#95 - Sicilian Tuna and White Bean Bruschetta

When Borders went out of business, we not only got the Jonathan Waxman book, but we also bought this cookbook from frequent Iron Chef judge Donatella Arpaia.

Sicilian Tuna and White Bean Bruschetta

From Donatella Cooks This recipe has two ingredients we know go well together from our Ligabue salad - tuna fish and cannellini beans. This is a bruschetta, so you have to get some nice crusty bread, slice it and toast it or grill it up. After making a little mustard and red onion vinaigrette, you mix that with the cannellini beans and puree some of that to make the whole topping extra smooth. This was a really nice little appetizer. There was a lot of topping, so we kinda felt like it was something else (maybe an open faced Italian tuna salad sandwich?) rather than bruschetta, but it was tasty.

The vinaigrette added nice flavor, and the onions added a solid crunch to the semi-pureed topping. All in all, this was a great appetizer / side dish / whatever you want to call it. You should have the ingredients in your pantry from your Ligabue stock. So make this instead one time.

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup olive oil plus extra for brushing
• 1 1/2 Tbs red wine vinegar
• 1/4 tsp Dijon mustard
• 1 small garlic clove, minced
• 1/2 cup thinly sliced red onion, soaked for 30 minutes in ice-cold water
• Kosher salt
• Black pepper
• 1 15-oz can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained well
• 1 250-gram jar imported olive oil-packed Italian tuna, drained
• 20 fresh mint leaves, cut in thin strips
• 4-6 slices rustic Italian bread

Preparation

1. Whisk together 1/4 cup of the olive oil, vinegar, mustard, and garlic in a small bowl.
2. Add half of the onions, toss, and let stand for 5 minutes.
3. Season with salt and pepper.
4. Combine the beans and onion vinaigrette in a large bowl.
5. Puree one-third of the mixture in a food processor until smooth.
6. Fold this mixture back into the beans, add the tuna and the remaining 1/4 cup of olive oil, and all but 1 Tbs of the mint.
7. Mix until the tuna is no longer chunky.
8. Brush the bread slices with olive oil, toast, and cut in half, if desired.
9. Arrange the bread slices on a platter.
10. Spoon some of the tuna-bean mixture onto each slice.
11. Garnish with the remaining onions and mint and serve.

#92 - Arugula Salad with Caramelized Onions, Goat Cheese, and Candied Walnuts

It's December, and we're winding down the 100 recipes! This one is #92 so after today's salad, there'll only be eight more recipes to go!

Arugula Salad with Caramelized Onions, Goat Cheese, and Candied Walnuts

From Bon Appetit We saw this recipe in Bon Appetit and had to try it. It's a salad with candied nuts on top. That's right, salad with candy. Like with the Caesar Salad we made a few months back, the first step is to make homemade croutons. Yet another thing that makes this recipe awesome. Then you caramelize the walnuts, caramelize the onions, and put it all together, topping with some goat cheese. So how was it? Well, let's just put it this way. We may never make another salad again.

This was so tasty with the bitterness of the arugula meeting the sweetness of the walnuts, combining with the flavors of the onions and goat cheese, and the crunch of the croutons. What's not to like? Here's what you need to do to make a salad that everybody you know or care to know will enjoy.

Caramelized Onions

Ingredients

• 1 Tbs olive oil
• 1 medium red onion, thinly sliced
• 1 Tbs balsamic vinegar
• Salt
• Pepper

Preparation

1. Heat olive oil in a medium skillet over medium-high heat.
2. Add the onions and saute until golden, about 18 minutes.
3. Remove from heat.
4. Sprinkle with the vinegar and stir to blend.
5. Season with salt and pepper.

Candied Walnuts

Ingredients

• 1/6 cup (packed) light brown sugar
• 1/8 cup water
• 1 Tbs butter
• Large pinch of salt
• 3/4 cup walnut halves

Preparation

1. Combine sugar, water, butter, and salt in a medium skillet over medium heat.
2. Bring to a boil, whisking.
3. Boil for 1 minute.
4. Add the walnuts and stir.
5. Toss until the syrup forms a glaze on the nuts, about 3 minutes.
6. Transfer the nuts to a sheet of foil and quickly separate nuts with forks.
7. Cool completely.

Croutons

Ingredients

• 2 cups 1/2-inch cubes crustless country bread
• 1 1/2 Tbs olive oil
• Salt
• Pepper

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350.
2. Place the bread cubes in a large bowl.
3. Drizzle with the olive oil, tossing to coat evenly.
4. Spread the cubes on a rimmed baking sheet.
5. Season with salt and pepper.
6. Bake croutons until crisp, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes.

Salad

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 Tbs olive oil
• 1 1/2 Tbs balsamic vinegar
• Salt
• Pepper
• 1 5-oz package baby arugula
• 1 5-oz package soft goat cheese, broken into 1/2-inch pieces, chilled

Preparation

1. Whisk olive oil and vinegar in a small bowl.
2. Season with salt and pepper.
3. Place the arugula in a large bowl.
4. Drop in onions, tossing to distribute evenly.
5. Add nuts, croutons, and goat cheese.
6. Toss with enough dressing to coat lightly.

