About once a month we try to have my adult children come over and have dinner, to touch base, see if they’re doing well, and feed them. They both grew up on my cooking, and my son, at least, continues to cook whenever he has the time and energy, which isn’t as often as he’d like.

This time, I made the American classic Betty Crocker Ham & Scalloped Potatoes. If you read that recipe closely, though,
you’ll see that the total cook time is a mind-boggling 1 hour and 40 minutes, and that’s after you’ve spent 20 minutes putting everything together. It’s 2 hours ’til dinner is ready, although the cook only has to put in the 20 minutes at the beginning.

Thanks to a delay at the pharmacy and a traffic accident on the way home, I didn’t have two hours. But I do know how to cook. And thanks to Anthony Bourdain and Jacques Pepin, I had a few aces up my sleeve. I realized that the long cooking time was there to ensure the potatoes were cooked through and softened, and that I could shorten that process substantially by pre-cooking them until not quite soft enough for mashing, and while that was happening I could soften the onions for a much longer period in lower heat, caramelizing them for a deeper,
sweeter flavor.

Ingredients

1 medium onion, sliced thin

6 Yukon gold onions, sliced 1/4” thick

4 tablespoos butter, divided 3tbs / 1tbs

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon pepper

2 cups milk

3/4 cup cheddar cheese

1/4 cup Parmesan cheese

1 1/2 cups cooked ham, cut into small cubes

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350°F

Put a Dutch oven on the stove, on medium-low heat. Melt 3tbs butter in the pan, then the onion slices, stirring to coat completely with the butter.

Put the potatoes into a pot, cover with cold water, and bring to a boil. Turn it down immediately to a simmer and set a timer for 12 minutes.

Watch the onions, stirring occasionally. Do not let them burn!

When the timer for the potatoes goes off, try to push a fork through a slice. It should go through with some resistance (they have to be firm enough to stand up to mixing), but not solid the way fresh potatoes will be. If they’re not ready, another three to five minutes
should do it. When the potatoes are ready, drain completely and set aside to cool.

Heat the milk in a microwave, about 3 minutes, but not to boil.

Put the last tablespoon of butter into the onions and, when it melts completely, add the flour. Stir to coat completely, about a minute.

Turn the heat up to medium and begin slowly adding the milk, stirring continually to mix it all together. You’re going for a white sauce with caramelized onions here! The gluten in the flour should thicken the milk as it heats up, and you want it consistent. When all the milk is added, take the Dutch over off the heat and stir in the cheddar cheese, then the salt and pepper, tasting it as you go.

Begin adding the potato slices and the ham, a handful at time, stirring gently so as not to break too many of the slices (it’s okay if a few break) to coat everything with the onion sauce.

Sprinkle the top with the Parmesan cheese, and bake for 20 minutes. If it’s not browned on top, turn on the broiler for a minute or two, but watch it closely!

Serve hot.

It’s an extra ten to fifteen minutes of effort, and it’s a lot more hands-on doing even this minimal amount of caramelizing the onions, but dinner’s ready in 50 minutes instead of 2 hours and the flavor is a heck of a lot deeper and more satisfying.

Serve with a steamed or roasted green vegetable (broccoli, string beans, something like that) and a salad with a bright dressing.

Current Mood: full
Current Location: The Villa Sternberg
Current Music: Frank Sinatra, It Was A Very Good Year

Today's mad science: Thai Tea Ice Cream

Now, Thai Iced Tea is one of those recipes that my wife, Omaha, adores. She gets it pretty much every time we get Thai food, although if it's in the evening she'll eagerly substitute a tall glass of Mango Lassi instead. The other day, I was talking to a friend of mine and she said that somewhere in Pike Place Market someone sold Thai Tea Ice Cream.

I know how to make ice cream. I had a bag of Thai "Tea leaves" lying around. It was time to experiment.

Now, one of the ingredients that's classic to Thai Iced Tea is that the sugar source is sweetened, condensed milk. I did the math and realized that one can of the stuff is almost entirely sugar-- in fact, it would have more sugar than some of the sweetest ice cream recipes I know call for!

Anyway, here's the recipe.

Prep time: 30 minutes.

Cooking time: 1 hour, requiring occasional attention

Total time: 8 hours (sorry)

Makes: 1 quart (8 servings)

Calories per serving: 290

Caffeine per serving: 20mg-30mg

Special equipment you'll need:

A sous vide.

An ice cream churn

Spatulas

A fine mesh strainer or a funnel & cheesecloth

A one-gallon Ziplock bags

Measuring cups, including a 4-cup liquid cup

Ingredients:

1 cup heavy cream

2 cups whole milk

1.5 cups sweetened condensed milk

4 to 6 egg yolks (I used four, it came out fine!)

1/2 cup Thai Iced Tea leaves

pinch of salt

First, and this is serious: let everything come to room temperature. The milk, the cream, the eggs. This makes the initial stir a lot easier.

Start the sous vide and bring a large pot of water to 176℉, exact. Too low and the egg yolks won't thicken into custardy goodness; too high and the yolks will curdle in the presence of all that lactose. Whisk the egg yolks until smooth, add the cream, milk, sweetened condensed milk, and whisk gently, being sure not to whip any air into the mixture. Once everything is well-mixed and uniform, pour it into the Ziplock bag, add in the Thai Iced Tea leaves and the pinch of salt. Seal the bag mostly, leaving a small opening, and carefully squeeze all the air out until the mixture is near the opening, then seal the bag entirely. Gently shake the bag to distribute the tea leaves and salt.

Immerse the bag in the sous vide and clip to the side with clothespins, setting the timer for 1 hour. Every 10 to 15 minutes, gently agitate the bag with a wooden spoon to redistribute the tea leaves.

After 1 hour, remove the bag and carefully strain the contents of the bag through a fine mesh (a cocktail strainer is good for this, but a simple two-fold cheesecloth and a funnel or colander works just as well) into a four-cup measuring glass. Cover the glass with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.

