Tomato Onion Curry

Well - it's been a while since anyone has posted!

I am calling today's post a Bengal Style Tomato Onion Curry Sauce.  I wanted to expand our Indian curry selections to some new flavor combinations.  Aside from our old standbys, I wasn't sure what went with what so I decided to start with a recipe.  I used Fish Curry Bengal Style from p. 103 of Mary Atwood's "A Taste of India".  Of course I didn't exactly follow the recipe.  First attempt at curried tilapia made a pretty good dinner.  As usual, the leftovers were better the next day for having sat in the 'fridge overnight.  I decided to make a bigger batch of just the sauce without the fish, put in jars in the 'fridge, and have it available.  So the following is the sauce only.  My plan is to heat some up and add a piece of poached fish; could do the same with chicken or parboiled cauliflower with chickpeas or potatoes and peas, or whatever.

The recipe calls for 3 large tomatoes, chopped.  I used canned tomatoes with green chilies which added the chilies to the recipe and produced some heat.  The recipe also calls for adding yogurt 10 minutes before the end and simmering.  I did this on first trial and found that the yogurt curdles or clarifies so you don't a smooth cream sauce effect.  Yogurt is good with this recipe but I find I just prefer to add it cold at the table. I also thought the recipe as written was a bit anemic so I doubled all of the spices (except the chili powder which I left the same because of adding the green chilies).

Since I was basically following a recipe and wanted to be able to write it up, I actually measured everything:

4 Onions, diced (452 g)
3 14.5 oz. cans Petite Diced Tomatoes, 2 with green chilies, one just plain
4 cloves Garlic, minced (16 g)
1 t. cumin
1 t. brown mustard seeds
1/2 t. ground cinnamon (I used Saigon cin. which is very pungent - just discovered it at Echo Hill)
1/2 t. ground cloves
1/2 t. ground cardamom
1/2 t turmuric
2 t. Paprika (I used sweet Hungarian)
1/4 t. chili powder (10,000 HU)
1 t. salt

Saute the onions and garlic in vegetable oil (recipe recommends mustard oil; I used coconut oil).  Add the canned tomatoes.  In a skillet, cook the powdered spices in oil (again, I used coconut) for 3 - 5 minutes, then add to the onions and tomatoes.  Mix, add salt or to taste, and simmer until onions are cooked.  Cool, transfer to jars.  Yields about 3 pints. 

I expect we'll have this for dinner tomorrow after it has sat for a day.  I will let you know...

Polenta Pizza

OK, I know this is just about identical to my last post minus the eggplant and that each of you is perfectly capable of thinking of this on your own and, in fact, have probably done so.  But for the record, this morning I fired up some roasted corn meal polenta, turned it over on the other side, added warmed up sauce and cheese, covered the pan so the cheese would melt, and served it up with a fried egg.  It was awesome.  Would have worked with a poached egg dropped on top too.

Polenta and Eggplant

The other day, we went up to Echo Hill to get some roasted corn meal.  We have eaten grits a couple of times lately and I have used the extra setup in a pan for slicing and frying at a later meal.  But the grits have a very bland flavor, more just a carrier for maple syrup than anything else.  I had a hankering for some fried corn meal mush with some backbone to it.  Got around to making it yesterday which means today we had roasted corn meal polenta in the 'fridge.  Just so happens, the baby eggplants (one of the few things the deer have left us in the garden this year) are coming in beautifully and I just made some fresh tomato sauce.  So, bread and bake baby eggplant slices the way Mom always used to, slice the roasted corn meal polenta, layer up polenta, baked eggplant, fresh tomato sauce, and mozzarella cheese, and bake in the oven at ~375 until everything is hot and cheese is melted.  Served with hot Italian sausage and sauce on a good Kaiser roll.  Yum.

