The Generous Pour at Capital Grille

Warning: Fake wine snobbery ahead.

Recently Katie and I were invited to a free event celebrating Capital Grille’s Generous Pour event. The event itself is an all you can drink wine pours for $25. 9 summer wines are featured, some available for the first time in America. Now, normally Katie and I are not normally wine drinkers. We’re definitely not oenophiles. I had to look up how to spell the fancy word for lover of wine if that’s any indication. But we decided to check it out because it sounded like an interesting idea and we’ve always meant to stop by the Capital Grille since it’s only a couple blocks away from us.

First and foremost, can I mention they hand make their mozzarella every 2 hours hours for dishes like their caprese salad? It’s definitely something you can taste. The cheese was smooth, and not overly salty. When they told us it was constantly being made in house we were surprised, and I think it’s something that should be better known. That bit of extra effort earned big points from us.

Katie loved her main dish, a Bone-In Kona Crusted Dry Aged Sirloin w/ Shallot Butter. The sirloin was perfectly cooked, and being someone who truly hates coffee, was surprised at how well it worked on the meat. It was a meal full of surprises for her. Not a fan of seafood either, she thought the pan fried calamari was some of the best she had. She noted that it was neither chewy or had an overly fishy taste. And she couldn’t stop talking about the lobster mac & cheese.

My meal was much simpler, consisting of the previously mentioned caprese salad and a massive bowl full of pasta filled with crisp asparagus and other random vegetables. I’m still no fan of the “oh crap a vegetarian is here” bowl of noodles many restaurants serve, but for what it was it was tasty. The pasta wasn’t watery, cooked al dente and seasoned well.

Dessert’s highlight was the flourless chocolate espresso cake. Powdered with bittersweet chocolate and moist enough you would think it was undercooked, the cake and handmade vanilla bean ice cream was a great cap to the evening.

But that night the meal was almost a precursor to the wine. Each course was paired with two different wines, an American pour and an imported specialty.

I’ll list all the wines available below for this special event, but I wanted to talk mostly about the ones I enjoyed, because it’s my blog dammit. As I mentioned above, neither of us are wine drinkers. Katie probably less so than me. She knows she likes nice fruity white wines and sticks with that, while I have no real preference. I can’t taste out the spices in wine, or the hoppiness in beer. All I know is if something tastes good to me. And taste is far more important than being able to recite a list of ingredients as far as I’m concerned.

When you go, and you really should if you’re a fan of wine (or a fan of $25 dollar bottomless wine), definitely check out the La Cana Albarino, Rias Baixas from Spain. The Spanish white blew away the Californian white. It went well with the appetizers being served, supporting the flavors instead of over powering them. The Californian white, Chateau St. Jean, Belle Terre from California, just had an aftertaste that overpowered the original sip.

Dinner was served with 5 different reds (the most red wine I’ve ever had), 3 from California and 2 from Europe. The highlights were a California red, Chalk Hill Estate, Cabernet Sauvignon from Sonoma, and a Spanish red available for the first time in the US, Tarima Hill, Monastrell, Alicante.

The Chalk Hill red benefits from the grapes being cultivated over a volcanic chalk which adds an extra flavor which surprised me. It was the wine I was most interested and most weary about trying, yet turned out to be my favorite red of the evening.

As I mentioned, the Tarima Hill is an exclusive at the Capital Grille, and is great for those who like a spicy red wine. I can’t say I would drink it normally, but I can see why it’s paired with the Grille’s steaks.

But honestly, my favorite wine of the evening was a “port” from Australia, RL Buller, The Portly Gentleman. It can’t officially be called a Port for regional reasons, but the emphasis on the label lets you know it’s going for a tawny port flavor. It was sweet. It was thick. It was like drinking a fruity cherry syrup. It was like liquid candy.

For just $25 with dinner, you are invited to enjoy as many of these red, white and sparkling gems as you like. Each vintage was hand-selected by Master George Miliotes to ensure that there is something for everyone in this collection

Consumer Reports: “Why Your Favorite Fast Food Sucks/Rules”

The newly released Consumer Reports article isn’t going to shock anyone in terms of what they discovered when rating the fast food world of burgers, pizzas, tacos and chicken. It may shock you to learn that they think (insert your favorite restaurant here) in fact does not have good food, and why the hell are you eating there anyways?

