Snappy Joe, or Sucio Lucio?

I'm starting to like the Sucio Lucio

Snappy Joe, originally a recipe from mommie.  I LOVE the sandwiches, but yeah, the name of this easy-peas dish is the dumbest thing ever.  I’m sure it comes from a cutesy women’s magazine trying to cover up a fairly bland, “healthy” makeover of boring sloppy joes with a fancy new name, a snappy new name that looks great with the model’s stirrup pants, permed hair and caked-on blue eyeliner. SNAPPY.

Then again, I’m the one who made it the other night, so my sitting here making fun of it isn’t really helping my cause at all.  And sharing the fact that I spent 2 hours after dinner “crafting” homemade xmas cards doesn’t lend a lot of weight to the “I’m so cool” movement either. Cutting edge, I’m not, but at least I don’t have a perm.

Since A was supposed to be at a work event the night in question, I didn’t plan a dinner, figuring I could just eat leftovers or weird things I eat when nobody’s watching. (I’m not alone – check out these two books I really, really want to read.) 

With nothing planned, I went into safe mode, much like my archaic computer does when trying to run any program with a birthdate after 2007.  Spying a pound of sirloin and some random sausage buns in the freezer, and a recipe began to take shape.  Based on my mom’s “Snappy Joes,” a sillily named turkey and cabbage-based take on sloppy joes, I wanted to really snap these Joes up a bit.  Yeah, I’m going all out on this snappy theme. 

A few too many jalapenos in the fridge, some chorizo in the meat drawer, and an extra can of goya tomato sauce meant I was taking these Joes into spicy territory. (Somebody help me.  Why am I writing like this?)  I cut up a bunch of peppers, jalapenos, and onion, then sautéed them with ground sirloin.  AND I FORGOT THE CHORIZO.  Dumb, dumb, dumb.  Anyway, then you add in some tomato sauce, BBQ sauce, hot sauce, and some shredded cabbage, and let it simmer away for 10 minutes.  DONE. 

Rachael Ray, who probably would LOVE the name Snappy Joe, did a running series once where she took Sloppy all around the world.  She made Messy Giuseppes (Italian), Sloppy Cubanos (with pickles and swiss), and a few other versions.  I tried a couple, being an avowed Sloppy Joe fan (comfort, messy, sandwiches).  

I like this one the best.  Should we name it -- a Sucio Lucio, perhaps?  It’s easy, quick, and sneaks in a bunch more veggies than you would think.  It’s also awesome cold the next day, scooped hastily onto crackers or corn chips.  Not like I’ve ever done that, or anything.  Sloppy told me.

Cranberry-Orange Compote & Ultimate Thanksgiving Sandwiches

The Ultimate Thanksgiving Leftover Sandwich, version one.

Honestly, I cannot take credit for this genius sandwich.  It was sourced on a Silver Cloud sammich sissy and I shared a few weeks back, when our eager tummies sought a taste of the rapidly approaching thanksgiving holiday.  Served on white bread with canned, jellied cranberries and Stove Top stuffing, it hit a nostalgic spot on the taste buds and got us both salivating for the feast to come. 

When Sunday night following Thanksgiving rolled around and heating up yet another round of leftovers seemed, somehow, boring, I reached into the not-too-deep recesses of my food memory bank and found this sandwich waiting there.  I wanted to copy that interesting, dumbed-down version with the fancy-ass delicious leftovers now crowding my fridge.  So I checked our leftover stock to see if it could be possible: seedy whole-wheat bread, check; sage & mushroom ciabatta dressing, check; lots and lots of leftover cranberry-shallot glazed turkey, check.  Yet, alas!  We had no more cranberry sauce left! 

Boiling away...

A Thanksgiving dinner is nothing without that tiny dollop of tart cranberry sauce.  We always had two in our family – my grandpa’s traditional cooked cranberry sauce, and the tarter orange-cranberry relish that is uncooked.  To properly enjoy your turkey, you needed both.  And to properly enjoy my leftover turkey sandwich, I needed at least one. 

Lacking cranberries, I remembered K’s basic instructions on how to make a chutney – “you need fruit, spices, sugar, and vinegar.”  Would dried cranberries suffice?  I thought I could plump them up by cooking them with some acid and juice.  I threw in a handful of raisins, too, to beef up the berreis’ relatively low number.  A hearty squeeze of lemon juice stood in for the vinegar, and a tangelo (skinned, sectioned, and squeezed) complimented the tart berries with some sweet citrus, instead of sugar.  Oh, and a Tablespoon or so of cranberry juice concentrate and apple jelly added intensity of flavor and a bit more substance, respectively. 

