lousy smarch weather
soups & sandwiches, another pantry battle, and the pizza I can't shut up about
How did February fly by at warp eight despite being only two days shorter than January (which seemed to last 16 weeks) this year? One of my creative deadlines is rapidly approaching, too, now that we’ve entered March, and having a deadline always makes time pass faster than you’d like it to. I sit down at my computer to write, and then I blink and suddenly it’s 5:30 and time to make dinner, and I’ve only written a few paragraphs. But at least one of those times I managed to use it as an excuse to try one of the two pizza places near to us. I’ll definitely miss being walking distance from Farina a Legna, but we got two really nice pizzas from Lucky Fingers, a veggie and a sweet chili. It’s kind of an odd place— a takeout counter that has pizza, coffee, and pastries, but the donuts were totally decent, too (we got a vanilla custard-filled). And I still get to look forward to trying Scratch Kitchen in the future.
I got to feast on the leftovers all weekend like a college bachelor, because Jeff was away visiting his dad, and any time he’s out of town I embrace the excuse to eat a lot of cheese. So even though I didn’t cook, I did use some of the time to fix a cupboard that’s been plaguing me since we moved in. The shelves were arranged in a way that made it impossible to put away the oils and sauces I wanted to keep in there, but we’d already unpacked some other things into it out of necessity, so the sauces were still in boxes, and because I felt so defeated by having to take everything out of the cupboards again to move the shelves, I just hadn’t gotten around to it. It took me about two hours and a can of IPA to get it to a place I’m relatively happy with, but it freed me from the burden of another three boxes.
While some parts of the continent seem to be… well, enjoying doesn’t feel like the right word for it when we can’t help thinking about climate collapse, but experiencing an early spring, here we’ve been getting a last gasp of winter the past couple of weeks, with temperatures below zero and even some snow. When I decided to use a few centimetres of it as an excuse not to go to the grocery store, I forgot that that didn’t mean I wouldn’t have to make dinner, and I made this red lentil soup again. It’s got a lot of flavour from only a few ingredients, and pretty much hands-off to make once you’re done chopping up the onion. Especially if you’re extra lazy like me and just use chili crisp for garnish, instead of making the chili oil from the recipe.
Later in the week I made the red-hot tempeh BLTs from Isa Does It. This uses a simple smoky hot sauce marinade that makes it more reminiscent of buffalo wings than of bacon in my opinion, but it makes such a good, satisfying sandwich. I like to cook some of the tempeh the night of, and then leave some to continue marinating until lunch (or dinner again) the next day. Jeff and I split a sandwich and had some of the soup leftovers with it for a nice little diner meal.
Also on the soup front, I saved this chicken and rice soup recipe awhile ago after finding it when it was too sunny and warm to want to eat it, and I’m pleased to say it was incredibly delicious and really easy to make. I started it while watching “Trials and Tribble-ations” (Deep Space Nine S5E6, for the uninitiated) and barely had to look away, even though I sautéed onion and celery at the start instead of following the recipe precisely. The comments are correct that the star here is the gremolata garnish— the soup is very simply seasoned in a way that’s lovely and comforting on its own, but the bright flavours of the lemon zest, parsley, and raw garlic really make it shine.
I’m not sure which of my twitter mutuals shared this chickpea cauliflower wrap recipe a week or two ago (if you’re reading this, thank you), but I left the tab open and finally got around to making it recently. Chickpeas are baked until crispy in the oven and tossed with a little seasoning, and a head of cauliflower gets chopped up and browned in the same way. Usually I tend to crisp up chickpeas in a cast iron pan, but you do get a different texture from doing them in the oven, and I’ve found they hold their crunch a little better than the pan-fried ones do for leftovers. While these are doing their thing in the oven, you can prepare the other elements. The main topping is quick-pickled red onion with cilantro, and even though I’m not generally a big fan of the pungent taste of raw onion, this worked really well here, though I might pre-salt the onion first next time to take some of the bite out of it.
The sauce for this was absolutely amazing: sort of a chipotle-lime crema. The recipe uses yogurt, but I didn’t have anything plain, so I used sour cream instead, and one chipotle was enough, but if they’re smaller, use two. The recipe has a step where you mix the chickpeas and cauliflower together with a bit of the sauce before assembling and serving, which seemed odd to me— why go through the trouble of roasting everything to make it crispy only to sog it up with a bunch of sauce? It might work if you’re using everything immediately, but it also worked perfectly fine just to spread a bunch into the tortilla or pita and put the filling on top, and then dollop on a bit more at the end after adding lettuce and the pickled onion. I gladly ate the leftovers for the next two days, and I can definitely see this joining my regular rotation. I think the sauce would be a good starting point for other fillings, too.
My brother and his partner were in town briefly from Victoria, so I invited them and my mom and stepdad over to see our new apartment (still a work in progress, but not so much that I’m embarrassed if my family sees it). I had a mild moment of panic when I realised I’ve forgotten how to entertain, so when they showed up I had newspaper all over the couch because the serving dish I wanted was still in a box and I therefore had to unpack the whole box. But we put out a snack that never fails: olives, taftoon, and instant pot hummus. The link here is just a loose guide on how to make it, but cooking the chickpeas this way gives it that restaurant-smooth texture without having to peel the skin off the chickpeas by hand. No photo because I was too busy having a nice time with my family (ie. my brother stuck a stainless steel ladle in his sleeve and pretended it was some kind of wizard’s orb).
If you’ve been reading this newsletter for awhile, you’re aware that we make pizza about once a week (sometimes we skip a week if we’re too busy for the dough process, or will be out on the weekend), and in a week where we didn’t have enough cheese or sauce for two pizzas, I remembered something we’ve been meaning to try: cacio e pepe pizza. The method was described in the same book we use for the dough, so I knew it would be trustworthy, and it manages to seem impressive even when you have almost nothing else in the house (assuming pecorino is a fridge staple for you like it is for me).
Anyway, the method for this is very cool: you form the crust as usual, then place it under the broiler with some lightly crushed ice spread out on it, and the ice will melt and boil as the crust cooks. I kept having to peek at it through the oven window, because it just seemed like such a fun thing to do. When it comes out, there will be a little puddle of hot water in the centre, and grated pecorino is sprinkled over top— this will form the sauce. The recipe says to lightly shake the pizza to mix it around, but I had better luck just spreading it gently with a fork. Finally, grate a bunch of black pepper over the whole thing and top with some olive oil and a little more cheese (this won’t melt). All week I was showing photos of this pizza around like it was my child. An amazing work to reward ratio for this beauty, and I’m proud to have finally found a cacio e pepe that will not defeat me.
Thanks for reading— if you enjoyed this newsletter, please share it with someone new! I like providing this to you for free, but it does still involve time and effort, so any donations, especially while I’m still looking for work, are greatly appreciated. I’m going to try to get back to writing this weekly, so hopefully I’ll be back in your inbox next Friday (but please forgive me if I’m not). In the meantime, I leave you with the many distinctions of “I could eat”.