Lessons learned:
- Unless I want to eat the entire bushel of asparagus myself, I shouldn't bother buying it.
- Hash browns may not be the most sophisticated thing to do with potatoes, but when Sophie will actually eat some of them, not much else matters to me.
The night before was my last planned dinner before my next shopping trip, and those can always be a little dicey since I may not have always saved everything I needed for it. In this case I had a different problem: there were some potatoes on the verge in my refrigerator. A few days before I had thrown them in there hoping to keep them going for a few more days, but I figured I'd probably reached the limit and it was now or never. So although I think these corn fritters would have been matched better by a cool tropical rice salad, my kids got to eat some plain ol' hash browns (and ketchup of course) for once.
By the way, I pretty much only buy Yukon Gold potatoes. They have a built-in buttery taste and what I consider to be a very satisfying texture. I may buy red potatoes if I'm doing a cold salad, just to change it up. But when I say "potatoes," I'm only talking about one kind.
I discovered these corn fritters in HTCEV when I decided I wasn't cooking with meat anymore and kind of panicking because of how few vegetarian dishes I knew and liked (let alone how few my family would like) at that point. Can I just say again how thankful I am for this cookbook? I think I paid $25 for it. It was too little.
Basically, you bind corn together with egg and flour and fry it up. The best thing about these is how creative you can get with them, though. His version is "thai-style" because it has some hot chiles, soy sauce, and is fried in peanut oil, and I used that combination plus some cilantro. But when the tomatoes and peppers come out in my garden, I like to throw those in, too, and you can leave out the soy sauce, draw from more traditionally Mexican flavors -- maybe even throw in some black beans! and some cheddar! -- and serve them with sour cream. These are some versatile little doodads, is what I'm saying, especially with a dipping sauce.
A dipping sauce is another thing I was missing this time. Sigh. I still am not good with the dipping sauces. I've got to get on that!
Here is the asparagus that no one but me ate. John said he had "some." I think he ate one stalk. I broiled them in the oven for about 8 minutes, mixed up a champagne citrus vinaigrette I had with some mustard, and drizzled that over the stalks when they came out. What a waste!
Fortunately, I had my Corona to take my mind off of that.
Corn Fritters, Thai-Style (adapted from Mark Bittman's HTCEV)
2 eggs
Salt and fresh ground black pepper
1/2 cup chopped scallion (I grabbed about 1/4 cup chives from my garden)
1 teaspoon minced fresh chile, or hot red pepper flakes to taste
2 cups corn (soon I hope to be able to get the corn right from the cobs)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
3-4 tablespoons peanut oil
Separate the 2 eggs, letting the whites fall into a small mixing bowl and putting the yolks into a larger bowl. Add all the remaining ingredients except the oil to the yolks and mix well. Start heating the oil in a skillet over medium heat -- you don't want the outsides to cook too fast.
Beat the egg whites until they're stiff. Gently fold them into the corn mixture, just until they are mixed in evenly. Spoon dollops into the heated pan in the size you prefer and cook until nicely browned on one side, 3-5 minutes, then brown the other side. These taste best hot, so serve them right away.
This recipe is supposed to contain 4 servings, but that seems awfully stingy. For four adults, I'd increase by 50%, especially if this is intended to be more than just a side. However, I think they could make good appetizers, too.
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