197. Vodka-Spiked Cherry Tomatoes with Pepper Salt (p. 26)

OK, it's time to stop sulking. Gourmet's gone, and it's not coming back. (But if you believe Ruth Reichl, the death of every other magazine isn't very far behind. It sounds a little like sour grapes, but she just might be onto something.) So, it's time to move on and get back to blogging. And boy do I have a huge backlog of recipes to get through!

But before I do, I have to comment on something I saw on EatMeDaily.com today. Every year, there are a few "big" cookbooks that are released around the holidays. This year, those books are David Chang's Momofuku, and Thomas Keller's Ad Hoc at Home. In what I think is a wonderful development, two intrepid bloggers have already stepped up to take on the challenge of cooking through these two ambitious books. EatMeDaily isn't so sanguine. Here's what they have to say about the cook-through phenomenon: "this schtick is starting to get old." Well, folks, the snarky food blog is a schtick that's not all that original either. That said, I just can't hate you, EatMeDaily. Can't we all get along?

Now that I've got that off my chest. Back to the food. This recipe, which I made as an hors d'oeuvre for my family's Labor Day cookout (I told you I had a backlog!), could easily be renamed "Bloody Mary Bites." These boozy, zesty, spicy and salty nibbles were a nice surprise, even though they weren't my favorite recipe from The Book.

For the last few weeks of August and the first few weeks of September, my CSA box included some delicious red and yellow cherry and grape tomatoes. Sweet and flavorful, they were great on their own by the handful as a snack, but I was happy to sacrifice a pint to this recipe. First I peeled the tomatoes. I made a small "x" on the bottom of each tomato and blanched them in boiling water for just a few seconds before shocking them in ice water. Just like magic, the peels slipped right off. A little bit of a pain, but necessary for the vodka to permeate the tomato flesh.

Next, I combined some vodka, white wine vinegar, lemon zest and some superfine sugar. I marinated the tomatoes in the vodka mixture for about an hour, and I served them with a small bowl of mixed kosher salt and coarsely ground black pepper for dipping.

These hors d'oeuvres were potent little bites. There's a lot of bold tastes here: vodka, lemon zest, salt and pepper. They made quite an impression, although I didn't really love them. I think that had a lot to do with the fact that I'm not a big vodka fan.

Date Cooked: September 5, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: B-

170. Buffalo Chicken Wings (p. 54)

I've seen a buffalo or two at a zoo somewhere along the way (nothing like Teena's recent experience of getting stuck in traffic as a herd of them crossed the highway). But as best as I can remember, they don't have wings. Or do they?

Of course they don't. Everyone knows that Buffalo wings are chicken wings, but not just any chicken wings. This recipe comes from The Anchor Bar in Buffalo, New York, the place that claims to have invented them in 1964. Not surprisingly, in Buffalo, they're just called "wings." Makes sense. Here in New England, we just call it "chowdah," not "New England Clam Chowder."

First, I made the blue cheese dip. (What are Buffalo wings without blue cheese dip?) I whisked together two parts mayonnaise and one part plain yogurt and then stirred in some crumbled blue cheese. I used twice as much blue cheese as The Book called for. What can I say, I love the stuff. This was an excellent dip. Just the right consistency, not too thick, not too thin. Nice and creamy with the tang of the yogurt and the bite of the blue cheese. This dip would also be excellent on a wedge salad. Yum!

Next, the wings. The Anchor Bar deep fries them, but The Book gives the option of frying or grilling. I chose to grill mine. I cut the wings in half (after I cut off and discarded the wing tips). I grilled them for a few minutes on each side on a preheated, lightly oiled gas grill. As the wings were grilling, I mixed some melted butter, Frank's Red Hot sauce, and cider vinegar in a great big bowl. I put the grilled wings in the bowl and tossed to coat them with the sauce.

I served the wings, with the traditional celery sticks, at my niece's middle-school graduation cookout (congratulations, Alex!). They were great! I'm sure that all of the Buffalo wings I've had at restaurants have been fried. I really prefer them grilled. They have a nice crispiness and that great grilled flavor. The little bit of butter in the sauce gives them just that extra richness and smooths out the flavor. These wings weren't too spicy (actually, they weren't spicy enough for my tastes, but they're good for a mixed crowd).

