Bad Home Cooking

Going Rogue: Stir-fry style

The rain slammed down on the tin patio roof as I stared bleakly into the refrigerator at 4:30. Another dinner time, another blank slate. Even though the weather called for soup, my eye caught the soy sauce, which suggested stir-fry. Not what you think of for stormy weather fare, but it could work.

Besides, I had almost everything on hand -- carrots, celery, soy sauce, ginger, sticky rice. All I needed was tofu and maybe some snow peas, if I could find them. If Trader Joe's wasn't flooded (like most of the streets in my town were at the moment), I could procure and make it happen.

I was only half soaked upon getting there, and feeling like a damp rug I was pointed in the direction of the tofu. "What kind should I get," I asked one of the workers there, who I knew to be vegetarian. "What are you making?" he asked. Stir-fry, I told him. "Do you have a recipe you like for that?"

He regarded me pityingly. "No," he said finally. "It's stir-fry. You don't need a recipe for stir-fry."

Maybe most people don't. Obviously no one there has read this blog. (when in fact it should be sponsored by TJ's, given the amount of time and money I spend there.)

Upping the pressure considerably was the fact that Debbie was coming over for dinner. She's not picky when it comes to food, but it does have to be at least partially edible. In an attempt to accommodate, I put off drinking until I'd started my summit attempt. This would be my stir-fry without a map. Going rogue with the stir-fry.

You laugh, perhaps. But if you know me and my history of disastrous forays into un-recipe'd territory, you wouldn't laugh long.

With Debbie coaching me, I cut the carrots and celery into medium dice. Diced the fresh ginger. Sliced my block of extra firm tofu into cubes (more or less) and soaked them in a marinade of my own design -- soy sauce, rice vinegar and a little sesame oil.

I made the rice, then threw the veggies into the pan to saute.

"Shall I put a little sesame oil in this?" I asked Debbie.

"Yes, but not too much or it will overwhelm everything else."

So I opened the cap and doused. I thought there would be a little spout that held back the liquid. There was not.

Chug, chug ...oh, crap...

Debbie rolled her eyes. "Do you do this on purpose, Jules?"

But as it turns out, the flavors were not overwhelmed by the sesame oil. If anything, the tofu must have sponged it up. Because the end result was fresh-tasting and zesty. Even the nits ate their bowl. Debbie and I had two bowls each.

We celebrated by opening the two-buck Chuck. 

This minor miracle, followed by the Rosemary red beet soup with miso that I made for the Soup Swap today, which turned out so good people fell on it, heartens me greatly.

Tonight I'm trying a seared sashimi-grade Ahi. With just a drop of sesame oil for flavor. (thanks for the idea, Liz) Stay tuned...

Beat the flu: Bad Home Cook-style

Nobody rolled her eyes more dramatically than I did at the hype surrounding the H1N1 "Swine Flu" pandemic. But after watching just about everyone I know take to their beds with a flu that came with a throat full of nails and a loss of inner-ear balance, I myself got felled.

Was it the dread Swine Flu? Who knows. All I do know is that it was a doozy of a flu bug. I was on my back for two days and probably should have stayed down for another two. But in between, I fought back with tradition, folklore, and non-science. And I emerged greatly improved. Allow me to share the method to my madness.

Garlic. Upon first signs of sickness, send someone else out to the store for several heads of garlic. You must make garlic soup, and lots of it. You can try my version of Julia Child's a l'ail aux pommes de terre (that's garlic soup with potatoes) or Heidi Swanson's version of Richard Olney's classic version. This looked creamy and delicious (just look at that photo!), but not surprisingly, I botched it. Strangely enough though, it still helped a great deal.

Hot and sour soup - there's a Chinese place on the corner that makes a hot and sour soup with mysterious and proven healing qualities. Over the last five years, it's been the deal-breaker between me and certain death. It must have something to do with the strange chilis stewing within, or the mixing of the hot and cold vapors, or the special mushrooms. Maybe it's the tofu. Whatever the reason, it works every time, breaking whatever hold an illness has on me. I've never tried this at home, but maybe you should in this case: Epicurious has the number for you. 

