Salsa Verde

I love the Southwest and all the food that goes along with it!  I always make homemade salsa every summer and this year I made a few that I never have made before.  So now I have about 4 kinds of canned salsa and thought I would make a salsa basket with 2 or 3 kinds in the basket and home made chips.  Now don’t get exctied about the homemade chips they are super easy!  You buy some corn tortilla’s and then deep fry them till crispy and salt!  Yum!

Salsa Verde

5 1/2 cups chopped Tomatillos (about 2 lbs.)

 

1 cup diced White Onion

 

1 cup chopped Green Chili Peppers

 

4 cloves Garlic, minced

 

2 TBS minced Cilantro

 

2 tsp. Cumin

 

1/2 tsp. Salt

 

1/2 tsp. Red Pepper

 

1/2 cup Vinegar

 

1/4 cup Lime Juice

 

 

Combine all ingredients in a large saucepan.  Bring mixture to a boil.  Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes.  Ladle hot salsa into 2, hot, pint jars; leaving 1/4 inch  head space.  Adjust caps.  Process 15 minutes in a boiling-water canner.

Coarsely chop the peppers and onion.  Put them into the food processor along with the garlic, oil, lemon juice, and salt. Process until finely chopped. Put the mixture, along with the tomatoes and cilantro, into a pan.  Bring contents to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes.  Pour the salsa into sterilized jars and process in a boiling water bath for 25 minutes.

When Things Turn Ugly In The Kitchen

….otherwise entitled “Just Because The Recipe Has a French Word In It And Scary Amounts of Milkfat Doesn’t Mean You’re Julia Child”

It’s probably a good thing we don’t have regular TV service or cable, or whatever higher tech thingies there are out here nowadays, because I seriously love watching cooking shows and can really lose track of time once I’m hooked.

I love seeing the personalities of the cooks and finding out new ways to make the same old ingredients into new culinary expressions.  I love seeing regional specialties, unearthing time-honored favorites, and trying to guesstimate measurements and techniques of cooks who whip together recipes by memory instead of using a cookbook.  I loved Julia Child, who never took herself too seriously.

These give me hope. 

Sometimes hope is a good thing, helping us navigate the unfamiliar.

And sometimes hope, which they say springs eternal, can turn downright ugly.  

(ugly can be fun, though, ha)

It’s ok.  My kitchen’s not a cooking show and my half-melted plastic chicken-shaped wind-up timer tells no tales.

But since I have the keypad handy, I can detail The Ugly in case anyone out here is under the delusion that most folks who try to make things from scratch, who love the terms Homesteading/Sufficiency/Handmade, and who have indulged in other exploits with some degree of success at times aren’t ALWAYS successful.  Sometimes they, like me, are even SELDOM successful at certain particulars.

I remember once when the NotDabbling site solicited for reader questions, and one of the readers asked “do you guys ever make mistakes, or have any flops at the things you try?”

Ah hahahahahaha!  Around our house, the flops are considered part of Success in general, because we just can’t take things that seriously…or we’d feel constantly defeated.  And so Hope dangles that tantalizing carrot of possibility again just in front of our noses, and the journey continues

I can cook well enough to fend off starvation and to keep my husband from looking to other women for sympathy meals.  In fact, I’m GOOD at some things, and those have usually come with some practice.  After years of honing The Art of the Wheaten Doorstop, the stars aligned and I was  finally able to make a decent loaf of bread deemed edible (and butter masks a multitude of lesser ills, eh?)  I’m pretty good at soups, baked desserts, roasts and meat dishes.  I don’t mean good as in gourmet, but there are some recipes guests have requested after meals…always a compliment!  So we won’t starve or have to rely on packaged goods too much…that’s something at least

However, there are total blind spots and black holes in my cooking abilities.   To date, I have yet to make anything custardish or involving incorporating egg into a warm liquid without ending up with curdled egg yuck.  So much for homemade banana pudding with a custard base, boiled custard with nutmeg, certain sauces, and one of my favorites…creme brulee…broo-layyyy, oooo-lah lah…

I know better than to inflict my egg blunders on any recipe inherently French.  I just have too much respect for their cuisine  (or maybe it’s just fun faking the accent after having had six years of French in high school and college, having traveled to all the European French-speaking countries, and nearly marrying a native French speaker…and yet remaining nearly illiterate in the language, arrgghhh )

When I’ve Googled recipes till my stomach is growling, perused my cookbook shelf for new ideas from some of the pros, I still end up thumbing through the motley collection of Mom ‘n Pop cookbooks …the ones put out as fundraisers for colleges, churches, companies, and special causes.  I mean, chicken spaghetti is a part of my history though the Cheez Whiz and RoTel will never likely make it into the Taste of Provence books and none of the particular ingredients are likely to remember their origins.

The other  day, I remembered a conversation from years ago in which a friend of mine, who is a really good cook, told me she makes a “mock fruit brulee” by putting a layer of green seedless grapes in a glass dish, spreading sour cream over the top, and sprinkling brown sugar over that.  Then, according to her, you refrigerate it overnight and the brown sugar forms its own sort of glaze by “melting” into the sour cream…and that’s it.  Easy Peasy!

(This is exactly how I begin my downward slide…with a fragment of a memory, and available ingredients.  I should be asking myself “do I even LIKE grapes IN anything culinary??  non, non, zut alors! <—by the way, that’s not even a contemporary french phrase.  So much for expensive college classes.  But you can come by sooooo much faux french by watching Beauty and the Beast 1,235 times with one’s daughter from age two and up.  And for so much cheaper..but I digress…)

Hmmm.  Well, I’d never tried This Dish before today.  But today I had the ingredients, nevermind that my grapes are red rather than green, and nevermind that I could not find my friend’s recipe being duplicated by any online search I did.  Hmmm.

(DANGER…DANGER, Will Robinson!)

Hope.  Springs eternal.

So here’s what happened.  No, these are not grape tomatoes.  They are grape grapes.

Ah. So innocent, the grapes. Come into my kitchen, said the Robbyn to the grapes...

There.  That wasn’t hard, was it?

Next step, sour cream.

Try this step with your cardiologist present. It's all about kitchen safety, ha

 Oh yeah, don’t forget the brown sugar.  It goes on top of the other two ingredients. 

Oh heck, while we’re at it, how about some cream cheese, mayo, a few sticks of real butter, and some fudge sauce?  No??  Ok, we’ll stick to lowfat then…

Now invite the endocrinologist over the join the cardiologist, and get your glucometer out. You can become diabetic just looking at this

It’s at this point, I’m either impressed at the ease of this dish, or growing surpremely wary.  I mean, when was the last time I made anything featuring grapes in the bottom of a dish, except in the 1970s when lime green jello was all the rage?  (till everyone learned it builds up in things like pancreases and spleens and to keep it on the market they’d have had to begin calling it Spleen Green?)  You know, back when Food Coloring was its own food group and we drank neon Koolaid with real sugar and rode our bicycles with wild abandon hyped up on a perpetual sugar high? (that is, OTHER kids did…my parents were all sensible and we drank water and tea, woo)

Oh yeah, about the grapes…

I am now becoming insecure and secretely kicking myself for the potential waste of that much sour cream.  And brown sugar.  I’ve become stingy…or at least FRUGAL…with those in the past few years as we’ve gotten really careful and are making more from scratch.  And those grapes would have been great sliced into the chicken salad…hmmm. 

Sheeze… well, “what’s did is did.”   Oh the flashbacks to Home Ec awkwardness…the days of trying to make a basic icing (with food coloring, of course!)  and having to repeatedly unpick sewing errors on a mint green dotted swiss dress I hated even in the Butterick picture.   I’ll soldier on.  My friend was SO sure this easy recipe is foolproof, and good.

Next step, fridge.  And it’s a good thing…the brown sugar’s already beginning to dissolve into the sour cream…

Better get this into the fridge, pronto

 Fridge picture made possible by the Letter P, for Papertowel.  I didn’t have time for the Full Fridge Cleaning Monte.

Not too thrilled at this point with how this looks. But let's give it eight hours and check back

Well, at this point in the procedure, I’m underwhelmed.

But Hopeful!!

I go and cook less picturesque, but entirely dependable things.  Such as dinner.  Tonight was homemade calabaza soup.  It’s total peasant fare, but my husband loves it.  I could swear he was purring as he ate

Jack's fave Cuban soup

And then I took care of the beloved furball.  Here’s what the family canine had for dinner…

Kaleb, be glad dogs can't eat grapes...that's all I can say

 Eight hours later, time for a fridge check.

There’s no photo, so I’ll just draw everyone a little word picture.  Brown melted goo escaping in a lava flow over the edge of the glass dish, making a sticky oozing Crakatoa landscape of that shelf in the fridge.  So much for procrastinating cleaning any longer.

I consult some Google recipes that are similar, which call for hardening the brown sugar  meltdown under a broiler for about three minutes.  Convinced that a puddle of wet brown sugar is not quite the effect originally intended, I heat the broiler and have the good sense to put the dish on a cookie sheet before putting it into the oven.  An oven check after two minutes shows it bubbly (is it supposed to be bubbly?) and resulting in a slightly thicker but still melty brown liquid.  I have a few seconds to decide its fate…is it edible As Is?  Does it need to heat up just the merest bit more?  The online advice suggested not burning it.  I put it in for one more minute.

It went into a total oven rejection, and when I pulled it out, the sour cream had slumped down unevenly over the (poor poor unsuspecting) grapes.  The brown sugar was a horrid mess.  I shoved it back into the fridge.  I’ll deal with it later.  Maybe sheer neglect will work wonders and it will take on the fridge interior-nuanced Terroir of green tomato relish, acidophilus yogurt, turkey stock, assorted condiments, and valencia orange juice?  And then it will have to be named something like Maison LePeu Frere Jacque?

(I still think some of that 70s food coloring still made it into my gray matter..back to reality)

It’s at this point that most people would quit, having the sense to know when to retreat and wave the white flag.  I was just ticked off at having wasted that much of my luxury pantry items stash in one lousy, ill-planned dish.   I don’t even like fruit dip.  This topping was like a fruit dip disaster.  Well, alright…I was expecting the unexpected…a friend’s tried and true recommendation.  And it was so easy.  Ok…deal with it, Robbyn

I have no idea what I’ll do with the sour cream mess.  Here’s what it looks like….

…………………………….

Please thank me right now for not including the photo.  It aesthetically induces the same kind of nausea I had my first trimester when pregnant with my daughter…

……………………………. 

So, as you can see, it’s not all about successes.

