Warning – Detour Ahead

image from http://www.apartmenttherapy.com

Do you see that moving van parked out in front of Exit 51?  It’s waiting for me to finish packing up the boxes of as yet, unpublished posts, so they can be moved to their new home.

Back when I started Exit 51, I had no idea that it would end up being about food.  It was just something to keep me occupied while SFC was gone and I figured I would stop posting when he got back.  But like I’ve said here before, you start in one place, finish in another, and have countless intersections, detours, and exit ramps along the way.  This is just one of those detours.

I’m not moving far, just a click away to Bon Appetit Hon.  Exit 51 will still live on here.   And there will be links back to it since part of moving forward is always remembering where you’ve been.  I hope you’ll follow along and see where this journey takes us.

The kitchen here at Exit 51 may be closed but there’s a seat the table for you at BAH.  Pull up a chair, make yourself at home, and Bon Appetit Hon.

Smitten

What do you do when a neighbor kindly gifts you a 3 pound zucchini?  You make zucchini bread.  Lots of zucchini bread.  And if you’re me, where is the first place you look for a zucchini bread recipe?  Smitten Kitchen, of course.

Sharp

 

We have accumulated an odd assortment of knives here in our kitchen.  Some were wedding gifts.  Others were random purchases.  We’ve even inherited a couple that are probably almost as old as I am.  My grandfather was a meat cutter and every so often some of his A&P work knives would find their way home with him.    After he passed away, two of those work horses found their way to our house.  Funny how that happens.

GOOPy

Dear Gwenny,

You really do make it too easy to pick on you.  You can’t help the fact that you are genetically blessed, so I won’t hate you because you’re beautiful.  I also won’t hate on you for your career success (truth be told, I really enjoyed you in  View From The Top and I was sorry to see you lose your head in Seven) or for landing a rock star husband.  Some people are just lucky.

On A Roll

The Foodie Blogroll that is.  See that?  Up there.  Exit 51 got a shout out on the Foodie Blogroll Badge under Most Recent 5 Blogs.

Hi and welcome to everyone stopping by.  We’re open 24 hours a day for your convenience and there’s plenty of free parking.  Hope you’ve enjoyed your visit and we see you again soon.

The comments section is open below if you’d like to say howdy and let me know where you traveled from.

Welcome to Baltimore Hon!

Waste Management

Buying items just because they are on sale is only a bargain if you use them.  Otherwise they’re a  huge waste of money.  Impulse grocery shopping usually comes back and bites me in the butt.  My most recent example?  Those cherries on sale at The Fresh Market were a great price.  I was expecting cherries as delicious as the ones I got direct from the farm at Baugher’s.  What I got instead was a heaping serving of disappointment.

Muscle

A good amount of the disk space on our Tivo gets taken up with cooking shows.  Food Network, PBS, I like to mix it all up.  When I watch them, I frequently experience kitchen envy.  Seriously, have you seen Paula Deen’s or Ina Garten’s kitchen?  Dreamy.  Multiple cooktops, deep fryers, and refrigerator drawers.  Best of all are those professional stoves.  48 to 60 inches of high btu muscle with double ovens.  They are the kitchen equivalent of the Ford Mustang in Steve McQueen’s Bullitt.  High revving, rubber burning, wild horses.  I so wish I could have one of those.  My kitchen, in comparison, is more like a Honda Accord.  It’s reliable for getting you where you need to go but would never win in a drag race.

Not that having fancy, expensive equipment means anything when it comes to serving up good food.  Deb, who I heart, from Smitten Kitchen turns out the best food from a teeny, tiny New York City apartment kitchen.  Think your kitchen is small?  Try working in a 24 square foot space.  That’s smaller than my closet.  And yet, without the aid of fancy equipment, she turns out all sorts of baked, fried, and roasted goodness.

Like anything else, your equipment is a tool that either you know how to use or you don’t.  That 48 inch Viking isn’t going to magically transform a bad dish into a good one.  So work with what you have, find its muscle, and make it work for you.  Your kitchen may not burn rubber like Steve McQueen’s Mustang, but it won’t need new tires as quickly either.

Oven Roasted Salmon

Cook’s Illustrated

I added paprika and chili powder, not original to the CI recipe.

• 1 skin on salmon fillet, 1 3/4 – 2 pounds (I used two individual skinless fillets)
• 2 teaspoons olive oil
• Paprika
• Chili powder
• Salt

Adjust oven rack to lowest position, place rimmed baking sheet on rack, and heat oven to 500 degrees.  If using skin on salmon, make 4 or 5 shallow slashes about an inch apart along the skin side of each piece, being careful not to cut into flesh.

Pat salmon dry.  Rub fillets with oil and season with salt, paprika, and chili powder.  Reduce oven temperature to 275 degrees and remove the HOT baking sheet.  Carefully place salmon skin side down on baking sheet.  Roast until centers of thickest part of fillets are still translucent when cut into with paring knife or instant read thermometer inserted in thickest part of fillets registers 125 degrees, 9 to 13 minutes.  Transfer fillets to individual plates or platter.

Pineapple Avocado Salsa

The Washington Post

• 4 ounces fresh or canned pineapple, cut into 1/4 to 1/2 inch dice (1/2 cup)
• Flesh of half a medium avocado, cut into 1/4 to 1/2 inch dice
• 1 scallion, white and light green parts, cut crosswise into thin slices (2 to 3 teaspoons)
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• Juice of 1 to 2 limes (1 tablespoon)

Combine the pineapple, avocado, scallion, salt, and lime juice in a mixing bowl.  Toss to combine.

Don’t Judge a Book by the Cover

You never get a second chance to make a first impression.  Not only is that some commercial tag line, it’s also the God’s honest truth.  Sometimes, bad first impressions can’t be overcome.  Other times, if you look past them, you find that you were totally wrong.  Like that time in middle school when both Kristen Heher and I thought each other was trouble, with a capital T.  Maybe we were, but after we got to know each other, we were best friends for two years.  As hard as it is for me to admit when I am wrong, it’s even harder not to share with you something so ugly it’s good.

Tastes Like That Good Old Fashioned Lemonade

In my childhood, a container of Country Time mix was the closest we ever got to homemade lemonade.  You remember Country Time, don’t you?  It “tastes like that good old fashioned lemonade”, or so they say.  I say it tastes like: Sugar, Fructose, Citric Acid (Provides Tartness), Natural Flavor, Ascorbic Acid (Vitamin C), Maltodextrin, Sodium Acid Pyrophosphate, Sodium Citrate (Controls Acidity), Magnesium Oxide (Prevents Caking), Calcium Fumarate, Soy Lecithin, Artificial Color, Yellow 5 Lake, Tocopherol (Preserves Freshness).  How’s that good old fashioned lemonade? Call me silly but I thought lemonade was lemon juice, water, and sugar.

Julie & Julia

Did you think that I would not eventually get around to talking about this?  The movie trailer has made its way across the Internet and the movie opens soon.  So I guess it’s about time for my two cents on the whole Julie/Julia thing.