When the mix has reached the temperature of your refrigerator, it's time to churn it. I am not delicate; I just turn the machine on, pour in the mix, and walk away. Ten minutes later, there is ice cream.

It's going to be soft-serve at this point; either eat it immediately or, if you can resist, put it into a couple of freezer-safe storage containers and let it sit for a few more hours. Enjoy responsibly!

Tip: If you're having trouble keeping the sous vide at such a high temperature, put a hot pad or folded kitchen towel under the pot so the heat won't escape into your counter, and stretch another towel over the top of the pot, using clothespins to hold it in place so it doesn't sag and get wet.

Tip: If you don't have Thai Ice Tea leaves, you can make it yourself with:

1/2 cup loose leaf black tea

4 star anise pods

6 cardamom pods

1 cinnamon stick

1/2 split vanilla bean.

This recipe has the advantage of not having the additional red food dye that seems to be popular with some manufacturers, and is less likely to stain any light-colored clothes onto which your kids might dribble any ice cream.

Current Mood: full
Current Location: The Villa Sternberg
Current Music: Cake, Italian Leather Sofa

This weekend I had a bunch of twenty-somethings over at the house. Everyone was vaccinated; we actually checked. But given that this was Seattle, I had requests for a vegan dish as the main, and I wondered what I could make that would satisfy everyone. I settled on chili.

It turned out to not be all that difficult. What was fun was that I ended up using my Instant Pot three times in one day.

First, I had to make vegetable stock. We keep a ziplock bag of vegetable ends, mostly onions but also celery, carrots, garlic, even some beans and stalks and bell peppers. The parts you cut away, like tops and such, they all go into this bag. It was almost a gallon’s worth of random vegetable matter, so I tossed it into the instant pot with six quarts of water and let it go at HIGH for an hour, then released the pressure. After cooling a bit, I strained it, and that was the first step.

Then I put two pounds of kidney beans into the pot, along with eight cups of water, and let that run on HIGH for 45 minutes, then release the pressure. I rinsed and cooled the beans. I replace the lost liquid with the vegetable stock; it’s a lot less gassy that way.

Then I made the chili (serves 8-12 hungry people!):

olive oil

2 large onions, coarsely chopped

2 medium yams, chopped

2 large bell peppers, chopped, any color except green

1 can diced or crushed tomatoes

4 or more cloves of garlic, minced

1 cup quinoa

The two pounds of dried beans, now cooked!

2 cups of the vegetable broth, or until it looks right

Spices! I like chili powder (up to 1/4 cup), cumin (1 tbsp), gochugaru (Korean chili powder, a ton of umami), oregano (1 tbsp), Italian herbs, maybe some epazote or ajwain, plus salt and pepper. You could also try throwing in cinammon or cocoa powder.

Apple cider vinegar

Cornmeal

Just dump it all in the pot, run it on HIGH for 15 minutes. When the alarm goes off, let it sit for 10 more minutes, then release the pressure. Add the vinegar, then add the cornmeal in tablespoons to thicken it, if it needs it. You could also use potato starch instead, if you have anyone allergic to corn.

I was surprised at how tasty it was. I’m usually a meat eater, but this has been a pretty good experience in just how tasty a really vegan meal can be. There are approximately 12 grams of protein in this, mostly from the beans, which is only a quarter of what the average person needs, but it does imply that getting enough protein isn’t impossible on a vegan diet, just bulkier than usual.

Current Mood: full
Current Music: Stellaris OST, To The Ends of the Galaxyi

Korean Sticky Chicken

Last night, I decided I was going to make Korean Sticky Chicken. The recipe had come to me via Yummly, and I had printed it out. While I was working on it, I found a recipe on-line that looked, as far as I could tell, like the one Yummly had parasitized, so I started working off it. Then my wife, Omaha, found the recipe that I had printed and brought it to me, and they were in no way the same recipe. For one major thing, the one on the phone called for a marinade; the Yummly one did not. The Yummly recipe called for chicken breasts, the one I was working with used chicken thighs. For some reason, I had thought the Yummly one was thighs, as thighs was what we had in the refrigerator. Besides, I had already started making the marinade.

The other detail is that my family is not very fond of spicy foods, and this recipe called for a lot of Gochujang, one of my favorite spices to work with bland meats like chicken.

The solution, naturally, was to just say screw it all and invent my own hybrid recipe. So:

Equipment:

This is a “no special gadgets” meal: no pressure cooker, no sous vide, no KitchenAid, no food processor. Just the basics: pots and pans, knives and cutting boards, measuring spoons and cups. You will need a grater for the ginger, and a garlic crusher is a convenience.

Marinade

2 tablespoons honey

1-3 tablespoons Gochujang (Korean chili paste with a distinct, smoky flavor)

3-1 tablespoons ketchup (yes, ketchup). Use with the Gochujang in whatever proportion your family will tolerate.

3 tablespoons soy sauce

1/2 inch knob of fresh ginger, grated

2 gloves of garlic, minced or crushed

1 tablespoon olive oil

Meat:

4 chicken thighs, boneless

2 tablespoons mirin

olive oil for sautee’

Topping:

Toasted sesame seeds

One green onion, very thinly sliced

Mix everything in the marinade together. The Gochujang and ketchup should total 3 tablespoons. (Hint: a shotglass is exactly three tablespoons to the top; I tend to use several shotglasses when cooking. This isn’t an exact science, it’s okay to go over by small amounts.) Put the marinade and the chicken into a plastic bag, shake well to coat, and leave, flat, in your ’fridge for 20 minutes. Take out, shake, turn over, and let marinate for another 20 minutes.

Make the rice and your sides while all this marination is going on; the sides are meant to be room temperature when served.

Put a heavy pan on your stove, turn it up to medium-high, and when it’s hot enough put in a little olive oil, just enough to coat the bottom. With tongs, pull the chicken out of the bag and put into the pan. Save the marinade! Letting the chicken cook for 4 minutes, possibly 5 minutes. Turn the chicken over, cooking the other side.

