Retro Recipes and Traditional Fare

If man could only have one pan, it would probably have to be an iron skillet. You can fry, bake, sear and roast with these workhorses of the kitchen. Baking, as in cornbread, is most often thought of when using these pans for non-frying purposes, but there is a class of cakes that take the cake when it comes to iron skillet cooking, and the Pineapple Upside Down Cake is one of them.

I actually made this cake for Mama and Mimi’s birthday. They share the same birthday and don’t always want the same cake for their special day, but, this one is a great neutral for our family – everyone likes it! Mimi makes hers in an iron skillet as did Mema, her mother. This is one of those desserts with one arm reaching back to the “Ol’ South” via an iron skillet and another broadly stepping into the mid-twentieth century with the Baby Boomers and the craze for canned fruit! It seems that by the 1980’s and 90’s fresh fruit was hard to come by in Suburbia, USA, but thankfully those days are waning and fresh, seasonal produce is here to stay!

I am very much intrigued by the unique food of Alsace, the tiny region that shares a border and many culinary similarities with Germany. My love for Alsatian food stems from my visit a few years ago to The Modern, which is run by Alsatian chef Gabriel Kruether. There I enjoyed many traditional Alsation dishes, among them a tarte flambée, a simple pizza-like tart. It is also known as flammekueche in Alsatian or flammkuchen in German. It's fundamentally a very simple combination of smoky bacon, sautéed onions, and rich cream on a crispy bread that forms a most amazing salivatingly savory meal.

The flavors I experienced that day still linger in my memory. I knew then that I would try and re-create this Alsatian tart at home. But it wasn't until last week that the thought crossed my mind once I discovered my local supermarket sold crème fraîche, the French sour cream, which is a necessary ingredient for this recipe. To recreate the flavor profiles of the tart I enjoyed at the restaurant, I also searched for applewood-smoked bacon, which I was also luckily able to procure. With all the ingredients in hand, I was now absolutely ready to bake and devour a traditional tarte flambée.

Now and then I have a craving for red meat. And when that craving comes I want a meal that's fast and easy to make. Steak au poivre is my answer. It's a French-restaurant favorite. I don't think there's anyone out there who can dispute that. It's one of my absolute favorite dishes and I almost always order it if I see it on a menu. But it's so simple to make at home when I feel like staying in. It's quickly cooked in a pan followed by a luxurious sauce that includes brandy and white wine. This recipe can be made for a quiet romantic dinner for two or even doubled or tripled for an elegant dinner party.

For the perfect level of flavor and doneness, make sure the steaks have come to room temperature before cooking, then pat dry, and season well with salt and freshly cracked black pepper. Crush the pepper in a mortar and pestle or using my new favorite tool, the Flavour Shaker. I like to press the steaks into the crushed black pepper for optimal adhesion. For a steak that's beautifully pink inside, a 2-minute cook time per side is ideal. 

Years ago when I was a round nugget of a child running around in terry-cloth shorts I had a book I read to myself many times over. It involved some Amphibian or Owl With Shoes who lived inside a mushroom or hollow tree. I can’t remember much of the story but the one thing that stuck in my brain was that on many occasions this anthropomorphic critter would find himself without food or drink and would simply chop an onion or think about sad things in order to create his own version of tear tea.  I remember being disgusted by the thought of sipping one’s own saline tears but that didn’t freak me out as much as the things he’d think about to coax the tears out of his eyes and into the kettle.

Torn books, uneaten mashed potatoes, no internet (ok I added that) and stubby chewed-up pencils that were no longer needed and left to roll behind the oven, never to be seen again.  As a kid I could see those pencils laying there waiting to be found, just looking up at the ceiling thinking “I’m still good! Please! Anyone, I Can Still Make Notes And Drawings For You, I Promise You! Please? I’ll be good!” and wouldn’t you know I would begin sobbing every single time I got to that damn part of the story! Here’s where it gets bad – and you might want to stop reading here – the lead character would fill his pot up, wipe his eye, smile and exclaim something like “Tea’s Ready!” and flutter away.

What the hell? Did you really get my 5-year old emotions in a tizzy so you could have tea and then just walk away smiling? What about me? What about those pencils? They are still there, tiny and little, craving the warmth of a human hand!  That hasn’t changed just because your thirst has been sated!  You goshdarn son of a bitch dirty bird!