Fresh Tomato Sauce

Every year at about this time I like to make fresh tomato sauce.  This is just tomato sauce made from fresh tomatoes and not cooked down so far that it loses its fresh taste.  I usually include onion, green pepper, garlic, fresh basil, bay leaf, etc., etc., etc.  You know the things that work.  Trouble is, it tends to be watery.  If you cook it down far enough to avoid "tomato chunks in very watery sauce" it soon takes on the regular cooked flavor.  This year, I tried something different.  After the tomato chunks had just cooked enough to soften, I separated most of the liquid from the solids using a colander.  I then cooked the liquid portion, reducing it by about 50% or slightly more.  Recombined the liquid and solids, added a can of tomato paste, and voila:  sauce that was not too watery but with the tomatoes not over cooked.

A couple of years ago I was at a training class about this time of year and sat next to a classmate of Italian extraction.  We were chatting and I described fresh tomato sauce to him.  He told me that the Italians have a name for this.  I have forgotten the name, but the concept is recognized as distinct from marinara, which is a cooked down tomato sauce, as I understand it.

Fried corn fritters

After a day at the beach and a mid-afternoon lunch, I thought we would want, at most a light summer dinner tonight.  I got a hankering for corn fritters and after looking around and reading some reviews came up with the recipe below.  I thought they were great!  Nice fresh corn flavor, light and crispy.

I used a gluten free 1:1 substitution blend, which is mostly rice flour.  I've read some recipes that weren't designed specifically to be gluten free that used rice flour because it's lighter and makes for a crispier crust than wheat flour.  The original version from which this recipe is adapted called for wheat flour.

1 c. flour -  (see note above)
1/4 c. cornmeal
1 t. baking powder
3/4 - 1 t. salt
1/4 - 1/2 t. sugar

~12 oz fresh corn (I cut the kernels off of 4 ears of corn)
~1/4 c chopped basil (optional)
~ 1/3 - 1/2 c chopped scallions (optional)
some grated parmesan or a little havarti would probably also work well, but I didn't try that.

2/3 c. buttermilk (or plain milk would probably work)
1 egg
1 T. shortening, melted

Oil/shortening for frying


Heat about 1/2 - 3/4" of frying oil of your choice in a skillet or whatever you fry things in.  I dumped the corn into some hot water briefly (~2 min, maybe) just to cook them a little as I really dislike under-cooked corn.  From there it's pretty basic - mix up the dries, then stir in the veggies/extras.  (Adding them to the dry ingredients allows for even distribution throughout the batter without the danger of over-mixing once the wets are added).  Whisk together the wet ingredients, then stir into the dries just until combined.  Drop spoonfuls into hot oil, fry until brown, then turn over to get the other side.  I mixed together some sour cream and scallions to serve on top of these, which I thought was pretty good.  Some people leave out the basil and scallions and serve them with honey or syrup.  Whatever floats your boat.  These were slightly sweet, but mostly from the corn, and just really delicious, I thought.  I'll be adding them to our meal list for light summer dinners.  I served them with lightly sauteed zucchini and carrot ribbons with chopped mint and basil and topped with goat cheese.

Dad's Bangin' Baked Beans - Take 1

Needed something to take to a party Memorial Day weekend so I decided to try my hand at baked beans.  I did a trial run early in the week using 1 cup of dried navy beans which turned out OK, then modified the recipe based on that.  I was pretty happy with how the end product turned out so I am posting it.

Ingredients:
5 cups dried navy beans
1 lb bacon, cut to small pieces
2 medium onions, diced
9 cloves garlic or to taste
4 carrots, grated
1/2 cup molasses
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup maple syrup
5 t. prepared Dijon mustard - I used Grey Poupon of course
2 t. ground cumin
2 t. garam masala
1 t. dried mustard
1 t. salt, then to taste
1 t. Thai Fish Sauce
3 T. apple cider vinegar
1 cup V8 juice
Ground black pepper to taste

Prepare your dried beans according to your favorite method.  I used the soak-overnight,-then-boil-for-1 1/2-hour method (actually, I over cooked this batch by about 45 min, but no worries).  I tried the soak-for-an-hour-in-boiling-water method for the 1 cup trial batch and wound up never really getting the beans cooked through and soft.  You want to be sure that your bean wind up thoroughly cooked and soft for baked beans, in my opinion.

In your cook pot of choice (I like a cast iron dutch oven) cook the bacon, rendering the fat.  Add the onions, garlic, and carrots and saute until the onion is translucent.  Remove from heat and add the beans, reserving the bean water.