Date Cooked: June 25, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

155. Spicy Lemon-Marinated Shrimp (p. 45)

How is The Book like Pvt. Benjamin Buford "Bubba" Blue? Well, as Bubba explained to Forrest Gump in one of the most memorable movie scenes ever, "shrimp is the fruit of the sea." And both Bubba and The Book know that shrimp can be prepared in innumerable delicious ways:

You can barbecue it, boil it, broil it, bake it, saute it. Dey's uh, shrimp-kabobs, shrimp creole, shrimp gumbo. Pan fried, deep fried, stir-fried. There's pineapple shrimp, lemon shrimp, coconut shrimp, pepper shrimp, shrimp soup, shrimp stew, shrimp salad, shrimp and potatoes, shrimp burger, shrimp sandwich. That- that's about it.

But, wait, there's more ... so far in The Project, I've made Cilantro Lime Shrimp, Shrimp in Adobo Sauce, Pad Thai, and now this recipe* for Spicy Lemon-Marindted Shrimp. And that's just the beginning. According to The Book's index, I've got twenty-five more shrimp recipes to make.

The Book says that this recipe is a new take on the classic Southern pickled shrimp. I've never had pickled shrimp, so this was new to me. But this spicy, tangy, briny preparation might just be one of my favorite ways of eating shrimp.

First, I took all of the zest off of a large lemon with a vegetable peeler. Then I squeezed the juice from the lemon and put it in a bowl with the zest. Next, I ground some coriander seeds in a spice grinder and added them to the bowl. I whisked it all up with some white wine vinegar, olive oil, water, sugar, and a whole lot of salt. Finally, I added some pepper flakes. The Book calls for Aleppo chili flakes, but says that "plain old red pepper flakes" are fine, too, so that's what I used.

Next, I added some pickling spices and a whole lot more salt to a pot of boiling water, and boiled some shelled, deveined shrimp for about 90 seconds until they were cooked through. (By the way, thanks for the advice on deveining. I bought "deveined" shrimp from the grocery store, but this time, I didn't remove the vein along the inner curve of the shrimp. I didn't notice any difference in the flavor, and it was a lot less work.) I drained the shrimp and let them cool a little bit.

Then, I put the shrimp in a zip-top bag with the marinade and let it sit in the refrigerator overnight (The Book says to marinate for at least eight hours and up to three days.) I drained the shrimp, put them on a platter and served them as a appetizer at my family's Memorial Day cookout. These shrimp were very tasty. Salty, but tasty. The flavors of the lemon and all of the pickling spices combined in zesty, sweet and sour, puckery deliciousness. I really enjoyed this one.

Date Cooked: May 23, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

* The recipe on epicurous.com feeds fify and calls for ten pounds(!) of shrimp. Unless you're a caterer, go with the recipe in The Book.

151. Hummus with Toasted Pine Nuts, Cumin Seeds, and Parsley Oil (p. 14)

The Book introduces this recipe by saying that "Hummus is so common these days it's become almost pedestrian." To me, this sounds a bit snobbish. It's kind of like those hipsters who claim not to like bands like Coldplay now that they have top-selling albums and sell out big arena shows. If you liked the band before they were popular, it's OK to keep on liking them once everyone else catches up to your superior trend-spotting skills. You don't have to apologize for liking something that everybody else likes. And you certanly don't have drizzle parsley oil all over your Coldplay CD and sprinkle toasted pine nuts, cumin seeds and parsley on it. You'll just wreck it.

At its core, this is just a basic recipe for very good hummus. First, I whizzed together some canned chickpeas and garlic in the food processor. Then I added some well-stirred tahini paste, water, lemon juice, olive oil, salt and more chickpeas, and whizzed it all together until it was smooth. Delicious! This is where I'll stop the next time I make this recipe.

The rest is all gilding the lily, especially when you do it all at the same time. Any one of the following accouterments on its own might be a nice little change, but all together, it's a bit much.

First, I blended equal parts of olive oil and chopped parsley in the blender. I poured this into a fine-mesh sieve and pressed the bright green oil from the solids. This parsley oil was was really good. It had a very fresh, almost grassy flavor. I'm sure that I'll find a use for this in some other dish that I make somewhere along the way.

