BS: The other recipe thread is too long

Subject: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 01:08 PM

I can't even load it enough to make a blicky to it without going away and coming back.

Blicky.

I did something different with my rabbit: when I cut it up usually I put it all in the stew, then do the take-meat-off-bones bit for the messy pieces.

This time I put all the messy pieces into a small pot with an unpeeled onion, some whole peppercorns, and some sea salt.

The plan had been to take the meat iff those bones and add it to the stew with the rest of the rabbit. Instead I stood there over the sieve and ate all that meat while the stew cooked.

And I ended up with an exact ice-cube tray-full of rabbit broth now freezing up for later cooking.

The stew involved browning the big pieces (dredged in onion powder, garlic powder and paprika, forgetting the salt, oops) in goose fat, deglazing with white wine, adding in onion and lost of garlic, put rabbit back in pot, cover with chopped cabbage, add some chicken broth, into oven. It is smelling marvelous. It will be finished with thyme and parsley.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 02:14 PM

Rabbit can take a largish amount of garlic without it being too much.

The best paté I ever had was a rabbit paté bought in a small shop near the Mont-Saint-Michel. Next time, if you can resist eating it all, you could try making paté with those fiddly bits of meat.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 02:23 PM

Bonzo's recipe was moved over here to make more sense than being a one-off, and in order to still let Mrrzy's post start this recipe thread I've transcribed Bonzo's chronologically earlier post and am adding it here.

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Subject: How to prepare Argentine Asado!!!
From: Bonzo3legs - PM
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 03:28 AM

How to prepare Argentine Asado!!!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 05:43 PM

Ooh I love living alone:

When my stew was done (I totally forgot the thyme and parsley) I fished out the flanks and ate'm, fished out an arm and ate it, and then stood there and, with my fingers, ate all the cabbage off the top.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 07:09 PM

Yeah, Mrrzy. The things you get away with.

I, for example, just ate a Sunday dinner of smoked oysters and crackers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Mar 21 - 07:09 PM

I looked out of the bedroom window this morning at the heavy hoar on the grass and thought to meself: "pot roast."

I had a hunk of brisket weighing in at one kilo. Now I know you yanks like to cook a brisket weighing about ten pounds, but there are only two of us, and my hunk yields enough for two meals.

So I get my smaller Le Creuset, whack up the heat, melt a big knob of butter and brown the meat all round. I stick that to one side and then fry for five minutes some big hunks of carrot, celery and onion. I put the beef on top of that and insert into the pot a bouquet garni (a bunch of fresh parsley, bay leaf and lemon thyme, all tied with string), and add half a pint of beef stock from a cube, half a pint of the soaking water from a handful of dried porcini and half a pint of some home-made veg stock I happened to have lying around. Something of a variable feast, but I reckon you can use whatever liquids you happen to have. It just needs to come well above half-way up the piece of meat. A touch of seasoning, then at least four hours in a very low oven (120C, yanks go figure).

We had that with me home-grown, well-frosted parsnips, roast spuds, cauliflower and a few carrot batons. The gravy in the pot was exquisite, though I extracted enough for two and thickened it ever so slightly with flour. It was a feast to remember, and I have enough beef left for tomorrow with a very buttery jacket spud and some roasted tomatoes.

Good living!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 03:08 AM

beef stock from a cube
Steve, whose cubes do you use? I gave up on Oxo cubes and their ilk after examining the ingredients list: nowadays I use Knorr Stock Pot, which my aging taste buds find not bad.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 04:34 AM

I use the Kallo organic ones, not because I think they have the best flavour (I don't know) but because they're organic. I always make my own veg stock and I usually have enough of my own chicken stock, but I rarely get the chance to make beef stock.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 08:16 AM

I like Better Than Bouillon. Glop, not cubes. Analog rather than digital amount calibration.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 10:10 AM

I find all stock cubes to be too salty. By the time you've used enough cubes you've got too much salt... I used the beef cube in that recipe along with the porcini water, enabling me to use just half of the cube. And I think that Marigold bouillon powder is the spawn of the devil.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 12:22 PM

Things to do when you live alone but cooked a whole rabbit:

Take all the meat off the other arm and put it on a salad. Lettuce cukes almonds, vinaigrette.

Take all the meat off one leg and stuff a pepper.

Eat one leg cold, like cold fried chicken, outdoors in the sunshine, like a picnic.

Make an entirely different stew, curry or something, with the saddle and the liquid from the original stew.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Mar 21 - 07:37 PM

I made the traditional Portuguese soup caldo verde tonight. I had about 150g of dolce chorizo, which I skinned. I chopped up two-thirds of it small and fried it for five minutes in some extra virgin olive oil in my big sauté pan. Then into that pan went some sliced onion and a couple of cloves of smashed garlic (squashed with the flat of a knife blade). While that was softening up I peeled about six good-sized spuds and cut them up into 3/4 inch cubes. The spuds went in the pan along with about a litre of stock (I used half-strength home-made chicken stock, but you can use just water).

After about 15 minutes the spuds were cooked. I carefully fished out about half of them, then I whizzed everything else in the pan until smooth. Then I put the reserved chunks of spud back in along with half a pound of very finely-shredded greens (I had a sweetheart organic cabbage, but anything leafy will do). While that was simmering away (do a seasoning check), I cut the rest of the sausage into thin circles and dry-fried them until quite crispy in a separate frying pan.

Once the greens were cooked I ladled the thick soup into bowls, topped it with the chorizo slices and sprinkled extra virgin olive oil on top. Delicioso!

So far, fairly authentic, though I confess to having cheated in order to make this a hearty meal and not just a big bowl of soup. In Portugal they'd have it with corn bread, but instead of that I threw in a can of cannellini beans with the cabbage. Not exactly purist but begod it did the trick.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 07:04 AM

We don't cook on Wednesdays. It's cheese night, so we have cheese (duh) with matzo crackers (me) or Bath Olivers (she). I must have a neutral crunchy vehicle for my cheese. I can't understand anyone wanting weird herby or seedy crackers which detract from the beautiful cheese. Bread would be a bit too bulky in consideration of the other stuff we eat with the cheese. We have a hunk of Montagnolo d'affine, a soft blue German cheese which is far superior to the dismal Cambozola, and some Wookey Hole cheddar. We scoff that with a selection of nuts, nocellara olives from Sicily (our favourites), caperberries and cherry tomatoes, maybe with a few thin slices of mild chorizo or salami or a sweet potato falafel or three.

But Mrs Steve has a potentially dodgy dental appointment tomorrow, so the crunchy stuff might not be apropos. I have some caldo verde left over from last night which can only improve with keeping. I'll be able to bulk that up quite easily for a bowl of comfort food if she's been under the drill/pliers. The cheese can wait until Friday night, but the wine can't (we're definite wine weekenders with just the Wednesday oasis, which is sacrosanct, a tradition I'd say).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 07:40 AM

I always eat cheese with bread, ever since I lived in France. It has to be decent bread, of course. I can't understand anyone wanting to eat cheese with any kind of biscuit or cracker.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 08:11 AM

Well I love cheese with bread too. My abiding memory of that was one evening after a tough day's teaching in the summer of '76 (remember that one?). A mate and I toddled down to the Angel in Rotherhithe. A couple of pints, crusty bread some home-made pickle and a big slab of strong cheddar - bliss. He hardly drank anything so he was driving. You need mates like that. I slept for twelve hours that night!

We might have bread with cheese of a lunchtime, but there's too much else going on on our cheesy Wednesday night. Matzo crackers are just flour and water, very thin, no salt, no fat, light a feather, 19 calories each - I love 'em!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 02:02 PM

He who controls the Spice controls the Universe

perchance a bit of cheese caused dreams

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Mar 21 - 02:09 PM

I wasn't suggesting that you should set fire to a feather whilst eating your cheese. The burning smell would put you off your food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 06:24 AM

By the way:

"I can't even load it enough to make a blicky to it without going away and coming back."

I just click on the little d next to the number. You have to read upwards but I've got used to doing that after fifteen years...You get the most recent page quickly, no matter how long the thread is.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 08:28 AM

Back to the bread or crackers bit.

Blues or a soft ones like Brie don't usually work too well on bread for me.

I recently found that I liked the combination of Danish Blue on Ryvita but, more generally, I think the plain old cream cracker is as good as anything. I'm not a fan of the "biscuits for cheese" type boxes I sometimes see at Christmas. Most of their contents detract from the taste of the cheese.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 09:52 AM

For softer blue cheeses, I go for St Agur and Montagnolo, which in m'humble are far better than Danish Blue or Cambozola. A nice lump of Gorgonzola hits the mark too, or even Dolcellate, though that's a good one for making a creamy chicken pasta sauce. Last time I went to Gloucester Services they had a huge wheel of Gorgonzola that was so ripe that it could be scooped out with a ladle into a pot. I'm not a big fan of Stilton because it's far too variable and not always that good. A superb blue, which must be freshly cut before it starts to blacken, is Bath Blue. Then there's Stichelton, which is made near where Stilton is made and made in the same way except that unpasteurised milk is used. It's very classy and better than any Stilton I've ever tried.

I find Ryvita to be a real ordeal, like eating a dried loofah. Jacob's crackers are so-so, and you could try Bath Olivers instead (Waitrose?) - they are a bit softer, neutral in taste and uncoloured, a real treat with any cheese.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 09:59 AM

Mrrzy:
You've probably been on here long enough to know, but I thought I'd just comment.
If a thread is too long to load/retain, you can load just the first 50 comments by clicking on the blue 'number of messages' number opposite the title.
Better yet, clicking on the blue 'd' beside that number gives you the most recent 50 messages (in descending order).
These options were introduced to make it easier for people whose systems had problems loading long discussions.
Hope this helps, and that I'm not 'preaching to the converted'.
Cheers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 09:59 AM

I have been wondering how to get back to eating cheeses, without bread or crackers to convey them...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 10:10 AM

Thinly slice an onion, cut a hunk of cheddar into small pieces and put that lot into a baking tray with a splash of milk. Grill for 10 min until all is sloppy and oozy. Nirvana. Failing that, eat the cheese with some cherry tomatoes and some olives and a few slices of salami. For soft cheeses just scoop some up on to a stick of celery or slices of red pepper, cut lengthways.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 10:37 AM

You could eat the cheese with a baked potato - not too hot so as not to melt the cheese rather than just softening it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 11:46 AM

I've got some sea bass fillets. Any suggestions about what to do with them?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 12:01 PM

Hadn't included chilli in my "One-Pot Cooking" for ages but, yesterday, came home from my grocery shop with a Tesco stir-fry medley that included one - half of which I added to the pot (beginning by sautéing the mix, as usual).

Could be quite some time before I add another as, with a tingling stiff-upper-lip (waste not want not), I quietly coughed and burped my way through the pottages - barely noticing the spice mix that I usually enjoy.

In other words, I don't like chilli because I do like spices and veggies/non-chilli non-carne!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 12:24 PM

I've sometimes been tempted by those stir-fry bags but I always vow never to buy them again, as I have to pick over the contents to get rid of all the woody chunks of cabbage stalk.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 12:36 PM

...the rest of the above medley was okay, Jos - baby corn, mangetout, broccoli and salad onion.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Mar 21 - 01:11 PM

SPB, your sea bass fillets. When we have sea bass or another tasty slab of fish we sometimes have it on a bed of lentils. Chop up an onion and some celery and fry until softened in extra virgin olive oil with some herbs (thyme and a bay leaf is good) and a clove of garlic that you've squashed with the flat of a knife blade. Add a glass of white wine and let it bubble for a minute. Stir in some green or brown lentils, a small handful of porcini mushrooms that you've soaked and chopped up, a big glug of tomato paste and some vegetable stock. Simmer it all until the lentils are done, half an hour maybe. Adjust the seasoning and add more stock if needed. When you're nearly there with that, cook the fish very simply by frying it in hot olive oil. Skin side down for about four minutes (hopefully you'll get the skin crispy) then flip it for two more minutes. Lay the fish skin side up on top of the lentils on plates. If you've got some fresh parsley, chop some up and sprinkle over the grub. Lovely job.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 01:38 PM

When it comes to food preparation I am utilitarin and cheap. It has to be instant or quick and easy like chocolate or peanut butter and fruit sandwiches. So for lunch today I noticed a nice avocado. I smashed it together with about 1/3 tangy tarter sauce and spread it on open faced pumpernickle. One slice got color and heat with a light sprinkle of spiracha and the other a mild smoked paparika. Slice into squares. Salt to taste.
I thought it was good with horse radish cheese and a can of Lemomatta.

Steve if you eat alot of fish, your carbon 14 test will indicate you are a hundred years older than you are. But why do they call it brain food?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 02:54 PM

I eat a lot of fish because I like fish. Tomorrow we are having Skrei cod, the best cod I've ever had. Our lovely fishmonger Tracey gets it in every Thursday in season (Jan to April) and she saves the thickest fillets for me if I ask her. Mrs Steve is in a delicate buccal state, having just had a somewhat complicated extraction, so it's soft food for now. But soft food does not mean bland. I'll simply fry the fish, in butter I should think, and we'll have it with fluffy mash instead of chips. Greens of some kind, not too crunchy, and I'll make some parsley sauce á la Delia Smith. I've been known, when the mood takes me, to marinade white fish for a short while in a mix of extra virgin olive oil, freshly-squeezed lemon juice, fresh thyme and a touch of fresh garlic. When the Skrei goes out of season I'll be waiting with bated breath for the red mullet to come in. We also eat mucho tuna and smoked mackerel. Hake, halibut, skate, dabs, anything. Even Alaskan pollack, which tastes great although it goes a bit off-white when baked. And salmon. Only ever wild red Pacific salmon. I will not buy any fish that has been farmed.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jack Campin
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 03:21 PM

The oldest recipes in the world

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 06:10 PM

Only a few millennia, forsooth!

No, but, fun article.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 11 Mar 21 - 07:38 PM

I'll pass on the carob but the chicken looks great.

Licorice and citron what a blast!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 09:56 AM

Among the few things I regret about moving from Ottawa to Stratford is the lack of a decent fishmonger anywhere in sensible driving distance. Ottawa is a big city with an airport, so ocean fish is flown in every day; here, not so much. Now, fish comes in two kinds: farmed and frozen, with the exception (in season) of lake trout and pickerel from Lake Huron. Even the mussels and oysters are farmed, raised in the coastal waters of Prince Edward Island.

It's enough to drive one to canned sprats. Almost.

A friend from the gym gave us a "paleo" cookbook a couple of years ago, but I have yet to try any of the recipes. When I flipped through it, I was discouraged by the many dishes with ingredients I would have to hunt and gather in faraway places such as Kitchener and London, Now that I'm usually feeding only myself (and the cats), such expeditions are vanishingly unlikely. I have a hard enough time moving my arse to Sobey's once a fortnight for oranges, yoghourt, milk, and frozen veg.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Mar 21 - 07:15 PM

I remember what that self-sufficiency guru, John Seymour, said about raising free-range pigs, in as happy an environment that we could provide for them (which he did). I can't recall the exact quote, but he said that the good-life pig he'd grown for food that he was about to kill was happily munching away on roots one minute and in heaven the next. That's how we should think, I suppose, about wild ocean fish. I guess it takes them longer to die than John's pig, but it's hard to see how we could do it better. For me, it's no farmed fish, only wild, and fish only caught by sustainable methods that don't involve by-catch or wrecking the sea floor. That'll do me. Suit yourself.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 05:03 AM

Not sure if Chinese wet-markets, where fish, etc., are kept alive for freshness (photos from a Either way, for those who have never tried tofu, or not had it a second time because it was "too bland", I challenge you to try this:

Heat some vegetable oil in a frying pan before adding some soft tofu, then soy sauce. Place that mix atop some toast and, perhaps, mop up the remaining oil/sauce with another piece.

Imagine the most creamy scrambled egg you ever had and a chook with a sore rear...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 06:23 AM

Well I wouldn't buy fish that way, but you don't know that that's where coronavirus came from. For scrambled egg for just me, I beat up three eggs with salt and pepper. No milk. The beating is gentle only. I get a nonstick small frying pan (£3.99 Lidl) and melt a big knob of butter on high heat. In goes the egg mix, then straight away off goes the heat but leave the pan on the ring. Mush that around mercilessly with a spatula until it's underdone. Then go over to your buttered toast and slap it on. The eggs are in the pan for less than a minute. They should be soft and creamy with no runny bits. We all have our own way. I've never eaten tofu and probably never knowingly will. Make sure they didn't chop down too much rain forest to produce the soya beans.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 06:39 AM

Yes, Steve - much of the sad slash-and-burn that has destroyed large areas of rainforest in South America has been for growing soya beans...but not sure how much of the produce is for livestock vs. human feed..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 07:08 AM

I'm doing a risotto tonight. For two of us, very generous portions, I use 300g risotto rice (I have carnaroli). I need about 700 ml stock, which will be half home-made chicken stock and half the water from boiling the veg I'm going to include. So I'll start by boiling some tenderstem, some peas and some green beans, a handful of each, in unsalted water, keeping that water and setting the cooked veg aside.

I'll dry-fry 100 g of chopped pancetta until nearly crispy in my smaller Le Creuset casserole. To that I'll add some thinly sliced onion and a bit of butter if there's not quite enough fat. I want the onion soft but not coloured. Then I'll add some fresh thyme and the rice, stirring to coat the grains with fat. Then in goes a small glass of white wine. I'll turn up the heat to get that bubbling, and then...

...And then I cheat shamelessly. I'll add 600 ml of my hot stock all at once, stir it in, get it to a simmer then put the lid on and forget it for 15 minutes.

The next step is crucial. I'll remove the lid and stir and beat the rice like a lunatic for about three minutes. This gets it nice and creamy, as though I hadn't cheated at all. It also very reliable in getting the rice perfectly al dente every time, not the easiest thing with risottos. And it means I get to sit down for 15 minutes, preferably with an aperitif (come on, it's Saturday), instead of standing over the stove adding bits of stock and stirring until my arm nearly drops off.

In goes some seasoning and the reserved veg to heat through. Then in go a big dollop of creme fraiche (butter if you like), two big handfuls of grated Parmesan and a good sprinkling of fresh parsley (or not, Maggie). If it's all a bit too stiff add a bit more hot stock.

It can sit for a few minutes while you pour out the vino, then ladle into bowls and eat it in front of the telly. Good living!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 08:20 AM

Alpro, who make soya milk as well as lots of other stuff, mostly get their soya beans from Europe or Canada. They have claimed in the past not to get them from felled rain forest areas. If I were buying tofu (unlikely, as I only eat actual food), I would be checking its source. Incidentally, I buy lots of their unsweetened oat milk but not the soya milk. On offer in Sainsbury's for a quid at the moment.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 08:29 AM

...in terms of limiting food-miles, oat milk (which I didn't like a few years ago but should probably try again) is more environmentally friendly for us in England...although, I seem to recall a Country File article looking at growing a variety of soya bean here..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 09:07 AM

Tofu here is mostly from Twin Oaks, one of the few remaining working communes. But no, I don't eat it either.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 09:42 AM

I saw someone on the telly making Parmesan crisps the other day. I'm going to make some this evening. They look like the kind of thing I would eat 50 of in an unstoppable frenzy. I'll keep you posted...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 10:13 AM

Steve,

lentils don't appeal to me, but cooking in white wine + a medley of wild forest mushrooms does. I have two jars of dried mushrooms from a Czech forest.....

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: SPB-Cooperator
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 10:16 AM

The cooking times are important.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 11:52 AM

The biggest danger is overcooking fish because you're not confident that it's cooked through. With fish the price it is, that would be a tragedy. Total frying time for sea bass fillets would be no more than 5-6 minutes in all at medium heat. I fried two very thick cod fillets last night. Five minutes skin side, two minutes top side. It was perfect done like that.

There are lentils and lentils. I usually fall back on the little brown puy lentils, but what I really want is the Italian green Castelluccio lentils. I've had trouble finding those. The green jobs that seem to come from Canada are not a patch.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 11:53 AM

I tried the lentil recipe (adapted to suit what I had to hand) with my sea bass last night. I wasn't sure about the lentils but it was surprisingly good. Thank you Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 13 Mar 21 - 12:08 PM

Mine were brown lentils, but I'm not sure if they were Puy ones as they were in an unlabelled jar as the previous wrapping had split.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 11:30 AM

Not sure if others have a better memory for the taste of foods than events, etc., but I just had my first (stoned!) date for what must be at least 3 decades, and the toffee-like taste was most-familiar and not unpleasant.

Got them as a change from sultanas on my shop last week - but honestly can't remember why..?!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 11:47 AM

...I remember now - it was seeing groves of date palms on cycling's UAE Tour.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 02:29 PM

I keep misreading Puny Lentils.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 04:37 PM

After a cock-up last night, I've perfected my Parmesan crisps. Heat the oven to 180C. Get a big baking tray and cover it with baking paper. Grate Parmesan finely. Put heaped tablespoons of cheese on it at regular intervals. They can be quite close together because they won't spread. Persuade each blob of cheese gently into a disc about two inches across. Don't sweat it but make the discs roughly equally thick all the way across. The cooking time is crucial. Ten minutes, too much, burnt flavour. Eight minutes, pretty good. I might try seven next time, but eight was good. Very nice with the Prosecco aperitif. In fact, we devoured them. I can just see me of a summer night by the barbie, burgers and bangers a-sizzling, quaffing the fizz with a plate of Parmesan crisps and a bowl of nocellara olives... Nirvana calling!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 04:52 PM

...not sure if that can be done with any of the vegan cheeses currently available, but I know Violife (with coconut oil) slices make a pretty good grilled cheese on toast - sometimes sprinkled with mixed herbs but always with tomato sauce, for me.

Maybe you could try a sprinkle of herbs next time, Steve..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Mar 21 - 05:01 PM

I'm not talking about cheese on toast. This is Parmesan on its own, made into crisps. Whatever "vegan cheese" is, and I won't be looking it up, it isn't cheese. Incidentally, Parmesan can never be vegetarian. If calf rennet isn't used, it can't be called Parmesan. I will not be consuming cheese with herbs added any time soon. The reason for this, as hundreds of my posts here will testify, is that I seek out the best cheese I can find, and I will not adulterate good cheese. Even if I have it on toast.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 12:56 PM

Mad household panic yesterday as our kitchen floor was inundated with water from an extremely inaccessible leaking pipe. Our plumber, after mucho turning of the air blue* - we're well used to him, and Mrs Steve knew him as a little lad in the primary school she taught in :-) - he managed after several hours to fix it, a few traumas on the way but without dismantling the whole kitchen.

So. I grabbed a bag of my bolognese sauce from the freezer, fried a chopped-up red pepper and some cherry toms and threw them into the sauce along with some dried ancho chilli and a dusting of hot chilli powder. A good dose of dried oregano also went in. We had that with boiled basmati rice, a blob of creme fraiche (we didn't have any soured cream or guacamole) and a sprinkling of El Paso green jalapeños from a jar.

Delicious. We'll be doing it again, panic or no panic!

Plumber quotes:

*"Oh f**k, I haven't got half the f**king kit I need to do this..."

"What the f**k have I f***ing done with that f***ing pipe bend..."

"Sh*t, I f***ing hate water...I'm a f***ing plumber and I f***ing hate f***ing water..."

"B***ocks, I can't f***ing do this b*st**d, what the f**k am I gonna f***ing do?"

"Jesus, it's a right f**king game is this..."

etc...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 04:10 PM

Things not to want to hear, like Oops from you surgeon, during surgery.

Did a lazy thing: got a container of lobster bisque from Wegman's soup bar, and some salmon and some tuna from the sushi counter. Fried an onion in butter with some cayenne, added the fish, deglazed with a smidge of white wine, added the bisque, brought to almost-boil. Chopped the daikon radish garnish on top. Yum.

Saved the hot mustard and ginger.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 05:09 PM

...re the language, you don't mind telling me to put a plug in it, Steve!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 06:16 PM

I don't recall railing against your language...?

That's right, Mrrzy, not quite what one wants to hear, but, as I said, we're used to him, and we know it helps him to fight through and get the job done...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 07:06 PM

Yesterday I was at my discount gourmet grocery and they had some large lovely unsliced loves of some kind of French bread, wrapped two to a parcel. I bought two of these, thinking I'd keep one for myself and donate the other three loaves to the community fridge I help stock. When I got to the fridge I realized I couldn't unwrap the pair without leaving the other one looking exposed or not professionally packaged by the store. So I donated both double packages and this morning made myself a loaf of my usual whole wheat/white flour mix bread. And on this bright but cool windy day I've finally started a pot of lentil soup for myself. I've been meaning to make some for a while, but kept putting it off. It smells wonderful! I'll probably have some pollock (floured, sauteed in butter, with lemon) along with my soup and a salad and another slice of bread.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 21 - 08:58 PM

Gotta keep eating the fish! We eat tons of fish, smoked mackerel from the supermarket, unsalted tuna sandwiches, tuna with pasta, that lovely sockeye wild salmon from the cold Pacific, at least one dollop per week of (usually) chunky white fish from Tracey, our lovely fishmonger half a mile away at the beach house shop... It costs us, but bejaysus, if we didn't support the local fishmonger, we'd lose her... I'll eat any fish with relish...

In the last nine months I've had two really serious bouts of cellulitis, which totally pees me off. On Monday I have to have a blood test at my doc's behest to see if I have diabetes, which I haven't got. Sheesh. I shall eat fish and eschew puddings the night before. And no booze. I have cod. I have peas to mush. I have organic spuds to chip. I feel really well. Bugger the medics, eh...? Grr...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 01:24 AM

Neat new St Paddy idea: arrange fruit on round platter into concentric arcs of colors for the rainbow, with a little pile of golden something to one side for the pot of gold.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 03:25 AM

Mustard?????

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 05:22 AM

What will you use for the blue fruit?

A rainbow salad might be easier. A bit of cold cooked red cabbage goes a lovely clear blue.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 09:18 AM

Carrot and ginger soup today. It’s spring, so the onions are sprouting in their bin — time to use them or lose them.

The beer fridge has gone to the town dump, so my cache of frozen soup stock is now in the chest freezer. When moving it, I noted two litres of ham stock. The last time I boiled up a ham bone was well before the pandemic began, so I guess I had better use that.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 10:44 AM

Blueberries.

Not sure what the little orange fruit were. Smaller than grapes, bigger than blueberries. Had a kind of dark spot at one end, like a stem scar or strawberry seed thingie.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 11:01 AM

The fish was disappointing. I tried every way I could to see the contents of the box and it just said wild-caught pollock, but I think it was treated with that sodium tri -long name stuff that holds water. It was a sodden mess once it thawed. I'm going to have to thaw on a wire rack and see if that helps the liquid drain from the fish. One of the most dishonest treatments of fillets is to soak them in water with this chemical then freeze them and get a lot more per pound for that extra water.

The soup was great. The Lebanese restaurant where I first ate it serves it with some toasted strips of pita bread that I'd like to figure out how to fix next.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jeri
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 01:53 PM

Mrrzy, kumquat? They look kinda like "honey, I shrunk the oranges."

