Pollo a la Plancha

Last month, I wrote about trying a Cuban dish called pollo a la plancha during our San Diego trip. It's a simple dish consisting of chicken cutlets grilled on a griddle and topped with onions. I was surprised with how much I enjoyed it. A few weeks ago, I threw together my own version for a quick Passover-friendly lunch. Ariel later told me how much she liked it, which is usually a one-way ticket to a blog post. As I'm not too experienced with Cuban cuisine, I won't claim this is particularly authentic, but I can guarantee it is delicious.

My original version used a boneless, skinless chicken breast butterflied and separated into two cutlets. This time, I had some thighs on hand instead. I think either cut works equally well, so go with whatever you have. This recipe ends up using only half an orange and about 3/4 of a lime, so I encourage you to use the leftovers to make yourself a drink. I served with rice, but a salad works, too.

Pesach in the Pandemic

Celebrating Passover in the depths of a pandemic was always going to be a challenge, but as the Passover story tells us, the Jews are a resilient people. Our Zoom seder went off with surprisingly few glitches, with people joining in from such far-flung locations as Boston, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, and even London. 

With classes moved online, I've been as busy as ever with work. Finding a creative outlet and taking some time doing something else has been very welcome. Passover, while throwing its usual culinary curveball, always presents an interesting challenge. As I've written before, wheat and barley (other than matzo) are prohibited during Passover. Additionally, Ashkenazim also avoid other grains and legumes. It's actually this second part I find more difficult, since both rice and beans (two very important components of Chinese cooking) are eliminated. In this article, I'll briefly discuss the highlights of this year's Passover cooking. 

For the seder, I made a brisket, based on Daniel Gritzer's recipe. It's not too far off from my existing recipe. I cooked half of the 9 pound brisket that was part of our Sam's Club run about a month ago. This was, in my opinion, my best brisket yet. As usual, I made it in my extra-large saute pan instead of a roasting pan. It's definitely a specialized piece of equipment, but it's become a real workhorse in my kitchen for braising. Being able to sear a 4 1/2 pound slab of meat and braise all in the same pan is definitely a plus. We also had matzo ball soup and gefilte fish. 

Passover standbys from the last few years made return appearances throughout the week, including scotch eggs and probably too many Brazilian cheese breads. Chopped liver was the only Passover staple missing from the menu, since all the local stores were out of chicken liver, for some reason. We are truly living in unprecedented times.

I added to the repertoire with some new chicken breast dishes, including a Kosher for Passover schnitzel. Later on, I marinated chicken cutlets in lime juice, orange juice, olive oil, cumin, and paprika, pan fried them in olive oil, and served with sauteed onions and garlic. Rice would have been a welcome addition, but I had to do without. Another simple meal involved skin-on salmon fillets with quinoa. Since it is not technically a cereal grain, quinoa is generally considered Kosher for Passover. 

We also experimented with making matzo pizza. This consisted of pieces of matzo with some jarred tomato sauce, mozzarella, and sauteed sausage (left over from the scotch eggs). With a few tweaks, I think this could be really good. Even as it stands, the effort to result ratio was just fine. The main issue for me was that the matzo softened too much, and I ended up eating it folded like one of those "New York slices" that some people like to go on about. It did make me think about trying a "matzo nachos" experiment next year. 

I've never written about matzo brei on the blog before. Matzo is soaked in water and fried in a pan with eggs. It's not quite like anything else I've eaten, but always hits the spot. We made two batches this Passover. Ariel did her usual sweet one with cinnamon and sugar. I made my first attempt at it using Molly Yeh's savory recipe. I added some Chinese chili crisp to mine. 

By Wednesday night, we were hungry and running out of ideas and Ariel even proposed ending Passover early. I was pretty close to frying up a pan of potstickers, but managed to save Passover with a sausage hash, following Kenji's general advice. The baked eggs are a great addition that tie the whole thing together. To make mine, boiled the potatoes and sauteed the sausage. Then, I diced the potatoes and cooked them with some lard on high heat. Finally, I sauteed some diced onion and garlic, combined everything back in the pan, and baked for about 15 minutes with the eggs on top.