Next, I toasted some pine nuts and cumin seeds in the oven. Toasting nuts and seeds is alwys dicy. They go from toasted to incinerated in the blink of an eye. The pine nuts were just a smidge "toastier" than I would have liked, but they were OK.

I sprinkled the toasted pine nuts and seeds over the hummus and dirzzled the parsley oil over the top. I didn't even take the last sept of scattering parsley leaves over the top of the whole thing. It was all just too much. This is an excellent basic hummus recipe. All of the "tarting-up" is good, but completely unnecessary. I just think that the editors of Gourmet "out-Gourmet-ed" themselves on this one.

Date Cooked: May 9, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A-

143. Cilantro Lime Shrimp (p. 46)

OK, I think I need a little lesson in shrimp anatomy, or at least in shrimp preparation. In order to make this recipe,* I bought a pound of frozen "deveined" shrimp. I thawed them in a bowl of ice water, and then I started to peel them. That's when I noticed the dark vein running down the inner curve of each shrimp. But wait, I though I had paid a couple of bucks extra to get "deveined" shrimp. What's the deal? Turns out that shrimp have two veins. One website I found called the vein on the outer curve the "sand vein" and the vein on the inner curve the "blood vein." Another website said that many people only take out the vein on the outer curve.

My shrimp had a slice down the outer curve of each shrimp, and the outer vein had been removed. The inner vein was still intact. I decided to take that one out, too. To I took a sharp, pointy paring knife and did some shrimp surgery. I made a thin slice down the inner curve of each shrimp and pretty easily removed the inner vein. But my question is, did I have to? I'd appreciate your thoughts about deveining.

With my shrimp fully deveined, I made some marinade. I mashed some garlic and salt together with my chef's knife to make a paste, and whisked that together with some fresh lime juice, orange marmalade, finely chopped fresh cilantro, olive oil, red pepper flakes, and salt and pepper. (The Book also calls for a little bit of soy sauce, but I left it out due to our current soy/wheat/dairy ban.) I reserved some of the marinade for a dipping sauce. I tossed the rest of the marinade into a zip-top bag with the shrimp. I let the shrimp marinate in the refrigerator for a little while.

Next, I drained the shrimp and patted it dry with a paper towel. I heated some oil in a skillet and sauteed half of the shrimp for a few minutes until they started to brown. I transferred them to a plate and cooked the rest of the shrimp.

This was a delicious way to eat shrimp. The citrus and cilantro flavors are bright and clean. The marmalade gives the shrimp a touch of sweetness and the red pepper flakes give just a hint of heat. We thought that they were just a bit greasy. Maybe the amount of oil in the recipe could be reduced?

This recipe is in The Book's hors d'oeuvres chapter. I could see these shrimp being served as a passed hors d'oeuvre at a cocktail party, but only if there were plenty of napkins. This is definitely a "finger lickin' good" shrimp. I think that a better use for this dish might be as part of a meal of "small plates" (i'm thinking non-Spanish tapas). It would also be great for dinner, served over rice, drizzled with the reserved marinade and accompanied by some crisp steamed vegetables, like snow peas. However you serve it, and you should, you'll enjoy this one.

Date Cooked: April 19, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Medium
Rating: A-

*On epicurius.com, this recipe is called "Coriander Lime Shrimp." Same thing.

137. Deviled Eggs (p. 27)

I suppose that there is something not quite right about making "deviled" eggs on Easter. After all, the word "deviled" has been used since the 1700s to describe firey foods based on the obvious connection between intense heat and the devil. But, eggs just seemed like something I should make on Easter, and deviled eggs are such a crowd-pleaser, I knew I couldn't go wrong by making these as an appetizer for the big family meal.

There really isn't too much to say about this recipe. I mean, it doesn't get any easier than this to make a fancy, yet familiar, and totally delicious appetizer. I hard-boiled a dozen eggs. (The Book calls for six, but I made twelve because I knew they'd go fast). I think I've mentioned this before, but it's worth saying again, the Book's method for cooking hard boiled eggs works every time to make a perfectly set egg and a brilliantly yellow yolk without a hint of green. Next, I cut the eggs in half and removed the yolks. I combined the yolks with some mayonnaise, Dijon mustard and a pinch of cayenne pepper. I piped the filling into the egg halves, sprinkled with some paprika and that's it!

