Addicted to Noodles

We (I) cook a lot here Chez RosenBum, as you know. We've got some favourites that pop up a couple of times a month, but we also like to experiment with new recipes. What often happens with new recipes is that I read about a food, or try something in a restaurant, and get obsessed with replicating it.

A couple of weeks back, I started reading a blog that reviews restaurants (mostly Asian) in Southern California. Random, I know. Anyways, one of the dishes mentioned was dan dan/dandan noodles, and I needed to eat them. After an afternoon spent trying to find restaurants in Toronto that serve them (not our Hakka place, sadly), I moved on to trying to find a recipe. Having never actually eaten them before, I was basing my recipe requirements on what sounded tasty and do-able at home. I ended up discovering that America's Test Kitchen had a recipe, but of course ATK won't let you access their recipes without a membership. I have no issue with paying for content, and had been contemplating an ATK membership, but I wanted these noodles NOW. Luckily, someone has (probably illegally) posted the recipe on Food.com, and it can be found here.

We're lucky that we live in a neighbourhood with a huge Chinese population, thus our No Frills has lots of speciality ingredients that might be hard to find elsewhere. Over the years we've amassed a pretty broad collection of Asian sauces, so I didn't have to buy anything extra for those, but I did really want fresh noodles. Fortunately, No Frills had options, and I opted for the thing that looked tastiest. The recipe calls for chinese rice wine or dry sherry, but I just used the Harvey's Bristol Cream I had on the bar cart. Otherwise, it's a really simple recipe that came together in less than 30 minutes.

And it's DELICIOUS. Everything I ever wanted in a noodle dish. I had a huge bowl and was beyond jealous that David got to eat the leftovers.

Now this was on Saturday. Last night, I needed to make dinner, and all I could think about was dan dan noodles, so I made them again. This is the first time that I have ever made a recipe twice in one week. I was shopping at our IGA instead of No Frills, so used fresh linguine instead of Chinese noodles. I also used the full amount of chicken broth (I only used 1 cup on Saturday) and it made for a saucier sauce. I think I liked it better that way.

What was the last thing that you made that was so delicious you immediately needed to make it again?

Single Food

Well, that was quite an...(checks calendar)...eight months. I do NOT know how that happened. I cannot even count the number of times we've made a lovely meal, taken pictures, I've written a post in my head and then...never did anything about it. But life has settled somewhat, for now anyways, and I've missed having a space to talk about our cooking (RIP SweetSpot). I daren't commit to anything resembling a schedule, but I'd like to think you can expect to see recipes, reviews of cookbooks and other food related books, and other things that I find interesting in the world of food.

When I was a single gal, lo those years ago, many a bad night would finish with the punchline, "and then I ate an entire box of macaroni and cheese". Almost 5 years later, I'll still make macaroni and cheese, but it's usually of the homemade baked variety for big BBQs and comfort dinners. Now, it doesn't happen very often, but I am occasionally left with a night at home with no-one to feed but myself. And I'll admit, my first thought is always to have a box of Kraft Dinner. I often talk myself out of it though, as I really try to avoid processed food as much as possible, and that cheese powder is almost certainly the definition of processed food. To get to the new punchline, it was in making dinner for D and I last week that I discovered my new single girl food. It's just as easy as a box of KD but contains far less crap, and I can assure you is just as delicious.

Behold: Cacio e Pepe.

The only unusual thing you need is Pecorino Romano, and if they have it at my IGA, I can promise you can find it almost anywhere. Scheffler's Deli at the St. Lawrence Market has great Pecorino Romano, and it's cheaper than the piece I buy at the store. Once you've bought a piece, it will last for several meals, and since it's a hard cheese you have a little more breathing room when it comes to using it. The only part that's any work is grating the cheese and that takes about 30 seconds, depending on your grating device (note to self: buy new box grater with smaller holes).

The thing I particularly like about this recipe is that it's super easy to cut down to a smaller portion. I'm a recipe follower to the enth degree and I find it very difficult to improvise around these types of thing. It's always hard to know how to cut down a recipe involving a sauce, especially. This though, you basically cut down by 6ths or 8ths, depending on your appetite, and it's easy peasy.

To make it even easier, I would recommend:
-use spaghetti if you have it, but any long and thin pasta will do (I particularly like it with fettuccine)
-putting out your measuring cup for the pasta water when you put the pasta in, as I am forever forgetting to scoop out some water before I drain my pasta
-grating more cheese than you think you need and leaving out your cheese and grating equipment just in case you need more
-using less pepper than you think you need, as it can quickly become overwhelming - better to need more than have a dish ruined
-if you forget the butter, it's no big thing

But I'm curious, what's your single food?