I was busy working on many things today, but near one of my favorite Greek Restaurants and had to eat something. I hadn’t tasted the Moussaka from the Greek Town Grill yet, since I always get the Dolmades. I wrote about them in a previous post – They’re the best.

The Moussaka (aka Mousaka) was good, but I have to admit that it didn’t top the one served at Papadakis Taverna in San Pedro. It’s amazing there. Both restaurants have tasty Greek dishes — It’ll just depend on where you find yourself. Greek Town Grill is more casual and both are very welcoming. The waiters often dance at Papadakis. It’s a fun atmosphere.

Related Links:

http://www.papadakistaverna.com/

http://www.greektowngrill.com/

http://www.ineedtext.com/FoodBlog/?p=92

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moussaka

http://www.restaurantica.com/blog/Shelly-Borrell–A-Food-Writer-in-the-Making/124/

Some like it hot–and some not.

I like stuff hot, and as longtime readers of this blog should have figured by now, I will put chilies into anything, including chocolate truffles and brownies.

So, of course, since I am learning about and cooking Moroccan foods these days, it only stands to reason that I would feel the need to make my own jar of harissa to put up in the fridge. I mean, if I am going to be making my own preserved lemons because they taste fresher than the ones you buy in the store (and they very much do taste fresher), then it only stands to reason that I should give harissa a shot, too.

I am glad that I did.

I have eaten harissa from the store before, and while it is kind of hot and tasty, it is mostly hot and salty, though it tends to have a weird bitter edge. I suspect that this is from some of the preservatives and the vinegar they put in it in preference to the lemon juice that the cookbooks say to use in it. To be honest, most of the commercial harissa I have tasted has left me rather cold, and gave me a less than stellar impression of the beautiful, flavorful and fragrant foods of Morocco.

Homemade harissa, on the other hand, is a scarlet sauce that is filled with the heat of chilies, the sweetness of roasted bell peppers, the bite of garlic the smooth fruitiness of good olive oil, the tang of fresh lemon juice and the musky aroma of cumin. Oh, yeah, and there is salt in there, too–but it isn’t as overpowering a flavor as it is in the commercial kind.

I am a convert.

The other cool thing about making your own harissa is that you can make it as hot or mild as you like by either adding more roasted red bell pepper or by using milder or hotter red chilies. For mine, I used my last harvest of Kung Pao chilies from the garden on my deck–they are about the same in heat level as a cayenne, and I used a fairly small roasted red bell pepper.

It turned out wonderfully tangy-hot, with a lovely scarlet macaw color that looks quite vibrant in the jar or on a plate.

Once you have made harissa, what do you do with it?

Well, anything you would do with any other hot sauce. Put it in soups, stews or sauces to perk them up. Add it to any sort of egg dish, but especially scrambled eggs. Use it in a marinade for meats, use it in cooking or as a table sauce. (If you make that white bean and greens soup from Tangier I wrote about yesterday, you can put some harissa in it for a little extra kick. It’s really good that way.)

If you keep it tightly covered and keep the top covered with a layer of olive oil, your homemade harissa will stay fresh for six months in the fridge.

You can’t beat that, really.

Besides, with the holidays coming, homemade harissa would make a great gift for any hot-sauce heads among your family and friends.

Harissa
Ingredients:

20 fresh red cayenne chilies
1 roasted red bell pepper, skinned and seeded
10 cloves garlic, peeled
2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus about a tablespoon to go on top of the sauce for storage
1 teaspoon or more of salt
freshly ground roasted cumin seeds, to taste (I used about 2 1/2 teaspoons)
pinch ground cinnamon

Cut the stem ends off the chilies, and cut them roughly into smallish pieces. Cut up the bell pepper into chunks, and the garlic cloves into several pieces.

Put these all in the bowl of a food processor, food grinder or chopper, and puree or mince very finely. Add the lemon juice, olive oil, salt, cumin and cinnamon and process until a sauce that is fairly liquid, but still with good body, is formed.

Put into a clean jar just large enough to fit the sauce without leaving a lot of air space. Cover the top of the sauce with a thin layer of olive oil, close tightly and store in the refrigerator, where it will keep safely for six months.

Wow, these are frickin’ awesome, as Carl would say.

Here is Christy’s recipe again:

The Bees Knees

1/3 C hot water
1 Tsp lavender
1/4 C honey
6 Tbsp gin
2 Tbsp lemon juice

This makes 2 small (6 oz) drinks (or as pictured above, one HUGE drink). Steep the lavender in the hot water for 4 minutes and then strain. Mix the lavendar water with the rest of the ingredients and add ice. Strain out into cocktail glasses.

I found it helpful to the honey first with the strained, hot, lavender water so that it melts, then mix that with everything else. Yum!

