Pear, Gorgonzola, and Mesclun Salad

We’ll start at the end. Tonight I made the final dish. Pear, Gorgonzola, and Mesclun Salad. This salad is to the 90s what the Caesar was to the 20s. Who knows how many times I’ve eaten this (plus or minus the toasted walnuts). But it definitely stands the test of time.

Pumpkin Panna Cotta

This looked like a simple and awesome recipe for, say, Thanksgiving. Given that I had to make a second turkey for this project (see below), it made sense to have this as a dessert. Unfortunately, this dish was a dud. The flavor was great, but the texture was terrible — oddly sandy and greasy at the same time. I blame the gelatin. Also, some of the dairy sank to the bottom of the dish as it cooled, so there was a creamy white layer below the pumpkin puree. Really strange. I have reread the recipe and I don’t know what I could have done differently: as far as I can tell, I followed the directions exactly. I pureed the hell out of it, too. Anyway, I think this dish would have turned out way better as a stirred custard: I’d try substituting 3 or 4 eggs for the gelatin, and following pretty much the same steps.

45 Minute Roast Turkey

I don’t eat much turkey. It just doesn’t occur to me to go grab a 12 pound bird at the store and throw it in the oven for dinner. Plus, it puts me right to sleep. Having said that, if I did need a quick turkey dinner, this would be my method of choice. It is the turkey equivalent of Chicken Under a Brick from part 1. And it works! Our turkey took a bit longer than 45 minutes, but it was done in under an hour and a half. And in a way, it felt like magic: aren’t turkeys supposed to take hours and hours? Nope.

Corn Salad with Soy and Tomato

This was my favorite of the batch. What a great combination of flavors. Like the Watermelon and Tomato salad in part 4, this salad is unconventional, super chunky, and it starts turning into soup immediately. Not that that’s a problem—I really enjoyed slurping up the leftovers the next morning.

There is one more dish: South Indian Eggplant Curry. I don’t have a picture of it. Of all 25 recipes, this is the only one I’d actually made before, when it originally appeared in the Minimalist in 2008. It’s the only microwave Minimalist dish I know of, and it’s good but not something I’d make twice.

With the completion of this project, I do feel like a small burden has been lifted. A low-grade burden that grew as I did more of these recipes and neared the end. A voice saying, “Finish the damn thing already!” So I finally did. This was a great project, but I’m glad to be done with it.

What should I cook next?

Braised Turkey was lovely and yields enough turkey for an army. The mushrooms and italian sausage lend great flavor to this, too. The turkey breasts came out beautifully thanks to the short cooking time, but the thighs had dried out by the end, like the braised duck legs in Carl and Mark part 2. That was frustrating. I still feel like I don’t understand how to slow-braise dark, tough meat so that it falls off the bone, rather than being dry and chewy. I think it needs to stay wetter (maybe be basted?) and probably cook for less time (the above turkey thigh cooked for 2.5 hours).

Spaghetti With Fried Eggs. The yolks and olive oil make this work; what a nice combo. I love the chewy texture of the spaghetti with the silkiness of the sauce. The other pantry sauces in this Minimalist are worth checking out, too.

Fried Chicken With Ketchup was rather Happy Mealish, but in the best way. It hits all of the primal flavor buttons: sweet, tangy, salty, fatty, a little spicy, and lots of umami. The sauce is really ketchup, caramelized a little, with sauteed garlic and oil. We made sushi rice to go with it, but ended up eating the chicken right out of the pan before the rice was finished. Then we ate the leftovers cold right out of the fridge.

Watermelon and Tomato Salad is a keeper. I made it twice, and the first time my guest asked for the recipe on the spot. The second time didn’t work out so well because the tomatoes were not great, the sherry vinegar was weak (5% acidity — not 7-8% as it should be), and I put too much watermelon juice into the dressing. Also, the watermelon in this dish starts to weep immediately, so I think the key is to handle it gently and serve it right away. As with any salad, I suppose.

