Slacker

Boy am I bad at this blog thing. Not that I think anyone notices or cares. My excuse is summer. All those things to do besides sitting down at a computer. We have had a pretty productive summer. Need to remember that we only need six pepper plants next year though. We have enough frozen to last into the next decade. Maybe not that much. Have to leave space in the freezer for the chili andtomato sauce since we ran out of bottles making salsa, spagetti sauce, elderberry jelly, choke cherry jelly, and whatever else. The tomatoes have gone crazy this year. Yesterday I spent all day cooking tomato sauce. I started with a five gallon bucket-full and ended up with about five quarts of sauce. If anyone wonders you have to cook it down that much so the sauce doesn't separate. You can tell when it is done because the layer of liquid on the top goes away. And so you don't take up as much freezer/bottle space. It is a bit strange for us to have tomatoes and corn out of the garden this late. It did attempt to freeze at the beginning of the month, but since then the weather has warmed up again. The only problem is we rely on irrigation water from the field for the garden and that is about over. And I have eaten so many cherry tomatoes that I have canker sores. It just needs to stay warm long enough to get the popcorn ripe. That was our experiment this year. So far what we have tried hasn't popped. Probably because it was just what we salvaged from the stalks Miss Polly the cow knocked over. Now that she is secured the rest should ripen in safety

Fall

Summer is over and school has started. Where has it all gone? We did finish our second Cook's Illustrated. Mom also got a book called "Zucchini Houdini" that we have been trying out. The recipes we have tried have been pretty good. The people at work were not too impressed with my zucchini brownies. "Is that ruining a vegetable or a dessert?" I wouldn't have called them brownies though, but cake. Or really cakey brownies. They were one of those things better the second day. The first day they had a definite vegetable flavor, but the second it didn't seem so bad. Or I got accustomed to the flavor. One of my cousins (there were two here at the time) saw me making them and doesn't like squash so he didn't try them. The other one ate two before he figured the secret ingredient. Then he decided he didn't like them anymore. Maybe a smaller holed grater next time so the zucchini is less noticeable. The chocolate does cover up the green color.

Back to the five day bread pudding. We needed Challa bread to make it, and I don't know where we could get that here, so day one was make Challa. Fortunately it made more bread than needed for the bread pudding so we got to eat Challa, and it was good. I am pretty good at the bread thing. Day two nothing happened because we were busy. Day three, cube the bread then run out of time. Day four, make the final thing. It was good too. Don't know if it was worth the wait. Maybe if we had bought the bread. And not actually five days, but close.

Here is some manzanita. A very pretty bush with it's glossy evergreen leaves and smooth red bark. And a pretty good picture too, I think. Hey, I have to do something with all these pictures I take.

Back to food

Vacation is over and the niece is home so we can go back to trying out new stuff. Have to be careful with a somewhat picky eater. How can she be spoiled by Grandma if she has to eat strange things. The only thing of note we made was some granola bars with nine grain cereal. We went to a store that had bulk stuff down in California and I ended up with more than I expected of the cereal. It was for granola bars and it turned out well. Usually I make them with just oatmeal, but the cereal gives a firmer feel. The recipe for those is simple and I changed it enough to claim it for myself. 4 1/2 cups oatmeal (or rolled # grain cereal) 1 cup flour ( whole wheat works well, WWWW) 1 Teaspoon baking soda 1/3 cup brown sugar. Mix together in a large bowl. Larger than you think you would need. Melt together 1/2 cup butter and 1/2 cup honey. Add 1 teaspoon vanilla. If using chocolate chips or peanut butter add a little(1/4 cupish) to the melted stuff. Mix in with the dry ingredients. When sufficiently cool so that things don't melt, add 2-3 cups of good stuff: chocolate, nuts, dry fruit, sunflower seeds, coconut, etc. Last time we did 1 cup dark chocolate chips, 1 cup dried cranberries, and 1/2 cup chopped almonds. Someday I will find dried mangoes and make a white chocolate, mango, coconut bar. Smash into a 9 x 13 pan. Really smash it in there, otherwise it will be very crumbly. Cook in 325 oven for 18-22 minutes. Press carefully into pan again when it comes out of the oven, but don't get burned. Let cool and cut into bars. They are heavy so cut small. For some reason, putting the cut bars in the freezer for a day or so tends to make them less crumbly. They keep well and are good for a work snack, if you catch all the crumbs.