But let’s see what we learned today:

1.  Ditch the fruit goop.  Robbyn hates grapes all gooped up with other things.  Lesson learned!  Unless it’s anything resembling a cobbler or pie.  Different story altogether…

2.  I am not a From Memory person. I do well to remember my name.  I should not be trusted with “vintage recipe memories” sans written evidence.

3.  Robbyn cannot engage dairy products and heat together without curdling them to kingdom come.  But she can enrage them.  If you need a curdler, I’m your girl!

4.  One refrigerator shelf got cleaned.  Hot caramel sauce blends beautifully with SO MANY OTHER things sitting together on glass surfaces. Especially after having cooled to a bricklike density. It might be the first time a chisel has ever found a practical use there beyond the icebox.   And now for the other shelves…

5.  Robbyn should refrain from science experiments involving copious quantities of brown sugar unless they are entitled “Oatmeal Cookies,” “Molasses Walnut Cookies,” or the like.

6.  Keep feeding the man soup.  Soup erases all ills.  Equilibrium will not be breached if this one important rule is obeyed.

 

So, to recap, here’s the recipe:

Les Raisins Miserables

Grapes.  Lots of sour cream.  Plenty of brown sugar.  Layer them in a clean glass dish and put into fridge for 8 or more  hours, or until fully coating all the other contents nearby.     

Scratch head and wonder why you decided to attempt this, while preheating oven broiler and placing rack 4 inches below top of oven interior.  Place funky goop mixture dish below broiler and close oven.  Pace floor and stare at the timer.  You can set timer for anything you like because you’ll either undercook or overcook this..there is no other option.  If you opt to undercook it, remove from oven after three minutes and marvel at the wilted grapes peering up, confused, through the newly-formed curd crevasses, as brown sugar lava seeps down, down, down.

Hastily return the dish to the fridge shelf.  Be sure to do this while still very hot, so it will partially warm all the other fridge ingredients to unsafe temps in order to precipitate bacterial blooms so intrinsic to the contribution of  your own unique”terroir” (those subtle tastes from the surrounding area).  Keep it uncovered.  You know, just for fun.  Then when it takes on a special patina, take it as a surprise to the friend who gave you the recipe in the first place. 

Enjoy!! 

Horseradish Cream

 

Horseradish Cream with medium-rare roast beef

Horseradish is a traditional accompaniment to roast beef.  It has a spicy zing that pairs well with tender, juicy meat and makes a great addition to roast beef sandwiches and even mashed potatoes (it’s also great with oysters).  Fresh horseradish can sometimes be found at markets but I find the jarred kind easier for my purposes since I don’t use it too often and it will keep for a while.  Jars are typically found in the refrigerated area of the supermarket, often near the meat or dairy section.

This cream sauce is very easy to put together and is great with roasted meat.  You can also spread a little on some bread and top with cold leftover roast beef for a delicious sandwich with a bit of a kick.  It’s really delicious served with Braised Short Ribs or Oven Roasted Prime Rib.

Horseradish Cream

(VEGETARIAN)

Makes 1 cup

• 1 cup sour cream
• 3 Tablespoons jarred horseradish (or to taste)
• Salt to taste
• A bit of fresh ground pepper

In a small bowl, stir together all ingredients until well combined.  Sprinkle with fresh ground pepper and serve with your favourite beef dishes.

Bon Appétit and Enjoy!

weekend recap

friday:

• a run at the beach, which is turning into a fun friday tradition. i definitely tend to push myself more there, i guess since the scenery is so much better and the path just keeps on going… i think i need to reevaluate my running route in west hollywood, I tend to get stuck within a few key busy streets that i don’t like to bother crossing. or maybe i’ll just start running in santa monica more, since the sun is disappearing earlier anyway.
• finally went to canter’s deli. we split some delicious matzo ball soup and reubens (leftovers for lunch today, yum). (by the way, is it weird that we got saltines with our matzo ball soup?)
• followed by a game of scrabble (i lost, but had a good a-m-e-o-b-a + l-i-b-i-d-o combination) and a few rounds of set, forgot how incredibly fun and addictive that game is.

photo of the day

saturday:

• yummy egg-and-whatever-leftovers-are-in-the-fridge scrambles
• planned on going to the red bull soapbox race, but it just didn’t happen. probably better, since it was close to 100 degrees downtown. instead i whipped up smitten kitchen’s cheesecake marbled brownies (i just couldn’t resist any more). they are amazing. though my swirls weren’t quite as beautiful as deb’s.
• headed to barney’s beanery for the penn state/iowa game. pretty awesome that it’s within walking distance, and just so happens to be the penn state bar (with a 25% discount for alums, whee!) awesome atmosphere (complete with citizen’s bank buttons!), but the game was shitty. ugh. iowa is officially our nemesis.
• natalie finally made it from san diego for the end of the game, and then we went home to “nap” before getting up at 2am for our sleepover in hollywood forever cemetery and the sunrise Bon Iver show…

photo of the day

sunday:

• we got to the cemetery and there were already a ton of people camped out, so we spread out our sleeping bags and nestled in for a showing of bottle rocket, planet earth, and (in my case) a little snoozing. a thick layer of fog rolled in around 4 or so, and hung around for the rest of the morning. at 5:30 we were ‘gently’ nudged awake by buddhist monk chants, and Bon Iver started their set around 6am. having a sunrise concert in a cemetery was seriously one of the best ideas ever, and made what would have been an already amazing concert even better. natalie took some great photos for pitchfork.
• after swapping banana bread and brownies (score!), she headed back to san diego, i took another nap.
• got up a few hours later for my swimming lesson!
• urth cafe for some coffee, and then more napping. football. scrabble. did i mention napping? (seriously, how did i make it through school?)
• made some golabki and called it a weekend.

aloo gobi

this spicy indian dish can be an entreé served with either naan (my favorite) or plain rice, or it can be served as a side dish. pita bread can be substituted for naan, but i would highly recommend finding yourself a source for naan. most indian restaurants will allow you to pick up fresh naan without ordering a meal.

 

2 tablespoons canola oil

2 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed

2 cups frozen cauliflower florets

1 teaspoon cumin seeds

1 clove garlic, minced

1 teaspoon minced ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground turmeric

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon ground cumin

1/2 teaspoon garam masala

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

1 teaspoon fresh cilantro, finely chopped

salt to taste

 

steam potatoes and cauliflower in separate baskets of bamboo steamer for 3-4 minutes to partially cook. (potatoes in lower basket)

heat oil in wok or skillet over medium heat.

add cumin seeds, garlic and ginger. cook about 1 minute or until fragrant.

add potatoes and season with turmeric, paprika, cumin, garam masala, cayenne pepper and salt.

cover and cook 5-6 minutes, stirring occasionally.

add cauliflower, reduce heat to low, cover and cook 10 minutes or until potatoes and cauliflower are tender, stirring occasionally.

remove from heat and stir in cilantro.

Super Healthy Mac & Cheese!

I LOVE Macaroni and Cheese. But I very rarely ate it because it’s always full of fat and unnecessary calories. And then there’s the boxed Kraft version which is probably worse than eating the full-fat version made from scratch!

So I was very excited when I found this recipe on EatingWell.com. I made a few slight modifications, and it turned out great – super cheesy and flavorful!

Ingredients

• 8 ounces whole-wheat elbow noodles, (2 cups)
• 1 10-ounce package frozen chopped broccoli
• I also added 1 10 oz bag of spinach
• 1 3/4 cups low-fat milk, divided
• 3 tablespoons flour
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground white pepper (I used black pepper and it was fine)
• 3/4 cup shredded extra-sharp Cheddar cheese
• 1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard (If you don’t like the flavor of Dijon use 1/2 tsp-1tsp depending on your taste)

Directions

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Cook pasta for 4 minutes. Add frozen broccoli and continue cooking, stirring occasionally, until the pasta and broccoli are just tender, 4 to 5 minutes more.

2. Meanwhile, heat 1 1/2 cups milk in another large pot over medium-high heat until just simmering. Whisk the remaining 1/4 cup milk, flour, garlic powder, salt and pepper in a small bowl until combined. Add the flour mixture to the simmering milk; return to a simmer and cook, whisking constantly, until the mixture is thickened, 2 to 3 minutes.

3. Remove from the heat and whisk in Cheddar, Parmesan and mustard until the cheese is melted.

4. Drain the pasta and broccoli and add to the cheese sauce. Add in the spinach. Return to the heat and cook, stirring, over medium-low heat, until heated through, and spinach is wilted.

5. Sprinkle pepper on top when serving (to taste).

Enjoy!

Nutritional Information

Serving size: 1 and 1/4 cups

412 Calories

13 g Fat; 7 g Sat

22 g Protein

7 g Fiber

Edition Thirteen 20 to 26 September 2009 (Wine by Cush)

 

Edition Thirteen moved on as editions before but expanded also. I included the same content types as before and expect to add tasting and event notes in the future. As I was writing critical essays for my writing blog, I found topics of interest related to wine also. That proved to be a time-consuming departure from the normal content but rewarding one. This edition has an essay on mobile food cart and beer certfications. Randall Graham was in town and reminded me of his famous back label for Le Cigar Volant. I couldn’t find the backlabel online nor on his web site. I did include a cool video clip about his Le Cigar flying. I somehow thought maybe Graham could be an alien himself. His outpost is way out in the woods where no humans go often. He could be visited by any kind of creature or be an alien himself. How would anybody know except for his eccentricities? I really don’t know. I am supposed to read non-English wine blogs and though my Italian and French are pathetic, I yet do search. An Italian wine blog I subscribe to had nice supermarket type wine bottles with pictures of Hitler and so on. I don’t think they are zealous. I think they will do anything to sell a bottle. Are world records so important to make a 185 point burger? I give up. Cured pork is becoming a favorite subject of mine and Mexico is my favorite country for a large project of turning a whole large country into a giant dairy making artisan cheeses and cured meat products. I think the project is very beneficial to all of us in North America. New Zagat is out. I used to love reading Zagat reviews and telling people how much I agreed with the quoted comments versus my own experiences of visiting places. I am writing a critical essay which is too large and had to break it into five essays. One of the essays mentions of Zagat as a pack of lies. That is my opinion today. Michael Bauer continues his weekly nagging in his blog. He went to an amateur cooking contest (sponsored by an impartial huge corporation). I think his blog will set records for going off topic one day. This was not the day anyway. Rajat Parr has his wines to taste in San Francisco which is a good previledge. I continue to miss all tastings and honestly cannot blame myself. I barely pulled my blogs together and just when they were automated so I can do things, I started with the damn essays. Now, everyone is on my back to scrap everything except the essays. I won’t. Those contents will get better also but for now my essays take my time and brain power away.