These deviled eggs were perfect. The filling was creamy and delicious with just a touch of heat from the cayenne. I'll make these again and again. They're just as at home at a picnic as they are at a fancy cocktail party.

Date Cooked: April 11 - 12, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

105. Guacamole (with Tomato) (p. 9)

I had guacamole for the first time when I was a freshman in high school. Our debate team went to a tournament at Harvard (yes, I was a bit of a nerd in high school), and our faculty advisor took us to a Mexican restaurant in Harvard Square for dinner. I remember getting my plate of food and seeing "a big blob of brown stuff" and "a big blob of green stuff" on the plate. As unappetizing as these things looked to an uninitiated fourteen-year-old, I gamely gave them a try anyway. I've never been a picky eater, and I've always been willing to try just about anything once. With those first bites, I became a life-long fan of guacamole and refried beans.

This recipe* is pretty easy. I started by mashing some chopped white onions, a minced serrano chile, and some kosher salt into a paste using my mortar and pestel. I transferred the paste to a larger bowl and, using a potato masher, I mashed the paste together with four perfectly ripe avacados (my lucky day at the grocery store). Then I squeezed in some fresh lime juice and tasted it to make sure that the salt, heat and acid were just right, which they were. The Book's basic guacamole recipe ends here.

I opted to enhance it with some chopped, seeded tomato to make one of the several variations suggested in The Book ... Guacamole with Tomato. The other variations are a bit more exotic: Radish and Cilantro Guacamole, Fall-Winter Fruit Guacamole (with apple, grapes and pomegranate seeds), and Summer Fruit Gucamole (with grapes, peaches and raspberries). These other variations sound "interesting," but I'm sure that I'll give them a try someday.

This guacamole was superb. The texture was smooth, creamy and decadant. The flavor had the buttery mildness of ripe avacado with just the right amount of saltiness and a little zip of lime juice and just a hint of heat (I used a lot less of the minced serannos than The Book calls for). The tomato added some nice substance and interest. I want some more right now.

Date Cooked: February 1, 2009
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

*The recipe in The Book isn't on epicurious.com, but this one is close enough, just add some lime juice.

86. Baked Potato Chips (p. 6)

I made these chips a while back to go along with the Turkey Wraps I made with Thanksgiving leftovers. Somehow, I'm just getting around to posting about them.

I was suspicious of this recipe.* I knew that they'd be good, but I didn't believe that they'd taste like real potato chips. Boy, was I wrong.

This recipe has three ingredients: potatoes, olive oil and salt. First, brush two baking sheets with olive oil. Next slice the potatoes as thinly as you can using a mandoline. Then arrange the potato slices on the baking sheets, brush with more oil and sprinkle with salt. Bake for 10 to 20 minutes until golden and crispy.

When Teena made these, she found that they took longer to cook than indicated in The Book. I agree. Many of the chips tasted like I thought that they would - like oven roasted potato slices. Good, but not potato chips. The chips that I thought looked a little overdone were, much to my surprise, perfect! They tasted just like my favorite potato chips. They were crispy and delicious. Amazing.

I'll keep playing around with this recipe to get the timing and amount of oil just right (I thought that some of these were a little greasy). I'm also looking forward to trying the variations in The Book for Salt and Pepper Potato Chips and Rosemary Potato Chips.

Date Cooked: November 29, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: B+

* I couldn't find this recipe on line.

55. Tomato Tatins (p. 66)

According to The Book, this recipe* is a savory take on the classic upside-down apple pie known as Tarte Tatin. Legend has it that the dessert, also known as tarte renversee, was invented in the 1850s at l'Hotel Tatin. Apparently, in a moment of harried distraction, Caroline Tatin, who ran the hotel with her sister Stephanie, absent-mindedly tossed a bunch of carmelized apple slices into a pie dish without first rolling out a pie crust. Not wanting to start over, Caroline just put a crust over the top of the dish and baked it anyway. When it was done, she flipped the whole thing over onto a serving dish, served it to her eager and appreciative patrons, and the rest is culinary history ... more or less. In reality, French farmwives had been making tarte renversee long before Caroline was born, and some suggest that Caroline never even set foot in the kitchen at l'Hotel. But, hey, everyone loves a good story, right?

