Into the Soup

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Heidi’s Own Oyster Stew

December 28, 2009 / / 0 Comments

My father and I share a love for this simple soup.  It’s a great tummy settler for those of us who may have over indulged this weekend.

Ingredients

  • 2 6 oz. cans Oysters – with Juice
  • Whole Milk
  • 1 Cap, Worcestershire Sauce
  • 3 Dabs Butter
  • Salt and Pepper

Pour oysters and juice into medium saucepan over medium high heat.  Fill one of the oyster containers 1 ½ times with milk, add to saucepan and bring to a near scald.  Reduce the heat and add the Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper to taste.  Remove from the heat and add the butter.  Let it melt across the top of the milk. Serve in big bowls with a side of Nabisco Saltines and some more of that butter!

T’was The Birthday After Christmas & Italian Cream Cake

December 27, 2009 / / 0 Comments

I have never liked my birthday. Not for the fact of birthdays, any excuse to have a party, but for the date – December 26th – Boxing Day, the day that people recover from Christmas celebrations, pen their New Year resolutions, and gear up for the next holiday.  No one feels like going out or raising a glass, and presents are often the batteries for what you got the day before.

That is until this year.

Who would have thought that one could have a singularly spectacular birthday after the age of 39++? 

This year was special because my BFF, the friend I have had since second grade and her mom, Patty B, came to visit. Along with my wonderful family in-law, we feasted on surf and turf, made a big dent in the wine given during the holiday party, and indulged in the most spectacular Italian Cream Birthday Cake.

It was a blast and for once the day after Christmas became the party of the year. Wonders never cease. And, apparently, neither does the desire to blow out all the candles on the cake whilst lying on top of my dining room table.

 

 

In case you’re interested, the recipe for Italian Cream Cake is below.  I warn you, it is decadent, and it was even better the following morning with a really strong cup of coffee, 4 Advil and half a gallon of water… t’anks Patty!

 

Pat Martinson’s Italian Cream Cake

Cake

  • 2 cups sugar
  • 1 cup buttermilk
  • 1 stick butter
  • 1/2 cup Crisco
  • 5 eggs yolks
  • 1cup flour
  • 1 cup flaked coconut
  • 1 teaspoon soda
  • 5 egg whites, whipped stiff

Cream sugar and butter and Crisco until light and fluffy. Add the egg yolks one at a time. Mix the buttermilk, coconut and then add the flour and soda. Mix well. Fold in the egg whites. Butter and flour 3- 9″ cake pans. Bake 325 for 25 min. Cool on a rack and then frost and top with extra coconut.

Frosting

  • 8 ounces cream cheese, softened
  • 1 stick butter or margarine
  • 1 box of powdered sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 cup chopped nuts

Mix and cream all together. Frost tops of each cake and stack. Traditionaly this cake is not frosted on the sides and the nuts and coconut are sprinkled on the top. Refigerate and enjoy this marvelous cake.

Co McArthur’s Minnesota Heartland Soup

December 20, 2009 / / 0 Comments

By David Lee

 

It is Christmas week, so we needed a Soup of the Week that represents Christmas.  For me, there was never a question whose soup we would put on the site for this first Into the Soup Christmas. So, if you will please indulge me, I would like to tell you about someone who is quite amazing.

There is one place that truly means Christmas to me. When I was a kid, we moved a lot, so I don’t remember how many Christmas’ I actually spent there, but this place lingers in my memory. I am sure most everyone has just such a memory, usually from your childhood, that sticks with you so that no matter where else you spend Christmas, that place and time is the measure for all subsequent Christmas’. For me, it is a house just a few steps from the train on the North Shore of Chicago and, more importantly, the woman who lives there.

As a child, the house seems massive with a great staircase, four rooms upstairs, a basement where the kids played and a large, elegant living room with a fireplace, the perfect spot for the Christmas tree and plenty of room for presents. As the snow fell outside, the house was warm inside, and a series of great smells were always rising from the kitchen. Cherry pie, apple pie, cinnamon twists, the world’s best ginger cookies, or my favorite banana bread arrived as if off an assembly line. But, they were all baked by just one person, Mrs. Co McArthur.

