sauteed shrimp with chile, lemon and thai basil, summer squash saute and wild rice pilaf

whenever my friend nerissa and i get together we know it's going to be a long night of fun conversation. so this time around, i suggested we have dinner at my place where i could cook us a nice meal and we could gossip leisurely over a bottle of wine in a comfy space without feeling rushed by a waiter. yes, i haven't made a wednesday nite dinner in a while...

i decided to go with a one-plate entree inspired by a food post in the kitchn blog, chili, lemon, and basil shrimp with israeli couscous to keep prep to a minimum. after work today, i ran into safeway, picked up a pound of large 31/40 count raw shrimp and a container of raw macademia nuts (because i love macademias and i figured it would add a little crunch and texture to the dish). i then ran across the street to golden produce to pick up other ingredients.

while in the produce store, i realized i needed to add some vegetables to balance the protein/starch recipe. i settled on some nice yellow and italian squash and grabbed a roma tomato for acidity. with groceries in bag and hand, i jumped on the muni back up the hill home.

once home i got the wild rice pilaf going (the store didn't have israeli, or pearl, couscous, so i substituted a wild rice mix that would add texture and color to the dish. a cup of rice, 2 cups of chicken broth and a pat of butter simmered on the stove for about an hour until fluffy.

while the rice simmered, i diced up the squash and sauteed them with some garlic and shallots over medium heat in olive oil until soft and caramelized. i then added the diced tomato and seasoned liberally with salt and pepper, some cumin seed, some chopped cilantro, more olive oil, and a couple of tablespoons of red wine vinegar to balance out the flavors. as the saute was pretty soft, i crushed a handful of the macademia nuts and added that to the mixture for some crunchy texture. the whole concoction simmered over low heat for another 10 min or so which really helped all the flavors meld.

when the rice was ready, i turned my attention to the shrimp, which would cook quickly once they hit the pan. i heated a saute pan over high heat, added olive oil, chopped garlic and red chilies, and quickly added the shelled, deveined and butterflied shrimp. once they started turning opaque, i grated the zest of one lemon into the pan, squeezed the juice from said lemon, and added a big handful of coarsely chopped thai basil leaves. a quick stir and the shrimp was ready.

to plate, i layered the rice pilaf in a bowl, followed by a hearty portion of shrimp, and then garnished with the squash saute. sorry for the lack of usual step-by-step pictures, but i was too engaged in conversation with nerissa sitting across the counter to remember to grab my camera. but here's the plated result...

i must say, the flavors, textures and colors came together very nicely for a one-plate entree. the shrimp was fresh, springy and spicy with a nice lemon punch from the citrus and lemony thai basil. the summer squash saute had the right amount of acidity, thanks to the tomato and red wine vinegar, to cut through the olive oil in both the squash and shrimp sautees, and the cumin seed added just a touch of mediterranean to the dish. the rich wild rice pilaf was a perfect match, adding crunch and texture as well as a nice dark color base to the dish.

nerissa brought a lovely bottle of 2007 ledson russian river valley sauvignon blanc which paired perfectly with its bright floral and fruity pineapple notes. oh, and note my awesome new orange, basket-weave square placemats from cb2!

all in all, dinner was ready in an hour and nerissa and i settled into an evening of non-stop conversation and laughs while devouring everything on our plates, in the pots and pans, and bottle and glasses. what a great wednesday nite...

roasted beet and arugula, grilled swordfish with salsa di giovanna, grilled peach and summer fruit with marscapone

last friday nite i hosted a special dinner for the boys. they've all heard i'm a foodie and that i can cook but have never tasted my cooking with the exception of an albondigas here and a green herb dip there. so i thought i'd pull out all the stops for this dinner for 7.

for hors d'ouevres, i served a bruschetta with red, yellow and green heirloom tomatoes tossed with fresh torn basil, minced garlic, extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper. the crostini was freshly sliced from a round loaf of sourdough from thoroughbread bakery on church st, toast in a grill pan for some deep grill marks, and finished off with a rubbing of freshly sliced garlic and drizzle of extra virgin olive oil. unfortunately i forgot to take a picture of the colorful bruschetta plated on a black tray, so you'll have to use your imagination.

onto the first plated course, roasted beet and arugula salad. here i roasted some red beets in the oven at 400* with some olive oil and sprigs of thyme tightly wrapped in foil. once they were knife tender, i let them cool, carefully peeled the red-staining skins, sliced into wedges and tossed with a bit of red wine vinegar and olive oil. i also made a vinaigrette with red wine vinegar and extra virgin olive oil in a 1 to 3 ratio and seasoned with salt and fresh ground black pepper.