Just about the only thing that this Tatin has in common with its namesake is the upside-down presentation. The "crusts" on these individual tarts are rounds of country-style white bread that have been cut out with a cookie cutter, brushed with oil, toasted in the oven, and then rubbed with a clove of garlic. The "filling" is slices of ripe red tomatos that have been lightly salted and roasted to soften them and bring out their natural sweetness.

The tatins are assembled by placing a tomato slice in each of four ramekins, topping it with a dallop of pesto, and repeating until all of the tomato slices are gone. Each tatin is topped with a toast round, and they are put in the oven for a short time to heat through and to let the flavors combine. Once they are done, they get the Tatin treatment by being flipped over onto a serving plate.

I really liked this dish, and I'd make it again as a first course for a dinner party when I want to impress my friends. This is one of those recipes that's really pretty easy, but it gives you a lot of bang for the buck with a stunning, restaurant-quality presentation, and a really nice flavor. The tomatoes, which were ripe and in season from the farmer's market, were delicious, and the pesto was a really nice flavor accompaniment. The golden toasted crust gave textural interest and structure to the dish. Overall, I'd say this one is a winner.

Date Cooked: September 21, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

* The recipe on epicurious.com calls for red and yellow tomatoes. The Book's recipe doesn't specify colors. If I had thought of it, I would have used some colorful heirloom tomatoes in this dish. It would have made it just that much more impressive.

46. BL-Tomatoes (p. 26)

The concept for this recipe* is simple: BLTs without the bread. These tasty hors d'oeuvres are simply a hollowed-out cherry tomato stuffed with a mixture of shredded iceberg lettuce, crumbled bacon, mayonnaise and salt and pepper. The result is something that is fancy, yet familiar.

I could just tell from reading the recipe that these were going to be a hit at my family's Labor Day cookout, so I doubled the recipe so that we wouldn't run out. That was a good call, since they disappeared pretty qucikly.

I was lucky to find 24 large-ish, ripe cherry tomatoes at the local mega-mart (sometimes they surprise me with good produce). The first thing you do is to cut a very thin slice off the bottom of each tomato so that they won't roll around on the platter. Then you slice off the tops of the tomatoes and scoop out the centers with a melon baller. The one-inch diameter tomatoes called for by The Book is an absolute minimum, otherwise, scooping out the centers with a melon baller will be a frustrating, if not impossible task. But, don't go much bigger than one inch, since as Teena noted, these things should be single-bite-sized, or else you'll be wearing the "BL" filling.

The filling couldn't be easier. First, you crisp up some bacon (I used turkey bacon without any ill effects to the finished product) and crumble it. Then you finely shred some iceberg lettuce. Mix it all up with some mayonnaise, salt and pepper, and stuff the filling into the tomato shells. This last step proved to be a little time consuming, and I don't think that I'd try to make these for a great big party. Unless you had lots of help, stuffing a hundred of these babies would take all day, and I'm guessing that they need to be eaten pretty soon after being made, so making them in advance probably isn't an option. But for a small party, they're fun and delicious.

Date Cooked: August 31, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Medium
Rating: A-

*The recipe is not available on-line

42. Herbed Lima Bean Hummus (p. 15)

So, in my last post, I picked on lima beans. (Did I say something about hipsters eating edamame and grandmas eating limas?) Well, if anything can give lima beans the cache of edameme, it's this recipe.

The recipe starts with simmering frozen baby lima beans, chopped onions and garlic in water for a few minutes until tender. Simmering the garlic and onions is a nice touch, since it mellows their flavor. Then you stir in a 1/4 cup each of chopped parsley and cilantro and let it stand off the heat for a few minutes. After that, you drain it and process it in the food processor with the other herbs and spices (mint, dill, cumin, cayenne) and lemon juice and oil. Season with salt and pepper and additional lemon juice to taste.