In a separate sauce pan, combine all of the other ingredients, heating gently to fully dissolve the molasses and brown sugar.  Pour this mixture over the beans, adding bean water as needed to fully cover the beans.  Mix thoroughly.  Bake in a 275 deg oven for as long as it takes.  Add bean water as needed to prevent drying out.  I baked mine for about 2 hours.  The key is making sure the beans are fully cooked (mine were already overdone from the boiling step) with plenty of time to soak up the flavor from the sauce.  If you do not overcook your beans it may take 4-5 hours of slow cooking, regularly making up the water volume with bean water (or just water if you run out of bean water).  I actually transferred mine to a disposable aluminum roasting dish to bake them; this works well for taking them to a party or picnic where you don't want to have to chase up your dish afterwards.

Oh, yeah.  Garam masala is actually just "mixed spice" so the composition might vary according to your source.  I get mine at Echo Hill in Dryville.  In this recipe, the key flavor contribution from the garam masala is clove, I think.  If you do not have garam masala you could try to substitute 1/2 t. or so of ground clove.  Thai Fish Sauce is made from anchovies.  If you do not have it, you could substitute 2 or so finely chopped anchovies in the recipe.  This is added for umami, not for fish flavor so don't overdo it!

Also, I didn't do it this time because I was taking this to share with others but I would normally add just a pinch of red pepper, not enough to notice any heat, just enough to add some sparkle and interest.

You don't need gluten to make a decent cookie (peanut butter cookies and chocolate chip oatmeal cookies)

We recently came across two pretty good gluten-free cookie recipes.  I'll just link to them here with a couple notes:

1) Flourless peanut butter cookies
These are good and peanut-buttery.  Watch the cooking time so they don't dry out.  I use half the sugar, and they're plenty sweet.

2) Chocolate chip oatmeal cookies
These are definitely my new favorite cookies.
-You definitely need to really press the batter into the measuring cup, or else the cookies crumble apart after they bake.
-Don't try to make them too thick or the oatmeal will get a little "gluey" before they're cooked all the way.
-I think I made these with 1/2 c of sugar, instead of 3/4 c, because I always cut the sugar.

Roasted carrots, fennel and sausage salad on yorkshire pudding

This recipe is basically just what the name says, but it comes together to something that's a lot more than the sum of its parts.  I originally served the salad with popovers on the side, but we were short on time to make popovers the other night.  Instead we made some individual stove-top yorkshire puddings, and they turned out to be a good base for the salad.

Ingredients:
Carrots
Fennel
Brats or sausages
Salad greens - I used spinach and arugula
Yorkshire pudding (recipe below): egg, milk, flour, salt, butter
Olive oil
salt
pepper
fennel seeds if you want.

Peel and cut carrots for roasting (whatever size you want and have time for.  I usually cut a regular carrot into halves or quarters length-wise, then cut them into 1-2 inch long pieces.  Toss with a little olive oil, salt, and pepper and some crushed fennel seeds if you're feeling fancy.  Put on a baking tray, then throw a little water on top - maybe 2-4 T, cover with foil, and bake for 10 min at 400 degrees.  Remove the foil and continue to roast until the carrots are tender.

Core and cut fennel into 1/4-1/2" wide slices, toss with olive oil, salt, and pepper, then roast at 400 degrees.

Cook some brats.

The basic recipe for a yorkshire pudding that I use is:

1 egg
1/2 c milk
1/2 c = 2.25 oz flour*
1/4 t salt.

This makes a good-sized yorkshire pudding for one hungry person if cooked in a 6" skillet.  I usually do it on the stove top: just preheat the skillet under medium low heat, add some butter, pour in the batter, cover with a lid.  Cook until the top of the batter is just set, about 3-5 minutes.  Flip and cook until the underside is slightly browned - another 1-2 minutes.  *Note: We've had good luck using gluten-free all-purpose flour blends.

To serve, put some greens on top of the yorkshire pudding (or next to your yorkshire pudding if you're not quite willing to take my word on this one).  Top with sausage and roasted veggies.  Enjoy.