The real test of done-ness for chicken is whether or not it feels spongy and soft when you press on it. If it’s firmed up, it’s cooked through. It takes practice, but it can be mastered.

Take the chicken out and put onto a plate. Add the mirin and scrape all the glaze off the bottom of the pan, letting it boil away until about half gone. Add the rest of the marinade from the bag, let bubble for 30 seconds, turn the heat down to low and add the chicken back in, spooning the sauce over it, and let it sit for another two minutes.

Remove the chicken and serve, sprinkling with the toasted sesame seeds and green onions.

Thai Basmati Rice

1 cup Basmati rice

1 1/4 cup water

1/2 cup whole coconut milk, well-shaken

Put the water in a pot on the stove and set to high. Rinse the rice well in a mesh colander. When the water starts to boil, add the rice. Let the water start to boil again, drop immediately to low, toss in the coconut milk, cover and let simmer gently for 16 minutes.

Take off the heat and let it sit in a cool place for a few minutes. Fluff with a fork and serve.

Blanched or Sautee’d Kale With Soy-Sesame Dressing

We had a lot of kale left over the winter. That stuff is damnably hard to kill, and I kinda like it, so I decided to cook with it. This recipe works with just about any green: spinach, watercress, whatever, just adjust to the delicacy of the leaves. Kale is a hardy leaf and puts up with sauteing pretty well. Here’s what I did:

1 bunch kale

1 scallion, sliced thin

2 teaspoons soy sauce^*

1 large clove garlic, minced fine

1/2 teaspoon honey

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon sesame seeds

(Optional) Like it spicy? Add anywhere from 1/2 to 2 teaspoons of Gochujang. This is not a subsitution; you don’t have to take anything out.

^* For the chicken marinade above, you can get away with just any soy sauce, but for this, the soy sauce is such a strong note that I recommend buying and using tamari-grade soy sauce. It’s more expensive, but it’s also worth it.

Put on a large pot of water, salt it well, and put it on high heat to bring it to a boil. Trim the kale, removing the heavy spines. Rinse it thoroughly. Prepare a large bowl of ice water. Drop the kale into the boiling water for about 45 seconds, until it’s wilted, then scoop out the leaves and drop them into the ice water to stop the cooking.

Alternatively, heat a large pan to medium-high, add a healthy amount of olive oil, give that a minute to heat up, then add the kale, stir-frying it gently but continuously, about 3 to 5 minutes. Immediately remove with tongs and shock with the cold water.

Drain the kale and squeeze it gently over the sink to get out excess water. Cut or tear into clumps.

In a separate bowl, prepare the dressing, adding everything except the sesame seeds. Gently stir the dressing into the kale and then let it sit for ten minutes (hey, you’ve now got time to cook chicken!) to come to room temperature and to let all the flavors mix well.

Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve.

Cucumber Salad With Honey-Sesame Dressing

1 English cucumber or 2 slicing cucumbers

1 teaspoon coarse salt, like Diamond kosher.

2 scallions, minced

1 small clove garlic, minced

1 teaspoon rice vinegar

1/2 teaspoon honey

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon sesame seeds

Depending on your family, you may or may not want to peel the outside of the cucumbers. Slice them into discs, no more than 1/4" thick. Toss them with the salt and put into a bowl for 15 minutes; the salt will pull the moisture out of the cucumbers, making them crispy.

Drain the liquid that has dripped out of the cucumbers. Make the dressing, again holding back the sesame seeds, in another bowl (confession: I was running out of bowls at this point and used a clean coffee cup), then stir into the bowl of cucumber slices, stirring gently. Sprinkle with the sesame seeds and serve.

Some recipes use gochugaru, the red pepper flakes that give gochujang its heat, to make this a spicy salad. Personally, I think my family would have rebelled at the idea of a spicy salad, and I didn’t have any gochugaru on hand anyway.

One thing about the sesame seeds throughout these recipes? I like to toast them: put a pan on the stove on medium heat, dry. Add all the sesame seeds you’re going to use this evening into the pan, and just stir rapidly for two or three minutes, or until they start to turn brown. Quickly spread them out on a large, cool plate to prevent them from burning.

And that was our Saturday night dinner. The family pronounced the chicken “far too amazing,” the cucumbers “wonderful,” and the kale “tolerable.” I loved the kale, but I’m pretty much the only person in my house who really likes kale. We did it blanched; Omaha says she would have preferred it sautee’d. Even the kid, who we cannot convince to eat vegetables, made the cucumbers go away.

Current Mood: satisfied

Instant Pot Bolognese Sauce

Makes 8 servings. Cooking time: About an hour.

Ingredients:

1 pound ground beef

1/4 pound prosciutto cubetti (cubed chunks of pork belly, sometimes sold at the deli in larger groceries. You can use thick-sliced bacon, cut into cubes, instead)

2 celery stalks

2 medium onions

2 carrots

4 cloves of garlic (or more)

1/2 cup red wine

1 1/2 cups beef stock

1 can diced tomatoes

3/4 cup milk

3 tbsp full fat sour cream (optional – see note)

1/2 tbsp vegemite (optional – use salt to taste otherwise)

1 tsp dried oregano

salt, pepper, ajinomoto (optional), shichimi togarashi (optional)

cooking fat or oils

Gear:

Pressure cooker

Food processor

Knives & cutting board

Measuring cups and spoons

Steps:

Peel as necessary and cut the onions, carrots, celery, and garlic into chunks. Put into the food processor and pulse until the vegetables are in very small pieces, but not liquefied.

Start the Instant Pot on saute’ mode. When it’s hot enough, put in your cooking oil. I recommend bacon fat but if you don’t cook much with bacon or don’t save the grease, olive oil is just fine. Add the vegetables and saute until they’re cooked all the way through, ten to fifteen minutes. Stir regularly, and if it starts to burn, add a splash of water to make a layer of steam between the vegetables and the heat, but cooking all the sulfur out of onions and converting the starches into sugars takes more most people are willing to wait.