The next installment will go back to the Cooks Illustrated, including the five day bread pudding, and surprisingly good leek soup. Now for random wildflower pictures. They have been good this year. A claret cup cactus and death camas. In case anyone was tempted, don't eat the death camas. It is called that for a reason.

A little more food

Better get this done before vacation this week. Haven't had much time to make exciting food with a job and the sheep going to the mountain. Mom made the better stir-fry broccoli. May have been better, but wasn't that great. Mostly just crunchy broccoli with a little sauce and red pepper flakes. The red pepper flakes did make it a little more exciting. Eat it with milk near by.

The other thing was pork tostadas. This one needs a retry. They were good and didn't take too long to make. We did eat at 8:45 pm, but it wasn't because they cooked for that long. It was just a long day. This was the first time we left out the secret ingredient though. I guess I missed the add chipotle powder part so they were a little bland. Flavor was good, but no kick at all. Even with my Tapatio sauce they were mild. Tapatio is a pretty mild hot sauce, but still should help some. So now we have to try again... with the chipotle. It sure smells good.

The diet should get more interesting now. The lettuce and spinach are pretty much done for, and the beets were kind of skipped, but the peas are ready to begin. We had the first six pods tonight and they were just how I like them. Small enough that when you bite down the peas pop a little. This is the reason for a garden. Get everything picked when you like them, not when someone else decides they are ready. Still haven't figured out the watermelon thing yet. They are either so green they taste like cucumbers or old and mealy. And the biggest one I had was about softball size. Forget icebox melons, I grow pop cooler melons.

And beginning another

On to March and April 2010, or the broccoli magazine- it has a picture of broccoli on the front cover. We need to keep moving. The day we started this one the Pepper issue came. Still three to go. The broccoli issue has much less exotic ingredients than the previous "sweet potato" issue. Dried chipotle powder is about as strange as it gets. Hopefully we find something to do with the sheep cheese and oyster sauce somewhere in one of these next couple issues.

The first we tried was the pan-seared chicken breasts, sub titled 'Exposing boneless, skinless chicken breasts to a hot pan often yields dry, leathery meat. But what if we did most of the cooking in the oven?' For us the answer was dry, leathery meat. I am sure it has more to do with our thermometer and interpretation than the actual process. At the end, rather than the 160 degrees suggested, they still read about 80. I better stick to the 'looks good' method. I did calibrate the thermometer to the ice point since that was the only temperature we know exactly, but as I learned at the lab, it is best to calibrate close to the point that will actually be used. Might have to use boiling water and just adjust for altitude. They were good, especially with the lemon and chive pan sauce, just a little on the tough dry side. I did take a picture of the dinner, but I am on the wrong computer so it will have to be put on later.

Next was beef stroganoff. This was good. A little more work than Mom's traditional hamburger stroganoff, but not too bad. It used tomato paste to enhance the flavor like the beef stew did and just a little sour cream. We will try it again with hamburger rather than the sirloin tips since we have all the hamburger we want while we have to buy sirloin tips. Still have enough of that to make the stroganoff two more times. We did leave the wine out so lost that "brightness" but it was good enough for us.