The assembly line

Boiled down until syrupy, this improvised cranberry orange compote really popped.  It just fell in love with the turkey, but I can see this tarty mixture giving herself equally well to a pork tenderloin or perhaps even atop a nice creamy brie....

So on to the sandwich!  First, I set four slices of grainy wheat breat to toast, so that they’d be sturdy enough to hold their husky fillings.  I added a bit of stock to the stuffing to remoisten it, then after heating it up (microwave) I mashed it lightly with a fork – going for a more cohesive, spreadable texture here.  I thinly sliced some white-meat turkey, and then set to assembly: bread, thin layer of mayo, stuffing, turkey, cranberry, bread.  Some reheated green beans went alongside.

This is just a flipping awesome sandwich.  Bright, tart fruit flavors on the sandwich are needed to cut through the relatively heavy layers of turkey and stuffing.  This, dare I say, may have topped the “leftover turkey and plochmann’s mustard on grandma’s dinner roll 4 hours after dinner” as my all-time favorite leftover thanksgiving sandwich.  But, you know, I’m not done with all those leftovers yet either…

A. G. Ferrari's Deli in San Francisco

Across the street from this little hotel is a small Italian specialty food store and deli.  It looks like a nice, new little place.  A quick Google search reveals that it's a mid-size California chain, although it doesn't feel much like a chain when you walk in.  It carries Italian candies, wines, imported pastas, and olive oils, in addition to its well stocked deli of italian meats, cheeses, and prepared food items.  It would be a fun place to explore were I a local resident. 


But I'm not, so none of these food finds really caught my eye, since my 50.5 lb suitcase can take no more contents unless I want to pay a $100 oversize bag fee when I fly back to Chicago on Wed.  No matter how special that olive oil is, I'm not paying a hundo to take it with me on the aeroplane. 

They look like black-eyed peas to me...

Sandwiches, on the other hand, are something I can enjoy.  And A.G. Ferrari makes those by the tenfold.  Their "seasonal" (doubt it" menu lists about 20 varieties, and I'll give them credit that only one or two feature deli smoked turkey.  Instead, they stuff their (freshly baked?  maybe) bread with cured Italian meats, roasted veggies, house-made dressings, and less-common cheeses.  A welcome find. 


Going back to that across the street location, it's no surprise that it has fed me lunch two days running now.  Yesterday I selected #4, a tuna and celery salad with tomato, arugula, and olive tapenade on foccacia.  The not-too-mayo-y tuna salad had a fair bit of crunch, and the chunky olive tapenade cut through the richness with its salty brine.  The foccacia as well wasn't greasy like this olive-oil laden bread can sometimes be, making it a nice counterpoint to the savory contents it held.

Today the #9 Veneto called my name.  Layers of spicy, rich sopprasetta, asiago cheese, red leaf lettuce and--the deal clincher--pickled vegetables on crusty italian bread.  A side of cannellini bean, celery, and pecorino cheese salad with red wine vinaigrette somehow made its way into my cart, too.  Strange how these things happen.  


This was a great sandwich.  Great.  The peppery, salty salami balanced perfectly against the vinegary, crunchy vegetables, and mixed with the creamy asiago and the chewy bread it became perhaps my perfect sandwich. 


If you find yourself near this place (as I will tomorrow) I highly suggest helping yourself out and heading inside.  The #8 sure sounds good too.....   

Turkey Burgers with Creamy Romaine Slaw

Is there anything so great as a burger?  Besides sandwiches….

Behold: a burger.

No, people, there is not.  Let my un-highbrow food preferences be known—there is no more perfect food than a cheeseburger.  It is my favorite food, although my arterial walls may wish it otherwise. 

An American icon, the hamburger evokes childhood memories and particular emotions with each juicy, meaty bite.  Can you remember the first burger you ever had?  Can you imagine a summer barbecue without burgers on the grill?  Can you walk by a restaurant and smell charcoal and sizzling beef without a Pavlovian drool response?  We even love bad burgers, a fact to which McDonalds can attest.

See all the junk in the patties?  This will help the finished product immensely. 

Thankfully, the burger is not staid in tradition.  It is malleable, adaptable, and open to new ideas.  It is GGG for whatever you could think to do to it.  Just look at the Australians—they put beets and pineapples on their burgers. Or peruse the Kuma's Corner or Bad Apple menus, and rethink what should and should not top a burger. 