Add in all the meat, breaking up the ground beef with a wooden spoon, and cook until all the meat is browned.

Turn off the pressure cooker. Add the wine and use the alcohol in the wine to scrape any bits off the bottom of the pot. This will both deglaze the pan, getting tasty bits into your food, and will reduce the risk of hotspots on your pot bottom triggering the pressure cooker’s “food is burning” alert. This should take no more than a minute.

Add the beef stock, tomatoes, oregano and vegemite. Add salt, pepper, and ajinomoto to taste. I like to use shichimi togarashi, a kind of Japanese pepper blend, but plain old black pepper works just fine. The vegemite is both salty and adds a huge flavor bomb of savoriness to the dish. Stir all ingredients until well-mixed.

Close up the pressure cooker and set it to Pressure, 25 minutes. Note: If you’re prepping a standard spaghetti dinner, now is a good time to start cooking your pasta! While you’re at it, wash the food processor.

When the timer goes off, release the pressure. Set the pressure cooker to Slow Cook with the lid off. Taste it and adjust the salt and pepper to your liking. Add the milk and, if you’re using it, sour cream. If you’re not, add a little more milk. Let simmer for 20 minutes and serve with fresh shredded Parmesan cheese and a good, crusty bread!

Will keep in the ’fridge for about a week. Can be frozen for up to three months, but it rarely survives that long in my household.

Current Mood: full

It has been a rather food-heavy week here at the Villa Sternberg. We have Lisakit living with us again, as she was stranded on the mainland when Governor Inslee announced the shelter-in-place orders and her housemates developed a certain paranoia about “mainlanders” bringing the virus to Whidbey Island, so we’ve given her a place to stay.

This week I’ve made five loaves of French bread using a pate fermente technique that seems to work well with my own cooking style. I just have to start at 10am if we want bread by dinnertime. Noon is too late.

For a half-kilogram of bread, start with 300mg of flour. For that 300 mg, you need the following ratios: 1.9% salt, 0.55% instant yeast, and (approximately) 65% water. So: 5.7 grams of salt, 1.65gms yeast, and 195ml water. Sift the dry ingredients together, add most (but not all!) of the water and stir with a strong spoon. If it’s too dry, add more water. If it’s too dry, it’s okay to add water by the teaspoon until all the dry ingredients have been pulled into this shaggy, sticky mess in your bowl.

Scatter some flour on a clean surface, scatter more on your hands, and knead the dough for about six minutes, until it’s stretchy but doesn’t seem to be easy to tear. Put in into a clean bowl greased with olive oil, and then spread a little more olive oil over the top until the entire lump has a thin layer. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise on a high shelf for 90 minutes. Check it; punch it down gently if it’s risen, and give it another 90 minutes.

Weigh the result and divide that number by 1.6. I ended up with 421 grams total, so 263: That’s how many grams of flour I needed for the next step. Sift that much dry flour into a new bowl, and add salt and yeast in the same ratios. For 263 grams of flour, I needed 1.5gms yeast, 5gms salt. You’ll also need 172gms of water, but first…

Take the first lump and with a knife cut it four times, until you have sixteen pieces. Toss those into the new bowl and stir gently to coat them with flour. Now, while stirring with one hand, slowly add the water until you develop a new ball of dough.

Remove the new ball of dough to a clean, floured surface and knead some more, about ten minutes. It’s okay to sprinkle flour until it’s very easy to work with; it should feel just a little bit sticky, but none of it should stick to your hands while you knead. Just get those muscles working.

Once you’ve got this whole ball of dough, grease it and put it back into the bowl, covering with either plastic wrap or a light towel. Let it rise for another hour; if it’s doubled in size, push the air out gently with your knuckles. Either way, give it another hour after that.

Now, carefully remove the dough, cut it in half or thirds, and shape it into rounds (those are easiest) by gently tugging a “bottom” part down in a kind of curling motion. Now, put the bread on a cookie sheet, with either parchment paper, silicone liner, or cornmeal to keep the dough from sticking. Let it rise for, yes, another 45 to 75 minutes.

Once the rounds are fully developed, heat the oven to 500 degrees (F). Fill a garden spray bottle with water. When the oven is hot enough, put the cookie sheet into the oven and spritz the walls of the oven with the spray bottle to generate a lot of steam. Do this four times, with thirty seconds between the times, then close the oven and drop the temperature to 425.

At about 20 minutes, check the bread. Let it bake until it’s a lovely golden brown color on top. Take it out and let it rest for 30 minutes, and it’s ready for eating!

The marking there is done with a very (very!) sharp razor; you can’t do it with an ordinary kitchen knife, it just doesn’t work well.

Current Mood: full

I've been raving about my recipe for Balsamic-and-Fig Chicken Dinner for a few weeks now, but haven't quite put it up out for other people to read about. This recipe exists because HelloFresh and HomeChef (the people who supply Kroger, my local mega-chain of grocery stores) both have competing versions of this recipe, and both are so full of waste, and so overpriced that I needed to come up with my own.

This recipe includes one of my favorite cooking utensils. It's not particularly obscure, but I rarely see anyone talking about it: the shot glass. That's right, those little things for drinking booze. I have six, and the only thing they're ever used for is cooking.

So here we go:

Balsamic-and-Fig Chicken with mixed rice and something green, for two.

Ingredients:

One chicken breast, about 10oz. (Just get it from the grocery's butcher table, wrapped in wax paper.)

Rice medly (Trader Joe's Rice Medly, Lundberg "Wild Rice Blend". My local co-op has a "bulk organic wild rice blend" that's less than two dollars a pound.)

One large head of fresh broccoli or 12oz fresh green beans

Dijon mustard

Balasmic vinegar

Fig jam. (Really, any jam will do. Try it with blueberry!)

White wine (a small box of cheap white wine will do fine. And it'll keep okay in the 'fridge, so you can make this meal a lot. Or, you know, you can just drink the rest.)