Seriously, it blends together so well.  And it's easy.  So, it ranks as delicious, nutritious, cheap, and easy - the quad-fecta that I'm always looking for!

Another note: I'm starting to think that you can put just about any leftovers on top of a yorkshire pudding to make a good post-workout breakfast.  We regularly enjoy them cooked with a sprinkle of cinnamon and some melted chocolate chips and/or berries for breakfast or a snack.  They're also amazing as a base for left-over carnitas tacos, and today I threw some left over cheese and corn on top of one and was pretty pleased with the results.  You can also add cut up cooked sausages to the skillet before adding the egg batter to make Toad-in-a-hole.

Choco-coco balls (no bake)

I was inspired to make up this recipe after tasting a cookie Mark got at the coffee shop the other day.  These aren't too sweet, but satisfy any craving for a little bite of chocolate.  They are, of course, gluten free.  They're also super quick and easy to put together, and I think they taste fancy enough that they can be served with something like fruit for a company dessert.

Makes about 10 1-in balls

75 g ground almonds or almond flour 

60 g finely shredded coconut (unsweetened)

28 g maple syrup

16 g (~2  T) cocoa powder

1/4 - 3/8 t. salt

30 g melted coconut oil

Stir everything together in a bowl.  Let it sit for a minute or two.  Press into whatever shape you want - I tend to make 1-in balls.  Cover with plastic to keep them from drying out.

Notes:

- To make the ground almonds, I just throw a couple handfuls of almonds into the food processor.  I store any extra in the freezer for the next time I'm going to make these.  

- The first time I made these I used 60 g of almond flour and 60 g of coconut.  They were really good, very striking, but in some ways too much.  I think upping the almond flour makes them a bit more balanced, but if you like really strong bold flavors you might prefer it with less almond flour. 

- The amount of salt indicated here results in a "salted chocolate" taste.  So, in the midst of coconut and cocoa, you get an occasional taste of salt, in a pleasant way.  If you don't like that taste, use 1/8 t of salt or less.

Serbian cornbread muffins

A Serbian astronomy friend that we met in Madison made these muffins for us last fall, and they very quickly became my staple cornbread recipe.  They're super moist and healthier than regular cornbread.

They're amenable to lots of variations.  The original recipe calls for the addition of feta, which makes them the most eastern European-like.  The kids like them plain.  I like to mix in a handful of chopped pickled jalepenos and queso fresco if I'm serving them with chili.  It's also been really easy to make them gluten free as there is very little regular flour in them.

Depending on your additions, the recipe below makes about 10-12 muffins

3 eggs
1.5 c yogurt
3 T oil
7.5 T flour*
7.5 T (56 g) cornmeal
1 T baking powder
3/4 t salt

Additions: cheese (feta, queso fresco, cheddar) - 1/4 - 1/2 lb, peppers, bacon, etc

*(for gluten free muffins, I use 4.5 T (42 g) of corn flour + 3 T of a 1:1 replacement flour mix

Stir together the wet ingredients, stir together the dry ingredients, add the dries to the wets and mix.  Fold in any additions that you're using.  Bake at 375 for 18-25 min until a toothpick comes out clean.  Note: these tend to stick to regular muffin liners a lot, for some reason.  I use silicon liners, and they pop right out with no mess.  You can also grease your regular foil or paper liners with a spray oil.

Chicken and Sausage Gumbo

Ed gave me a year subscription to Cook's Illustrated for Christmas and it's a game changer.  My goal is to make something new each weekend, so I'm getting good use out of the magazine.  This weekend was chicken and sausage gumbo.  I've never made gumbo before and I'm not even sure I've really had gumbo before, but ya'll...ya need to make this recipe.  I'm telling you...it was so so good.

It takes some time, about 90 minutes, but that's not all active time by any means.  It uses pretty common ingredients.  In fact, we subbed some things because I didn't feel like searching for andouille sausage on this island.  We struck out at Whole Paycheck and decided not to look any further.  Here are the substitutions I made...

chicken thighs - chicken breasts (probably would be even better with thighs though)
andouille sausage - Italian sausage (again, probably awesome with andouille)
fresh thyme - dried thyme
white vinegar - rice vinegar (what the heck, how do I not have white vinegar on hand?)