Now, she would not like me disclosing this, but CoCo (or Co or Cozy if you wish) is my grandmother. This fact is an admission similar to what magicians call the “reveal.” You see, at 95 years old, Coco bears no resemblance to the typical grandmother. She has more energy than most people a third her age, and she gets more done before 9 A.M. than the US Army. She drives her own cherry red Cadillac, takes care of her house with little assistance, still plays the odd round of golf and arrived at her last birthday party on the back of a Harley motorcycle. This is the same party, by-the-way, where she took it on herself to order an Elvis impersonator to entertain the crowd.

CoCo has many activities that mean a lot to her, but two are very special. One is her curling club. She and my Grandfather, Chuck, joined the Chicago Curling Club in 1968, and she has been an active member ever since.  At age 93 she became the most mature woman to curl in a bonspiel (tournament) at the club, and then the bonspiel was named after her. If that were not enough, she manages the scoreboards for all major club events. In 1971, Coco became Secretary of the Women’s Western Golf Foundation which is a position she still holds today. The cause of the WWGA is education for women. The organization provides scholarships for worthy and deserving women to attend college.

Most importantly, CoCo has 3 children, 8 grandchildren, and 11 great-grandchildren all of whom look at her as a great role model and inspiration. I have not surveyed my cousins, but if I did, I have no doubt that they would hold similar memories of Christmas with Coco – the world’s greatest baker (and a darn good soup maker too). So, it is with great pride that I wedge myself into this weeks Soup of the Week to submitted by and dedicate to CoCo.

To learn more about the Women’s Western Golf Association, click here.

Merry Christmas from Into the Soup

 

Co McArthur’s Minnesota Heartland Soup

  • 1 pkg. Dry Beans
  • 3 qts. Water
  • 1 T. Salt
  • 1 Smoked Ham Hock
  • Bouquet Garni [in cheesecloth bag]

Rinse and drain beans.  Place all ingredients in 8 qt. pot and simmer 3 hours.

  • 1 28-oz. Can Italian Tomatoes
  • 2 C. Onion, Chopped
  • 2 C. Celery, Chopped
  • 1 Green Pepper, Chopped
  • 2 Cloves Garlic, Minced
  • Freshly Ground Pepper

Chop all vegetables and add to pot.  Simmer uncovered 1 ½ hours.

  • 1 lb. Sliced, Smoked Kielbasa Sausage
  • 1-2 Whole Chicken Breasts, Sliced Into Small Pieces While

     

    Raw or Slightly Frozen

Add sausage and chicken and simmer covered 40 minutes. This soup can be made a day or more ahead or frozen.  With an optional garnish of 2C. cooked white or wild rice, French bread and a green salad, this soup serves 10 to  12.  A Hearty Winter Dinner!

 

 

 

 

Sherry – The Comeback Wine

December 19, 2009 / / 0 Comments

by Chef Larry Canepa, Wine & Spirits Editor

Sherry is again gaining ground in the wine world, and it is well deserved.  I write ‘again,’ because Sherry has a long history of serving famous figures from Christopher Columbus to Shakespeare. Sherry is fashionable again because of its stellar value and food-friendly behavior.

Fundamentally, Sherry is a fortified wine, produced in Analucia, Spain in the Jerez-de la Frontera region.  Along with Porto and Madeira, Sherry is considered one of the three great fortified wines. Sherries range broadly in color, flavor, and sweetness, but fundamentally there are two types- fino and oloroso.

Spanish Sherry is made primarily from the Palomino grape along with small amounts of Pedro Ximénez  (PX for short) and Moscatel. The soil in this region is chalky, limestone based, and provides the perfect conditions for growing the Palomino and PX grapes that are used in making the world’s finest Sherries. Once harvested and fermented, the wines fate is then decided. Will it become a Fino or an Oloroso?

Fino is very dry with a lighter-body while Oloroso is still dry, but much richer in both flavor and body. If the winemaker is going for Fino, alcohol is added (fortification) until it reaches just over 15% alcohol content. If Oloroso is the goal, then alcohol is added to reach 18%. The alcohol content is important for reasons beyond the obvious. Because of its lower content, Finos allow a layer of yeast to coat the top where the wine meets the air. This enables a coating called “flor” to form and controls the oxidizing process. Olorosos on the other hand do not support the forming of the coating due to their higher alcohol content prodcing a darker, richer wine.