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jeri
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 02:00 PM

I can't stand repeating things too much, but I'm stuck on one recipe for sea bass.
Let it sit for a while with granulated (this is dried and chopped/ground/little-ized. It IS garlic, so THERE! And fresh doesn't work when coating the fish with it) garlic and salt. Let it sit, then fry it. I melt some butter, and add lemon, and pour it over the fish, and take 30 seconds to eat it. (Really, it's longer than that.)
The problem is that's so good, I don't want to try anything else. I love the fish. It's a very non-fishy fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 03:41 PM

Bingo, Jeri!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 04:12 PM

If I'm going to bake fish in the oven uncovered, I make a marinade containing extra virgin olive oil, fresh lemon juice, sprigs of fresh lemon thyme, a tiny dash of Tabasco and a clove of garlic that I've bashed with my fist. The fish gets a garlic kiss which is just right, but you're not eating bits of actual garlic. The marinade is just for about half an hour. Just before baking I might get a piece of kitchen towel and soak some of the marinade off the top of the fish, which avoids too much liquid sitting in the fish after cooking. It doesn't matter if you're frying and flipping. I don't want salt anywhere near the fish until it's in the pan, and even then not much.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 07:44 PM

Sounds like ceviche, Steve Shaw. Yum.

I seared a steak and while it was resting put some white wine to deglaze then added the mushroom sauce I had made with some onion garlic cayenne pickles and some Dijon mustard. Served with sour cream. Strogonoffesque. Yum. Some rabbit broth cubes to add a little liquid.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 07:46 PM

Forgot ... The mushrooms were sautéed in snail butter, of course.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 08:00 PM

..and the steak was seared in duck fat..

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 08:15 PM

Ceviche? Er, did you see the bit at the beginning of my post when I said I did it before baking the fish??

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jeri
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 09:47 PM

I was wondering why you baked the ceviche'd fish, but decided not to get involved. Your fish. :)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 10:04 PM

It was just a marinade! Anyway, as I've often said, one man's fish is another man's poisson. If the oven's on anyway, if you're doing home-made oven chips for example, open-baking a chunky piece of skin-on fish (as opposed to wrapping it in foil) is an excellent way of cooking it, and that bit of marinade adds subtle flavour and stops the top from drying out. You can even push the chips to one side (or put them on another tray), once they're nearly done, and just sit the fish on the oily tray for six or seven minutes. And come on, folks. Why are you using garlic dust on your fish when beautiful fresh garlic is so easy to obtain and use? A house without lovely, plump garlic bulbs is like a pub with no beer!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Mar 21 - 10:44 PM

Ceviche IS just a marinade. The lemon cooks the fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 05:25 AM

Ye gods...

A MARINADE FOR CHUNKY FISH (cod, hake, haddock, etc.)

Sufficient for two skin-on fillets. Mix together the juice of half a lemon, a glug of extra virgin olive oil, a sprig or two of lemon thyme (leaves picked if you can be arsed), three drops of Tabasco and a peeled clove of garlic that you've squashed but not chopped. Put this into a shallow bowl and put the fish in it for half an hour before you bake it, turning once or twice. Only season the fish, lightly, immediately before cooking.

Viola!

I will devour smoked mackerel, but smoked salmon in this country is invariably an inferior product made from farmed fish and I avoid it. I will not eat other forms of raw fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 06:37 AM

I'd been wondering what "snail butter" was (it sounds revolting), so I looked it up. I am relieved to discover that it neither contains nor originates from snails. It's just garlic and herb butter.
What a relief.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 07:20 AM

I can't imagine what I'd ever use that for. The only time I'll ever "mince" garlic is when I make pesto, and then only half a clove.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 07:43 AM

You should try gravadlax Steve, I make my own along with pickled herrings, the gravadlax recipe was originaly a salmon recipe but you can use it for any oily fish and it's always great I use it for sea trout and rainbow trout which I catch myself. Although I catch brown trout [ not on purpose ] I never kill them.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 12:28 PM

I can't think that I'd ever want to sully a lovely bit of wild red salmon by doing that to it. I don't buy any other kind of salmon. Can't say that I fancy it, Dave.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 04:26 PM

Jos, sorry! Yeah garlic parsley butter *for* snails. I make and freeze it in a long log, so when I want some I slice off a round. A Kerrygold butter amount usually lasts a couple of months.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 04:52 PM

Kerrygold? Grease.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 08:04 PM

I cooked a big pot of Elizabeth David's boeuf en daube today, to be consumed tomorrow evening with our bubble friend. Any stew or daube is ten times better the next day, which is the aim. That was enough cooking for one day, so we fraternised a new fish and chip outlet, Potters, in Bude tonight. Cod in beer batter, chips triple-fried in beef dripping and, of course, mushy peas. It's a restaurant which can't open right now, so they've done the enterprising thing of temporarily converting to a chippy takeout. It was superb. The daube tomorrow, probably untraditionally, will be consumed with mash and some greens. Despite the lack of liquid additions in the recipe, lots of rich gravy is always produced. The recipe is in her book French Provincial Cooking. You really must use the right beef, top rump, cut into little steaks about two or three inches square. The dish is easy, and it's a masterpiece.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 08:09 PM

You don't have to buy the book just for that. It's on the Guardian website if you google something like "Guardian Elizabeth David daube." Scroll down the rather lengthy article until you reach Rick Stein's bit!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jeri
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 08:42 PM

There's a cultured butter out of Vermont I'm currently in love with. Kerrygold isn't bad, but the Vermont stuff is out of this world. (Maybe we should have a butter thread?)

The weirdest/best thing I did with salmon (it will surely offend someone) is poach it in liquid, the contents of which I don't even remember. I know there was scotch in it. Talisker 10-year old.(Iif the poaching doesn't offend, that surely will.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 08:55 PM

I've poached cod fillets in milk many times. It's wonderful with mash, home-made parsley sauce and something green. Best thing on earth if you happen to have toothache. The only thing I ever do with salmon is fry it in butter or cut it into small chunks and add it at the last minute to a spicy arrabbiata sauce, in which it's cooked in under two minutes. I'm never going to be buying pink salmon or any farmed salmon, and I always ask.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jeri
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 09:27 PM

I should stay out of these recipe threads. I'm really craving a nice piece of wild-caught salmon right now. I watch the TV show "The Last Alaskans", and they catch a massive amount of salmon to FEED THEIR SLED DOGS over the winter! Even when I was younger, I'd be crap at pulling a sled, but...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Mar 21 - 09:36 PM

It's expensive, but you don't have eat it that often.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 12:54 PM

I am trying something different because my farmer's market had duck eggs.

Fried some onions in snail butter and hot peppers. Into bowl.

Fried some mushrooms in same pan, with thyme. Into same bowl.

Fried some bacon. Decided it was too sweet, set aside, wiped out pan.

Wilted spinach in the pan. Ate bacon while doing that. Into bowl.

Mixed contents of bowl, then into over-safe dish previously greased with some goose grease.

Beat 2 duck eggs in bowl, poured over veg. Used utensil to push sticking-up bits down into egg.

Grated some cheddar for the top.

Into toaster oven at 350°F.

Not sure if it is a crustless quiche or a frittata or what.

Will report back.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 01:11 PM

Checked: it is pouffy but not browned yet. Smells marvy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 02:38 PM

Just reminded of this whilst watching Jane McDonald cruising in Australia, and stopping for a pie topped with mashed potato, mushy peas, then gravy in a kind of well made by first pressing the ladle into the pile.

I used to work making wire ware in Adelaide, South Australia, with a chap who, every lunchtime, would follow the same routine so closely it may impress a Geiko in Kyoto practising chado/the Japanese tea ceremony:

He would neatly cut off the top of his pie, drench it with tomato sauce, before neatly placing the pastry lid back on.

(And I bet I've made your weekend with that bit of info!)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Mar 21 - 03:36 PM

It was meh. But fun to make. I think it was closer to a frittata than a crustless quiche.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Mar 21 - 01:01 PM

Took a bite of the leftovers on my way to make something yummy, and it was WAY better. Go figure.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 22 Mar 21 - 11:05 AM

I know that daube, Steve. "French Provincial Cooking" was my first really good cookbook (still have it), and Elizabeth David is up there in my pantheon with Marcella Hazan.

I made a batch of carrot-and-ginger soup yesterday that will do me for lunches until maybe Friday. The kitchen was still deliciously scented with onions sauteed in butter when I got up this morning. Great way to start the day.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Mar 21 - 11:29 AM

I made a Spanish tortilla last night, more or less following Jamie Oliver. The spuds I used were all wrong, too soft and grainy. But I ate the leftovers for lunch today and it was thoroughly delicious. I haven't been and gone and figgered yet...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Mar 21 - 08:05 PM

I know this isn't a recipe, but I've just eaten a guilty late-night tablespoon of Morrison's crunchy peanut butter straight from the jar (own up: it isn't just me...). I read the label: no added salt, no added sugar, no palm oil, 100% peanuts. That'll do me, I thought. Then I read the back label: "ALLERGENS: may contain nuts..."

"May." Bwahahaha!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: keberoxu
Date: 22 Mar 21 - 09:58 PM

Boeuf en daube:

I can never see the words Boeuf en daube
without thinking of
To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf:


The boeuf en daube was a complete triumph.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Mar 21 - 11:08 PM

During the afternoon I considered the contents of the refrigerator and was planning to make pasta and put a sauce with meat and cheese over it. But then it got really stormy and rainy and I decided to keep it simple. I have homemade bread from over the weekend so I made a couple of thick slices of French toast (bread soaked in egg and fried) and bacon. Comfort food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 23 Mar 21 - 12:39 PM

I wanted to have a play in the kitchen so I've made Rum Babas for my good lady and have some to take to my son and his family. Complete with Chantilly Cream.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 23 Mar 21 - 01:58 PM

As usual a prosaic recipe
for tuna salad;
I found that two very strong flavors sort of cancel each other out.

I mix 2 tbl spoons of strong horseradish with four cans of albacore tuna and mayo equivalent to 1/2 the mixture. I add diced and equal amounts of ; thick onion slice, colored peppers and 1/2 dill or half sour pickle equivalent to the whole mixture. I add a teaspoon of Coleman mustard or a bit more of another kind of mustard. Mix well. The taste is veggie dominant and the tuna is the smooth almost bland protein. Experiment with a seasoning like Peruvian chicken or spiracha for a kick.
Tricking the pallette is even more dynamic by eating Miracle Fruit followed by drinking lemon juice which then tastes sweet with no sourness whatsoever.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 09:26 AM

Have a giant yak steak. Salted it, fried it in a cast-iron pan with a smidge of goose fat. Ran out of patience, so ate the 4 rare edges and kept the way-too-rare insides.

Today will thinly slice some of that too-rare meat and marinate it for a while, then put it on a salad for my lunch. I am thinking lime-citrus, à la ceviche, for the marinade. With hot peppers of course. Garlic.

Have not decided what to do for the next 2-3 meals. Maybe a stroganoff, and a stir-fry, and a soup. Ideas welcome...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 11:43 AM

About that label, Steve. Peanuts are not actually nuts. The allergen warning means that the peanut butter may contain traces of true nuts from equipment in the plant.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 11:51 AM

Grrr, you'd have thought that I should have spotted that, with my botany degree an' all... :-( Although I can't help thinking that most people wouldn't know that peanuts are not really nuts...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 12:34 PM

Severe food allergies are now so common that you'd have trouble finding a Canadian who can't tell you precisely how a peanut differs from a tree nut. Anyone who cooks is gonna know, likewise anyone who shops for groceries, anyone who works in a restaurant, anyone who works in food preparation of any kind, anyone who has children or routinely spends even a little time with children ... That's a lot of people.

Brit mileage may vary, but I doubt it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Apr 21 - 01:58 PM

I am truly humbled.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 08:48 AM

Knowledge tells you a tomato is a fruit. Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

There is likely a similar couplet about peanuts and nuts...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 08 Apr 21 - 12:13 PM

We had barbecued pork last night. Well, faux BBQ'd pork.

I'm tired a lot, and now I cook so as to save time and clean-up. So about two weeks ago I put a 9-pound pork shoulder roast in the oven at low heat and cooked it until it was flavorful, moist and exquisitely tender. Timing was mostly a matter of dumb luck - I'll have to do something about that.

The day I roasted it, I was eager to get to the Mudcat singaround, so I didn't put a single thing on the meat. I cut it in half for easier handling. No salt, no garlic, no herbs, no parsley.... I simply lined a big pan with parchment paper (for easy clean-up), put in the meat and forgot about it from 1:30 till 7 pm. It was delicious.

The DH helped cut it up, and we froze most of it. Last night I grated the peel off an an orange with my nifty microplane and added it to a bottle of BBQ sauce from a favorite restaurant. Thawed some of that pork, added the orangey sauce and roasted it at 300 F for about 2 hours. This heated the meat, melted the fat and browned the outside just enough.

Parchment paper under the meat made clean-up a lot more fun. Whole-wheat rolls from the grocery store, homemade cole slaw and avocados completed the ensemble. Only the cole slaw took an effort, but that wasn't much, so it was a delicious and easy meal.

I could have made my own BBQ sauce, but I'd already used the tomato paste to make Chicken Cacciatore in the slow cooker, another easy recipe.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Apr 21 - 04:10 PM

Ok, now I am *really* hungry!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 12:38 AM

heh heh (chuckles evilly)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 08:39 PM

Which would you have chosen, farmed never frozen, or wild defrosted, salmon?

Put sone snail [garlic parsley] butter on tin foil, put salmon on butter and more butter on top, into tpaster oven at 350F for 12 mn. Meanwhile sautéed some pearled cauliflower in more snail butter (using up tail end) with a little salt and hot pepper. Served fish on veg with squeezes of lemon and a handful of almonds.

Glass o' kir to go with. My state liquor store had some locally-produced crème de cassis (blackcurrant liqueur) to my amazement. It doesn't taste quite *right* but is nonetheless delicious, and it has *the* most amazingly *beautiful* color I have ever seen in a drink. I mean almost a shame to drink it, it is so pretty.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Apr 21 - 08:57 PM

If you buy any farmed fish you are contributing big time to pollution of our oceans. You will also be buying inferior fish that most likely has been treated against the parasites that overcrowding causes. Defrosted frozen fish is just as good as the fresh version. I won't buy any fish that I suspect is not wild fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Apr 21 - 04:05 PM

I am with you on that, Steve Shaw. I got the wild-caught. Curious about others' thoughts on the taste, too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Apr 21 - 02:48 PM

Serendipity strikes...

Put some oil on a tinfoil square with the edges turned up, and put a bunch of spinach on it. Put a frozen swordfish filet on top, buttered on top and bottom. A sprinkle of hot pepper on top, into toaster oven @ 350F. After 15 mn flipped the fish, after another 10 put the fish on a plate and covered it with the spinach I had expected to be wilted, like every other time I have done this.

It wasn't.

It was crisp. It was crunchy. I have never encountered *crunchy* spinach. It was marvy. What did I do and can I do it again?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 22 Apr 21 - 08:54 PM

Put the toaster oven on 450, not 350? When you think back, did the dish seem extra hot when you removed it from the toaster oven?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Apr 21 - 11:09 PM

No, and the fish was cooked as if it was at its usual temp...

Has anyone made crispy cooked spinach?

I tried pommes anna tonight to feed to someone and have a bite of, it wasn't flippable without coming apart because I wanted to use my cocotte which was too deep, but yum.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 12:53 AM

Curiouser and curiouser. I just had flounder at a French restaurant, and it had crispy parsley on top. So you're not alone, Mrrzy.

Yesterday I watched Gordon Ramsey make an "authentic Italian dish" on YouTube. A sort of fritatta I guess. Onions, eggs, Italian sausage, parmesan cheese and mozzarella in a skillet.

The comments were all "oh wow!" except for mine. I wrote, "How much salt is there in this dish? There's salt in the eggs, sausage and both cheeses, then you added salt yourself."

When I cook, I don't put salt in anything. The DH doesn't like it, and he worries about his blood pressure. So I leave it out. If a diner wants salt, there's a salt shaker on the table. I may put a little on my meat, but not on the other dishes. Nobody seems to miss it, neither guests or family.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 02:50 AM

"There's salt in the eggs ..."

Do you mean he put salt in the eggs as well as adding salt himself?
Eggs re not naturally salty - unless US eggs are somehow produced differently from what English hens lay.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 09:50 AM

Well I do most of the cooking in our house. I have a low tolerance for overly salty dishes (though I'll make exceptions for bacon and salted pistachios). If I'm boiling pasta or potatoes, I taste the cooking water just before draining. If I think it's too salty I'll replace some of the water with freshly boiled water. Everyone gets served up food that's seasoned to my taste. I can't remember the last time anyone added extra salt. Manufacturers of ready meals use salt to disguise their inferior quality ingredients. If you use only good quality ingredients you don't need much salt added and it's amazing how some fresh herbs can "replace" salt. But you do need a bit of salt a lot of the time if the food's going to taste good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 10:48 AM

I agree. A bit of salt. Of course, we need a certain amount simply to survive. I know of people who have been hospitalized because they lacked salt.

However, I don't like the typical YouTube chef's habit of picking up a tiny bowl with looks like a tablespoon of salt in it and plopping it unmeasured into a dish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 10:52 AM

"According to the American Heart Association (AHA), the minimum physiological requirement for sodium is less than 500 mg a day — or less than the amount in one quarter of one teaspoon of table salt. For most Americans, eating this little sodium is near impossible."

The Food and Drug Administration says to limit salt to 2300 mg per day. I wonder about children though. How much is too much for them?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 11:04 AM

Another exception is parmesan crisps. In fact, I've just made a tray of them to be nibbled with our aperitif ce soir. Get a big baking tray and line it with greaseproof paper. Put little piles of grated Parmesan, heaped tablespoon-size, all over it. Big gaps not needed. Bake at 180C for seven minutes. Maybe eight. Careful - a minute too long and they burn. Very nice with a bowl of olives and an Aperol spritz.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 11:10 AM

Leeneia - you reminded of something I really dislike about some television chefs (I don't bother with YouTube chefs).

They have all their ingredients laid out ready in little dishes, and then add about four-fifths of each into whatever they are making. Why? Why not put the right amount in each dish to start with? I imagine all those left-over bits just get thrown away.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Apr 21 - 04:34 PM

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/trisha-yearwood/strawberry-rhubarb-crostata-5171696
Its good with some crushed almonds or a few drops of almond extract.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Apr 21 - 02:05 PM

Jos, I agree. I've always thought the wee dishes are twee. I haven't noticed the waste. Maybe it doesn't go on all the time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Apr 21 - 08:31 AM

I agree with Jos too. And they should taste their food, too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 28 Apr 21 - 07:35 PM

What salt will do in older people is to stop elasticity in blood vessels of all sizes. The complications should be obvious.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 May 21 - 09:24 AM

Time to collect all Epicurious beef recipes, eh?

Meanwhile anyone have a new idea for pork chops?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 May 21 - 10:16 AM

Delia Smith's way with pork chops is hard to beat. You need thick-cut chops with most of the fatty rind removed. Get a big frying pan and brown the chops all round in butter. Put the chops on a big piece of tinfoil on a baking tray and season. Add a sprig of fresh thyme (fresh, d'you hear?). I use two layers of foil. Fry some chopped mushrooms in the chop pan, adding a bit more butter. After five minutes throw in a tablespoon of plain flour and the juice of 3/4 of a lemon. Stir into a sticky mess and cook the flour for a minute. Put the mix on top of the chops then pour about 120 ml double cream over them. Wrap the chops in the foil very securely but not too tightly. Make a sort of tent. Bake for one hour in an oven set to 160C. You don't get much juice but what you do get is big flavour. Goes very well with a buttery jacket spud and some greens. We think of it as winter food. My amounts are for two nice big chops, one each.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 01 May 21 - 11:05 AM

Instead of removing the fat, I would render it by propping the chops up, vertically with the fat lying in the pan, until it is browned and the pan has a layer of runny fat in which to cook the chops, instead of butter. Or cut the fat off, if you must, and render it in the pan before cooking the chops in it.
Then proceed following Steve's/Delia's instructions.
Don't worry about your fat consumption - you are going to cook the mushrooms in butter anyway, and then add cream.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 01 May 21 - 12:16 PM

I do mise en place with wee dishes for ingredients in small quantities and bowls and jugs for large quantities. My galley kitchen does not have room for two kinds of work -- and two lots of mess -- under way at the same time.

I made nearly four litres of rather good ham and bean soup yesterday. Three-quarters of the batch is now in the freezer for future reference.

* One smoked ham hock
* Two to three litres of chicken stock (Canadian recipe -- both metric & Imperial measures in use!)
* A little olive oil
* Six cloves of garlic, chopped
* One large onion, chopped
* Three stalks of celery, chopped
* Black pepper ad lib
* Two or three bay leaves
* A goodly amount of dried oregano
* One pound of dried white beans (navy or Great Northern)
* Half a cup or so of split dried peas or lentils
* One teaspoon ground cumin
* A pinch or two of crushed dried chilis
* Salt (only at the end, and only if necessary)

Put the ham hock in an Instant Pot or similar programmable pressure-cooker. Add enough chicken stock to more or less immerse the hock, usually about two litres. Close the lid and set the controls for 15 minutes at high pressure. Let the pressure release naturally, then set the hock on a plate to cool. Pour the pot liquor into a large jug or bowl.

Turn the Pot to its Saute setting and let it heat to its max. Then add the olive oil, the garlic and onion, and cook and stir until the onion is light brown and translucent;don't let the garlic scorch. Add the celery and continue cooking and stirring until it begins to show signs of browning. Grind rather a lot of black pepper into the Pot, then add the beans and peas, the bay leaves, and the oregano, cumin and crushed chilis. Pour in the stock in which you cooked the ham hock. Clamp on the lid, close the vent, and set the controls for 30 minutes at high pressure.

While the beans are cooking, take the meat off the ham hock and dice it fairly small.

Allow the Pot to release its pressure naturally, then open the lid and add the diced ham. Stir well and taste. Then, and only then, decide if it needs salt. It probably won't.

Serve with whole-wheat toast and maybe some nippy cheese.

NB: When made in an Instant Pot, this takes about half the afternoon, with only about 45 minutes of actual chopping and stirring. It can be made in an ordinary soup kettle on the stove, but that way takes hours and hours, and you have to remember to set the beans to soak the night before.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 May 21 - 02:33 PM

I've tried that, Jos, and found it to be an added faff. I don't waste the rinds. I put them in the freezer and use them to add savour to my boeuf en daube, Elizabeth David style.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 02 May 21 - 09:10 AM

Recipes are a choice but you don't have a choice when it comes to plastic and micro plastics. You eat the equivilent of one plastic credit card per week. So do I.
The health hazards are as yet unknown*.
Apples had one of the highest microplastic counts in fruit, with an average of 195,500 plastic particles per gram, while pears averaged around 189,500 plastic particles per gram. Broccoli and carrots were shown to be the most contaminated vegetables, averaging more than 100,000 plastic particles per gram.Jul 21, 2020
Then there is water, sea salt, shellfish, beer, carrots, broccoli and virually everything else in the alnd and sea.
You see micro plastics are consumed by the smallest organisims and we eat them be they nemotodes or others.
Don't drink the water and don't breathe the air. 8^/


*There seems to be an abundant number of GI conditions lately but who knows.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 02 May 21 - 09:52 AM

Donuel, the most important cause of the rising incidence of irritable bowel syndrome is the abundance of antibiotics we all consume. Acidophilus capsules help with that. Stomach and bowel cancers kill so many people because most of us fortunate residents of the developed world live long enough to develop them. So have your colonoscopy already.

Is plastic in the food supply your latest bugbear?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 May 21 - 12:33 PM

I like to think that this is a recipe and food enjoyment thread. I'm doing a risotto tonight. It will feature broad beans, French beans, peas and pancetta. It will contain the usual suspects such as chicken stock, onions, Parmesan and butter (for the initial frying), but for the mantecura step I'm using creme fraiche instead of butter. I'll use the veg cooking water to contribute to the stock. I'll finish it with fresh parsley.

Last night I did Yotam's baked cauliflower. You put all the ingredients except for one into a big bowl, mix them well with your bare hands and put them on a big baking tray lined with greaseproof paper. Into a hot oven (200C) for half an hour, stirred half way through. The ingredients for two of us are one big cauliflower cut into florets, 30g pumpkin seeds, 30g chopped green olives, one 150g chorizo peeled and cut into 1cm rings (dolce or piccante, you decide), two teaspoons of sweet smoked paprika, a roughly-chopped onion, three cloves of garlic smashed with your fist or a knife, salt and pepper and several big glugs of extra virgin olive oil. It's all on one tray and you can clear up while it's cooking. When it's done, stir in some fresh chopped parsley. You can eat it off your knee in front of the telly and the only washing up is your two bowls and two forks.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 02 May 21 - 01:48 PM

Charmion's tiny bugbear

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 02 May 21 - 05:00 PM

Risotto. I miss risotto.

Now that I cook only for myself, risotto is a restaurant thing. And all the restaurants have been closed since Christmas and will stay that way for at least another two weeks.

I miss risotto. With a nice glass of Soave, and a clever little green salad to follow ...

Sigh.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 May 21 - 06:07 PM

My risotto was very good. It followed a day which started with my bad back playing me up summat rotten and Mrs Steve suffering side effects from her second jab. Every year we do the bluebell walk in the woods at Brownsham, between Hartland and Clovelly. It was a lovely day but it started badly, with parking near the start of the walk a massive problem (we've done this walk every year for 34 years and we still haven't learned to avoid bank holidays). I eventually parked hard by a roadside hedge and scratched my leg on a protruding blackthorn twig that I hadn't spotted.

However.

My new Black Diamond Trail hiking poles were a total revelation. I've tried cheap ones before and they put me off the whole idea. But these were a miracle. I did the whole strenuous walk without back pain and the poles were absolutely superb. The sun was out, the bluebells were wonderful, the sea sparkled, God was in his heaven and all truths were universal. Who'd have thought it, on a day that started so fretfully, and we came home and I did a great risotto. The Prosecco and Argentine Malbec were great too...!

Then you watch the news about India...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 May 21 - 06:17 PM

Charmion, cook your risotto for two, eat half of it and use the leftovers to make arancini the next day. Mrs Steve, foolish woman, won't let me have a deep fat fryer, so I can't follow my own advice...She thinks I want to just make chips...

By the way, my amount for two, which is generous (you piggie, Steve...), is a sparse 300ml (yep, measured in a jug) of risotto rice. I always use carnarolo, by the way. That needs about 700ml stock, with a bit to spare in case it thickens up too much. Life is good!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 03 May 21 - 08:21 AM

Steve how do the hiking poles help? Does it take weight of knees and hips? I had a friend who used those amputee curved springs on hiking poles for extra propulsion.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 May 21 - 09:36 AM

Those chops sound yummy. Thinking of stuffed cabbage, too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 03 May 21 - 10:15 AM

Not down by Bluebell Grove where wild flowers grow then Steve, (I guess you know Nancy Spain)...