In n’ Out ranks highest, which even I, a non-meat eater, would tell you. The burgers just look better than other chains. Not to mention their fries and shakes are outstanding. I would also tell you that Burger King ranks the lowest purely because of how awful the (late and not missed) BK Veggie tasted.

But go on! See for yourself! What’s your favorite fast food restaurant?

For the record, I can’t disagree with CR’s toppers. Although I do enjoy Baja Fresh if I can get it over Chipotle. So take THAT Consumer Reports.

Why I Can’t Be Vegan – Soy Cheese

In my early days of going vegetarian, I briefly flirted with the idea of just dropping all animal products and trying out veganism. I figured I was able to cut out red meat, chicken and fish pretty much (I realize now I just painted myself into a painful pun corner) cold turkey. Here is what I’ve learned: I can never be a vegan. Maybe it’s because I don’t have the animal rights fire burning within, or maybe I realized it just wasn’t cost effective for me to, at the time, make nearly everything by hand. I lived in an age before vegan options regularly appeared on menus. I was a broke student. It just wasn’t going to happen.

flickr.com / via boojee

But now I realize, at my age where I COULD afford it, I don’t want to be a vegan because I would miss cheese too damn much. And no, soy cheese is not a good substitution. Soy cheese is like getting some cheap knockoff shoes while your friends have the real brands, and your parents keep trying to convince you that your shoes are just as good. No mom and dad, Pro-Wings are not as good as Reebok and Nike, and the fact I was ostracized by my 4th grade class proved this.

And before anyone makes a snide remark that maybe it was my personality, of COURSE it was my personality. But we all had defective personalities, we were honors students. I’m surprised we knew how to interact with each other.

I’ve given soy cheese a chance several times over the years. But I bring it up now because we’ve come a long way from the early days of veggie substitutes. Ian’s Pizza in Wrigleyville (of the mac ‘n cheese pizza fame) now offers a vegan night every Thursday.  It’s a great idea, and really shows just how far some restaurants have come to make sure their customers are happy. We rushed over there the first Thursday it was available even though I remembered well my disdain of the fake cheese. What can I say, I’m either an optimist or a glutton for punishment. The veggie pepperoni on the slice I got was delicious; not really pepperoni, but just as spicy. Their crust was light, fluffy and crispy as usual. But the cheese sat there barely melted, looking at it’s fat-filled, perfectly melted cousin. Katie’s slice, the cheese wasn’t melted at all.

This week I stopped at Whole Foods (preparing for Chicago’s #SNOMG) to see Tofurky has released their own vegan pizzas. I bought one, naturally, my experience with soy cheese at Ian’s already forgotten. Too lazy to cook I heated it up last night and ran into the same results. Not only was there not enough soy-cheese on it, but again, it sat under the pepperoni only slightly melted.

Also for 8 bucks? That is a ridiculously small pizza. Shame on Tofurky, or Whole Foods, or both of you.

And that’s why soy cheese will never replace the real thing. You don’t get the visceral joy of cheese forming strings from the pizza to your mouth. You’ll never have a stuffed soy cheese pizza because there’s no way you’d get that sight of cheese oozing out the sides. And we all know the cheese oozing out the sides is the best part of stuffed pizza. It’s why we steal it from other slices.

I’m glad that vegans have an option for a pizza replacement, but until they get a fake cheese to mimic the beautiful, stringy, melty, creamy deliciousness that is real cheese, I can never, ever be vegan.

P.S. This argument also applies to butter.

I do not like your recipes Biggest Loser

We’ve been attempting to eat healthier, and to do so we invested some money in the Biggest Loser cookbook collection. We’ve also discovered the problem with many of the diet cook books: The food is bland. Chicago magazine’s food section, Dish, had a great quote from Andy Rooney (something I never thought I’d say):

“The two biggest sellers in any bookstore are the cookbooks and the diet books. The cookbooks tell you how to prepare the food, and the diet books tell you how not to eat any of it.”