This hummus is a really nice change. It's got the familiar texture of chickpea hummus, but the variety of fresh herbs give it a nice bright flavor. Of all of the herbs, I felt that the dill came through more than the others. Generally, I'm not a huge dill fan because it tends to take over in a dish. The finished hummus could have used more lemon juice, but I used all of my lemons making Lemon Squares (check back later for more on those). This is a great dip to make for a party if you're looking for something a little different. I served the hummus with Pita Toasts (not burned this time, thank you very much).

Date Cooked: August 17, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: B+

18. "La Brea Tar Pit" Chicken Wings (p. 55)

When I decided to do a cook-through project, I considered a few different books for the project. I chose The Gourmet Cookbook in part because there were already three other people working on The Project, and I could learn from their mistakes benefit from their accumulated wisdom. If I had only checked Kevin's blog before making these wings, I would have known what I was getting myself into and I could have planned ahead to deal with the temperature and cooking time (I know, cooking time again!) problems in this recipe. But instead, I winged it. Get it? Winged it? OK, you can stop groaning now.


The title of this recipe conjures visions of chicken wings smothered in a thick, sticky, rich sauce. That's exactly what these wings are. However, the name of the recipe is not a description of the wings, it's a warning about what your roasting pan will look like after you're done cooking. That's right, the burnt, crusty, inky surface of the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles (see photo at left) is an apt analogy for what you, and your scrubber sponge, will face when the wings come out of the oven (see photo below).

Now, don't get me wrong, these were the best chicken wings I've ever had, and I'm already thinking of making them again soon (knowing now what I wish I'd known then). The preparation is very easy. Heat up some soy sauce, sugar, red wine and a little ginger on the stovetop. Pour it over the wings and pop them in the oven. That's where it gets complicated. The Book says to cook the wings at 400 degrees for 45 minutes, turn them over and cook for another hour to hour and 10 minutes. That's a total of 115 minutes! Now, cooking times in wing recipes are all over the board. This recipe from Southern Living calls for a total of 30 minutes of cooking time. Alton Brown, who knows a thing or two about cooking times, cooks his wings for 40 minutes (he steams them for 10 minutes first). Martha Stewart's wings cook for 25 minutes (under a broiler). Emril's wings are cooked for 80 minutes. But, The Book's 115 minutes is by far the longest.

After the first 45 minutes, I turned the wings, set the timer for another 60 minutes and went upstairs to get ready for our family's Fourth of July cookout. After about ten minutes, the sauce turned pitch black and started to smoke. My wife was afraid that the house would burn down, or worse, that the wings would be ruined, so she took them out of the oven. And not a moment too soon! The sauce in the bottom of the pan was a burned, ashen mess, but the wings were perfectly cooked.

The next time I make these wings, I'll try the cooking instructions from the creator of the recipe, Metta Miller of Boston, as told in the comments on epicurious.com (hat tip to Kevin for pointing me to Metta's comments):

If you follow my original instructions (Gourmet altered the recipe) they will be delicious every time .... To the salt sensitive: Use low-sodium soy sauce. To those concerned about burnt pans/sauce: Bake at 375 degrees for 45 minutes; turn and check after another 30-45 minutes. I've been making these wings this way for years and haven't ended up with a single ruined pan — or a single complaint — yet. Good luck!

One last note. When I first looked at this recipe, four pounds of chicken wings and a yield of 48 pieces seemed like an awful lot of wings for a smallish family cookout. So, I made two pounds of wings. Big mistake. The wings were gobbled up in a couple of minutes, and everyone was left licking their fingers and asking for more. Next time, I'll make the full four pounds of this crowd-pleasing recipe.

Date Cooked: July 4, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Medium (due to scrubbing)
Rating: A (despite the recipe flaws)

17. Charred Tomatillo Guacamole (p. 10)

Guacamole is one of my favorite things in the whole world. I could eat it every day for breakfast, lunch and dinner. OK, maybe that's a bit of an overstatement, but you get the point: I like the stuff.

I made this as another contribution to my family's Fourth of July cookout (see the earlier post for Creamy Slaw, and stay tuned for a post on "La Brea Tar Pit" Chicken Wings), and it was a big hit.

This is a basic guacamole recipe with a twist: the addition of roasted tomatillos.

