Indian Stew?

Ever notice how the best soup recipes start out "Saute chopped onion"? :-)
As soon as I started frying onions tonight every kid came up and asked "Whatcha making?" or "When's dinner?"

Tonight we had an Indian inspired stew (which we served with our experiment in making naan).

Indian Inspired Stew:


2 chopped onions
2 chopped carrots
4 cloves chopped garlic
~1" peeled and chopped ginger

Saute all together until tender

Add -

chunked meat (I used left over roast beast from New Years dinner)
~ 25 oz diced tomatoes
Thow in any nice big chunks of veggies you have around. ( I had two baggies full of baby carrots, broccoli, and snow peas, left over from a recent picnic.)

Spice to taste with:
ground fennel
curry
salt
pepper

Thin with water and cook down.

Notes and modifications:

I started dinner only an hour before we needed to eat. This would be better cooked down for half a day.

I used beef fat from another meal to saute the veggies.

If I had thought of it I would have used some beef bone broth instead of water to thin the broth.

Red Beans

Happy New Year's Day!

I love that we got invited to a potluck brunch for New Year's Day. Eating with friends is not only a good way to spend some time (and calories) but also portends a great year.

My offering was red beans and rice. It's simple, delicious, healthy, and economical. What more could you want?

This looks like a long recipe, but notice that it's really just beans, ham bone, chopped veggies, and spices.


Red Beans (and rice)
- from Chef Paul Prudhomme's Louisiana Kitchen, by Paul Prudhomme

1/2 pound dry red kidney beans
water to cover all
3 lbs small ham hocks
1 1/2 cup finely chopped celery
1 cup finely chopped onion
1 cup finely chopped green peppers
3 bay leaves
3/4 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
1/2 teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon thyme leaves
3/4 teaspoon garlic poder
3/4 teaspoon oregano leaves
1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper (preferably cayenne)
1/8 teaspoon black pepper


Throw it all together in a big pot and cook for at least half a day. Add water as necessary, depending on how thick you like it.

Serve with rice, especially if it's hot and your guests like it mild, or if you need to stretch the quantity.


Notes and modifications:

This doubles easily, and freezes and reheats well.

I didn't get any special "ham hocks", and didn't make sure I had 3 lbs of it either. I just used the bone left over from the Christmas ham. It was fine.

I've halved the pepper and Tabasco sauce from the original recipe. YMMV, depending on your tastes and how fresh your spices are. Remember, taste as you go and give the pepper time to expand to its' full flavor. You can always add spice, but once it's in all you can do is pour the mess over more rice if it's too spicy.

In the book the recipe actually has instructions about such frivolities as soaking the beans, cooking the meat separately, taking out the bones, etc. I'm not a patient cook. Soaking the beans speeds the cooking time, but I've never noticed the mythical decrease in flatulence (commonly called farts, or toots, at my house). Eat beans regularly, as your digestive system adjusts the toots will decrease (or maybe you'll just cease to notice them - shrug). Cooking the beans from the start with all the good stuff increases their flavor and nutritional content, and you want that nice meld of flavors that cooking for half a day gives. I also figure my people are quite capable of fishing out bay leaves and bones as necessary.

Lorin's Truffles

One of my children got these as a gift for his birthday. I'm pretty sure that child was sorry he shared with me.

Truffles

1/2 cup cream
1/2 cup butter
1 pkg chocolate chips (12oz)
3 Tbls vanilla or flavored liqueur
dash of salt


Gently heat cream and butter until the butter melts. Then stir in the chocolate until melted and add the flavor and salt.

Pour into a lined casserole and chill until firm. When it's firm cut into small (<3/4") squares and roll in cocoa powder. You can roll them into balls if you like. Store in a closed container, keep chilled until ready to gift or eat.


Notes:

You can use all sorts of flavors with this. I used a little orange oil in this and it was lovely. Lorin has used instant coffee granules - Mmmm.

Christmas Recipes

Now I usually like our family to eat healthy, but at the holidays I make a pretty major exception. I'm in the midst of Christmas baking. I've got little scraps of paper, and even the odd email, with my favorite recipes. I'd like to have them all in one place, so here's a list of what I'll be trying to get posted here.

