

This recipe is for two:

2 tilapia filets
3-6 pieces of bacon
About 1/2 cup panko breadcrumbs
1/4 cup grated parmesan

2 sweet potatoes
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup grated parmesan
1 T butter

Saute the bacon (I voted three pieces, Mark voted six and six won) until crispy, drain on paper towels and crumble.  Save enough of the grease to brown the panko in.  Mix that around till the panko is nice and bacony. Take off the heat and let cool a bit and stir in the cheese.

Meanwhile, get your taters boiling in salted water and preheat your oven to 375 or 400 -- we started at 375 and turned it up to 400 during the cooking.

Season your fish with salt pepper and any other dried herbs you like -- we used Lake Shore Drive seasoning from The Spice House, which we put on nearly everything.  Put them in a pan and drizzle with a little olive oil and get those in the oven.

When your potatoes are soft, drain them and mash them, mixing in the garlic and butter.  Salt and pepper to taste. 

Your fish should be close to done.  If it flakes easily with a form you are good to go.  Top with the panko mix and pop back in the oven for two to three more minutes to get that nice and browned.

If you have extra panko topping, it's pretty darn good sprinkled on top of the potatoes too. 

A Chicken Pot Pie for Mark

As I mentioned in the beef pot pie post from a few weeks ago, Mark has been craving a chicken pot pie for a while now.  A long while.  I thought that beef pot pie with the cheddar biscuits would scratch that itch, but it only made his chicken pot pie cravings worse.

So I turned to Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home to try out his chicken pot pie recipe.  This book has yet to let us down, and this was no exception.

One thing you should know about this recipe, like a lot of recipes from Ad Hoc -- expect to use nearly every pot and pan you own and don't expect it to be quick. 

Here's what you'll need:

Basic Pie Crust 

Filling:

1 cup 1/2-inch pieces red-skinned potatoes (I used regular Idaho taters since we have an enormous bag at home that is not getting any younger)

1 1/4 cups 1/2-inch pieces carrots (cut on the diagonal)

12 white pearl onions

3 bay leaves

3 thyme sprigs

24 black peppercorns

1 1/4 cups 1/2-inch pieces of celery (cut on the diagonal)

2 cups shredded cooked chicken  (I boiled my chicken with herbs for this, but if you have leftover roasted chicken on hand, that would be incredible in this recipe.)

Bechamel:

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

3 cups whole milk

1 teaspoon kosher salt, or to taste

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste

1 tablespoon finely chopped flat-leaf parsley

1/2 teaspoon finely chopped thyme

Pinch of cayenne

1 egg, beaten

Make your pie crust and get that in the fridge.  Meanwhile, chop your veggies.  Mine looked like so (minus the celery):

In three separate sauce pans (this is the start of Thomas going through every pot you own) cover the veggies with water, add one bay leaf, eight peppercorns (really Thomas?  not nine? not seven?), and one spring of fresh thyme to each pot.  Boil until just tender.  

As you get those softened up, boil yet another saucepan with water for blanching the celery.  Blanche for one to two minutes and then drain and add to an ice bath to stop the cooking.  This also helps keep your celery nice and bright green.  Very pretty.

At this point I transferred all the veggies to a cooking sheet to wait while I made the bechamel.

In a medium sauce, add three tablespoons of butter.  Once melted, add three tablespoons of flour and whisk constantly for two to three minutes.  Then slowly pour in your three cups of milk while whisking.  Lower heat so this stays at a simmer and let it reduce to about two cups, which takes about 30 minutes, even after accidentally turning the burner off for a few minutes...

In between whisking the bechamel, I took the bottom pie crust dough out of the fridge.  It had been chilling for about an hour.  I rolled it out and fit it into the bottom of my pie pan:

Mark scattered the veggies and chicken on top:

 At this point the sauce was thickened and I strained it through a fine-mesh strainer.  I seasoned it with chopped parsley, thyme, a pinch of cayenne and salt and pepper before pouring it on top of the pie filling.

Next, on with the top pie crust:

I brushed it with a beaten egg and made a steam vent, which was an "M" so there was no confusion whose pie this was:

We popped it in the oven for 50 minutes and dug in:

Mark declared it the best pot pie he's ever had.  I would have to agree!