***

So, jwa’s 34th(!!) birthday is coming up and we’re looking for a restaurant to have a nice, leisurely, tasty meal. Not too fancy, but still, an occasion restaurant of sorts. Oh and we ususally don’t eat out on Saturday nights (Sunday is actually my favorite night to eat out), so I’m hoping stuff isn’t all unreasonably crowded and hectic.

As of now, the list has been whittled down to:

* Wildwood.
Never been. Have heard great things (obviously). We really want to try it sometime, but I fear trying a place I really, really want to love on a birthday is a recipe (hee!) for letdown.

* Paley’s Place.
See above.

* Three Doors Down Cafe.
Sadly, again, never been. Pro: Walkable. Con: No reservations on a weekend could be annoying and not much of a festive experience.

* Wild Abandon.
Sigh. Again with the never tried. Walkable. Great name. Have heard nice things but I think I may want to try this place more than he does.

* Rivers Restaurant.
We’ve been here before as well but never for dinner (just brunch, which was pretty good). The dinner menu looks intriguing.

* Castagna — affectionately dubbed Costanza around the house.
We’ve been here before and liked it, so maybe this is a possibly — but it is fun to try someplace new…

Hmmmmm…my goal is for him to make a decision and for me to make a reservation today. Edited to add: Okay, so I think he has decided on Wildwood…Yay!

You will find Hotel Marie in Ammoudara, near the city of Heraklion. It is open from April until the last days of of October. The hotel is only 60 meters or so away from the sea and has frequent bus connections to take you to Heraklion, while restaurants and mini-markets are a couple minutes away on foot.

The hostel is consisted of many cosy rooms, fully equipped with all amenities such as safe boxes, telephone, garden, car park, cafe, reception and bar. The room-service is excellent and the hotel carefully cleaned. Hotel Marie is a really good choice for people who want to visit Crete, because of its position on the Greek island, its services and prices, and the hospitality of the staff. Visit the website of the hotel by clicking here.

If you are also interested in a good car hire agency, we suggest Elite car & bikes hire , one of the best agents in Crete. An updated fleet of vehicles, best possible rental solutions provided and guaranteed low prices by the car rental office that operates for several years now.

Hotel Marie and the Car Hire Crete car rental agency are waiting for you to provide you everything you need to have the vacations of your life.

Technorati Tags: apartments, car, Crete, Greece, greek, hire, holidays, hotel, island, Marie, rental, rooms, summer, vacations

But what to take? Taking various bottles of spirits, mixers, mixing tins, strainers, jiggers, etc. would be a hassle and too labor intensive. So I decided to make a bottled cocktail. For those of you looking for more information on bottling cocktails, I highly recommend reading this post. But what cocktail to bottle? I wanted something that said “HEY IT’s FALL AND KIND OF CHILLY. DRINK ME BECAUSE I’M LIKE FALL.” Okay, so maybe not so much with the yelling, but you get my gist.

I searched through my cocktail books and even tried out the Virginia Autumn that I made last year but nothing was really tickling my fancy. I then came across Paul Clarke’s site and more specifically, this post on the Northern Spy. Now this little number had promise. So I whipped one up to give a try before committing to an entire bottles’ worth. It was good. But still wasn’t exactly what I wanted. I was afraid that the dryness of the cocktail, and the inherent boozyness, would be off-putting to some people. I wanted something that was a little sweeter, mainly because I wasn’t sure of my audience. Usually, sweeter things are more appealing to the masses and I certainly wanted my drink to be a hit.

Paul mentions that the Orchard Apricot can be replaced with ginger liqueur, pimento dram or another flavor enhancer. Well, I don’t have Orchard Apricot. I know, I know! I should have some, but every now and again, something slips through the cracks when I go booze shopping. (Shhhhh . . . don’t tell Joe at Ace Beverage. He’ll have me buying some within 15 minutes of reading this!) Anyway, I do have the Orchard Pear, so I figure that’s a good place to start. I also wanted to get some extra fall flavors into the drink, so I thought about a few dashes of Fee’s Whiskey Barrel Bitters. But then again, Paul unknowingly guided my hand with his suggestion of using pimento dram.

So after a few tasty trials and errors, here is the recipe for my finished cocktail. Which I have called,

Fort Hunt Fall
2oz Applejack
1oz Apple Cider*
.5oz lemon juice
.5oz Pear Brandy (I used Rothman & Winter Orchard Pear)
.5oz Pimento Dram
.5oz Apple Cider Syrup**

-Shake everything with ice and strain into an ice filled rocks glass.

*For those of you not in the US, by “apple cider,” I’m referring to fresh pressed apple juice. Not the hard stuff.

**To make apple cider syrup: Take one cup of apple cider and reduce by half on the stove. Stir in a quarter cup of sugar. Let cool and bottle. You can play around with the sugar you add to get a sweetness you like. The cider will have a lot of residual sugar already so you may not need too much. This is a great syrup to add an intense apple flavor wherever you like.