How This Week's Mealplan Went

The first weeks of mealplanning went quite well!

Was a but gutted though as when I closely inspected the minced beef it wasn’t in a very good state. I defrosted one pack and it was dark brown and had a funny smell, I looked at two other packs and they were a similar colour and were dated April. I made the decision to bin them – I don’t want to mess with our health. I bought a new pack, along with fresh carrots, mushrooms and a large bag of potatoes and carried on as planned.

Here’s my mealplan for this week:

• Mon  Me- Chicken Steak in Breadcrumbs & Jacket potato. OH – Southern Fried Flavour Chicken steak in breadcrumbs & oven chips, both served with peas and carrots.
• Tues  Beef & Ale Stew made in slow cooker (consisting of 1/3 pack of lean minced beef, one Colmans Beef & Ale sachet, onion, mushrooms and carrot – haven’t decided yet whether to cook with potatoes in, or make potoatoes into mash to be served alongside) – didn’t have chance to put in before I left for work so cooked in oven instead. Served with yorkshire puds that I’d planned to use on Saturday.
• Wed  Spag Bol (will use the rest of mince to make a massive portion of bolognaise with onions, mushrooms and tinned tomatoes)
• Thur Lasagne (using bolognaise from last night)
• Fri Fishcake & Oven chips (or maybe home made potato wedges) with peas & carrots/sweetcorn – had payday chinese takeaway instead.
• Sat  Roast chicken dinner - 1 leg of chicken each, roast pots, yorkshire puds (all from freezer), plus veg & gravy. – having grilled burgers from freezer and making potato wedges as OH will be in late tonight.
• Sun  Round at my parents for tea.

Raw Hummus

I picked up some chickpea sprouts at the farmer’s market, so I decided to try making raw hummus based on the recipe in Alissa Cohen’s Living on Live Food book.

I give this a 3/5 happy monkeys.  It was ok but it was too starchy for me, not smooth enough.  Perhaps adding more oil would help, but I think the raw chickpeas just might not break down very well.  I even soaked them for a while before I made this but it didn’t really seem to help much.  I think I’d rather try making hummus out of almonds or zucchini, or just stick to cooked hummus.

Ingredients:

- 1 cup sprouted chickpeas
- 1/3 cup ground sesame seeds
- 1/4 cup onion
- 1/3 cup olive oil
- 1/4 cup lemon peeled
- handful basil
- 2 cloves garlic
- sea salt to taste

Directions:

Throw it all in the food processor and process away!

Vegan MoFo

Haribol ya’ll! I have only been a vegan for about 2 years now, and not nearly as strict a vegan as I would like when eating out. I have however been a strict vegetarian since 1995.  I have read so many amazing vegan blogs over the past few years that I feel constantly inspired to be a better vegan cook. On that note, I am participating in this years Vegan MoFo (Vegan Month of Food)  by The Post Punk Kitchen website. I am happy to be a part of the revolution. But what does all this mean to you and to me?? It means that in the month of October I will be posting a minimum of 20 vegan cooking related blog posts, the goal being to post every single day. All the posts will have the ultra cool Vegan MoFo banner attatched to them too.

Chez Kelsey

Had some friends over for a quiet dinner tonight… we’ve only known them a few months, but it feels like forever! Helping him move in tomorrow, which should be quite a good time indeed! Served up Chicken Marbella, Roasted Beet Salad with Walnuts and Bleu Cheese, Roasted Potatoes and Crepes with Apple filling – can you say “yum!”? It went off fabulously well and I just can’t wait… for what exactly, I don’t know, but I’m excited!

My Own Therapy

Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve really delved into cooking at home. I cooked before, and a sure as heck baked before, but now I’m really getting into the whole process. It’s so satisfying.

In a way, it’s become a kind of therapy. It’s been a horrifically stressful week, and as the days wear on, I’m becoming increasingly dissatisfied with my “career” or lack thereof. The nights I’ve gone home and really cooked something, I’ve actually felt quite a bit of joy. It’s not necessarily that I want to eat everything I cook (I leave that for Patrick, the human vacuum, with the metabolism of a jack rabbit); it’s the act of creating something that people love. I love that.

I sound like a self-help book. “Find Yourself With a Hobby” or “Happiness is Just a Whisk Away!”

It’s just in this world that is filled to the brim with frustration and anxiety (this time of year in college publishing is off the chain), I can find control and peace in my kitchen. I love that. I love how it’s like my own little world. There is so much I need to learn, even though I have been told that I’m a great cook. I’m a terrible chopper. I’ve yet to make a successful meatloaf, and I’m not sure if it’s me, or the two recipes I’ve tried so far. I also need lots of kitchen tools. Thankfully my birthday is coming up next month (I’ll be 27 on October 26th!), so you can bet your sweet bippy I updated my wishlist to reflect my culinary needs, heh.

Tonight I’m planning on making a lemon, asparagus, and goat cheese pasta dish from Smitten Kitchen, and I’m really excited about that. It’s barely after 12pm, and it’s already been a blah day. This weekend I’m making my own pizza at home, with from scratch roasted garlic sauce.

And last night? I made this really easy polenta dish. Originally last night was going to be pizza night, but tragedy struck in the form of Comcast ineptitude. Thankfully that was squared away, but it took quite a bit out of me (well, both of us), and my cooking mojo withered. In any event, the polenta dish was fantastic.  Polenta, spinach, a tomato sauce brimming with herbs and onions, and topped with a layer of mozzarella cheese.  Such good comfort food, and it was so easy to make.

I’m going to spend today searching for recipes to try, and maybe a few cooking classes.  It’s nice to be really excited about something.  I’m excited about a lot of things, but it’s nice to have a little something that’s just for me, but at the same time is something that I get to share with others, if that makes any sense.

Packaging a really great product

Well, it’s avocado season here in SoCal. Carpinteria is gearing up for its big annual avocado festival and the fruit is ripe on the trees. Unfortunately, my hubby is allergic to avocados, so I don’t cook with them as often as I would like, but I couldn’t pass this up! I spent my lunch break wandering the shelves at Trader Joes and for a small investment of around three bucks, I got myself a delicious flavor explosion! Check it out:

A Trader Joe's Guacamole Kit!

And check out the fresh goodness inside this little treasure box!

2 Avocados, 1 Tomato, 1 Onion, 2 Cloves of Garlic, 1 Lime, and 1 Chili - Some freshy-goodness to get your guac on!

Mmmmmm…. I will let you know how it turns out!

Quick projects

I was hard at work on Saturday morning, making Heather’s cinnamon swirl bread and finishing some napkins for a wedding gift which I totally put off until the last minute. They aren’t all that fancy, just squares with the edges turned over twice and stitched, but I love them. I wanted to keep them, that lantern bloom fabric by Laura Gunn is so good. But I didn’t, I have some Anna Maria Horner Good Folks Cathedral for myself. And goodness knows since it took so long for me to get down and dirty to make these with a deadline, I’ll probably never get around to making the set for myself, even though they are SO EASY. That is just like me. I also started some coasters. Who knows when those’ll get finished.

The bread was delicious, too. It rises huge which I totally love because my normal go-to bread recipe is kind of dense and doesn’t get very poufy. So it was exciting watching this rise and bake. And of course we couldn’t wait and cut in to a warm loaf right away. Cinnamon bread always makes me think of my dad, when I was little I remember him liking that peperidge farm (?) cinnamon swirl bread with raisins quite alot.

Microwave oven favorites

There are two things that I love to cook in the microwave. Well, as it turns out, I cook almost everything in the microwave, except for noodles. But bacon and potatoes cook to perfection in the microwave.

For bacon you need this special dish that has raised ridges so that the bacon fat can flow away in the grooves between the ridges. And it spatters like crazy so you must cover it with a paper towel or you’ll really regret it. I cook it on high for a minute or so, then take out the dish and carefully pour off the grease and then back in it goes for another minute or two. Repeat until the bacon is nice and brown. It cooks very evenly with no rubbery areas like you get when you cook it in a frying pan. And there’s probably less fat since it’s constantly draining away.

I think that baking a potato in the microwave is the best and only way to bake one; I like the skin left on my potato, and I like it soft, not hard and chewy the way it gets when you bake the potato in the oven. But this is a recipe for satisfying that starch craving, not for presentation; the way I cook the potato is to cut it up into small pieces, like you were going to boil it, and put it in a covered glass bowl. Cook on medium heat for however long is necessary. Halfway through you may want to take the bowl to the sink and pour off any condensation that’s collected at the bottom of the bowl. It’s a careful balancing act; using the lid to keep the potato pieces in the bowl but slid slightly back so that the water can pour out. And while you have it out of the microwave you may as well stir the potato pieces so that they all get a chance to cook evenly.

When the potato is ready I jazz it up with cottage cheese. The best is cottage cheese with chives which my local grocery store sells. Spoon about 8 ounces over the potato pieces and smooth it over. Then either let it sit for several minutes until the cottage cheese is thoroughly warmed through or put it back in the microwave on very low and cook it gently for a few minutes.

Just that is ecstasy for the taste buds; cheese and starch; a match made in taste bud heaven.

I like to jazz it up a little more by sprinkling Parmesan cheese over the potato before I cover it with cottage cheese. And some freshly grated pepper is always wanted.

Good Eats = Good Reads

ALTON BROWN TO THE RESCUE!!!!!!!!!!

This weekend my husband and I decided that I probably have too many hobbies. I’m not really an expert at anything, I have pretty general knowledge about most things, but I can’t stand up in a room and give you a dissertation on running, painting, reading, cooking, piano, hiking,  people or the human condition.

Nope. Can’t do it.

Shocking right?

But you know what!? Out of all of those cooking really has become a true passion of mine. I find myself wanting to just cook all the time, and I blast myself and my kitchen whenever I am missing an ingredient or a special gadget. I also curse myself whenever I have no idea what the damn cook book is talking about – you know what I’m talking about right? Blanch this, double boil that, imulsify blah blah blah. ARG! I’m clueless.

So the hubs suggested this. Take one hobby, and figure out as much as you can about it. Read all the books you can find, test all the theories yourself, enjoy getting to know the ins-and-outs of whatever you choose…and by the way, can you choose food because I know my belly would love it.

And of course I obliged.

So I’m on a quest.

I’m on a quest to cook the hell out of some food. I’m also on a quest to know everything I can about gadgets, gizmos, flotsam, jetsam and whatever I can get my hands on when it comes to home cuisine. Lord knows I can’t go to culinary school now…so I am going to have to do all of this by trial and error. Oh I can’t wait!

