Real Reality Cooking Challenges: No 2 [Contest]

More fun with tomatoes

As with Real Reality Cooking Challenge No. 1, this is a game to test your creativity in real-life kitchen situations that will never confront TV chefs.

Everybody here knows (I hope) that you shouldn't store tomatoes in the refrigerator, because it ruins their texture. On the other hand, once they're cut, they have to go in the fridge. So here's the situation:

You have three or four very ripe tomatoes that have been cut up but not used. You have stored them in a plastic bag in the fridge. Unfortunately, they were stashed too close to the freezer compartment and have become partly frozen. You still have no fresh herbs, but you do have some other fresh produce -- redskin potatoes, yellow onions, iceberg lettuce, a cauliflower, an eggplant, one poblano pepper, about a cupful of green beans, McIntosh apples, Bosc pears, limes and a lemon -- as well as routine pantry and fridge staples. Bread products available are sliced challah, supermarket whole wheat and hot-dog buns. (You need not use all or any of these other ingredients.)

What do you do with the partly frozen tomatoes?

Because of the similarity to the first challenge, I'm going to say that any solutions offered there are disqualified. So pasta sauce is out.

Timing is more flexible, but it was a weeknight, so let's say start-to-finish in an hour. The tomato item need not make up an entire dinner but its preparation should fit into creating a whole meal within the time limit.

Assuming that there aren't any major proteins around to build something Mexican around (and without cilantro, I probably wouldn't do that at all), I'd probably make a potato/cauliflower curry.

I don't know about you, but I always have a piece of ginger and a couple heads of garlic around. Mince an inch of that and three cloves, and the onion.
No garlic? Add 1 tsp garlic powder with the other spices below. No ginger? Give it up.
Sweat with some oil until quite transparent, but just barely starting to brown. Cut the poblano, c'flower and potatoes into small cubes during this time. Add to the onion mix a tsp of cumin, tsp of chile powder, 1/2 tsp red pepper, 1 tsp salt, 2 tsp coriander, 1 tsp turmeric and sautee for 30 seconds.
Add the tomatoes, poblano, c'flower and potato. If you have cream, yoghurt or sour cream, add 1/2C water (yes that sounds confusing, but see below), or add 1C milk now. Simmer for half an hour or more until the potatoes are tender, and the sauce is thick.
About this time, start a pot of rice. No rice? You could sop this up with challah.
If you have the cream, yoghurt or sour cream, add 1/2 cup now. Adjust seasonings with lemon juice and salt.

Do you have any meat in your pantry staples?

Mhays wrote:Do you have any meat in your pantry staples?

I have frozen meat: steaks, chicken breasts, hamburger patties and bacon. You may assume routine kitchen appliances, so there is a microwave available for thawing. However, the steaks are prime from Allen Brothers, so I would be reluctant to cut them up as ingredient!

I also have lesna sausage in the fridge. Some kind of sausage -- if only hot dogs -- counts as a fridge staple at our house.

I'd try for a chili stew: Cube and roast your potatoes, eggplant (after salting & draining) and cauliflower. Render some bacon, sweat the onion and poblano in its fat (I assume garlic is a pantry staple - if so, add garlic) Remove excess fat, brown your hamburger in the sweated aromatics, and once again remove the excess fat, add tomatoes along with chili powder, cumin, oregano and salt to taste - if your pantry staples include canned beans, beer, or wine, add them. Simmer until desired consistency, I'm guessing half an hour (depends on how much liquid you add, and how watery the tomatoes are) Add green beans and roasted veg, simmer until beans are tender.

I'd make tomato chickpea stew. This assumes canned chickpeas are a pantry staple...they are in my house at least.

Mince about half a head of garlic - maybe 4 cloves and zest one of your lemons. Finely chop the zest. Heat a medium-sized saucepot and cook the garlic in about 2 Tbsp olive oil. Add the lemon zest and tomatoes. (If you have dried orange zest in your spices, add some of that too - I normally use lemon and orange zest.) Add a teaspoon or two of sweet paprika. Simmer for about 5-10 minutes until the tomatoes begin to soften. Drain and rinse the can of chickpeas, then add them to the pot. Simmer another 5-10 min until the tomatoes are pretty soft, but still keep their shape. Keep an eye on the liquid level throughout - you're looking for a slightly thickened soup with big bits of tomatoes, chickpeas and noticeable bits of garlic and zest. The tomatoes will probably provide enough liquid, but add water if necessary (or canned tomato juice if available.) Add salt to taste. Normally I'd add some chopped parsley right at the end; I supposed dried would work if you have it.