I’m happy to report that this drink was very well received. In fact, the bottle was empty when I went to gather my belongings. Some even topped it off with champagne; which was very delicious as well. I saw a few people (cough, cough Heather) go back for seconds. I was just happy that those who tried it, seemed to enjoy it and that their introduction to my cocktails was a pleasant one.

Of course, in true Scofflaw fashion, I couldn’t just show up with one drink. I also brought along a small bottle of Trader Tiki’s Primitiva which I had just bottled a couple of weeks prior. If you want to make a tasty liqueur, this stuff is money! The Trader knows his spirits and is second to none in concoctioneering. Seriously. Make this stuff. It’s fantastic. Anyway, back to the picnic. I brought a small bottle of primitiva and was pouring about an ounce in a small, ice-filled plastic cup and topping it with champagne. Fantastic! Mixed together with a Fort Hunt Fall - fantastic. Swigging straight from the bottle maniacally laughing at the poor poor people who couldn’t fathom the tasty treat they were missing out on - fantastic. You catch my drift.

As we’ve already written about here and here the picnic was awesome.

Next up on my calender is the second cocktail class by Gina Chersevani at EatBar. This is the Halloween themed class and I’m really excited about it. Friday night, I have my Halloween party and am in the process of creating the cocktail menu for it. I need two more cocktails for the menu and I’m hoping Gina gives me some good ideas. I won’t give anything away until after the party, but expect to see plenty of pictures and the recipes for all the drinks from the menu later that weekend.

Hope everyone has a frightful (and safe) Halloween! Cheers!

I’m going to give some notes on the recipes as I post them.

The Rob Roy Cocktail
2 1/2 ounces blended Scotch whiskey
3/4 ounce Italian (sweet) vermouth
1-2 dashes Regan’s orange bitters
Build in a mixing glass with ice, stir, strain into a cocktail glass.

This is a drink that I’ve made a few times. I’d suggest playing with the ratios depending on the Scotch and the vermouth; it’s VERY easy for the Scotch to overpower the vermouth. I believed they used Famous Grouse Scotch at the Tabard Inn and Noilly Prat sweet vermouth; I would’ve used more vermouth, personally.

The Tabard Cocktail (by Chantal Tseng)
1 1/2 oz. Milagro Reposado tequila
1/2 oz. Lustau Amontillado Sherry
1/2 oz. Drambuie
Dash of orange bitters
Stir, garnish with orange twist and a sprig of fresh thyme.

This was an absolutely delicious drink. I’d suggest trying one at the Tabard Inn or making one yourself before really experimenting with it. The Milagro Reposado tequila is one that I should buy for myself now, and I’ve been still meaning to get some sherry. The Drambuie - well, that might be a topic for a post all on its own.

The Bloody Mary
2 oz vodka
4 oz tomato juice
2 dashes Worcestershire sauce
4 dashes Tabasco sauce
Pinch of salt and pepper
1/4 oz of lemon juice
Combine all ingredients in mixing glass and roll back and forth to mix. Strain into an iced goblet. Garnish with wedge of lemon and lime on a side plate.

You’ll notice that this drink isn’t as spicy as many you see nowadays. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Then again, I’m a big fan of hot sauce and horseradish in mine - even if the original was even weaker (spice-wise) than this! (And even worse if you believe one claim that the original was half vodka, half tomato juice. Ick.)

The Vieux Carre Cocktail
3/4 oz rye whiskey
3/4 oz Italian (sweet) vermouth
3/4 oz Cognac
1/8 oz Benedictine
2 dashes Angostura bitters
2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters
Build drink in rocks glass with ice, garnish with lemon peel.

They don’t say it here, and maybe it’s going against the drink, but I’d stir it, personally. If you take out the Cognac, up the Benedictine, and add a bit of absinthe this becomes a Cocktail a la Louisiane (about) - I wonder if there’s any history between them.

Speaking of history in between drinks, we were given minis of Domaine de Canton and asked to add a splash of it to our Vieux Carre cocktails. I had drank too much of mine already (you should tell us AHEAD of time that we’re going to do something like that) so it was overly ginger, but here’s the recipe for what they’re calling the Nouveau Carre Cocktail, thanks to Walter Bergeron, Derek Brown, and Phil Greene…

Oh. It’s the same thing but with 3/4 of an ounce of Domaine de Canton ginger liqueur added. Okay.

(Mental note to keep bugging Derek about samples of Domaine de Canton!)

Singapore Sling (original version, per Ted “Dr. Cocktail” Haigh)
2 dashes of Orange Bitters
2 dashes of Angostura Bitters
The juice of half a lemon (1/2 oz)
One-eighth gill of Benedictine (1/2 oz)
One-eighth gill of Dry Cherry Brandy (1/2 oz, Cherry Heering)
One-half gill of Gin (2 oz)
Pour into a tumbler and fill up with cold soda water.