Diet cook books as a rule tend to rely on only the essential ingredients for getting you everything you need to survive. But in many cases they also sacrifice flavor in place of weight loss. I’ve always felt that you lose weight because you end up hating what your new image of food is in your head. Most of us that are overweight love the TASTE of food.  Even with a salad wouldn’t you rather have the one that includes goat cheese, cranberries, candied walnuts and apples over spinach instead of the one that’s merely lettuce, tomato and cucumber? Of course! There’s different flavors blending together. The goat cheese’s bitter mixes with the cranberries’ sweet to provide you with something that tastes good rather than just filling not only your belly but your dietary need for vegetables.

Yet all those little extra things add up calories, and that’s not even counting a dressing if you get one. All those extra calories, even at 10 here or 20 there, soon snowball into you eating far more than your daily intake should be. For someone my age height, I’m told I should weigh 200 pounds. My current LoseIt calorie limit is 2000 calories. Man that seems like more than enough food for one day!

Yet I’ve yet to find a great cookbook that learns how to balance weight loss and taste. Skinny Bitch in the Kitch has some great recipes, but I can’t vouch for how diet friendly they truly are. Weight Watchers has a vegetarian cookbook, but man, most of those recipes are just not good. And as I’ve mentioned, The Biggest Loser books have some great ideas with just okay results.

Instead, like the recipe below, we’re learning to adapt things to have a little more flavor. Sure the calories may increase, but at least we’re trying to make a difference in our lives. The recipe started as a healthy Biggest Loser chicken cheese steak sandwich. The closer we got to finished, the more we realized this was going to be a bland meal. So what started as a cheese steak turned into a shredded chicken BBQ sandwich. We switched out fat-free cheese with fresh Muenster. We added salt and pepper. We made it taste better at the sacrifice of strictly adhering to the idea of losing weight. But how many sacrifices do you make before you’re once again fighting over what you weigh and what you want to weigh?

Anyone have any good weight loss/diet cookbook recommendations?

Shredded Chicken BBQ Sandwich

• 1 cup white onion, quartered and thinly sliced
• 16 oz Trader Joe’s Chicken-less Strips
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/2 cup BBQ sauce
• 4 slices cheese of your choice
• 8 ounce baguette, or sandwich roll of choice
• 2 tablespoons olive oil

Heat the oil in a pan. Once hot, add the onions and cook over medium heat until soft, about 9-10 minutes. While the onions are cooking, shred/slice the chicken into thin strips. Add the chicken to the onions once onions are soft.  Add BBQ sauce,  salt and pepper. Mix thoroughly and cook until chicken is hot throughout.  Slice the bread into 4 equal servings (about 2 ounces per roll) and heat in the oven or microwave. Fill each roll with chicken mixture and lay a slice of cheese on top. Heat in oven or microwave until cheese is melted.  Serve.

Makes 4 sandwiches (3 if you were as hungry as we were)

Butternut Squash and “Sausage” Bake

Oh Serious Eats, you are seriously a great recipe source. Seriously. So is our friend Jen who pointed me to this recipe. She cooks it annually as part of her orphan Thanksgiving group, but mentioned that it would be something easily converted to vegetarian for someone like me, a dirty vegetarian.

A few notes:

• We are not the kind of cooks that have fresh thyme hanging around. The dry equivalent of one sprig is 1/2 teaspoon.
• We used a pretzel bread roll which made it tasty. If you don’t have individual slices, 3 slices of bread equals about 3 ounces.
• We took either Tofurky Italian sausage or Trader Joe’s Italian sausage and introduced them to a food processor. We went with a full 12 ounces of sausage for a heartier meal.