End of a chapter

We have reached the end of our first issue and those strange foods weren't that bad. Mom is a big fan of the Thai-style Chicken with Basil. And interesting note on that. We forgot the sugar when we made it and she thought it was really hot. I have lived with a Mexican long enough it wasn't that bad for me. Anyway, put a little sugar on it and turns the heat way down. The theory is that the "happy" caused by the sugar overpowers the "ow" caused by the capsaicin. May come in useful someday. We put it on some rice sticks that my sister-in-law gave to us. Maifun I think they are called, and they are fun. Drop them in hot oil and there is a moment of suspense, then suddenly they boil to the top. Worth making them just for the entertainment value. They don't taste like much, but then they are made of rice which doesn't taste like much.

The final trial was Cacio e Pepe, or spaghetti with cheese and pepper. This was the sheep milk cheese and since we want our sheep milk to go to lambs we had to buy $14/lb cheese. Fortunately not much. I personally liked the cheese, Mom almost spit it out. Tasting the finished product though she didn't mind. Mostly it tasted like pepper. No picture because it looked like spaghetti with pepper. Use your imagination.

The war edition

A little while ago Mom and I were book shopping at the local thrift store (my favorite book store), and found an old copy of "The Joy of Cooking: a compilation of reliable recipes with an occasional culinary chat" published in 1943. World War II for those who forgot their history. The "Occasional culinary chat" is quite entertaining. A whole column devoted to the story of how the king of France brought about the invention of puffed potatoes; he was late for dinner to make the story short. Also the section on the Calorie Chart, missing in the 75th anniversary edition. "A malediction on the first calorie counter (must have been a man)... It's fun to count other people's caloric intake. Make a game of it... Watch the calories mount. Yes, you may eat and grow thin. It isn't nearly as much fun as giving your appetite a free rein, but if you are inclined to take on soft, but unfortunately much-dated curves, a concentration on non-caloric food (with only an occasional indulgence) is advisable." And my favorite diet advice "Let your contours be your guide."

It was going to press about the time rationing started so some "emergency" chapters were tacked on: Sugar saving recipes for desserts, and Meat stretching and substitutes. And no cookbook could be complete without 'rules' on how to handle sweetbreads, brains, small birds (pigeon), frog legs, hare, and squirrel. As well as the new pressure cookers and varieties of baking powder. We did use one of the recipes for strawberry rhubarb pie which was the taste of spring in a pastry shell.

4 cups sliced strawberries and rhubarb
We used about 2 cups of each
1 cup sugar
9 Tablespoons flour

put in a 9 inch pie pan, with crust on top and bottom and cook at 350.

Simple, straight forward, and very good if you can find good strawberries. Should have taken a picture of that one. Very pretty too.

Pictures

I have been told this thing needs pictures of our accomplishments. I did take some, just had to get them off my camera. Over one hundred pictures later here are some. Wow it worked. This first one is of my first loaf of sourdough bread. Nice golden brown color and smooth top. Not quite a perfect circle, but it was a free-form loaf and the imperfections are part of its handmade appeal.



And these are the baked apples. Don't they look good enough to eat. And I know I should not have used the flash, but my hand is not that steady, so it was either the washed out look or the blurry look. At least this way it is possible to see what they look like.

And here is Mom's sourdough bread. Looks like something out of a bakery. She is good at the bread thing. Her specially developed (normal) bread recipe is the best homemade bread around.
And finally, here is my cat stuck in a tree. Unfortunately the attacking magpies flew away before I got the picture taken. Poor citified fuzzball. Not a big fan of this country life. I did go rescue her after taking the picture so everyone can rest easy. And she won't hardly go outside anymore.

Pizza

Pizza, I forgot the pizza. It was Chicago style deep dish pizza. One of the two recipes so far that get a definite retry. The other is the beef stew. The only real problem with the pizza was that the sauce was too salty, but that was my fault, or Mom's. She told me to add salt and I added too much apparently. Next time it will get more toppings. We had one plain and one with kielbasa left over from the red beans. No wonder the food budget is over this month. All these exotic ingredients. And beef. We had to actually buy beef since all our cows are good for is hamburger. We get some nice lean hamburger though, don't have to drain it at all. This is what happens when the cow is 12 or more years old before she gets eaten. Always hamburger, except the killer cow. She got made into steaks. Killed her before she killed someone. Sweet revenge, or is that prevenge?