Tea with honey. - Any kind of tea, but make sure it's local honey. I don't think of myself as a crunchy granola type, but I really do believe that honey made from your friendly neighborhood bees packs a particular punch to your immune system.

Just stay home already: Don't be a martyr to corporate America. If you feel yourself getting sick, just call in sick. If you try to put a brave face on it and go in, chances are your colleagues will rat you out anyway.

Shots of Whiskey. It works. A doctor friend told me this himself (OK, he's English, but he's still an M.D.). One this one count, my Irish grandmother would have agreed with him 100% Not for nothing whiskey has been called the "water of life." Take a shot (or if you're larger than me, take two) at night after the kids are down. Tell me it doesn't fight symptoms better than Nyquil...

Try all of the above and get lots of rest. And let me know how you're feeling.

Popover morning

As with so much else that is fine and delightful in my life, I learned about popovers from Christina. When we lived together in graduate school she'd whip these up from scratch after a long night studying, or a long night doing whatever it is 20-something graduate students do. It made a great impression on me. It only took 15 years for me to try them myself.

Ah, the popover: warm and doughy, a half-opened bottle cap-shaped object of morning delight. An excuse to have your cake and eat it too. I don't think my kids realize how good they have it, when Mom decides it's a popover morning.

There is some lore surrounding the humble popover, and I salute these pursuits. But I use Mark Bittman's simple recipe, to admirable results:

1 Tbsp melted butter, plus some for greasing the muffin tin

2 eggs

1 cup milk

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup flour

Preheat the oven to 425 F. Grease a standard muffin tin and put it in the oven while you're making the batter.

Beat together the eggs, milk, butter, sugar and salt. Then beat in the flour, a little at a time. The batter should be smooth. Fill the tins at least halfway (you probably won't have enough to fill all 12 of them).

Bake for 15 minutes, then lower heat to 350 and continue baking for another 15 minutes. NO PEEKING! They have to bake for 30 minutes before you open the over door. They should be puffed up and lightly browned.

Serve hot, with butter and jam and scrambled eggs. (I'm trying to learn how to do scrambled eggs a la Julia Child...but it hasn't worked yet. My kids don't know the difference.)

It's like having candy for breakfast. They will complete all homework on the spot if you promise them a popover morning.

Try it and see for yourself.

The complete idiot's guide to making lasagna

"Lasagna," I texted Debbie.

"Not veggie!" she texted back.

Debbie was my guinea pig the last time I tried to make this most basic of dishes. I tried a "light" vegetarian version on her three years ago. She still remembers the "watery sauce" and "non-lasagna taste" of that little experiment.

The previous time before that, years earlier, my first attempt at lasagna had underperformed in the opposite direction: After carefully following a recipe, my carefully-crafted lasagna spilled out of the pan and was so cheesy and rich it gave instant artery blockage to all who dared try it. Nobody could finish a piece, not even the hungriest men folk.

So lasagna and me. We don't have the best history. It's another example of an outwardly simple dish that everyone can whip up except for me. Little wonder: When I was a kid my mom bought Stouffer's and we ate that unquestioningly.

This time however, my previous defeats long faded into the murk, I vowed I would not be defeated.

Debbie was coming for dinner again. And if this didn't turn out, I was altogether prepared to call out for Chinese to save face.

The heat was on.

First, I read up on the topic on the Internets; the food blogs, the recipe forums, the Food Network. I realized there are more versions of Lasagna than there are Italians, and that following a specific recipe isn't necessary. As long as I layered sauce between two sheets of pasta, that's technically a lasagna.  A consultation with the owner of my local pizza joint also confirmed that I didn't have to go with three cheeses, I could just use two. 

And so I went out on my own. No recipe. 