Butternut Squash and Sausage Bake (adapted from Serious Eats)

• 12 ounces Tofurkey or Trader Joe’s Italian sausage
• 1/4 cup olive oil, divided
• 3 sweet onions, quartered and thinly sliced
• 5 fresh thyme sprigs or 2 1/2 teaspoons dried
• 1 teaspoon marjoram
• 1 teaspoon rosemary
• salt and pepper
• 1 small butternut squash, peeled and chopped into 1/2 cubes, (about 6 cups) seeds and scrapings reserved
• 1/4 cup flour
• 1 cup shredded smoked mozzarella
• 3/4 cup extra flavor vegetable stock (2 teaspoons veggie stock in 3/4 cup water)
• 3 slices bread, cut into cubes
• 2 tablespoons melted butter, optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a 9″ x 12″ inch baking dish. Cook sausage in a large skillet over medium heat until it just begins to brown. Remove from skillet and set aside. Add 2 tablespoons oil, onions, thyme, marjoram, and rosemary. Season liberally with salt and pepper. Cook over medium heat for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. When onions are thoroughly soft, remove and set aside. While the onions cook, simmer the squash seeds and scrapings in the vegetable stock for 10 minutes, strain and keep the stock warm over low heat.

Add the remaining two tablespoons of olive oil to the skillet. Toss the squash with the flour and arrange in a single layer in the skillet. Let the squash brown, undisturbed, for 4 minutes then stir the squash as it cooks for the next 4 minutes. Season liberally with salt and pepper, and set aside.

To assemble the casserole:

• Layer the onions in the buttered baking dish.
• Evenly layer the sausage over the onions.
• Top with the squash.
• Sprinkle the mozzarella over the top.
• Pour the stock into the baking dish
• Press the top of the casserole with a spatula to evenly distribute.
• Cover tightly with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes.

While the casserole bakes, pulse the bread crumbs with the (optional) melted butter in a food processor until you have coarse bread crumbs. After 30 minutes remove the foil and top casserole evenly with breadcrumbs and bake uncovered an additional 20 to 30 minutes, until the liquid is absorbed and the top is nicely browned.

Serves 8 side servings, or 6 main dish servings.

Two Bites Times – A New Way To Read

Super awesome new Twitter toy, Paper.Li lets users create a virtual e-paper that gathers a list of their links collected from their twitter feed throughout the day. And it’s just so fun that I thought I needed to share.  Yeah, it’s a link dump, but with the current political season work load I’m dealing with, at least I feel that I’m not disappointing the WordPress gods who judge me for every day I don’t post.

Issue 2 is available here.

Issue two features top posts from Rick Bayless & Starbucks.  And as I grow my Twitter list, so too will the paper grow.

What does everyone think?  Yay or nay on the e-paper?

Healthifying Food & Wine’s Frittata

Food & Wine has some delicious recipes lurking within the pages of their monthly magazine. Those recipes, however, do very little for people trying to help watch what they’re eating.  A combination of cream, butter, oil and eggs can be found in most of the recipes; and of course they are, because they are delicious. It’s part of the reason I love baking. Yet with the wedding on, rich foods are not normally on a dieter’s menu.  For our weekend breakfast I flipped through the new issue just wondering if it was even possible to adapt any of their dishes for people who do not want to die at an early age. You’ll be shocked to hear this, but it turns out that ANY recipe is adaptable.

Vegetarian “Prosciutto” & Mozzarella Frittata (adapted from Food & Wine)

• 8 Large Egg Whites
• 1/4 cup non-fat Milk
• 2 Tbsp low-fat feta cheese
• 1 Tbsp dried Basil flakes
• 3/4 tsp Salt
• 1/2 tsp pepper
• 2 medium shallots, thinly sliced
• 1 tomato, diced
• 4 slices Lightlife Ham Deli Protein sliced into strips
• 4 ounces shredded mozzarella

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Chop the feta cheese in a small food processor or mincer.  In a bowl, beat the egg whites with the milk, feta, basil, salt and pepper.  Heat an 8-inch ovenproof nonstick skillet until a drop of water beads. Remove the skillet from heat and spray it with some cooking spray (prepare for smoke!) Add the shallots and cook over moderate heat until softened.  Stir in the tomato and “ham” until warm. Add the eggs and cook until they begin to set on the bottom. Sprinkle the mozzarella over the eggs, gently pressing it into the eggs. Bake the frittata for 20 minutes or until just set. Remove from the oven and shake the skillet over high until the frittata releases from the pan. Invert the frittata and let cool for 5 minutes before cutting into wedges.  Serve it!