Despite my lame substitutions, it was great because the secret, I believe, is in the sauce.  It's all about toasting the flour to create a dry roux.  You throw the flour in a cast iron skillet and put it in the oven for about an hour, until it's the color of cinnamon.  That's where all your flavor comes from and holy cow, is it good.  I can't imagine that subbing a gluten free flour would have a negative impact on the final product.  I will say that the gumbo had a velvety texture so it's possible a GF flour would effect that, but I don't know enough about GF to say.

Anyway, here's the recipe.  Give it a shot, I doubt you'll be disappointed.  Oh, one more thing, if you're sensitive to spice, go easy on the cayenne.  I'm pretty sure I measured the cayenne and the final product had some kick to it.  Might be better to go easy and then add more if you need.  Oh and we both thought the addition of hot sauce after serving was awesome.

Ingredients
1 C flour
1 T vegetable oil
1 onion, chopped fine
1 green pepper, chopped fine
2 celery ribs, chopped fine
1 T minced fresh thyme (I used about 3/4 t of dried)
3 garlic cloves, minced
1 t paprika
2 bay leaves
1/2 t cayenne
salt and pepper
4 C chicken broth, room temp
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs, trimmed
8 oz andouille sausage, halved and sliced 1/4 inch thick
6 scallions, sliced thin
1 t distilled white vinegar
hot sauce, to taste for serving

Method

1. Heat oven to 425, adjust rack to middle.  Place flour in 12 inch skillet and bake, stirring occasionally until it's the color of ground cinnamon (approximately 40-55 minutes).  Towards the end it needs to be stirred more frequently.  Transfer to a bowl and let cool.
2. Heat oil in a dutch oven over medium heat until shimmering.  Add onion, pepper, and celery and cook until softened, about 5-7 minutes.  Stir in thyme, garlic, paprika, bay leaves, cayenne, 1/4 t salt, and 1/4 t pepper and cook until fragrant, about 1 minute.  Stir in 2 cups of broth.  Add chicken in a single layer (it won't be completely submerged).  Bring to simmer, reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until chicken is fork tender, about 15-17 minutes.  Transfer chicken to plate.
3. Slowly whisk remaining 2 cups of broth into flour until thick, smooth, batter-like paste forms.  Increase heat to medium and incorporate paste into gumbo, making sure each addition is fully incorporated before adding the next.  Stir in sausage.  Simmer, uncovered, until gumbo thickens slightly, about 20-25 minutes.
4. Shred chicken and put in gumbo with scallions.  Remove pot from heat and stir in vinegar and season with salt to taste (I didn't add any more salt).  Remove bay leaves.  Serve over rice with hot sauce.

It's stick-to-your-ribs good!

Enjoy,

Molly

Spam Musubi

Well, ya' go to Hawaii and what do you have to try?  Spam Musubi, of course.  Ya' come home from Hawaii and what do you have to do?  Buy a Musubi press and try it yourself!

Japanese Style Pickles

If you Google "Japanese Pickle Recipes" there are a number which use rice vinegar, salt, and sugar - seems to form the basis of Japanese pickle making and I look forward to a lot more exploration.  But for now, I started with a recipe for soy/ginger pickled cucumber spears.  That's nor what I made, of course but it is where I started.

The recipe called for pickling cucumber spears and fresh ginger slices in a marinade of rice vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, and toasted sesame oil.  I used a sliced seedless cucumber rather than spears and used some pickled ginger strips which we had picked up at the Asian market in Philly.  These are definitely ginger but not really very tasty, useful for adding to other things but not something you would want to eat by itself.  I substituted apple cider vinegar for rice vinegar because that's what I had and honey for sugar because I prefer it.