#70 - Cornbread

Cornbread is delicious. If you want to eat cornbread as often as possible (and who doesn't?), you have to know how to make it yourself. Here's our shot at it.

Cornbread

From The New York Times We like our cornbread to be more on the sweet side rather than savory, and so we scoured the Internet for recipes and finally settled on this one from The New York Times. To get started, you melt some butter in the pan you're going to cook the whole thing in, and then you start mixing the cornmeal and other dry ingredients. You add some eggs and milk, and then you pour the batter into the melted butter. Then you put the whole thing in the oven for half an hour. Overall, this recipe was pretty good. The original recipe called for 1/4 to 1/2 cup sugar, and we went with the half cup, and it still wasn't as sweet as it could have been. It was also a little grittier than we'd like, and that might have had to do with the choice of cornmeal. So while it may not be the best cornbread we've ever had, it was still tasty, and maybe we could learn to adjust it a bit to make it just right. If you want to try cornbread at home, this deserves a shot.

Ingredients

• 4 Tbs butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups medium-grind cornmeal
• 1/2 cup flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/4 cups milk, more if needed

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 375.
2. Put butter in an 8-inch square baking pan, and place pan in oven.
3. Meanwhile, combine dry ingredients in a bowl.
4. Mix eggs into milk, then stir this mixture into dry ingredients, combining with a few swift strokes.
5. If mixture seems dry, add another Tbs or two of milk.
6. When butter and oven are hot, remove pan from oven.
7. Pour batter into pan and smooth out top.
8. Return pan to oven, and bake until top is lightly browned and sides have pulled away from pan, about 30 minutes.
9. Remove from oven and serve hot.

#65 - Mamu's Apple Salad

There is a recipe for a delicious apple-custardy thing that is sweet and tasty and a perfect side dish for any pork meal. According to the Great Mu, that recipe is called "Apple Salad." Don't be tricked into thinking this resembles salad in any way. There are no vegetables, there's no dressing, and the whole thing is baked in the oven. This is not your typical apple salad.

Mamu's Apple Salad

From The Great Mu As already mentioned, there are no vegetables in this recipe. It's basically just apples and butter. And it's really easy to make. All you do is peel and slice the apples, and then add in the sugar, flour, milk, and eggs. Then you plop it in the oven for half an hour, let it cool, and dig in.

And boy is it tasty. It is by far the tastiest non-salad-salad you'll ever eat. And it goes perfectly with Open-Faced Cuban Sandwich Sliders. You should try this next time you're making pork or are just in the need of a sweet side dish.

Ingredients

• 6 medium apples
• 3 eggs
• 3 Tbs flour
• 4 Tbs butter, plus additional for greasing bowl
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup evaporated milk

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 325.
2. Butter a large oven-proof bowl.
3. Peel and slice the apples and put in the buttered bowl.
4. In a medium bowl, beat the eggs.
5. Add sugar and mix well.
6. Add flour 1 Tbs at a time, mixing with each addition.
7. Add milk and mix.
8. Pour milk and egg mixture over the apples, covering apples well.
9. Dot the top of the apples with butter.
10. Cover bowl with foil and bake for 30 minutes.
11. Remove foil and bake for an additional 15 minutes until set.

#63 - Cinnamon Coffee Cake

Back before we were married, four of Emily's cousins gave us The Joy of Cooking as a present for our wedding shower. But along with the 4,500 recipes from Irma S. Rombauer, we got an extra four recipes courtesy the Renda ladies. A couple years later, here's the first one we're trying.

Cinnamon Coffee Cake

From Celina Renda This coffee cake is a really easy recipe, and it calls for your usual baking ingredients - flour, sugar, butter, salt, and egg.

The recipe didn't specify what kind of brown sugar to use, and as you can see from the picture, we used dark brown. That's fine, but we only used it because it's what we had. We'd probably recommend light brown sugar if you have it. So this is super easy. All you do is mix together practically all the ingredients and pour them in a greased dish. Then you sprinkle a mixture of the brown sugar and cinnamon on top, and drizzle some melted butter on top too. Oh wow. We knew that Celina made tasty treats from her brownies at Christmastime, but this was crazy good. The cake was nice and dense, the crumble on top was sweet and delicious, and the whole thing made breakfast a joy. Don't wait two years to make this:

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1 egg
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 3/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 cup butter

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 400.
2. Grease a 9x9 inch baking dish.
3. Mix together the flour, white sugar, baking powder, salt, egg, and milk in a large bowl with a spoon until well-blended.
4. Pour batter in prepared baking dish.
5. Melt butter over low heat in a small saucepan.
6. Mix brown sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl, and sprinkle mixture over batter in baking dish.
7. Pour melted butter over entire cake.
8. Bake for 20-22 minutes.
9. Cut cake into squares and remove from baking dish.

#58 - Corn and Black Bean Salad

Pete Beck made this salad at Grandma Bebe's house earlier this summer, and since it was really tasty and pretty easy to make, we thought it deserved a spot in the Hundred.

