Tag Archives: butter

Bianca in Noho

So, one of my dearest friends, Stef, took me to one of her favorite UWS restaurants several weeks ago (I didn’t blog about it because I was so hungry I forgot to capture photos… sorry folks!). This restaurant is called Celeste — and Celeste doesn’t even have a website, so I wasn’t able to menu-stalk prior to going for dinner. Following our dinner a coworker of mine mentioned that I should go to Bianca downtown in Noho — she described this restaurant making it sound a bit like Celeste; there were no reservations, always expect a wait, payment is cash-only and the food is spectacular. Bianca does have a website so I forwarded it to Stef saying we needed to get to this joint asap! Stef couldn’t help but laugh as she pointed out to me that Bianca is Celeste’s sister restaurant.

food from bianca

So Stef and I hurried down to Bianca at 7:30 p.m. thinking our wait would be quick and easy — nope! we waited over an hour to be seated. But time flew by as we caught up over a glass of wine at an uber hipster bar right next to the restaurant. When we were seated at Bianca, I was reminded instantly of Al Di La in Brooklyn; the decor was so similar — old-school wall paper with white subway tiling to help divide the space on the walls, even the smells coming from the kitchen were as delectable as Al Di La’s.

We quickly ordered — clearly, we both scouted out the menu prior to attending dinner. To share: the Gnocco Fritto with Stracchino Cheese, a caprese salad (special of the day) and for our main dishes we both ordered pasta — I ordered myself the Ravioli di Ricotta con Burro e Salvia (ravioli in a butter and sage sauce) and Stef ordered herself the Gramigna con Salciccia e Peperoni (pasta with crumbled sausage and red bell pepper). Even though the restaurant was packed — not a single seat was available — the food came out in a very timely manner.

gnocco

Our apps were d-e-l-i-s-h … The gnocco was perfectly cooked, nice and puffy and soft and the stracchino cheese was out of this world. It was obvious it was coated in a very flavorful truffle olive oil, but the cheese consistency was smooth and creamy — maybe even more so than a burrata. Remember folks, Gnocco is not the same as Gnocchi.

butter and sage ravioli

When it came to my ravioli, I instantly had a flash back. The first time I ever cooked my boyfriend a meal at home I made him a caprese salad served with ravioli in a sage and butter sauce (Thanks Food Network for the fabulous recipe and thank you Whole Foods for providing the “homemade” ravioli). This ravioli at Bianca though was homemade and wasn’t just “served with butter” — it was swimming in it. The longer I let the ravioli sit, the thicker the butter got, which allowed me to scoop more of it up on to my fork. I would order this rich dish again in a heart beat!

meat pasta

I had to share a pic of Stef’s pasta — it was out of this world! I also loved that Bianca wasn’t afraid to feed people, the serving sizes were outstanding!

I love finding restaurants like Bianca and Celeste — I am always ready for more suggestions… So if anyone has any, be sure to share the details! Bianca really fit the bill for me and Stef this weekend — literally! Ultimately for 2 appetizers, 2 main dishes of pasta, and 1 homemade sorbet for dessert … plus a bottle of wine. It all totaled up to $81. The way we ordered we were also “splurging” so the fact that we didn’t faint at the sight of the bill, we were very pleased!

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Paula Deen’s Type 2 Diabetes Diagnosis

Paula Deen in a kitchen

(Photo Credit: zimbio.com)


Alright everyone, shall we address the elephant in the room? Last week, Paula Deen announced that she has type 2 diabetes, and a few days after the announcement she admitted to knowing about her diagnosis for the past 3 years! Within that time she had published her cookbook, Paula Deen’s Southern Cooking Bible — which was also voted as the “worst culinary offerings of 2011 by the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.” (according to People magazine.)

While I can’t help feel bad for someone who is diagnosed with something that can ultimately be fatal, I’m also frustrated over the fact that she doesn’t plan to change her cooking style. I also can’t seem to grasp the concept of deep-frying a lasagna (which is one of her most popular recipes). A lasagna is fantastic all on it’s own, why would you want to kill the dish (and possibly yourself) by deep-frying it?! What are the stats on this dish, you are probably wondering… For one serving it is 670 calories with 47.5 grams of fat. Ouch, I think my heart just got all clogged up just by reading that.

I’m all for comfort food, in moderation of course and at appropriate times. But more than anything, I am all about taking care of myself. I may love a creamy mac and cheese side dish every once in a while from my favorite restaurant, but I’m also working out multiple times a week to stay healthy… and more importantly I am making healthy daily decisions in regard to my diet.