So here is my first school book purchase:

OH Alton! You are my hero! Here is a blurb from his website about the book:

“The minute AB put the final touches to Good Eats: The Early Years, he was on a plane en route to shooting Next Iron Chef, but he wanted folks to know — October 2009, the first book of the trilogy hits bookstore shelves. It was an awesome task, putting the first 80 episodes into one tome, but he packed in 140 recipes (with updates), a ton of scientific data, factoids and tips, along with screen grabs, behind-the-scene photos and AB-style illustrations.

Starting with the premier episode, “Steak Your Claim” through “Pork Fiction” (baby back ribs), to “Citizen Cane” (caramel sauce), to “Oat Cuisine” (oatmeal), the first 4 years’ episodes are all represented, with the second volume due out Fall 2010.”

And what the website doesn’t tell you, is that the book is chalked full of facts about cooking, gadgets, food in general, technique, etc! It’s like having your own personal professor in the house!

So I’ll have to keep you updated on how the book translates into yummy food, but for the time being, I’m stoked!

Poppy Seed Bread with Orange Glaze

There once was a restaurant here in this little ol’ town I live in that my husband and I loved, loved, loved!  It was situated in one of the historical Victorian homes down town and they had food that was divine!  The atmosphere was quaint, but relaxing. Did I mention the food was divine?  When they closed their doors for good (the owners retired) we were so sad.

A few years before they had closed up shop, they were featured in Midwest Living Magazine (When you visit the magazine link you will see only a tiny bit of the original article that was published in the magazine way back when, the picture of the girl is actually a homeschool friend’s daughter, she’s all grown up now).  The original article had featured the restaurant and shared some of their yummy recipes.  One was our favorite!  It was their poppy seed bread and it is divine!

Since having the sacred poppy seed bread recipe my husband has made it every year for Christmas.  He loves making it. I love eating it!

Poppy Seed Bread with Orange Glaze
Makes 2 loaves

For the bread…

2-1/4 cups sugar
3 cups flour
1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
4-1/2 teaspoons poppy seeds
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
1-1/2 cups whole milk
1 cup vegetable oil
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla

In a bowl mix sugar, flour baking powder, poppy seeds and salt. In a separate bowl beat together eggs, milk, oil and vanilla. Slowly mix in the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Stir until smooth. Bake in 2 greased loaf pans for 1-1/2 hours at 300 degrees, covering with aluminum foil the last 15 minutes to prevent the top from burning. Spoon orange glaze (see recipe below) over hot bread while still in pans. Let bread completely cool before removing from pans.

*Orange Glaze
1 cup powder sugar
1/3 cup orange juice
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Mix well

Gluten Free White Cornbread Muffins with Orange Zest

White Corn Muffins with Orange Zest

• 1 cup White Corn Flour
• 1 cup White Cornmeal
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 4 teaspoons Baking Powder
• 1/2teaspoon Salt
• 1 cup Milk
• 3 Eggs
• 1/3 cup Melted Butter
• 2 teaspoons Grated Orange Peel

Mix it all together and divide out into Greased Muffin Tins

Bake @400 for 15-18 min muffins should spring back to touch.

On eating well

By Judy at My Freezer is Full.

I was at the grocery store last week, picking up milk and eggs and a few other things when I saw a sign promoting their new ‘healthy eating’ campaign.  It went something like this:  ”If, when your children ask, ‘Can we watch TV during dinner?’ you turn on the DVD player in the van- maybe it’s time for a change.”  I was appalled.

We hear so much talk about eating well and promoting health and good nutrition for our children but it seems that it is mostly just talk.  Last week my two older children brought home a piece of paper to fill out and sign, a by-product of the latest ‘Healthy child’ law in our state.  It requires that every child, from 7th grade up, have, on file, a plan of how they will achieve at least 120 minutes of physical activity a week.  Mine didn’t have difficulty filling it out, they have an abundance of physical activity and they’re not even involved in school sports programs.  Our schools have also been hopping on the bandwagon about serving more healthy school lunches.  Of course, what I’ve seen this entail so far is  serving whole wheat pasta or making the breading on the fried foods ‘whole grain’.  They try, but I think the problem is much larger than school lunch programs can solve.  It starts with the parents-with the loss of the family meal and with the fact that so few people now-days can actually COOK.

I have several coworkers who are prime examples of this.  First is one I’ll call Jessica* (names have been changed to protect the innocent).  Jessica is married with two children in elementary school.  She complains frequently that they have money problems yet she continues to buy her lunch at the hospital every day, saying that she doesn’t have time to pack her lunch.  But what she buys frequently are pre-cooked, pre-peeled hard boiled eggs and little plastic bowls of celery and carrot sticks.  She has asked other co-workers to bring in the coupon sheets from the papers for her to use.  I offered to bring in ours and she was surprised that I didn’t use them.  But then, most things that we purchase from the store don’t have coupons.  She is living the prepared food, quick and easy lifestyle, yet she complains constantly that her children have lots of health problems and that she often doesn’t feel well.  Hmmmm….

Another co-worker is Mary*.  She is also married with two children in elementary school and  16 month old twins.  She went through a stint where she was going to one of those places where you can, for a steep price, make a series of pre-packaged “home made” casseroles to put in the freezer. She gave up on that one after finding out that most of her family wouldn’t eat them.  She frequently talks of feeding her children bowls of cereal for dinner as she doesn’t have time to cook between work and evening activities.

In my opinion, these co-workers are a symptom of a larger problem in our society.  The loss of the importance of the family dinner and the ability to cook ‘real food’.  I’ll admit, I sometimes use box mixes for quick meals or side dishes but these are the exception, not the rule.  Two weeks ago, at an orientation session for my middle child’s church confirmation class, the other mothers were surprised to learn that we sit down as a family for dinner nearly every night.  There are few nights when that isn’t true in our home.  We eat real food (that you can pronounce all the ingredients!) together as a family. I find it rather sad that we are now the exception rather than the rule in society.

I definitely don’t have the answer to this problem.  I hear lots of people talking about ‘Eating Fresh and Eating Local’ but very few people can truly make that  happen.  It is definitely a lifestyle choice that you need to embrace.  There are plusses and minuses to it.  It isn’t always convenient or easy- it takes planning and effort- but my children are healthy and happy. We can sit and have a conversation every night at dinner, and my children are learning about ‘real food’ and are learning to actually cook, rather than just open a package.  For the most part, they know where their food has come from and what that means.

How about you?  Any thoughts?  Or any answers?

Edition Twelve 14 to 19 September 2009 (Wine by Cush)

 

Edition twelve has more posts but also has more to offer. Tastings notes are always afloat and so are book reviews. I have found beer a topic I am more and more drawn to. Beer may not have the richness of wine in terms of a beverage but can be a great remedy during poor economies. The foot traffic a beer-friendly establishment attracts maybe one of smaller dollar tickets compared to easy-sell that wine is, but beer traffic is steady and a lifesaver in a weak economy. I am drawn to beer as a topic. Ice wine from Argentina is another interesting development worth checking for various reasons. Drinking vessels are a common topic and will return. Cotes du Rhone maybe my favorite cheap red but also is a great wine for developing market niches that greatly benefit the public. Yelp continues as the evil of social media. I bet they had a memo about me at some point. They are very dedicated to how business should be done at the cost of everyone else. Cachaca is the newest gift the poor American public have received from another country and fights to be famous now. Food markets and food carts are continuing their slow development as a mainstay of San Francisco food scene. My favorite topic of beverage certifications is back and this time the restaurant staff should be to handle the learning challenge. Sens has started a very interesting trend. If the landlord cannot lease your large space, he/she can start its own restaurant. Who cares a large restaurant is very hard to run and will probably fail. It just needs to look good and “open” to keep property values and rents high which takes slight specialized help.

I like your heat

Imagine. Its a hot day. You have too much heat. You are standing at the bus stop,  someone gets up and you take their seat. They have heated up the seat with their bum, but when you sit down you dont find their heat unpleasant - even though you have too much of your own. If you found that person attractive, you even like their heat (but you would never tell anyone).

This is because their heat is a frequency that you dont have much of. Heat is part of the electromagnetic spectrum. The visible part has colors for different frequencies. Heat also has a spectrum (infra-red). Different people (and things) generate different frequencies of heat, due to differences in personality, genetics, diet, activity, etc. Everyone has their own unique pattern of heat, and it can change quickly and easily.

Heat from combustion and electric resistance are different from each other. So, cooking on gas tastes different than cooking on an electric element, or a microwave oven, because different frequencies of heat enter the food, resulting in slight differences in the chemical reactions that are the cooking process. No need to think you are crazy because you dont like the taste of things cooked in the microwave! Heat from a fire matches our combustion heat, so it either feels nice if we are cold. Not all heat is the same.

Cooky vs. Cookie

As a kid, I loved to flip through my family’s cookbooks, especially the ones made just for children, dreaming about what it would be like to make the exotic-sounding dishes inside. I was always quite shy about asking my parents to buy the ingredients for fancy cakes or elaborate main dishes, but I’d find myself scouring the cupboards to scrounge up most of the ingredients for a side here, a snack there, or my interpretation thereof.

My scavengeresque style and reluctance to try the most complicated recipes certainly carry on today — you’ll see that most of my cooking involves only a few main ingredients and few elements, other than seasonings, that are unfamiliar even to the most basic of American meat-centric home cooks. I love to read about foreign and fabulous eating and preparation, but I’m still a little bit scared to put my money, and my skills, where my imagination and, well, my mouth are.

I loved that this book provided me with my very own set of measuring spoons. What a geek!

Today I was reminded of one of the classics of my, and my mother’s, childhood, the “Betty Crocker’s Cook Book for Boys and Girls”/ “Betty Crocker New Boys and Girls Cook Book.” In addition to the literary-oriented “Wond’rous Fare,” which grabbed recipes straight from the pages of children’s classics (and from which I never made a single dish), and Klutz Press’ silly “Kids Cooking: A Very Slightly Messy Manual,” among about a dozen others, I read every single recipe, top to bottom, imagining the dishes and the cooking process as though it held the mystery a scene straight out of a witch’s den.

None of my classmates looked like these kids.

One of the great elements of the Betty Crocker manual was that it included a panel of uppity-looking kid testers whose comments guided you throughout the book, when mom’s recollection of the time she made that castle cake  just wasn’t enough for me.