Here's what I did: For the meat sauce:

1 pound ground meat

4 sweet Italian sausages, chopped

1 medium onion, chopped

crushed garlic, to taste (I used two teaspoons of crushed garlic)

1 28-ounce can of diced tomatoes, with juice

1 16-ounce can of tomato sauce

1/4 cup grated carrots

5 or 6 whole basil leaves

For the cheesy stuff:

2 small tubs of ricotta cheese

1 cup of Parmesan

two eggs

sea salt and ground pepper to taste

chopped Italian parsley

One package of no-boil lasagna noodles.

3/4 cup Mozzarella cheese

Decently chop onion and saute in large skillet or dutch oven until translucent but not brown. Add garlic. Take care not to burn.

Crumble your meat (ground beef and sausage) into a medium bowl and season it liberally with an Italian seasoning mix (Trader Joe's has a nice one, of course), salt and pepper. Add to the pot and stir.

When lightly brown, add the diced tomatoes and tomato sauce. Heat to a simmer, then add your shredded carrots. Cover the pot and simmer this mixture for an hour to an hour and a half. Stir every so often so it doesn't stick to the bottom, and taste. Adjust seasoning as necessary.

Meanwhile, heat oven to 350 degrees. Scoop the ricotta cheese out of the tubs into a bowl. Add two eggs and mix. Add salt and pepper and chopped parsley. Mix well.

Sauce the bottom of a 9 X 12 pan, lay the first layer of lasagna noodles on, then follow this sequence:

Meat sauce

Ricotta cheese

Parmesan cheese,

a little meat sauce

Next layer of noodles.

Repeat sequence until you have three layers. Top with meat sauce and a little mozzarella cheese.

Cover with Tinfoil and bake for 20 minutes, uncover, bake for another 10-15.

IMPORTANT: The secret to better lasagna, I have learned, is to let it rest for half an hour before you touch it, and preferably longer. This lets everything set so you don't have a goopy mess.

Mine sat long enough for me to have to microwave it when Debbie showed up. But the results caused tremendous gratitude and overwhelming relief.

"This is more like it, Jules," said Debbie, shoveling more into her mouth. "Delicious." This woman, probably my oldest non-relative friend, would not hesitate to tell me if it sucked. She has in the past. So that felt good.

Then the Drama Tween had her plate. "Yummy." was the verdict. Followed by dancing and the eventual finishing of her entire portion. Good. Good.

Now that I've made one successful lasagna, you'd think I'd be heartened to retry several other failed attempts at Italian cookery, including the pasta dish with pepper. 

Nope. God, I can't even come up with a clever kicker.

OMG roasted tomatoes -- Once more with feeling

When two people in the space of a month fall into rapture over a recipe, you know you're doing something right. And it's about time.

I've made Molly's roasted tomatoes twice in the past month, taking advantage of high tomato season, and the results have been great for my self-esteem.

I had a girlfriend and her daughter over for dinner last night and served these tomatoes. "Oh. My. God," she said after the first bite. And didn't say another word until she'd licked her bowl clean and asked for another tomato.

A few weeks earlier I sent an extra tomato home with Luke. He called the next day. "I don't remember them being this delicious last time you made them," he said. "I need that recipe, please."

Why yes, that IS a giant, shit-eating grin on my face.

Here's the recipe, once again, with feeling: (and another hat tip to Molly and Luisa)

Find four large, ripe, great-tasting tomatoes. (It's summer, all you have to do is follow your nose. Buy Farmer's Market tomatoes or use your own. Supermarket sorts just don't do justice to this dish.)

1 small yellow onion, diced
olive oil
1/3 cup Arborio rice
1/3 cup water
5 fresh basil leaves
salt
breadcrumbs (I use Japanese panko, to great, crunchy results.)
2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, sliced into 1/4-inch slices

Behead the tomatoes and scoop out the guts; juice, seeds, flesh, all of it, into a small bowl. Lightly oil a 9X13" pan and place the empty tomato hulls inside. Pull out some of the chunkier bits of flesh from the bowl and chop them up. Replace.