Seder Staples: Maror and Charoset

This year was the first time we made our own horseradish and charoset for Passover. These are both essential parts of the traditional seder plate. The seder plate contains several items symbolic of elements of the Passover story. Horseradish, known as maror (bitter herb), represents the bitterness of slavery. Charoset, a fruit and nut mixture, represents the mortar used in bricklaying. As part of the seder, maror and charoset are eaten as a sandwich with matzo. 

The horseradish recipe is a simple mixture of chopped horseradish root and vinegar. Usually, distilled white vinegar is used, but I started wondering if this would really be kosher for Passover. A little internet research revealed white vinegar is usually derived from some kind of grain alcohol, so is not kosher for Passover. As such, we used apple cider vinegar instead. Fresh horseradish is pretty strong stuff, but seems to mellow a bit in the refrigerator. It's a nice condiment to have with gefilte fish and brisket. Many variants of charoset exist all over the world, with different locally available ingredients. Ours is a classic Ashkenazi style. It's also left fairly chunky compared to some pictures I've seen of a more paste-like consistency. The toasted walnuts add a nice textural contrast.

Kosher for Passover Chicken Schnitzel

We're living in a strange time. It's been interesting noticing how people have responded to our new reality of social distancing. Since people are going grocery shopping far less frequently, buying habits have changed. We made a large Sam's Club run a few weeks ago, and they were completely out of dark meat chicken. Our local Hy-Vee and Walmart were also out of dark meat. Perhaps this is a reaction to the relatively low prices of these cuts. As is well-known on this blog, the thigh is my favorite part of the chicken, so I've had to deal with boneless, skinless chicken breast for basically the first time ever. 

Continuing on the theme started with my kosher for Passover scotch eggs, I wanted to do another easy variation of a classic dish that can be done for Passover. Pounded thin and fried as a schnitzel, the potential dryness of chicken breast is less of a problem, though I do still prefer thighs for chicken cutlets (see Cotoletta alla Palermitana). To substitute thighs in this recipe, use two boneless thighs instead of one butterflied breast. 

I use the basic flour-egg-breadcrumb breading technique here, substituting matzo cake meal (finely ground matzo) for flour and regular matzo meal (coarsely ground matzo) for breadcrumbs. The result mimics the traditional schnitzel, but with that distinctive matzo flavor in the background. As a final note, I used canola oil for frying, which is kitniyot, a broad category of foods avoided by some, but not all Jews during Passover. Ariel typically doesn't eat kitniyot, but usually makes an exception for cooking oils. If you want to avoid this, an alternative oil or schmaltz could be used.

The Duane Purvis All American

As of writing this post, we are a few weeks into the COVID-19 crisis. For me, this has included moving my classes online, which has left me as busy as ever without leaving the house. Even as cabin fever sets in, cooking and blogging are pleasures still available to us in these strange times. I have a few more posts planned as Passover arrives next week, so stay tuned!

We recently found ourselves reminiscing about the West Lafayette days. The Triple XXX restaurant, located a short walk down the hill from my old office in the Krannert Building, has been a Purdue icon for nearly 100 years. The restaurant came to wider attention from an early appearance on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. 

The Duane Purvis All American (like many menu items, named for a Purdue football star) is arguably the most famous offering at Triple XXX. It's a classic diner cheeseburger with one unusual addition: peanut butter. It sounds strange, but for some reason, it just works. The hot hamburger on top the peanut butter turns it into a bit of a mess, but a delightful one. I've done my best to recreate the burger based on my recollection and the restaurant's online menu. Although Guy Fieri didn't enjoy his Duane Purvis All American, I certainly do. As they say in West Lafayette, "don't be nervous, try the Purvis!"