I’ve never understood those lyrics from the Police song, ‘ I resolved to call her up/a thousand times a day/and ask her if she’d marry me/ in some old-fashioned way’. What, you mean old fashioned like over the phone? That just never made any sense. Why not go really old fashioned and do it by text message, loser.
Of course, to ask her to marry you in a truly old fashioned way, you’d need a club and a dry cave somewhere.
Fortunately the Italians are one up on us as the originators of Italian Wedding Soup. I’m not sure how old fashioned it is, but its gotta be better than asking her by fax or IM. Alright, actually the phrase ‘wedding soup’ is a popular mistranslation, the ‘wedding’ in it refers to the ingredients going well together. Whatever.
Simplified Italian Wedding Soup:

• Chunk and lightly brown a parsnip, two carrots, a large onion and a huge handful of basil. Add plenty of fresh pepper and four chicken thighs, some herbs de provence, and oregano.
  
• Cover with chicken broth, and simmer until the chicken is tender. You may have to fish out the bones.
  
• Add directly to the soup a cup of either Israeli couscous or small macaroni, cook until tender
  
• Tear the leaves off a whole head of escarole. Mix into soup and let sit until wilted and tender. Tender is a big part of this recipe.
  
• Mix together three eggs and half a cup of fresh grated parmesan cheese. Bring the soup to a boil and whisk in the mixture. Final color should be a fluffy white.
  
• Serve with even more fresh pepper. Adding meatballs is a popular variation- can’t say I’m a fan tho.

There are three skills that every human should be able to do well. One is to sew on a button, since life contains many situations where a button may pop off. The second is to be reasonably skilled in some of the more interesting examples of those situations which might cause a button to pop off. And third, you should know how to roast a chicken.
Well, the first your mom should teach you, the second you can only learn from practice. But today, gratis, I will tell you how to roast a chicken right.

• Compound butter is the key to this recipe. Have some ready made and softened to near-room temperature, along with a lemon, an onion, and a decent sized chicken, washed and dried with the insides taken out.
  
• Towards the back cavity, carefully lift up the skin and, with a ‘hooking motion’ with your finger, separate the membrane from the meat. There will be a tougher membrane down the center you will have to break, and another one separating the area between the leg and the main breast area. Loosen the skin all the way over the top, leaving It attached near the neck.
  
• Now, take your compound butter and stuff it all the way under the skin until you have a layer

So you tried our South Beach-safe Cheesecake last week? What

This month’s Gourmet is all about London, so it was a surprise to find a recipe from a local restaurant in the magazine. Katherine M. Whann of Washington, D.C. wrote in asking for TenPenh‘s recipe for Chocolate-Covered Cashews. Holy Yum! The recipe does have a lot of messy syrup and chocolate going on, but if you’re absolutely dying for a taste of TenPenh at home how’s a little sugar and chocolate gonna stop you? Thank you Gourmet and Katherine M. Whann! The cashew recipe hasn’t made it to Gourmet’s website yet so we’ve slavishly duplicated it for you here. You can also browse their ‘You Asked For It’ archive to see recipes from a handful of other local restaurants. TenPenh is also kind enough to post some of their recipes on their website if you’re looking for something a little more substantial.
Chocolate-Covered Cashews
Adapted from TenPenh
Makes about 3 1/2 cups
Active time: 20 min Start to finish: 1 1/2 hr
These chocolaty cashews make a perfect after-dinner treat to serve with coffee or tea.
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons water
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 cups whole raw cashews (1/2 lb)
1 table spoon unsalted butter
8 oz fine-quality bittersweet chocolate (not unsweetened or extra-bitter), chopped
3 tablespoons unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder

• Line bottom of a shallow baking pan with parchment or wax paper
• Bring sugar, water, and salt to a boil in a 12-inch heavy skillet, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Reduce heat and simmer syrup 2 minutes.
• Put nuts in a large heatproof bowl, then add syrup and toss with a wooden spoon until nuts are coated and sugar begins o crystallize, about 3 minutes.
• Return nuts to skillet and cook over moderate heat, stirring constantly, until sugar coating is golden and no longer crystallized, 5 to 8 minutes. Remove from heat and stir in butter.
• Spread nuts in 1 layer in baking pan and cool to room temperature, about 20 minutes.
• When nuts are cool, transfer to a bowl, reserving baking pan with parchment. Heat half of chocolate in microwave-safe dish in microwave (see cooks’ note, below) and 50 percent power until melted, checking frequently after 2 minutes. Add remaining chopped chocolate to melted chocolate and stir until smooth, then pour over nuts and let stand, stirring occasionally, until chocolate is almost set, 20 to 25 minutes.
• Sift 2 tablespoons cocoa powder over nuts and toss to coat.
• Return nuts to parchment-lined baking pan, separating nuts with your hands, and let stand until chocolate is completely set, about 30 minutes more.
• Toss nuts with remaining tablespoon cocoa powder.

Cooks’ notes:

• We tested this recipe in an 800-watt microwave oven. If yours is less (or more) powerful, adjust the melting time accordingly.
• Chocolate-covered cashews keep in an airtight container at room temperature 3 days.

The other day I found myself in possession of a huge (32 OZ) carton of truly excellent plain yogurt (Stonybrook Farms Organic) and no interest in using it for breakfast. What to do with it?
Then I remembered that I was planning to make something hot and spicy for dinner and what could be better than a traditional cool and soothing Indian cucumber raita to go along as a side dish!
Serve this with your next Chicken tandoori. I used Patak’s Original Spicy Ginger & Garlic Marinade and Grill Sauce which is fairly widely available in supermarkets to make the chicken, and the recipe on the side of the jar happily enough uses more yogurt for the marinade. I added some extra fresh garlic, ginger and onion to the marinade and let it sit about 2 hours.
Cucumber Raita
about 5- 6″ of English, seedless cucumber – that’s the long, ribbed one usually sold plastic wrapped
1 1/2 – 2 cups plain yogurt-preferably Stonybrook lowfat. Dannon’s plain fat free is sold everywhere but is pretty thin and unsatisfying.
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground cumin seed
1/8 tsp cayenne pepper
1/8 tsp fresh ground black pepper – or more to taste
Peel and grate the cucumber with the large holes on the grater. Don’t drain any liquid that accumulates.Mix everything together with the cucumber quite well. Add more yogurt if you prefer it more traditional and soupy – I like it thicker. If I had had a tablespoon or two of fresh mint that would have been lovely to add too, but alas I didn’t.
-MHF, Guest Blogger

Interested in giving your food a little more international flair? You have to start somewhere, and sometimes the beginning

Interested in giving your food a little more international flair? You have to start somewhere, and sometimes the beginning