In a medium (2-quart) saucepan, warm a chug of olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring frequently until soft and translucent. Add the rice and continue to cook, stirring for another minute or so. Add the tomato guts and the water, plus the basil. "Season expertly," reduce the heat slightly, cover the pot and simmer for ten minutes. Taste, add salt as needed.

Spoon this rice glop (the rice will be par-cooked) back into the tomatoes. Top this with a sprinkling of bread crumbs or panko. Arrange the potato slices around the tomatoes and give everything a good drizzle of olive oil. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. The tomatoes should be shriveled up a bit, having released their juices and the potatoes should be cooked through and delicious.

Let me reiterate: Oh. My. God. This is so good. Especially now.

I'd be feeling pretty chuffed right about now if it weren't for that gazpacho problem chilling in my 'fridge. Seems I still need a lot of work on my dicing skills...

Go forth and tomato!

20-20-24-hours to go, I wanna be Nigella

I am not a chef. I am not even a trained or professional cook. My qualification is as an eater. I cook what I want to eat – within limits. I have a job - another job, that is, as an ordinary working journalist - and two children. -- Nigella Lawson

Me and Nigella. Like this. Thick as thieves. BBFs. So much in common, especially if you don't count the beauty, the fame, the fortune, and the fact that her little kitchen experiments tend to turn out. Obviously I would buy one of her books and give it a whirl. Friends support friends, right?

Right. Here's another thing I love about Nigella: she's all about the basics! I noticed that the first few pages of How to Eat give a rundown on the basics of cookery, the sort of dishes everyone should be able to prepare on a moment's notice. Really, it's an actual list in the table of contents, under "Basics."

Like Basic Roast Chicken. Yes! That's basic! And I'm still working on my technique. Nigella will be able to help, I just know it.

We move onto stock, which I made once or twice...mayonnaise...well, why would I need to make that myself? (just because I can, I suppose the answer would be. But we all know I can't, so why go there?) Hollandaise...bearnaise...bechamel....oh dear.  Here we enter dangerous waters.

Scented Panna Cotta with Gooseberry. Clearly a basic. Just not at my house. Maybe Trader Joe's has this in a box.

Grouse.

Damsons.

Quinces.

A Christmas Goose.

It appears that a decade married to an Englishman has not properly prepared me for cooking basics with Nigella. I can't even define several of these basics. Luke told me about the Glorious 12th, but what the hell are damsons? I'm trying hard to understand. But Nigella, girlfriend, I'm just not there yet.

Ah, but then I get there. Shepard's Pie. A basic, indeed, but one worthy of trying to nail. The mother of all comfort foods. Nigella would approve of my trying this one out, and impressed that for once, I have all the ingredients already. Except for the apple juice. I'm thinking 1/4 cup of apple grape juice from a sippy box can't ruin an entire dish...can it?

Here's the recipe:

1 pound of potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
3 Tbsp milk, plus more if needed
4 Tbsp butter (1/2 stick)1 med onion, diced
1 med carrot, diced
1 garlic clove, diced
1/2 celery stalk, chopped
2 Tbsp olive oil
1/4 pound button mushrooms, sliced
8 ounces ground beef of lamb
1 Tbsp flour
1/4 cup apple juice
1 cup canned tomatoes, drained
1 tsp soy sauce or Worcestershire sauce
salt and freshly milled pepper
1/4 cup grated cheddar

Fill a large saucepan with cold, salted water. Bring it to a boil and cook the potatoes until soft enough to mash, 25-45 minutes. Drain, return to the pan and heat for one minute to dry off the spuds. Add the butter and the milk. Nigella says to then push them through a ricer, which of course I don't have. So mash them by hand, pouring the milk in a little at a time. Probably helps to warm the milk a little, too.

Set aside your delicious mashed potatoes and carry on.

