Fun Fish Dishes

 Lenten fridays mean no meat. It does give home chefs a chance to experiment with seafood dishes. There are so many to choose from along with different kinds of fish. The recipes will make you forget steak and poultry for sure.

Melissa Clark's A Good Appetite columnin wednesday's New York Times Food section inspired me to think of other fish dishes. Her take on trout almondine was inspiring and easy to create. It's an easy cook with any white fish filet.The sauce is just a blend of lemon and butter with chives added in . serve ith wth smashed potatoes and white wine for a sophisticated intro to the weekend, The little ones may not like this so ther'es always fish and chips. You can easily buy already made filets along with Ore-Ida crinkle fries. However you  cna also make them in your air fryer. It's just creating a tasty batter out of breadcrumbs egg and flour. They could even help out in dredging the filets. . The fries cna be home made and air fried too. Use russet potatoes and give them an hout long cold water bath. This is to remove the starch and get them nice and crispy. They're then tossed in olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper.The kids will love these with ketchup but the folks can have it with a garlicky aioli sauce.

Of course a hot brothy chowder is a great Friday  night dinner. Clam chowder comes in three variations., Manhattan, New England and Rhode Island. This is the red chowder , livened up with tomato paste. A Spanish onion is added as are chopped celery stalks. Yet ti's the melange of spices that give this soup its' distinctive flavor.There are seven cloves of galric , a pinch of red pepper and the all important thyme. This last is what imparts an earthy herby flavor to the chowder.Bay leaf can be added as well. The New England variety still has the minced clams but the chowder is It has onions too but potatoes are added (some Manhattan clam chowders also have these ) along with bacon for extra flavor ,there is also celery and butter added as well. It's usually also made with chicken broth but you can sub in vegetable broth for a truly meatless soup. The Rhode Island variety is not a blend of the Manhattan and New England but rather its' own rich mxiture of quahog clams , celery , onion and bacon cooked with a splash of Worcester sauce and white pepper for zing.

A friday night fish dinner cna be just as exciting as a weeknight meat dinner. Try any of these for a great way to bring in the weekend. They're tasty and flavorful for a great supper in,

Travel Through Your Kitchen

Since we can't physically travel this summer, we can do it another way -  through our kitchens. We can easily make dishes form different parts of the US and the world. It's a fun way to expand our palates and our repertoires.

Luckily there are cookbooks that can help us on our culinary journey.Try Priya Krishna's Indian-ish Recipes and Antics From  A Modern American Family. You can sip spicy chai drinks while enjoying dal or pulao.  The great Marcella Hazan left a phenomenal legacy in her Essentials Of Italian Cooking : A Cookbook.  You'll feel like you're at Lago Maggiore as you recreate her polenta and squab. Finish with a homemade Italian ice or granita as you play bocce in the backyard. If you're yearning  for bouillabaisse, there are several excellent Provencal cookbooks that you can upload to your Kindle.Enjoy the dishes of romantic Provence under backyard fairy lights. Want a week in Mexico, then buy Oaxaca: Home Cooking From The Heart Of Mexico by Bricia Lopez. This has hearty dishes of the home kitchen sort that can easily be recreated in yours. Author Kelly Kwok has The Asian Slow Cooker; Exotic Favorites For Your Crockpot. where you can make classic Chinese dishes while you sunbathe or garden.

If you had planned on an American road trip, not to worry. You can still make the same fried chicken you'd have in the South. It can even be made healthier by using your air fryer. You can fry okra and green tomatoes too. Wash down with sweet tea or mint juleps. Finish with a peach pie and homemade pralines. There are some excellent cookbooks such as Sweetie Pie's Cookbook Soulful Southern Recipes from My Family To Yours. So many head to New England for the beaches and seafood. You can easily get already steamed seafood at any local seafood restaurant or do the steaming yourself. Serve with cups of melted butter and lemon wedges.Of course there is the Jersey shore, and the famed boardwalks that dot many a coastal town. The Jersey  shore is known for its pizza and you can easily recreate it with dough already made and a good homemade sauce. Of course there's sausage and peppers. This is an easy saute piled on Italian bread. Mix it up with some red and yellow peppers. Finish with cotton candy  which you can buy the machine at Five Below and the sugars off of Amazon.

Turn your kitchen into a road trip. There's so many different cuisines you can try and pretend you're at the place where they originated. It's a fun staycation.

Seafood And "R" Months

There's been a long standing rule that you should only  eat seafood with months that have an "r" in them. That means lobster or shrimp  until May? Is that true? Or can we eat it all year round.

