The Way of the Cook

My various experiments with roast beef have finally born fruit. After some rocky paths (too much chipotles with adobo sauce) intersperced with a few highlights (heavy dill applications) I have created my best roast beef to date! I started with a big 'ol chuck roast containing 2 bones and about 4" thick. After a heavy salting, I seared every side of the meat I could get in contact with my skillet and placed it tin foil. Also in the foil was a yellow onion, most of a head of garlic (with the biggest cloves left intact for independent savoring), some chopped celery, a couple carrots and a hand full of raisins. For the liquid I added a small can of tomato paste wisked together with a can of beef broth and some red wine vinegar. I seasoned the liquid with salt, sage and thyme. After a night in a 180F oven I removed the roast to the fridge for later carving. The internal temp of the meat read 160 when I took it out. To prepare the meal for eating I punched a hole in the foil to drain most of the liquid then whisked a tablespoon of cornstarch in and heated it up to make gravy. To the gravy I added the little bits of vegetable that would be difficult to keep on a fork. The meat was sliced and heated with the bigger pieces of vegies. Some mashed potatoes and a salad rounded out the meal and gave me something to do with all that wonderful gravy. Margaret and I agree that this was a superb roast and I will have to make extra effort to top it in the future. I'll just have to wait and see what else I find in my pantry the next time I make a roast.

One of the glories of having a house is grilling in your backyard while drinking a frosty beverage. I picked up a Weber grill and I haven't been able to stop grilling. A list of things I've grilled: salmon, mahi mahi, beef tenderloin, green chiles, onions, leeks, corn, nectarines, plums, angel food cake, cauliflower, hamburgers, bratwurst, polish sausage, bread. I'm sure there are some more but my memory fails. The cauliflower wasn't a big hit and my wife and I disagree on the angelfood cake (I liked it, it tasted like toasted marshmallows) but all in all it's been fabulous. My suggestion to you: grab whatever looks tasty in your kitchen and try it out on the grill, you might be surprised.

A rundown on what's been going on inside:
I made a very successful meatloaf using 1/3 pork, 2/3 beef and lots of dill.
I made somewhat successful beans. They needed molasses and I forgot to add salt when they started cooking so the beans themselves were a bit bland but the sauce was great.
I made a fairly successful chili. At Hatch chile time I always make a big pot. I needed to add one more beer than I had on hand so wound up adding too much tomato just for the liquid. It really is good chili, just a little too tomato-y for my palate.

Tonight I'm making some potroast, so stay tuned for the results tomorrow.

We have moved and we have a new baby and now I can finally get back to the kitchen. My cooking at the moment is revolving around a big project on the weekend that I can then freeze to feed us all throughout the week. This last weekend I made several different types of gnocchi. This was my first attempt at this fabulous pasta dish and was very educational. I made a potato based gnocchi from this recipe and ricotta gnocchi from this one. Neither turned out quite as I had expected.

I had some very old potatos that I boiled and peeled. Since I don't have a food mill I mashed them up a bit and then threw in my my electric mixer's bowl and whipped them up real good, adding the egg. I then folded in the flour by hand so as not to overmix it. In cooking, the first batch of potato gnocchi I boiled pretty much dissolved in the pot. Undaunted I went ahead and added the next batch of 12 and they turned out great. I believe the starch content in the water helped keep the dumplings together. They turned out very light and fluffy, moreso than any I've ever gotten at a restaurant. The potato flavor really came through, it was like little dabs of mashed potato with tomato sauce. Nice, but both my wife and I prefered the ricotta.

These were very interesting. Rolling them in flour created something like a very delicate ricotta filled dumpling. I made mine too large so had some trouble getting them out of the pot intact. Noticing how the potato gnocchi formed a sort of dumpling shell I rolled the ricotta in flour a second time just before cooking to give it a strong enough shell to survive the boil. That worked quite well and didn't put too much dumpling around the cheese. I also tried adding a little flour to the ricotta so that would hold together better, but this neither helped in flavor or texture so should best be avoided.