Not sure what any of this has to do with cooking but for a different flower, a local church has a snowdrop day where that flower grows abundantly in the grounds. Not a long walk in this case but a nice sight.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 May 21 - 11:43 AM

Well there were plenty of trees in grove-like assemblages and bluebells and wild flowers, and (odd that you should mention it...) I did happen to be singing along to Christy's Nancy Spain in the car yesterday!

The hiking poles work out your upper body, especially arms and shoulders. They help to maintain a good, upright posture,good for the back, and they take the strain off your knees and hips, especially when walking downhill. They give you stability and confidence on uneven terrain. I'm a novice and I'm still researching good technique, but one thing I have learned is that cheap poles are a complete waste of money which will have you thinking that poles are useless. Also, you don't need poles with built-in shock absorbers, any more than you need a springy mattress saddle on a bike.

On the food front I'm starting to try to shed a stone. It'll be Mondays and Thursdays on very frugal rations. I'll be aware of, but not counting, calories and the only thing I'll be cutting out is snacking. In the long term I'm expecting portion control to be the key to keeping it off. And those hiking poles. I did this before, but over the years I've put about a third of my lost weight back on.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 May 21 - 04:52 PM

Why are my meatballs always *tough* (I can't think of a better way to describe them)?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:01 PM

I've added some more pics to my poem "My Diet" recently - e.g., a full (vegan) English using slices of tempeh; sweet and savoury avocado sandwiches; and a vegan cheese platter.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 May 21 - 05:08 PM

Ok details: I have made meatballs in the oven, pan-fried them, cooked them from the start in broth, and browned them and cooked them the rest of the way in broth. Tonight's were made from ground lamb with grated onion, parsley, berbere spice, cumin, cinnamon, smidge of salt, and garlic powder, browned in lamb bacon grease, then cooked in a broth of beef stock with a bit of tomato paste and fresh thyme. The broth is droolworthy-good, as is the *flavor* of the meatballs.

I don't put breadcrumbs in. Is that the problem? Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 04 May 21 - 06:01 PM

You may be overcooking them. Make them smaller and cook for less time. Another possibility is that you're squeezing the bejaysus out of them when you make them, for fear of their falling to bits. Roll them in your hands without pressure and employ an ever-so-gentle touch. And blimey, all those herbs and spices. Don't you trust your meat? My way is to make them small, fry them in oil just to brown them, maybe for five or six minutes, not cook them through, then let your chosen sauce finish the cooking, maybe for ten or fifteen minutes. For me, it would be a spicy tomato sauce made with extra virgin olive oil. By spicy, I mean with chopped garlic, no onion and some chilli flakes to taste. I always tear in some fresh basil leaves at the very end. That goes really well with crusty bread, or some home-made oven chips. I'm not a fan of spaghetti meatballs...

And leave the breadcrumbs in the store cupboard. I've tried meatballs made with a mix of minced steak and crumbled black pudding, or a mixture of minced steak and minced free-range pork. A touch of chilli always goes well. One I got from Gino d'Acampo is beef mince with a bit of caramelised onion chutney mixed in. It sounds like it shouldn't work, but they are delicious. I usually find that you need a tad more salt in the seasoning than you might expect. Small is beautiful.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 May 21 - 12:00 PM

Definitely pressing too hard. Definitely cooking too long. Aha.

And not a *lot* of any spice. A shake or so of each. The cinnamon makes everything savory taste north African.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 01:13 PM

I like most herbs and spices in small doses (though the possession of dried basil should be an arrestable offence), but I'm not a fan of cinnamon and if the recipe has it I leave it out. Mrs Steve demurs, but then we never have coriander/cilantro because she says it tastes like washing up liquid. So we're evens.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 05 May 21 - 01:21 PM

I like cinnamon on toast or porridge.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 05 May 21 - 02:43 PM

A repeat but, just now on the Beeb, the Hairy Bikers on their Med Adventure were cooking Spanish meatballs or albondigas, with - more to my taste - patatas bravas.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 05:23 PM

I missed that, probably because I was watching Chelsea triumph over Real Madrid. I'll be catching up with that one. The Hairy Bikers are not to be ignored!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 05 May 21 - 05:55 PM

Agreed - I think they actually met while working behind the camera, but have gone on to do a lot of good stuff in front of it.

We get the gist of the area they are in, some good humour, and the food they prepare certainly looks good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 May 21 - 06:20 PM

Agreed!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 May 21 - 08:54 AM

Details on albondigas?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:03 PM

Without going to google, definitely paprika/pimenton as the key Spanish spice, Mrrzy; but, once Steve looks into it, I'm sure he can give the culinary details better than I...

Mostly vegan, in 2018, I enjoyed patatas bravas, with a glass of sangria, at one of many nice tapas bars in Barcelona. Fried chunky potato chips (I recall the Hairy Bikers boiled them first), again with paprika.

The other dish I enjoyed on that trip was vegetable paella - it always seemed to be second down on restaurant lists, after the seafood option.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:22 PM

I googled and found this:

Hairy Bikers Moorish lamb meatballs

Is that the one?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:28 PM

If I were making Spanish tapas-style albondigas I'd use a mixture of beef and pork mince and make them small. I don't use eggs (though a yolk in the mix is unobjectionable) and I definitely wouldn't use breadcrumbs. I'd be inclined to make them quite spicy so I might add a bit of smoked paprika and a pinch of dried chipotle chilli flakes, to taste, as well as salt and pepper to the meat mix. Smoky is good. Make them into small balls as mentioned earlier and brown them for four or five minutes only in hot oil. Set the meatballs aside, leaving the oil in the pan. For the tomato sauce I'd use good-quality canned plum tomatoes (don't buy ones with salt added). Slice a couple of cloves of garlic and sauté them in the meatball pan. Add more oil if needed, which it probably will be. No cheap oil please. To be authentic, use a Spanish extra virgin olive oil. Get the garlic sizzling but don't let it go brown. You could add some chilli flakes too, bearing in mind that you've already spiced up the meatballs. A pinch of dried oregano make evverthang super. Add the tomatoes and some salt and a scant teaspoon of sugar. Break up the tomatoes a bit and let it simmer without the lid on for half an hour or until you see the oil wanting to float. After the first fifteen minutes or so, throw in the meatballs. For a tapas table you could have the meatballs, padron peppers fried in hot oil (I do them outdoors as they spit and smell) then sprinkled with sea salt, some strong blue cabrales cheese and, to start with, a little bowl each of well-chilled salmorejo with some cold crumbled hard-boiled egg yolk and some little slivers of jamon iberico on top. Maybe a bowl of olives and some crusty bread for the cheese. Get your guests in the mood with a bottle of Cava and have a nice Rioja to hand as things get going. Good living is that!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:30 PM

Oh yes, and some of those big chunky spicy wedges...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:39 PM

Certainly the one, Jos, as there is also the patatas bravas on the plate; as ever, Steve's option also seems good and thorough.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 May 21 - 12:45 PM

also, if you'll pardon the pun, I find sangria, along with sherry, can at times be a bit too moorish!!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 May 21 - 02:56 PM

Thanks for the meatball advice.

Had some leftover salmon so I made some bacon to go with my omelette, flaked the fish into some spinach wilting in the bacon grease, and added a duck egg in the middle. Ate the bacon while the rest was cooking. I am bad at keeping bacon around.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 May 21 - 09:02 AM

Did not finish my salmon thing. Next day did not finish a big salad. Breakfast *next* day was leftover salad with leftover omelet which was somehow better than either dish had been, and both had been yummy...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 09 May 21 - 05:19 PM

I find that left-over omelette makes a tasty sandwich.
(I have taken to making my omelettes far too big, just so as to have some left over.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 May 21 - 05:19 AM

If you want really good eggy leftovers, make frittatas instead. Plenty of variations are possible, and they are often even better eaten cold the next day. Very nice to take for picnics and you have tomorrow's lunch with no effort at all.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 10 May 21 - 06:06 AM

Yesterday's omelette was a Spanish omelette, so today's left-overs are very like a frittata.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 May 21 - 02:33 PM

I was reading an article from US interpretive naturalists talking about using this invasive (in the US) weed for pesto. It occurs to me that for some of you, this is a native delicacy.

Do nothing about invasive plants

Until recently, ignoring problems in hopes they’ll go away hasn’t served me well. However, a decade-long study done by Cornell University researchers has clearly shown that avoidance is the best way to manage garlic mustard (Allaria petiolata), a pernicious exotic plant. Evidently I’ve been doing a great job in the fight against this aggressive and troublesome invader.

Native to most of Europe and parts of western Asia and northwestern Africa, garlic mustard is in the cabbage and broccoli family (Brassicaceae), and indeed was imported to North America as a culinary herb in the early 1800s. It’s not entirely evil, as it has the spicy tang of mustard with a hint of garlic, and can be used as a base for pesto and sauces, and to flavor salads, soups and other dishes. Unfortunately, eating it has not worked well as a control strategy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 May 21 - 06:11 PM

It's a benign native here. I don't eat it myself, but I believe that the young leaves are very nice sprinkled in salads. If I want a garlicky hit from a wild plant I'll use the young leaves of ramsons, confusingly often referred to as wild garlic (Allium ursinum). It's at its best right now, but it goes to bed for the summer.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 May 21 - 07:13 PM

It's "Alliaria," by the way. It means "like Allium," a reference to its garlicky aroma, not to any relationship with Allium. Allium and Alliaria are wildly unrelated genera.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 11 May 21 - 10:50 AM

It is interesting how some flavors span species. Like the lemon (citrus fruit) duplicated to a degree in Lemon Balm (mint family) and other plants. Licorice flavor in both ferns and umbels (fennel). Root beer in sassafras and in something else I just read about recently. Chocolate mint plants, or cacao.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 May 21 - 03:56 PM

I've just potted up three nice lemon thyme plants. It's the only thyme I use these days. Brilliant in risottos, brilliant with fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 11 May 21 - 05:54 PM

If one can not cleanse the pallet with wine the order one eats different flavors is importnt. I can not taste oranges if preceded by licorice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 May 21 - 06:10 PM

I can't imagine cleansing my palate of licorice by drinking wine. I'll try anything once but I might save my favourite Rioja for something else.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 11 May 21 - 06:25 PM

Star anise also tastes like licorice.

I just bought samphire, I think for the first time in my life, and fried it with tofu and some soya sauce, before placing them on toast - not bad.

I guess I could also add it to my pottages...any other ideas..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 May 21 - 08:16 PM

Taking the hint from Jos, I made us a big Spanish omelette tonight. I got the idea from the BBC Good Food website. You need a couple of shallots sliced up, a red pepper chopped up, 500g of unpeeled Jersey Royals sliced a bit thicker than a £2 coin, a good handful of chives and nine eggs.

Boil the sliced spuds in salted water for 15 minutes. Fry the shallots gently in butter for ten minutes (your frying pan needs to be about 10 inches across and needs sloping sides), adding the pepper after three or four minutes. Beat the eggs with the snipped chives and a goodly amount of seasoning. Drain the spuds and put them in with the shallots and pepper. Pour in the egg mix. Keep the ring fairly low. I put a lid over my pan. After ten minutes, put the pan (lid off!) under a hot grill for three minutes. I wrap tinfoil round my pan handle to protect it. Don't forget how hot it might get. Viola!

That made enough for two of us to have a nice big wodge for tea (we had greens with it) and some good eating for lunch (cold) tomorrow. I make a lot of frittatas but I haven't done this before. It was very good, but the slight tweaks needed will be more butter and more seasoning next time. To get things like this right, you really do need to know your pan and your cooker very well, otherwise it'll either take too long to set or you'll burn the bottom, or both. Best to keep the heat fairly low but not too low.

I'm making meatballs tomorrow for two separate feasts in a few days' time. I'll use three pounds of minced steak, a pound of minced pork and about six tablespoons of caramelised onion chutney. Enough for eight portions. That all goes into a bowl with some salt, mixed together and made into balls slightly bigger than bite size and quite a bit smaller than golf balls. Formed gently without squeezing. They open-freeze nicely. To cook them, I'll fry them for about six minutes in extra virgin olive oil to brown them, then throw in two cans of plum tomatoes (best you can get is paramount). I'm adding a bit of salt to that and enough chilli flakes to really spice up the sauce. Get the heat up to simmering and let them bubble gently for about 20 minutes. Right at the end, I'll be tearing a handful of fresh basil leaves in (no fresh? Leave it out, or a sprinkle of dried oregano would be good). That's it, so simple. We have it with home-made oven chips but it also goes well with plain boiled rice or some crusty bread to soak up the lovely sauce. No onion, no garlic, in case you think I'd forgotten.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 May 21 - 09:35 AM

The Spanish omelette was delicious eaten cold. I'll be doing that one again.

We don't cook on Wednesdays. It's been cheese and wine night for us for decades (otherwise it's wine at weekends only). I have a lump of Montagnolo d'affine for tonight, a soft German blue cheese with a delicious grey furry rind, and some Wookey Hole cheddar. I put out little bowls of nutty things such as cashews, pistachios and/or sweet almonds, with some cherry tomatoes, nocellara olives and some Marché-style garlic cloves (you can eat twenty of those without effect - don't ask me how they achieve it). I have a jar of pickled caperberries, which I love, but Mrs Steve isn't so keen. We have a glass of white to start with then it's red the rest of time. I refuse to divulge how long that means... ;-) We've discovered some very nice little sourdough crackers, made by Peter's Yard, great with cheese, though I'm also a fan of Matzo crackers, one ingredient only, white flour, 19 calories per cracker and a superb vehicle for cheese. Mrs Steve is a big fan of Bath Oliver crackers, also made with white flour but soft-baked with no browning on them. I love them too, but they are far more calorific, and I'm currently trying to convince my doc that my weight is heading inexorably downward...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 May 21 - 12:53 PM

Not sure if it's a Wednesday but, from work trips, I know some hotels have meet-the-staff cheese and wine nights, Steve.

Good tip re tinfoil to protect pan handle.

More spice next time with the omelette - I've repeatedly heard Spanish love their paprika..?

And further to the above on samphire: on the negative side, as with some herbs, like rosemary, it can be a tad woodie; but, on the positive side, a slight taste of the sea for vegans.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 May 21 - 05:16 PM

I'll eat samphire but I do have to wonder whether it's less than the sum of its parts. I thought about adding paprika but as it was my first time with that recipe I thought I'd stick to orders this time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 May 21 - 09:07 AM

Snicker... The Spanish love Hungarian paprika, no?

Having appeased the shade if my Hungarian mom, I can say that I like the Spanish smoked paprika too. But for hot, Hungarian is better, imho.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 13 May 21 - 10:31 AM

Sunny and a bit warmer in southwestern Ontario, so it's time to break out the barbecue. I have invited the rest of my bubble to dinner tomorrow, and thus ensured that I will not procrastinate.

Chicken and ribs, with cornbread and a crisp green salad. Rosé is on special at the liquor commission, so we might get a bit squiffy.

If the warmth of the day persists to suppertime, I’ll put the guests to work burning deadfall branches and my husband’s old client files while I finish cooking. Then we can toast marshmallows over the coals for dessert.

After more than a year of pandemic restriction, we are easily amused.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 13 May 21 - 10:42 AM

There used to be a npr show that challenged a female chef to devise a meal from what was in the fridge and pantry. My great omlette this morning was like the show. Some of her challenges were impossibly difficult.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 May 21 - 11:05 AM

Lynne Rossetto Kasper. The Splendid Table. That was always a fun game. A caller would name the things in their fridge and pantry and sometimes Lynne suggested something good. Sometimes it was dreadful, but she usually managed a "less is more" dish.

She retired a few years ago. She had a perfect radio voice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 13 May 21 - 12:20 PM

Pantry supper, also known as day-before-payday supper, is less of a challenge if you typically have pasta and a tin of tomatoes in the cupboard and capers, olives and anchovies in the fridge. Puttanesca!

Way too often, Edmund would come home with something strange he bought on the way home from work. "What do you think you could do with this?" I think that's the Iron Chef Challenge.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 13 May 21 - 12:57 PM

Paprika in goulash, Mrrzy?

Or sprinkled on those marshmallows for an extra smokey flavour, Charmion?!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 May 21 - 01:02 PM

We call puttanesca whore's spaghetti :-) but, in addition to your list of ingredients, I start by sautéing some garlic and chilli flakes. And no cheese!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 May 21 - 11:26 PM

Think Outside the Banana. Eat the Peel.

After the British chefs Nadiya Hussain and Nigella Lawson developed recipes using banana skins, the British cooking public is perplexed.

In November, the British cookbook author and food personality Nigella Lawson shocked her nation when she demonstrated a recipe from her latest cookbook, “Cook, Eat, Repeat,” on her BBC television show of the same name. It wasn’t royal family-level scandalous. Still, based on public reaction, you’d think she’d caused a major controversy.

And all because she’d prepared a fragrant dish of cauliflower — and banana peels.

“I certainly didn’t expect newspaper headlines about it!” she said in an email. “It’s hard to overcome the cultural assumptions about what is and is not edible, and to start eating what we have customarily regarded as waste.”

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 14 May 21 - 03:07 AM

The skin is mightier than the banana.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 May 21 - 06:41 AM

I'll swear that as a teenager I read somewhere that you can dry banana skins and smoke them and they're even better than pot...

Don't try this at home! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 May 21 - 11:32 AM

An urban myth long-since debunked. https://theuijunkie.com/smoking-banana/

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 May 21 - 12:37 PM

From a reliable source (TV programme on Kew Gardens), I learnt yesterday that the banana plant is a herb.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 May 21 - 03:44 PM

Heheh. I love that photo of an old lady trying to light a banana :-). Banana plants are botanically herbs simply because they're non-woody. Not suitable for sprinkling on your pasta dishes... :-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 May 21 - 04:03 PM

...although in Ethiopia, ensete is a staple.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 May 21 - 04:33 PM

Bananas are herbs *and* berries, I just found out. I had known they were an herb.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 May 21 - 04:10 AM

The meatballs with caramelised chutney that I mentioned a couple of days ago were a big success last night. I should have said that the amount of tomatoes I mentioned was for four people, not all eight! They are SO simple, just meat, the chutney and salt. No mucking about with onion, garlic, breadcrumbs, egg... The fewer ingredients, the less chance of messing up. By the way, Mrrzy, I formed them with gentle rolling in the palms, no squeezing, and not a single one fell to pieces in the sauce, and their texture was perfect.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 May 21 - 09:51 AM

I will try that next time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 15 May 21 - 10:45 AM

I've never tried currywurst, but heard it is basically just adding curry powder, instead of mustard, to ketchup as a sausage dressing.

I have both in the kitchen so gave it a go - not a bad combination, one feels.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 15 May 21 - 10:49 AM

I have never tried German mustard, either, but apparently it is quite sweet; I have however tried English, French and American and, on this occasion, I prefer the latter.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 15 May 21 - 12:14 PM

...but, as I say, not sure if German is wurst..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 17 May 21 - 10:52 AM

Having been brought up on Keen's dry mustard mixed into a paste by my English-raised Dad, I found German mustard bland and boring. Dijon mustard works because of its vinegary bite, but the American version isn't worth the trouble.

The curry sauce that makes currywurst of any ol' sausage (but usually bratwurst) is a Dutch confection originating in their long-gone Indonesian colonies and adopted by the Germans in the 1960s for their nascent fast-food industry. I first saw it on "Schnell Imbiss" counters when I was a young soldier in the 70s.


If you like that kind of thing, it's the kind of thing you like. I never liked ketchup so curry sauce held zero appeal for me, but I know many people who became firmly addicted at first taste, usually experienced within hours of arriving at Schiphol Airport.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 May 21 - 03:01 PM

...so currywurst has nothing to do with English soldiers being stationed in Germany after WW2, Charmion?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 17 May 21 - 03:59 PM

British soldiers, WAV. I'm sure some of them were English, but the Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish were not.

Of course it has to do with soldiers, not just British but also Americans and Canadians, and air force people too, the whole benighted NATO garrison in what was then West Germany -- including me. But civilians travelled in Europe, too, and by the 1970s there were a hell of a lot more of them.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 May 21 - 04:24 PM

I don't remember currywurst from my visit to Berlin in 1988; as I've mentioned before on Mudcat, I do remember and wrote a poem about signing the reunion book when I came back from East Berlin through Checkpoint Charlie...but, despite a couple of attempts, including emails to museums there, I can't find what happened to that book.

Maybe I will manage a return visit to Berlinnext year and find it then..? That poem is here if you wish to look.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 May 21 - 09:18 AM

I don't think of German mustard as sweet. It is Dijon-like but grainy, in my US experience.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 18 May 21 - 10:37 AM

The mustard I remember from Germany (more than 40 years ago, mind you) had much the same texture as Dijon mustard, but it was less vinegary and sometimes blended with honey. I found the version labelled "Feuer Senf" disappointingly bland. I see the same brands of German mustard for sale here in Stratford, and they seem even blander now.

Whole-seed mustard was not popular in southwestern Germany in the 70s, and I first encountered it in France where it was served with pot-au-feu. In Canada, you could buy it at gourmet shops, and by about 1995 it had made the leap to supermarkets. The French brand Maille is most popular, and it has the same piquant, vinegary flavour profile as Dijon. German whole-seed mustard is also sold here, but I never buy it so I don't know how it differs from the Maille version.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 21 - 12:26 PM

I used to live not far away in Walthamstow, Charmion, and one of the positives was the wide variety of foods available.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 May 21 - 12:31 PM

In the US we have mustard out the wazzoo these days. And the discount gourmet warehouse grocery where I shop has a aisle of fancy mustards. I get the ground whole seed varieties instead of things like "honey mustard" that are too sweet. And I stay away from anything with horseradish. Way too hot.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 May 21 - 12:40 PM

I might have mustard (though rarely) on a ham sandwich, or to spice up a mackerel pâté or something, and it's great in piccalilli, but I never want it unadorned on my plate. I regard mustard with seeds in to be greatly overrated... Horseradish sauce is a sine qua non on a roast beef butty.

Which Stratford are we talking about here? I taught in Walthamstow from 1980 to 1986 in a terrible school...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 21 - 01:35 PM

...there was no mention of "upon Avon", Steve! Never lived there but have enjoyed visiting.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 18 May 21 - 04:09 PM

I think Charmion is in Stratford, Ontario.
No doubt she will correct ne if I'm wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 18 May 21 - 04:22 PM

I am, indeed, on the other side of the Herring Pond, in deepest Perth County, Ontario.

It’s not humble, but it’s home.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 May 21 - 04:42 PM

Ooh I *love* horseradish. I have neen putting some in everything lately.

I love good [Dijon-style] mustard, grainy or no.

Every once in a while I have an actual hot dog, in which case that yellow goop Americans call mustard is actually good.

If there is sauerkraut, though, which I ptefer, *then* Dijon or German mustard. The yellow is only good on otherwise plain hot dogs.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 21 - 04:50 PM

Sincere apologies, Charmion...I'll see if I can get hold of a hair shirt in Manchester, England.

When I occasionally break my veganity, Mrrzy, and stop at a hot dot stand, I like it with onions, ketchup and what seems to be American mustard.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 18 May 21 - 07:36 PM

You can find town names from all over the British Isles in Ontario, but we don’t have a Walthamstow.

I checked.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 18 May 21 - 08:15 PM

Horseradish is more than a tasty cocktail sauce. When used liberally in tuna salad it becomes a new dish along with mustard.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 19 May 21 - 02:30 AM

Horseradish is great on smoked fish and beef.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 19 May 21 - 02:58 AM

I quite like horseradish sauce but I don’t think it’s ever been anything we’ve felt we’ve needed to have in the cupboard. We did have some horseradish just left to grow in the garden for a couple of years though. Had the devil of a job getting rid off it.

English mustard for me. We’ve got both powdered and ready made in the cupboard.

It had to be Coleman’s of course. After all it was made in Carrow, Norwich and Norwich City play at Carrow Road. But maybe one day, I should look for something else as Unilever in 2019 ended 160 years of mustard production in the city...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 May 21 - 04:13 AM

In general, I'm not a fan of having a strongly-flavoured sauce or relish on my plate with food that is otherwise mild in flavour. For example, whilst I like the taste of cranberry sauce I don't want it on my turkey dinner. A bit of mint sauce on roast lamb is good because the lamb has a fairly assertive flavour itself. Piccalilli is grand on a sandwich which contains a nice tangy cheese. Horseradish on a roast beef butty is a challenge to get right. If you're too timid with it, you can't taste it. A smidgeon too much and your eyes are a-watering - not good. Tommy K can be good on a bacon butty or with a spicy sausage but I usually leave it off. I can't stand apple sauce - sour and sloppy (I never eat apple pie either). I regard things such as Branson Pickle as devil's vomit. One man's fish is another man's poisson...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 19 May 21 - 04:29 AM

Now I could never stand horseradish myself, nor English mustard. They both have unpleasant and overpowering flavours, even in near-subliminal quantities, which ruin anything to which they're added. At least they do so for me - some things must just taste different to different folks I guess.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 19 May 21 - 05:23 AM

Different things but both Branston pickle and cranberry sauce are things I'll eat but would rather not have on the plate.

Apple sauce (sorta). We've got a few cookers and mum wants to make a crumble with them. I have to help these days (putting in and out of cooker and maybe reaching something from a cupboard) but I look forward to it. And our own small Bramley tree is looking quite good so far this year..

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 19 May 21 - 07:09 AM

I found this confusing:

" We've got a few cookers and mum wants to make a crumble with them. I have to help these days (putting in and out of cooker ..."

until I realised that, while "putting in and out of cooker" was referring to the cooking stove, "a few cookers" meant a few cooking apples, rather than too many kitchen appliances.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 19 May 21 - 07:12 AM

Apple sauce is often served with roast or grilled pork in these parts. Like Steve, I find it too wet and not right in the flavour department. I make a kick-ass chutney that does the job much better for me, but is probably too spicy to pass the Shaw taste-test.

The best use for apple purée, in my opinion, is in baking. I have some American recipes for cake, muffins and other soda-raised bready items that include apple sauce instead of milk, and they work very well — tasty, moist and with a nicely textured crumb. Now, if only I could figure out a vegan substitute for egg I could feed them to my fussy nephew.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 19 May 21 - 07:54 AM

English mustard on a good pork pie, sublime, nowt else will do.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 19 May 21 - 09:59 AM

LOL, Sorry Jos. I tend to think of apples as "cookers" and "eaters" and one tree we still have but no longer fruits as a "juicer" (and a few years back, we'd juice loads and store the juice in a freezer).

I gather that we in the UK are a bit unusual in having things like Bramleys just for cooking. I think Australia for example uses the Granny Smith as "multi-purpose", ie. "eater" and "cooker".

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 19 May 21 - 12:02 PM

I like Bramley apple pie with single soya cream...not sure if suchlike or tofu would work with your baking, Charmion..?