While watching Paula Deen on TV, viewers might not realize that she’s technically cooking those unhealthy dishes for only 30 days of filming. Whether or not her unhealthy eating habits are a daily routine or only 30 days out of the year — people don’t know! So several folks out there are probably thinking that her doughnut hamburgers are okay to eat as a meal whenever they want! Disgusting!

I have such a hard time watching people constantly stuff their face with unhealthy food. Why don’t you just spike your sweet tea with arsenic and speed up the death process a little faster?

And, on top of the Type 2 Diabetes drama, Paula is also a smoker and she has yet to give that nasty habit up — smoking when you have this disease can actually be fatal and cause heart attacks and strokes! If you have a stroke Paula, I doubt you can be a host on a cooking show.

I’m not an avid Paula Deen watcher, but I know so many people love her dearly — which is why I hope she can make some drastic changes in her private life and on TV. It would be great for the 23 million people across the U.S that have type 2 diabetes to see a cooking legend change her life and diet. Paula, that’s 23 million people, in case you didn’t see that number the first time — that’s a lot of people (and a business woman should know, a fantastic business opportunity as well!). People seem upset that she’s making money off of being a spokes person for Victoza (diabetes medicine), but if she tries to help people with a new cooking style I have no clue how anyone could be angry at her. I’d applaud her if she made some big changes!

I want to know… what are ya’lls thoughts on this current event?

Asellina at The Gansevoort Park

My boyfriend and I have walked by Asellina numerous times over the past few months — at first we didn’t see much of a crowd but all of a sudden we would walk by at 9 p.m. and the place would be packed. I quickly put the pieces together — Kim Kardashian and Kourtney Kardashian were filming their current season of ‘Kourtney and Kim Take New York’ at the Gansevoort Park hotel (the hotel right above Asellina). So, my guess is their fans were piling in in hopes of getting a look of their favorite celebrity sisters. It’s a good thing people were congregating at Asellina because the food is pretty good. Whether or not you see the Kardashians, I’m sure you’ll enjoy your experience at this restaurant.

The first thing I have to tell you about this restaurant is that the service is impeccable. Our waitress was very attentive, energetic and exceptionally kind. My boyfriend and I are those types of people that always asks the waiter/waitress what they recommend, what are their favorite dishes on the menu, and what plates people typically enjoy the most.

With the help of our waitress, we started off with a couple of appetizers: The Ahi Tuna Tartare that comes with robiola cheese, black truffle and spring onions, and we also ordered the Veal Meatballs.

Asellina food at the Gansevoort Park

Veal Meatballs appetizer

The Ahi Tuna Tartare was tasty but it wasn’t anything extraordinary. I love tuna and I love to be wowed whenever I eat a new tuna tartare dish — this didn’t wow me. But the quality of the tuna was extremely fresh and the cheese added a fantastic flavor and texture to the fish.

I really enjoyed the Veal Meatballs (although I always feel guilty whenever I eat veal, can you blame me?) — they were nice and moist (exactly the way meatballs should be) and the cheese melted on top was very stringy and provided subtle but enjoyable flavoring. The red sauce it was marinated in was also very good — it was similar to a classic grandma’s red sauce, and you can never go wrong with that!

pasta dishes

Fillet filled ravioli & truffle, and a pappardelle dish

For our main plates we ordered one of the specials — ravioli stuffed with fillet in a light butter sauce topped with shavings of black truffle, and our other plate was the Pappardelle which was made with homemade sausage and porcini mushrooms. The ravioli was delicious! You can never go wrong mixing butter and truffle together. Over all the dish was very enjoyable although I do wonder what it would have tasted like if the chef added a bit of extra seasoning on the inside of the ravioli. The pappardelle on the other hand was disgusting. My boyfriend has said in the past that he doesn’t like something that he’s eating, but he’ll keep eating it because he’s hungry. This time, both me and my boyfriend put our forks down and decided we needed to send the plate back. The flavors did not go well together at all and if I was forced to take another bite, it would have been torture.

grandma red sauce

Spaghetti in a red sauce

Our waitress was so understanding and suggested that we get a spaghetti in a red sauce to replace the pappardelle. That’s exactly what we did and we loved our replacement. The pasta was perfectly cooked and the red sauce was out of this world.

Even though we had one bad order, we are excited to go back to try the pizzas and flatbread — both looked delicious and we couldn’t help but eye them down when they were ordered from near by tables.