Olive Oil

Butter

Garlic

Salt & pepper

Chicken broth

Optional or substitution ingredients:

Butter: If you're dairy-free, feel free to skip it in the rice. It's a nice-to-have, but not necessary.

Wine: If you're alcohol-free, use chicken broth instead, but...

Chicken broth: if you don't have any and don't care to keep it around, because you're going to use only a little for the broccoli or green beans in this recipe, feel free to use water instead. However, if you're going to use chicken broth instead of wine, you should have some broth on-hand; water will work, but you'll lose some of the flavor. I like the bottles of broth concentrate; the salt content kills almost any bacterian and they last for months.

My house keeps everything on this list around except the chicken and the vegetables. Yours may differ, and that's okay.

Equipment:

A microwave

A stove top with two burners

Two timers (you have them on your stove or your phone)

One frying pan & a spatula

One pot with a lid

One casserole dish with a lid

A cutting board & kitchen knife

Wax paper

Spoons

Two shot glasses

A mesh colander (the thing you use to drain spaghetti)

Procedure:

Measure 4 full shot-glasses of rice and put them into the colander. Rinse the rice for about twenty seconds under cold running water.

Measure 6 full shot-glasses of water into the pot. Put on the stove and set to High.

Lay the wax paper on top of your cutting board and put the chicken on it. Put another piece of wax paper on top. Now punch the fat part of the chicken until it flattens out a bit. You kinda just want the chicken to be uniform. Peel off the top layer and sprinkle the chicken with some salt & pepper.

Maybe the water is boiling now. Turn it to low, put the rice in with a hefty pinch of salt and small pat of butter. Cover and let it bubble very gently. Like, my oven goes "LOW-1-2-...9-HI", and it's perfect at about 1½. Set the clock to 18 minutes. Dinner will be ready when that reaches zero.

Cut up the broccoli or trim the ends off the green beans. Take one clove of the garlic off the head, peel off the skin, crush it with the heel of a shot glass (or a spoon, but shot glasses are pretty tough— they have to survive drunk people, after all), and put it into the casserole dish with your greens. Add one shot glass full of chicken broth or water. Sprinkle gently with a little bit of salt and then stick in the microwave. DO NOT TURN ON THE MICROWAVE YET.

Heat the frying pan to medium-high. (I have a cheap but well-loved cast-iron pan I bought for three bucks at a charity consignment store. Three minutes on HIGH, then down to medium, and it works great. Cast-iron pans require a lot of love and attention before you can cook with them, though, so if you don't have one, stick with what you've got.) Add enough olive oil to coat the bottom, then add the chicken (without the wax paper, but you can compost wax paper, so do that if your municipality allows) and leave alone for 3-4 minutes, turn over, leave alone for 3-4 minutes again. Take out the chicken and put on a plate.

While the chicken is cooking, fill one shot glass about half-full of balsamic vinegar (a little too high is okay). Add dijon mustard, about half as much as you did vinegar. Fill the other shot glass completely with your jam.

Check the rice time. Is it down to 8 minutes? Start the microwave on HIGH for 2 minutes.

When the microwave stops, stir the greens, cover it and start it on HIGH for another 2 minutes.

When the chicken is browned (this may happen before or after the greens; it's okay, the greens can wait before it's turned and restarted, just don't let the chicken burn.), take it out and put it on a plate. Take the white wine and splash it into the pan, enough so that there are no dry spots on the bottom. With the flat edge of the spatula (plastic if it's non-stick, metal if it's cast iron), now scrape the bits of chicken stuck to the bottom of the pan (yes, it'll be there even for "non stick" pans). Now, to this, mix in the balsamic vinegar, mustard, and jam. Stir until everything is well-mixed. If it's kinda syrupy, it's perfect, otherwise let it bubble for a minute or two and it'll get that way. Put the chicken in and let it sit for two minutes, spooning the sauce on top. Turn the chicken over and set it go for another two minutes, spooning more of the sauce from the pan on top.

Take the chicken out of the pan and put it on a plate. Turn off the heat. It's ready. Cut it in half and give one piece to each person. Spoon the extra sauce out of the pan and glaze the bird even more.

Take the greens out of the microwave. Your broccoli or green beans are ready.

Sometime in the next minute or so, the rice timer will go off. Turn off the heat, and move the pot somewhere cool. It's ready.

Eat.

The total cost per person of something like this is about $4, which is less than half what the boxed meals cost.

Your total waste is whatever the greens came in, the wax paper for the chicken (which ought to be compostable), and whatever the rice and other ingredients came in. Buying in bulk reduces that a lot, as does using recyclable materials like glass.

And it's delicious.

Current Mood: full

Last night I took a couple of beef stew (or beef soup) recipes, slammed them together, and came up with a fairly effortless comfort stew that my family liked. This recipe uses an Instant Pot.

1lb round steak, cut into cubes

1 large shallot, diced

3 medium carrots, sliced

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 large or 2 medium potatoes, cut into cubes

3 cups beef broth

1 cup water

2 tbs Worchestershire sauce

Olive oil, or other oil suitable to sauté

Salt, pepper, ajinomoto (always optional) to taste

4 oz egg noodles

Turn the pressure cooker to "sauté." While it's heating, cut up the ingredients. The beef and potatoes should be bite-sized; the shallot diced small, the carrots sliced to about 1/4 inch thickness, the garlic minced.

When the pressure cooker is hot, add oil to coat the bottom of the pot (I used bacon grease, because, you know…) and add the beef, stir-frying until browned on all sides, about 5 minutes. Add the shallot and carrots, sauté another two minutes until slightly soft. Add the garlic, sautee one more minute. Turn off the heat.

Add the potatoes, broth, water, Worchestershire sauce, and "not enough" salt, pepper, and ajinomoto if you're using it. Close the pressure cooker lid, set to "Soup: 20 minutes," and start.

