Day 5

You don't really care about breakfast and lunch, do you? Blah blah, yogurt and cereal, blah blah, sandwich and salad and grapes, etc. etc. You're here for dinner, aren't you?

Tonight's dinner goes on record as one of the better things I've ever cooked. This was serious, restaurant-quality tastiness. Which is doubly impressive considering that I'd never before cooked the two main ingredients, greens and polenta.

I give you...


Polenta squares with gorgonzola cream, braised greens, and cannellini beans

Not only had I never cooked greens, I wasn't even sure if I liked them. I don't recall my mom ever making them when I was a kid. I do remember her cooking kale for herself when I was a teenager and it stinking up the whole house. (I remember this so clearly: I walked in the back door with my friend Jamie and said "God, what's that smell?!" Years later Jamie I still talk about this.)

Anyway. The recipe said I could use whatever greens I fancied, so I chose mustard, totally at random. Basically how this all worked is that I cooked the greens down in a skillet with some onion and garlic, and then added a can of cannellini beans. The sauce consisted of half-and-half, gorgonzola, garlic, and rosemary; all it needed to do was come to a simmer and get properly melty. The polenta that I cooked last night was cut into triangles, dredged in flour, and fried. The whole thing was a little time-consuming, but fairly easy.

Neil observed that the gorgonzola sauce was a little overwhelming and might work better with a milder blue cheese. I did think that it drowned out the other flavors in the dish a bit, but it was still awfully good (I'm a sucker for overbearing cheese). It turns out that I do like greens, quite a bit, and the beans were a nice complement. The fried polenta was awesome. In fact, there's quite a bit leftover that hasn't been fried yet, and I think it's going to be a cornbread-esqe side dish when I make chili in a few days. I am now quite interested in polenta and excited to see what else I can do with it.

I would share the full recipe with you - from Vegetarian Suppers from Deborah Madison's Kitchen - but the recipe actually contains two other recipes from the book, Polenta Cooked in the Double Boiler and Braised Mixed Greens and Garlicky Beans, so it would be a huge pain to transcribe. If anyone is really interested let me know and I'll get Neil to scan it and then just send it to you.

Now we're approaching the worst part of the week for eating at home: the weekend. I've already turned down lunch with my mother, even though she offered to buy. The buying is not the point, at least not all of it. It's the thought and the effort that goes into preparing my own food, even if it's just making a sandwich or heating up some soup.

So far I am really, really enjoying this project. Toward the end of February we had two very good dinners - one at Osaka, and one at Cafe LouLou - that totaled $129. We spent less than that at the store last night and got enough food to last a week. Don't get me wrong; I think Cafe LouLou and Osaka both serve great food that is worth the price we paid. But from a budget standpoint, Neil and I need to learn that meals like that should not be an everyday occurrence. Or at least not until one of us has a substantial increase in income.

I feel like I'm really having a major shift in my perspective on food as a result of all of this, but I'm tired and I want to go read. I will save that to blather about in another entry.