Often when I cook, I use wine or beer to add flavor or as a tenderizer. Recently, I realized that I rarely use spirits when cooking … at least not in the recipes. This inspired me to create a recipe based on my favorite cocktail, the Manhattan.
My first memorable experience with a Manhattan was not from drinking one, but from making one or two … well, actually quite a few now that I think back on it. When I was in high school, my best friend, Dan, and I would often bartend for his parents’ cocktail parties to make a little cash. We didn’t know much more than how to pour wine or open a beer, so when a guest would ask for a cocktail, we usually had to ask how to make it.
Most of the drinks were pretty straightforward, like a gin and tonic, screwdriver or rum and coke. But there was this one party where my friend’s mom asked me for a Manhattan. I was intrigued — here was a drink that had more than two ingredients, and required a little chemistry lab experience to make it. I followed her directions very carefully and handed her the drink. She took a sip, and with a big smile and a nod said that it was one of the best she ever had.
Curious, I took a sip to see what magical concoction I had made. I suppose my palate was not developed enough to appreciate it, but hers was because she kept coming back for more. After I served her fourth one, she made me promise it would be her last. But she came back for another and another, justifying it by saying, “It’s not like I have to drive home.” Looking back, I realize I should have cut her off, but what does a 17-year-old know about Manhattans?
The next time I saw her, she said she would never have one of my Manhattans again, not because she didn’t like them, but because she liked them too much. I always keep this in mind now that I have become a fan of Manhattans, and I always limit myself to two.
When creating the recipe this month, the obvious choice was New York strip steak, not just for the name, but because I knew the slightly sweet nature of the Manhattan would pair well with the flavor of the steak. I decided to skewer the steak to represent the cherries on the toothpick served with the cocktail.
Manhattan Kabobs
(serves 6)
3
tablespoons olive oil, reserve 2 tablespoons
2
shallots, minced
6
ounces bourbon
2
ounces sweet vermouth
1
jar maraschino cherries
1
tablespoon maraschino cherry syrup
3
teaspoons salt
3
teaspoons pepper
2
pounds boneless New York strip steak, cut into 1-inch cubes
1
medium onion
2
red bell peppers
16
medium crimini mushrooms
skewers (if using bamboo, soak them in water for one hour before using)
In a saucepan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil; add the shallots. Cook on medium-high heat until shallots start to brown. Add bourbon, vermouth, 6 cherries, syrup, 2 teaspoons salt, and 2 teaspoons pepper. Simmer over medium heat 15 minutes, or until reduced by one-fourth. Remove from heat and let cool. When cool, pour over steak and marinate in the refrigerator for at least 1 hour.
Cut the onion and peppers into pieces slightly larger than the cubes of steak. Combine the vegetables in a bowl and drizzle remaining oil, salt and pepper over the top and mix to coat. Assemble the skewers, alternating between meat and vegetables. Start and end each skewer with a cherry. Grill directly over medium-high flame, turning the skewer one-quarter turn every 4 minutes until the steak is slightly charred on each side.
Growing up in Newark, New Jersey, I ate soul food from an early age because I was from a “mixed” neighborhood. It was the fifties and African-American families were moving north for work.
The tenements of the big cities, once stocked only with first- and second-generation immigrants from Europe, were where they found cheap housing.
Nancy Dorsey became my friend in the third grade. What brought us closer to each other was that my last name at the time started with “Du” and I stood in line and sat behind her “Do.”
We liked each other in the careful way, whites and blacks mixed in the fifties. We walked to school together and hung out on the front stoop after, singing popular songs, playing games or fantasizing about becoming movie stars. She called herself colored and I referred to her as my colored friend.
One Friday, she asked me to come to Sunday dinner. My mother and father were OK with it, so I went, bringing a bunch of daisies as a gift for her mother.