When the timer goes off, do a quick release of the pressure. Taste the broth and add salt, pepper, or other spices as desired. Turn the cooker back to "sauté" and when the soup begins to bubble add the egg noodles. Cook another 7 to 9 minutes, until the noodles are soft. Tasting— spooning out a noodle and biting into it to see if it's done— is always better than timing.

Serve immediately with crusty bread and a vinagrette salad.

Current Mood: full

I had a bag of fish sticks in my freezer that desperately needed to be used up, so I came up with this. I went to the store and bought a bag of cabbage coleslaw shred, without the dressing, and a 24-pack of those tiny, 4-inch "street" tortillas.

While the fish sticks cooked, I made a dressing: 1/3cup mayonnaise (lowfat is fine), 2 tbsp lime juice, 1/2 tsp chili powder, 1/2 tsp diced softened ancho peppers (see below). If you have kids, a half-teaspoon of sugar might not be out of place, but adult palates shouldn't need it. Salt and pepper to taste.

Ancho peppers usually come dried in those cellophane pockets usually only seen in "ethnic" groceries. They're unbelievably cheap, not very hot at all, and they add a ton of flavor. To prepare it, peel the dried pepper open and wipe out the seeds with your fingers or a spoon; put the pepper into a saucepan with just enough water to cover. Heat on low (do not boil) until they're soft— this should take about 10 minutes, the time it takes the fish sticks to cook. Drain and let sit on a paper towel.

If you leave the seeds in while you simmr, the peppers come out hotter. I'll leave that to your discretion.

When the fish sticks are ready, take them out, turn the oven off, then put into the still-warm oven at least three tortillas per person. Add the peppers to the dressing, and then mix that into the cabbage shred.

Take one warmed tortilla, add one heaping tablespoon of the coleslaw, one fish stick, and an optional dollop of salsa. Three to five of these is a single serving, depending on appetite.

It takes about 20 minutes to make, and I think the whole meal comes out to something like less than three bucks a person, too.

Current Mood: satisfied
Crossposts: http://elfs.livejournal.com/1619052.html

This is what I make for breakfast when I'm working out mornings, and it's my usual winter fare.

2 celery stalks, diced
2 medium yellow onions, diced
2 large carrots, diced
1 cup diced lean ham
1½ cups French lentils
Spices: bay leaves, thyme, cumin, epazote, ajwain
Chicken broth, to cover plus an inch

Combine everything in a slow cooker. Cook on low for 8-12 hours. This should make 8-10 servings, good enough for one to two weeks, depending on what regimen you're following.

One 12-oz serving has 300 calories, contains 30 grams of complex carbohydrates (the "good" kind), 33 grams of fiber (almost your whole daily nutritional need!), and 15 grams of protein. Lentils and celery both contribute a substantial amount of sodium to your diet, so if that's a concern, be aware of that.

Feel free to add other spices. Oregano and parsley would both be nice in this. Leave in the epazote under all circumstance-- lentil makes some people gassy, and epazote seriously cuts down on that effect.

One alternative, that I haven't been brave enough to try, is to make this your only meal for two days each week: One 12-oz serving in the morning when you awake, and then again 12-oz serving five hours later, and then nothing else for the next nineteen hours. This is called "interval fasting," and if done right, including sufficient hydration throughout the day and high-intensity interval exercise before your first meal the next day, can really kick fat loss into overdrive.

Blogging this because I don't want to lose it. I'm tired of having to look this recipe up time and again.

Current Mood: amused
Current Music: Gut, Weird Science
Crossposts: http://elfs.livejournal.com/1517609.html

Since we ate all the leftovers last night, I was forced (forced! I tell you!) to cook something for lunch. Here's what I came up with:

½ bag of "spring mixed greens with spinach."
4 oz. shrimp, thawed and tails off
½ pear, diced
1 egg
1 tbs lemon juice (fresh is best, bottled is okay)
3 tbs the best olive oil you can afford, plus extra for cooking.
1 tbs anchovy paste
1 garlic clove, minced
dash of Worcestershire sauce
fresh coarsely ground black pepper to taste
Parmesan cheese

Take a cast-iron pan and put it in the oven, and preheat the broiler. Boil the egg for 90 seconds, then dunk in ice water for rapid cooling. Thaw and de-tail the shrimp, as needed, then toss with olive oil to coat. Mince the garlic. Mix the garlic, lemon, 3 tbs oil, anchovy, Worcestershire sauce in a small bowl. When the egg is cool, crack into the bowl. Mix well.

When the oven is heated, put shrimp into the pan and broil for one minute. Toss & turn shrimp, broil for another minute. Leave out to cool.

Peel and dice the pear. Dice the shrimp. Toss shrimp, pear, and greens in a large bowl. Apply dressing, top with pepper and freshly grated cheese.

Low carb, minimal dairy, some protein, lots of greens, massive flavor. Can't beat that.

Recommendation: Wrap the handle of the cast-iron skillet in aluminium foil. It transmits heat slower than iron, and will make it possible to handle the pan for a longer period of time than otherwise. When you're done, wipe the pan quickly with a damp washcloth, then let air-dry: everything on it is dead, and the olive oil will help preserve the non-stick features of the pan.

Also, I learned that you should never try to heat meat in a cold iron pan by just putting both on the stove. Micro-tears in the iron seal up if you pre-heat the pan, but grab the meat if don't and ruin the outer layer, inhibiting the Maillard reaction and changing the flavor noticably for the worse.

Current Mood: happy
Crossposts: http://elfs.livejournal.com/1485478.html

Last night, Kouryou-chan and I cooked an enchilada casserole. It was three cups of grated cheese (a combination of cheddar and flagship), a half-pound of beef (not in the recipe, but we had some in the 'fridge that needed to be used up), sour cream, shallots (we were out of onions, so we grabbed the nearest equivalent), and various herbs, oregano, parsley, all mixed together. Then, we simmered tomato sauce, water, minced garlic and minced green peppers, chili powder and cumin until it was thick.