i then lightly dressed mixed herbs and arugula leaves and tossed with sliced red onions, the beets, and dotted with creamy goat cheese. the result was a nice balance between the sweet, earthy beets and acidic red wine vinegar, and the soft and creamy goat cheese and peppery arugula.

for the second plated course, i seasoned 1/2 inch thick swordfish steaks with salt and pepper and brushed them with olive oil. these went down on a searing hot grill pan for a couple minutes each side. for the accompanying sides, i boiled a couple pounds of small red potatoes until knife tender and smashed them, skins and all, with a lot of extra virgin olive oil, thyme leaves for a lemony herbal note, and salt and pepper. i also sauteed yellow and pale green summer squash that were sliced into bite-sized chunks in a bit of olive oil and some fresh basil.

to plate, i scooped a big portion of potatoes down, followed by the grilled swordfish, and then topped with the summer squash. to finish the dish, i drizzled salsa di giovanna on and around the fish, an italian concoction of fresh lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil, thinly sliced garlic, and freshly chopped oregano and mint, along with salt and pepper to taste. the result flavors bring a bright lemony zest to the swordfish and moistens the meat nicely.

to finish the meal, i decided to go with something summery to balance the richness of the last course. i sliced a couple of ripe but still firm peaches on a searing hot grill pan until some great grill marks rode across both faces of the peach slices. while that was going i macerated raspberries and blueberries with a bit of sugar to give it a little bit of a sweet kick. marscapone cheese, an italian cream cheese, was whipped with a whisk and sugar to lighten the cream and sweeten it. that then went down on a small plate to anchor the grilled peaches and sweet berries and provide a creamy contrast to the naturally sweet and light summer fruit.

i served all the above with a great '08 chateau st. michelle dry riesling that had just enough fruit to brighten up the swordfish but enough body to counter the richness of the meal.

all in all, a great meal with the boys. plenty of wine and laughs. and everyone's plate was licked clean: the best compliment a chef could have. thanks for an awesome nite and dinner, boys!

spanish tapas cookbook and dinner

jen and dan picked out a great little spanish cookbook for my birthday present a couple months ago titled "classic spanish cooking: recipes for mastering the spanish kitchen" by elisabeth luard.

the cookbook is full of interesting recipes ranging from tapas to dessert and shellfish to legumes, covering pretty much the entire pantry. luard's writing style is unique; she describes cooking techniques that rely on common sense and observation versus measurements of capacity or time. for example, in preparing meat for skewers, she writes, "all the pieces should be neatly trimmed and no bigger than a baby's mouthful." or, when broiling shrimp in the shell, "the heat should be fierce enough to blacken the shells a little."

luard's cookbook reads much like a memoir of a spanish grandmother's cooking lessons, full of short stories and history but ever-focused on the good of the dish and whatever was in season and locally available. i found her recipes offer a sort of freedom, free of precise measurements and rigid structure you find in today's cookbooks, a sort of refreshing reminder that cooking is an art where you taste as you go and season by hand, not simply a scientific process to be followed.

there were many great-sounding recipes in here and i wanted to share them with a willing guinea crowd. so what better way than to invite jen and dan to our house for an evening of spanish tapas, featuring recipes from the cookbook they gave me!

dinner started a little later than i had anticipated. although i was only cooking for 5, i sorta miscalculated the time i needed to prepare the 6 tapas recipes i had picked out. that's 6 whole dishes made from scratch. that's a lot of cooking.

no matter. i sent out a small dish of setas a la parilla, or mushrooms grilled with garlic and parsley. i didn't have access to the type of mushrooms specified in the recipe (orange tear or saffron milk cap) and made do with small portabellos, grilled cap-side up on a grill pan until juices formed in the cap. garlic and parsley were added at the end just long enough to soften the flavors a little. i then chopped these up to top slices of baguette. along with some slices of manchego cheese and salted marcona almonds, it provided a nice first tapas. unfortunately i was too busy getting the other 5 tapas ready to take a picture.

a couple of wine glasses later, dinner was ready and we all sat down and started passing round the dishes.

a steaming-hot pot of almejas en vino de jerez, or clams in sherry, announced the beginning of our spanish tapas meal. the recipe was very simple and the flavors of garlic and fresh parsley blended beautifully with the dry sherry. i originally wanted to use black mussels here but the market was out of them. the manila clams were great though, with a slight hint of sweetness to their meat.

next was pisto de berejenas, or braised eggplants. this, while a little time intensive to make, was a hit, especially spread on crusty baguette swith warm slices of manchego cheese. another simple dish, i pan-fried diced eggplant with caramelized onions and a bit of cumin seed and salt and pepper. that's it. it takes time to caramelize the onions and fry the eggplant to a soft consistency. but when it's done... oh so good.