Corn and Black Bean Salad

From Pete Beck
This is a corn and black bean salad, so make sure you have corn and black beans. You're also gonna need a red onion, a lime, and cilantro if you have some. We didn't.
Basically, you're just cutting and mixing here.
We've been getting some really nice corn on the cob from Farmer Randy this summer, and this is the first time that we've cut the kernels off of the ear. It's surprisingly entertaining.
This is a really great summer salad. It's light and flavorful and has that zing of citrus from the lime.
This is so easy, you really don't have an excuse not to make this.

Ingredients

• 3 ears of corn, husked
• 1 red onion, diced
• 1 can black beans
• 1 lime
• 2 Tbs olive oil
• Salt
• Black pepper

Preparation

1. Fill a large pot with water and add corn.
2. Set on high heat. Remove corn when water begins to boil.
3. When slightly cooled, slice kernels off of cob.
4. Mix corn, onion, and black beans in a large bowl.
5. In a small bowl, whisk together the juice of one lime and the olive oil.
6. Toss dressing with corn salad, and season with salt and pepper to taste.

#56 - Zucchini Patties

Something that we've been wanting to make for quite some time now are these tasty fried zucchini patties that Emily's grandmother makes. Normally when she cooks up a batch, they're gone in just a few minutes, so we figured if we could make them ourselves, we'd have better odds of tasting one.

Zucchini Patties

From Bebe Renda
We've gotten some nice zucchini from Farmer Randy before (we think we used one in our ratatouille), but nothing compares to the giant zucchini you find in New Jersey. Emily just got back from a weekend with her family, and she brought home this behemoth.
This is actually a pretty easy recipe to make. Once you have your zucchini, you chop it and boil it; and magically, the insides fall out, and you're left with these beautiful little arcs.
Then, you mix together all of the ingredients in a bowl, spoon little dollops into a pan, and fry them up.
Then you eat them all really quickly. They're tasty hot, they're tasty at room temperature, and we don't know about anything else because they don't last long enough to be eaten cold.
Find yourself a baseball bat-sized zucchini and make these.

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup Panko bread crumbs
• 1/4 cup grated Parmigiano cheese
• 3 large eggs
• 2 medium zucchini, sliced into small pieces
• Olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 sprigs basil, ripped into small pieces

Preparation

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add zucchini pieces and boil until soft, about 7 to 8 minutes.
2. In a medium bowl, mix eggs, bread crumbs, garlic, and basil.
3. Add the cooked zucchini into the bread crumb mixture, and use hands to mix together.
4. Add grated cheese.
5. If the mixture is too dry, add another egg. If it's too wet, add more bread crumbs.
6. Cover the bottom of a medium skillet with olive oil and heat over medium-high heat.
7. Spoon small to medium-sized balls of mixture into the pan.
8. Cook patties on one side until lightly browned; then flip and continue cooking until browned.
9. Drain on a rack covered with paper towels.

#54 - Ratatouille's Ratatouille

We've talked about Smitten Kitchen before, and we've shown her Spiced Sweet Potato Wedges and her Red Bean Chili on this site.

But this was the recipe that started it all for us. We saw this post, thought it was awesome, and followed her blog. Now we're finally getting around to making it.

Ratatouille's Ratatouille

From Smitten Kitchen
Yep, this is the recipe for the ratatouille made at the end of the movie Ratatouille. We do, however, try to keep our kitchen rodent free.
This recipe calls for a lot of slicing and dicing. So after cutting the garlic by hand, we pulled out our handy KitchenAid slicer attachment to do the rest.
Then, just like in the movie, you layer all the vegetables in concentric rings until it looks all pretty.
And it looks pretty when it's cooked too.
This was a really good recipe, and a fun way to use up all of Farmer Randy's vegetables. We had it as a side dish to a meatloaf, but it could be eaten on its own if you want a light vegetarian meal.
If you want to eat like a rat, here's what to do:

Ingredients

• 1/2 onion, finely chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, very thinly sliced
• 1 cup tomato puree
• 2 Tbs olive oil, divided
• 1 small eggplant
• 1 small zucchini
• 1 small yellow squash
• 1 red bell pepper
• 3 sprigs fresh thyme
• Salt
• Black pepper
• Soft goat cheese (optional)

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 375.
2. Pour tomato puree in the bottom of an oval baking dish.
3. Drop the sliced garlic pieces and chopped onion into the sauce.
4. Stir in 1 tablespoon of the olive oil, and season generously with salt and pepper.
5. Slice the eggplant, zucchini, yellow squash, and red bell pepper into very thin slices, approximately 1/16-inch thick.
6. Arrange slices of cut vegetables atop the tomato puree, going from the outer edge to the inside of the baking dish, overlapping slightly.
7. Drizzle the remaining tablespoon of olive oil over the vegetables and season with salt and pepper.
8. Remove the leaves from the sprigs of thyme and sprinkle over the vegetables.
9. Cover the dish with a piece of parchment paper cut to fit inside.
10. Bake for 45-55 minutes, until the vegetables have released their liquid and are clearly cooked and the tomato sauce is bubbling.
11. Serve with a dab of soft goat cheese (optional).