There is a pic of my, alternative, scrambled tofu on toast here.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 May 21 - 12:29 PM

The good Lord made apples to pluck from the tree and immediately sink your teeth into. I have no use for apples aside from that. I don't even like cider...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 19 May 21 - 12:42 PM

I got 3 galas on my last shop and enjoyed them - with a knife (without this aid, some of my teeth would probably end up in the apple - no porkies).

In the summer/when thirsty, I like a cider but, otherwise, I do love a sherry.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 19 May 21 - 12:57 PM

Of course cider can use a different type of apple again... I believe West Country ciders are made from from bitter cider apples but a Norfolk cider can use sweet dessert apples. I'm not sure what Bulmers (Hereford) use.

Then there are the white ciders like Diamond White and Omega that at least used to be cheap ways of getting pissed (UK usage, Americans can think that means angry even without the "off" added) but could leave one debating whether they had known a real apple in their production.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 19 May 21 - 02:43 PM

Ontario craft brewers have taken up cider-making in a big way. I buy only the kind with the ingredients listed on the can, and only if the list consists of one item: apples. I am spoiled for choice.

The Gravenstein apple is popular here, originally for juice but now also for cider. It’s not much good as an eater (i.e., raw in the hand), but it’s also excellent for cooking.

The Northern Spy is a late bearer, so it is now less popular than the Gravenstein, but in my opinion it is the best cooking apple available in this part of the world.

Ontario cooks (like me) can go on for hours about apple varieties.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 May 21 - 08:50 AM

I've just made a big pot of caponata, following the Ottolenghi recipe (it's online). I let it mature for a couple of days and we're having it with some crusty bread this evening. I did include a chopped courgette and I left out the raisins (I don't care for them at all in savoury things such as kofkas and pasta con le sarde). It tastes very promising. The aubergines don't half soak up the oil, and if we find it a bit oily I'll use a different method next time. Jamie Oliver's recipe is much-praised and it's easier to do, though, oddly, he leaves out the celery, which would make many a Sicilian hopping mad...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 May 21 - 09:35 AM

Cider just tastes like the apple juice went off, to me.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 May 21 - 12:37 PM

...and cheese like off milk, Mrrzy?!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 May 21 - 05:21 PM

The caponata was gorgeous. It's very filling and we have enough left for a pasta sauce tomorrow (Yotam's recommendation). Caponata is vegan and low in carbohydrate (though high in oil, thanks to those aubergines soaking it up). To go with it I bought a ciabatta and made some garlic bread in the end. My way is to chop up a garlic clove or two and marinate it in extra virgin olive oil. I then brush the oil on to both sides of the ciabatta slices and toast 'em. No butter, no cheese. We are happy!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 May 21 - 05:50 PM

I visited Sicily in 1988 (I seem to recall the Olympics was on a TV in a cafe), Steve, but sadly didn't come across caponata - sounds delicious with either bread or pasta...but which pasta..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 May 21 - 06:27 PM

Short pasta for me. Funnily enough we've been debating just that this evening. I think that the best pasta in the world comes from Gragnano in the Bay of Naples. Happily, several varieties are available these days even in supermarkets. They are generally around £1.70 for a 500g bag, so even expensive pasta is cheap (as with good rice). There's a lovely short tube pasta in Sainsbury's called (I think) mezze rigate, one shaped like little curly trumpets in Tesco called gigli and one made of coiled thin hollow tubes in Waitrose called bucati spirali, all made in Gragnano and all wonderful. Whatever pasta you choose, make sure it's been made using bronze dies, which makes for a much better texture for holding the sauce. It might say "bronzo" on the pack. Pasta water should be as salty as the Mediterranean and should never contain oil. In Italy, it's a mortal sin to leave the kitchen once the pasta pan is on. And the pasta is added to the pan containing the sauce along with some pasta water, never vice versa and generally not drained in a sieve (if you do that, catch some pasta water in a jug). The most abject sight on earth is a pile of spaghetti on a plate with a heap of sauce dumped on top. That is just so English. Even worse, accompanied by a tub of months-old ready-grated Parmesan.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 May 21 - 06:57 PM

Yes - I think we've said that before: bolognese sauce is certainly (northern) Italian, and spaghetti is certainly (southern) Italian; but spag bol is an English invention.

In Bologna they would have their sauce with a fresh pasta like tagliatelle.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 21 May 21 - 12:46 PM

Your abject sight is also very Canadian, Steve. You have just reminded me of a certain kind of cheap restaurant that used to be found on the main street every Ontario town. The sign out front offered “Italian & Canadian Specialties”, and the special on Friday was always fish and chips.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 May 21 - 09:41 AM

I remember Louis Wu avoiding cheese as if it were spoiled milk...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 May 21 - 10:04 AM

The leftover caponata as a pasta sauce was a triumph. I did top up the capers, added a sprinkle of dried oregano and threw in a handful of lightly-roasted cherry toms. We used the mezze rigate pasta from Gragnano, little tubes half the length of rigatoni. Cheese on top not needed. Perfect. The caponata has been so good that in future I'm sticking to Yotam's way. A few years ago we discovered Marché-style garlic cloves. The brand is D'Amico Specialíta. They are marinaded in oil and herbs. I haven't a clue what they do to them to eliminate the hot, garlicky taste, but you can eat them by the dozen, nice and crunchy, with impunity. Gorgeous gorging. They're like those whole cloves that you sometimes get in garlic-stuffed olives. So it's Eurovision tonight and no cooking. Cheese, falafels, olives, garlic cloves, tomatoes, crisps...Prosecco, red wine...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 22 May 21 - 10:12 AM

You sound like a ' gourmand ' Steve.


Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 May 21 - 12:13 PM

Ok finally made good meatballs.

Saw a recipe that said Add *pureed* veg to the meat. So I food-processed some celery green pepper onion garlic with a bunch of spices, put half the ground meat flat into the bowl, half the veg, repeat, mixed minimally then used a scoop rather than making balls in my hands. Browned in goose fat with very slight effort at turning, added broth, some tomate paste and cauliflower, simmered till cauliflower cooked. The spices went nicely into the broth, the meatballs maintained integrity and had a great texture. Beef only, this batch.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 21 - 06:10 AM

I keep checking on here and hoping that Steve will put his good skills into our own good English fare.

The Two Fat Ladies (RIP) had no problem championing English dishes and found plenty of variety therein.

However, their programmes were very much the exception to the rule in modern multicultural England - as I've tweeted many times, most of the BBC's Saturday Kitchen, e.g., is foreigners presenting their cuisine and English presenting foreign fare, very sadly.

...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 21 - 06:40 AM

Well tonight I'm roasting a free-range chicken from a farm near Crediton in Devon. The carrots and the spuds I'm roasting are Scottish, the cauliflower is Cornish. The stuffing will be made from local sausage meat that I buy from a butcher in Bude who also has a farm (he rears the best lamb you could ever get your hands on and his sausages are to die for). I grew the parsnips myself, which I'll baste with Cornish butter (from Trewithen dairy, the only brand of butter we've bought for about 15 years) and home-grown fresh thyme and parsley, and we make our own gravy from the roasting tin juices. I bought the chipolatas in Waitrose and they say Duchy Originals on the packet. When we have cold chicken tomorrow it will be with Jersey RoyaIs and broad beans I grew myself. Is that good enough?

The wine will, however, be Italian...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 21 - 06:53 AM

Yes, thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 23 May 21 - 10:03 AM

I didn't know that Clarissa Dickson Wright had died, so I checked and yes, she died in 2014.
What I also found was her full name - Clarissa Theresa Philomena Aileen Mary Josephine Agnes Elsie Trilby Louise Esmerelda Dickson Wright

That must have made filling in forms a bit difficult.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 21 - 10:17 AM

Apparently, they didn't always get on but were equally strong minded, such that I'd imagine if a BBC producer started saying they need to promote diversity more, they'd both reach, equally quickly, for a rolling pin!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 25 May 21 - 08:56 PM

12,ooo years ago rock paintings around the world depicted the things they liked to eat, kinda like this thread.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 20 Jun 21 - 05:30 PM

I've missed the potato pies I used to occasionally buy from a SPAR store (not all stock them) on the way to work, but got a good tip from James Martin on TV this morning:

After frying mushrooms and other vegetables in a pan (he added chicken also), simply roll out a sheet of pastry over the top, crimp it to the pan edges, then place in the oven for about 25 minutes - if, as with mine, the frying pan is not all metal, from Steve (above), tinfoil may be used over the handle.

I shall give that a go shortly...

(As Donuel suggests, we have discussed pies here a couple of months or so ago.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 20 Jun 21 - 06:29 PM

At a moment of particular poverty, more or less the only meat we ate was either rabbit or kid, roasted whole over vegetables in a pot on the hob, or else roasted whole then stewed with added stock and vegetables. Both were very cheap from a butcher that got them from the leather and fur trade.
I can't remember which it was that was cooking when my teenager came in, lifted the pot and said, "Ah, abortion again", and wandered off. I relented and started buying the odd 'normal' meat!
I find rabbit much enriched by about half a bottle of a deep-flavoured red wine.
One of the chefs interviewed in The Irish Times last week about where he buys his ingredients said he used coconut vinegar from one of the oriental shops, which sounds like a very interesting concept indeed.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 06:18 AM

Marinate the rabbit in the wine, herbs, and A LOT of garlic. It's surprising how much garlic rabbit can take without it being too much.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 06:38 AM

Dunno whether it's just us, but we neither eat rabbit nor fancy eating it. I had it once when I was a teenager and found it to be somewhat bland and lacking in bite, a bit like immature chicken.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 07:27 AM

Wild rabbits taste very strong, toyrs must have been farmed Steve.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 10:28 AM

No human who isn't starving should eat an Ontario cottontail rabbit. Very gamey, and so lean as to provide little food value. They're much better left for the native predators -- lynxes, foxes, coyotes and wolves. And the odd Cooper's hawk; they like to swoop down and grab baby bunnies out of the grass.

I think my new bed of thyme has settled in to bear consistently, but the parsley is probably doomed, thanks to the thrice-damnable rabbits. They don't touch the sage, oregano, mint, thyme or chives, but they bloody love parsley. Every plant is nibbled almost to the dirt.

I'll have to grow parsley in clay pots arranged on a rack on the patio. I have never seen a rabbit climb.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 12:08 PM

On my tiny juliet balcony, I grow thyme and mint and, occasionally, have chives, parsley and other annual herbs inside.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 02:04 PM

I spent an hour with the weed whacker trimming grass and weeds around the edge of the vegetable garden and part of the front yard. The tomatoes are huge but green, though starting to shift in hue that tells me soon I'll see some pink. The eggplants are also weighing down the stems, the peppers are robust and numerous, and the okra is almost ready to start picking. Tomorrow will be the first couple, and I'll accumulate a few a day until there are enough for a meal or a jar of pickled okra. Or to give to my next door neighbor who adores it.

Since a week ago I started using home grown peppers in my cooking, and though I harvested garlic last week it's not dried enough, but I have tons left from last year (and the year before).

We're supposed to get some rain, a small chance today, better tomorrow, then I have some more planting to do. It will be time to make some babaghanouj as soon as the eggplants are a little bigger. Rain always gives everything a better push than just watering with a sprinkler.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 03:12 PM

Rabbits will stand on their haunches and even on their toes (like cats) to nibble on things to which they are particularly drawn.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Jun 21 - 04:52 PM

Last year, I had some spare parsley plants after filling up their allotted space in the veg plot. I planted the spares in a couple of old plastic troughs that were lying around. I put the troughs on an old wooden ex-picnic bench, about three feet above the ground. Rabbits ate every single plant to the ground in the veg plot, but I got a magnificent crop from the troughs. All my plants will be off the ground this year.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 12:10 AM

Last night I wanted to make a new vegetable dish, I found a nice recipe for carrot salad with an Indian flavor. The DH loved it! Here's the link:

Bombay carrot salad

Apparently carrots are more healthful if cooked, so I cooked the whole carrots in the microwave for two minutes. Then I let them cool and sliced them thin with my salad shooter. I was supposed to grate them, but I couldn't find the right attachment. I like them better sliced, anyway.

I left out the raisins and the red pepper.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 08:01 AM

Oh, did I make a huge mess trying not to have to clean my food processor.

Decided to try grating cauliflower into riced cauliflower. It went EVERYWHERE. Then decided to follow the advice of wringing out the extra moisture. It all STUCK to the towel and I made even MORE of a mess trying to get it off.

Food processor next time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 08:12 AM

I like cauliflower the way it is. I can't see the point of trying to turn it into pretend rice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 08:44 AM

How nice for you, Jos.

People who try ricing cauliflower typically do it because they (a) like cauliflower and (b) are seeking creative ways to cut back the amount of carbohydrate in their diet.

I have never tried it at home because I am lazy, but a local restaurant serves a “keto bowl” made up of riced cauliflower, quinoa and zippy grilled veg with poached eggs on top. It’s obviously labour-intensive, but delicious and therefore worth paying somebody else to make it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 09:05 AM

I'm definitely more with Jos here on the cauliflower front. They're just as keto left in nice big chunks are they are messed about with. Steamed cauliflower, lightly salted, is a thing of beauty as long as the cauliflower is (a) firm and fresh, (b) cooked to just the right level of bite. It's also very nice roasted in bite-sized florets with olive oil, green olives, onions, paprika, pumpkin seeds and chorizo slices for half an hour, with a sprinkling of fresh parsley at the end. I tried cauliflower steaks once. Waste of good cauliflower in m'humble. It amuses me to think that anyone would try to make something that isn't rice into fake rice, just because they won't eat the real thing. I once saw some vegan "lamb chops" in a supermarket that were the same shape and colour as real lamb chops. I mean, do me a favour...

Incidentally, smashing your raw veg into smithereens does absolutely nothing for its vitamin content.

Still, whatever stirs yer loins...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 09:10 AM

I agree with you, Steve, because l like cauliflower pretty well any way it can appear on a menu, starting with raw in a hunk. But I also get that some people want a ricy texture and bulk in a dish without the carb load of real rice.

Lots of diabetics in my family, see.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 12:50 PM

You can eat rice if you have diabetes as long as you don't overdo it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 03:32 PM

Steve, Charmion comes from a family in which she had to compete with her siblings for pieces of raw cabbage core.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 04:20 PM

"It amuses me to think that anyone would try to make something that isn't rice into fake rice, just because they won't eat the real thing" (Steve)...Italians have done it with orzo, of course...but I much prefer fusilli pasta.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 05:19 PM

If there's a jar of mixed pickles in my house, and I get there first, there is the severe danger that anyone hoping to find pickled cauliflower therein will be severely disappointed...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 05:29 PM

Orzo serves a different function to rice in Italian cuisine, though I do make a devastatingly tasty "orzotto" with bacon, peas and Parmesan. I don't think that rice-avoiders, on the grounds of carbohydrate content, would gain much succour from orzo...

I'm not a fan of fusilli. Get thee to a Waitrose and buy a bag of bucatini spirali (it's a pasta from Gragnano). I think it's far superior to fusilli and can be used instead of it every time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 05:31 PM

I eat so much cabbage/cauliflower/broccoli core when I'm chopping the veg that I'm often in danger of spoiling my appetite.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 05:49 PM

Ditto.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Jun 21 - 08:05 PM

I don't eat riced cauli as rice but as cauli that takes mere seconds to cook.

I am not a fan of raw cauliflower. But I love the texture of it riced, especially in soups.

I love cauliflower steaks, roast whole cauliflower, pretty much any form thereof, including riced. But not grating no more.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 24 Jun 21 - 08:25 AM

I much prefer cauliflower to broccoli.

The cheapest & quickest meal I prepare is with a 14 pence packet of curry flavoured instant noodles from Tesco - with the curry powder first stirred in a mug of boiled water, into a pan with some sautéd veg, soy sauce plus tofu for protein; total cost would have to be below 50 pence/63 cents.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Jun 21 - 09:53 AM

I prefer cauli to brocc too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jun 21 - 11:54 AM

I'm not a fan of the calabrese type of broccoli, but (given careful cooking) I do like tenderstem and purple sprouting broccoli, both of which I grow. I'm also fond of that new veg which started off being called flower sprouts but which the commercial chaps now dub "kalettes," presumably because "sprouts" in the name might have put off sprout-haters, of which there are many (more fool them: simply choose only tight sprouts and watch them like a hawk in the cooking - and no cutting crosses in the bottoms!).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 01:06 PM

Orzo doesn't replace rice, it complements it. I first learned how to use it from a Lebanese friend who browns the orzo in olive oil then adds the rice to heat it up a bit then adds the liquid. You have the classic browned pasta amongst the rice (I use Basmati most of the time now). Those in the US (at least) think "Rice-a-roni the San Francisco treat" for a similar boxed approach to this.

Cook orzo and rice with chicken broth and it's almost a whole meal like that. In winter I make that mix (adding the browned pasta and rice to my rice cooker) with lightly sauteed chicken breast and sliced mushrooms and it comes out a perfect comfort food.

Today I have the carcass of last week's chicken simmering to make a rich broth. I'll freeze some of it and use the rest this week.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 01:16 PM

...never tried them together - a test for the taste buds, maybe..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 04:07 PM

Make it like vermicelli and rice but use orzo instead. Not a tough "test" - it tastes like rice but has the added color of the browned pasta.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 04:21 PM

...if it "tastes like rice" (SRS) it would be a "test for the taste buds" (me) to distinguish between them.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 07:10 PM

Browned pasta sounds like burned pasta to me. I don't know why you'd mix rice and pasta. I agree about basmati. I use it for everything (except risottos) that calls for rice. By the way, there is a lot of tosh written about how to cook rice. Here's a method guaranteed to work every time with basmati:

Measure out the amount you need. Put it into a capacious pan and rinse it in cold water at least three times (crucial). Don't bother sieving it, as the rice stays on the bottom and you can just decant out the water. Boil a kettle of water and turn on the ring full. Salt the rice to taste, then add *an excess* of boiling water (you can check the saltiness later). As soon as you pour in the water, set your timer for twelve minutes. Get the pan to a simmer, give it a stir to prevent sticking and put on the lid. After exactly twelve minutes, strain the rice in a sieve, put the sieve over a pan and wait for one minute minimum. There you go. Perfect rice every time, nice and fluffy, no stickiness. Ignore those recipes that have you measuring precise amounts of water-to-rice. They are received wisdom from people who don't cook but who just copy from ancient, outmoded gurus!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 07:32 PM

Or, you can rinse the rice (because the package says to) then add it to your rice cooker, add whatever ingredients you want, add the amount of water the rice cooker instructions say and wait until the little lever flips from red to green. Perfect!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Jun 21 - 08:21 PM

My rice-cooker is a "saucepan-with-lid."

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:08 AM

For just myself, I place half a mug of rice in the pan, rinse it a few times, then add a mug and a bit of boiled water from the kettle, similar to Steve. Let it boil for a bit then turn the heat down for the rice to gradually absorb all the water - all done by eye rather than a timer.

Rather than salt, I may add a bit of vinegar to the hot water, similar to what some Japanese do - sushi is vinegared rice.

The three of us are using slight variations of the absorption method.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:15 AM

Absorption methods use measured quantities of both rice and water? Steve, like me, uses a plenty of water and boil away (OK before draining and standing) version?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:36 AM

Sorry - I didn't read Steve's post carefully enough - "strain the rice in a sieve" is not the absorption method, as you suggest Jon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:50 AM

What Jon and I do is far more chilled than using careful rice-water measurements. Different batches of rice, different amounts of water. Not for me! The only measures are the amount of rice needed for one or two or three or four people (a bit left over is great next day, fried up in butter with an egg and some peas and mushrooms) and that exact twelve-minute boil. I stopped measuring the water years ago after many irritatingly-inconsistent results. The only other thing is to never buy cheap rice. There's a lot of dishonest "basmati" around that's been cut with other (and inferior) long-grain rice. Even expensive rice is cheap. It's the big brands only for me when it comes to basmati.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:55 AM

Another thing is that I never freeze cooked rice or any dish containing it, even though it's sometimes recommended. Freezing does something to the texture of the rice that I'm not keen on. If it's a soup with rice in it, I'll freeze the soup without rice, then cook some rice when I thaw the soup and throw it in for a minute of two. Much nicer.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 06:58 AM

As with Steve, I do get good quality rice. Usually Tilda, but I've also found Kohinoor good. My own feeling is that getting the consistency with rice is more a factor of this than choice of cooking method.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 07:18 AM

I've forgotten the name but, from quite a while ago, I recall trying something other than basmati (a long-grain home brand, I think) and it was not good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jun 21 - 08:42 AM

In the same vein, there's also a lot of inferior risotto rice around. I have yet to find a decent supermarket own-brand version. My go-to is Gallo carnaroli rice. It's often on offer somewhere for a shade over two quid, and a box gives two of us two generous risottos. At that price it's not worth economising and risking chalky or drop-to-bits rice!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Jun 21 - 02:23 PM

Ok tried two new things at once.

I have read that ground nuts can sub for breadcrumbs.

I also read several recipes for sardine cakes.

So I ground 1T pecans 1T walnuts 2T almonds to a fine powder.
Food-processed an onion, the oil from the sardines, a clove of garlic, some paprika and cumin. Shoulda only used some of the oil, it was way too runny. But I thought to do the nuts first at least.

Mashed the tinned sardines with the goop and added about half of the crushed nuts. Made patties (ish) and used the rest of the crushed nuts to coat the outsides of the 4 patties.

Toaster-ovened at 400, turned down to 350 after 10 mn for burning the tops, took out after 20 mn total.

Ate on a bed of cherry tomatoes with lime juice and a blob of sour cream.

Totally yummy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 30 Jun 21 - 12:47 PM

Now that's a totally new recipe, Mrrzy. Thanks for posting.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 30 Jun 21 - 02:22 PM

What does ' 1T ' mean ?

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 30 Jun 21 - 05:08 PM

I assumed that 1T means 'one tablespoonful'.
I could be wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Jun 21 - 05:31 PM

T=Tablespoon
t or tsp=teaspoon

My mom used to make totally delicious salmon croquettes that I've never managed to duplicate. There were a lot of other things that weren't so fabulous, but those were. (For example - she often burned the grilled cheese sandwiches when making the total comfort food lunch of cream of tomato soup and grilled cheese - perhaps it's because she was making the meal for 4 kids and had distractions?)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 02 Jul 21 - 12:07 PM

Mods, oops wrong thread

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 03 Jul 21 - 12:51 PM

I invented a tangy side dish to go with meat loaf.

Black bean salad

Drain but do not rinse one 15-oz can black beans
Make dressing: Put in a medium-size bowl and whisk well.
2 T veg oil
1 T apple cider vinegar         
1/2 t dried leaf oregano
a few grinds of black pepper
1/4 t mayonnaise (optional, aids mixing)


Chop finely 1/4 cup yellow onion
Chop coarsely 6-8 cherry tomatoes or one medium-size tomato

Mix all together. It is better to make this ahead so the flavors can blend.

The DH really liked this.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Jul 21 - 02:13 PM

Yes, sorry, 1 T = 1 tablespoon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Jul 21 - 11:42 AM

Made an odd salad by julienning a yellow squash and sitting it in parsley lemon juice garlic for an hour, then adding mostly defrosted green beans and a bunch of cucumber, letting that sit another hour, then adding a bunch of riced cauliflower and some olive oil. Yummy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Jul 21 - 12:07 PM

The first of the big garden cooking productions came last night with the weighing in of ripe tomatoes, green bell peppers, poblano peppers, and garlic, all from the garden, plus onions, cilantro, salt and apple cider vinegar from the store rounding out the mix for homemade canned salsa. "Zesty salsa" the recipe is called in the Ball Blue Book and it's many shares on the Interwebs.

It's a slow motion marathon, back and forth between the sink, counter, and stove, and I started out dicing peppers by hand but soon shifted to the food processor to speed the job. Peeling and coarse dice of all of those tomatoes much be done by hand (in my opinion - otherwise you're going to make tomato sauce in the processor). The only glitch in the operation was that I sat down at the table to read on the phone as I waited for the timer to signal 15 minutes of processing. Some time later I realized the timer not only hadn't gone off, it no longer retained the setting I had given it so I don't know if it needs new batteries or is on the fritz. I *think* the Rachel Maddow Show was just starting when I sat down and it was about 22 minutes in when I turned off the pot and removed the salsa. Processing an extra 5 minutes isn't a problem, I just don't want to under process it.

The kitchen sink was piled high with the large pots and bowls and food processor parts, so this morning my first job as tea brewed was to put all of that away. At least it goes pretty quickly - the pile looks huge but each item is large so putting just 3 or 4 away makes the sink look much better. Mind games to get through a job.

The house smells wonderful. I worked my way through most of the peppers I'd picked so far (I went out to pick a fresh bell pepper when I realized a couple of the ones I intended were getting a little wilted - always try to used the freshest best crops when canning). Those wilted ones will be diced and frozen later today, they won't go to waste. I have a large cardboard flat (Costco's 35 can sparkling water packaging) full of ripening tomatoes and the window sill is holding another dozen at least. I'm visiting the garden two or three times a day and picking any that have started a rosy color - they are officially vine ripe at that point and I hope to keep them from the sharp eyes of birds and squirrels.

The recipe offers diced measurements as well as approximate weight of ingredients (cups vs pounds), and this time I weighed everything. The recipe output says six pints, but having weighed all of the ingredients to be precise I got eight pints in the hot water bath and another pint and a half unprocessed in jars in the fridge.

After finishing cleaning the kitchen I did a victory lap around the kitchen. I need to head out to the garden to pick more tomatoes and my next decision - canning diced or sauce? And the next batch of peppers will go into jars with okra for Lady Bird Johnson's Pickled Okra recipe. You can look it up. Simple and delicious. I'm collecting a few okra a day, and soon it will be dozens a day since I recklessly put in six plants.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Jul 21 - 09:01 PM

I've been growing potatoes for the last forty years or more. I gave up on maincrop ones because I've always had blight every year, nearly always in late July or August, and the maincrops haven't reached a decent size by then. Besides, the slugs become a menace after the end of July.

For many years I've grown only Sutton's Foremost as my first early. We've been eating them now for a couple of weeks. They have a wonderful flavour, they bulk up well (given enough water), they keep their flavour and texture for a long time and they generally crop early enough to beat the blight (as soon as I see it I cut off all tops straight away, which means I'll get all the tubers in good condition).

The second early I've settled on for years is Nicola. It's waxy and dense with a great flavour, better than Charlotte in m'humble. It stores well and it makes superb oven chips (made with groundnut oil) or Mediterranean potatoes (made with extra virgin olive oil, a big sprig of rosemary and a big scattering of unpeeled garlic cloves) and fantastic jacket potatoes (they are not good for mash, but it's summer, dammit). I do get blight on it but not before the tubers are a decent, but not massive, size. Some shop potatoes aren't too bad and I rely on them through the winter as I can't grow anywhere near enough of my own to keep us going. But home-grown are incomparable when it comes to texture and flavour. I'm strictly organic with my spuds, by the way.