for this tapa, albondigas en salsa, or meatballs in tomato sauce, i recruited jen and dan's help to form the meatballs, a sort of pre-dinner entertainment. i've always read it's best to have something for guests to help with so they feel immediately at home and part of the action. so before jen and dan arrived, i had started the tomato sauce which was flavored with red peppers, sherry, bay leaf and cinnamon stick and let that simmer while i combined the meatball mixture which consisted of half ground beef, half ground pork, bread crumbs and egg, flavored mainly with onion, cumin, coriander, and parsley. after the meatballs were formed, they were then browned and finished off with a simmer in the tomato sauce. this was my favorite. the cumin and coriander in the meatballs coupled with the cinnamon and bay leaf in the sauce lent an exotic taste to the tender, moist meatballs. mmm.

the favorite of the nite, which surprised me, was a homey and hearty dish, arroz a la cubana, or cuban rice. this consisted of cooked risotta rice layered with a basic tomato sauce flavored with chile powder and allspice, caramelized plaintains, and 4 fried eggs. so simple, yet so good together.

about halfway through dinner, i got up from the table and fired up the stove one more time to quickly prepare this dish, gambas pilpil, or shrimp with garlic and chili. i wanted to keep it as hot as possible for serving, per luard's notes, hence waiting to cook until we were fully ready to eat it. i heated a good amount of olive oil and tossed in sliced garlic and whole, dried red chilies to season the oil with garlic essense and a huge amount of firey heat. the shelled shrimp took just a minute or two tossed in the hot oil to cook and that went quickly onto the table. everyone's first reaction? "whoa, that's got some bite!" indeed it did. the chili peppers had added a piquant zing to the shrimp that was quite memorable, but not hot enough to burn the tastebuds. fantastic. they disappeared in a couple minutes.

with all that salty savory-ness, we needed a contrast for dessert. jen and dan had brought a couple pints of excellent ice cream from bi-rite creamery, including roasted banana and the oh-so-tasty salted caramel.

and as if that wasn't enough, we enjoyed some baked treats from tartine bakery as well.

they also brought a fabulous spanish wine to wash everything down, a 2003 legaris reserva tinta fina (100% tempranillo) from the ribera del duero wine region in spain. smooth, ruby fruit and an elegant finish. highly recommended with the dishes prepared here.

thank you jen and dan for the thoughtful gift and a great nite of spanish tapas, wine, and friendship! we need to do it again soon...

my 100th post!

didn't even realize it, but this entry marks my 100th wednesday nite dinner post! woo hoo! it's gotten tougher to keep up regular blogging over the past few months due to work and other priorities, but i'm happy to have made it thus far. and i have no intention of ending the blog anytime soon. cooking, dining and food in general are still my passions and that'll never change.

so to celebrate my 100th post, i thought, what better way to do that than to share a recent "wednesday nite dinner" that was basically a reprise of a dinner i cooked for a friend's "au revoir" almost 2 years ago on march 31, 2006. that evening, i prepared an elaborate vegetarian dinner for my friend, jenny chu, and 3 others as we wished her good luck and farewell as she embarked on a journey to beijing for work.

this dinner was months before i had even given interest in blogging and archiving my food adventures, let alone cook a gourmet meal for friends on a weeknite. interestingly, when i look back on photos from that night, they look identical to the wednesday nite dinner series i did for a few months at the end of 2006. here's a quick look at that evening...

the menu


table setting with platter of asiago zucchini and chinese eggplant frites


plated belgian endive, watercress, and red radish dressed in a sake wasabi vinaigrette


tower of portobello and truffled celery root puree with a red pepper balsalmic reduction, served with roasted mixed grape tomatoes with garlic and basil, and toasted pine nut couscous with thyme


it was a grand ole time and the food was great. and jenny felt that was the best vegetarian meal she's ever had in her life.


fast forward 23 months or so, jenny is back in the states, visiting friends and family for the chinese new year. one of the things she absolutely wanted to happen was to have me prepare her another vegetarian meal. and so this is what i came up with for a party of 3 that night.

1st course: broiled stack of eggplant and beefsteak tomatoes with aged gruyere


2nd course: hearts of romaine with crumbled feta and eggplant chips drizzled with balsamic and extra virgin olive oil


3rd course: soft parmasean polenta with vegetable ragout - a blend of zucchini, eggplant, roma tomatoes, mushrooms, sun-dried tomato tofu sausage, and port


a bottle of fruity and hearty old moon zinfandel from trader joe's rounded out the bold and acidic flavors in this meal. and for only $4.99 a bottle too.


while not as elaborate as the previous dinner, this turned out pretty well. and i still hold my position as one of the best vegetarian chefs, according to jenny.


jia jien jenny!

and thanks everyone for your support over the past year and a half. it's nice to know you guys still read this! and that definitely keeps me going...