Well, it turns out a writer for Gourmet had some of the same questions little me did about this book. A true child of the ’90s, quite a bit younger than the writer of this piece, I didn’t trust a boy with such an uppity crew cut to tell me the merits of things like milk with maple syrup in it (perfect for lumberjacks) or a loaf of canned ham with pineapple on top. Read Missy Ketchum’s tale of the kid testers for more information.

Look, a cake shaped like something! A "salad" made of canned fruit and raisins! Something, anything covered in heavy cream!

Curious about the title? It was a question that plagued me for some time. Older cookbooks seem divided on whether the singular of everybody’s favorite hand-held chocolate chip snack was “cooky” or “cookie.” In the days when our family’s copy of the Betty Crocker children’s book was printed, it was “cooky” for one, “cookies” for more. Just goes to show you can’t always trust an artificial homemaker to be grammatically infallible, I guess.

Oh my goodness. Please don't look in the upper-right corner.

See, I told you there were bunnies made of canned pears. Would YOU eat that crap? No. But it sounded so nifty and quaint and unusual to me, I still kind of wondered what it’d be like to make it.

Gluten Free Banana Nut Muffins

Before we get into the bananas I would like to thank Karen, author of muffin fixation , for the inspiration to dedicate this week to muffins. Thank you. Your Blog is wicked cool.

Ok, now on to the Bananas. We are a fresh fruit house. We always seem to have bananas and apples. This recipe is used once or more a week. The muffins freeze beautifully. And keep frozen for at least a month. Muffins are a quick and simple snack. If you make them with this recipe your are also increasing you protein and fiber intake. Not all muffins are created equally. Let us get on with the show.

Banana Nut Bread Muffins

• 1 cup Sugar
• 1/2 cup Shortening
• 1 cup Bean Flour Mix
• 1 cup light Flour Mix
• 2 Eggs
• 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 Bananas
• 5 tablespoons Sour Milk (add a little lemon juice or vinegar if your milk is fresh or you are using Rice or Soy Milk)
• 1 teaspoons Xanthan Gum
• 1/2 cup Walnuts (optional)
• 1 cup P-nut Butter Chips (optional)

Place your bananas, sugar, shortening,eggs, and milk in a mixing bowl or food processor. If using a food processor simply run until everything is combined and smooth. If you do not have a food processor all you need to do is use a fork and smash everything together until well blended.

In another bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and xanthan gum.  Mix and then add your liquid mixture. When all is well combined you can add your optional ingredients.

Fill your greased muffin tins about 2/3 full. I use a 1/8 cup for each muffin tin. You will have to gauge it for your own tins. They tend to differ in size.

Place in an oven that is  preheated to 350

bake for 12- 15 min

Muffins should spring back when lightly touched.

Enjoy!

☆。

。★。*。Have

☆。a wonderful day.

.★´*。.☆¨¯`*★。。☆

..frazzled..

Yup, that’s me. Dh asked me a funny question yesterday. Sometimes I wonder where he comes up with this stuff, but other times I think he might have something…

Last night he asked me, “Do you think you are being tested?” After requesting more clarification even though I did have a pretty good idea what he was talking about, he asked again- “Do you think you are being tested?” He has observed that I have become very disciplined regarding my physical self..

For example, I guard everything that is either going into my body or coming near to it.. I respect my body in such a way that I am truly trying to keep it my ‘temple’. He’s very observant and has obviously noticed this. He seems to think I have come to some sort of conclusion with that regard. He comments often how much I have changed, how much my confidence has increased, how much I see things my own way, with confidence..

Just yesterday I was doing something, I can’t think of what at the moment but he started to make dinner. When I had finished what ever it was that I was doing.. Probably something to do with the baby, I told him I could either take over or help in another way.. You know like tidy up or whatever.

He was about to do something and what he was doing was not at all my way of doing it.. it wasn’t wrong per say but it’s wasn’t right either, nor was it at all efficient. I stepped in and told him how to correctly do it. He was upset.

I suspect his feelings were hurt and he called me a control freak. Last week I am arrogant and now I am controlling.

Then he said… “Just because I am not doing it your way doesn’t make it wrong!”

 OH MY GOSH!!! I haven’t laughed so hard in ages.. I was laughing so hard that I was crying. That for me was a true full circle moment.. The proverbial shoe was absolutely on the other foot. How many times in the years that we have lived together have I said that to him and how many times has be gotten ANGRY with me for not doing as he says!!!

Oh it was so priceless.. I feel like laughing all over again just rethinking about it.

I told him that he is sure right, the tables are turning.. But the point is balance, not to tip the scales fully one way or another.

Okay back to my original thought.. He was asking me about being tested I guess because now that I am managing so well physically, next he wonders if I am capable of surviving mentally.

Our home is pure chaos at the moment, every day a new drama to deal with, everyday a fresh batch of lies and cover ups.. Not to mention the task of living. Carrying out our everyday lives that had never been mundane even in the quietest of times, the back to school rush, the organization of all the places I have my hands into.. all the while maintaining the home life.

I did great yesterday, I gave my laundry some tender love and care, my home is sparkling clean again, I’ve been doing pretty good in the dinner department, I have walked twice this week and I am planning to go running at lunch today..

But again back to the test question. I don’t know how to answer that. I don’t think so actually. At least not in that way.

I guess I wouldn’t call it testing really but a trial. I think these moments we are living right now are trials and dramas, meant to come before us in this exact way to maybe bring more awareness to the reality of life.  To the greater good. That’s about all I can say to that, but inadvertently tested.. no, I don’t think so, not this time.

Anyways I am done my lunch so I had better get back to work.. I have a good harvest of tomatoes to work on today, I am going to stew them when I get home from the school. Running club, here we go..

On another note I slept during the day again yesterday. At 2 30pm I layed down and immediately fell asleep, I woke again around 3 45. So strange. In more that ten years- I simply do not nap. I’ve napped 3 times in two weeks. Obviously I wasn’t picking up the kids yesterday.. don’t worry I am not shirking any responsibility’s.. LOL. But it is strange..

I went for a nice walk this morning. It was so fresh, it felt great.

Okay back to work.

Delicious Raw Miso Soup

I’m eating this right now!  It’s the perfect thing when my tummy isn’t feeling so happy, like this afternoon (and unfortunately, most afternoons).  Depending on how raw I feel like being, I make this with varying temperatures of water. It’s a new staple in my diet and gets 5/5 happy monkeys. Just a note of caution: although I list ingredient proportions as adapted from Alyssa Cohen’s Living on Live Food, I really just throw in however much looks good.  I personally like it really miso-ey.

Ingredients:

1.5 cups water (warm or hot)

1 tbsp fresh ginger root

2 tsp miso (I like the brown rice variety)

1/4 tsp sea salt

2 tbsp scallions or other herbs (dill shown here), chopped

raw vegetable, such as chopped mushrooms, baby spinach or shredded carrots

1/4 cup soft tofu, cut into cubes (optional for raw)

Directions:

Throw everything but the herbs, veg and tofu in Vita Mix blender and blend until smooth. Pour in bowl and add herbs, veg and tofu. I like to add some flax oil on top of mine as a garnish. Enjoy!

Cooking

    (islamicbookstore.com) ISBN: 0781809487

Author: Nur Ilkin

Publisher: Hippocrene Books (2002)

Pages: 275 Binding: Hardcover with Dust Jacket

Description from the publisher:

(islamicbookstore.com) ISBN: 0781806437

Author: Samia Abdennour, Abdennour Samia

Publisher: Hippocrene Books (1998)

Pages: 199 Binding: Paperback

Description from the publisher:

Keith Floyd

Keith Floyd died yesterday.

I have never really enjoyed any chefs or cooks on TV. Floyd himself thought that he had started an endless cult of people consuming food and cookery programmes as entertainment without actually cooking anything themselves. I tend to agree.

But, back in the 1980s when I was a kid and watching TV when I should have been doing homework, Floyd was a legend.

Can you believe a TV cookery show today would ever use Peaches as the theme music?

Even though his producer was a perfectionist and often insisted on multiple re-takes, the shambolic impression of him at work made it look like everything was shot in single take. Floyd would issues instructions to the camera to ‘focus back on me’ or ‘look at the food’ and the camera would willingly oblige.

He was never without a drink and in reality was probably a miserable wino, but on camera was a bon vivant…

In an era of endless celebrities, where fame is achieved as an exponential result of being famous, Floyd was a genuine entertainer. He deserved more success from his 20+ books and constant TV presence through the 80s to 90s, but the new era took his ideas and sanitised the swearing and drinking from the mix – Jamie Oliver being his most obvious heir, though Nigel Slater is also clearly an admirer.

Oliver is himself incredibly talented, but he can’t quite match the sheer dangerousness of Floyd trying to drink wine, cook food, talk to the camera, and all on a bouncing fishing trawler off the English coast.

Tasty Tuesday: Cupcakes in Jars

In full disclosure, I did not take this picture, nor did I come up with this idea by myself.

Recently BC moved in with Coocatchoo and became the newest resident in our building. And his birthday was on 9/11 – same as my cousin, Nick. I decided at the last minute that I had to do something nice for him. But he’s a picky eater, and I only had an hour or so to put together a boy-friendly birthday-and-welcome gift. The solution: cupcakes in jars. Perfect for them to take on their trip to the mountains for the weekend, where they rented a house that turned out to be haunted and couldn’t do any hiking because of BC’s unfortunate toe injury. Meanwhile, I was camping with the still-in-recovery Swamp and busy getting poison ivy all. over. myself. What is with everyone’s luck this summer? Man.

Anyways, about the cupcakes in jars…I think the magic of these cupcakes, which everyone says taste better than normal cupcakes, is the ratio of cake to icing. You get way more icing in there. I made cupcakes (funfetti) and icing (cream cheese) like normal. Then I got out my half-pint jars with lids. I put a spoonful of icing in the bottom of the jar. Then I cut a cupcake in half vertically and iced the outside. I placed it in the jar on one side. Then I took the other vertical half of the cupcake and iced all the way around it, with a good thick layer on the side that would be in the middle. I also added some sprinkles to that layer. Then I slid it into the jar to form a whole cupcake again. It required a little tapping on top to get them secured. Added another spoonful (or two) of icing on top, and more sprinkles. Capped it, screwed on the lid, and added a circle of pretty paper on top. Voila!

Some people bake the cupcakes in the jars — they’re glass, it works fine. But I thought it was easier to bake them separately for better control over icing placement. If you give these as gifts, I recommend including a note about removing the lid by sliding it across instead of pulling upwards, so as not to remove the top layer of icing. I gave BC four of these because I had four jars, and I think it was a nice amount for two people. It’s a great gift idea, but it would also be a good solution for taking cupcakes to work (or school) with your lunch. You wouldn’t have to worry about the icing sticking to whatever it is you carried it in.

