Eau de Allium

If I ever got famous enough to have my own perfume, there is a very big part of me that would want to call it Eau de Allium, especially if the source of my fame was my culinary [mis]adventures.  In case you missed it, Allium is the "scientific" Latin name for garlic, and that is the scent I am most likely to ooze through my pores for the next few days (at the very least).  Once again, I offer my apologies and condolences to my colleagues and new hires...but not my regrets, nor my repentance: I'll do it again.

Apparently, in 2007 there was some huge stink (tee hee) about the prevalence of garlic in Italian cooking.  I totally missed that, and I'm glad, because I love love love garlic.  Mister's exact words upon his first bite of dinner tonight were, "That's a lot of garlic you have there, lady!"  Meh.  I guess, if you consider a whole head a lot...

I'll come back to that, though.  Last night, we finally had the Mediterranean Rice Salad from One-Dish Vegetarian Meals.  The vinaigrette I poured over the rice salad before refrigerating for 30 minutes to let the flavors meld and set contained only a conservative 2 cloves, but since it was raw, you could taste it even more intensely than the 10 cloves in tonight's dinner.

It was very simple, easy to put together and it tasted phenomenal.  This is absolutely the kind of recipe you just want to tack to your refrigerator so you can just pull it out at any random and necessary moment.  There were not many ingredients, which allowed the ones that were there to shine and play off of one another.  I used twice as many roasted peppers as I was "supposed" to, but it worked out perfectly.  Mister's only request was that the next time I make it, I make it earlier in the week so he doesn't have to resist the temptation of oil-cured black olives he isn't allowed to eat, and then he acted out a short vignette of the olives beckoning to him whenever he opened the refrigerator and his attempts to resist.

The vinaigrette was primarily olive oil and balsamic vinegar with some garlic, salt, basil, and lemon juice.  It was also supposed to have oregano, but I was not trying to choke on my salad.  It saturated the rice perfectly - not too much, just the right amount, with a delicious sheen of oil on top of each little grain.  I grated a half cup of fennel into the mix as well, but it really didn't stand out - it must have been one of those behind-the-scenes players that made the whole thing amazing.  It smelled fun!

Anyway, tonight we had Orecchiette con Broccoli from The Urban Vegan.  I didn't make this too long ago, but there was one substantial difference: this time I used fresh broccoli.  It wasn't perfect, but it was a vast improvement.  I also got to use a new-ish toy, my butterfly whisk by Kuhn Rikon to mix the white miso into the garlic-olive oil "sauce.

I don't think it worked nearly as well as this ubiquitous "flat whisk" Dynise apparently has, and uses for this recipe.  At the moment, my home is too small for one more whisk - I have four already.  Besides, I'm trying to save (find) room for the 4-quart All-Clad saute pan on sale for nearly 50% off.

Natalie, would you like to purchase this 5-star rated piece of cookware you already know you need and want for $110 off its original price?


Yes, yes, I would.  *doe eyes at Mister*


Anyway, with the fresh broccoli and allowing the garlic to saute for a long time, the result was actually a much more flavorful dish that met with both mine and Mister's approval.  It's fortunate we've hit a little cold front this week, because I would really feel bad if I was sweating out all this garlic...er...Eau de Allium near my colleagues.