Generally, Sherries are non-vintage and the quality is consistent year after year. This is because Sherry wines must go through a solera system for adequate aging. This system is essentially a blending system of casks that hold wines of different ages. The oldest casks of Sherry are the ones that are bottled in a given year. This process lets the old wines infuse the younger wines with character, while the younger wines give their nutrients to the older wines. It’s the ultimate mentoring system.

 

Member’s Links:

Members of Into the Soup can access more information on Sherry by signing in and clicking the links below:

Types of Sherry – A quick guide to the finer types of Sherry

Serving ans Storage – Advice on the best ways to manage your Sherry

Not a Member, Its free! Click Here to Join. BECOME A MEMBER

 

About Chef Larry Canepa

Chef Larry Canepa brings  30 years of Food and Wine experience to today’s adult culinary learners. He has worked in the Food & Wine business as Chef, caterer, sommelier and Food and Wine educator. He has taught culinary and restaurant operation classes at the International Culinary School at the Art Institute of Phoenix and Le Cordon Bleu, Scottsdale. His experiences include management and operation of free-standing restaurants, hotels and resorts. Chef Larry Canepa owned and operated the full service catering business, Dinner at Eight for 10 years in the Valley, specializing in intimate private dining and wine seminars. Larry Canepa has conducted seminars and lectures on coffee, tea, wine, etiquette, cooking and service for students, adults, continuing education classes and charitable organizations.

Who’s Cookin’ Now: Heidi Lee Restuaranteur of Arizona Interview

December 18, 2009 / / 0 Comments

by Restauranteur of Arizona, December 2010

Heidi Lee is the Founder of www.intothesoup.com, a food and travel media company.  A self proclaimed party girl and world traveler, we thought that her fun personality and unpretentious approach would make her the perfect person to start this feature. We met at a local restaurant. Heidi arrived in a leather jacket, jeans, and boots and ordered a Chardonnay. It was 11am:

R: So, Heidi, you are the first cover girl for our new feature “Who’s Cooking Now?”

H: Wow, that’s nice, thanks. You guys ROCK!

R: How long have you been a Chef?

H: First of all, I don’t really call myself that. I’ve had the privilege to work with and meet so many great Chefs, that I don’t put myself in that category.  I’m just a really good cook with a few great assets and a nice smile. I’ve cooked professionally off and on for 20 years and aside from the last 3 years with Into the Soup, I did start a cooking school for kids in 2004, but just as we got going, we had the chance to move to Singapore. 

 

R: Singapore! How was that experience?

H: Absolutely amazing. Singapore has such a huge confluence of cuisine that you could eat there every day for a year and try something new. Wouldn’t recommend all of it, but there’s usually some sort of decent sauce.

R: Did you work as a “really good cook” there?

H: Actually, I spent a lot of my time taking cooking classes and experimenting with all the different ingredients they had. We travelled a lot, too; Thailand, Indonesia, Bali, New Zealand, and Malaysia. It was a nice ‘not working’ time for me. Rare!

R: So, where did you start cooking professionally?

H: As a galley slave on charter boats in the Caribbean. I escaped from corporate America for a time. I was sitting in a bar in St. Thomas – all my best stories start in a bar, by the way – and a boat captain offered me a job as a stewardess for a week. The day before we left, the Chef stormed out and Captain asked me if I knew how to cook…. I lied. The next four years were the experience of a life-time.

R: I bet you had some pretty interesting characters on those boats.

H: You’re tellin’ me. These people came from every walk of life imaginable and you were ‘on’ 24/7.  I remember one cruise in particular when we had a multi-millionaire and his family on board, he was pretty cool, but his wife was a trip. She wouldn’t come out of her cabin unless she was completely made up for the day. I would bring her breakfast to her, and she would hide in the head until I’d set everything up and left. All she ever ate for dinner were broiled scallops. No butter, no oil.  Didn’t do a lot of improvisational cuisine on that boat.

R: Where did you go from there?