Candy:
Lorin's Truffles
Chocolate dipped pecan fudge
Peanut butter cream cheese fudge
Grandma's Fudge
Divinity


Cookies:
Simple Sesame Cookies
Pfeffernusse
Pizzelles
Bell Cookies
Russian Teacakes/Mexican Wedding Cake

Panettone bread

Our Daily Bread

For the last couple of years I've been making bread regularly. It's gotten to the point where, except for sour dough bread, my kids prefer homemade bread to store bought. That's mostly ok. Sure, it's a pain to hear them complain if I need to serve store bread, but when we eat homemade I know exactly what's in the bread, and more importantly what's not. Here's the recipe I fall back on for our every day bread.

Maple buttermilk Bread
(modified from Bread Machine Baking, by Lora Brody and Millie Apter)

1 Tbsp butter or oil
3 Tbsp real maple syrup or honey
1 cup buttermilk or 1 cup water plus 4 Tbsp powdered buttermilk
3 Tbsp gluten
3 cups whole white wheat flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp yeast

Mix and knead in bread machine dough cycle or by hand
Let rise in loaf pan on 2nd rising
Bake 350 F for ~25 min.


Notes:

I didn't put in rise times because around here that varies with the house temperature and me remembering I was making bread. Whole wheat generally takes longer to rise than refined flour, and a dry loaf can take a bit more time than a wetter loaf. I'd give at least 2 hours to each rising.

Yes. I'm still making my own buttermilk and sour cream. It's that easy, and that good.

I've used the powered buttermilk in this and it turns out fine.

I've used regular whole wheat flour, and white flour in this. They're both fine, although regular white flour is a bit pasty after you get used to whole wheat.

This is a nice dough to use to make cinnamon raisin bread, or pecan rolls, or monkey bread.

Stolen idea

I think I've mentioned A Year of Slow Cooking before. I love her blog. Well, she's done it again.

This year I got 6 cabbages bigger than my head in the fall from gleaning at a local farm. I've still got a couple in cold storage (ok, cool storage, an unheated basement room) and I made something like 3 gallons of sauerkraut with 1 1/2 others. (I turned the difference into krautburgers, yuum!)

Then I had to ask - "What do I do with all this sauerkraut?" I have a limit for how much brautwurst I'm willing to feed my family. I gave half of it away in pint and quart sizes, and the rest is sitting in the extra fridge, waiting for inspiration.

And here is Stephanie O'Dea to the rescue! Pulled pork with sauerkraut looks fantastic, and it uses up all the carrots I have left from the gleaning too.

Rene's Dad's Salsa

Fall is here and the mornings are giving us a hint of the frost that can't be far behind. It's time to use up all those tomatoes and peppers that are finishing in your garden or on sale at the markets.

Here's where I admit, yet again, that a foreigner is better at an ethnic recipe than me. ;-) OK, so we're both American, but Rene's Dad is of Dutch decent, and I'm of partial Hispanic decent. His salsa recipe is too excellent to turn my nose up at, so it's what I use. We ran out at the beginning of the summer, and this year my garden was almost worthless, so I'm using store bought veggies. Sigh.... poor me.

Rene's Dad's Salsa

1/2 bunch cilantro (~4 oz)
30 Roma tomatoes (~5 lbs)
1 jalapeno pepper
3 yellow or red sweet bell peppers
2-3 onions
2-3 green bell peppers
1 Tbs canning salt
15 oz tomato paste
1 1/2 tsp black pepper
1/3 cup sugar
3/4 cup white vinegar

Chop all vegetables very fine (skin tomatoes if desired)
Put all ingredients into bot and bring to a boil.
Simmer for 3-4 hrs

May can using water bath method for canning.

Notes and modifications:

Skim the extra liquid off if you like a thicker salsa. You can use the extra liquid for cooking other dishes.

I'm told you can halve this recipe, and I have successfully doubled and tripled it.

I have made lots of changed to this recipe as dictated by what I had on hand - different varieties of peppers and tomatoes, no tomato paste, more cilantro, and all of them have turned out great, just taste test as you go so you know what to expect. Some variations came out hotter than others. I give this away at Christmas time and it would be mean to give a spicy variation to my gringo friends. :-P