Mushroom & Spinach Quesadillas

I love quesadillas — typically once a week or so I will chop up some veggies, cook them in a pan, add some seasonings and make them into a quick homemade quesadilla. Of course I add cheese and sometimes chicken to the mix. Quesadillas are a fast and easy way to make something full of flavor and the best part is you can also use up the rest of your veggies before things go bad.

Instead of using quesadilla cooking as a way to get rid of veggies, I cooked up more of a gourmet version of the dish for me and my friend Kelly this weekend. Inspired by Ree Drummond, also known as The Pioneer Woman, I used her recipe as a base and altered the amount of ingredients to cater to me. For one thing, I like to use very little butter in my cooking — don’t get me wrong, butter is incredible and it tastes great, but I prefer to make some healthier choices when it comes to cooking. Although when I made Ree’s Spinach and Mushroom Quesadillas I used less butter than what her recipe called for when cooking the mushrooms and instead of using butter when cooking the spinach, I swapped the ingredient with olive oil.

So here’s how I made this delectable plate:

Ingredients: butter, white mushrooms sliced, wine (for cooking), salt, pepper, baby spinach, flour tortillas, fontina cheese, and goat cheese.

ree drummond quesadilla recipe

I started by cooking my sliced white mushrooms — I put in a skillet 1.5-2 tablespoons of butter and once the butter melted I added my mushrooms (I sliced about 7 large white mushrooms — they weren’t exceptionally large, but I grabbed the bigger option at the grocery store). I cooked these mushrooms for about 3 minutes and then added 1.5 tablespoons of red wine. Note: Ree’s recipe calls for sherry but I didn’t have this ingredient in my kitchen. So instead of going to the store and spending more money, I substituted the sherry for wine and it turned out fabulous! After I added the wine I seasoned the mushrooms with a bit of salt and fresh ground pepper, I let the mushrooms cook for another 6-7 minutes and then I removed the mushrooms from the skillet once the wine completely evaporated. I placed the mushrooms on a plate and then used the same skillet to cook my spinach in. This time, instead of adding butter I used a couple tablespoons of olive oil and 2 tablespoons of red wine to cook the spinach in — I only let the spinach cook for a couple of minutes and then removed the spinach from the skillet and placed it on another plate. At this point I have two ingredients (mushrooms and spinach) and they are both cooling on a plate. Then, I used my stove top griddle to finish off the quesadillas. I used a small amount of butter to butter the surface of the grill side of the griddle (this helped give those gorgeous looking grill marks on the flour tortillas). Then I placed a flour tortilla on the grill, followed by a very light layer of freshly grated fontina cheese, then I put a small amount of spinach over top of the cheese, then the mushrooms. I let this cook for a few minutes on medium heat (until the tortillas had those perfect grill marks on them and the cheese melted). At the same time I put another tortilla on the griddle and put some goat cheese crumbled on top. Goat cheese is so potent, I prefer to use small amounts of this type of cheese so those eating the dish aren’t too overwhelmed by the flavor. Once both tortillas had the grill marks on them, I placed the goat cheese tortilla on top of the other half, removed them from the griddle, sliced and then served.

spinach and mushroom quesadilla by ree drummond

The tortillas came out perfectly crispy and I was so proud of the end result. Using wine rather than sherry was the perfect call, and the mushrooms and spinach combined together was perfection. I am also excited to say that I know a very tasty dish to cook up for vegetarian friends! (Sorry to all the vegans out there, I just don’t know how to cook anything without a little bit of cheese!)

There were a few pieces left over, so I wrapped them up in Saran Wrap and ate them the next day. The left overs held up beautifully and the tortillas were still crispy even after I reheated them!

Grilled Cheese with Lemon Pesto

There are so many things that I miss about the warm summer months… one thing is the food. I can never get enough of the cheap in season fruits and veggies that are sold at various grocery stores and farmer’s markets. One of my favorite herbs that is really only in season in the summer time is basil. I can do so many fabulous things with basil! I actually make a killer pesto! My pesto ingredients include: pine nuts, basil, extra virgin olive oil, garlic, salt, pepper, and parmigiano reggiano cheese. This week I was able to snag a nice sized container of pesto for $3 (I felt like I won the lotto, kind of). But my excitement still hasn’t died down from the thrill of finding this fresh basil. The other night I decided to make some pesto and for kicks I threw into my recipe a bit of lemon zest. The lemon zest actually added a sweet/sour kick to the sauce.

