Posted on : 09-Sep-2009 | By : dre elmore | In : food
Oh, it’s a dread word: leftovers. No one likes them. My kids won’t eat them. Personally, I like leftovers, and I really think it’s the word itself that turns people off. I just call ‘em “ingredients.” Like most people, we generally have the most leftovers after a big holiday meal. Which is what happened this Labor Day.
We’ve been trying something new: everyone takes a turn at cooking dinner. It works pretty well. At least no one whines anymore about doing the dishes. So, for Labor Day, Christopher decided to cook Garbage Plates.
Nick Tahou’s is a Rochester, New York landmark restaurant featuring a dish called the Garbage Plate. The restaurant was founded in 1918. While there are other Upstate New York variants, Nick Tahou’s is the originator of the Garbage Plate and, as holder of the trademark, the only restaurant able to use the name.
A Garbage Plate is a combination of one selection of cheeseburger, hamburger, red hots, white hots, Italian sausage, chicken tender, fish (Haddock), fried ham, grilled cheese, or eggs; and two sides of either home fries, French fries, baked beans, or macaroni salad). On top of that are the options of mustard and onions, ketchup, and Nick’s proprietary hot sauce, a greasy sauce with spices and ground beef. (wikipedia)
The classic Garbage Plate is mac salad, home fries, 2 hamburgers and hot sauce. This is the version Chris settled on. They are kinda like the popular English “fry-up” and my theory is they were invented after a long night of binge drinking. Anyway, they make a nice hang-over cure. I would suggest you only eat one a year. My doctor advised me to stop eating Garbage Plates when I began to bleed butter.
We ditched the cast-iron skillet and spread the home fries out on a baking sheet in a 400 degree oven to get them nice and crisp. The recipe Christopher found for mac salad called for 2 cups elbow macaroni, to produce four servings–it made twelve. I explained that recipes are mostly lies (especially ones found on the internet), and they are to be mistrusted and used only as a general outline.
No matter, our hot sauce came out pretty good. Especially when doused with plenty of Frank’s. So Labor Day Garbage Plates are, I am sure, a new family tradition. At least I’m willing to bet we make them again, unlike my feeble attempts to make “Christmas Morning Fried Spam” a family tradition.
But all that extra mac salad. What to do? Leftovers. Blechh. Well, I’ve found pasta usually works great for a base when it comes to cleaning out the fridge. Alton Brown calls this type of recipe “refrigerator velcro.” I call it Copypasta.
Copypasta
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 tbs. olive oil
1/4 tsp. black truffle oil
1 tsp. butter
Salt & pepper
1 thin slice prosciutto, roughly chopped
1 grilled chicken thigh, deboned and roughly chopped
1/4 cup peas
2 fresh basil leaves, roughly chopped
2 cups cold mac salad
2 tbs. parmigiano-reggiano
Cook garlic in oil & butter, seasoned with salt and pepper. After a few minutes, add prosciutto, chicken, peas and basil and saute. Pour over pasta, add cheese and mix well. Serves one: the guy in the house that knows that leftovers are really just ingredients.