Makes 6 servings at 97 calories a serving.

I wanted to provide a comparison of the original recipe to the slightly healthier version, but as you can tell based on my blogging habits, I am incredibly lazy (and occasionally busy). Just know that an ingredient that looks healthy here was very much not in the original recipe.  So remember, when trying this recipe, I am trying to make you healthier while eating food that should be rich. Food & Wine, though, is TRYING TO KILL YOU!

(Blame that last bit on Stephen Colbert’s March To Keep Fear Alive)

Vegetarian General Tso’s Chik’n

For as much as we love traditional ethnic foods, there is something to be said for those crazy Americanized ideas of what food should be in other countries.  Why try a traditional Chinese dish when you can try General Tso’s Chicken? It’s deep fried chicken covered in a sugar sauce! It’s brilliant! It barely resembles Chinese food! And it’s also delicious.

This recipe is no different.  And with two people working on it, one prepping while one watches the oil and frying, it’s also one of the easier setups.

In the end, I don’t know whom this General Tso is, but I salute his most-likely imaginary self for introducing cornstarch, soy sauce and sugar into such a delicious sauce.

Ingredients

• 1 package Trader Joe’s Chickenless Strips
• 1 Egg
• 3/4 cup Cornstarch
• 3 Tablespoons vegetable boullion
• vegetable oil
• 5 sliced green onions
• 2 Tablespoons minced ginger
• 2 Tablespoons minced garlic
• 1 1/3 cup vegetable broth
• 4 Tablespoons soy sauce
• 7 Tablespoons sugar
• Red pepper flakes to taste
• 2 Tablespoons vinegar

Directions

Cut the chik’n into 1 inch chunks.

Whisk egg with 2 Tbs. water. In a separate bowl mix cornstarch with veggie bouillon.

Heat oil, at least 1/4-1/2 inch deep, in a medium-sized pot.  Dip chik’n chunks into egg mixture then coat with cornstarch mixture. Fry in hot oil until golden brown. This may take several batches depending on your pot size.  Drain on paper towels.

Heat 1-2 tablespoons of oil in a separate pan fry the onions, ginger and garlic for about 2 minutes at a medium heat. When garlic starts to brown add the broth, soy sauce, sugar, pepper flakes and vinegar.

Whisk 2 tablespoons of cornstarch with 4 tablespoons of cold water and add this to the pan, stirring to thicken the sauce. As soon as the sauce begins to thicken remove from heat and add the chik’n to the sauce.

Serve with cooked rice, or in our case Israeli couscous.

Serves 3

Vegetarian Pepperoni Stromboli

When preparing Italian food, does anyone else get that commercial stuck in their head that uses the catchy remix of Mambo Italiano?

You know the one:

Okay, well that wasn’t the actual commercial, but a drunk baby singing Dean Martin is, and will always be, hilarious.

My joy of cooking and baking has diminished these past couple months, which I can only blame myself for causing.  I became obsessed with fighting calories and looking for weight-fighting recipes that ultimately resulted in dishes that may have been good for us, but left more than barely a mark on our memories.  And for people who love food, love eating, and love sharing food with others, I don’t know if there’s anything worse you can do to a collection of ingredients.

And that’s where the stromboli comes in.  I’ve never once attempted making any other than a pizza with pizza dough.  If I were in a boardroom, I would be chastised for thinking inside such a very small box.  And it’s not as if a stromboli is breaking new grounds, but I feel I’ve made some great (unhealthy) strides in breaking free of tasteless Weight Watchers recipes and once again realizing cooking should be fun.  I may never be a chef, being able to come up with the grandest of ideas within minutes (thank you Top Chef for making me feel even more food-dumb than I usually do), but I can embrace my pop culture cookery.  Find something I like, change it by 10%, and hope I don’t get sued.

