Fast Balls, Slow Polenta

Plus: Challah French Toast, Lunch at abcV, Dinner at Popina.

Hey everyone,

Sometimes I crave meatballs. I always have. Maybe it’s my body saying “you need the vitamins that are in meatballs,” whatever those might be. I’m not a scientist. All I know is that sometimes I crave them, but that they’re also a pain to make.

Enter my new favorite meatball recipe.

I suppose you already know about baking meatballs in the oven, but did you know about using Panko instead of making your own breadcrumbs? And using a significant amount of Parmesan? And lots of olive oil? Credit goes to Chris Morocco for these game-changing meatballs.

My own twist? I add slow-cooked polenta and slow-cooked marinara sauce. What gives? Why would you do something slow with something fast?

I don’t know. I’m full of contradictions. Maybe I enjoy slow-cooked polenta and slow-cooked marinara more than I like labor-intensive meatballs?

Click the button to read all about it, recipe-ish included.

Now let’s talk French Toast. If you can find challah, you’re already making better French toast than most people.

My old recipe is here; lately I do this: whisk together 3 eggs, 1/2 cup of whole milk, a splash of vanilla, a tablespoon of sugar, and a pinch of salt. Slice the challah into thick slices. Melt butter in a skillet, dip the slices in the batter until soaked, allow to drip off, and then fry in the butter. Flip when golden.

To serve, I sprinkled with powdered sugar and topped with lots of berries. Also fried up some chicken sausage for protein.

That’s pretty much as good as French Toast gets. (Though it was a little soggy in the middle. Maybe next time I’ll finish it in the oven?)

Had lots of meals with Jennys last week. First I had a wonderful lunch with my editor at Knopf, Jenny Jackson, author of Pineapple Street, who’s working with me on my new novel. We ate at Buttermilk Channel and had a lovely time.

Then on Thursday I went to lunch with my literary agent, Jenni Ferrari-Adler, at abcV to belatedly celebrate the book. Isn’t she cute?

We ate so many good things, but the highlight was clearly this whole-roasted cauliflower that made me rethink my attitude about whole-roasted cauliflower.

I usually think roasted florets are better because you get caramelization all around, not just on the outside… but here the thing was so beautifully browned and then it came slathered in the most scrumptious tahini sauce. And there were pomegranates and a hot sauce on the side. It’s one of the best things, vegetable, animal, or mineral that I’ve had in a while.

The final Jenny was Jenny Rosenstrach who you all know and love from Dinner: A Love Story. We joined her, her husband Andy, and Cup of Jo’s Jo (not a Jenny) for dinner at Popina on Friday night. Here’s Jenny and Jo at the table.

Dinner at Popina was so good. We all shared olives and bread and strachiatella. I had the orecchiette with pesto and Fava beans, which I loved; Craig had the Southern riff on chicken Milanese (the restaurant is Italian-Southern fusion) which was spicy and came with ranch-dressed salad.

For dessert, we shared the cheesecake and the panna cotta. The cheesecake was the clear winner. Look at its high collar.

And that, my friends, was just a few days of eating in New York. No wonder I went to the gym today and ran on the treadmill for 30 minutes. Swimsuit season is almost here and I’m still in winter hibernation mode.

Let’s look at some links:

• Gary Shteyngart, one of my favorite writers, does a martini crawl around New York (The New Yorker);

• Melissa Clark on finding local fish (NYT);

• Deb steams artichokes (Smitten Kitchen);

• Ruth, Nancy, and Laurie talk their favorite food TV shows… several of which I’ve never heard of (Three Ingredients).

That’s it for today, folks!

See you back here on Thursday….

Your pal,
Adam