We wrapped the filling in tortillas, arranged them in a casserole dish, poured the sauce on top and sprinkled some more cheese.

She actually did most of the work. Only the grating of the cheese intimidated her; our cuisinart broke, so we had to grate the cheese by hand and she has tiny hands. She complained about getting her hands dirty while we rolled the tortillas, she simmered the sauce down to thicken it, she put it in the oven.

They were the most ridiculously filling things we've had in a long time. Absolutely delicious, down to the very end. And now she has another favorite recipe.

Current Mood: full

Stormy and I made Chinese Hot-Pot, also known as Shabu-Shabu. This is a simple dish: take a good hunk of steak, a good hunk of pork chop, and a hunk of chicken breast, slice them all up very thin, along with mushrooms, zucchinis, summer squashes, and broccoli. Stormy got to practice her knife skills. She's not very good with a knife, and it might take a nasty cut for me to finally convince her to keep her fingers safe. She kept splaying her fingers close to the knife.

The point of hot-pot is to let people cook these raw things in a deep pot of simmering broth. Slicing the meat to be less than ¼ of an inch thick lets it cook within a minute or so. This with a pair of sauces made with beef broth, mirin, soy sauce, and various herbs, one sweet and one salty, was the whole of the meal.

It was delicious. The family loves hot-pot, but it takes so long to eat and it's really a winter meal. Even in the early fall, it's too warm to fill the dining room with steam. And it takes forever to eat, so it's not something we can prepare on a night when someone has dance, or choir, or a D&D game, or a meeting, or Goddess only knows what else.

Current Mood: full

Tonight was one of those rare, sad nights where the family doesn't get to eat together. Kouryou-chan had dance; Omaha had politics. I got home late from work, and Storm was off with her older sister for the evening. Even Lisakit was out.

Since I was home alone, I made myself dinner: Sautee'd sausage, onions, and red bell pepper in a bowl. Now, that would be soul food enough for my Germanic tendencies (Northern Italians being, basically, Germans in outlook and diet), but I had gone one better.

Two weeks ago, there had been a head of cabbage in my garden going uneaten. We'd had all the coleslaw we can stand. I pulled the head, opened it, and cleaned it out. It was remarkably bug-free. I then proceeded to tear it, with clean hands, into small pieces and layer it in a sterilized mason jar, scattering a quarter-teaspoon of salt on top of each layer every half-inch or so. I would cram it down, gently, with my fingertips, then add more until the mason jar was full. I poured filtered water on top, covered but did not seal the jar, and left it out on top of my refrigerator.

Today, I opened it up and had a taste. If you've never had real sauerkraut, you're missing out, because this stuff was awe inspiring. Just the right bite, not disgustingly salty, still crisp and wonderful. I forked some out into the cast iron skillet to heat through, and put the rest in the refrigerator to halt fermentation.

But really, home-made sauerkraut, made with cabbage from my garden was... awesome.

Current Mood: satisfied

Dinner Friday night was roasted Tandoori chicken, broccoletti stufati con cipolle, and Basmati rice. I've been hitting used bookstores and garage sales, picking up cookbooks that have fallen out of someone's love. One that I adore is a ratty Italian cookbook that's all post WWII recipes, before the farming industry fully recovered, so it's all vegetable combinations, perfect for Primal or Paleo diets.

The Tandoori chicken recipe is a hash of three recipes I had (from Bittman's How to Cook Everything, I got the idea of using a skillet; from 1000 Indian Recipes I got the basic Tandoori recipe, and took suggestions from the family for making my own garlic-ginger paste and cutting out the cayenne.)

Tandoori Chicken:

Cooking time: Overnight. Hands-on time: about 1 hour. Oven: about 45 minutes.

This recipe requires that you start around lunchtime the day before. Each stage requires only about fifteen minutes of care, but there are four stages.

1 whole chicken, approximately 3 lbs
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
½ tsp salt
⅓ cup plain yogurt
1 tbsp fresh ginger
2 cloves garlic
2 tbsp whipping cream
peanut oil
1 tsp garam masala
½ tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground paprika
1/8th tsp ground turmeric

Place the chicken in a glass pie, baking, or casserole dish. Make several deep cuts in the breast and drumsticks of the chicken. Gently insert oiled fingers under the skin of the chicken and lift it up until it is just a loose bag around the meat. Mix together the lemon juice and salt in a small bowl, then rub it all over the chicken, making sure to get it deep into the cuts. A syringe might help, but is hardly traditional. Cover with wax paper or plastic wrap, put into the refrigerator and marinate two to four hours.

Mash the garlic and ginger into paste, adding a few drops of oil. The recipe calls for peanut oil; I used macadamia nut oil, which is sweeter and has a buttery taste, but is expensive and hard to find. Mix the paste with the yogurt, whipping cream, 1 tbsp oil (again, I prefer the macadamia), garam masala and cumin. (It is possible to add up to ¼ tsp cayenne pepper here, if you like, but I was making this for Kouryou-chan and skipped it.)

In a small pan, heat a teaspoon more oil until it's just barely smoking, turn off the heat, add paprika and turmeric and stir. This brings out the color. Let cool about ten minutes, then add to the yogurt mixture. The result will be a thick yellowish sauce. Take out the chicken and slather this mixture under the skin, everywhere, top bottom, the whole bird. Try to get some into the cuts. Put back in the refrigerator to marinate overnight.

The next day, heat the oven to between 375°F and 400°F. If you have a cast-iron skillet, heat it in the oven, wrapping the handle in aluminum foil. (Aluminum foil transfers heat much slower than iron; if you happen to grasp the handle by accident, this will prevent serious burning, and also allows you to handle the skillet safely with an oven mitt when transferring the pan to/from the oven.) If not, a standard roasting pan will do. When the oven is hot, put the bird into the skillet or pan, and cook 35-50 minutes, until a quick-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh reads 160°F. Remove from the oven, let rest 5 minutes, and eat.