My Clandestino Valentine

Mark and I were planning a low-key, special dinner at home to celebrate Valentine's Day this year when a few weeks ago I got Clandestino Chicago's email about February underground dinners.  These dinners are not cheap, but seemed like an interesting way to celebrate Valentine's Day, so we bought our tickets to the Pilsen Clandestino dinner.

We had no idea what to expect -- location, size, food?  The day before our dinner we got the details on the location -- the New Arts Club Building just off 18th in Pilsen.  Turns out the building was one of the treats of the night.  It was built in 1906, as it current owner and resident shared before dinner.  It was unusual, according to him, because of its beaux-arts exterior and arts and crafts style interior.  I don't know much about that, but we were immediately impressed with the old woodwork and other preserved details throughout the house.

The building had numerous iterations, including a social club (from what I could gather) for Slovenian immigrants around the turn of the century.  The room we had our cocktail hour in was the old billiards room, an exposed-brick room towards the back of the house was the old gym, and the room where we ate was a small ballroom.  More recently, the building was a book store and the old stock of books is now stored in the former gym.

Here is a pretty poor picture of the second-floor ballroom where we ate:

The menu of the night combined flavors from the history of Pilsen and called itself Bohemian-Mexican fusion, although I found it leaned more heavily on the Mexican.  You can find more details of our menu on the Clandestino site (and I don't feel like repeating that word-for-word here), but I will share our favorite course: lobster dumplings, lobster mushroom consomme and brown butter:

All the ingredients were extremely fresh -- I believe the chef mentioned the mushrooms in the picture above were picked the day before we ate them.  Overall, I'd have to the food a solid "B" -- very good, but not great.  The entire experience, however, gets an "A."  Sign up for their emails if you want to check out a future event.  We might.

Beef & Veggie Pot Pie with Cheddar Biscuit Topping

Yes, it's true, this winter in Chicago has been pretty brutal.  Last week we were stuck in the house for two days while we dug out from the blizzard.  Today the high temperature is in the single digits and I don't even want to look at the low for tonight.  Alas, it is a good excuse to make some comfort foods, if we're trying to find a bright side here.

A few weeks ago we made this beef and vegetable pot pie from Food & Wine.  It wasn't quite the chicken pot pie Mark has been asking me to make for him, but no one complained with the finished product. You can make that version if you want to eat pot pie for two weeks (which you may), or you could go with our modified version, which is also a little lighter since all this comfort food is making my jeans snug:


Beef & Veggie Pot Pie with Cheddar Biscuits (adapted from F&W)

3/4 of a stick of butter, cubed & chilled
1/2 a large onion, coarsely chopped
About 3/4 pound of carrots, chopped
About 3/4 pound of parsnips, peeled and chopped
1 1/2 pounds beef (I used extra lean here and it worked fine since it's not the main player in this recipe)
1/2 T thyme
2 1/8 cups flour
About 2 3/4 cup milk (we only had skim at hand and it worked fine)
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 bag frozen peas
3/4 cup sharp cheddar (we used an English Coastal Cheddar I picked up at Trader Joe's and it was awesome all around)


Heat oven to 350


Put the oven racks with the top one in the upper third and the bottom one in the lower third.  This recipe tells you to put a pan to catch the drippings on the bottom rack, but I put our casserole dish right on a pan covered in aluminum.  Do not skip that step unless you enjoy cleaning your oven.  

In a large pot, heat some olive oil and saute the onions, carrots and parsnips until tender.  Season with salt and pepper as you go.  Add the beef and thyme and cook until browned. Stir in 1/8 cup flour and cook for a few minutes.  Stir in 1 1/2 cups milk and your stock and simmer until it thickens.  Stir in the peas and season with salt and pepper again.  Pour into a 9x13 baking dish.
Time for the biscuits.  Mix 2 cups flour with the cubed 3/4 cup of butter.  I used a pastry cutter.  When it gets a sandy texture, stir in the shredded cheddar.  Add a little more than a cup of milk until a smooth dough forms.

I used an ice cream scooper to scoop balls of the dough onto the beef mixture.  Bake for 40 minutes and then broil for another minute to brown the biscuits.  This ended up delicious with a really nice thyme flavor. With how well this turned out, Mark's chicken pot pie may be next.