Long ago the "r" rule only applied to oysters which made sense,It then became more inclusive and also meant shrimp, lobsters and clams, Refrigeration a century ago was spotty at best. There was no way shellfish could be kept cool during the sweltering summer months. That only happened in cooler ones  when ice was readily available.Another reason was that the bivalves spawn in the summer so there are only young ones to catch and that there needs to be a rest for the fish to repopulate . The flavor is also different too, which can ruin an elaborate dish such as Oysters Rockefeller.One of the most compelling arguments for only eating shelled seafood in the fall and winter is the red tide. Luckily the levels on this algal bloom are now  closely monitored. It affects not only the nervous systems of marine life but also mammal  - humans included. Monitored harvesting and regular toxin testing have all but eliminated this deadly threat.

This means if you've been off seafood during the Spring and summer months, then embrace it now. It's time to try Oysters Rockefeller  - an easy two part  cook. First boil the shell fish, and let cool. Then it's just simply a mix of breadcrumbs, spinach and bacon. Tabasco sauce and Pernod, absinthe, give it flavor and a certain decadence. If you don't have absinthe, use Anisette. It's then spooning the mixture into the oysters and broiling for ten minutes in the oven. Of course, if you want something delicious and simple, try steamed mussels. What they're steamed in is up to you. Some people add beer , some add white wine and butter. They should be de-bearded  which is getting rid of the thin, sticky membranes that adhere them onto surfaces.Just grasp these strings with your thumb and forefinger , pulling firmly until it comes loose. Just discard afterwards. A little less labor intensive are clams. Fall is the perfect time for a meaty New England or Manhattan clam chowder.They're also delicious in red or white clam sauce over linguine.If you want their full, briny flavor, try them raw with either a squeeze of lemon or hot sauce. Clams can be had crudo style , cut up and marinated with citrus juices  such as lemon and lime as a kind of civic.

Start the fall with tasty shellfish and warming chowders. Enjoy clams and oysters, along with mussels in a variety of dishes. It's the season for them.

Summer Theme Parties

It is summer and the time for all sorts of parties.To make them more memorable think theme . Nothing is more entertaining and fun than a party with a set theme You don't have to go all out as with Sean Combs and his all white Hamptons party but you can have something similar on a smaller scale.

Ever since the arrival of Downton Abbey, teas have become almost de rigueur  for theme parties. These are still fun and the food can be a nice change from sloppy barbecues. Think watercress and chicken salad  sandwiches along with jam and butter ones too.Scones dripping with clotted cream are a must.as well A variety of teas can be served from  the fruity Lady Grey to soothing chamomile or mint, Wimbledon will be starting soon and you can serve their signature dishes, strawberries and cream washed down with champagne. Another Masterpiece classic Poldark has been retooled and revamped for a new generation. Winston Graham's classic romance adventure takes place in Cornwall, where rum was smuggled  freely and drunk freely. Have a Sunday night watching party (it's on PBS  stations at nine on that day) with what else rum and  Cornish pasties. If you're in the New York City area you can buy this last  from the famed Myers of Keswick on Hudson Street. If not it's a simple recipe  of  pastry filled with any kind of chopped meat, usually beef mixed with  potatoes. . You can also make a stargazey pie, a seafood variation of shepherd's pie, toppedwith pilchards staring up at the sky, hence the name,. Have a dessert of blackberries and clotted cream. Both are as Cornish as the  region's broad accent and tin mines.

Of course you can look to America for  theme ideas. Have a Saturday night hoedown, complete with  barbecue, Coca Cola cake and a variety of mayo based salads. Guests can also bring their own favorite picnic dishes  for a down home pot luck get together. New England clambakes are another great way of celebrating.It's  not only clams but also lobster and clams along with mussels steamed on rockweed or seaweed.  True clambakes also have sausages and corn on the cob. Other sides are potatoes, carrots and onions. Remember to include a coffee pot full of melted butter for the seafood  and veggies. A similar shindig is the Wisconsin fish boil. This is a tad more laborious than a clambake but it's essentially any white fish cooked with onions and  potatoes in  heavily salted water. The fish oil floats to the top where it's set aflame similar to crepes Suzette. Melted butter is dribbled on the fish and veggies afterward. It is usually served with cole slaw followed by cherry or blueberry pie.If this is too much then think  drive in  movie. Invite friends over to see a classic or celebrate a birthday with a favorite flick.  Have dogs and burgers along with butter drenched popcorn and malteds (you can make this last a bit naughty by adding a shot of vodka, or bourbon). Have boxes of Juniors Mints Red Vines and Good N Plenty for dessert.

It's summer! Celebrate with parties, full of good fun and good food! Try an English tea or a New England clambake  - whatever you want  for a warm weather get together!