I’d suggest at least stirring, if not going ahead and shaking. Come on, it’s Dr. Cocktail, shake that bad boy up!

A number of people drank theirs before the carbonated water was added to theirs. They seemed to like ‘em that way fair enough.

The Side Car
1 1/2 oz Cognac
1 oz Cointreau
3/4 oz fresh lemon juice
Shake well with ice, strain into chilled cocktail glass, optional garnish of sugar crusted rim

Come on, sugar coat that rim! It’s good!

Anyways, if you didn’t come to the seminar, you missed a good time. Keep your eyes open for the next one!

Who doesn’t love ripe raspberries with a jolt of spicy red chili peppers? Serve over a bed of cream cheese, baste over chicken, or try this easy brie cheese recipe.

Jeweled Brie

8 ounce Brie, top layer of rind removed
½ cup Robert Rothchild Hot Pepper Raspberry Preserves
1 cup combination of chopped or sliced toasted nuts, seeds and dried fruits- such as almonds, walnuts, cashews, cranberries, sour cherries, sunflower seeds.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place prepared Brie in a buttered ceramic baking dish. Bake until cheese is partially melted, 5-8 minutes. Spread Hot Pepper Raspberry Preserves on top of softened brie and sprinkle with topping mixture of choice. Serve warm with crackers, toasted bread, fresh bread, apple or pear slices.

Happy Eating!
Michelle Wylie
Assistant Culinary Director

All You Can Eat

Website: http://www.dongenova.com/shows_podcast.html

RSS Audio Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/allyoucaneat

APM: The Splendid Table

Website: http://splendidtable.publicradio.org/

RSS Audio Feed: http://americanpublicmedia.publicradio.org/podcasts/xml/splendid_table/kitchen_questions.xml

Barbecue Bob’s BBQ and Beer Bash

Website: http://www.bobsbeerandbbq.com/

RSS Audio Feed: http://barbecuebob.podOmatic.com/rss2.xml

Barbecue Secrets

Website: http://www.barbecuesecrets.libsyn.com/

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.barbecuesecrets.libsyn.com/rss

The BBQ Central Show on LA Talk Radio

Website: http://www.latalkradio.com/Greg.php

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.bbq-4-u.com/bbstalkradioshow.xml

BBQ Forum Podcast

Website: http://bbqblog.com/?cat=13

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.bbqblog.com/podcasts/bbq_forum_2.rss

Behind the Bar Show

Website: http://behindthebarshow.blogspot.com/

RSS Audio Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/BehindTheBarShow

CHIC Podcast (Cooking and Hospitality Institute of Chicago)

Website: http://chicpodcast.mevio.com/

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.podshow.com/feeds/chicpodcast.xml

NPR: Food Podcast

Website: http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=4985908

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast.php?id=1053

NPR: Kitchen Window Podcast

Website: http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast/podcast_detail.php?siteId=10512892

RSS Audio Feed: http://www.npr.org/rss/podcast.php?id=510210

KCRW’s Good Food

Website: http://www.kcrw.com/etc/programs/gf

RSS Audio Feed: http://kcrw.com/podcast/show/gf

Serious Barbecue Radio

Website: http://www.controlledburnbbq.com/

RSS Audio Feed: http://feeds.feedburner.com/barbeque

Know of any other good food podcasts? Leave a comment and let me know about them!

Also, if you need help getting started with listening to podcasts, leave a comment and I’ll be glad to help out.

Tonight is Thursday Drink Night (TDN) starting at 7 PM EDT over at the Mixoloseum. Tonight people will be trying out drinks made with honey syrup, so I’ve got to remember to make some! Which means I’ve got to remember to buy some honey…the syrup is 1:1 honey and water. The best drink of the night will get a bottle of St. Elizabeth’s Allspice Dram thanks to Kaiser Penguin.

Tomorrow night is our night out to celebrate an entire year - and a long year at that, the whole 366 days - of Scofflaw’s Den, from our humble origins on LiveJournal (which we imported here, but I implore you not to look at my first post, I’m embarrassed by it) to having our own domain and everything else that’s happened.

Right now, it looks like our plan is to be out at Bourbon in Adams Morgan around 5:30 - 6:00 time frame for a couple of drinks and maybe a bite or two. From there, we’ll head over to Central Michel Richard to harass say hi to Justin and maybe have more food…

From there we don’t have any plans, but depending on who is around and what time it is we’ll be looking to see what is up. Urbana, Tabard Inn, Bar Pilar, Cork, there are so many choices.

If you’re around and want to join us, just show up! If you need to get ahold, feel free to e-mail us - I, for instance, will be checking my e-mail on a regular basis while we’re out. And if you contact us ahead of time, I’ll be hooking people up with a phone number or two.