October 07, 2015

Baked Noodles Romanoff

October 07, 2015/ Blair Cowan

Eleanor, as we've discussed, was Polish by heritage, if not by birth. As a first-generation American, though, I'm sure her childhood meals were mostly comprised of Polish-type foods. I'm especially sure of this, because even my childhood meals often included slightly Polish foods: I was the only person in my first-grade class to have ever even heard of a pierogi, and I remember eating potato pancakes fairly frequently as a kid, too.* And every year until she died, Eleanor and her friends made sauerbraten and potato dumpling, curing the meat for days before inviting all of their friends over for a massive feast.

So when I found the recipe for Baked Noodles Romanoff in the box, I wasn't surprised-- it sounds like a Polish dish (creamy noodles with bread crumbs? Duh.) and even the name sounds pretty Eastern European (although I assumed it was based on the Russian Romanovs-- of Anastasia fame-- which is most decidedly is not). In fact, for awhile I even thought it was just going to be a savoury kugel (a Jewish dish made with egg noodles, a custard-y base, and garnished as you like), but then I realised that kugels containing cottage cheese are probably pretty rare.

So, you ask: if it's not a kugel, then what is it? In short, Noodles Romanoff is basically a cross between a kugel and a meatless stroganoff. It's insanely easy, super comforting on a rainy autumn night, and, though it was delicious on the night we made it, it was even better tonight, topped with a soft-boiled egg and a ton of red pepper. It's sort of like a fancy man's 'refrigerator pasta,' where you just use up whatever is in your fridge about to go bad and mix up a bowl of pasta to go with it, but it's way more delicious. It may not be healthy, but with a sauce made of cottage cheese, it's still not as bad as a cream-based pasta dish could be.

I looked it up to see if this was a common dish in Poland or otherwise, and I was surprised to learn that it was a pretty popular meal in the mid-20th century. So popular, in fact, that almost the only reference to it that I can find on the internet is a reference to Betty Crocker's boxed Noodles Romanoff mix. (This is all news to me; I just assumed that, much like Pollo Alla Verona, this recipe was just kind of a made-up one). So if you remember days of eating Noodles Romanoff from a box, or even if you don't, try this dish. It's easy, it's delicious, and you get to mix up a bunch of spices like a mad scientist, so you know it's gonna be fun.

Smooth cottage cheese is strange and pretty.

*I kind of forgot about pierogis, until we moved to Edinburgh, where there's a strangely high proportion of Polish grocery stores that sell the best pickles I've ever tasted and all the possible types of pierogis you can imagine. Also, Judson's Polish hairdressed introduced him to Polish vodka shortly after we moved here, and our lives (not to mention our Moscow Mules) haven't been the same since.

The verdict:

4 spoons out of five. This was really good, but the leftovers kind of required the egg to make it moist enough to enjoy for a second time. However, it's one of those 'set it and forget it' meals, where you can put it in the oven, wash all the dishes you dirtied, and finish just in time to eat it in your sparkling clean kitchen. It's definitely worth making, and who knows-- your version might even beat out Betty Crocker's!

The recipe:

Baked Noodles Romanoff

The directions:

Cook noodles according to directions on package.
Meanwhile, preheat oven to 176C/350F and grease a casserole dish or deep-dish pie pan.
Mix together bread crumbs, spices, and parsley, then set aside.
Drain noodles and combine with cottage cheese, sour cream, and parmesan.
Pour mixture into prepared casserole and top with prepared bread crumbs.
Bake 20-25 minutes, until golden brown and delicious.

the ingredients:

8 oz. egg noodles
8 oz cottage cheese, beaten or whizzed in the food processor until smooth
8 oz sour cream
½ c parmesan, grated
½ c bread crumbs
1 tsp parsley
Spices of your choice

Spices I used:

Oregano
Marjoram
Dill
Smoked Salt
Pepper
Smoked Paprika
Onion Powder
Garlic Powder
You don't need all of them, just whatever you want to use!

October 05, 2015

El's (Ersatz) Pound Cake, or, Easiest One-Bowl Pound Cake

October 05, 2015/ Blair Cowan

When I was a kid, my mom made Pound Cake all the time. All the time. It just became part of the landscape for me because it was around so often, and I've always loved it. When I was in college, my mom used to make me an entire pound cake to take back to my dorm with me anytime I came to visit, and those days when I would walk into Smith Hall with a giant tin of pound cake to share with my hallmates are some pretty amazing memories. (Plus, the car ride from Raleigh to Atlanta always smelled a lot better with a cake in the passenger seat next to me!).

I've made a lot of riffs on my mom's pound cake: adding in peaches when I lived in Georgia, adding in cocoa when I wanted something more dessert-y, glazing it with lemon or dusting it with powdered sugar just to make it prettier, but my favourite way to eat it is still just plain. I haven't made a pound cake in ages-- they're not exactly cheap cakes, and they'll totally deplete your pantry if you're not careful, after all. But I was thrilled to find this recipe for Eleanor's Pound Cake in the box to see where my mom drew her inspiration from. This is definitely not the same recipe as my mom used when I was growing up (hers was sour-cream based, while this one has milk as the star ingredient), but it's delicious all the same, and it's interesting to see where my mom gained her baking knowledge from.

Weirdly, this recipe is labelled as 'El's Pound Cake,' but it's from Eleanor's own box, so I'm not sure why she felt the need to further explain it. It's also written in what could well be the sloppy predecessor to my mom's impeccably neat, font-like handwriting, on the back of a receipt for dry cleaning, which I just love. Based on the fact that the dry cleaner was in Florida (where Eleanor didn't move until the late 1950s) and my mom may have been the one who wrote it down, I'm pretty sure this one comes from the mid-to-late 1960s. While not a decade known for their culinary delights, this cake is amazing, not least of all because there is no ingredient in it that measures a pound... so why, in fact, is it even called a pound cake?

I don't know if pound cake is particularly common over here in Scotland, so just in case you haven't heard of it/had one, it's a cake traditionally made with one pound of every maind ingredient in it (flour, sugar, milk, butter/shortening). It's a dense, moist cake that goes absolutely perfectly with a cup of coffee for brunch, but can also make a perfectly fine snack or dessert. Most importantly, this one is a one-bowl recipe, which means you really have no excuse not to make it ASAP.

Additionally, I know that technically you can make a pound cake in any pan, but I grew up with my mom making it in her trusty bundt pan, so it never even occurred to me to make it in anything else.* If you choose to do the same, then note that this doesn't rise a whole lot and will only fill a standard-size bundt pan about halfway (if you have some of those adorable smaller bundt pans, this would be the perfect time to give them a try!). Even in a standard-sized pan, it still cooks up just fine, so don't worry if your pan looks only half-full. Alternately, in lieu of a bundt, you could make this in a loaf pan and it would still be just fine.

*Incidentally, my mom and Eleanor's proclivity toward bundt pans may be another sign of Eleanor's Polish heritage shining through-- in doing my research to make sure I was using the correct terminology, I learned that bundt pans originated in Germany and Poland, where they were used for making cakes called gugelhopfs.