Coocatchoo is an admitted cupcake-a-holic, so she loved them. But my real joy came from hearing about BC, who is not even much of a dessert person, exclaiming that they were like the best cupcakes he’d ever tasted. Right before the haunted house made him dream it was kicking them out.

Easy & Tasty Chocolate Truffles

I made these the other day an they are tasty and EASY! My coworkers devoured them!! I got the recipe from Time Life’s Family Favorites Made-Easy. Here’s the recipe:

INGREDIENTS:

• 6 oz. bittersweet chocolate, finely chopped

• 1/3 cup heavy whipping cream

• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

• Coatings: 1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, sugar, coconut flakes, or finely chopped walnuts

DIRECTIONS:

1. In work bowl of food processor or, medium, heatproof bowl, place chocolate.

2. In small saucepan over medium heat, combine cream and vanilla. Heat stirring, until it just starts to boil.

3. Remove saucepan from heat and immediately pour over chocolate in work bowl. Process for 15 to 20 seconds or stir together until chocolate has completely melted and is smooth.

4. Pour into 13×9 inch baking dish and refrigerate until mixture is set, about 18 minutes. ( I left it in longer because I got busy working on other things. I pulled it out and let it sit for a bit and then continued.)

5. Put desired coatings into individual bowls. ( I put them in bags so I could shake them and  have less dishes to do. ) Using melon baller (this makes it easier to have them come out as the same size) or two teaspoons, scoop chocolate mixture into approximately 1-inch balls and toss in cocoa powder or other coating. (It was a little difficult to get it out of the scoop so I had to roll them back into shape in my palms.) Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

NOTES:

*I tripled the batch so I could try more coatings and who’s going to use whipping cream again before it goes bad? Since I made a larger batch I did have to put the chocolate back in the frig before I got them all made because it got too soft after a while.

I didn’t like the cocoa powder topping so I tried powdered sugar instead. It’s pretty good. Then I went for peanuts instead of the walnuts. Plain sugar wasn’t anything fancy but I had leftover chocolate sprinkles and I think those were pretty good but my FAVORITE was the coconut!

Next time I want to try adding extracts for different flavors such as orange, raspberry, and mint (1 Tbsp). I’ll also see what other coatings I can come up with. I’ll be sure to let you know!

Happy Cooking!

Elisa

for Appoggiatura, Arnie and Mark

Left to right: Sungold cherry tomatoes, assorted heirloom grape and cherry tomatoes, assorted heirloom tomatoes (Plum Yellow, San Marzano, Persimmon, Red Zebra)

Tonight will be a mini tomato dinner. I had initially planned for Tuesday but a casual inspection this morning revealed that a couple of toms had ripened a bit while in the fridge. That, or they’ve softened considerably. All the more reason why I should eat them as soon as possible.

Heirloom tomato salad, corn flan

Fettucine with Sungold tomatoes, garlic and bush basil

Pan-roasted monkfish, Tuscan long beans (long beans and tomatoes briefly sautéed in olive oil with a bit of garlic)

Watermelon and white peach salad

If I had more time, I would have candied some Sungold toms and served that with the fruit salad for dessert. Depending on tonight’s weffort, I might do another tomato dinner in a couple of weeks.

Check back later for pix and recipes.

Gluten Free Pumpernickel Bread

INGREDIENTS

3 eggs – lightly beaten

1 cup water

3 tbs. oil

1 tsp. vinegar

3 tbs. molasses

2 cups brown rice flour

½ cup potato starch

½ cup tapioca flour

1 tbs. xanthan gum

1 tbs. caraway seeds

1 ½ tsp. salt

½ cup powdered milk

1 tbs. cocoa powder

2 ¼ tsp. dry active yeast

 

DIRECTIONS

In a small bowl, beat the eggs and stir in other wet ingredients. Set aside.

Place all of the dry ingredients into a medium bowl and whisk together.

Pour wet ingredients into your bread maker, followed by the dry ingredients.

Set machine to dough only.

Use a spatula to scrape the sides and bottom of the bread-maker pan at about the half way mark.

Place dough into a round bread pan (or casserole dish) and allow to rise in a warm kitchen for about an hour.

Bake at 375°F  for 30 minutes.

Cover with foil for the last 10 minutes of baking.

When cooled completely, hollow out the centre and break the centre bread into dipping sized pieces.

Dip into Spinach dip.

 

Spinach Dip

INGREDIENTS

1 ½ cups sour cream 1/3 cup mayonnaise 3 tsp. minced onion 1 tsp. dried chives 1 tsp. dried parsley flakes 2 tsp. garlic powder 10  Ounce package frozen chopped spinach  

DIRECTIONS

Thaw and drain the spinach and mix in all of the other ingredients.

Allow to sit in the fridge over night.

Sneaky Apple Pancakes

This morning I woke up before Charlie did, so I snuck into the kitchen (not an easy feat, since I sleep on the inside next to a wall) and got to the kitchen. I haven’t been able to do a lot of independent cooking and baking lately because my arthritis in my hands has been flaring and I’ve actually had worse pain since getting some epidurals for my herniated discs this week. I loathe relying too heavily on others, despite the fact that Charlie is wonderful and helps me out immensely when I need it. In spite of my reluctance, I have actually decided to ask some friends to help me out with some things from now on.

But, since I wasn’t feeling awful this morning, and since I managed to sneak out of bed without waking him, I decided to get some pancakes going before he woke up. We had the first round of apples in our farm share this week. A few of them have been munched through already, but we had a few left standing for pancakes. I made the batter in my new KitchenAid Mixer, had a cup of coffee, woke up Charlie, and he made the pancakes.

These pancakes are sneaky not only because I had to sneak out of bed to make them, but also because the apples are grated and aren’t in huge chunks, so they’re a bit of a delicious surprise.

*Note: If you’d like to make these pancakes vegan, simply substitute 1 tablespoon flax seed + 3 tablespoons warm water, mixed well, for the egg, and your preferred unsweetened non-dairy milk.

Ingredients

1 large apple, peeled and grated

1/2 cup 1% milk, plus a little extra to thin batter if necessary

1 egg, beaten

3 tablespoons canola oil

1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce

1 1/3 cups whole-wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 tablespoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

Directions

Combine the wet ingredients in a small bowl. So, toss in your grated apples, your oil, your beaten egg, milk, and applesauce. Give it a good stir.

Combine all the dry ingredients in another bowl, in my case, my stand mixer bowl. So, your flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, brown sugar, and baking soda. Mix your dry ingredients well.

Add wet ingredients to dry and mix just to moisten.

Lightly grease a non-stick skillet with spray oil and heat griddle on medium heat. Working in batches, spoon 1/4 cup batter onto the grill. If the batter is too thick, add a bit more milk or water to the remaining batter. Cook until golden and bubbling (2 to 3 minutes), then turn and continue to cook 1 minute.

Serve pancakes with the traditional warm maple syrup, or do what I did, and top with warm applesauce, a bit more cinnamon, and sprinkle a few chopped nuts on top. Yum!

Blenderrrr Frenzee

Yeay! I just bought TESCOM multi purpose stick blender at Amazon. Although it’s the cheapest price online so far, still for 7100Yen is quite expensive for kitchen appliances. Plus it would be useless once I go back to Malaysia due to voltage differences (Japan is 100V, Malaysia 240V).

I couldn’t help myself thinking about getting a juicer, after drinking a sesame banana soy milk smoothie at a cafe one day. But I hate all the tedious work of cleaning up a blender so I end up choosing something that is easy to clean and use.

Tescom blender is different. It can do 5  jobs for one machine.

Smasher, blender, chopper, beater and also bread kneader. One thing it can’t only only do is smash ice.

Now I’m looking for to cook homemade hamburgers, fishballs, healthy fruit shakes for breakfast, cakes and homemade bread. Can’t wait for it to arrive. Slurppp…

THM500 7100Yen at Amazon.jp

[Via http://wonderfulencounters.wordpress.com]

Corn Chowdah

Corn showed up in the CSA panier a couple of weeks ago.  I was excited and wary.  Excited because yay, corn!  Wary because the few ears of cob corn I’ve had in France have been unpalatably starchy.  So before even tasting it I devised a plan.  Corn chowder.  That way I could extract the flavor from the cobs, while the chopped, cooked kernels would have less of a chance to be offensive when combined in a creamy soup with bacon and potatoes.  (How do you make anything taste good?  Bacon and potatoes.)

Fortunately, when I cut the corn kernels from the cob and tasted one, I was rewarded with the crisp crunch of sweet corn.  Hooray!  No animal feed for us tonight!  I reserved the kernels for later and put the halved cobs in a pot with a little cream (okay, a lot of cream), a bay leaf,  and a few sprigs of thyme harvested from my windowbox garden.  I brought it up to a simmer, then covered it and lowered the heat so the cobs and herbs could really infuse the cream with their flavors.

As we all know, a good chowder always starts with bacon.  Potatoes are another must-have.  Keeping it simple, I rendered some lardons while dicing potatoes, then threw the potatoes on top of the bacon and tossed to coat the cubes of potato in bacon fat.  I cooked them like that for a few minutes, then added a little white wine and water to cover.  Salt, pepper, and 10 minutes of simmering later, the potatoes were tender and tasty.  Time to strain the corned cream into the pot and add the reserved corn kernels.  Back up to a simmer for another couple of minutes to heat the corn through, and dinner was good to go.

Simple, classic, and great for those first few chilly nights of the changing season.

Originally published on Croque-Camille.

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[Via http://croquecamille.wordpress.com]

Carrot Bread

Carrot Bread

This experiment turned out so well!

Ingredients:

• 2.25 tsp dry yeast (1 cake yeast)
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 3.5 cups bread flour (500 grams)
• .5 pound grated carrots (250 grams)
• 1 tablespoon melted butter (cooled to room temp)

Directions:

Sprinkle the yeast, then the sugar into .5 cup of water and let proof for 10 minutes. Stir to dissolve.

Mix the flour and the salt in a large bowl. Make a well in the center and pour in the dissolved yeast, then add carrots, then add butter. Mix in the flour from the sides of the well.

Add water, as needed to form a moist (sticky) dough.

Turn dough out onto a lightly floured work surface. Flour your hands, and knead for 10 minutes. This dough is super sticky, and you may need to add a tablespoon of flour now and then to hands and surface, but try to not add very much, to avoid a dense bread. The dough will still be sticky at the end of your kneading time…that’s ok.