I haven't been posting lately because I've been busy packing up to move to a new kitchen, surrounded by our very own house! With the move looming near I've been playing "make what you can with what you have" in order to have less stuff to move. My latest exploration was beef and broccoli enchiladas. They turned out quite tasty. I had some roast beef left over that I had decided to make a little spicy and some broccoli wilting in the fridge. In the pantry I had an onion and some corn tortillas. I chopped up the broccoli, reserving the florets but slicing the stalk thin (after removing the tough outer parts with a vegetable peeler). I dropped those in a skillet with the onion to get some of the moisture out and brown them a bit. While that was darkening up I sliced the beef thin and layed it into some tortillas. I divided my vegetable mix among them and rolled them up then dropped them in a casserole. The sauce from my roast beef was very tomatoey and quite spicy, having added a can of chipotles when originally cooking the beef. I liberally spread the sauce over the enchiladas and grated some swiss cheese, conveniently lurking in my refrigerator door, to top it off. I baked it at 350d for about 30-45 minutes, until golden brown and delicious. I served sauted broccoli florets on the side and it made quite the dish. My wife is not big fan of enchiladas but she devoured hers without a peep. Go forth, play games with your fridge and find out what food combinations work with your family!

After an embarrassing failed attempt at a low-fat turkey-a-la-king (don't use storebought gravy packets as a binder in casseroles!) it was nice to have a big success at breakfast this morning. I love pancakes. I love to make them, I love to eat them and I love them as leftovers, I love pancakes. Pancakes are not the best thing in the world for your body so I don't get them very often, but that might change. In an attempt to make them good tasting and good for me I constructed a whole grain version. Inspired once again by Cooks Illustrated, I read their article and then did something completely different. Here's the recipe:

Team dry:
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup oatmeal
1/2 cup walnuts
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder

Run half a cup of the oatmeal in your food processor for a few minutes to turn it into a flour, add the walnuts and pulse it a few more times. You can add the rest of the dry except the waiting oatmeal and give it a couple more pulses to mix and aerate. Add the last 1/2 cup oats by hand so you get some nice whole oats in there.

Team wet:
2 eggs
4 tablespoons butter
2 cups buttermilk
2 tablespoons brown sugar

Melt the butter and whisk it into the eggs to create an emulsion, then add the rest of the team.

Fold the wet and dry teams together, trying to stir as little as possible. Agitation creates gluten and gluten is the enemy of fluffy, delicate pancakes! Let the batter sit around for 5-10 minutes while you heat the skillet. Don't skip this step, the rest is important. Cook the pancakes and eat! The seemed to take a little longer to cook, so be patient. I like some nice dark grade B maple syrup, surprisingly not too expensive from Whole Foods to top them.

It made a deeply flavorful and delicate pancake that fills you up and keeps you satisfied for some time. I can't wait till tomorrow morning when I pop a couple into the toaster oven for breakfast. This is my new favorite pancake, I actually prefer the flavor and texture to my traditionally made pancakes. Try it out yourself!

Using Alton Brown's meatloaf recipe as a starting point I've been experimenting with different meat mixes. This time I wanted to make a meatloaf that would be a bit more friendly towards my cholesterol level so I used 1 pound of turkey. In order to keep it from being too bland I mixed in 3/4 of a pound of lamb leg (on sale!). To up a the flavor I dropped in 3 ounces of parmesan. These items made two trips through my Kitchenaid meat grinder attachment with the coarse grind disc in place. Beats the hell out of my old hand grinder. For team veg I dropped 2 carrots, 1/2 onion and 1 red bell pepper and 3 ounces of shitake mushrooms into the food processor for a few seconds. Margaret says I should have pulsed it one more time to break up the carrots a little more, but I like it. After emptying the veg I processed 6 ounces of saltines and threw everying in a bowl to mash it up with my hands (fun!). I added an egg and a few last minute herbs and prepared to bake. I use a cookie sheet a simple ketchup glaze to maximize browning potential and cook to an internal temp of 155.

The results were quite delicious. The addition of mushrooms and parmesan made a very savory flavor which I thought needed a little brightening. A nice tomato sauce would do just the trick. This meatloaf mix would do great as meatballs or in ravioli, so that's exactly what I did next. I reseverved a bit of meatloaf to try some ravioli and the results were passable. I made an egg noodle sheet, thinning it out to number 3 on my machine. This turned out to be too thick when the doubled up on the edge of the ravioli so next time I'll try it a bit thinner. This will also help my yeild a bit. The noodles were also a bit tough, I'll try it without egg and see what difference that makes. If you're interested, heres some instruction on making your own ravioli.

My mom may have abandoned it but I keep the tradition of orange bunny rolls alive! I don't have her recipe so I had to find one, but that wasn't too hard. I found a nice one in my well used 1963 copy of The Good Housekeeping Cookbook. Here is my own interpretation on that recipe.