Aside from being a tad salty, and missing a nice marinara sauce for dipping, this recipe was quite tasty, and fairly simple.  I used Mark Bittman’s recipe for pizza dough from his invaluable How To Cook Everything Vegetarian.  I just added some black pepper, oregano and garlic to the dough since the stromboli itself isn’t seasoned.  The stromboli recipe was (barely) altered from a Real Simple recipe we found offering many uses for leftover pizza dough.  We replaced the salami they call for vegetarian pepperoni, and used a lower sodium provolone cheese.  Most of the prep time is spent either waiting for the dough to rise, or baking the stromboli.

Also, stromboli is a ridiculously fun word to say out loud.  You should try it.

Mark Bittman’s Pizza Dough

• 3 cups bread flour
• 2 teaspoons instant yeast
• 2 teaspoons kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 cup water

Combine the flour, yeast, salt, pepper and oregano in a mixing bowl.  Slowly add the water, 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and garlic. Mix until the dough forms a ball and is slightly sticky to the touch. If the dough is dry, add more water a tablespoon at a time.  Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and knead for a few seconds to form a smooth ball. Put the last tablespoon of olive oil in the bowl and toss the dough, coating it well.  Cover the bowl and let rise for 1-2 hours.

Veggie Pepperoni Stromboli

• 1 pound Pizza Dough (see above recipe)
• 1/4 pound veggie pepperoni (we used Yves brand)
• 4 cups fresh spinach, stemmed
• 1/2 pound sliced low-sodium provolone

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Form dough into a 12-by-15-inch rectangle. Top with salami, fresh spinach, and provolone. Working from a short end, roll up the dough. Place seam-side down on an oiled baking sheet; brush with olive oil.  Bake until golden brown, 25 to 30 minutes. Serves 4.

Mexican Chocolate Snickerdoodles

The words Mexican Chocolate trigger something hiding within my brain whenever I read my Recipe RSS. “YES. STOP HERE.” Says my brain, and it does.  But here’s the thing, I’m not really a fan of Mexican Chocolate.  Katie is.  She’s the only reason I spend time trying to perfect the recipes that you see here involving this particular ingredient.  She gladly fills the stereotype of the girl who loves chocolate.  She believes that a Mexican meal is a failure without some type of mole sauce with which to smother her enchiladas. What can I say, she loves the chocolate and the spice.  I am still a believer that sweet and savory, at least where desserts are concerned, should remain on opposing sides of the mixing bowl.

So when I saw this recipe I knew I would at least have to try it. I stuck directly to the recipe, from Culinary in the Desert one of my favorite food blogs, for the first go around.  Now that I know the end result, there are things I’d definitely change.  I could the batches 1-2 minutes less, closer to 7-8 minutes to ensure a softer cookie.  I would also find a richer, deeper cocoa powder than the one I had available (Herhsey’s).  And if I’m feeling particularly spicy, maybe toss some tiny chocolate chunks dusted with cayenne pepper…for kicks.

But, that isn’t to say, this recipe isn’t any good.  It’s quite good, as most of my coworkers would agree. I just have a ridiculously high set standards for what I consider one of the best, softest, cookies in existence.

Mexican Chocolate Snickerdoodles (from Culinary in the Desert)

Ingredients

For the cookie dough
1 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup Dutch process cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup pure maple syrup
3 tablespoons milk
2 teaspoons vanilla

For the sugar coating
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon

To prepare cookie dough
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, cinnamon, cayenne and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together oil, sugar, maple syrup, milk and vanilla. Pour mixture into the dry ingredients, stirring with a wooden spoon until combined.

To prepare sugar coating
In a shallow dish, stir together sugar and cinnamon.

Roll dough into walnut sized balls, then gently flatten each ball into a 2″ disc. Place once side of the dough disc into the sugar coating, pressing to adhere. Place dough, sugar side up, onto parchment-lined baking sheets, spacing them at least 2″ apart.  Place into the oven and bake until the cookies have spread and are crackly on top, about 9 to 12 minutes. Remove from the oven and place baking sheet on a wire rack – let cookies cool for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes about 24 cookies.