Goldy's Kitchen Cookbook (13 page)

I no longer remember where Jim and I tasted a salad that we both adored. I only remember that it contained mayonnaise in the vinaigrette. But since Jim's default dressing is bottled ranch (insert heartfelt sigh here), I resolved to figure out how to make one he would like. He thought it was marvelous, and came up with the title for the recipe.

1.
In a large skillet, toast the pine nuts over low heat, stirring constantly, until they are lightly browned and emitting a nutty scent, about 4 minutes. Turn out on a paper towel to cool.

2.
Place the greens and tomatoes in an attractive salad bowl. Toss with about ¼ cup dressing and taste. (You may need to add more dressing, but do not overdress the salad.) Sprinkle the blue cheese crumbles and pine nuts on top of the salad and toss again. Serve immediately.

Makes 4 servings

3 tablespoons best-quality aged balsamic vinegar

2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese

1 tablespoon mayonnaise

1 tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh basil

2 teaspoons minced shallot

1 teaspoon minced garlic

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste

1 cup extra-virgin olive oil

1.
In a blender jar, combine everything but the oil and blend to purée. Stop the blender twice to scrape down the sides of the jar. When the mixture is a uniform color, remove the small filler cap, and with the blender running, very slowly drizzle in the olive oil. (With your free hand, you may want to hold a paper towel over the filler cap opening between drizzling operations, to prevent spattering.) When the mixture is completely emulsified (less than a minute), stop the blender and pour the dressing into a pint jar or pitcher.

2.
Use right away or cover the jar or pitcher tightly and refrigerate. Bring the dressing to room temperature before using. When it is at room temperature, use a whisk and quickly stir the dressing, so it can re-emulsify.

S
ometimes you are just driving merrily along, minding your own business—or running carpool—and you hear a report on the radio that almost lands you in a ditch. But it doesn't, and you think,
Wow, that's what my next book is about.
This has actually only happened to me twice, with
Dying for Chocolate
and
Crunch Time
. With the latter, it was my friend Jasmine Cresswell who heard an episode of
The Diane Rehm Show
and told me I needed to write about stalking, which ended up being central to
Crunch Time
.

But long before that, with
Dying for Chocolate,
I was driving to pick up one of our children on Valentine's Day, which turned out to be important, because an author was talking on the radio about her book on aphrodisiac foods.
Hm,
thought I,
could Goldy ever be asked to provide an aphrodisiac feast?

I'd sat in on enough booking appointments with my catering instructors to know that eccentric clients asked for all kinds of foods, and didn't think twice
about paying for them. Or maybe they did think twice about paying for them, but something else was going on.

There was the bride who wanted her wedding reception buffet, which featured prime rib and lots of other expensive foods, to include frisée salad drenched with—wait for it—bottled ranch dressing, for which you have probably guessed I have no affection. Supposedly, the dressing had sentimental value for her and the groom. The caterer gently tried to persuade her to choose a lemon vinaigrette, but she was adamant, so that was what the catering team served.

Another time, one of my instructors invited me to sit in on a meeting with a prospective groom and his parents. He warned me ahead of time, “Say nothing.” (It's amazing how often people feel they have to tell me that.) As is traditional, these parents-of-the-groom wanted to pay for the rehearsal dinner. But they were only willing to shell out fifteen dollars per guest. They, too, asked for prime rib, to which the caterer said, “No problem.” The parents also wondered if they could have . . . lobster tail . . . and three vegetables . . . and dessert, within the fifteen-bucks-per-person ceiling. “Absolutely,” the caterer replied. Okay, then, the parents asked, how about some wine? The caterer said, “Sure, we can do two kinds of wine for fifteen dollars per person.”

I took a deep breath. I'd mentally totaled the tab at a hundred dollars-plus per person . . . and this was over thirty years ago. Today, with set-up, servers, and gratuity, you'd be looking north of that.

After the meeting, the caterer told me that the parents had grown up during the Depression and despite “having money,” did not want to spend it on so frivolous an event as a rehearsal dinner. The son was a recent arrival in our small town. He drove a Porsche and was a full-fledged participant in the go-go eighties.
He
was picking up the tab for whatever was in excess of the fifteen bucks per person, but the parents were not to have a glimmer of this fact. And to my knowledge, they never did.

But to get back to the Valentine's Day radio story: In the Goldy books, people in Aspen Meadow seem to know each other, or at least, they're aware of people within their social, ecclesiastical, athletic, or parental circle. Country club members
know each other, as do members of different religious communities, as do mothers whose kids are the same age, and so on. Everyone knows everyone, or knows somebody who knows that person.

The same used to be true in our town, as I learned when I began work on my second novel,
Dying for Chocolate
. Background: After
Catering to Nobody
sold in 1989, I decided to write a book featuring Goldy preparing aphrodisiac foods, which I'd heard about on the radio. I went to our wonderful local library to order books on the subject, available through interlibrary loan.

I received the notice that my books had come in and hightailed it to the library. The librarian, who had known me well for years as the borrower of many Dr. Seuss books, slid the large pile across the counter. Here were titles like
How to Get Your Man Back with Food, A to Z of Aphrodisia, Food and Love,
and
Food and Sex
. The librarian lifted an eyebrow and asked, “How's Jim?”