H: Oh, lots of places. I sailed across the Atlantic on a 72 foot Swan. That was awesome!  We sailed into the Mediterranean where I fell off a bar stool in Majorca and broke my arm.  From there I went to England, cooked there and the Isle of Wight to save some cash to go to Africa for a few months. Came back to the States and followed a boy to Northern Michigan where I worked sauté in a 4 start restaurant, then slung hash in Bellingham, Washington.

R: Interesting. So, has all this traveling helped your cooking?

H: Absolutely!  It’s amazing what you learn not only eating, but cooking in another country, or another region of this country for that matter. It opens your eyes and your palate to all sorts of different ‘flavor friends’.™  If you look behind the dining room door,  you find some pretty interesting folks and more likely than not, they’re willing to share with you.

R: What is Into the Soup?

H: We’re a Food and Travel Media Company that brings people entertaining and educational experiences. Not only do we have the website, we interact with people through social media like Facebook and Twitter and my weekly radio show. We want to increase awareness of Chefs and Chef driven restaurants and support them in any way we can. 

R: How is the business doing?

H: It’s going great!!  We have over 1,500 members and fans on the site and have had over 50,000 page views in just a few months. We have great content and are getting other contributors involved, too. In fact, we just launched our “Wine and Spirits” section and are looking forward to some neat stuff from there!

R: So if people wanted to contact you about doing a Chef Spotlight video or anything else, what would they do?

H: They can go to the site at www.intothesoup.com or email me at heidi@intothesoup.com. If you’ve got something you want to share, we’d love to hear about it.  You don’t have to be a personality; you just have to have one.

R: Thanks Heidi, it has been great talking with you. Anything else you’d like to add?

H: Thanks. This was really fun!  I guess I’d just ask people out there to remember those Mom and Pop spots, the restaurants that have a person behind that dining room door putting all of their effort into good food and a great experience for you.  Keep the culinary arts alive and stop by for dinner some time. 

 

Enjoy The Party, Get Help

December 16, 2009 / / 0 Comments

I just came off of putting together three huge parties in nearly as many weeks. Am I tired?  Are you serious?  There are a few tricks to keeping your sanity, creating spectacular food and having a good time…GET HELP!!

I used to be all about getting it done myself. I am past that. Seriously, if that’s at all possible, get any-and-all the assistance you can.  For instance, the party I did on Dec. 5th, I was the help!  Payment required, but it’s still a lot of work and was a completely new menu for me and my team.

We created a game plan, lots of lists and still managed to leave a box of crucial elements in the base kitchen. Not such a big deal, except for the fact that we realized this little error after the 75 minute drive to the client’s house.  Through great teamwork, we worked it out, got the box, and the evening was a hit!!

My head’s a little sore today after the Holiday Party we threw at my house last night. We kept the menu simple, and I graciously accepted all offers of assistance from my chef friends! It is good to have a game plan.  In this case it was to have all food prep completed no later than 30 minutes after party started and then, no more kitchen time required. The team made me a cocktail, sat me down at the table, and took over my kitchen.  That had to be one the best parties I kind of, sort of catered.

With best for last, I’ll tell you about the party we threw for my parent’s 50th Wedding Anniversary around Thanksgiving.  My brothers and I pulled out all the stops : Maine Lobsters, Prime Tenderloin Fillet, Fresh Salmon Roe, Cheese and Charcuterie, Ahi Tuna and four dozen quilcene oysters… and much more.

We sent the folks out and had all the party equipment delivered, including three high boy cocktail tables, chafing dishes, stemware and plates.  My BFF attended and did all the decorations (which is what she does), and before we knew it, the room as all black, gold and white.  Everybody helped, a lot!!  It was a beautiful evening with lots of good food, gorgeous memories and love. 

So, have those parties without fear and don’t forget to ask for help.  Most of the time, people are waiting in the wings to lend a hand. It’s what friends and family are for.  Nothing’s any good when the host is in freak mode. You know what I mean.

A party is supposed to be about creating great memories, so get some help and perhaps some of the best memories will come from the prep. I will look back at this season and think of Julie and Katie workin’ it to make the catering event spectacular; remember my friends turning my humble kitchen into the best restaurant in town for a night; and cherish the time with my brothers and best friends preparing for a special occasion. What I won’t remember is the stress.

 

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