The pickling brine consists of
1/3 c. vinegar
1/3 c. soy sauce (I used Kikkomen's)
2 T. sugar (I used honey)
1/4 t. Toasted Sesame Oil



Slice the cuc's and ginger as you want them,

1. Put soy sauce, rice vinegar, sugar and toasted sesame oil in a bowl and stir until sugar has dissolved.
2. Put cucumber and ginger in a ziploc bag and pour vinegar mix on top. Removed air before sealing the bag. Once sealed, lightly massage the cucumber and ginger, making sure the pickling liquid evenly coats all the vegetables.
3. Refrigerate for at least 2 hours and for no more than 12. Drain pickling vinegar and keep the cucumber and ginger pickles in the fridge.

I saved the brine and used it for another batch.

This is about as easy as it gets and the pickles were awesome!

Pretty Good Zucchini Fritters

Did I sell it to you?  Pretty good.

If I'm being honest, I don't use a lot of fancy ingredients anymore, mostly because it's too expensive.  And since the exhaustion of pregnancy and having a newborn hit, I tend to cook pretty darned simply.  It was a miracle that I tried a new recipe last night at all.

That said, these fritters were good and healthy, though nothing fancy.  I made a half recipe and we ate them up.  I recommend the accompanying yogurt sauce.  I made it as written, except I left out the mint because I didn't have any.  Also I wouldn't say that I necessarily measured as much as estimated.

Instead of posting the recipe, I'll just post a link to the blog where I found it.

http://sallysbakingaddiction.com/2015/08/17/zucchini-fritters-with-garlic-herb-yogurt-sauce/

Molly

Fish Quesadilla

I don't think we've had a discussion of quesadillas on the blog yet.  We've taken to making these as a great way to use up small bits of leftovers, especially things like spicy beans.  Or sometimes we will start from scratch with chicken strips and mixed vegetables or some such. 

The other night we got a reasonably good piece of cod fish from the store and ate it broiled with salt, pepper, and lemon juice with baked potato slices and steamed broccoli - very good in a straight up, traditional way.  Last night I sauteed up the left over fish, some left over rice, and fresh asparagus from the  garden with salt, pepper, a little horseradish, and some fresh lemon zest and used it for quesadilla filling.  We use shredded orange cheddar for the cheese cause that's what we tend to have, not too much, don't what to overpower the flavor of the fish.  Served it up with just a little bit of salsa (again, don't overpower) along with a big plate of lightly steamed fresh asparagus (you know what season we're in).  This was a winner.  The lemon zest provided a brilliant  high, light overtone.

Perfect Brownies

I recently developed a brownie recipe that I think yields something that can legitimately be called the perfect brownie.  I've had three independent groups proclaim these to be pretty much the best, so I feel somewhat justified in my claim.  This yields a straight-up chocolate brownie, moist and somewhat fudgy, definitely not dry, but just cakey enough to be different from flourless chocolate cake.

I adapted the recipe from one I found on Epicurious.com (originally published in Gourmet in Oct, 2003), and I applied some principles I learned from the America's Test Kitchen cookbook to get a deep, rich chocolate flavor.

2 sticks (1 c) unsalted butter
8 oz bittersweet chocolate (I use Ghirardelli bittersweet chocolate chips)

1 c white sugar
1/3 c brown sugar
4 large eggs
1 t vanilla
1/2 t instant coffee dissolved in 3/4 t water

7/8 c all purpose flour (1 cup minus 2 T) = 3.94 oz
3/8 c cocoa (1/4 c + 2 T) (I use a mix of dutched and non-dutched cocoa)
1 t baking powder
1/2 salt
1/2 t cinnamon

Melt butter and chocolate over low heat, then remove from heat and whisk in sugar.  Allow to cool briefly, then add eggs one at a time, whisking after each egg until batter is smooth.  Whisk in the remaining wet ingredients.  Stir together the dry ingredients, then add to the chocolate mixture, whisking just until all the dries are incorporated.

Bake in a buttered 8X8" or 10X6" or so baking dish.  I usually line mine with parchment paper and then butter that to make it easy to remove the brownies from the pan.  Bake at 325 degrees for 35-40 min or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out "mostly" clean without any raw batter on it.

Lentils

I had a very Keck moment last night when it came to dinner.  Tom was working late and I wanted to make something that I could make quickly and easily but could be left on the stove for awhile.  One of the food blogs I search had a recipe for lentils and I was inspired.  I really felt like a Keck as I made lentils and rice for dinner.  Even more so when we both loved it.