I have filleted red mullet (my all-time favourite fish) in the freezer and we'll be having that with my thinly-sliced Nicola at the weekend, the slices brushed with extra virgin olive oil, seasoned and baked in the hot oven in a single layer on greaseproof paper for fifteen minutes while I fry the fish in butter. The fish, with its skin well crisped, goes on top of a little mound of the potatoes skin side up, and we have that with a little scattering of black olive tapenade round the edges. That's easy to make but it's just as easy and just as cheap to buy a decent jar of it, enough for two, from M&S. We got the idea from a Rick Stein episode.

Tonight we had some Alaskan sockeye salmon (fried in butter) with some green beans and my Foremost potatoes, simply boiled. Plenty of butter, salt and pepper on that lot and it's food fit for the gods. And it was!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 12:37 AM

All those food sound so good!

Safety thing:

Some recipes say to crush a clove of garlic with the blade of a knife, but I've thought of another way to do it. There's a tool called a bench scraper which I really like - not that I've ever scraped a bench with it. We call it the lifter, because after we chop food, we use it to lift it into the pot.

It occurred to me that I could use the lifter to crush garlic. I put the garlic under the lifter, make a fist with my right hand, step slightly to the left of center and WHAMMO! There's plenty of room for the blow, there's no knife blade, and if I do it twice, the garlic is well and truly crushed. And then the lifter can go in the dishwasher.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 04:13 AM

Point taken re knife blade (though I still live dangerously). I have several broad-bladed silicone-coated gizmos I suppose I could use instead. Squashed cloves are my go-to for stews and other slow-cooked things, but for those quicker tomatoey pasta sauces I slice the peeled cloves into thin slivers (using my thumb as an anvil - more danger!) which are sautéed for two or three minutes in olive oil ((often with chilli flakes if called for) before adding the tomatoes/parsley/capers/whatever. What I never want is for the garlic to go brown. I haven't used my garlic crusher for years. I'm not a kitchen vandal...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 05:00 AM

Wild Salmon are on the west coast of Ireland at the moment. I bought a whole Salmon for 12.50 Euro last week ($14.86 or £10.79)

Last night at a bar I was asked if I wanted a any Salmon, an acquaintance could get me some so I asked for two more to cut into stakes to freeze. That will keep my good lady very happy!!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 05:30 AM

In 1977 we stayed near Cloghane, over the Conor Pass from Dingle, for two weeks at the wonderful Nellie O'Neill's B&B. We laughed out loud at breakfast every morning when I got two fried eggs with my fry-up but Mrs Steve, "the little woman," only got the one! We didn't need any more food until the evening! Her sister ran Murphy's Bar, four miles down the road at Brandon. One evening Nellie asked us furtively if we'd be going down to the pub. We said we would be, so she asked us to deliver a huge parcel wrapped in thick, plain brown paper, to be handed to no-one except her sister, no names, no pack drill, ask no questions get no lies. We complied, of course, increasingly suspecting from the odour that the parcel contained something, er, fishy. The sister was very grateful, gave us a free Guinness and disappeared off with the hefty parcel into the back room. A while later she emerged with a huge tray of paper plates and forks, each holding a generous chunk of the finest salmon I've ever tasted, before or since - free of charge to the couriers. We didn't ask...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 08:44 AM

Nora Murphys bar !! Run then by Mary Murphy the nearest thing to an Angel on this earth.!!!

The bar itself has to have the finest location in the world, it is now run by Mary's newphew.

I could regale you with loads of stories about Mary's kindness and generosity, I still get a Christmas card every year.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 09:08 AM

Mrs Steve has confirmed that it was Nora who had the place at that time (I'm not good with names!). It was/is indeed a superb pub. The old boys always sat on wooden benches drinking Guinness straight from the bottle, and a small girl regaled us one evening with some of the finest tin whistle playing you'll ever hear. The weather didn't play ball that August, we got three punctures in the Morris Minor in four weeks, and I became infested with over thirty sheep ticks sucking me dry, but hey ho!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 09:36 AM

Yes Steve, in 77 it would have been Nora, my first visit there was 95.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Jul 21 - 07:41 PM

You're making me feel like I should be planning a sentimental journey...

Now I have to confess that I used an Old El Paso fajitas kit for tea tonight, the hot and fiery one. I fried up some onion, a red pepper and some strips of free-range chicken breast, added the seasoning from the kit (not all of it, as there are just the two of us), laid it on the warmed-up tortillas with a bit of lettuce, spooned on the salsa provided and rolled 'em up. We had a little bowl of soured cream and a little pot of guacamole to optionally spoon on (which we did, to add to the mess).

I tell you, that was utterly messy to eat (I think I overloaded the tortillas) and utterly delicious... And I have three tortillas left over. I might stuff a couple with scrambled eggs for breakfast in the morning...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 14 Jul 21 - 08:35 AM

If you ever go on that sentimental journey give me a shout, I'll join you there for a pint .................... or several!!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jul 21 - 05:19 PM

Nellie was 77 at the time we stayed with her at the B&B, so she'd be 120 by now! We never booked ahead anywhere on our travels, and after three days' leisurely driving in the Morris Minor across the south we ended up by chance at Nellie's place. We stayed for a few nights then decided to move on, via Galway Bay to Clifden. But we missed the "Nellie experience" so much that we haretailed back the next day and stayed for summat like another two weeks! Each morning Nellie's granddaughter Ellen knocked on our bedroom door and piped up in her singing voice "The breakfast 'tis ready!"

Solid gold, going into my autobiography if I ever get round to it!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 11:53 AM

I was poking around in Google Earth to do with the archeology thread, so I querie "Nora Murphy's bar Dingle" and got a hit. Now it is Murphy's pub, bed and breakfast if the business on Strand St in Dingle is the one you're discussing.

Steve, I think the only way to eat fajitas is in an over-stuffed tortilla. There is a store north of me that has a tortilla bakery inside so I buy them when they're still warm. Both flour and corn are available. A trick that is helpful in particular for the corn tortillas is to lay two of them down with a huge overlap. Maybe an inch on each end being a single layer, the rest of it doubled. Put your ingredients on there and it's easier to eat before it falls apart. I suppose you could do that with flour tortillas but they're larger and thicker and that's a lot of carbs.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 12:27 PM

Not the same bar SRS, here is a link to the bar

Murphys

It really is very basic, door into the premises, bar to the left, fire to the right and a door opposite the front door out to the toilets. The floor is uneven there is little furniture but you will never find a better bar anywhere in the world.

The view from the front door looks over a (very) small harbour right up Bay of Tralee with a range of mountains which form the "spine" of the Dingle Peninsula to the left and is absolutely stunning.

It is said that St Brendan who Brandon is named after sailed to America even before the Vikings got there. His voyage was recreated by Tim Severin in 76/77 and if you can find his book "The Brendan Voyage" it is well worth the rad.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 12:50 PM

Ah, St Brendan's Voyage

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 12:58 PM

Raggy, that link won't load - my Internet Provider's software says it isn't safe to surf there. I suppose like a lot of bars it's "enter at your own risk." :-/

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 01:08 PM

Cannot imagine what it can find wrong with the site, it is just a quite basic advert for the bar.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 02:42 PM

The link opened for me without any warnings, but it wasn't a bar advert. It was a YouTube of Christy Moore singing 'St Brendan's Voyage', illustrated with photographs of Ireland, a view from space, and images of Saint Brandan, a sailing boat, the Pope apparently asleep on the job ... (some recurring again and again).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 02:49 PM

Oops - sorry, I opened the most recent link, which wasn't about the bar.
I have now opened the Murphy's bar advert link, which also worked OK with no warnings about it being unsafe.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 06:07 PM

The B&B was at Cross Cloghane, which is about four miles from Brandon - not in Dingle. I'd be amazed if it were still there. Nellie was Nora's sister, which we discovered only via the fishy parcel incident. Raggytash's description of the bar is just as we remembered it. The atmosphere in Nora's time was truly magical. The salmon trafficking incident ensured that Mrs Steve and I were never treated as tourists! We did climb to the top of Brandon Peak while we were there. Sadly, it was a bit foggy on top, but the cliff scenery is majestic.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jul 21 - 06:43 PM

That's a good tip, Maggie. Thing is, I made the mix to go into the tortillas and wanted Mrs Steve to have her fair share of it (I'm that kind of chap, don't you know...). But she wanted only two (I wanted three...) so I think I over-stuffed hers somewhat. To be honest, just get in there with your hands, sit over your plate and gorge. Life's too short!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Jul 21 - 05:07 PM

My okra plants are growing large (chest high at this point - they can reach upwards of 8-10 feet) but they aren't making as many pods as plants in the past. Maybe they're waiting for the heat of August. I made brine for picking and cut up a 4" poblano pepper and one of my homegrown garlics and trimmed the skin off of the tops of the okra (leaving them closed so seeds don't float out). I packed on pint jar and filled with brine then processed it for 10 minutes in my asparagus steamer pot. There was another equivalent amount that I took next door to my neighbor who loves this fried, boiled, etc., (I eat it fried and sometimes use it stir-fried - I'm not a fan of the consistency of boiled okra). I'll pick more as the plants keep growing and next time I have enough I'll warm the brine, cut up another pepper and peel another garlic, and do it again. This works so much better than trying to save a bunch to make a big recipe, so much gets too old and goes to waste.

I'm thinking about making another batch of the Ball Blue Book Zesty Salsa. It has been a hit with the family members who have gotten a taste. I made a gallon before, but it goes fast when divided among several households. This time it depends on if I have enough peppers or have to supplement my supply from the grocery store.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Jul 21 - 11:52 AM

I got a lot of fresh herbs today... Parsley, mint, dill. Gonna make my noncarb tabbouleh with cuke tomato cauliflower rice parsley dill and some mint with lemon juice and olive oil, and mojitos with the rest of the mint.

Also ran into a friend whose *name* is Parsley, whom I had not seen in years, but I did not bring him home.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Jul 21 - 02:30 PM

Parsley was sandy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Jul 21 - 10:00 PM

This evening I used tomatoes that were imperfect (so I couldn't use them for canning) in a favorite dish called Hirino Me Melitzanes (Pork with Eggplant)

I went poking around online and found the recipe transcribed on a cooking site, it comes from the same cookbook. They didn't use US measures (2 cups of diced peeled tomatoes, 2 pounds of pork) but it's the same recipe. I didn't have mashed potatoes, but I have red lasoda potatoes from my garden that I cut up and pan fried the other day and I used leftovers with the pork. Amazing!

Hirino Me Melitzanes.

If you want a marvelous cookbook, The Complete Middle East Cookbook by Tess Mallos is it. She offers techniques and, where needed, substitutions. I go to this book all of the time. I made hummus last week, I'm going to be making babaghanouj next week. I make some of her rice dishes and her lamb dishes and her vegetarian dishes. I use Bookfinder.com to find copies. I always keep extras here to give to people when the urge strikes) and you can find used hardcover copies much cheaper than a new perfect-bound (soft cover) volume. And though it doesn't make sense, if you search on the title with "The" at the beginning you get much better results (the search database should filter that out, but it doesn't.) Don't search on "Complete." Search on "The Complete."

Anyway, its a great book. Mallos is a cookbook author from Australia. Her ethnic background is Greek, and I don't know much more about her than that.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: JennieG
Date: 18 Jul 21 - 04:54 AM

Tess Mallos

Her books have been popular here for a long time. I bet if you checked the local Rotary Club used book sale (just down the road from me) you would find several; I don't know if they are still being published though.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Jul 21 - 11:46 PM

Thank you for the link!

Sad to see she isn't still writing - died 9 years ago. The book I sent links to appears to still be in print, or at least in stock, for sale new in bookstores. On Wikipedia looking at her oeuvre, and oooooh! She has a filo pastry cookbook! Now that might be a real treat!

Just today my ex was over to deliver some groceries and taste test the next batch of salsa. It's a mild recipe, and it seems this Puerto Rican has developed a taste for some heat (I used to have to make "false alarm" chili for him), so I advised that he mix in a couple of teaspoons of Tabasco sauce when he opens the next jar. (There is some in the recipe, I'll make a note to add a little more - I also like a bit of heat in the salsa). While he was here I pan fried a few cut up small potatoes from the garden and gave him a bowl of the eggplant and pork dish to try with them. He loves it - "could you make this with lamb?" - I'm sure you can. I've seen variations on My Fitness Pal, people make it with beef and lamb is bound to be good also.

As far as the heat, I think both of us over the years have broadened our willingness to have heat as part of a dish. I grew up in a no-heat world at the time in the Pacific Northwest; recipes spread and restaurants flourish with lots of stuff up there now. And elsewhere. We talked about that - I won't hold back on the heat in some of the things I make that I know he's going to want some of. We'll see what happens. (I hear from my son, who was the original picky eater, that he goes full-tilt on the Thai food with curry paste and peppers. And he's in the Pacific Northwest where, as a kid, I remember it being a big deal with a few places started carrying bagels.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 19 Jul 21 - 03:20 AM

Whilst we are on the subject of cookery books, does anyone have a particular book (or books) without which they would be lost? About half-a-dozen in my overlarge library fall into that category.

Among them is a disintegrating paperback by Bon Viveur (Fanny & Johnny Cradock), which I regard as akin to Holy Writ. Which does not, BTW, mean infallible.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Jul 21 - 02:51 PM

Among my cookbooks are Nora Ephron's Housekeeping and all the Edward X. Delaney novels...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Jul 21 - 11:58 AM

I have a few that I always seem to cook from, though I have several shelves of them because I inherited cookbooks from my mother. The first book I bought for myself was the Fanny Farmer cookbook, eleventh edition (the one I grew up with at my mother's house), the Joy of Cooking (one I found in the shelves at my dad's house when doing his estate), and the Better Homes and Gardens loose-leaf book from about 1974, given me by one of my best friends who knew I was going to be setting up my own apartment soon and needing to cook. That was the first book I had until Fanny Farmer came along in 1978.

I ended up with mom's Mastering the Art of French Cooking and have made a few of those recipes. She does chicken like nobody else. I have a little wooden card box mom gave me when I was maybe 11 - with home recipes I used to make, cookies, cakes, frosting, and as I got older, a few dishes like chicken teriyaki, casseroles I liked, etc. I have a larger plastic box probably intended for storing the large floppy disks (6" x 6" or so) that I put in folded printouts of online recipes and quite a few I've printed from Mudcat cooks. That box is a history of what I've been making because I use the recipe then tuck it into the front, so flipping back through the sheets shows me what I've made lately. My turkey brine and roasting recipe, cranberry sauce, Martha Stewart's pizza dough recipe that is my favorite, Puerto Rican rice and pigeon peas is in there, folded pieces of notebook paper with hand written recipes from watchin my mother-in-law cook and literally catching her hand to measure what she was putting into the dough or filling for things like empanadillas. My jelly making recipes are in there, as is Lady Bird Johnson's pickled okra recipe. And much more. I probably cook out of that box as much as I do the other cookbooks combined now.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 01:32 AM

Hi, SRS. I too have my boxes, full of the recipes we like best. I have two for my own recipes, one for meat dishes plus bread, another for everything else, mostly salads and desserts.

When my husband's parents passed away, we accepted their collection of recipes. There are the old favorites - beef in red wine, coq au vin, quiche Lorraine, Hungarian goulash. Another favorite is chicken thighs roasted with lime juice and paprika. It's very tasty.

My father-in-law was a great one for clipping recipes out of the newspaper and then never cooking them. That recipe for chicken was probably one of those. It looked like it had sat in the box for thirty years.

Often I cook those old European recipes in a slow cooker. There's less fuss and the meat gets very tender. I put the herbs and spices in at the end, so they don't get cooked to death.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 22 Jul 21 - 05:54 AM

Two books formed the basis of my cooking years ago

1. Practical Cookery by Cesarini & Kinton

2. Reportoire de la Cuisine by Gringoire & Saulnier

The latter is a brilliant book

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Jul 21 - 07:13 PM

For a change, I found some rather tasty shop-bought full-size tomatoes this week. My own tomatoes are nowhere near bearing as yet, so this was a bonus. I made a batch of salmorejo, a tapa that we've had many times in Granada, Córdoba and many a little village bar in Andalucía. I had to battle with Mrs Steve even to make this, as she associates it exclusively with sitting outside Spanish bars on hot August evenings with a glass or five of the best local red... However, just for once I prevailed.

Salmorejo is the thicker, creamier and tastier cousin of gazpacho, and must be served very cold and in small dishes or wine glasses. It's very easy to make, as long as you have those really good tomatoes. Here goes:

You need (for four):

a pound and a half of the best full-size tomatoes
Two fat garlic cloves, peeled
100 ml of the best extra virgin olive oil you can get your hands on. Compromise is not possible.
A really good glug of sherry vinegar
A teaspoon of sugar
Salt
The bread from a smallish baguette, crust removed

Blend everything except the bread to a fairly smooth paste. Crumble up the bread and put it into the tomato paste and let it sit for ten minutes. Blend again, achieving a pretty smooth consistency. You're done!

Now you really must chill this thoroughly. And here are two golden rules: first, don't bother peeling your tomatoes. Absolutely not necessary. Second, soak your bread in the tomato sauce you've made and ignore those stupid recipes that have you soaking the bread separately in water. I mean, why would you do that...

Now when you serve this as a tapa or a starter, the tradition is that you crumble a small amount of cold hard-boiled egg and a few slivers of Serrano ham on top. I find Serrano ham to be a bit chewy and the sort of thing I'm picking out of my teeth all the next day, so I substitute some crumbled-up crispy pancetta or streaky bacon. No-one's ever complained!

In Spain this is often served with little breadsticks, but I don't think you need those if you're serving it as a starter or as as part of a platter of tapas.

Finally, I made a double batch tonight, and I'm experimenting with the leftovers to see if it freezes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jul 21 - 07:49 AM

Yikes, my ingredients list omitted the yolks of two hard-boiled eggs (they go into the mix - the chopped eggs to serve are extra!). Sorry about that. It was well past my bedtime...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Jul 21 - 10:10 AM

Looks yummy!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Janie
Date: 30 Jul 21 - 04:53 PM

I rarely fix fish, because I so rarely fix it that I nearly always ruin it. For me, fixing fish and other sea foods is kind of like making bread or pastry, have to do it often enough to get a feel for it. Thing is, flour is a lot cheaper to waste while one learns than is fish or seafood.

Splurged and bought scallops - yes, frozen, but even so, still quite pricey. Enough for more than one meal for a few people. First go round turned out great. 2nd go round was ok but not as good as the first, and last night, with just enough left to feed myself, I botched it completely.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 30 Jul 21 - 05:09 PM

Helen, When you say 'fix fish' do you mean 'cook fish'?
I am used to 'fixing' meaning 'mending' or 'putting right', so 'fixing fish' would mean sorting out the fish when something has gone wrong with it. Your post suggests that it goes wrong when you are fixing it. I am confused.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jos
Date: 30 Jul 21 - 05:10 PM

Oops, sorry. That was meant for Janie, not Helen!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 07:29 AM

We had a wonderful fishmonger (sadly, he died far too young) who got us into fish in a big way. From being scared of a piece of raw fish and not knowing what to do with it a few short years ago, I now cook many different kinds, and you're right, the more you do it the more confident you get. The biggest mistake possible is to overcook it because you're scared of it being still raw in the middle. Only the very thickest hunks of fish need more than five or six minutes, and thin fillets need a lot less.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 08:18 AM

Have you not tried sashimi Steve ?
Pepople often think that sushi is just raw fish but it's a lot more than that whereas sashimi is raw fish, and delicious too.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Jul 21 - 08:46 AM

If you served it to me I'd eat it, but I'm not attracted.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 09:21 AM

I've discovered that salmorejo freezes perfectly, just needing a good stir when thawed out. That means I can make it when I find the perfect tomatoes, which isn't often!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 11:35 AM

I made my first batch of granola yesterday, ending up incorporating a couple of recipes. The one with the original ingredients I wanted didn't bake the mix long enough to even begin to toast it all so I turned down the oven (from 300 to 250^o) and baked it for another hour, turning every 20 minutes.

Most recipes call for coconut, and often for coconut oil. It's no problem substituting oil and I simply add extra oats instead of coconut (I'm allergic - I get a wretched case of dermatitis on my hands). This batch had oats, sliced almonds, chopped pecans, and when it finished baking, adding raisins. I have some sunflower seeds (no hull) to try in the mix next time. The baking time and temperature come from a recipe from Alton Brown, who can be relied upon for good advice. He does the math and science in the kitchen.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 08:16 PM

I mentioned on another thread that I tried Marcella Hazan's "chicken with two lemons" (page 347 if you have the book). I happened to have a fairly small organic chicken in the freezer (I got it half-price). The method is ridiculously simple: two lemons, salt and pepper and nothing else. The timings and temperatures are so different from my usual roast chicken ones, so I was worried...

We had it with my own new spuds and my runner beans, with lashings of butter and the rather sparse juices from the lemony chicken. It was the best thing I've cooked in months. Marcella, God love yer, gal!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Aug 21 - 08:32 PM

I was so enthused by the success of Marcella's chicken recipe that I was moved to look her up on wiki. I discovered that she died, at a ripe old age, when Mrs Steve and I happened to be on holiday in Sorrento, one of the finest holidays we've ever had. Dammit, it seemed appropriate to me anyway... :-(

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 12 Aug 21 - 10:02 AM

Yesterday I bought have a leg of Lamb from our local butchers, who supplies superb meat. Today I have studded it with Anchovy fillets, and sprinkled a selection of herbs on it ...... no salt ..... the Anchovies will provide that. Tonight it will be served new new season potatoes and a rather nice glass (or 3) of Red wine.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Aug 21 - 10:32 AM

We had the family round for a shoulder of lamb roast last weekend. Just salt, pepper and rosemary, into the oven mid-morning at 110C then forget it until spud-roasting time in the evening. It fed seven of us and there was enough left over for cold meat for five next day. It weighed in at 8lb and came from the farm of our butcher, five miles as the crow flies.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Aug 21 - 10:40 AM

Imma try that lemon chicken with my game hen later.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 14 Aug 21 - 10:23 PM

I invented this today.

EGGPLANT WITH TOO-HOT ITALIAN SAUSAGE

Recently we bought some I. sausage which proved to be too hot. (Why do they make that stuff?) I had cooked it in a conventional way - onion, garlic, tomatoes. You know the drill. This is what I did with the second half of the batch.

Get out half a small box of dairy sour cream to come to room temp.
(Don't use the fat-free; it won't get the spices off your tongue.)
Peel some of the skin off an eggplant.
Slice it diagonally into half-inch slices.
Put a handful of flour on a plate.
Heat the sausage and sauce in a saucepan.
Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in a big skillet over medium heat.
Dip the eggplant in the flour, fry for about 5 mins per side.
You want it browned but not burned.

To eat:

Put an eggplant slice on your plate.
Slather it with sour cream.
Spoon the Ital. sausage plus tomatoes mixture on top.
Slice bite-size pieces vertically with fork and steak knife. The sour cream will neutralize the hot-pepper in the sausage.

It's good.
Spread sour cream on the eggplant. Be generous.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 15 Aug 21 - 06:45 AM

At Jersey Mike's my wife asked what the tiny pimiento-stuffed thing in my cheddar-bread sandwich was. Without thinking I said: Maybe a "Wee olive in my yellow sub, Maureen."

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Aug 21 - 08:46 PM

Cod fillets, nice thick ones (no skin)
Home-grown french beans
Home-grown Nicola potatoes unpeeled
Butter
Groundnut oil

Apart from seasoning, that was it!

I turned the spuds into oven chips in 35 minutes by cutting into wedges, parboiling, roughing up and baking in a very hot oven in groundnut oil. I fried the cod in butter. The beans were topped and tailed, snapped in half then boiled for ten minutes. No sauces, just extra butter on the table. So simple, so healthy and so damned tasty!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 19 Aug 21 - 09:18 AM

Sounds good, Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Aug 21 - 06:22 PM

Now here's one you can whip up in 15 minutes and it's lovely. Using the best, freshest ingredients is paramount.

For two of us I used a jar of albacore tuna (aka yellowfin, I think) in olive oil that yielded 150g drained weight. I won't buy canned or jarred tuna that isn't in oil and I won't buy it if it has added salt.

The other ingredients are:

Two cloves of garlic, chopped (not minced)
A pinch of dried chilli flakes (to taste: I want a good lift, but not my mouth on fire)
225g, or half a pound, of the best cherry tomatoes you can lay your hands on
A big glug of extra virgin olive oil
The juice of half an unwaxed lemon and the zest from all of it
A big handful of freshly-chopped flat-leaf parsley
Salt and pepper
250g spaghetti that's been made with a bronze die (DeCecco is grand)
Parmigiano reggiano, freshly grated

I cut the tomatoes cleanly in half and drained the tuna. I broke the fish into large flakes with my hands. I heated the olive oil gently in my big Le Creuset casserole pan and added the chilli flakes and garlic for a gentle sauté for five minutes. Meanwhile, I got the spaghetti on the go in water as salty as the Mediterranean Sea. Once the garlic pan was sizzling (brown garlic? Start again...), I threw in the tomatoes, the parsley and some seasoning. A few minutes later, when the tomatoes were softening and the pasta had two minutes to go, I threw the tuna and the lemon juice into the sauce and turned off the heat. I drained the spaghetti, retaining a mugful of pasta water, and threw the spaghetti into the sauce, mixing well. It needed just a bit of the pasta water just to loosen the sauce a tad. Into two bowls it went and it was finished off with a sprinkling of lemon zest and a grating of Parmesan (optional, and to be sneered at on a fish dish by true Italians, but hey ho...)

This was really quick to do and was absolutely delicious. You need to aim to get the tomatoes just softening but not so soft that they create a tomato sauce. I can't think why I haven't tried this before. My little sister (who's only 56) is coming for a week next week and I'll be doing this one again. One more arrow in the quiver!

Only the best ingredients you can lay your hands on now...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Aug 21 - 07:45 PM

Well we've finally ditched our ancient (and in several regards malfunctioning) cooker (which had a ceramic hob) and bought one that has an induction hob. This is new to me, and I can hardly believe how good it is. No more pans boiling over, no more waiting for your pasta pan to come back to the boil for five minutes after adding the pasta. Totally controllable, totally powerful. We had to ditch a non-magnetic pan or two and buy a couple of replacements, but it wasn't too bad, as most of our stuff had magnetic bottoms (I've heard that said about me...) No more apologising to the assembled company because my massive pan of potatoes was taking forever to come to the boil. I made some cheesy omelettes tonight and I think I was a bit too cautious with the hob temperatures, but they were tasty, if a bit ruffled, and my oven chips and french beans (both from my veg plot) were superb. I'm getting there. It exactly a low-calorie repast, but sod that... I also made a massive batch, mostly for divvying up into portions for the freezer, of bolognese sauce, and that was a learning curve (I'm not a bad learner!). More of that later...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Aug 21 - 07:47 PM

Grrr. NOT exactly...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 05:25 AM

I've never used one have liked to have tried to have persuaded my parents into an induction hob cooker earlier this year when our sealed plate hob cooker was dying. I couldn’t find a 50cm model available and widening the gap to take a 60cm one wasn’t on so I never got as far as proposing this. We would have been almost ready for one in terms of pots and pans. My frying pan is a non stick coated aluminium one but I think everything else here is a suitable stainless steel.