Northern Cuisine

There 's a new regional cuisine that's making itself known - it's the Northern style.This is a reflection and blend of Canadian and New England recipes and flavors. Unlike Southern cooking, there is a crispness and sharpness to it; ,a more primal feel like the rugged Northern landscape itself

Jeff Gordonier wrote about it in today's New York Times Food section.He interviewed the innovators of this interesting and varied  as well as trying the different dishes that make up the foods served from Canada and the New England corridor.It is not what people think, especially when it comes to  Bostonian cuisine. This is usually misrepresented, according to Boston chef , Matt Jennings, who is also with the group Northern Chefs Alliance.It's not just creamy chowders and the standard baked beans, He does put chowder on his menu but its' perked up with black Squid ink crackers. Even Boston brown bread which is served at every table is punched up with maple butter and the Korean soybean paste doenjang The wildness of the Great North is also represented throughout this vast region. Foods that the indigenous people first caught , through crude hinting and fishing, are turned into haute cuisine fancies.These are deer kidneys and cod collars- fish throats.along with   Canadian dwarf cornel berries-  a kind of cross between a lingonberries and cherries, and Labrador tea jelly made from a kind of  mountain rhododendron. These come from  nature and not a downtown  farmer's market. Foods are cooked over fires kindled from wood found on beaches or in forests.

 Many recipes reflect the micro local bounty.This is true at Boralia a Toronto restaurant, owned by husband and wife team Wayne Morris and Evelyn Wu who go foraging locally for their restaurant's ingredients.They even use variations of recipes that the French explorers brought with them back in t the early 1600's such as eclade , mussels blanketed in dried pine needles. Their updated version involves a pine  ash infused butter. Some restaurants will serve freshly shot moose, arctic hare and partridge at one restaurant Raymond's. This is not regulated meat, in fact some dishes come with a warning as to watch out for the buckshor or you'll wind up with chipped. teeth.Local seaweeds are  such as dulse, lavar kombu and sea lettuce are incorporated in both  main and side dishes.Some of the traditional European recipes like the ones served at the Montreal eatery Maison Publique rely on these wild ingredients to fuse the new world with the old.Their Spanish dish  boquerones usually made with anchovies is now made with capelin, a North Atlantic bait fish.it gives the dish a rawer , taste that reflects the roughness of this untamed country.

Northern cuisine is a cuisine of wind, rock and wood as some chefs have deemed it.It is a rugged blend of sean and leand ,Old world and New.It is the food of wildness but also the food of great sophistication..

Just A Simple Bowl Of Soup

The week between Christmas and New Year's is always full of rich  treats and party foods. This can be fun for the palate but havoc on the stomach. It's best to take a break from all this and go for a simple bowl of soup - or even better broth.Have a day or two of just eating simple foods - nothing fancy . Think a hot bowl or mug with crackers- nothing else.

One of the  most detoxifying meals is a simple, clear broth. Nothing beats either a homemade or a bouillon cubed one. If you have leftover turkey you can easily make a broth out of it. The carcass does need to be cut up and cooked with celery , carrots and onion, typical stock ingredients. Home chefs can also do this with leftover chicken too. Serve as a light supper with Saltines or oyster crackers. You can make a light soup too, using whatever meat is still on the bone, more carrots, onions and celery.  Add rice or noodles for more substance. More oomph can be added with a cup of barley or orzo.Another good plain soup is pasta fagioli, . This is a bean soup, originating in Naples, Italy .It is chicken broth with the addition of tomatoes and sauce. Spinach is added for nutrients and flavor along with celery and onions. The recipe calls for red pepper flakes but if you want a tamer soup, then nix them. White cannellini beans are also added for protein and more flavor.This is a great recipe to make for New Year's Day, after a night of rich feasting.

A simple soup can be hearty as well.Chowders are always a welcome change .Most are vegetable or seafood, usually thickened up with cream or for a more basic fare, milk. One of the most famous is Manhattan clam which is a light meal in itself. It starts off with a tomato based broth  along with the addition of clams and their broth. You can get fresh clams right now but canned ones will also do.Add in potatoes and carrots along with garlic and more tomatoes. Spicing is everything with the Manhattan version so make sure you have plenty of thyme, clove and celery seed. You can also make the original New England version which is truer to the original chowder recipe of the  late 1700's and early 1800s. This requires bacon, milk or cream (preferably milk) along with bottled clam juice and chopped razor clams. You can add Worcester sauce  for some zing. A milder version is corn chowder which subs in kernels for clams. This is filling without being heavy and it's a perfect supper for these between holiday meals.

Treat your palate and stomach to a light supper of soup. A bowl is a nice change from the usual wild and heavy holiday fare. Have some for a  tasty yet soothing respite .