One of my favorite burgers has just bacon, sharp cheddar, and barbecue sauce on it.  Perhaps my favorite all-time burger had pancetta, brie, spinach, and a bourbon-poached pear on it (thank you, Kuma’s Lair of the Minotaur).  But, really, all burgers are my favorite.  Some are just more favorite than others. 

Sizzling away on the grill pan.  I have a bad track record with grilling turkey burgers on a real grill...too many down the grates.

This one came to me via Mommie from Real Simple magazine--Turkey Burgers with Creamy Romaine Slaw.  Usually turkey burgers suffer the same fate—dry, overcooked, a bland imitation of beef.  You just can’t treak turkey the same way as beef.  For one, I like my burgers medium-rare—but you won’t ever catch anyone sane eating undercooked poultry.  A good burger needs little more than an 80/20 meat/fat ratio, a coarse grind, loose packing, liberal sprinkling of salt & pepper, and a quick sear on a roaring hot grill/griddle to become great. (I guess that might sound like a lot…) But, lo and behold, treat the turkey the same way, and dry blandness results.

Instead, it helps to approach turkey burgers from a different angle.  What does it usually lack?  Flavor and moisture, both due in large part to its lean-ness.  So…why not add those things back in?  Unlike burgers, which I almost never “mix-into” before cooking (I’ll make an exception for the Contessa’s burgers, which call for onion, Worcestershire, egg, and, yes, a pat of butter stuck into the middle), turkey burgers call out for seasoning and add-ins. 

Someday soon I’ll tell you all about my Salsa Verde Burgers, which began as a Rachel Ray recipe but have evolved far beyond into something sublime.  They use about ¼ cup salsa and cumin to spice up the burgers, with the chunky tomatoes keeping the meat from drying out.    

These burgers use spicy Dijon mustard, thyme (or sage, if that’s all you have) and green onion to much the same effect.  Lacking cheese, a tangy romaine slaw perks up the earthiness and keeps them tasting light while also hearty.  The only substitutions I made were the aforementioned sage.  I also used only 1/2 the amount of meat to make 2 burgers, but kept the add-in amounts the same.  What can I say, I like big--not subtle--flavors.  Same with the slaw--probably went a little heavy on the sauce, but it came out just right--tangy, bright, crunchy, and oh-so-flavorful.  A success all around. 

Yes, those are panko-crusted baked onion rings.  Patience, friends. The recipe is coming.

I know I write loftily about silly topics like what we eat and why we eat it.  I’m still working out the tone and style and, truthfully, I’m using this as an exercise to help me find a style of food writing that suits me.  So, internet, bear with a girl.  She’ll come around, eventually.

Minorly adapted recipe after the jump; original linked above. 

Wherein the Metaphysical Sandwich is Realized.

What is there to say about a chicken sandwich?

It's good.

A.  It's a sandwich.
B.  There's chicken in it.

A sandwich isn't something that needs a recipe, friends. Granted, I've seen--and tried--more than my fair share of sandwich "recipes."  But as a convenience food, and a regular, beloved staple of my diet, anybody can make a pretty darn good sandwich.  And a sandwich is something more than anything a recipe can define, I think.  It is so humble, we don't think much of them as a genre...but we probably eat more sandwiches than, say, tacos or pizza or salads.  If we vote on our favorite foods by eating them, I'd hazard a guess that the humble sandwich is the President of the United States of American Diets.

Start with good bread, like this soft ciabatta from Trader Joe's.

True, there are food lovers the world over who excel at sandwich making.  I've had great sandwiches that blend unexpected flavors, introduce a range of textures, and unite between chewy, fresh bread into something much more than a sandwich's humble origins would expect.  But, I've also had amazing sandwiches out of random ingredients I dig out of my own fridge and assemble between whatever bread we have on hand.  A good sandwich can come from humble roots, just like a bad sandwich can run you $15 or more.

Know what you want on it

And we've all had mediocre sandwiches probably more often than either of those last two events combine.  Still, though, even a mediocre sandwich is pretty good.  As a meal, they're universally appealing, and universally delicious...OK, well, palatable.  I did try lots of Tesco pre-packaged sandwiches while in London last year (hey, a sandwich, chips and water for 2 pounds is a whole lot less than any other London eats I could find...) and had some unfavorable reactions to one of them (the cheese and onion and mayo concoction...what?  i love cheese.  i love onion.  i love mayo.  but together, ALONE, on white bread? ....ew).