Saute your diced veggies in the olive oil for ten minutes, then add the mushrooms. Add also a few "knobs" of butter, saute for 2 minutes more. Add the meat, pushing and breaking it up as it browns with a wooden spoon, until it's lost its pinkness. Sprinkle the Tbsp of flour over this and stir well, then add in the juice, then the tomatoes and your Worcestershire or soy sauce. Stir well, cover, and simmer for 20 minutes. Uncover and season. A few minutes more and you're ready to dish this out into a ceramic baking dish or casserole. Cover this mixture with the mashed potatoes, dot with butter again, sprinkle on the cheddar cheese, and set it under the broiler for five minutes.

Eh voila! Deliciousness! Not even the apple-grape juice substitute had a negative effect. 

This worked out fabulously the first time. The second time something was lacking, can't say what. The third time will be a charm, I"m certain.

Because here's what Nigella has to say about practice:

Cooking is not about just joining the dots, following one recipe slavishly and then moving on to the next. It’s about developing an understanding of food, a sense of assurance in the kitchen, about the simple desire to make yourself something to eat. And in cooking, as in writing, you must please yourself to please others.

See? My BFF Nigella knows me all too well.

Who's the birthday blog?

Bad Home Cooking is three years old today! Incredible. Hope surely does spring eternal.

In honor of three years of blogging, I've composed this rare diddy:

Happy birthday to you!
Your food looks like goo...
A cake might turn out well...
But I'd stick with stew...

Thank you all for still reading!

Procrastination sandwich

Curse Elfini. Curse her, I say!

I sit here Friday, hyperventilating. Shaking with panic. Four big-ass articles in various stages of due, day job editing backing up, daughter's birthday party tomorrow, house in a ruinous state, and only ten short days before I'm off to visit the cousin in sunny New England. How am I going to do it all?

And she sends me this.

Truly. A pox on the house of Elfini.

She knows how I feel about chickpeas. She knows I probably have a can in the house. I don't know how she knew about the lemons, but that's Elfini for you.

I had no choice but to make this sandwich. My editors might understand. Maybe.

The recipe, from Deb at Smitten Kitchen:

1 15-ounce can chickpeas, drained and rinsed
2 tablespoons pitted, halved and very thinly sliced black olives
1 tablespoon finely chopped red onion
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley
Juice and zest from half a lemon (unless you've got a dry one, in which case, go ahead and use the whole lemon.)
A couple good pinches of salt
A few grinds of black pepper
A few glugs of olive oil (your discretion. Or, if you're at all like me, your ultimate undoing)

Mix everything but the olive oil in a small to midsize bowl. Lightly smash the chickpeas with the back of a fork or a potato masher. You're not going for smooth here. You want a blend of smooth and chunky. Note to self: buy another potato smasher.

Add the glugs of olive oil, mix it lightly and enjoy.

I added a tablespoon of chopped roasted red pepper. Because what's better than chickpeas? Chickpeas with roasted red peppers. The color blast helped, too.

Spread this on any kind of good bread, preferably toasted. I went with lightly toasted dark slices of "European-style" whole grain bread.

The result? Well, when I stopped shoveling this into my mouth as I seasoned it, I got it onto the bread and continued eating. When the sandwich was gone, I put the rest of the mixture into a bowl and devoured most of that. No matter that I put too much parsely in, or that my lemon had shed seeds into the mix. I ate through it.

Perhaps my shaking was due less from deadlines and more from forgetting to eat today? It wouldn't be the first time. Elfini knows this.

OK. I remove the pox on the Elfini clan.

As for photos, well, go back to Smitten Kitchen and study Deb's. She's the pro. I am becoming increasingly shamed over the quality of my photos on this blog, and something will have to be done. And anyway, my camera ran out of juice just as I was trying to capture this delight and I don't have the time right now to search for the charger. I offer you up cell phone pictures instead.

Now back to work. *urp.