Now that I have a basic pesto made and put into an air tight container to keep it from spoiling, I have so many things I am looking forward to cooking up over the next week or so. There are so many things you can use pesto in/on: bruschetta, caprese salad, grilled cheese, pasta, salads, gnocchi, ravioli, and it even makes a fabulous marinade for chicken! The best part about pesto is, just a little bit of the sauce goes a long way. Seriously, never use too much pesto on something because 1. you don’t want to waste your cherished pesto, and 2. the flavors will be very overwhelming.

My boyfriend claims he doesn’t like pesto. But, recently I decided to sneak some into an appetizer I made for us. Instead of using basil leaves on a simple yet delicious caprese salad — I used pesto. I swear, the pinenuts do so much for pesto and it does so much for the flavors in a caprese salad made of bufala mozzarella, heirloom tomatoes, and pesto sauce. So, I snuck it in on him and he loved it! I actually never told him that I used pesto and when pesto came up in a conversation over dinner with some friends he had to say to everyone “I hate pesto” and I looked at him and said, but you’ve eaten it before and you never complained. He turned right to me and said “WHEN!?” and “WHERE!?” … I am such a sneaky girlfriend.

So after making this lemon pesto at 10:30 at night, I had to eat some of it! But how? I didn’t want to cook up an entire dish of pasta, I just wanted a near-midnight snack. So, I lightly buttered some bread on one side of each slice (lightly buttered people, we don’t want to get type 2 diabetes like poor ol’ Paula Deen), put them on a skillet, but a very light layer of pesto on one side of one of the slices, laid down some very basic american cheese, and toasted up a grilled cheese. The resulted flavors were spectacular! It was such a fabulous savory snack I have had in so long!

fun grilled cheese recipes

A Lemon Pesto Grilled Cheese Sandwich, made in 15 minutes or less!

It’s really true, just a bit of pesto goes a long way!

Note: when making grilled cheese, as I said above only use a little bit of butter to butter one side of each slice of bread (the side that goes on the pan). I have found that butter really is better to use than olive oil because you want that crispy breaded texture and you want your cheese to melt inside. I have found that if I spray my bread with a bit of olive oil, my bread turns that perfect golden brown way too fast and the bread burns before the cheese melts.

how to make a grilled cheese

Perfect golden brown grilled cheese bread.

Lady Gaga’s Meat Dress & Other Halloween Ideas

I’ve seen plenty of Lady Gaga’s meat dress on VH1 and E! but I never really looked into what the deal with the dress actually was all about.

I’m currently trying to decide what I should dress up as for Halloween for parties this week on Friday and Saturday. (Suggestions would be greatly appreciated.) So while I was google’ing around last night looking for costumes I started to think that I wanted to wear some sort of food-themed costume. There’s the classic ketchup and mustard costume, along with popcorn, tacos, butter, lobster, and hotdogs… nothing looked good. I’m looking for a comfortable costume that allows me to fit into a taxi, and one that doesn’t require me to wear outrageous makeup or have to spend hours doing my hair.

After brain storming for a while I remembered how Lady Gaga wore a dress made of meat to the VMAs. There’s no way I would ever go down to Whole Foods and have the butcher slice me meat so I could stick it on my body. First of all, how is it possible to wear meat? Do you use needle and thread to put the pieces together? And if you sit down, wouldn’t you get fuzzies on your outfit? And what happens if there’s a dog close by, wouldn’t you be in big trouble?


So I did some further research on what the deal was with this outfit. Here’s what Lady Gaga said to Ellen DeGeneres right after she had worn the dress (read the full article here, the following is just a snip from the article): “‘Well, it is certainly no disrespect to anyone that is vegan or vegetarian. As you know, I am the most judgment-free human being on the earth,’ Gaga replied. ‘However, it has many interpretations, but for me this evening … If we don’t stand up for what we believe in and if we don’t fight for our rights, pretty soon we’re going to have as much rights as the meat on our own bones. And I am not a piece of meat,’ she added, holding up the magazine cover.”

Okay, so Gaga was inspired to wear something that made a statement… I still could never wear meat!

But back to this whole Halloween costume thing, I still need something to wear and I have 2 parties to go to this weekend! Is there something I can whip together that’s in my closet? Or do I seriously need to get my butt to a Halloween store to pick something out? Suggestions are needed!

For those who are obsessed with Gaga’s meat dress, I found this video that you might enjoy… it’s on how to create the dress but in a meatless way!