Put the dough in a lightly buttered/greased bowl and cover with a linen towel. Let it rise until doubled in size…about 1.5 hours. Punch down, and let rest for 5-10 minutes.

Shape the dough into a round loaf and place on either a floured baking tray or a parchment lined baking tray. Cover with a linen towel and let proof until doubled in size…about 45 minutes.

It should look like this:

Carrot bread dough - 2nd rise

Bake in a preheated 400 degree oven (200 degree C). Steam is optional, but I think it made the crust nicer. You can add steam either by adding icecubes in a baking pan below the bread, or do what I do, which is to spritz the oven (careful to avoid electrical elements) right after I put the bread in.

Bread should be golden and hollow sounding when tapped underneath.

Cool on an elevated wire rack.

Enjoy!

[Via http://spiderfarmer.wordpress.com]

Whew! Back to school.

Heavenly trio: marocchino, Perrier, and croissant

I popped into French Bakery in Kirkland today for a quick bite to eat and a marocchino, which Ms. Adventure’s in Italy so aptly called “Heaven in a Cup”. My son YM started preschool this week, and although I’ll miss him, it is a relief to me that he will be someplace to expend all that almost 5-year old energy in a safe, loving and supportive environment and under the guiding, patient and capable hands of his teachers, each of whom are my rock. You know, I think I learn more from his preschool teachers than he does.  So I took my daughter MR shopping at Sur La Table for a wedding gift for a friend: a Bialetti Moka Express.

Of course, the reason I went to French Bakery was to get a package of pre-ground Attibassi coffee to add to the wedding gift…or maybe that was the excuse to go there and have a croissant and a marocchino…okay, that’s the real reason I went. It was a lovely break, with YM in school and MR asleep in the Ergo carrier, it was 2:00 and I still hadn’t eaten lunch so it seemed like the perfect opportunity to take a rest during a busy day.  To the gift package I added a copy of the cookbook Pasta Harvest, by Janet Fletcher, which I bought gently used (really never used) through a seller on Amazon.com (I guess it’s out-of-print, because new books aren’t available).  As some of you may be familiar, I have used my copy a few times, and I am sure that the foodie groom and his bride would enjoy this book too.

The day ended well with Alex and I leaving the babysitter with MR and YM crying as we made our escape to a parent orientation meeting for preschool.  While there I was able to put in a few more rows on Shawl Neck Cardigan.

I don’t know, this thing is taking too long for me. My fingers are getting itchy to move onto something else. You know, something I can see finished before next summer. Maybe some gloves or a sweater in something truly satisfying like a nice bulky wool.

[Sorry for the cell phone pictures, but sometimes you have to make due.]

[Via http://domesticshorthair.wordpress.com]

The Carnelian Room's Closing: End of a Wine Institution

 

I wouldn’t lose hope yet. Carnelian does its best business between now and the end of the holidays. Many will return for a last dinner for the sake of past memories. That will be huge for their seasonal sales. Sometimes restaurants think want to close but change minds after a few good months. On the other hand, news say we maybe heading to another “downturn.” That will make a recession a bigger one or a depression! If anybody would know for sure, it would be those guys who do breakfast at Carnelian and the place was built for them. Who knows. Maybe it is bad enough for them to throw the towel in. We will be the last to know. That is for sure.

————————————————–

The Carnelian Room’s Closing: End of a Wine Institution

The wine cellar of the Carnelian Room

I was sorry to read the note in the Chronicle that the Carnelian Room is closing.

Read the post

http://www.7×7.com/blogs/buzzed/carnelian-rooms-closing-end-wine-institution

[Via http://worldofcush.wordpress.com]

Looking toward Livonia

So to make a really really long story short, which I almost never do, I’ve been worried recently about the distance thing between J and I.  I know that I’ll be fine, and I’ll handle it as long as I need to.  J’s confident about himself as well, but he’s not making any guarantees… which I understand, but when you give that information to a pure pessimist, that makes for a bundle of nerves and insecurities.  There are those damned insecurities again!  Eff!  Anyway, I’ve been keeping an eye on job postings within my GreatBigCorporation in Michigan.  Unfortunately, the closest headquarters location for my GBC employer is in Livonia, which is about 2 1/2 hours from J.  Okay, 2 1/2 hours is way better than 12-14 hours.  It’s not GREAT, but it guarantees weekends at the very least, and that’s way better than what we’re dealing with now.  Plus, I know people in Livonia.  So I’ve been keeping an eye on job postings.  It occurred to me today though, that lots of positions get hired internally in my GBC, and never get posted on the website.  Duh!  So I actually called the manager of my department in Livonia and spoke to him personally.  He said they JUST filled their last position… grr… but he said that “things happen literally every day” so he took my name and number… he’s super nice… and I took his info, and I asked if I could check in with him periodically.  I told him I was rather anxious to transfer, and I am.

Enter J’s concerns.  First and foremost, he doesn’t think I should uproot my entire life just for him.  I told him that’s crap, he is my life… next.  He said he could understand if moved closer to Holland where my friends are.  I told him that I actually have friends in Livonia too, so that’s also crap… NEXT.  Also, I could move a reasonable distance from Livonia closer to Holland.  I don’t remember any more reasons, and I’m not sure he had any.  But unless he were to tell me he’s not in love with me anymore, none of them would change my decision to pursue a transfer.  Financially it’s probably a good move, because Michigan is a rather depressed economy, and it’s likely that I would get a lateral pay transfer, which would be really good money for Michigan standards.  Rent is hundreds cheaper than it is out here… so if I can transfer within my GBC, I’m good to go.  Most importantly, J and I don’t have to be so far apart.  I’m thinking of calling a few different departments too, customer service maybe.  I could do that.  Cross your fingers for me, say a prayer… whatever.

 

So anyway, on another front, I made a super tasty dish between Monday and Tuesday that I’d like to share with you.  Shit, I feel like Mr. Rogers all of a sudden.  Basically, I’ve had a lot of meat in the freezer getting freezer burned.  Who among us doesn’t just throw meat from the store in the freezer, in that styrofoam tray and the shitty plastic wrap?  Really?  Of course that’s the worst packaging for the freezer and it always gets freezer burn.  To make matters worse, burned meat in the freezer consisted of 5 swiss steaks.  I wasn’t aware that swiss steaks were the shoe leather part of the cow, and the only thing tougher than a poorly cooked swiss steak would be the cow’s hoof.  Great.  GRAND, even.  I got a bee in my bonnet on Monday to clean out the freezer… close my eyes, throw out the burned meat, and pretend I didn’t just throw out a good chunk of cash.  I started cleaning out the freezer, and as I ruefully pulled out the stupid burned stupid swiss stupid steaks, I remembered my favorite kitchen gadget sitting in the cabinet… the Crock Pot… the MAGIC pot.  Well DUH.  Why hadn’t I considered it before?  The magic pot that cures both freezer burn AND tough meat.  There is no cut of meat anywhere that can stay tough after 10 hours in the magic pot.  So I dumped the five swiss steaks in the pot, threw in two envelopes of Lipton onion soup mix for good measure, about two coffee mugs of water, and turned it on for the longest cook time.  By the 5-6 hour mark, I could smell the wonderful, oniony beef from the third floor.  I went to check on it, and sure enough, the pieces on the bottom that were completely in liquid were already shredding.  Perfect!  I fiddled the two steaks on top so they were submersed and left it until it was about 9 hours.  When I could cut it all with a spoon, I decided it was done.  I’d figured by now I was going to make stroganoff out of it, so I just threw it into a container and stuck it in the fridge overnight.  I had no inclination to mess with a roux, so I went the ghetto, lazy route and decided to just let it all congeal overnight.  Last night I came home, dumped the solid, terribly disgusting looking mess into a big frying pan, and began warming it through.  When it was semi-liquidy again, I stirred in almost a whole container of sour cream, salt and pepper, and let it simmer for a while.  I didn’t think it would need any salt, since the onion soup mix is basically salt and dehydrated onion, but you would be shocked how much you need to season meat in the magic pot for it to taste seasoned when it’s done.  So then I just boiled some noodles and threw the meat glop on top.  It was yummy!  It tasted just as good as the other times I’d made stroganoff, where I bought a pricer cut of meat, spent time cooking onions and mushrooms and adding ketchup and spices and who-knows-what-else, spent an hour trying to get it thick with a roux, etc. etc.  Bah!  Cheap ass meat + onion soup mix + 10 hours in the magic pot + 8 hours congealing in the fridge + sour cream = super yum.  I am a culinary genius.  Not really.  But I’m adding this to my arsenal of stuff-I-make-that’s-so-good-it-hurts.

 

Oh, and my stupid ass forgot that yesterday was Tuesday and I completely missed the scheduled raid.  Eff!  I’ll be there tonight, but when I checked this morning, we only had 14 people signed up, which means no raid, or a 10 man.  J said he would try to raid tonight, but since he’s diagnosed his crappy internet issue and it’s something that can’t be fixed, I don’t see that working so well, even if there is a raid.  Ugh.  Oh well…

[Via http://poofandmook.wordpress.com]

Happy Heart Farm CSAの今週の分け前のご紹介

以前にもご紹介したことのあるCSA=Community Supported Agricultureの話題再びです。初夏の雹で作物が大打撃を受けたものの、いよいよ「収穫の秋」を感じさせる大量の分け前を、今日はいただいてきました。

　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　　↓↓　ジャーン！！　↓↓

Happy Heart Farm CSA share of the week

すごくないですか?びっくりしました。。。真ん中で縦に寝ている緑の棒は、「芽キャベツBrusselSprout」です。一個一個手でもいで、40－５０個くらい取れたでしょうか。

それから枝豆も、葉っぱ・茎ごともらいました。せっせと下準備して美味しく茹でるお手伝いしてくださったSさんによると、インターネットには3分半くらい、って書いてあるけれどこの辺りでは5分茹でるとちょうど良いのだとか。。。たしかに。この辺りは標高が高く、水が沸騰しても100度Cにならないから、長めに茹でるのでしょうか。（どなたか、その辺強い方、ぜひ、説明のコメントをお願いします！）固さもちょうど良く、新鮮な豆で、美味しかったー：）枝豆なんて、ここに来て初めて、全く期待していなかったので、とても嬉しいびっくりでした。

その他には：

キャベツ（小一個）

きゅうり（一本）

サヤインゲン（一握り）

カブ（3個）

にんじん（5本）

バジル（0.47ポンド）

ケール（好きなだけ）

ズッキーニ（好きなだけ）

もも（おまけにプレゼント）

トマト（10個）

「生産地から食卓への距離が短い」が売り文句のCSA。天気に左右されるなどのリスクはあります。でも、泥臭い野菜たちがとてもかわいく、食材の本来の姿を教えてもらい、大切に使いたいなと、改めて思わされた「収穫が大きい」日でした。

[Via http://lifeinfortcollins.wordpress.com]

Joe's Special

Joe’s Special

 

This is a truly delicious San Francisco specialty.