The chickpea stays in the picture...

I've always loved chickpeas. I've eaten them out of the can, sauteed in a little garlic, with toasted cumin seeds, thrown over cous-cous or over baked cod, for years. But I've always heard they're so much better when you cook them yourself, so it always sort of felt like cheating.

Still, the idea of soaking dried chickpeas overnight then cooking them for two hours was too daunting. I don't have the time management skills for such tasks. I embrace the tenant of immediate gratification too strongly. And if I can have my beloved chickpeas whenever I want them (presuming I can find my can opener), I'll always take the shortcut.

Until I read about this chickpea salad with ginger on Mark Bittman's blog, Bitten. Anyone who's read my blog for long knows I adore Bittman, the man behind "How to Cook Everything," the book that lured me into the kitchen in the first place. He is a jovial Everyman; a cook who encourages non-cooks to give it their best try. I'll try anything he suggests. And here he writes:

(chickpeas) "They have a different flavor from any other legume, arguably the best of all. And the liquid they exude when you cook them is actually delicious. You’ll never become aware of this last aspect if you use canned chickpeas, because the canning process changes the taste of the broth."

Delicious love is something worth working toward. Maybe it was time to give the long-route a go.

I bought a bag of chickpeas (also known as garbanzo beans and chana daal) from my local Indian grocer. I soaked two cups overnight. I cooked them in water, per any instruction, for two hours.

The result: Chickpeas.

Chickpeas that were indeed meatier and somehow a smidge more satisfying, but chickpeas nevertheless. There was nothing special about the broth, either, unless you really have a soft spot in  your heart for chickpea-flavored water.

Clearly I was doing something wrong. I put the batch into Tupperware and doled some out to mix with roasted vegetables or what have you over the course of the week and then forgot all about them.

Normally my experiment with greatness would end there. But because I love chickpeas so, I vowed to try harder next time. So. A few weeks later, more soaking. More cooking. This time I scoured the internets for some recipe that would tell me, yes, you stupid cow, cook those chickpeas in garlic, or with onions, or some kind of spice, or something that would impart some flavor, but nothing came up. So again I cooked up a batch of nice-tasting chickpeas with chickpea flavored broth.

This time, however, I used my home-cooked chickpeas to make Bittman's chickpea salad with ginger.

The recipe couldn't be simpler: Which should have been warned me off, but, you know, I'm kind of stupid when it comes to chickpeas.

1 tablespoon cumin seeds or ground cumin
3 cups cooked or canned chickpeas (rinse canned ones)
2 bell peppers, red, yellow or orange; cored, seeded and diced
1 red onion, diced
1 1-inch piece ginger, peeled and minced (or more to taste)
1 tablespoon sugar (optional)
3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (I just squeezed half a lemon in there...is that
wrong?)
Salt and pepper to taste
Chopped fresh cilantro leaves.

In a dry pan, toast cumin seeds over medium-low heat until fragrant, about 2 minutes (for God's sake don't go check your email while doing this or you'll have to do it all over again.) Grind to a powder using a spice mill, coffee grinder or mortar and pestle.

Toss everything except the cilantro into a large bowl and mix. You can prepare up to this point and forget about it for up to two hours). Taste and add more salt, pepper or lemon juice if you like, garnish with cilantro, and serve.

And my result? Glop. Too much lemon juice? Badly diced peppers? The fact that I forgot about the onion? At least it was colorful glop.

Ah, but then I re-seasoned and let it sit for a bit, hoping the flavors might magically mingle. And indeed, those flavors cooperated. When I spooned some out for the Drama Tween, she responded very favorably, even asking for a second helping.

And I found that despite its outward appearance, it made for some very, very tasty lunches, especially when zapped in the microwave and sprinkled with chunks of Israeli Feta.

So even though I dice like an ax-murderer, even though I forget key ingredients. Even though I am running blind with my salt and pepper and have the assembly skills of an Albanian auto-worker, the chickpea came through in the end.