One problem we have noticed with all these recipes is the servings. For example the pizzas. It made two deep dish nine inch pizzas and the servings said 4 - 6. Four to six? Who is going to eat a third of one of those things in a sitting, much less a half? We had five adults and two kids eating them and still had a quarter left over. We must be light eaters or they don't plan on having anything for dinner besides a huge chunk of dough, cheese, and tomato sauce. We have to devote a week to leftovers. Or is this an excuse to not cook... Anyway we have only two recipes left in this issue. Roman mac and cheese (that is not what they call it, but that is what it is) and Thai Chicken. Bring on the sheep cheese, and oyster and fish sauce. Better start milking those sheep now.

Must go faster

As a quick catch-up. The minestrone was not that great. Rather bland, though some salt helped. Not sure if it was the recipe, cooking the beans in the pressure cooker to speed them up, or the lack of a Parmesan rind that was the problem. Hard to find a Parmesan rind around here. Not sure where one would be. Anyway that one won't happen again.

The stinky feet bread was good. It has more of a sourdough taste than the Italian start and a slight bitterness as well. It would have gone well with the minestrone soup if it had been done at 5:30 rather than 9:00. It kept well overnight and made good toast. This sourdough does seem to do better after storage than regular bread. I may have to try some rolls out of it. Those really show their age and are not near as good the following day.

The cream cheese filled coffee cake had a good taste, but the cake part seemed a little tough. This is another thing that could be altitude. Apparently you are supposed to adjust the leavening (baking soda vs. baking powder or the other way around) for higher altitudes and use buttermilk rather than normal milk, but improper pH can make things tough. More acid I think is what we needed, but I haven't got that part figured out yet. Maybe the acid makes it tough. The other problem was sinking. Both the topping and the filling sank, in some places so the topping was topping the filling not the cake. We can blame that on altitude too. Mom's usually breakfast cake recipe has a topping that partially sinks, which we really like because then there are seems and veins of brown sugary goodness deep in the cake. May have to try that one again. With a few changes.

Beans and more beans

This week saw the creation of Red Beans and Rice, Minestrone, and "Stinky Feet" bread.

To start with, I love beans. At least the dry kind. Green beans, of any color, can just go away as far as I am concerned. Or leave them on the vine long enough to get dry and worth eating. My Mexican roommate would apologize when we had frijoles for dinner and I could never convince her that no apology was necessary, just keep the beans coming. So, needless to say, I liked the red beans and rice. Couldn't find all the appropriate New Orleans special stuff, but it is surprising what the small town grocery store does carry. I am getting to know those aisles better and better. I can go right to the salt pork, anchovies, and oyster sauce. We learned an interesting fact with this recipe. At high altitudes the cooking time of beans is increased considerably. The instructions said to cook for an hour. After an hour and a half we had to eat and the beans were mostly done. It was maybe an hour later that the beans were truly done. Doing some research, thank you "Joy of Cooking", we found that above about 3500 feet the cooking time doubles. We are 1000 or so feet higher. This is why Mom has always used the pressure cooker to cook beans. This does raise an interesting question. Do we follow the instructions to add all the flavoring stuff at the beginning of the cooking time and cook that twice as long as called for, or cook the beans half-way then add the rest of the stuff so the beans are half cooked without the tastys, but the rest is not overcooked. All these lowlanders just do not consider us high up people. The red beans and rice is a keeper though. Pressure cooker will be pressed into service next time though. It can be done in under an hour.

Rhubarb cake

There are so few recipes for this vegauit I thought it would be good to put this here. One of my favorite ways to eat rhubarb. I prefer it when the rhubarb is a little older. Early spring it is pretty mild, later it will have more flavor. A nice combination of sweet and sour.

