I have all this oil, what else can I fry?

Surprisingly the broccoli was better than the mozzerella. Though both were awesome. The thing I really want to make with this dry batter is fried oysters, probably for a po'boy. Could be absolutely killer.

This one is courtesy of Meatwave.com who earlier this year posted a recipe for crack, er, fried pickles. They do not disappoint. Though they have that "my heart might stop at any moment" vibe.

The dry batter is just flour, cornmeal, paprika, cayenne:

Here's the production line. Drained dill pickle chips, coated in the dry batter, tossed into a bubbling pot of 350 degree oil.

Quick shot of the coating if a pickle:

Another bubbling caldren:

After just two minutes in that oil here is what you get. Super super crispy:

These were good. Simple. They would benefit from a dipping sauce of some kind. Meatwave suggested a ranch, but I'm thinking something with a sharp vinegar base might do better to cut the fried intensity. Even a BBQ sauce would do justice. Or maybe even just a cholula.

Go to meatwave.com for the full recipe. It's definitely worth a try at your next baseball, football, hockey, basketball, and/or dog show championship party. Strikes me as an easy crowd pleaser.

About 10 years ago my dad taught me how to make his meatballs that he's been making for our family for decades. I don't know if the way I make them at this point is really his recipe, but I think of him every time I make them and I attribute my method to him. The thing I love about the way he (and I because of him) cooks is he doesn't really measure anything. Just add whatever stuff you have, and there you go. Aside frim the ground beef we bought that morning, here's what I had in the fridge and pantry:

An egg, an oldish slice (butt end) of ww bread, some fresh parsley on it's way out, dried oregano and dried basil, and salt and pepper.

Here's what the amounts looked like on top of a pound of ground beef:

So you mix that all up, and form meatballs out of the mixture. Sometimes I make them bigger, but this pound of beef made 9 meatballs. I can easily throw back 3 of these, while Lori has 2 for dinner (with pasta and sauce of course).

I then fry these in a tiny amount of olive oil over a medium heat. This takes about 10 minutes or so, because I'm rotating the balls around to get them crisp on all sides.

Here's what they look like after about 10 minutes. I never really like the way these look at this point, but they are about to get much better. The meat at this stage is not cooked all the way through.

To conitune cooking the meat, and to add some great flavor I add in a bunch of already made tomato sauce. This was a combination of a vegtable sauce that Lori made earlier, and a jar of our butcher's marinara sauce which is pretty decent. So this cooked covered for another 30 minutes or so:

The meat will be slightly pink inside when you cut into it... Really tasty. To finish this sauce I ended up adding a package or fresh baby spinich which helps to lighten and freshen the whole dish up. Served over ww spagetti, with fresh grated parmesean cheese, cracked black pepper, and some garlic bread using up the last of that French bread I made earlier this weekend.

Overall i think I cooked the meatballs in the pan before adding the sauce closer to 15 minutes, so if you try I'd defintely keep it to 10 minutes. Mine were a little dry. But great flavor, and made up a string of 3 home cooked dinners in a row for us... Which doesn't happen often.

Mixed a few recipes together last night to replicate some awesome mussels we've had at 12th Street Bar & Grill. These things were really great. Mussels were average quality, but in the right season this dish would be totally amazing. Even so, these were the best mussels I've made at home.

I started with 1 onion chopped and four cloves of garlic smashed and minced. These satueed in some oil until soft. Then I added 1/2 cup Sauvigon Blanc and about a 1/4 cup of freshly chopped parsley. I then immediately tossed in 2 lbs of cleaned mussels and covered the pot. This cooked over medium heat for about 10 minutes until the mussels opened up. I then plucked all the mussels out of the pan and placed them in a warmed & covered bowl.

While those were keeping warm, I turned up the heat on the broth. Most recipes called for straining this liquid before you use it, and while I did see some dirt-type residue, I couldn't be bothered to go thru that hassle. So I just added about 1 and 1/2 teaspoons of yellow curry powder, a tablespoon of butter, and a 1/4 cup of half and half. I strirred this all up while heating thru for maybe 2-3 minutes. Then I plated the mussels in a large deep serving dish, and poured the curried broth all over them.

We ate this with some crusty French bread I had made the other day (which incidentally was the reason I wanted to make mussels in the firs place), and some tasty French fries I posted earlier. These were very tasty, and pretty easy. The hardest part is cleaning the mussels! And I definitely didn't have to strain that broth... No sand and anything unpleasant. Maybe I'm a really good mussel cleaner, who knows.

Made some fries last night to go with curried mussels. These fries were phenomenal! Crispy. Sea Salty. Yum. Using a mandoline (sp?) makes cutting the potatoes really easy. I peeled 3 russet potatoes, and cut into strips with the mandoline. All perfectly the same thickness. Then washed the potato strips in water 3 or 4 times, and let soak for about 10 minutes in an ice water bath. I heated up 2-3 inches of oil in a big Dutch oven, to about 375. Then you just throw all the fries in there which becomes a bubbling caldren immediatey. Kinda crazy looking. But I cooked these for 10 minutes, and then drained on a cooling rack with wax paper and paper towels underneath. After they cooled for about 20-30 minutes (while I was preparing those mussels), I tossed them back into the still very hot oil and stired them almost constantly for 2-3 minutes untill they were all a nice golden brown. I then drained them on the same cooling rack, and dusted with fresh ground sea salt. Tossed them in a bowl to coat, and served them hot. Really really awesome. I think next time I would pat down the fries after te second fry with a paper towel as they were a touch greasy. But just a touch... Overall these things rocked! And are really kinda easy... Sounds like more work than it was.

Inspired by some korean-ish hot wings seen at more please ( http://moreplease.posterous.com/sriracha-wings-0 ), I decided to redeem my grilling mojo after all but detroying some drumsticks earlier this month.

I happened across a sixer of PBR at the corner bodega (score!), and knew I had half a bottle of some stubbs in the fridge. This equals an old standby mop that is one of my favorites:

Thats 1 can of beer to about a 1/2 of stubbs. So i use that mop throughout grilling the wings for about 30-35 minutes on a pretty mellow/low heat. I turned the wings 3 or 4 times, moving them around the grate to give the right heat to the various wing sizes.

Meanwhile I'm making the finishing buffalo type hot sauce. Here's what I use:

Rougly 2/3rds cup franks (gotta be franks) hot sauce, 1/3rd cup red wine vinegar, a heavy tablespoon of butter, and a 3 second heavy squirt of ketchup. Here it is in the pot... If you stick your nose in there for a whiff you'll start coughing immediately. It's good stuff:

Back to the grill. It was super dark outside tonight so I didn't snap any pictures while grilling, but here's what the wings (bell and evans, btw) looked like after those 30-35 minutes on the grill, moped 3-4 times. These things were awesomly crisp:

They were so crisp, I didn't want to overdo it on the sauce coating for fear of creating a soggy mess. So I tossed a moderate amount (maybe 1/3rd or at most 1/2 of the pot) of that buffalo hot sauce. Here's what it looked like after all tossed up:

These were really really great. Crispy, hot, moist and tender meat inside. I got my grilling mojo back, and I'm officially ready for BBQ season.