(We will pause here as we imagine yours truly blushing furiously, checking out the books, and slithering out of the library.)

So sometimes you get your idea from NPR. Other times, life gives you the idea, and it has mileage either because of the emotional energy or just because something happened that really, really pissed you off. This has also happened to me.

Once our youngest son was three and could take skiing lessons, Jim and I used to take all three boys for a day on the slopes. When Jim had to work overtime on Saturdays, I would take the boys up to ski. (If you were a Colorado resident and bought coupon books sold by the Cub Scouts, skiing
used
to be cheap.) The Ski Patrol was omnipresent and performed well at maintaining order and helping skiers. This included everything from reviving someone having a heart attack to bringing a special stretcher for skiers who'd hurt themselves. The Patrol would also clip the lift ticket of skiers who skied too fast, got into fistfights (usually after having too many beers at lunch), did not yield to the downhill skier and caused an accident, or otherwise disobeyed the rules. (Our youngest son, once he graduated from ski school—still three years old—promptly tucked himself into the cool racing position he'd seen on TV, and skied away. No matter how many times I cajoled or scolded him, he did this. He had his ticket clipped more than once.)

One time, I had agreed to meet the boys for lunch at the base of Copper Mountain. From behind, I heard a loud
whoosh whoosh whoosh
and a hollered “Look out! Look out! Look out!” Then I was hit from behind,
from higher on the hill,
by a snowboarder.

I went airborne, then down hard. I couldn't move.

Remember that rule,
Yield to the downhill skier
? This fellow hadn't done that.

Skiers gathered around me, concerned. My skis had popped off my boots. This was before cell phones, so someone said they were going for the Ski Patrol. I was embarrassed and slowly rolled over. Two skiers had released their skis and were kneeling next to me. One looked into my eyes and asked if I was okay. I was sort of seeing double, my knee was killing me, and I gagged on an answer.

The snowboarder, meanwhile, leaned over me and said, “Get up, bitch.”

This is when you know you have another book.

And what does the mystery writer say to that snowboarder?

You are so dead.

This is our family's favorite pork recipe. All of our sons, now old enough to cook as well as ski, make it. My brother Bill came up with the idea to grill the tenderloin, and that's a great way to make it, too. Be sure to use a meat thermometer. Tenting all pork, chicken, or beef with foil after it comes out of the oven or off the grill allows the juices to reabsorb. We like this pork with cinnamon-flavored applesauce.

1.
Trim fat and silver skin from tenderloins. Pat dry and set aside. Place all the other ingredients in a glass baking dish and whisk together well. Place tenderloins in the dish, turn them to coat with the marinade, cover the pan with plastic wrap, and place in the refrigerator for at least 6 hours or up to overnight.

2.
Thirty minutes before you plan to roast the pork, remove the tenderloins from the refrigerator to come to room temperature.

3.
Preheat the oven to 400˚F. Using a roasting pan with a rack, line the bottom of the pan with foil (this makes cleanup easier) and place the tenderloins on the rack. Roast the tenderloins for 20 to 25 minutes, or until a meat thermometer inserted in one of them registers 140˚F.
Do not overcook the pork.
Remove from the oven, tent the pork with foil, and let sit 10 to 15 minutes before slicing. The center should still be pink when served.

Makes 6 to 8 servings

I'm aware that
osmosis
and
diffusion
may be words you haven't heard since high school science, but they're important for cooking pork (and poultry, but we'll get to that). During the whole low-fat craze, pigs were bred to be lower in fat. And guess what? That meant that you could no longer fry a pork chop, much less roast a porkloin, without brining it first. With no fat in the meat to moisturize it as it cooked, you got shoe leather. But by brining using salt and spring water, the pork absorbs moisture (osmosis), which penetrates the meat (diffusion). My preference is away from adding herbs and spices to a brine, because I think they just make the meat taste vaguely seasoned. Very vaguely. But sugar in the brine gives the finished dish a lovely, delicious crust. Serve the chops with Party Apples (
here
) or (our kids' favorite) cinnamon applesauce.

Pat the chops dry with paper towels.

For the brine:

1.
In a large bowl, whisk together the water, salt, and sugar until the sugar and salt are dissolved. Place the pork chops in the brine, cover, and brine overnight in the refrigerator.

2.
Drain the brine and discard.

3.
Rinse the chops in cold water and let them stand in more fresh cold water for 10 minutes, to remove excess saltiness. Remove from the water and pat dry.

For the marinade:

1.
Whisk together the vinegar, thyme, rosemary, garlic, and oil. Place the pork chops in the marinade and allow them to marinate for 1 hour. (You are marinating for flavor here, not tenderizing.)

2.
Preheat the oven to 375˚F.

3.
Heat a large sauté pan over medium-high heat, then pour in the additional oil and let it heat until it shimmers. Sear the chops for about 2 minutes (until well caramelized), then flip and do the other side of each chop for 2 minutes.

4.
You can either remove them from the pan and place them in a roasting pan, or, if your skillet can be placed in the oven, roast them directly in the pan. Insert a meat thermometer into the middle of one of the chops, without allowing it to touch the bone or the bottom of the pan.

5.
Roast the chops until the meat thermometer reads 140˚ to 145˚F. Remove them from the oven and tent them with foil for 10 minutes. Serve hot.

Makes 4 servings