 

1/2 pound spinach, chopped, or 1 (10 ounce)

    package frozen chopped spinach, thawed

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon butter or margarine

1 pound ground beef

1 small onion, diced

1/2 teaspoon basil

1/4 teaspoon marjoram

1/4 teaspoon oregano

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon black pepper

4 eggs

 

If using frozen spinach, place in a strainer and drain well.

 

Heat oil and butter in a large, heavy skillet. Add ground beef and cook, stirring, until browned and crumbly. Add onion and cook until tender but not browned. Stir in herbs and spices. Stir in drained spinach and cook until liquid in spinach has evaporated.

 

Beat eggs; add to meat mixture and cook, stirring, until eggs are set.

 

Makes 4 to 6 servings.

[Via http://chrisy58.wordpress.com]

How to make Biscuits and Sausage Gravy...Part Two:Sausage Gravy!

As mentioned in the Biscuit Post, Sausage Gravy is not only one of my favorite things to make, but one of the few things I learned directly from my mother. Most sausage gravy recipes are pretty much the same, with slight variations here and there, but the most obvious difference between the flavor of different sausage gravies is not in the spices used, the method of preparation, or anything like that, but in the sausage used to make it. The sausage used makes such a difference in flavor, b/c different sausage companies use various spices in their sausage to make it their own. Even my own sausage gravy varies from location to location because the best sausage rolls are usually locally-produced and therefore aren’t available country-wide.

When I lived in Missouri, the best sausage EVER was Oldham’s…I have relatives that live in other parts of the country and still go to Missouri with an empty ice chest just to bring back loads of that stuff. Nothing compares…nothing. And with that particular brand, the key to awesome sausage gravy was mixing the hot sausage with the medium sausage-and the result was perfection.

Now that I’m in Ohio, this is Bob Evan’s country, and I have to say, while overall I’m not a huge Bob Evan’s Restaurant fan, their Biscuits and Gravy can’t be beat in this area of the country! So, when trying to replicate their lovely breakfast dish, I now use Bob Evan’s original sausage. When we move somewhere else, I’ll have to find a new local company to love, b/c I’ve never been a fan of Jimmy Dean’s flavor (or price) and Odom’s Tennessee Pride pretty much makes me sick. So it’s like a new adventure to find the sausage that is best in YOUR area and use it for making sausage gravy!

Sausage gravy is fairly simple if you just understand the concept of a roux-based gravy. A roux is when you mix hot fat (in this case sausage fat, bacon fat, butter, or oil) with flour-in equal amounts, mix it up, cook it a little, and then add liquid (in this case milk) to it, bring to a boil stirring constantly (to keep it from sticking) and then when it reaches a boil, the roux will magically make your gravy thicken. So, knowing this is how it works, let’s get started.

First we need to cook our sausage. I just put it in the pan over medium heat and break it up with a metal spatula (metal b/c it breaks it up better) as it cooks. Partially cooked sausage breaks up more easily than raw sausage, so this is why I use this method. Some prefer to break it up with their hands, and that’s fine, too:

After you’ve broken it up into crumbles, it will look something like this:

Continue breaking it up during cooking, and cook until it is no longer pink-this picture is almost done:

Once the sausage is no longer pink, it is essentially done, and you can push the sausage to one side of the pan (or some people like to remove it completely from the pan, but if you do this, leave the fat from the sausage in the pan), and tilt the pan allow the grease to drain to the opposite side as the sausage:

Estimate the amount of sausage fat in the pan…if you are using a particularly lean sausage (like Bob Evans) you may not have enough grease to make a roux. You’ll need approximately two whole Tablespoons of fat to make it work. If you have too much fat, drain off what you don’t need. If you don’t have enough/any grease, you can add a Tablespoon of bacon grease, butter, or cooking oil if you are really desperate. Just make sure you have at least two tablespoons of the grease, and add an equal amount (2 tablespoons) of flour to the fat. Reduce heat to low.

At this point, you can add salt and pepper to the flour, and mix it together with the grease until it forms a paste. I didn’t get a good picture of my roux, but I found a picture for you, just click the link to see what it should look like. It is okay if it is even a little more thick than that-more paste-like…it’ll turn out either way. Now you have a decision to make. The longer you cook the roux (remember your pan has been reduced to low), the darker it will get and the more flavorful your gravy will be…but the darker it gets, the less thickening power it will have. About one minute is just about right for most people to cook their roux before adding liquids. Don’t forget to keep stirring constantly, and you can allow the sausage to be coated in the roux during this time.

Once you are ready to add the can of evaporated milk and can of water (you can use regular milk without water, but we don’t buy whole milk, and the more fat in the milk, the better your gravy will be, so I often use evaporated for this), go ahead and pour it in the pan, bringing the heat back to  medium and never stopping your stirring/whisking for anything at this point.

Continue stirring with a spoon or whisk, making sure to get all the way to the bottom so the roux cannot attach itself to the pan, b/c if it does…it’ll burn to the bottom of the pan, give your gravy a burnt flavor, and won’t be able to thicken the gravy like it should. So KEEP STIRRING.

Once the gravy comes to a full boil, it will be pretty much as thick as it is going to get, and you can turn off the heat, but don’t stop stirring until it has cooled enough to stop bubbling. As your gravy thickens, you’ll note that not only does it become thicker and more gravy-like, it will darken and become uniform in color. That’s a good way to know you’ve succeeded.

Congratulations, your gravy is done!

Now simply crack open a biscuit (or crumble it if you wish) and pour that yummy sausage gravy over it and enjoy!

Sausage Gravy over Biscuits:

Jess’s Sausage Gravy Recipe:

INGREDIENTS:

1 lb bulk pork sausage (local brand)

Fat to make 2 Tablespoons (sausage grease, bacon grease, butter, or oil)

2 Tablespoons flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. black pepper

1 Can of Evaporated Milk plus one can of water OR 3 Cups Milk

DIRECTIONS:

Crumble and cook sausage over medium heat in a skillet with high sides (cast iron and non-stick work best). Continue breaking up the sausage with your spatula as it cooks. Cook until sausage is brown and has no traces of pink. Once the sausage is done, move it to one side of the skillet with spatula. Reduce heat to low. Tilt the pan slightly, and add or remove fat until you have 2 Tablespoons of fat left. Add 2 Tablespoons of flour, salt and pepper, and mix with a whisk until pasty. Using the whisk, mix the sausage back in and cook for approximately one minute, stirring constantly, scraping the bottom of the pan thoroughly to keep roux from sticking. Add milk and water (or just milk if not using evaporated). Continue stirring with whisk, kick the heat back up to medium, and heat gravy to boiling. Do not stop stirring for anything, and be sure to keep it from sticking to the bottom of your pan while it comes to a boil. Once boiling, remove from heat and continue stirring until it stops bubbling. Serve over biscuits. Makes approximately 4 cups (enough for 4-6 people). Recipe can be doubled if using a pan large enough.

[Via http://homemadewithlove.wordpress.com]

For those of you itching for a personal post

Just wanted to let you ruffians know that I’m smoking a 6.5 lb Boston Butt right now using a new experimental rub. Cost me less than .60/ lb after paying .88/lb and using a Harris-Teeter $20 off $50 purchase coupon.

Hell, it’s about as cheap as ramen, but it takes a million times longer (it shouldn’t be finished until well after 9 pm since I only got it on the Weber around 11:45.)

Man, nothing like the smell of hickory and alder on Labor Day. Coupled with a pale ale, of course.

[Via http://teleburst.wordpress.com]

Scones

I never really did much cooking – a bit of instant stuff like 2 minute noodles, oven fry fish.   Until Wifey went away for 18 days in July.    That, and MasterChef has made a huge change in our household!   We’re now trying different recipes every week, and I’m now assigned to do cooking at least once a week

It’s so funny because I have such a different approach to cooking than Wifey.   For me, it’s like revisiting high school Chemistry.  I am one of those “follow the recipe to the letter” people.  I argue that they must have tried these recipes many times, so why deviate from it?

The good thing about cooking is that kids love it!   One of the first things I did was pull out our beginner’s cookbook and work through a scone recipe with the kids.

They were both so eager to get their hands dirty! Unfortunately, they didn’t seem too excited by all the scones by the end of it all… so I had to eat nearly all of them

[Via http://jasechong.wordpress.com]

Wanna make pizza?

Making pizza is very easy if you know how to make the bread, well I have already put up the recipe for bread. There is only one difference between pizza bread and normal bread and that is you really dont want much rise in your dough. It doesnt matter, but taste is important, so if you let it rise for a long time like 24 hours you get better taste, but 1 -2 hours will do just fine.

After your dough has risen then you punch it down, flatten it , then pinch and pull, my technique is usually pinch then pull towards left or right and keep repeating that, going around the pizza, till you have a good lip, put in the dish that you gonna put in oven, make sure you put semolina seeds under it if you have,

So then comes the sauce, you can either make the sauce yourself or buy it, I use taco sauce and its great, so pour the sauce on your pizza, then toppings is just common sense, first put the onion , then put in any order your topping, Mushroom, olive(get the pitted one), pepper, chop chop chop, put it on.

Don’t put too many different toppings, the main thing is really the bread and the sauce, dont put more than 4 toppings, 3 is optimum for me.

Dont chop too thin, you want to feel the texture, but again if you prefer it other way then go ahead.

ok so toppings are on now, then comes the cheese, mozarella finello is what you will get and shred on top, some people put different cheeses, I tried that and it didnt make any difference, and cheese is expensive, however there are no limits, so put 10 different types of cheese if you want to.

Put it in oven now and bake it in oven like how you bake your bread, I have  a Microwave oven so I put it on conv bake for 22 minutes at 250 degrees celsius.

Try to not attack the pizza once its out, let the cheese to solidify, so you can cut it easily and keep your topping on your bread, I know its hard to wait, just control.

Ideas for toppings:

1.Tomato, Basil and Mozarella

2. Tomato and Garlic

3. Tomato, mozarella and anchovies

well the possibilities are endless really.

Making the sauce yourself will give you further control which is something  I will cover later. Tell me how it goes, tell me about your experiences,

M. Ebrahim Sadeghian F.

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