3rd annual sf thanksgiving

having a theme really helps with planning your meal, from which recipes you choose to what wines you drink. and most people are attracted to themes. it helps pull things together. my 1st annual sf thanksgiving was all over the place; i had traditional mashed potatoes competing with sweet potatoes with goat cheese and cilantro. learning from that experience, last year i stuck to a southern theme which produced an soulful menu including cranberry-chestnut-sausage cornbread stuffing, buttermilk mashed potatoes, and hours-long stewed ham hocks and collard greens.

for my 3rd annual thanksgiving dinner in sf, i decided to give my menu a slight italian slant to it. while the turkey was my usual brined, honey-roasted affair, i tweaked the stuffing recipe to use sweet italian sausage and italian country bread, and traded fluffy mashed potatoes for rustic, smashed red potatoes with olive oil instead of milk and butter.

i felt most of this turned out pretty good. there were 12 of us total enjoying the feast and i received rave reviews for the turkey, stuffing, and red onion marmalade. yay! oh and 10 bottles of wine and champagne really helped. here was the menu for the evening:

hors d'ouevres
plate of port salami, parmesan wedge and baguette
roasted figs with proscuitto, stilton and pomegranate glaze
grilled shrimp with garlic, lemon and italian parsley

prosecco champagne toast
radicchio and arugula with roasted red onions, crispy pancetta and fresh parmesan

honey-roasted turkey served with port giblet gravy and Zuni red onion marmalade
cranberry-chestnut country bread stuffing with sweet italian chicken sausage
smashed red potatoes with garlic and thyme-infused olive oil
caramelized brussel sprouts and pearl onions with garlic and nutmeg

dessert
bustrengo (polenta and apple cake) with creme fraiche
nadeau late harvest zinfandel

some select pictures from the evening...

a quick and tasty starter. i marinated butterflied, shell-on shrimp in olive oil, garlic, chile flakes, italian parsley and lemon, then quickly grilled them in a grill pan for a couple of minutes.

the salad was a blend of raddichio and arugula leaves tossed in balsamic and olive oil, topped with roasted red onions, crispy pancetta, and a lot of fresh parmesan cheese.

the stuffing (my own recipe developed over the years) starts with browning a couple pounds of sweet italian sausage and sauteeing onions, celery and carrots, delgazing with white wine and creating a stew with chestnuts, cranberries, stock and herbs. the stew is then mixed with stale bread cubes and finished in the oven.

about 6 or 7 pounds of whole red potatoes went into a pot of cold salted water until they "fell off a fork." this was then mashed with olive oil infused with smashed garlic and thyme leaves. to make a chunky, rustic potatoes side dish.

the table setting for 12 included floor length white linens with an golden orange overlay, square plates with silverware from abbey rentals, 2 self-arranged floral centerpieces, an array of glassware and tealights, and chianti flasks for that slight italian feel.

shot of the potatoes and leslie getting a helping of the zuni red onion marmalade, a 3-hour concoction of red onions, honey, merlot, and herbs. way, way better than cranberry sauce.

the 13 lb turkey pre-roast. this was brined for several hours using a combination of alton brown and wolfgang puck's recipes.

i roasted it in a 500* oven for 30 minutes, then lowered the temperature to 350* for another 2 hours or so.

the chef presenting his masterpiece.

and the turkey plated.

amazing how the turkey disappears after you've carved it.

dessert brought the very dense and hearty bustrengo, a polenta and apple cake that also had figs and raisins mixed into it.

served with a dollop of creme fraiche and sips of the 2004 nadeau late harvest zinfandel from paso robles, it topped off a very hearty meal.

thank you to all the friends who made it to the dinner. it was a fun and delicious little trip over to italy. happy thanksgiving!

la bbq

memorial day weekend is approaching fast and that typically signifies the start of bbq season. but for some reason, it just doesn't feel the same up here in the bay as it does in la. blame the fog, and i do, but it's just too damn cold here in daly city for a real bbq.

what follows are a few pictures of a bbq i did at home in la during my bday weekend. we had about 20-30 ppl show up over the course of 5 hours. ironically, it was cloudy and drizzling that day too. but the food still turned out pretty tasty.

citrus sangria.

the grill.

mango bbq spareribs. pre-sauce.

paprika, rosemary, and thyme dry rub wings.

slow-braised cuban pork shoulder.

fork-tender.

asian slaw.

closeup.

ingredients for bowtie pesto pasta.

fresh guacamole, pre-mix.

the spread.


happy bbq season!!