1/4 c. sugar
1 1/2 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. butter
1 t vanilla
1 egg
2 1/2 c. flour
1 t soda
1/2 t salt
1 c. buttermilk
2 c. chopped raw rhubarb

Mix all the ingredients except the rhubarb. Spoon 2/3 the batter into a greased 9 x 13 pan and spread. Sprinkle with the rhubarb. Spread (glob, dollop, place) the remaining batter on top of the rhubarb. Sprinkle with about 2 T cinnamon sugar. Bake at 350 for 40 -45 minutes.

oh yes Vegauit- something cooked like a fruit that is actually a vegetable. Rhubarb is the only one I know of. As opposed to fruitable: a fruit cooked like a vegetable- tomatoes, squash, peppers, and so on.

Sourdough

Now we have made sourdough bread, bread-sticks, and biscuits. A rather mild sourdough, not very sour, and slow growing. The bread I had to let rise four hours each time. Another thing to think about early in the day. Easier than the pulled pork though since it could be left alone for four hours, shaped, left alone, and cooked. None of this brine for a little while, cook for a little while, take the foil off, cook a little longer. The nice thing about bread is it takes so little hands on time. Half an hour spread out through the day. My uncle has also given us another start, affectionately known as 'Stinky Feet'. Mom says it smells like rotten milk, I think it has a rather fruity smell. Haven't made anything with that one yet. It seems to be more active so the rise time shouldn't be as long. I wonder how much anyone has analyzed the products of the yeast and bacteria in sourdough. Run it through a GC-MS or something, after mushing it up and all. What exactly is giving it all these flavors and what are those bacteria anyway? One paper said Lactobacillus, but I am sure there are many others. Do we really know what we are eating anyway?

As far as the Cooks Illustrated goes Mom made the 'fixed' baked apples and this was the greatest deviation from the recipe yet. Most we had before was substituting broth for wine in the stew. We didn't have apple cider, so used (pine)apple juice. Not another apple for the chopped to go in the middle so it was dried apricots. This was my least favorite recipe. Way too sweet, except for the tasteless apple. It probably has more to do with the apple used and the changes to the recipe than a bad recipe. Might have to try it again with better apples and the appropriate ingredients.

In the Beginning

We have decided to cook our way through Cook's Illustrated magazine to give us some fun and excitement and try new foods. Thanks to the gift giver for the subscription. Since we have done the first two "official" recipes it is about time to start writing, lest we get behind. "official" by the way means that they have been made since we decided to start. We have made a few other things. Desserts since they are the most important part. So now we have started working through from the January/ February issue. Won't post the recipes since they are copyrighted I am sure, but go to their web site and I am sure you can find them. (Now maybe we can get paid for advertising?)

So we made "Indoor Pulled Pork" first. Quite spicy, but tasty. If we had actually had the outdoor version at some point maybe we could remark on how close it was to the goal of replicating the real thing. The biggest drawback was the time. About 7 hours. Get started well before dinner for this one or expect a late meal. Another pointer is make sure you have covered all skin defects before rubbing the mustard rub. The vinegar and mustard seed will highlight any you may have missed.

Next was "The Best Beef Stew". Which was about the best I have tasted. No where near as good as Mom's mutton stew, but it was just made with the lesser meat so what could I expect. This one only took about three hours. The secret ingredient (all non family look away) was anchovies. Add a few to your meat stew and it brings out the meaty flavor. Might have to try it with the mutton. Mash them up well before adding so people don't get grossed out by the little fishies swimming. Even the fish non-likers who knew they were there (especially Dad, but also my brother and his wife) enjoyed the meal. I am sure the bribing with dessert of banana cream pie had nothing to do with it either.

The next experiment is actually not from the magazine, but from my uncle who found a place to get all sorts of exotic yeast/sourdough starts. This one is Italian from Idaho. At least that is what we were told. We shall see how it works.