The ceramic hob part of the cooker we bought isn’t much change from the sealed plates. The rings do react quicker to changes in setting (preferred by me but mum liked slow hobs) but, if you are talking in terms of providing energy to boil your big pan of spuds, I don’t think it offers any improvement at all.

In other parts of the UK, I would have also looked at the gas hob/electric oven options but mains gas isn't available here.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 05:45 AM

I have three cherished stainless steel pans that are no longer any good. Not all stainless steel is magnetic. It pays to check the pan base with a magnet, otherwise you might be spending the first few days with your induction hob with not enough pans!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 06:12 AM

Sure, that's why I said "I think suitable". Never worked with them there but I learned from browsing a Dormer tool booklet on drills given to me back when I was a trainee setter operator making track rod ends for cars - early 80s - that there are magnetic martensitic alloys and non-magnetic austenitic ones. I've not put mine to the magnet test.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 10:38 AM

What the feck are you talking about ? martensitic ? what the feck does that mean ?

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 11:10 AM

Come on, Dave you should know: they make Aston Martins out of martensitic alloys and Austin Allegros out of austenitic ones! Tsk!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Aug 21 - 01:59 PM

And, outside cookware, the bits (just the odd fastener) of stainless I buy now are known as A2 and A4 - routes to drive these cars along?

Back to pots and cookers. I got a bit frustrated with the time it took me to get my first attempts at jam making to setting temperature with our (old) cooker last year. I know some of this comes down to patience and, also may not be worthwhile for the limited use it would have, but, any thoughts on a stand alone gas ring I could place in the porch and run from say a small propane cylinder?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Aug 21 - 11:37 AM

I'm interested in your induction hob, Steve, and I've done some reading which leaves me confused.

1. Does your unit take special wiring or do you just plug it into the wall?

2. If I have a pan and a magnet sticks to the bottom, does it qualify as a magnetic pan, or do I need something specially sold for induction?

The speed and the efficiency certainly appeal to me. On the hot days of summer, we don't want to use the stove much.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Aug 21 - 02:06 PM

We're recommended here to have a qualified person wire it in. The delivery chaps at our local shops are qualified for the job. It took him two minutes to wire it into our existing, old-fashioned cooker point. As for cookware, the magnet test is the one to go for. If a magnet sticks to the bottom of the pan, said pan will work on an induction hob.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 11:26 AM

Thanks for the info, Steve.

Other news: last night I made this recipe for Morrocan white beans.

https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=moroccan+white+beans

I simplified it by using a can of Great Northern beans. I also used cut-up cherry tomatoes from my garden. They were good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 11:32 AM

I have been spooning generous amounts of my fresh salsa over scrambled eggs. Good for breakfast, lunch, or dinner!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Aug 21 - 11:36 AM

oops I spelled moroccan wrong. This looks like a better URL, anyway.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kfe50CzNcfY

I had to use a French translator to tell me that curcuma is turmeric. I suggest only 1/4 teaspoon of it for a can of beans.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 07:58 AM

Leeneia’s question got me wondering if there were plug in worktop induction hobs in the UK and whether such a thing would be an alternative to the stand along gas ring I’d wondered about about in a previous post.

We bought this single induction hob which arrived this morning. I feel it does bring water to the boil quite a bit faster than the rings on the cooker ceramic hob but I’m a bit bothered by the heating pattern I see in the water. This is most noticeable when, having boiled the water, the setting is reduced to a simmer as the hob seems to work by giving max power pulses followed by off periods. There appears to be a ring OD about 8cm, ID about 4cm that receives high power heating and not a lot else. I’ve tried two different pans of different makes and get similar results so I think the pattern is from the unit. (Are your rings similar, Steve?)

I have some ripe plums to pick and aim to have a go at some jam making over the weekend when I get some sugar. I may find things are OK but I do wonder if I’m going to find I have hot spots where the jam sticks and burns.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 09:45 AM

The four cooking zones are three different diameters, one large, two medium and one small. Almost all our pans fit very tidily on one or the other of them. From all I read about induction hobs, matching the pan base to the cooking zone is pretty important for efficient cooking. I'm not sure how well it would work for a single hob and a number of pan diameters.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 09:54 AM

Thanks. There was a customer question asking about the size of pans to which the seller replied the recommended sizes were between 12 and 26cm. The pans I tried were 18cm and 24cm with the larger one being the one I'd use for jam. I'll just have to see how it goes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 09:57 AM

I've considered getting one of those portable induction cooktops to take outside for cooking in really hot weather. And I need to rework the guts of my barbecue grill (we live in an area with lots of mud dauber wasps and I fear there is mud packed into one of the tubes needed to make it run - the last time I used it I barely got heat.) You can still find the old hotplates with the electric coil, or the electric pad, and they're on the cheap end. And you can buy some of these induction units that come close to the cost of the entire stove (four burners on top and a robust oven below).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Aug 21 - 11:39 AM

Had a lot of crab at my beach week, but several had some empty legs, how is that possible?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 27 Aug 21 - 10:08 AM

Yesterday I invented a new sandwich. We went to Harvesters to package food for food pantries, and I wanted to take a sandwich along. The sandwich had to fit in my belt pouch, which would get warm from my body, so it had to be meatless.

So I cut open a bolillo (a kind of bun from Walmart. Delicious) and put Smart Balance ""butter" on it. Spread on apricot jam and nestled roasted pecans in it. Buttered the top, wrapped, packed and enjoyed later after sealing packages of ham with our team of senior citizens. It was quite good.
===========
Mrrzy, that's baffling about the empty legs. I'd be interested to know why that happened.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Aug 21 - 10:49 AM

Bolillo goes beyond Walmart - they come from Mexico and points south. As a kid I remember making a lot of picnic sandwiches on hard rolls, those were the big deal in the Pacific Northwest at the time. Down here in Texas, lots of things go on bolillos. And they're also great for making garlic bread. The local Hisapnic grocery stores often have panaderias inside. And I get tortillas in a Mexican grocery, made fresh the day I buy it and often times still warm. Life is good here if you like all of those Mexican breads! And Mexican bread goes beyond that, the biggest (as far as I know) cookie and bread maker from Mexico is a company called Bimbo Bakeries, and they own the big company from Fort Worth called Mrs. Baird's Bakery. (The big plant is near me and at night when the wind is blowing from the east I can smell bread baking.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 28 Aug 21 - 11:36 AM

Thanks for the info, Stilly. The bolillos at my neighborhood Walmart seem to be the most popular bread, and the whole-wheat bolillos sell out faster than the white ones.

The last time I was there, I bought the last bag of ww bolillos. The entire in-store bread rack was full, except for the space where the bolillos had been sold out.
============
If you can smell the bread from Mrs. Baird's, perhaps you are acquainted with a website called "Drumbeats" where you can watch the cars of silly people being towed in Deep Ellum. After the news, which so often tells of scoundrels and fools getting away with things, it is soothing to watch Drumbeats.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXRAS7H52-s

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 28 Aug 21 - 11:43 AM

Back to recipes.

Last night the DH and I returned to the past, having spaghetti frittata for supper. I used whole-wheat spaghetti and grated cheese (six kinds of Italian) from a bag. I am not a cheese snob.

This recipe from the New York Times tells you how.

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/6791-pasta-frittata

When you get bored with your recipes, spaghetti frittata offers a new and different texture.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 21 - 03:50 PM

Deep Ellum is Dallas, I'm near the big Fort Worth plant. Bimbo Bakeries is huge, it owns several other name-brand bakeries. It's a baking empire that's rolling in dough. :)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 12:14 PM

Well I made the plum jam. The induction thing provides plenty of power to the pan, 2KW better spent..., I found it difficult to control as the seconds of on and off cycles it gives, say at 600W can bubble a drop of jam over before cooling again in an attempt to get a simmer or faster but controlled boil. Maybe I just have to learn to live with this or maybe one day, we find a better model but, overall, having one more efficient and faster ring I can pull out reasonably easily isn't a bad place to be.

On a different subject, was it someone (Steve?) in this thread who suggested Nicola potato? As well us as being late planting, I pulled the tops off because of what I think was blight on the leaves but we have been very pleased with them. It's worked out around 1 root for our three portions, parents have liked them and (I'm, rightly or wrongly, leaving them in the ground till required) have another 5 roots to go. Very firm and very tasty spuds.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Aug 21 - 05:05 PM

As it happens, Jon, I lifted all my Nicola crop today to make way for my spring cabbage plants which are looking impatient in their little modules. I too cut the tops off, around the end of July, because of blight. The crop from just a few square yards was around 30kg of spuds. Fantastic! I've sorted them this afternoon into three batches: "premier" (big spuds with no blemishes); "chip-sized" (medium size, a touch of trimming of green bits needed on one or two); and "smallish" (best for Mediterranean-style roast potatoes with rosemary and garlic). The premiers are by far the biggest batch, and tomorrow I will put them into a mini-clamp in one corner of a veg bed, with just a touch of organic slug protection. The chip ones and the the smallish will go into a dark cupboard in my utility room, to be used up first.

They are indeed lovely spuds, of a quality you simply can't buy in shops. I grow them strictly organically and we never use them for recipes that need peeled potatoes. That would be a crime! In fact, their one weakness is that they don't make great mashed potatoes, but in a way that isn't a weakness at all. If I want mash, it's off to the shops!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 02:43 PM

Spaghetti frittata sounds great. Also saw a recipe for pizza salad, which also sounded great.

What with the no carbs thing I find I *think about* food all. the. time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 04:43 PM

Over the years I've had the garden in the front yard alongside the driveway, and when people are walking by they sometimes stop to talk. When there are children in those groups I invite them to visit the garden - pick a tomato or an eggplant or pepper, or if it's the right time of year "what do you think grows on this plant?" and when they can't figure it out, suggest sweeping away some dirt below. Little kids are so charmed when they see things in the ground that they are accustomed to from the grocery store. Digging potatoes is kind of like hunting for Easter eggs - always a surprise!

The potatoes I have the best luck with here are the red lasoda, and Beauregard sweet potatoes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 05:50 PM

I've grown potatoes every year since 1979, when I got my first allotment. I've had blight in every year bar one. There is no control for blight available to UK gardeners. The lesson I've learned from this is to grow first earlies and second earlies only, and to get them in the ground in good time, which generally means early to mid-April here in Cornwall. Any earlier and I risk a late frost killing off the tops. One horrible year I got blight before the end of May, but generally I get hit around late July. Maincrop spuds rarely grow big enough before the blight strikes. A double whammy is that late July is when the slugs kick in. So I want my spuds finished by early August at the latest. If I've had blight, I cut the tops off (it's safe to compost them as blight spores can't overwinter - they survive on spuds that have been missed), then leave the spuds for a couple of weeks before lifting, which allows the spores to wash harmlessly away into the soil. I've lifted my last spuds now and the bed is planted up with spring cabbages. I'm hoping that our new cat will deter the bloody woodpigeons.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 06:12 PM

I tried spaghetti frittata once and found that cutting it and eating it to be a major tribulation. I think I did it wrong.

We had Italian-style sausages (bought from Marks and Spencer) with lentils and chilli tonight and all was lovely. I can't find the Castelluccio lentils that I want in this country, but the puy lentils worked beautifully. You could just use good quality pork sausages, but the Italian-style ones, which use little or no bread and which contain fennel, are the gold standard.

I made a soffritto with shallots, carrot, celery and diced pancetta. A small sprinkling of dried chilli flakes also went in. Once that had softened, I fried the sausages separately for 20 minutes. Meanwhile, once the soffritto was done, I added to it a glass of white wine, some pepper and a splash of stock. I added about 300g of pre-cooked lentils (I swear by the Merchant Gourmet brand) and chopped the cooked sausages into bite-size chunks (you can leave them whole, but then you need to use a knife as well as a fork and sit at a table instead of in front of the telly). I threw in the sausage chunks and heated the whole lot gently to get the ingredients to blend. Off the heat, at the last minute, in went some chopped fresh parsley. Begod, I excelled meself tonight...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 10:26 PM

Congratulations, Steve! That sounds very good.

We didn't cook tonight. Instead we watched a historic steam engine go buy, then we ate a Viennese restaurant.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Aug 21 - 10:53 PM

You can slow blight by spreading whole ground cornmeal on the soil when you plant, by making a "tea" of that same cornmeal in water and spraying the liquid on the plants, and by using store strength (3%) Hydrogen peroxide, full-strength, as an occasional spray on the foliage. All of these things suppress fungus, which is what blight is. It may not eliminate it, but it will reduce it considerably. Start this as soon as you plant the potatoes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 07:07 AM

Call me Mr Sceptical, but I don't see how spreading something on the ground can deter airborne fungal spores (the only way blight can reach your spuds) from landing and germinating on leaves. From what I read about hydrogen peroxide, there's little evidence of its efficacy apropos of blight and at what concentrations. And as soon as it leaves your sprayer, it's turning into water and oxygen... I think I'll stick to choosing early varieties that evade the worst of midsummer attacks, and remove the tops as soon as I see blight infection. Look hard enough and you'll find myth-busting articles on cornmeal on the web.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 07:29 AM

I grew 2 potatoes this year. The other one was just 4 (2 per tub) Aran Pilot I wanted to try to see how it worked out. I'll try to organise our tubs a bit better, possibly adding another 2-4 tubs to our collection. They were a very nice new potato and worth expanding on for this easy plant way of getting a few early samples.

The planting of the Nicola was delayed due to a combination of the weather and the availability of our (usually once a week) gardener. I leave the heavier preparation and digging to him. I think that we in North Norfolk have a similar situation to Steve in Cornwall in that later plantings of potatoes are more at risk of late blight.

As for this year, a found a site that had a UK map predicting the likelihood of blight and showing where there were known infections. It also mentioned it's method of prediction and our spell of very high humidity with cool temperatures didn't look good. As with Steve, I don't think there is any protection available for UK home gardeners. I think all you can do is keep an eye on the leaves and cut the tops off if you find a problem. That should save the potatoes that are in the ground.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 08:55 AM

I get blight every summer, but, because of my policy of promptly cutting off all the top growth (I use sharp shears), I rarely lose any actual spuds to blight. I grow tomatoes in a biggish greenhouse (I grew them outdoors in Essex but it doesn't work here), and, despite what all the pundits tell us about greenhouse toms being safe, I get the blight in there as well, every year. Tomatoes are just that bit smarter at fighting off the disease so it's still a worthwhile pursuit. My favourite tomatoes are Sungold, little orange cherry toms. The plants have the added advantage of being resistant to all the soil-borne tomato wilt diseases as well as leaf mould, so I grow them in the greenhouse soil (hugely enriched with my garden compost every spring) year after year, no problem.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 06:14 PM

I've made a determined effort to keep my veg beds filled with something or other at all times from now on. As soon as my broad beans came out, I planted the bed with purple sprouting broccoli plants that I'd raised from seeds and held in small pots. I can expect them to crop from December through to March or April. I had a bit of room at one end of the bed so I planted some young french bean plants. They may be a bit too late, but I'm giving it a whirl. I've also interplanted the big gaps (for now) with some Little Gem lettuce plants that I sowed four weeks ago. The big spud bed, now cleared, is now full of young spring cabbage plants. I've planted them rather close, hoping to be able to thin them out for some early greens in winter whilst leaving some to form large heads. My choice is Durham Early, a really nice variety. I'm going to sow some Aquadulce Claudia broad beans next month, which can go in where the early french beans are coming out and in any other gaps I have. Some of these ideas may fail, but at least I'll have even more greenstuff for composting for next year. For now, I still have plenty of runner beans, a few french beans, herbs of all sorts including an embarrassingly-huge amount of flat-leaved parsley (which freezes magnificently) and those lovely spuds. Chives and rocket are "weeds" in my garden. I never have to plant or sow them and I have bucketloads of them, which I like. My parsnip bed is luxuriant but I refuse to use them until we've had a frost on them...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Sep 21 - 06:23 PM

Oh, and my Autumn Bliss raspberries are fruiting magnificently. They freeze beautifully too, and they don't seem to get that horrid reversion disease that afflicts summer raspberries. My raspberry bed is now 25 years old and I have to be very stern with it in order to stop it from turning into a jungle!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 11:20 AM

I like Then we ate a Viennese restaurant.

I had a thought today but when I looked it up, it is apparently a thing: Sardines and ratatouille.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 01:59 PM

To go back to the spaghetti frittata, it's easy to eat. Make it in a skillet, and cut the finished, pie-shaped frittata into wedges, like a pizza. [I forget whether I used kitchen shears or a serrated knife.] Eat the wedges with a knife and fork.

Mrrzy, I ate sardines in Italy once, and they were nothing like the sardines we get in cans. The Italian fish were fresh and delicious, and they were several times bigger than canned sardines. The fuselages were a curious triangular shape, and the scales were beautifully bright and silver. I wonder if your recipe is for that kind of sardine.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 02:09 PM

There is a great deal of research out there if you look in the right places. Hydrogen peroxide sprayed on the leaves in the 3% form (grocery store strength) will take out a lot of fungus. A spray with the cornmeal tea will also do that. The fungus overwinters in the soil, it gets to the plants later. Treating the soil doesn't hurt and it will generally help with fungal diseases.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 04:02 PM

Blight spores don't overwinter in soil. They can survive only in living tissue, "volunteer" spuds for example (the ones missed during the lifting), or in blighted tomato fruits.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Sep 21 - 05:28 PM

Leeneia, yeah, anchovies too, very different.

My ratatouille with tinned sardines in hot oil was marvy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 05:19 AM

I made a big pan of lovely, tangy tomato sauce last night using my glut of Sungold cherry toms (just extra virgin olive oil, a gently-fried chopped onion, seasoning and a pinch of sugar and a last-minute whiff of fresh basil). I rarely bother to skin tomatoes, and it wouldn't be practical in any case to try to skin a couple of hundred cherry toms! To avoid too much skinniness in the sauce I chopped the toms into quarters first. If the sauce still looks a bit too skinny when I check it later on I'll push it through a coarse sieve, whizz the skinny residue and put it back in. We've going to have the sauce tonight with some "meatballs" made from cooked puy lentils, those little brown ones, which I'll season and to which I might add a pinch of chilli flakes and a bit of chopped fresh parsley. The idea is to fry the "meatballs" then simmer them in the sauce, as I do with meat meatballs, then devour them on top of some long pasta. Maybe Parmesan. Never tried anything like this before, though we used to give our kids a sauce made with red lentils and tomatoes on spaghetti when they were little. That actually went really well with grated cheddar. I'll let youse know how it goes...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 06:20 AM

The skinny residue has been duly whizzed! I could have whizzed the whole lot, but I do like my tomato sauce a tad chunky...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Sep 21 - 06:03 PM

Well the lentil meatball thing didn't work. You can't make meatballs out of a pouch of lentils. I tried a different recipe that involved adding sautéed onions, Parmesan and oats to the mix. It did make "meatballs," they did fry nicely but as soon as I added them to the tomato sauce they disintegrated. So I made it into a sauce with tomatoes and lentils and we had it on spaghetti. Not bad, but the oats made the whole dish slippery. I might make some lentil and bacon soup with the leftover sauce...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 11:36 AM

Humble but yummy. I whisk my eggs with a bit of riccota til smooth for my scrmbled eggs , no milk.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 05 Sep 21 - 05:27 PM

Right, yanks. Just yesterday I heard for the first time in my life about creamed corn. So I made some today to go with my barbecued maple-cured bacon and sausages.

This is how I did it, for two of us:

I took three corn cobs. I cut the grains off half of the cobs with a sharp knife. I grated the rest into a bowl with a coarse grater. I then ran the back of the knife up and down the stripped cobs to get as much juice out as possible.

Next, I sautéed a chopped shallot in butter, along with a goodly portion of fresh thyme leaves. Once the shallot had softened (not coloured) I threw in all the corn. I added a good splash of water along with a touch of seasoning and simmered it for seven or eight minutes, until the grains were cooked and the liquid was thick. At the last minute I added a blob of cream.

Well I thought it was pretty good. Come on, yanks. This is one of yours. Did I do it right? Should it be stiff or floppy (I'm still talking about the creamed corn...)? Would you eat it with barbecued stuff?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 11:50 AM

It's definitely suitable with barbecued stuff, though in summer I would be much more likely to buy corn on the cob. If hosting a formal dinner, where cobs are unthinkable, I buy frozen corn.   

I have never heard of anybody preparing creamed corn. We buy a can of it and heat it up. Butter optional. Actually, I haven't seen it in years.

I'm sure your own creamed corn was much better than ours. It sounds like a lot work, though.

As for consistency, it's between mushroom soup and mayonnaise.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 01:09 PM

I've seen cooking show hosts make creamed corn several times - it involves cutting the kernels off the cob and getting some of the "corn milk" from the cob as well, then simmering for quite a while.

This Southern Living video gives you the most important part of it - how you remove the corn from the cob. There are various manufactured and homemade gadgets out there that cooks use for removing corn from the cob.

But I'm with Leenia, I get it from a can (and those don't have cream or butter, just a little added salt and using corn starch as a thickener). If I have fresh corn here at the house I eat it off the cob (after 2-3 minutes in a pan of boiling water.) I grew up buttering and salting it first, but now I eat it straight, no toppings.

When I was a kid my mother used to do a once-a-summer meal with a bushel of corn and she'd boil it and keep bringing it to the table and we'd fill up on corn on the cob for dinner.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 01:15 PM

I made falafel on Sunday for lunch with friends, and it came out very well. It's easy to make if you have a food processor large enough to put the whole batch in. I requested one on my xmas list a couple of years ago after comparing models. I was tired of fussing with several batches in a small processor. This is one of the few foods that I get out the small deep fryer for. Because of the fryer's small size it uses only a few cups of oil and there isn't the splatter problem.

I also make the tahini sauce. The pita bread came from a local halal grocery store bakery, and we added cut up iceberg lettuce and chopped cucumbers. I have made pita bread before, but in some ways the name of the bread spells out the making process - it can be a pita - pain in the ass. Good to know how to do it, but better from the local bakery for $1.19 for six.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 01:25 PM

Well we'll be having what's probably going to be our last BBQ off the summer this evening. 28.5C today (83F). That's rare and it isn't lasting. We've been out for most of the day so it'll be a burger in a bun, some sausages and....corn on the cob. I might grill a slab of halloumi too, though Mrs Steve hates the squeaky-tooth thing. Some rocket and some cherry toms from the garden and some onion chutney, and I'll be a happy man.

I had never even heard of creamed corn until I read about it in the Guardian, let alone knew it came in tins! You'd think from the blurb that accompanies some of the recipes here that it is all the rage in the States. You lot don't half disappoint me!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 01:41 PM

I don't know that creamed corn on its own is "the rage" - though corn (look up elote) is coming into it's own again in various recipes because it has always been a popular Mexican street food, and those recipes have traveled north with immigrants (or evolved here with native North Americans who grew it in the American Southwest, in particular).

The creamed corn variety I've always thought of as a New England dish, but that video clearly lays a southern claim to it (I think they might best claim the adding milk and butter part of it.) It was always something we had a few cans of when I was a kid - it was treated like a vegetable, but of course, maize is a grain. It was an addition to a meal that needed something more. Canned whole corn also was on the shelf, and I always have a large bag of frozen whole corn handy for various uses.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 05:25 PM

Our supermarkets sell corn cobs in pairs that are called "supersweet." Generally they're not too bad. My favourite way with them is to shove them on the barbie, uncovered, for about 20 minutes. Failing that, boiled in a big pan for ten minutes. There's something a bit caveman-ish about picking up a buttery cob and viciously stripping away the kernels with your teeth...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 05:29 PM

I've never made falafels, but at one of our supermarkets (Waitrose, Brits) you can buy sweet potato falafels that are extremely good. They freeze perfectly too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Sep 21 - 07:06 PM

Fajita soup. One ghost pepper in the vat. Funny how the Spanish Ay ay ay sounds just like the French aïe aïe aïe...

Slice onions beef bell & ghost pepper as for fajitas. Smash a lot of garlic. Heat olive oil, infuse with ghost pepper, then garlic, then onions, then some salt, then beef, sauté till no visible pink, turn down, add thyme marjoram, touch of worcestershire, mushroom broth to cover, simmer a half hour. Serve with biiiig sour cream dollop.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 09:35 AM

Why is cold leftover spicy so much spicier than reheated leftover spicy?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 10:27 AM

When the veg plot was a bit bigger and mum was an active gardener, she
used to grow a bit of sweet corn. Not much, maybe 3-4 meals, but it was nice and sweet corn is at its best cooked straight after picking. We just used to boil it.

I don't think any of us have the teeth to munch into it on the cob these days.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 10:43 AM

Boiling corn on the cob for 10 minutes was the rule of thumb when I was growing up but kitchen science has moved along and it is enough to simply heat it really well in that water for 2 or 3 minutes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 10:51 AM

Ten minutes does it for us. Mind you, ours is always supermarket stuff, so perhaps it needs a bit longer than ultra-fresh....?

I'm sure there was a saying once, Jon, that you cut the cob from the plant and then ran to the pan of boiling water...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 01:12 PM

Microwave corn 2mn in husk. It husks more easily and the corn is cooked perfectly. 2mn per ear, no reduced time for lots of ears. No pot. No boil. No flavor dilution.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 01:39 PM

I have a microwave but I'm not a fan. It was a top Panasonic model with all the bells and whistles, about 25 years ago. The only things I ever use it for are to soften butter in winter to make it spreadable and to make emergency porridge in a hurry. I have a granite slab about an inch thick and six inches square in a plastic frame that I can microwave on full for four minutes. That gets it hot enough to stand a dish on when I want to keep my bowl of Mediterranean-style potatoes warm for a useful period of time. Otherwise it sits in the corner, sadly and deservedly neglected. I've been campaigning to replace it with a deep fat fryer, which would take up less space and allow me to make croquetas and arancini, but Mrs Steve won't let me because she thinks I'll just use it to make chips. A scandalous accusation...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Sep 21 - 06:26 PM

Cuban shrimp creole, from WashPo. My whole house smells deliciously of shrimp heads.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 03:40 AM

Three cooks were discussing the best way of cooking corn on the cob for it to be really fresh.

First cook: "Get the water boiling, go to the corn patch, cut a cob and run with it (not walk) to the kitchen. Time from picking to cooking, less than a minute."

Second: "Set up a portable stove next to the corn patch, get the water boiling, cut the cob and throw it straight in. Time from picking to cooking, two seconds at most."