Red Pepper Puree is in the fridge right now. How can you go wrong with red peppers and olive oil? That was a rhetorical question. You can’t. It’s great, and I have a lot of plans for it: on sandwiches, in salads, on grilled veggies, on pasta, etc. I don’t think we’ll have any trouble gobbling this stuff up over the coming days.

Socca (aka. Farinata) is a chickpea-olive oil pancake. There is some deep, crispy Mediterranean magic in this one. I’m not usually a fan of rosemary, and I was concerned that a tablespoon of it would commandeer the entire dish, but in this context–kept in whole-leaf form–it was delicious. I’ve underestimated the impact of the form and shape of ingredients on texture and flavor, but I’m starting to realize it may be the most important technical consideration in a recipe. Anyway, Socca is a great appetizer. My only concern: it might be too flavorful an app to follow. Normally I can muddle through a dinner party with one or two mediocre dishes and people still think I know what I’m doing in the kitchen. But if Socca is the first thing I hand my guests, the pressure is on.

No-knead bread. The world has written enough about this recipe. I’ve written enough about this recipe. I’ve made it at least a hundred times. There’s nothing more to be said.

Scrambled Eggs With Shrimp. When I think about things I enjoy doing before breakfast, shelling and deveining a pile of shrimp is not on the list. Yeah, I love shrimp. And eggs. And the dish was good. It was. But it was a hassle. And sitting there eating it, I started thinking about what else I could have done with the shrimp. Or the eggs.

Pernil. These five pounds of pork took 10 minutes to prepare and 10 minutes to disappear. I made this after lunch one day, threw it in the oven, and that evening I brought it to a Cinco de Mayo party. It was a crowd pleaser. Everybody made tacos with it. And two minutes per pound later, it was gone. Would make again.

Pasta Alla Gricia. So I cheated on this one and used pancetta instead of guanciale. But it was tasty! And proof once again that a pasta sauce does not have to be thick or chunky or tomatoey at all. It is a condiment.

Oh. My. Cod. This was magnificent. Black cod with miso. Broiled black cod fillets with just three ingredients: miso, sugar, and mirin. How did I not know? How could I have gone so long without eating this? This dish makes the whole thing worthwhile. The whole “learning how to cook” thing. Not that it wasn’t a worthwhile endeavor already. But this dish really seals the deal. And it took no time at all to put together. Cod, rice, salad. Why go out? Why go anywhere? BTW, I believe this was originally a Nobu recipe that Mark adapted.

Fennel and Celery salad. I’d had Winnie’s celery salad before and it was much like this. Fennel does add something nice to it. This recipe made me wish I had a mandoline. PS: The shaved Parmesan is very important.

More-vegetable-than-egg Frittata. This was quite good and is an excellent example of the Minimalist Way. This was a quick breakfast on a weekend morning. Versatile, easy, and very satisfying. Looking forward to making something like this with asparagus when they come around.

Crisp-braised duck legs. I could see how this might be good. It looks good. The sauce was excellent. The vegetables were great. And the duck was dry and cottony. Was it me, or was it Mark? Do I need to try this one again, or have I found a crack in the otherwise perfect canon of minimalist cuisine?

Braised Squid & Artichokes. Sure looks good, doesn’t it? I bounded home from the fish market to make this one as a special Friday night dish.

Well, it was an unmitigated disaster. It was so terrible. The squid was rubbery and Karl said it tasted like cigarettes. The artichokes came out like thorny hairballs because I’m an idiot. You’re supposed to trim them! The instructions explained how, and I misread. And it’s not like I haven’t prepared an artichoke before, either. But my mind was elsewhere. Coupled with the Marlboro squid, the whole thing was a deceptively good looking inedible pile of garbage that I sifted through for an occasional chunk of hairy artichoke heart while Karl made a bowl of cereal for himself. I wish I had watched this video on the proper, cooking school way to trim an artichoke. And I have to stop buying the squid from that chain-smoking fish monger down the block. Maybe next spring I’ll try this again.

OK, back to the kitchen. I’ll have recipes #11-15 of 25 in the coming weeks.