We ate fried chicken, macaroni and cheese and this amazing vegetable, long-cooked collard greens. I had seen them at the vegetable store, but white people didn’t buy them, they were a “colored” food. And they also didn’t know how to cook them.
Politely I ate one piece of chicken and one helping of mac ’n and cheese, but I ate three cereal bowls of greens and potlikker (the rich collard green and pork-laced broth), dipping cornbread in the rich broth.
Her mother got the biggest kick out of my love of those greens, and she renamed me Gracie-May, making me an honorary southerner.
Mrs. Dorsey cooked her greens with fatback and smoked ham hocks. These days if you go to a butcher shop that caters to African Americans, you’ll find smoked turkey wings, drumsticks and tails — all used to cook greens. Smoked turkey is less fatty and just as tasty as pork. It is what I use for my greens these days.
Put a big pot on the stove and add a couple of quarts of water. Add tails and onion. Bring to a boil and simmer for an hour.
Wash the greens well. Chop into two-inch pieces. Discard very bottom of the stems — about an inch or two.
Place greens in the pot with turkey tails and onions; add salt and pepper. Make sure water covers greens.
Simmer for 90 minutes. Greens will be cooked and soft.
Take out tails, cool them and pull apart, discarding any fatty pieces and tailbone.
Put meat back in the pot. Serve in bowls with hot sauce and vinegar on the side, for sprinkling on top.
Happy Cooking,
GraceAnn
Cookbook Review
Without Reservations By Joey Altman with Jennie Schacht Wiley, $35 ISBN 978-0-470-13045-2
This Thursday, I will be interviewing Joey Altman, the star of Bay Café and the author of Without Reservation with Jennie Schacht, at the Jewish Community Center in San Rafael. Snacks and wine will be served.
I met Joey when he opened Miss Pearl’s Jam House in the Phoenix hotel. I’ve seen him many times, playing with his band, the Back Burner Blues Band, and of course on KRON TV’s Bay Café. With that show he did more than any other individual to popularize the kind of food we crave in the Bay Area, a mélange of Mediterranean, French, Latino, and Asian tastes.
As Joanne Weir says in her endorsement of his book, “This is the food I love to cook and eat.”
Here is something quick and clever from Joey’s book:
Roma tomato, halved, seeded and cut into ⅛-inch dice
1/4
cup minced red onion
2
tablespoons fresh lime juice
1
jalapeno pepper, seeded and finely minced
kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
Heat a grill or stovetop grill pan to medium high. Grill the corn, turning occasionally, until the kernels are lightly charred on all sides, about 10 minutes. Remove and leave the corn to cool while you prepare the other ingredients.
When the corn is cool, cut off the kernels. Use the back of the knife to scrape the remaining corn from the cob.
Stir together the corn, avocado, tomatoes, onions, lime juice, jalapeno, and cilantro in a small bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste and more lime juice, jalapeno and cilantro to your taste.
— GraceAnn
Tools & Toys: Korean stone bowl (dolsot)
I have a new obsession: bi bim bap. This comforting Korean dish combines all the major food groups in one bowl. Traditionally, it is served in a stone vessel, or dolsot, which not only keeps the ingredients (meat, veggies, a fried egg, and rice) warm, but also continues to cook the rice at the bottom, causing it to caramelize and become chewy and crunchy. You can find stone bowls in some Korean shops, but I got mine at KoaMart, a sort of online Korean grocery store. KoaMart’s bowls are made by hand of a 100-percent natural figure stone called agalmatolite, well known for its heat retention. The bowls come in small, medium and large (medium is a great size for individual servings). Besides being great for keeping food piping hot, the bowls are beautiful — no two are alike, with shimmering pieces of crystal mottled throughout the grey, white and black stone (the photo doesn’t do them justice). Since the bowl gets extremely hot, it’s also best to purchase a
Volume 1 Issue 12 
Soul Food Without the Guilt
Without Reservations
Tools & Toys: Korean stone bowl (dolsot)