Love obviously conquers all. That and a lot more practice.

Stuffed, roasted tomatoes, Bad Home Cook style (OMG!)

Molly made me do it. That would be Molly, of Orangette fame. A few deft words from her and I was inspired enough to try something I ordinarily would never touch with a 10-foot fork.

Roasted, stuffed tomatoes, topped with breadcrumbs.

Her most recent blog post waxed passionate about these roasted tomatoes, stuffed with Arborio rice and seasoned tomato pulp. they're adapted from a family recipe writer Luisa Weiss detailed on her lovely blog, The Wednesday Chef.

Lots of food bloggers try out each other's recipes. And while I've been tempted to try my hand at a few, I am the Bad Home Cook, after all. I know my limitations. Still the recipe didn't sound very complicated (famous last words). And I knew that with October here, my time for tomatoes was running out. What was I doing that evening, anyway? 

Here's the recipe, via Molly, via Luisa:

4 large, good tasting tomatoes (question - how do you know they're good tasting before you taste them? Never mind.)
1 small yellow onion, diced
olive oil
1/3 cup Arborio rice
1/3 cup water
5 fresh basil leaves
salt
breadcrumbs
2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, sliced into 1/4-inch slices

Behead the tomatoes and scoop out the guts; juice, seeds, flesh, all of it, into a small bowl. Lightly oil a 9x13'' pan and place the empty tomato hulls inside. Pull out some of the chunkier bits of flesh from the bowl and chop it. Replace. 

In a medium (2-quart) saucepan, warm a chug of olive oil over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring frequently until soft and translucent. Add the rice and continue to cook, stirring for another minute or so. Add the tomato guts and the water, plus the basil. "Season expertly," reduce the heat slightly,  cover the pot and simmer for ten minutes. Taste, and add salt as needed.

Spoon the rice glop (the rice will be par-cooked) into the tomatoes. Top with a sprinkling of breadcrumbs. Arrange the potato slices around the tomatoes in the pan, and give everything a good drizzle of olive oil. Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. The tomatoes should be shriveled up a bit, having released their juices, and the potatoes should have cooked through.

Some Bad Home Cook standard screw-ups: I bought four relatively good-smelling tomatoes, since I figured that if they smelled good they would also taste good. None of what I found at my particularly feeble farmer's market had that sweet/tangy smell of a vine-ripened tomato. So I had to work with what I found. Alas, they weren't as juicy as I'd hoped, and scooping them out took some work. I know it's October and tomato season for the rest of the world is long over. But it's been 90 degrees here with scorching Santa Anas. Is it too much to ask for ripe tomatoes for our suffering?

I ran out of olive oil and had to borrow my neighbor's. I didn't have breadcrumbs, either. I had panko, which is Japanese-style breadcrumbs. Heavier and crunchier than breadcrumbs.

With the kids running in and out and my neighbor commiserating with me in the kitchen, this took almost an hour to prepare. Then I noticed it would take another hour and 15 to bake. 

Really, this was all becoming a big pain in the ass.

Until I pulled them out of the oven. Now here was the tomato smell I was talkin' about. My four tomatoes were bubbling away, barely holding onto the juiciness within. The panko had browned nicely on top, to my great delight. But as we know, appearances mean nothing. I fobbed one off on Luke when he left after visiting the kids, feeling that he would appreciate hot, free, already-prepared food no matter what it tasted like, and waited another few hours to try my own, in the dark of my own midnight kitchen. I expected the worst.

Oh. My. God. Intense, warm tomato flavor filled in with chewy, filling starch and topped with a satisfying crunch. The first mouthful was followed unthinkingly by a second, then a third, and so on, with barely a pause to breath, until my tomato was gone and I was left to lick the plate.

That I made this bon-bon was truly a miracle in itself. Results like these give me the glimpses of glory I need to keep cooking despite every indication to the contrary.

My only tactical error? Giving one away.