I assembled the ingredients and put them together in a sponge variation. That means I used half the flour, all the liquids and none of the salt to let the yeast hang out and propogate vigorously. I also reserved the orange juice for later because I thought the acidity might throw the yeast off. Here is team sponge:
1 pkg active dry yeast
1 1/4 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
2 tbl grated orange zest
2 cups flour

We had a surprising cold snap on Friday so I just let it sit on my counter overnight till Saturday. The sponge wasn't catching a rise for some reason so I added the rest of the flour and the orange juice and let it sit all day Saturday and catch a good rise. Second string:
2 1/4 cups flour
1/4 cup orange juice

Over the course of the day it caught a good rise so I added 6 tbl room temperature butter in installments while kneading, then turned it over to my Kitchenaid for a good 10 minutes of kneading. I then divided the dough into 12 portions, rolled them into 12" long snakes and formed them into bunnies! The rolls sat in the fridge overnight to be pulled out the next morning for the final rise and 10 minutes of baking in a 400d oven.

Finally I whipped up some orange glaze with 1 1/2 tbl orange juice and 3/4 cup powdered sugar, applying while the rolls were very hot. It was a big hit and Margaret was so impressed with the bunny shapes that she's requested I do this every Easter into eternity.

For dinner we had some ham and pea salad, but those were nowhere near as fun as bunny rolls. Margaret later asked me what I liked most about the bunny rolls. After a moments thought I replied "Remembering all the times before when we had them for breakfast." So practice your bunny forms with some clay and be ready to start your own tradition next Easter!

We shopped at Whole Foods this last week and picked up some great food. We saved the receipt and took it to HEB on our latest shopping trip to do some comparisons. We'll probably continue to do most of our shopping at HEB because the prices are sometimes half what you pay at Whole Foods and if your careful you can still get good produce.

We got a chicken and I tried something a little different. Inspired by the recipe for Chinese barbecue pork in the latest issue of Cooks Illustrated I made some red spicy chicken. I started by cutting up and skinning the chicken so that I could put my crust inducing sauce right onto the meat. For the sauce I used some local honey and my favorite hot sauce mixed in about a 2:1 ratio (honey:hot) with a bit of olive oil as a bonus. I brushed this all over the chicken then popped it in a 475F oven, flipping after about 15 minutes. After 10 more minutes I turned on the broiler and moved up the rack. While the broiler was heating I brushed on some more sauce and then stuck the meat back in the oven till it looked delicious! It never really formed a crust but the flavor penetrated into the flesh a bit and gave the chicken a beautiful orange color.

I served it with up with some braised beets that I prepared using my hacked version of Mr. Brown's recipe for glazed carrots and it paired quite nicely. Instead of ginger ale for braising I used some white wine and added a little vinegar to brighten it all up. They turned out maroon and tasty!

I had a hankering for some spaghetti with tomato sauce, but lo! The pantry held no jars of prepared tomato sauces! There were, however, plenty of cans of diced and whole tomatoes (pretty much the only fruit/vegetable that I buy canned) calling out to me to be the base for my latest creation. I had a couple of old poblanos and an onion that were quickly chopped and sauteed in some olive oil. I added two cans of diced tomatoes, half a clove of garlic and fresh herbs from my balcony. After a simmer of about an hour it made a fabulous sauce. I decided it needed a higher concentration of tomato, so I added another can. I quickly heated up some of the leftover pork from the other night in a skillet and dumped it all on some spaghetti with a heap of parmesan cheese. Delicious. It took a little longer than my typical dinner but the sauce was worth the wait. The tomato flavor was very bright and this simple sauce beat most of the jars you can find at the supermarket hands down.

I love 'em. Margaret's aunt brought some salmon over to be cooked up for dinner. Since I had recently found some inexpensive sesame seeds I decided there was no time like the present to put them into action. A bit of salt, some nice mustard a little parmesan and a solid coat of sesame seeds went onto the fish and then under the broiler! I accompanied it with some green beens and fried potatoes. An excellent array. I always like coating the my salmon with some parmesan or what have you to protect the delicat flesh while under the broiler. It makes a wonderfully moist and tender end result, as long as you don't overcook it. Put it close to the broiler and flip it as soon as it's brown then take it out as soon as the other side is brown too. Good stuff.