This recipe gave me a chance to play a favorite game: Stump the Cashier. Here's how it works: look around in the produce department for something a little unusual, take it to the check-out, and wait for the fun to begin. As the cashier rings up your order, you'll hear that familiar beep, beep, beep as she scans the items at lighting speed. And then, all of a sudden, it comes to a screeching halt. The cashier's face gets all squinched up, she lifts the produce bag, usually holding it at a distance as if it smells bad, and then she says, in a half-curious, half-accusatory tone, "What's this?" Tomatillos are usually a guaranteed winner in Stump the Cashier. Other good ones are parsnips, turnips, and just about any fresh herbs. Some things that look a lot like other common items aren't quite as good for the game, such as shallots. These usually get rung up as onions without a bat of an eye.

This recipe also gave me an opportunity to use my brand new mortar and pestle, which was an anniversary present from my wife (thanks, Sweetie!). While the tomatillos were under the broiler, I mashed up the onion, chile, and cilantro, salt and pepper. Once the tomatillos were good and charred, I threw them in the mix. Finally, I put it all in a bowl, added the avocados and mashed it all up with a potato masher. If you make this in advance, like I did, be sure to cover the guacamole with plastic wrap pressed right against the surface of the guacamole, otherwise it'll discolor.

This was an excellent recipe. The guacamole has the creamy texture that we all love plus the pleasant and unexpected fire-roasted flavor and slight tang from the tomatillos.

The recipe calls for three to four serrano chiles. These little suckers rate about 10,000 to 23,000 on the Scoville Scale, which means that they're pretty darn hot! Now, The Book suggests removing the seeds from some or all of the chiles to make a milder guacamole, but even without the seeds, there's still a lot of heat in them there peppers. So, my wife and I had a debate about how many serranos I should include, but in the end, Stop and Shop made the decision for me. There was only one, single, lonely serrano in the whole store. The result was that the guacamole was pretty mild, but by no means wimpy.

My only complaint with the recipe was that it was too salty. The recipe calls for a whole teaspoon of salt, which was too much. If I make this again, and I probably will, I'll start with a half teaspoon, and then add more to taste as needed.

Date Cooked: July 4, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A-

2. Eggplant "Caviar" (p.11)

If I stumbled with the Pita Toasts, I jumped right back up with this great dip. This dish is simple enough, even though it does dirty more than its fair share of dishes: you have to broil the eggplant and tomatoes, and then you need to saute the onion and green pepper, and then you need to whiz the whole thing in the food processor.

The real reason I burned the Pita Toasts was because, instead of watching them closely, I was washing all the dishes I dirtied making this dip.

All that aside, this dip was excellent, the roasted flavors of the eggplant and tomatoes blended well with the carmelized flavors of the onions and peppers.

Date Cooked: June 14, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy
Rating: A

1. Pita Toasts (p. 7)

There's an old saying that every journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. If that's the case, I tripped and fell on my face on the first step.

I volunteered for appetizer duty for my family's Father's Day celebration, and I decided to make Eggplant "Caviar" and Strawberry Salsa. I thought that these Pita Toasts would go well with the Caviar, and the recipe couldn't be easier. It's one of those recipes where the name is the recipe. The ingredients and the cooking instructions are in the name: to make Pita Toasts, you basically toast pitas. That's about all there is to it.

I even said to my wife before I got started cooking, "This one is so easy that I can't even believe that I get to count it as a recipe." But I spoke too soon. The Book says to cook the toasts for "about 12 minutes total." Apparently, "about 12 minutes" is not the same thing as "12 minutes," because in a matter of seconds somewhere in between 11 and 12 minutes, the Pita Toasts became Pita Cinders. It might have had something to do with the fact that I used whole wheat pitas, or maybe it was the non-stick cookie sheets (which make food brown faster), or maybe the oven got too hot.

But, no one complained, and they gobbled them up. (Maybe it was just because the Eggplant "Caviar" was so good, no one noticed that the Pita Toasts were charred.) Anyway, I'm not going to let this initial setback break my spirit. The only way is up!

Date Cooked: June 14, 2008
Degree of Difficulty: Easy (or at least it should have been)
Rating: C (but it's all my fault)