Annie & Alison
gladly cooking through Alison Roman’s cookbooks
I don’t have a whole lot to say about this recipe. Pasta with buttery mushrooms and parmesan is a nice, mildly flavored dinner. It’s filling, pairs well with red wine, and makes for nice leftovers. Egg yolk adds a creamy element, balanced by the nutty flavor of buckwheat groats (Alison’s mark on this classic recipe). Gluten free noodles work just as well here.
In lieu of a full essay, here’s a haiku:
Sometimes I don’t have
Much to say about cheesy
Rigatoni pasta
193 recipes cooked, 32 to go.
Throughout this project, I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about how food can heal. Last January, I was physically in need of some serious healing. Rest helped, getting back into an exercise rhythm helped, but food saved me.
Jordan and I had both been working jobs that left little to no bandwidth for anything beyond them. Rhythms and relationships got thrown to the curb as we flipped the “survival mode” switch to “On.” Meals mostly consisted of pre-made dinners from Trader Joes and Door Dash orders. We ate for fuel, not pleasure.
Now, I realize that there are seasons in most peoples’ lives when survival mode is the only option. And there’s actually nothing wrong with Door Dash – we still use it today! (I also realize how privileged it is to even have access to Door Dash!) But it wasn’t until I quit my job and gained back the time and energy to cook for us that I started to heal. (You can read more about my thoughts on the importance of cooking rhythms here.)
Making things from scratch, besides the clear health benefits (isn’t it nice to know what’s actually in your food?), has brought great healing in my life. Yes, I was one of those people who started making sourdough during the pandemic. And yes, I actually do have a loaf proving in my oven as I write this. I love making my own bread. Another joy has been saving chicken bones and making bone broth. I first made Alison’s Golden Broth with Turmeric and Garlic, which is also the base for this chicken soup, on the day that I got my second CD-19 vaccine. I decided to make the broth again, and this soup, on the day I got my CD-19 booster shot. Seemed only fitting!
The broth, bursting with complex flavor, was even better than I remembered. I made two adjustments from last time: I used turmeric root instead of ground turmeric, and used a combination of chicken carcass and turkey carcass leftover from Thanksgiving dinner. Let’s just say I’ll never throw turkey bones away again.
After spending about four hours making the broth, I turned to the soup, starting with the toasted garlic. Toasted garlic is actually the soup’s topping, but by no means can it be missed. I let the garlic slices turn a warm, golden brown at the bottom of my Dutch oven and spooned them out as they reached peak color, being sure not to take them all out at once so the stragglers could toast, too. (Pro tip: I sprinkled the leftover garlic chips on a pizza the next day, and OH MY!)
Leaving the garlicky oil behind, I threw in two large shallots, thinly sliced into rings. They spent just a few minutes getting loosely crispy before the mushrooms joined. I really liked how the soup maintained a distinct, but subtle shallot flavor, especially with all of the other potent ingredients in this recipe. For that reason, I would strongly caution against substituting shallot for a different kind of onion, as some are wont to do. For the mushrooms, I used a combination of oyster, shiitake, maitake, and lobster, all found at Whole Foods. After roughly five minutes of releasing lots of steam, I poured in the broth and brought it to a simmer so the shallot and mushrooms could infuse the broth.
Two days before, I made Alison’s Slow-Roasted Oregano Chicken. I saved the bones for this broth, and the leftover meat for this soup! A true Laura Ingalls Wilder moment. The chicken and celery need only a few minutes to warm through in the broth before the soup is ready for bowls. Before serving, I mixed in a half teaspoon of fish sauce, which made the broth all the richer. Alison says it’s optional, but I think it should be mandatory.
I took Alison’s side note seriously and made brown rice noodles to go along with the soup, which made it more filling and hearty. I topped each bowl with cilantro and the toasted garlic chips. Wow, what an incredible soup. My serious compliments to the recipe creator! I recently ate at an up-and-coming ramen restaurant in Chicago called High-Five Ramen. Their broth may be the best ramen broth I’ve ever tasted. And Alison’s broth truly rivals it! It even got better with age – leftovers were a highlight these last few days.
Three days after my booster shot, I tested positive for CD-19. Instead of driving to see family, our Christmas will be spent in quarantine. Food can’t heal everything, but I’m grateful to recover with Jordan next to me and lots of time to cook the remaining recipes for this project.
Merry Christmas Eve! I wish anyone reading this a safe holiday, filled with wonder and good food.
192 recipes cooked, 33 to go.
For the not-so seafood savvy like me, you might be wondering, what is trout roe exactly? Also referred to as caviar, roe is an unfertilized egg collected from a fish. Not exactly a description I call “appetizing.” I recognize that many people view caviar as a delicacy, but I’m not really a delicacy kind of person. Needless to say, I put this recipe off until I couldn’t any longer.
Last week, I decided that it was high time to start crossing off the final seafood recipes. So I picked two: trout roe on toast and smoked trout with mustard and apples. Then I marched over to Whole Foods with determination and a tinge of dread. I found smoked trout in a refrigerator next to the seafood counter, but didn’t see the roe. I asked the seafood counter for help, and turns out, the roe was next to the smoked trout, but it was labeled caviar. Clearly I hadn’t done my research yet. They didn’t have trout roe, but Alison says salmon roe will do the trick, so that’s what I purchased.
I paid for the products reluctantly (caviar is pricey!) and marched back over the bridge toward home. That afternoon, I popped a slice of sourdough in the toaster, smeared a heck of a lot of butter on it, and topped it with dill, lemon zest, flaky salt, and roe. And it wasn’t bad. It’s hard to mess with buttered toast and dill. Roe is very fishy, perhaps too much for my taste. But I could sort of convince myself that it was good. I still have much of the jar left, so maybe I’ll try it with potato chips like Alison does in the video she released today (I swear I’m getting more and more on her wavelength somehow).