Third: "Set up a portable stove right there in the corn patch, get the water boiling, then bend the plant so that your chosen cob dangles in the water. That way it's cooking even before it's picked."

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Sep 21 - 11:18 AM

There was a Nero Wolfe mystery in which fresh corn on the cob was a major plot point.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 21 - 06:30 PM

I called into our fishmongers today (the beautiful Linda also sells lamb they've raised themselves as well as other meat and veg). I wanted a chicken and I got a beautiful free-range chicken from Creedy Carver, not far away in south Devon. I'll be cooking that the two-lemon Marcella way on Sunday. But Linda happened to be filleting some ultra-fresh sea bass which was certified line-caught (I saw the certification!). It was a bit pricey, but I bought two good-size fillets which Mrs Steve and I will have tomorrow, on a bed of puy lentils cooked with a soffritto of carrot, shallot, celery and pancetta. There'll be plenty of fresh herbs in the mix too (though I'll be leaving out Yotam's turmeric: personal taste...) I got the idea from Yotam Ottolenghi in the Guardian. Yotam can do no wrong.

The usual trawling method of sea bass destroys the sea bed so I won't buy it, even though it's much cheaper. I'd rather just have proper line-caught sea bass as a rare treat. No farmed fish will ever knowingly pass my lips. Dammit, I'm looking forward to a weekend of good living!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Sep 21 - 12:11 AM

Yesterday I used jars of last summer's canned whole tomatoes along with peppers and garlic from this year's garden to make myself two quarts of spaghetti sauce. It is the veg part without meat or cheese because I use a hot water bath to process, not a pressure canner.

This is the Italian tomato sauce recipe in the back of the Ball Blue Book, for those of you who cook and can. I filled two pint jars and four half-pint jars and had a little bit left over. That went onto a 1/4 of a tandoori bread to make a small personal pizza this evening. The flavor is amazing!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Sep 21 - 08:56 PM

Aparently the secret to gazpacho is to make it very late at night when you are really full. That is the only way to let it sit long enough to turn into gazpacho. Otherwise I make, and immediately eat, a liquidified salad.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 04:49 PM

I like to blanch and freeze garden tomatoes, putting them in one-quart plastic bage. Then, on a cold winter night I whizz them in the blender with some nice oil. (You have to use your judgment on how much juice to keep in.) Add optional flavors such as basil, black pepper or garlic powder. It makes an incredible salad dressing - the taste of summer.   

However, you need to eat by candlelight, because the red dressing looks funny on green lettuce.

I also make the beginning of tomato sauce by sauteing onion and garlic, adding sliced garden tomatoes, simmering for a while and freezing. This is not much more work than preserving the plain tomatoes, and it saves time and dirty dishes later on.
=====
We husk our corn and put it on a pie plate with 2 T water. Nuke 4 mins in our very small microwave. It's safer than trying to take off corn husks with steam trapped inside. Modern varieties of corn stay sweet from field to market.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Sep 21 - 06:55 PM

I haven't got the room to freeze whole tomatoes. I make tomato sauce which I freeze in portions enough for two, in plastic bags that I can flatten to save space in the freezer. The tomato sauces I use in cooking may contain onion (a small amount), or garlic (never, ever both), chilli and basil. To keep my options open, I don't put any of those in my basic sauce for freezing. Just extra virgin olive oil, tomatoes and seasoning. I may or may not skin the tomatoes, though I think I usually do. I nearly always want garlic and fresh basil in there, but I rarely want onion, which makes tomato sauce claggy. Even so, I always reckon that I can add any of those things later. The sauce needs simmering for half an hour or more, until you see the olive oil separating and floating on top. Once thawed, it's just a matter of reheating the sauce then adding anything else you want in there that you've sautéed in a separate pan. I've often frozen Marcella's onion and butter tomato sauce, which needs nothing added except spaghetti and fresh parmiggiano reggiano. With that one, you make the sauce with a whole onion cut in half which you discard at the end. Perfect.

But if you stick loads of onion and garlic in your sauce, not to speak of dried basil, then you and I have parted culinary company...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 12:57 PM

Accidentally made a version of shakshushka (?) - I was sautéing my last bell pepper in snail butter and some hot pepper, added sliced last tomato, was intending a scramble but when I cracked my eggs on top I just left them there, turned the burner off, lidded the pan, and voilà, 4 mn later had yumminess. Oh, a little salt just on the eggs. The yolks were just-barely-not-runny. If only I weren't out of milk...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 02:14 PM

Shakshuka, Mrrzy.

Definitely a dish fit more a caliph.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 16 Sep 21 - 03:16 PM

I made something different last night chicken with jerk seasoning.
I juiced and orange into a round glass dish along with the segments and stirred 1 tsp Jamaican jerk seasoning into it. Then I added dark-meat pieces. Baked it in the oven at 350. I can't give you the timing- long story.

I made the mistake of putting the cover on the dish, so that the chicken boiled more than roasted. I have further work to do to keep the orange juice from being boiled away before the meat is done.

Strangely enough, the hot part of the jerk seasoning wound up in the orange segments, and the meat was mild. Go figure.

On the side we had corn on the cob and green beans with almonds. Fruit for dessert.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Sep 21 - 04:31 PM

Steve, you've told us several times about the food in Naples. Do you have any quick recommendations at the moment, a restaurant (affordable) or a dish (traditional, typical of the area)?

Passing it along to a traveler who just landed there.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Sep 21 - 06:09 PM

Well the last time I was in Naples was in 2013! We had passed through Naples on the Metropolitana railway a couple of days before, to go to Pozzuoli, to see the Solfatara crater. On the day we spent in Naples we had a tropical deluge. We'd been to the amazing archaeological museum (definitely not to be missed), then went to a pizzeria for lunch. That's the only time we ever dined in Naples. It was wonderful and it was very inexpensive. It was full of locals, except for us, always a good sign in Italy. Neapolitans claim to have invented pizza and they are very proud of their tradition. I can't tell you where to get the best pizza, but I'd say several things: first, brilliant pizza in Naples is cheap. Second, seek out the pizzerias that locals use. I understand that the most cherished ones are in the Centro Storico. I'd say that the antennae should be honed in order to eliminate the tourist ones, and Trip Advisor could be useful...

By the way, after the pizza we went to the Duomo, where, we saw the bones of San Gennaro, the patron saint of Napoli, in the crypt. He was beheaded in the Solfatara crater in the fourth century. There's no skull in the urn. Decidedly optional, I'd say...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Sep 21 - 09:18 PM

By the way, the traditional Neapolitan pizzas are Margherita and Marinara. Naturally, other confections are available, but those two are the ones.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Sep 21 - 09:52 PM

I rarely post photos as public, but this one of a pizza in Naples should show up.

Whatever it is, it looks delicious!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Oct 21 - 10:26 AM

Did an excellent pork chops salted and browned in olive oil, remove chops, butter, one ghost pepper, a bunch of smoked paprika, half a head of cabbage, the last garden tomatoes into pan, deglaze with lemon, lime and a smidge of white wine. When fried up put the chops back in the pan under the cabbage, added the garlic I forgot, covered and into preheated 350°oven for 45 mn. Marvy, warmed my cockles right up.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Oct 21 - 01:13 PM

I have some apples that need cooking because they're mealy now, and found a recipe I don't think I've made before (in my ancient Fanny Farmer Cookbook). A "Dutch Apple Cake" that involves making a simple coffee cake batter and slicing and submerging the apples, wedge edge down, in the batter. I will share this if it turns out well (because eating it all by myself isn't a good idea.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Oct 21 - 02:40 PM

Share the recipe, at least!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Oct 21 - 03:34 PM

Well I obtained six Italian-style sausages, the ones with lots of meat, not too much rusk and plenty of fennel and herbs. I fried 'em in olive oil for 15 minutes to get 'em brown then removed 'em from the pan. Same pan, bit more oil, I fried some onion and sliced (not minced) garlic, and threw in a sprig of fresh rosemary (never dried). After a few minutes I threw in a small glass of white wine and let it sizzle, then threw in half a pint of my veg stock (no bloody cubes), a bit of seasoning, a pile of cooked pinto beans (which I'd soaked from scratch, not out of a tin) and a slug of wholegrain mustard. While that was simmering I chopped the bangers into bite-size pieces and put them back in the pan, along with a big pile of chopped-up greens fresh from my garden. Once the greens were softened I served it up. Begod, it was wonderful. I think it needs the herby and spicy Italian bangers, which leak out their beautiful flavours as long as you've chopped them up, and not just ordinary pork ones, which would mean you'd have to spice up the sauce a bit. Another tool in the armoury!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 11:14 AM

I am dogsitting so not in my own kitchen. I have done some strange things.

*Sizzled some salmon to crunchy-skinness in sesame oil, don't remembee how I ate the main course but the next day I put the leftovers with spice, bok choi and onions into a yummy chicken-broth soup. Yum.

Then I made a different soup with ground yak and cauliflower. And spices. Yum.

Then I put the

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 11:17 AM

Tried to edit and hit submit prematurely. I was going to say, the yak soup had a tomato-ey broth. Made yak meatballs with a tiny tomato in the middle of each.

Then I put the 2 leftover soups together and *that* was yummy.

Today I browned the rest of the yak with the rest of the cauliflower chopped tiny, let that cool, and made salad with avocado tomatoes and the ground meat mess with mustard vinaigrette. Yum, again.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 11:18 AM

Handful each of almonds and pistachio on the taco-esque salad.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 05:10 PM

Well, it came out, but it took a lot longer to bake than it should have. I have misplaced my metal 8" square pan so I used a glass one. I made the cake batter with the odd name of "Cottage Pudding," and the Dutch apple cake but modified it. The Dutch apple cake calls for 5 apples - I could barely make two fit into the batter. I had to bake it close to an hour to get all of the batter to finish baking.

So - what would I do differently - use a metal pan. Forget the apple wedges and cut the peeled apple into small pieces and stir it into the cake. The sugar and cinnamon on top was too much. The raisins were good.

Here are the instructions:

Cottage Pudding

Set the over at 400^o. Butter a shallow cale pan, 8x8 inches, a small angel cake pan, or cupcake tins.

Sift together

1 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar

Mix

1 egg, well-beaten
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup butter, melted

Stir gently into the flour mixture. Pour into the pan. Bake until brown and crusty (20 to 25 minutes.)

Dutch Apple Cake
Spread Cottage Pudding . . . batter 3/4 inch thick in a buttered round or oblong pan. Pare 5 tart apples, core, cut in eighths, and press the sharp edges of the apples into the batter in aprallel rows. Sprinkle with 1/2 cup sugar mixed with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, also 2 tablespoons currants of seedless raisins, if liked. (I would use 1/3 cup sugar at most.)

Bake 350^o until apples are tender (about 25 minutes).

The recipes both suggest sauces and such that can be served with the dish, but talk about gilding the lily. This is plenty.

I would peel and chop 2 medium apples and mix into the batter. Bake lower (325^o) to give those apples time to soften. You might even want to simmer them for a few minutes in shallow water and let them cool before you add them to the cake.

The result I have here is edible, but it took a long time and wasn't well-tested. I've now tested it. This is the 1965 edition of the Fanny Farmer Cookbook.

When I look at my instructions I think I'm probably looking at what my mother decided to do to make that coffee cake for us.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Oct 21 - 09:42 PM

I microwaved a piece of this after dinner this evening and it was perfect - the apples weren't hard any more. Since I baked it for a long time and it sat cooling it may have finished baking - but if you want a more predictable baking time, maybe microwaving or steaming the apples for a minute would help speed the process.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 07 Oct 21 - 11:08 AM

It occurs to me that I made this cake in the pan the Cottage Pudding recipe recommended (8x8"), not the larger pan with the shallower 3/4" batter the Dutch Apple recipe recommended. My bad. I have a longer oblong pan that isn't the full size of a cake pan - maybe next try I'll use that. And try three apples.

Waiting for Mrrzy's response.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 11:47 AM

iTS THE TIME TO EAT PAW PAW. Its an American temperate tropical fruit that is like a mango mint banana. Its huge and can be eaten off the tree since it has no shelf life. Washington Jefferson and Adams ate paw paw with glee. Its recipes include ice cream, popsicles and fresh with a spoon. There are several species and differ only in the appearance of the fruit. Some are assembled like gigantic grapes and others in a dual display like testicles. MD has immense paw paw orchards. It has 8 seeds
that you can spit out like watermelon. Today it is almost like a red neck secret. 40 years of research has not advanced its shelf life. It is close to eating rich and creamy ice cream without being cold.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 01:51 PM

I've heard about those often and they grow in North Texas. Finding the plants is the challenge.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 07:28 PM

If you don't like a whisper of wintergreen you may not like them.

Not an academic source hurd mentality

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 07:42 PM

Ooh sounds yummy.

I invented, I think, garlic-lemon asparagus with pistachios.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 08:11 PM

On our trips to Andalucía I've always enjoyed the concept of tapas as the full evening nosh. In the village bars we went to, we'd order a glass of wine, then be offered tapas, all for €2. Well you can't eat and drink at home cheaper than that (and we never found a bar that exploited us by giving us bad wine).

It's easy enough to put out a plate of cured meat slices such as jamon Iberico and a bowl of olives, but I've wanted to make things myself as well. I've more or less mastered salmorejo, the tiny bowl of chilled breaded tomato "soup" made with sherry vinegar and a topping of slivers of jamon and a bit of chopped hard-boiled egg (like gazpacho but thicker and much richer). Tonight I got myself about 100g of chorizo (it was a spicy one and cut off one of those shaped like a horseshoe). I skinned it, then made a little foil boat on a baking tray into which I put the sliced chorizo, extra virgin olive oil, a thinly sliced banana shallot and a sprinkling of smoked sweet paprika. That went into the oven at 180C fan for about twenty minuets. Begod, that was damn good...those crispy edges...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 08:29 PM

Had I played twenty minuets the chorizo would have been immolated ...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Oct 21 - 11:48 PM

I'm not going to fix that typo, that stays right there for others to chuckle over!

In the US in the 1960s fondue dishes were all the rage. Everyone had the chafing dish (usually a wedding present) for parties. Then it literally went away. There are modern dipping fads (can anyone say "chocolate fountain?") but mostly it went away. I'm curious to see if there is a little resurgence in North Texas - my daughter sent photos of a fondue lunch she and friends had during a side trip to Switzerland. They were enraptured. I have some ancient cookbooks my mother collected, and I'm sure fondue is in at least a couple of them somewhere. I'll have to pull them out.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 09 Oct 21 - 04:19 AM

A stainless steel fondue pot is also good to use for a steamboat meal. Very conversational as you have to wait for the food to cook. An extra set of forks is advisable.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Oct 21 - 05:49 AM

And NO double-dipping!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Oct 21 - 06:49 AM

A slight cheat last night, though it still needed work. I had in my freezer a huge hunk of shin of beef on the bone (big bone!) that had already been slow-cooked for 12 hours. I'd bought it on special offer a few months ago from the Scottish online butcher Donald Russell. Once thawed, it needed 75 minutes in the oven at 180C. I use diced shin a lot in winter for beef stews, so I know that it has a lot of sinewy bits that need slow rendering, so I was a bit worried. It was gorgeous, tender and flavoursome. Once it had cooled slightly I was able to pull the chunks away with my hands, no carving needed. Five of us had generous portions of that with peas, steamed organic carrots and hearted cabbage, roast potatoes and gravy (always home-made with leftovers assiduously frozen in portions-for-two) enhanced by the meat juice.   Not one scrap was left on any plate, which I love to see more than anything. Mrs Steve had made a semifreddo with dark cherries and lots of chocolate for pudding, and that masterpiece also vanished rapidly (she always does the puds, though I can be a devil with the ice cream scoop...) It was a birthday nosh for one of our friends, so that was just great. Naturally, as ever in our house, the wine flowed freely. There's enough cold meat left for the two of us tonight. I think I'll reheat it (thoroughly!) wrapped in foil and serve it up in bite-size chunks with mash, greens and the leftover gravy and we'll eat it out of bowls in front of the telly.

I've put that huge bone back in the freezer for now, but I'll roast it and make beef stock, which I could then use to make the real McCoy French onion soup...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Oct 21 - 10:41 AM

BobL those are popular in Japan also. My daughter has put up photos during some of her past visits of restaurants with that setup. She didn't go to Japan this year (last year's trip was cancelled) because Japan has been slow to vaccinate the population. She and two friends (all vaccinated, all wearing masks) went to Italy where they've done a better job vaccinating (and last year in the spring it sounded like the entire nation had COVID so perhaps there is natural immunity at work now.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Oct 21 - 11:34 AM

Nuked some cauli rice, set aside.

Browned some chicken thighs, dredged in hot pepper, ginger and smoked paprika, in sesame oil.

I am dogsitting so not my kichen.

Put the browned thighs into a pot. Sautéed onion and garlic in the leftover oil, deglazed with lime juice, into the pot.

Added somw chicken broth and simmered.

After 15 mn added mushrooms and thyme.

After another 15 mn added spinach and oregano. Turn off as soon as wilted.

Put caulirice in bowl under soup, top with almonds and pistachios.

Yum, yum.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 16 Oct 21 - 01:14 PM

That sounds wonderful, Mrrzy. Healthful, too.
------
Yesterday I wanted to make something new, so I invented a dish with baked turkey wings. Results were mixed. I sauteed shallots in butter and added 2 tsp smoked paprika. I put the wings in a roasting pan, made a broth of 1 cup water

buy cut-up turkey wings or cut them up yourself.
saute some shallots in 2 Tbsp butter (maybe this step could be skipped
)
add 2 tsp smoked paprika
Make a broth of 1 cup water plus 1 tsp chicken glop.

Remove the shallots from the butter with a slotted spoon. Add the shallots to the "broth".

Preheat oven to 375.

Spray a deep roasting pan and line with parchment paper for easier clean-up. Place the turkey pieces in, in one layer. Dribble the melted butter with paprika over the pieces.

Carefully pour in the broth plus shallots so as not to knock off the paprika.

Bake at 375, covered, for one hour. Bake uncovered for 45 mins more. That ought to do it.

=========
About the mixed results: The DH loved it, said the paprika was strong, just the way he likes it. I couldn't taste the paprika and thought the dish was nice but kind of bland. Go figure.

Warning: the butter-paprika mixture stains everything it touches.

Maybe I should just cook this in a slow cooker. What do you think?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 21 - 09:03 AM

Never skip a sauté-in-butter step.

I don't use slowcookers so have no advice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 23 Oct 21 - 10:39 PM

I invented a new dish tonight.

SUMMERTIME SUMMER SQUASH

Heat some olive oil in a medium-size skillet.

Cut up some shallot or garlic and saute.

Mash* some cherry tomatoes out of the garden. Add to the skillet.

Add some black pepper and 1/2 tsp dried rosemary or some rosemary from the garden.

Allow all this to cook for a while to develop flavor. Maybe 10 mins.

Spiralize a zucchini or a summer squash into the pan. Finely chop what doesn't spiralize and add it to the skillet.

Cover and cook gently until squash is cooked, maybe 15 minutes.
=======
* To mash cherry tomatoes - make a little slit in the skin by poking with the point of a knife. Place cherry tomato under a bench scraper and hit with the fist one or two times.

This was fun to eat - new texture and nice flavors. It went nicely with meatloaf and a salad. If you don't have cherry tomatoes, you can seed and chop up a regular tomato.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 01:12 AM

I sauté onions and bell peppers in olive oil with seasoning and garlic (oregano, salt, pepper) and then add some browned crumbled Italian sausage then add chunked up yellow squash. I also add a pint of diced canned (or thawed) tomatoes and a handful of pasta. Sprinkle in some grated Parmesan cheese and let the squash cook till soft then there you go.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 06:12 AM

Decades ago we got our kids (now in their 40s) to eat lentils by pretending that the sauce we made for spaghetti was called "pulse bolognese." :-). I resurrected it last night for old times' sake. It's the easiest thing:

To make enough for three or four people you need 250g split red lentils, rinsed, don't bother soaking (dirt cheap!), an onion, a garlic clove, dried oregano (to taste: I like it), half a teaspoon of ground cinnamon (don't overdo it), a good knob of butter, 400 ml of veg stock (I make my own, so it's unsalted), a decent-quality tin of tomatoes (400g size), a glug of red wine and seasoning. All you do is sauté the chopped onion and garlic (don't mince it) in the butter for a few minutes then throw in everything else and simmer it for about 25 minutes. We had it with wholemeal spaghetti (we don't usually have that, but that's what we did in the olden days). Then we committed the mortal sin of piling the buttered spaghetti on the plate and just heaping the sauce on top, finishing with grated strong cheddar. All the things we used to do...

Begod it was good, and just think how healthy it is!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 08:53 AM

I love anything in the ratatouille family for zucchini/summer squash. Slice squash onion tomato thinly, make a flavorful mush of more tomatoes with whatever you like, I am big on garlic olive oil and herbs, put glop in dish, arrange slices standing on their sides in alternating colors... The glop will help them stand up. Bake covered till really cooked. Serves one as a main.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 02:38 PM

It's time to roast some vegetables. I have onions, potatoes, and carrots, but could use a few more. Toss in some olive oil, salt and pepper, an herb of some sort (rosemary, oregano), and bake (low temp if things like carrots and parsnip and potato, hotter if things like broccoli, squash, eggplant, etc.)

The house always smells so good and they reheat well to go with various meals through the week.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Oct 21 - 03:57 PM

I like the sound of all these new recipes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Oct 21 - 09:32 AM

On the common sense side of things as Fall and Winter approach the temperature of food and beverage should become warmer. Tea drinkers rejoice. Taste, texture and cold refreshment have their place but cold salads should be replaced by steamed vegetables and warm drinks should replace ice cold beverages.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 11 Nov 21 - 01:56 PM

A couple weeks ago we cut down the tomato vines and collected the green tomatoes. Some have ripened nicely, but I found something interesting to do with those that seemed to green to do that.

Cut the tomatoes in half and coat them with oil. Place them on a cookie sheet, flat side up and put them under the broiler till the top surfaces are nicely browned but not burnt black. Maybe 8 minutes.   (This was easy for me, since I can see watch the broiling through the glass door of my new range.) If you can't see them, stick around, listen and smell.

Freeze and use as needed to add a rich smoky flavor to foods. I chopped some of them small and added them to a bland bean soup I had made. They helped. I also plan to add them to chili and possibly other Mexican favorites I make.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Nov 21 - 09:59 AM

I am still totally in salads, even in the cold. But soups are getting thicker, like winter coats.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 12 Nov 21 - 12:25 PM

I'm looking to perfect a chicken piquante version - with just chicken, lemon and capers, possibly a dash of Parmesan…

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 12 Nov 21 - 01:53 PM

That sounds good, Thompson, but my husband (the DH) hates capers, so I can't join you in the venture.
=======
The other night I woke up with a knee hurting pretty bad. I tried to withstand it, but finally woke the DH up and asked him to bring some ice. We wrapped it up, elevated it and iced it. (The RICE system.)

In the morning I looked for the ice in the bedding, and it turned out to be a package of sugar-snap peas, thawed but still cold. So, sugar-snap peas were on the menu that night.

After checking out a lot of dewy-eyed recipes involving sauteing sugar-snap peas from the owner's garden, I found one that I could use thawed, soaking-wet peas in.

Drain peas in a colander, at least 30 mins ahead of time.
Pat dry with a paper towel. Just one - there's a limit.
Mince one clove garlic.
Saute garlic in oil of your choice, or in butter.
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Put peas, garlic and oil in a glass baking dish. Stir to coat.
Bake 8 - 10 minutes.
While peas bake, zest a lemon.
Just before serving, stir the lemon zest into the batch.

It was delicious.

The leg is much better.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 12:23 AM

That sounds delicious!

This is the season for making jams and jellies, so I've started making some Christmassy spiced apple jelly and quince jelly. Here's the method. It's a two-day job, with a couple of days' gap between the days. Another tip: all jam and especially jelly is much easier to make if you do it about a litre at a time, no more.

Apples:
First day. Do this bit in the morning. Preferably using crab apples, or sour apples, wash them, chop them, put them in a normal cooking pot, hold your hand on the top of them and fill with fresh water till it's up to your hand. (I don't know what the quantity I use in, but it's enough to fill a biggish pot about a third.)
Bring to the boil, cover and simmer for an hour or so, giving the odd mash down with a potato masher.
Take off the heat and pour the mush into a mesh bag and let the syrup drain off the apples. (If you're lazy like me, use a strainer first, then a bag.) Let them drain all day. If you have room and no mice, let them continue to drain for 24 hours.
Put the syrup in the fridge in a glass or ceramic container. I find that leaving it for three days or so works much better. If you have hens or know anyone who has, they love the discarded apple mush.

Second day. After the syrup has been aside a couple of days, take it out and assemble your tools: preferably a conserve pan (flared and heavy-bottomed), a chopping board and sharp knife, citrus squeezer, strainer, measuring jug, long wooden spoon, jam thermometer which you'll hang on the side of the pot, bowl and scales for weighing sugar, jamjars, beaked (preferably) ladle, skimmer, citrus zester (microplane), hot water ready to wash lids and ladle in near-boiling water, enough jars (heating in a 100C oven), paper to rest the jars on while you fill them. Labels for the jars.
Put the lids and the ladle into the hot water.
Assemble your ingredients: syrup, sugar (I prefer Demerara sugar and use 600 grams to a litre of syrup), a washed lemon, a washed orange, cloves, cinnamon.
Put your syrup in the conserve pan and bring it slowly to the boil. At the same time, put your jamjars into the oven at 100C (I usually have around five jars at a time); put your sugar into a shallow dish like a roasting pan and put it in the oven with the jamjars to warm. As it warms, occasionally open the oven and give the sugar a stir with your fingers.
When the sugar is warm, add it to the syrup and stir it in. Add the zest and juice of the lemon and the orange. Add the cinnamon (half a stick for a litre of juice) and cloves. Bring the syrup to a boil, then a raging, foaming boil, stirring occasionally so it doesn't catch. When it's at 105C on the jam thermometer, set a timer for 15 minutes. Keep it at the foaming boil, stirring occasionally.
At this point, you can test the set. Traditionally this is done by putting a few drops on a cold plate or spoon, leaving it a minute and then giving it a push with a finger to see if it wrinkles. I'm not great at this, so I just cross my fingers; if it turns out not to be perfectly set, you can always put it back in the pot and give it another hard boil for five minutes. At this stage you can skim the jelly to take out the cinnamon and cloves. I usually leave them in, though.
Put off the oven and take the jars out onto the door or onto a metal surface; I put paper under them so any dribbles land on it and don't have to be wiped up. Take your lids and ladle out of the hot water, and ladle the jelly into the jars. (If you don't have a beaked ladle for this, a clean wide-mouthed funnel helps) Go away and have a cup of your preferred beverage for a while. Screw the caps on and put the jars of bright red jelly on the windowsill where you can admire it with the light shining through it.
Assuming it's jelled perfectly, when it's cooled, label it (I use the name - "Apple jelly" - my name and the date, or at least 11/21.) You can also get fancy-dancy and put adorable gingham caps held with ribbons on the jars so they make nice presents.