Spread the bread with loooove.  Yeah, I gross myself out sometimes. 

Straying back around to my original lack-of-point...I like sammiches.  I try to make great ones.  But, there is no key, I belove, to elevating a good sandwich to a great one.  Instead, it's all about the combination; the mood; the memory; the reason; and, of course, the taste.  Some might say, "use the best ingredients you can find!"  And, sure, in general this rings true.  But a natural, gourmet peanut butter and locally-sourced small-batch jam on rustic fresh baked bread aren't ever, ever going to outshine the memory of Jif & Smuckers on Butternut bread.  On the other side, deli turkey adorned with every condiment and topping is probably never goign to top leftover turkey on leftover rolls, maybe with some yellow mustard, the day after Thanksgiving.  It just can't.

So you can go as gourmet as you want, stay as kitsch as you want--it doesn't matter.  A good sandwich can't be defined so easily, which is why I think recipes can't really tell you how to make a good one either.  They mean too much to us to come with instructions.

Build sturdily and with consideration of each bite.

Instead, I say, eat what you want, and be creative.  Make the insides a surprise--leave the lettuce and tomato behind and throw on thinly sliced veggies you don't usually see on a deli tray, like zucchini, cucumber, carrots, cabbage.  Open your cupboard and think about what would compliment your flavors if you weren't using bread--curry powder? flavored vinegar? any dips or spreads? Hell, even celeb chef Flay has a burger at his restaurant that comes with potato chips on it.

I love the money shot.

Think beyond mayo and mustard to salad dressing, hummus, cream cheese--or create an easy "aioli" by mixing spices into your mayo before spreading.  Like I did on this giant ciabatta monster, consisting of garlic-grilled chicken, wilted kale, roasted red peppers, and fontina cheese, with an easy aioli of mayo, garlic (just the powdered kind), minced chives, and lemon. Wrapped in foil, baked until melty, and sliced up...and devoured.

Bottom line...be creative!  Think about your next sandwich, pay it a little respect, and get weird with what you throw on it.  You probably won't regret it.

We all live in a turkey submarine

As I verified today, a small slice makes a perfect breakfast.

My mom deserves all the credit for this post.  When we go to a tailgate or picnic or cottage on Lake Michigan, she'll often make one of these great big submarine sandwiches.  Made on a large loaf of French or Italian bread, they sit in the fridge overnight, wrapped tightly in plastic, so that all of the flavors can blend together and the sammich can "become one."  Instead of the hassle of making a bunch of individual sandwiches, you just slice this one up and serve.  It's easy and so good.  Somehow, the overnight sit softens up the bread, melds the flavors, and makes this bad bay so much more delicious than it would be assembled & eaten straightaway.  And it lasts for several days, so you can just slice off portions and eat as the hunger grabs you (if you're me, that translates to often).  I love having things prepared and ready-to-eat.  That's why I like to spend Sunday afternoons cooking, making big batches of salads, soups, etc for lunches the next week; cutting up veggies to keep in the fridge as snacks; puttering around and keeping myself busy with food...

That said, you do have to avoid a few potential pitfalls.  First, you gotta keep the veggies to a minimum (this should make you happy, Aunt L!!!) because they have a tendency to make the bread soggy.  And you need to be mindful to use a fairly sturdy loaf, otherwise you're going to have an unappetizingly gummy loaf on your hands the next day.  Also, I try not to stuff them too much, because you don't want "backsliding" to be an issue (a term coined by Serious Eats/A Hamburger Today to describe the unpleasant phenomenon of having sandwich contents shoot out the back end when you bite into the front).

Check out the innards.  I think they call this the "money shot."

Otherwise, you can experiment and layer it on to your heart's content.  I've used supermarket and bakery bread to equal success (supermarket bread's less crusty crust might even be preferable--see "backsliding" above), and any variety of meats and cheeses.  For the add-ons, try onions (give them a 5-minute bath in ice water or red wine vinegar to mild them down, if you're not a red onion fan), olives, giardinara, sliced peppers, cucumbers--just not anything watery like tomatoes or that will get unpleasantly wilted like lettuce.

A few weeks back I made up a classic American version, and yesterday I used the remainder of my D'Amato's loaf to make a spicy turkey sub, complete with my favorite sauce of all time.  Recipes for all three after the jump...