The next day, I pulled out the package of smoked trout and tried a small bite. Again, not terrible, but not something I’d normally choose to eat. This salad is a nice way to eat it though, with plenty of vinegar to balance out the fishiness. Sour cream smeared on the bottom of the bowl, mustard greens (I used arugula) and mustard seeds soaked in apple cider vinegar. Smoked trout, too. All in all a fine combination. Jordan and I ate this for lunch. Now that I’m thinking about, it would have gone nicely with some salty potato chips, too!
If you like this kind of fishy food, I think you’ll love these recipes. If you don’t, feel free to skip them.
190 and 191 recipes cooked, 34 to go.
I feel like I’m writing a minor, yet continuous confessional. As I blog about these final 40 recipes, I feel led to confess why I waited to cook them until the end. For some, it was unintentional. Others don’t spike my appetite. And others, like this panna cotta, are just plain intimidating. Or so I thought.
I was on my drive home from work and talking to my friend Margaret on the phone about all I planned for dinner. Slow-roasted chicken, garlic bread, arugula salad, and panna cotta for dessert. Off-handedly Margaret commented, “well at least panna cotta’s really easy.” “Right, yeah, definitely,” I replied. I still spent the rest of the drive home trying to mentally gear up for the tasks ahead.
Thankfully, Margaret was right. Panna cotta is on the easy side, it just requires patience. Step one, hydrate the gelatin packet in water. Alison tells us to sprinkle the gelatin over the water and let it soak. No mention of stirring. Given the gloopy look of things, I had the impulse to stir, but held back. Next, I combined buttermilk, honey, and heavy cream in a small pot and dumped in the clumpy gelatin mixture. Over low heat, I tried to dissolve the gelatin completely without letting the mixture rise to a simmer. This requires very frequent stirring and time. Alison doesn’t specify how long this takes, so if it helps, it took me about 20 minutes. Maybe it could have gone a tiny bit faster, but I was very conscious about not letting things simmer to avoid curdling. I didn’t feel like starting all over again.
In the meantime, I combined the rest of the ingredients - a dash of salt, more buttermilk, more heavy cream, and sour cream. Alison instructs us to lightly whisk them together so there are no clumps, but also no air bubbles. That’s a tall order, in my opinion. Especially as the sour cream wanted nothing more than to sink to the bottom and remain its clumpy self. I found myself with a fork, digging for bits of sour cream and trying to separate them against the side of the bowl. I think I got most of the clumps out?
Once the gelatin totally dissolved, I poured that mixture slowly into the bowl of many dairies and stirred to combine. I portioned them out in seven glasses and stuck them in the fridge. Alison says they need at least 1 hour in the cold. But I can say from experience that the longer they sat in the fridge, the firmer, and more panna-cotta like, they became. If you’re looking for an authentically firm panna cotta, without a more liquidy bottom, let them spend at least 4 hours in the fridge. I covered the ones we didn’t eat that night with saran wrap and enjoyed one even more the next day.
Finally, the raspberries. A truly great add. I would not skip them. Crushed raspberries mixed with a bit of honey and apple cider vinegar. That tiny bit of acid and sweetness were just what the gelatin needed to really pop. I love that the panna cotta has a subtle sweetness - recipes calls for only a half cup of honey. So the raspberries really bring the sweetness home.
189 recipes cooked, 36 to go.
I’ve eaten a lot of garlic bread in my life. I enjoy it, but it doesn’t make or break a meal for me. I can’t remember a great garlic bread or a bad garlic bread I’ve had. Garlic bread is ancillary to me.
Which is probably why I waited so long to make this recipe. Any time I meal-planned, I honestly forgot it was there. (I know this might sound odd given how much some people love garlic bread. I truly don’t know why I’m so ambivalent.)
Garlic bread is an old staple. And I mean old. According to good ole Wikipedia, its origins can be traced back to Ancient Rome! It’s traditionally a combination of garlic, butter and/or olive oil, and toasted bread. Simple. So what makes Alison’s garlic bread better? Caramelized, confit garlic and anchovies.
I peeled an entire head of garlic, and sizzled the cloves in a small bath of olive oil. The key is not to let the oil get so hot that the garlic burns, but hot enough to soften the garlic and turn it slightly brown. Once the garlic is ready, about 20 minutes, you’re ready to smash it with anchovies, softened butter and the garlicky olive oil. Spread the umami-filled mixture all over the sliced ciabatta and stick ‘em in the oven for 15 minutes at 425. I could have left mine in longer to get an even toastier bread, but our roast chicken was threatening to go cold, and I couldn’t stand simply smelling the bread any longer. I had to see if it was truly better than other garlic bread.
It was pretty good. I mean, given my ambivalence about garlic bread, I can’t claim it changed my life. But the flavor was definitively garlicky without overpowering. The anchovies got rid of any bitterness from the garlic. The bread was still soft enough to sop up juices but toasted enough to hold structure. We topped the bread with the buttered tomatoes from Alison’s Slow-Roasted Oregano Chicken. I love that chicken recipe, so it’s a high compliment when I say that I’ll likely start serving this bread with it every time I make it in the future. The best way I can say it is, it really is a *better* garlic bread.
188 recipes cooked, 37 to go.
All recipe credit belongs to Alison Roman. You can purchase her cookbooks, Dining In and nothing fancy, anywhere books are sold. All images and essay copyright belongs to Annie Varberg, unless otherwise quoted.