Anyway, each time we eat lentils, which is somewhat rarely, we always enjoy it and say we should eat more of them.  That's good considering how big of a pot I made last night.  What I made was nothing new or different, but I'm wondering if you all have any standbys that you go to when you need something quick, easy, and healthy (and cheap!).

Here's what I did last night...

Threw some chopped onion, carrot, and potato in a pot with olive oil.  Stirred it around a bit and eventually added some garlic.  Once they were softened, I added turmeric, cumin, coriander, a bit of cinnamon, and cayenne.  Then I added my lentils, chicken broth (could do water), and a can of diced tomatoes.  Once it was almost done, I added some kale to wilt.  Oh and obviously some salt and pepper as you go.

We served that up with some rice (Tom added Sriracha) and really enjoyed our meal.

Anyone else have any lentil recipes?  Or something similar?

Molly

White Beans

Revising write up based on Round 2:

1 med onion
3 large cloves garlic
1 can Navy Beans (or other white beans; I used Great Northern in Round 2)
1 can Diced Tomatoes with Green Chilis
1/2 t. salt or to taste
1/4 t. ground Mustard
1/2 t. dried Rosemary
1/2 t. dried Sage
1/2 t. dried Thyme
1 t. dried Basil
1/8 t. ground Cloves
1 Bay Leaf
2 T. Marsala

Tried this again today with mods based on experience with Round 1:  cut the dried mustard from 1/2 t. to 1/4 t. and tried to pre-wet the dried herb ingredients.  A quick search of the internet suggested alcohol as an edible surfactant suitable for cooking, so I pre-soaked the dry ingredients in 2 T. of Marsala.   "Why Marsala?" and "Why 2 T.?" you ask...'Cause there was a bottle of Marsala with 2 T. left in it in the liquor locker, of course.  I let it soak for about 3 hours just 'cause that's how the timing worked out.  Seems to have solved the problem of running into bits of "dry hay".

The whole point here was to come up with a different seasoning base for beans:  I like cumin but seriously, there has to be another way.  These came out pretty well.  Can't say I won't play around with the mix some more, but they're worth a try.

Marinated Mushrooms

I recognize that this might be the wrong crowd cause most of ya'll have some weird aversion to mushrooms, but has anyone tried making marinated mushrooms?  I guess I'm mostly asking Mom/Dad since most everyone else probably doesn't love them.

I just tried some for the first time this week.  Turned out pretty good, but needs some tweaking.  Here's what I did...

• Boil 8oz of mushrooms until just tender.
• Throw them in a bowl with equal parts olive oil and vinegar.  The recipe I was using called for white wine vinegar but all I had was apple cider.  In the future I would try a different vinegar than apple cider.
• In the bowl add some finely diced red onion, peppercorns, oregano, red pepper flakes, a dash of brown sugar, salt, and minced garlic of course.
• Threw that in a jar and put it in the fridge overnight.  

The result is better today (about 4 days later) than it was the day after.  As mentioned I'd try a different vinegar next time.  I think it could be fun to throw a hot pepper or something in there, but that might be weird. 

Anyway, if you've given it a try, let me know if you had some success.  It was a fun experiment.  I'm going to try it again cause I loooooove marinated mushrooms.

Molly

Polenta Pizza

Had some roasted corn meal mush that needed to be used, some left over (really good) spaghetti sauce that Mom made the other night, and shredded mozzarella that was looking a little peak-ed this morning.  Well, that spells polenta pizza, right?

Sliced and fried the mush (I used coconut oil, of course), warmed the sauce and spread liberally over the fried polenta slices, added shredded mozzarella, also liberally, plus some slice black olives for Mom's, and popped it all in the toaster oven 'til the cheese melted.  Served for breakfast; I dropped a poached egg on it, of course; Mom opted for a fried drain stopper on the side, as usual.

This is awesomer than it has any right to be.  Plus, it's gluten free, grass fed, free range, non-GMO, new-age, kaleless, and just plain-old tasty.