It will not be the red of restaurant Tandoori. It will be a dark reddish-orange color from the paprika and turmeric. The red you get is mostly food dye, and if you want that, add three to five drops to your yogurt marinade but... please don't. It's not necessary.

Broccoletti stufati con cipolle:

1 small bunch broccoli rabe (also known as rapini)
2 medium yellow onions
4 tbsp butter
Salt and pepper to taste

Rabe is a relative of broccoli that has small heads, broad, leafy and edible leaves, and is very bitter. Here, I boil it to leach out some of the bitterness, then mix it with butter-softened sweetened onions to make an irresistible sweet-and-bitter combination.

Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Melt the butter in a non-stick or cast-iron skillet over medium heat. Slice the onions very thin. Clean and trim the rabe. When the butter is melted, put the onions in and cook very slowly-- this may take up to 20 minutes. Meanwhile, cut the rabe stems into 1 inch pieces and pull the leaves off. When the water boils, boil the rabe, leaves and all, for 5-7 minutes, then quickly drain and toss in with the onions. Stir until everything is covered with butter, add salt and pepper to taste, and serve immediately.

Current Mood: full
Current Music: Jesus Jones, Right Here, Right Now

I totally blew my diet today, but it was worth it. I made mint-chip ice cream. Cream, sugar, and mint leaves all heated to 170F, whisked, then chilled and pressed through a strainer, heated back up and made into a custard with egg yolks (a lot of egg yolks), then chilled back down to near-freezing, put into the ice cream stirrer and hardened. Then I scooped spoonfuls of the ice cream into a chilled bowl, drizzled melted dark chocolate onto the spoonful, then added more.

Five ingredients. 100% organic. Utterly delicious. The family ate it all up.

Current Mood: full

Getting more vegetables into yourself while also cutting back on the food budget can be a challenge, so my challenge for the weekend was to make home-made pico de gallo.

I used 1/2 white onion, 1 large tomato, and one seeded jalapeno, all diced very small. To that I added handfuls each of cilantro, parsley, and basil (because they were in the 'fridge and I had to use them up), juice of one lime, and salt and pepper.

There wasn't enough tomato to overcome the onions, but I kinda liked it that way. The basil and parsley added a wonderful smell to recipe, and it made just about the best relish I could imagine for a cooked sweet italian sausage lunch.

Current Mood: hungry
Current Music: Vanessa Carlton, Hands on Me

Omaha bought a new bag of "steel-cut oatmeal," which is basically chopped groats. I've never had the stuff soften enough to be edible, so I decided to try it in a slow-cooker overnight. It's supposed to be even better for ya than the roller-flattened oats that most people are familiar with. (Actually, I suspect most folkes are familiar with the roller-flattened and then spin-cut stuff marketed as "instant," where all the fiber has been destroyed by the secondary cutting process to make it absorb moisture faster, but the physiology-related nutritional value has been destroyed.)

It worked, at least as far as softening was concerned. But it makes twice as much food, measured by dry volume, as any added sweetener is so fully absorbed as to be undetectable, making today's breakfast very bland. I'll try it again, but next time with half as much oats.

Current Mood: full
Current Music: Thomas Dolby, Urges

Saturday night, I cooked Alton Brown's Swedish Meatball recipe, along with egg noodles and roasted brussel sprouts doused in vinegar and drizzled with balsamic vinegar. The only substitutions I made were: I used ghee instead of clarifying the butter myself, and challah instead of white bread, since we didn't have any white bread in the house.

Although she didn't like the brussel sprouts (trim, halve, and drown in olive oil, then place cut side face-down to a pan and roast at 375°F for fifteen minutes, then flip and roast an additional ten; drizzle with balsamic vinegar and bacon bits), the meatballs vanished and she went back for seconds. Goodness, have I found something savory that Kouryou-chan likes? That's unpossible!

Even better, she ate the leftovers for lunch Sunday.

Current Mood: amused
Current Music: The Ride of the Valkyrie

So, without having much around the house, I decided to make polenta casserole. This is basically three layers: one layer of polenta, about 3/4" deep, one layer of my home made meat sauce, and a thin crust of mozzarella and Parmesan. Bake for fifteen minutes, until the crust is melty and a little browned.

Well, I thought it was delicious. The rest of the family, not so much. My Italianness must have been showing through. I was very disappointed, though, because I was hoping they'd like it more than that.

Ah well, more leftovers for me.

Current Mood: full

Profile

Elf Sternberg

May 2025

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
				1	2	3
4	5	6	7	8	9	10
11	12	13	14	15	16	17
18	19	20	21	22	23	24
25	26	27	28	29	30	31

Syndicate

Page Summary

Ham and Scalloped Potatoes [Recipe]
Thai Tea Iced Cream Recipe
Instant Pot Vegan Chili, with home-made beans & broth!
Korean Sticky Chicken w/Rice, Cucumber Salad and Spiced Kale
Instant Pot Bolognese Sauce
My French Bread recipe...
Chicken with Balsamic Fig Sauce, Wild Rice, and a Side Vegetable
Instant Pot Steak Soup Recipe
Comfort Food Fish Tacos
Breakfast Recipe: Ham & Lentil Soup
Caesar salad with broiled shrimp and pear
Kouryou-chan cooks Enchiladas
Chinese Hot-Pot!
Dinner tonight... was made two weeks ago
Dinner: Roasted Tandoori chicken, broccoletti stufati con cipolle, and Basmati rice
I made mint chip ice cream!
More cooking: Pico de gallo
Experiment #1 in slow-cooked oatmeal: modest failure
Apparently, I have found the perfect formula for feeding Kouryou-chan
Polenta Casserole!

Active Entries

Style Credit

Base style: ColorSide by branchandroot
Theme: NNWM 2010 Fresh by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated May. 28th, 2025 10:28 pm

Elf Sternberg

Entries tagged with recipe

Ham and Scalloped Potatoes [Recipe]

Ingredients

Directions

Thai Tea Iced Cream Recipe

Instant Pot Vegan Chili, with home-made beans & broth!