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I tried my hand at a rum-cake this weekend, using a recipe from page 70 of the Culinaria France book.  Borders is selling these books now for $9.99 in their bargain bin, and they’re a heckuva buy.  The France, Spain, and Italy books all have easy recipes I’ve tried,  but the pictures and stories behind the foods are what really makes the books worth it to me.  I used rum-soaked raisins instead of currants, and had to cut back on the butter used in the cake because I did not have 6.5 tablespoons even available!  Still the cake part wasn’t bad, and the Malibu coconut rum I used was definitely tasty.  The syrup made to go along with cake was the best part, I thought.  2 parts water to 1 part sugar and some grated orange rind, boiling the mixture, and adding another half-cup of rum when it was removed from the heat.  Dip the cake in the syrup and you can really taste the rum!  Good stuff.

The page is in Italian, but that’s ok, because the entire recipe is contained in the page title. :)   I used chocolate chips instead of dark chocolate, all that I had on hand.   Pretty good idea for a dessert, nonetheless …

Now this recipe IS one of my regular recipes. I make it at least every two weeks. I’ve found the meatballs are to kill for, and many people seem to agree. Absolutely unbelievable meatballs. Although I no longer add the garlic to them, and forgot the worcestshire sauce last night when I made it. I stopped adding the garlic because I could not taste the difference, and to be honest did not taste a difference without the worcestshire. Also, I’ve used ground beef instead of ground sirloin, and last night used half ground beef and half ground turkey. Either way, the meatballs come out delicious every time.

The sauce can taste delicious too. The emphasis of the flavor is on freshness, especially if you’re using fresh basil and parsley. Be sure to cook the onions long enough, until they’re yellow and softer at least. The sauce seems to turn out better when I take my time before adding the crushed tomatoes and herbs.

I also think I like using actual spaghetti. I’ve tried with angel hair pasta, and I think it’s just better with plain old spaghetti …

Last week I tried a recipe called Spaghetti as the Coalman’s Wife Makes It: Spaghetti alla Carbonara. Even managed to get egg yolk into the middle of the dish, haha. The spaghetti I’ve had has always had a tomato sauce on it, so this was a new experience. And I loved the taste, I think it really turned out well.

The real revelation for me was the pancetta. I live less than 2 miles from an Italian deli, and the pancetta was excellent, made the dish for me. It’s got a good strong flavor to it, as does the Parmigiano Reggiano cheese. I had bought some authentic P.R. cheese before, but it was hard as a rock and the taste left something to be desired. The cheese I bought from the Deli, Boar’s Head, was great though, and will definitely be the kind I pick up in the future…

And the dish as a whole, it’s definitely going to become a regular meal for me, something I do once a month or even every couple of weeks, depending how often I decide to splurge on the pancetta. Not much of a splurge though, the price was really reasonable. Less than $3.50 for 8 ounces!

I’ve never been big on eating fish, but that was as much due to my never learning how to cook it as it was anything else. But Paula Deen has a recipe for steamed fish on the food network site that’s pretty darn easy, even for someone as lazy or lacking in ingredients as me. Basically just boil water in a pan, place onions, fennel(parsley in my case), and any other veggies in the water and lay the fish on the veggies so that it’s not resting in the water, cover, and a few minutes later, voila! Worked great with frozen cod, may have to try salmon with it sometime …

This is one I’d been looking forward to trying for a while, I love the taste of lemon, enjoy eating the fruit in fact …

Boneless skinless chicken breasts
6 oz frozen lemonade concentrate
couple drops of soy sauce
couple shakes of garlic powder
touch of ground cinnamon

combine all the ingredients except the chicken and mix well. grease baking dish and place breasts in dish. pour marinade over chicken and bake at 350 for 45 minutes.

Results: Very tasty lemon chicken with a strong, distinctive, lemon flavor. Perhaps I didn’t even need the soy sauce or the garlic powder, the lemon taste was that dominant. Didn’t overwhelm the chicken though, and the results overall were pretty good. Next time I’ll make some Rice-a-Roni as a side dish…

From a 3 ingredient cookbook…

Chicken, cut into pieces

1/2 cup buttermilk

1 cup italian style breadcrumbs

Directions: dip chicken into milk, roll in breadcrumbs. Place on greased baking dish. Bake at 350 for 1 hour.

Results: Not bad. I cooked it the full hour, and the chicken was crisp and juicy. The Italian seasoning added a small, but nice, amount of flavor to the skin. I’ll try it again, almost surely…