You could probably use white beans or kidney beans if you have cans of those. If not, might be interesting to use the green beans - I'd cut into 1" pieces, add them about the same time as the chickpeas and simmer them in the tomatoes for about 10 min.

I really like this game...thanks for thinking of it.

I'd make a bastardized "ratatouille" with the eggplant, onions, cauliflower, tomatoes, green beans and poblano pepper.

If the tomatoes are already frozen, I'd most likely attack them with my Thunderstick (mine is still alive after many years) and a bit of olive oil, balsamic, S&P to make a tomato granita/sorbet for a starter. Pop that in the freezer until dinnertime.

Section the cauliflower, dribble on olive oil, salt, and maybe squeeze 1/2 a lemon and roast in the oven, 20-25 min @ 375F

Since the oven is on, might as well whip up a quick crumble/crisp with the apples and pears. Peel and slice the fruit, toss with a spoon or two of brown sugar, a squeeze of lemon (using the other 1/2), a spoonful of brandy if it's around, some cinnamon, and cloves or allspice. Mix 1/2 cup flour, butter, and brown sugar, and maybe some oats. Scatter over the top and pop it in the oven next to the cauliflower. Should need about 30min @ 375F

While that's all baking, fry up some bacon until crisp, pan fry the steaks in the drippings, and deglaze with some finely diced onions, chicken stock or wine, and finish with butter for a quick pan sauce.

Serve spoons of the icy granita on lettuce leaves with the warm crunchy bacon bits on top. Think mini lettuce wraps. BLTs, no bread! You could toss the extra bacon in with the cauliflower too. And heck, you could even sprinkle it on the steaks. Who doesn't love bacon?

These are all good ideas, so far. Any more entries before I tell you what I did?

i'd make some sort of potato gratin. layer the taters, onions, tomatoes, pour in hot milk/cream, grate some cheese on top. bake.

These were all excellent suggestions, but JoelF's idea really made my mouth water.

My solution was so simple, I'm almost embarrassed to admit after all of yours. I made a rustic tomato soup. It would not have been quite so "rustic" if the tomatoes had been skinned before cutting, but they were not. This was very tasty, though I wouldn't call it a company dish. Good oregano really made it.

I think it would probably have been decent even with canned tomatoes and frozen beans or whatever other veggies you happen to have. I had intended to add some cauliflower to make it more of a tomato-vegetable soup, but I got distracted and didn't get around to chopping it up. Himself, who's not really a tomato-soup fan, would have liked it better with more veggies in it. He was also dubious about the couscous -- "What are all those seeds floating in it?" -- so perhaps it would be better to use a more recognizable soup pasta. On the other hand, he ate two bowls full.

Before I got the soup going, I roasted the eggplant in slices and we had the soup, roasted eggplant and some sausage as a simple supper.

Rustic tomato and green-bean soup

3 tablespoons olive oil
1 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup cut-up green beans (1/2-inch pieces)
1/2 poblano pepper, diced
3 cups cut-up ripe tomatoes, with liquid
2 cups chicken broth
1 cup water
1 tablespoon dried oregano (preferably Greek oregano), crumbled
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/4 cup couscous or tiny pasta
Grated parmesan (optional)

Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a large saucepan or dutch oven. Saute the onion and garlic until beginning to color. Add the beans and poblano and saute a few minutes more. Stir in the tomatoes and continue to cook, breaking up any larger pieces with a spoon.

Add the broth, water, oregano and salt and pepper. Simmer about 30 minutes, until the beans are tender. About 5 minutes before the end of cooking, taste and adjust seasoning and add the couscous. Simmer till the couscous is done. Serve with cheese if desired. 4 servings.


So ... what are your reality cooking challenges?