It's also currently quince season. You can use quinces from the Japanese quince bush, or from a proper quince tree. At the moment they're dear - €2.50 in the cheapest local greengrocer I've found them in - but if you go to the fruit and vegetable market it's possible to buy them at a much cheaper wholesale price. Quinces store well, and are also delicious roasted instead of apples if you're having roast pork, being pleasantly astringent.

If you're making quince jelly, do more or less the same as with the apples. However, there's a secret: you can also make delicious quince paste/ quince cheese/ membrillo with the mush. To do that, rub off the nap from the surface with a thick cloth, chop and core the quinces, discard the core and pips and then continue with the jelly-making in the same way as with apples; I also add some cardamom seeds to the mix - about a quarter teaspoonful.

When you've made the jelly, put the mush into a heavy-bottomed pot (I use the conserve pan) with the same proportion of sugar - 600 grams to 1 kilo of mush - and bring it to a boil. Simmer it fairly fast, giving the odd stir with a wooden spoon, for 30 to 45 minutes, until it parts like the Red Sea when you draw the spoon through it. At this stage put it in a flat baking pan with baking parchment under it, stroke it down, and leave it to cool for a couple of days. (I use a couple of pizza pans, one under, one over). You can then wrap it in greaseproof paper with foil around it, or put it in jars. It's very nice as a relish, especially with cheeses, and most especially with manchego cheese.

If you don't want the palaver of coring but do want to reuse the mush, in either apples or quinces, you can pass the mush through a mouli instead. And if you don't have hens available, you can also make apple sauce with the apple mush.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 07:03 AM

I made a big batch of Marcella Hazan's minestrone alla romagnola (the one she calls, in her book, "vegetable soup, Romagna style"). I followed the ingredients and amounts exactly as in her recipe, the one difference being that I used the stock I had, which was home-made chicken stock. You can get the list online quite easily as long as you're prepared to put up with all that American "cups" nonsense. Some food bloggers can't help messing about with recipes. I ignore ones that suggest adding rice or pasta (this one definitely doesn't need bacon either). Marcella doesn't, the soup is hearty enough as it is without, and if you do use such things you have to add them afresh every time you serve up the soup. No thanks. There's nothing worse than soup that's been sitting overnight with pasta or rice in it, and nothing better than soup that's been sitting overnight without... We managed nicely with some crusty bread...

It did us for two evening meals, the veg heaped up in bowls. There was quite a stack of delicious liquid left over (I served the soup with a slotted spoon). I heated it up, threw in a handful of red lentils and let them cook for 20 minutes, then threw in half a pound of baby spinach. Five minutes later I whizzed it with my hand blender. The result was four big mugs of delicious soup that did us the next two lunchtimes. Cucina povera!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 10:17 AM

I've found a bunch of alleged Hazan recipes, but they vary wildly - for instance larger amounts of potatoes or smaller amounts of tinned tomatoes. Can't find an original.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 10:23 AM

Get Father Christmas to bring you the book! It's called The Essentials Of Classic Italian Cooking.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 10:45 AM

Thompson, the way to avoid a lot of that fruit processing fuss is to use a steam juicer. The juice comes out clear, not needing to be strained even once. I went looking for YouTube videos and the top ones are of people who are using them for the first time and making mistakes. I'll come back later and find better instructions and send along. I make grape juice for jelly (from wild grapes), strawberry juice for jelly and use the fruit leftover for jam, I make tomato juice and sauce, cranberry juice (and use the leftover pulp for other stuff), etc.

Yesterday I packed several jars with fresh cucumbers and added garlic pieces, spices, and brine and they're in the fridge for a couple of weeks before I start eating those pickles.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 11:34 AM

Thanks, Stilly - looking at steam juicers now; I'm also wondering if the juice so obtained is as delicious and as nourishing as that from the older method…?
Steve - Mother Library is bringing me the book as soon as my request goes through.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 21 - 12:15 PM

Hm. Watched a couple of videos of steam juicers; in one, the videoer was making apple jelly from juice extracted with a juicer like this, but the jelly wasn't the rich cherry read you get with my old-fashioned method but a kind of fawn colour. Mind you, I think she was using added pectin, maybe that makes a difference?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 15 Nov 21 - 03:24 AM

Still wondering… Stilly, have you made apple jelly with juice produced from a steam juicer?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Nov 21 - 11:13 AM

Added some leftover salmon to my crab-and-asparagus soup. That worked a treat...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Nov 21 - 02:33 AM

Made a stir fry with a new mix of saucing: coconut vinegar, soya sauce, sesame oil. And we've taken to removing meat from its packaging and dividing it in half before storing it in the freezer, so we use half the amount. It actually makes a nicer stir fry.
This was a definite hit: a julienned leek, 3 julienned carrots, a julienned courgette, a stick of chopped celery and a chopped bell pepper and 300g diced beef for 2 people), and to accompany it a pot of quinoa simmered with a chicken stock pod and a low-salt vegetable stock cube, and then about half a pomegranate's worth of arils added. It was a big hit.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Nov 21 - 07:11 PM

Thompson, yes, it is superb. I'm going to be steam juicing some cranberries and will see about setting up the camera and I can post it for you to see.

I'm ready to make some green tomato relish, and the recipe is incredibly imprecise. 24 large tomatoes, three red bell peppers, three green bell peppers, 12 large onions. So subjective! last summer I had some huge tomatoes that were almost a pound each, so I'm going to be conservative and assume that a standard large tomato weighs about half of that. And going from there to calculate the number of peppers, onions, etc to put into this. And if I did this math the last time I didn't leave myself any notes, so I'll jot down the calculations this time.

Green tomato relish is wonderful, and it gets made this time of year when the cool weather slows the ripening. They're picked before the first frost (you're not supposed to can tomatoes that have had the plants touched by frost - there is some chemical change that is a problem). I can let these sit in a flat box with a few sheets of newspaper or a paper bag over the top and they'll ripen slowly, but this is a higher use. The season of ripe fruit was during the summer, now is the season of relish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 26 Nov 21 - 04:14 AM

Oh, that sounds delicious, Stilly!
Here's a recipe that's fancier-dancier, but because it's precisely measured might give you an idea of what the heck a large tomato means!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Dec 21 - 11:45 PM

I have successfully made risotto, but not for a while. Decided to try the cauliflower rice version.

Actually patiently made the mushrooms right.

Gauged the broth and cook time right for the cauli.

I had gotten romano instead of parmesan as it came more finely grated. I know, I should grate my own.

No, really, I should have. Wasn't till it was served, and to a guest, that I realized the cheese, added just before serving, was... off.

Blue cheese risotto is not a thing, and for a reason.

But there was extra bison steak and a lot of salad, and the $mas baking (cookies, marzipan, breads that are really cake) so it was ok, but Imma remember that initial This-is-not-what-I-thought-I-was-putting-in-my-mouth taste. Kinda like reaching for milk and getting the OJ. Surprise!

Subject: RE: BS: Recipes - what are we eating?
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 04 Feb 22 - 02:55 PM

We're in a cycle of particularly cold weather here, but it will only last for about 3 days, so I wanted to make a batch of comfort food pot roast (for one) that wouldn't last forever. I used a large saucepan instead of a Dutch oven, to confine the amount I ended up with, and was blown away by how good it turned out.

I rolled a piece of beef chuck roast in flour with salt and pepper, browned it, added beef bouillon and braised it for about 45 minutes (watching the liquid level and adding a little as needed). After braising I added onion, then carrots, then potatoes, each in for 20 minutes before adding the next. Then some Worcestershire Sauce and a glug of red wine. Ground some oregano in my hand and dropped it in. More salt and pepper and a little water with flour for thickening. This used only 1 pound of meat and will be about three meals.

(I remembered about this newer thread and moved my post.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 05 Feb 22 - 10:32 AM

Yum!

I tried the risotto again with grating my own parm. Much better, a little too much better than bouiilon so added a lot of cherry tomatoes to the leftovers, yum.

Had a weird thing where I had combined a salad from my fave kebab place (tom cuke onion parsley in lemon redwine vinegar and olive oil) with my fave appetizer (cacik, kind of runny tzatziki, yogurt cukes garlic, it is supposed to be a dip but no pita for me) and topped it with pistachios.

The pistachios tasted like peanuts.

I *ran* to my kitchen and sniffed the cinnamon. Smelled like cinnamon. Whew.

So, weird but not covid! Wonder why it tasted like peanuts, though.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 10:27 AM

Hey any of you Yanks know how to get mutton, not lamb, here?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 11:38 AM

I've been making a very nutritious vegan lentil soup for weeks now. I deliberately make it thin enough to drink from large mugs. A big dose of that plus a couple of tangerines/clems/whatever you want to call them equals lunch.

So for a big batch that will easily give us three big mugs each, this is how I proceed:

Get a vegetable stock pot going. You need two litres for my size batch but it doesn't need to be very strong. I won't buy stock powder or cubes as I have never found any that are not utterly disgusting. In the pot go carrots, carrot peelings, those coarse sticks from the outside of the celery that you don't want to eat, onion peelings and maybe one whole onion, fresh thyme, a bay leaf and a few peppercorns. That gets boiled for about an hour.

The soup ingredients are 220g dried lentils (I use small brown ones that are very cheap. I don't think I'd use red lentils for this, and definitely not split peas), 200g of fresh baby leaf spinach, two carrots, two sticks of celery and an equal amount of shallots or onions, and a big glug of extra virgin olive oil.

Chop up the onions, carrots and celery and fry them gently in the olive oil for about half an hour while the stock is simmering. Wash the lentils and throw them in. Stir them around for a minute, then ladle in the sieved stock, up to around two litres. Don't sweat the amounts. Simmer that for at least half an hour.

When the lentils are soft, throw in the spinach. It reduces down miraculously in no time at all. Let that simmer for five minutes, put the pan in the sink and whizz it with a hand blender. It needs to be well seasoned, a bit at a time, to taste.

The golden rule is not to eat it until tomorrow. You can reheat the whole lot every day until you've finished it. It doesn't hurt it.   Very simple, very tasty, very cheap and really good for you.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 11:51 AM

I make a very simple Egyptian lentil soup - grated onion, red lentils, added to pot of boiling water. Cook for ~ 45 minutes. Pepper, a little salt, a little ground cumin and a squeeze of lemon. Give it a light mix with the stick blender (I don't want it completely pureed). I like all of the stuff (carrots, ham hock, etc.) in split pea soup, but for lentil soup my taste buds dictate that less is more.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 11:56 AM

I make lentil soup much like yours, Steve, with bacon, leeks, and chicken stock instead of olive oil, celery, and veg stock. I have vegan relatives, however, so I shall take note of your version for them.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 06 Feb 22 - 04:10 PM

Well the point of my soup was to avoid meat (which I do far too seldom), yet make it as nutritionally sound as possible. The soffritto base adds a lovely depth of flavour and the added spinach is a revelation. I do have lots of soups that contain animal protein.

As for those red lentils, my favourite use for them is to make a lentil sauce to go with spaghetti. It's half a pound of red lentils, a 440ml can of plum tomatoes, an onion that's been softened in extra virgin olive oil, a bit of chopped garlic, a pinch of cinnamon and a pinch of dried oregano. It all goes into a pan with enough hot water added gradually to make it sloppy by the end of the half-hour cooking. That gets dumped on a stack of wholemeal spaghetti and sprinkled with cheese. There's enough sauce for at least three people there. Very filling, very nutritious.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Feb 22 - 08:40 PM

I miss lentils most of all the bean/legume/family...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Feb 22 - 06:03 PM

Ok for the Super Bowl I got both teams in one dish: Cincinnati [-style] chili... but with *mutton* (terribly difficult to find here)!

I used (read rather than followed) the NYT recipe but did not measure anything.

Also, since the chili has more than one "way" --some star-shaped chocolate lava cakes. Hollywood: Stars, and Chocolat.

Ways: I can't do the beans, oyster crackers or spaghetti, but cheese and onions, yeah.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 11:34 AM

I love all the recipes but why do I get the impression when Steve describes a recipe it sounds more like food porn?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 11:52 AM

Have you ever watched Giada De Laurentiis cook? I read an article about her program and they said the camera work was the same kind they use in pornographic films.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Feb 22 - 09:16 PM

i've seen some pretty carnal recipes here.
Vegans do not despair. Eating a fresh fig can be erotic too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 12:43 AM

I remember in reading Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes, she has a line about finding pears that are so delicious that you feel the need to be private when you eat them. She's a poet and said it beautifully. :)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 04:26 AM

You can't "sound like food porn" as food porn is entirely visual.

My go-away-and-leave-me-alone food is a steaming heap of shell-on prawns dripping with garlicky butter. I reserve the right to get into a disgusting mess and ignore all the usual protocols of good table manners.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 07:07 PM

Sex, even for trees, is a deliciously messy affair. Unless you have allergies. We are mostly on the seafood side of flavors.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 09:38 PM

I made a batch of Italian seasoning tomato sauce back in September that was really wonderful. I processed it and opened the last jar this evening. I'm going to use some of my diced canned tomatoes to make another batch with the same recipe, but since these were canned once, I'll have to freeze the extra from the next batch. I checked with my canning guru - not a good idea to can the same tomatoes twice.

Tonight's dinner was a link of Italian sausage, casing removed, sautéed and cut into bite-size pieces, submerged in a half cup or so of my tomato sauce, and then a half-dozen frozen Portobello ravioli were boiled and spooned into the bowl with the sauce and the sausage. Very nice! Nothing wasted. (This sauce is so good you won't see me washing a bunch of it off the plate and down the drain.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 09:59 PM

That sounds great, SRS. I like the idea of adding the ravioli.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 10:52 PM

The sauce is in the Ball Blue Book and has onions and peppers and seasoning, but no meat, so it can be hot water processed. This time I finely chopped the sofrito part so it really vanished into the sauce. I've in the past done it as a coarse chop, but I find I like it better the new way.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Feb 22 - 11:21 PM

Food porn involves smell and feel and sight and sound and, arguably, poor taste.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 05:00 AM

It's mostly to do with photographing food.

I'll be making a big batch of tomato sauce for the weekend. I'll be using canned Italian plum tomatoes which are unsalted (I stopped using canned chopped tomatoes years ago as I find the ones here too runny). If I make Marcella's I use (as instructed) a whole onion cut in half which is discarded at the end. For other purposes I much prefer to use either minimal or no onion as I think onions can add a gloopiness to the texture of tomato sauce that I dislike. Garlic (thinly sliced and sautéed in extra virgin olive oil first) if the recipe demands it, but never garlic AND onion. Salt and pepper of course. If the recipe calls for basil I add freshly torn leaves right at the very end. Basil stalks can go in earlier but I fish them out at the end (count them in, count them out!). The magic ingredient every time is half a teaspoon of sugar. The nonnas often do that even with the best, ripest tomatoes, and who am I to argue!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:05 AM

I had to take the sugar out of my tomato-based sauces when cooking for a diabetic. I have not missed it, but yeah.

I like garlic and onion in the same dish.

Sometimes I like raw onion and cooked garlic, sometimes cooked onion and raw garlic, but often both cooked.

They do not go in at the same time, usually.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 09:42 AM

I'm talking half a teaspoon of sugar in a large batch of sauce, made with around four cans of tomatoes. I'm no dietician but I should think that that amount of sugar would be dwarfed by the natural sugars in the tomatoes. However, it's fine to leave it out. I taste the sauce for acidity before adding it, then add as or if necessary. It's no deal-breaker.

Onion and garlic to taste. I dislike raw onion but we have raw garlic in seafood sauce, a tuna-with-pasta dish in which the pasta is the only cooked ingredient (Well, the tuna comes out of a jar...), and in pesto (added parsimoniously and the only time I ever mince it up). We violently disagree about whether garlic should go into bolognese rágù (I say no, the domestic goddess says yes), and authentic Italian chefs (discuss...) never add it (nor basil nor oregano). So I peel the cloves, give them a quick bash and in they go. They add a pleasant sweetness but not that acrid garlicky hit. All a matter of taste...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 10:17 AM

These are home-grown canned diced tomatoes, and the way to avoid them being to wet is to pour them through a sieve and drain off extra liquid, that can be added back as needed.

The home-canning groups have a bee in their bonnets about canning diced tomatoes, they prefer whole, halves, or sauce. But I use them most often this way, so I process them this way.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 06:25 PM

Well I can't grow enough toms in the Cornwall climate to can or bottle any, so it's bought ones for me. The plum tomatoes are the same price as the chopped, and it's a cinch to snip them up into little pieces in the pan. There's more thick juice in the plum toms, and that's what I like.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 06:30 PM

Another hint from several chefs is to make the tomato sauce in an open pan, no lid. That way, it thickens up far more readily.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Feb 22 - 11:38 PM

Hey, hobo packet ideas? [Food in foil packets cooked on campfire]

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 12:23 PM

Get a nice big sheet of strong foil (could double it up). Scrub some waxy potatoes. Don't peel them but cut them into bite-size lumps. In a bowl, toss them in olive oil and seasoning. You could add some smoked paprika. Maybe a little pinch of dried oregano. Break a bulb of garlic into cloves but leave the skins on. Toss them in with the oily spuds. Wrap them securely in the foil (not too many together: could use more than one packet...). They can go in the embers or on the barbie (or even in the oven). Timing can be tricky but a good half-hour should do it. You might want to support the foil packs on an old oven tray or on a grill to stop them from accidentally coming open.

They're great, and sucking the soft, sweet middles out of the garlic cloves is a joy. I do a similar thing on a big tray in the oven, but with smaller pieces of spud uncovered and with a sprig or two of rosemary. I've been known to use Cajun seasoning for a change instead of the herbs and paprika. Don't leave out the garlic!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 12:25 PM

I should have said that the garlic cloves can be added in after about 15 minutes. They don't need as long as the spuds.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 12:46 PM

The halibut I had last night could be fixed in one of those "hobo packets." Double the foil, as Steve suggests.

I put a little dab of olive oil in the bottom of a Pyrex personal-size baking container (substitute the foil) then place a thawed piece of wild-caught Costco halibut (you can't get it fresh enough in Texas to make it worth trying to buy fresh instead of frozen). Slice a few strips of onion (I always seem to have a partial onion in a container in the fridge, so this is slicing a from one side of a half, creating strips, but you could do a whole round slice and break it up). A quick grind of black pepper, then apply a couple of tablespoons of sour cream (drop it around in spots on top of the onion) then sprinkle over some dried dill. Bake it about 20 minutes until it's finished (I put it in a toaster oven at 350^o and let it rest in that oven for another 10 minutes or so after it finished baking.) I add a little salt after it is finished baking.

If you've spread out the onion pieces enough and the dabs of sour cream enough you can pick up a bit of everything in each flaky bite. Mmmmm!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 12:59 PM

I've cooked fish in foil lots of times, mostly skinless fillets, and this year I intend to try it on the barbie. Last year I bought up, in a sale, a supply of special foil bags with little windows in, big enough to fit enough fish for two. The fish goes in with some butter, seasoning, a sprig of lemon thyme and a squeeze of lemon juice, maybe a hint of fresh garlic (you could steep a bashed clove in a spoonful of olive oil and just put the oil in the bag, though I still want the fat to be mostly butter), then you fold the bag shut. It's about 20 minutes in the oven but it should be a bit less on the barbie. I've cooked tuna steaks on the bars but most other fish tends to fall through. I have a cast iron plate that fits over half of the grill on my Weber 2200 barbecue, but it's the devil to clean after cooking fish on it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 08:10 PM

Can't do taters, but hmmm, fish sounds yummy.

I worried that fish would be too delicate but feel reassured about that now.

I worry that the ground meat ideas I've been reading about, without the taters most recipes have but I can't, will make grease rather than gravy.

Speaking of taters, ever heard of mille-fries? Mandoline-thin taters layered like pommes anna but baked, *then* pressed while cooling, then the cooled cake is sliced, and the slices are deep-fried.

Drooling like Homer, now...

Homer Simpson, that is.

Back to hobo packets: recipes recommend against double foil, glad y'all think that's rubbish.

The idea as I read is bottom is a grease, then your protein, then your veg on top, seal well but leave room for steam? I would also dollop butter on top of the veg? Would that be bad?

Thanks!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Feb 22 - 08:59 PM

Just bloody eat taters...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 11:01 AM

Steve, you know I can't. If I eat carbs, my mental health goes out the window.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 11:44 AM

There are many substitutes of cauliflower for potatoes (mashed, etc.) but I can't see it as a regular thing. But maybe it would work for you?

And there are lots of types of potatoes. I wonder if some of the waxier ones might be better than a Russet, for example?

The double foil is just because. It seems more secure.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Feb 22 - 02:15 PM

I am going to try ground yak, zucchini, cherry tomatoes and mushrooms. It is a hobo pack party, I will report back.

Dithering between snail [garlic parsley] butter and goose fat for the grease. Will add salt, pepper, and if I opt for goose grease, thyme and marjoram...

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 22 - 09:51 PM

Gosh, I've never removed seeds from tomatoes...

In Italy they grow San Marzano tomatoes, big plum-shaped ones, that have hardly any seediness in the middle, for making sauce. I tried growing them here last summer but they caught every blight, wilt and rot under the sun (unlike my Sungold cherry toms, which get the blight but fight through it really well). We don't really have a great climate for tomatoes in Cornwall, what with cool summers, occasional windiness and high humidity. Many years ago I grew tomatoes successfully outdoors just outside London, where it's a bit drier and warmer than Cornwall.   

We're on covid-19 tenterhooks here, due to a friend-of-a-friend being with the friend and the friend then being with us, all unbeknowns. We are testing every day and keeping away from people if we can, though we spent several days in blissful unawareness. We reckon to be safe by Friday if the tests are all negative. I've looked all the timings up today.

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 15 Mar 22 - 10:09 PM

After a couple of bumper crops of suitable tomatoes, I got a food mill to try to help processing. I've never had similar crops since to put it to much use.

I want well ripened plum tomatoes (I usually try Roma VF but San Marzano would be an alternative) for this. I love the salad varieties (eg. Ailsa Craig) I also try but, for me, they don't have the right taste for a worthwhile sauce or soup.

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Mar 22 - 10:14 PM

Tell you what, Jon. I use cans of Waitrose Essentials plum tomatoes to make tomato sauce and they make superb sauce. They're grown in southern Italy where they can get them much riper than we can here. Cheap too!

Subject: RE: FITNESS & Declutter 2022 - Pandemic redux
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 15 Mar 22 - 10:31 PM

Interesting idea. I'll have to give canned plum ones a try some time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Mar 22 - 04:25 PM

Bon courage, Steve Shaw.

Looked up ideas for swordfish and asparagus and ended up with another hobo packet. Snail butter and halved cherry tomatoes. Cooking from frozen, so will get lots of juice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 16 Mar 22 - 05:29 PM

Reporting: yummy but took *much* longer to cook than not packaging it.

I'd'a thought the extra pressure would make it cook faster, but the foil probably kept it from the heat source.

Toaster oven.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Mar 22 - 05:53 PM

When foods are wrapped or covered you bake them at a higher temperature; the cover or wrap keeps them from burning or drying out. It's a tradeoff from baking uncovered lower. If you bake chicken in just a pan, I'd use 350^o but covered, at 400^o.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Mar 22 - 06:54 AM

This is not a recipe but a heads-up to all Brits who love the best things in life. Waitrose are selling boxes of six pastéis de nata (Portuguese custard tarts). They come frozen, they cost four quid and they are of the Unearthed brand. You just heat them from frozen in the oven for 20 minutes and let them cool down. In our 'umble they are the best example of this heavenly little confection that we've found in this country, and begod we've looked hard. We scoffed them obsessively a few years ago during a week in Madeira (which is a bit of Portugal, of course), which started a lifetime's love affair. We haven't found them cheaper either.

I understand that they are the very devil to make from scratch, so here's my answer!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Apr 22 - 04:01 PM

Sometimes, simple is beautiful. It's peak Jersey Royal season and they are in tip-top condition. A quick scrub, a 25-minute boil in salted water, drown in butter... We had them tonight with rashers of streaky bacon, grilled to just short of crisp, and my organic spring greens, coming to the end now but infinitely superior to those scruffy bags of supermarket greens, cut into strips and steamed for a few minutes. Do not go easy on the butter. Mrs Steve doused hers with Heinz tommy-k, but I like my bacon pristine...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Apr 22 - 05:30 PM

I've just found out that you can't buy Jersey Royal potatoes outside Jersey and the UK. In m'humble they are by far the finest new potatoes you can buy. I remember an occasion in Bury, gotta be forty or fifty years ago. We'd rolled out of the pub after a jolly fine piss-up, and there in Kay Gardens was a chap selling hot potatoes in paper bags from his little wagon. They were Jerseys, all hot and salty. Bejaysus, I can taste them still. Only three things in life are certain: birth, death and the fact that that chap is now sitting at the right hand of his Father in heaven...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 May 22 - 01:54 PM

Ok, salmon soup:

Frozen salmon fillets, rinsed and dried.

Preheated toaster oven to 450F. Foil on oven thingie, twice as big as needed. Make edges with the foil. Lots of olive oil on bottom. Salmon filets, skin side up. Peeled and pithed lime sliced, small onion sliced, and a whole buncha plum tomatoes yellow and orange, cut in half. Pile on top, add marjoram, garlic powder, hot pepper sprinkles, fold extra foil over, in oven 20mn. Flip fish onto top of everything, another 20 mn with foil covering then a last 10 without.

Put fish in bowl. Remove lime slices and squeeze juice into bowl, then toss what is left of the lime. Use foil to pour rest into bowl onto fish.

Eat before cleaning up the mess the attempt to move everything in the foil made.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 01 May 22 - 07:34 PM

Mrrzy, that salmon dish looks boffo.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 May 22 - 08:00 PM

Well if I have a piece of really good salmon I want to fry it in butter for about six or seven minutes and have it with new potatoes, steamed greens and a simple sauce. In fact, we've had that this very week.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 May 22 - 11:32 PM

I can't tell you how long the salmon sautés, but it is in butter with a little granulated garlic and a grind of black pepper. Fry fish slide down first, then turn and finish on the skin side. Maybe 5 minutes. Salmon, like beef, doesn't need to be cooked till it's dry.

I've been playing with onion bagels and dry salami lately - toasting the bagel halves then putting a layer of sausage around one half and a slice of provolone and some thin slices of onion on the other. It put it under the broiler to melt the cheese and heat the rest. I need to figure out a good sauce to go with it. Maybe something like thousand island?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 May 22 - 05:25 AM

My favourite fish of all is red mullet. It's a small fish and the fillets aren't big, so we allow for three each minimum. The recipe I use comes from the BBC programme "Rick Stein's Cornwall" and was in episode 11 in series one. We have the fish on top of a pile of "confit potatoes" with some dabs of black olive tapenade.

The potatoes need to be waxy ones that won't fall to pieces: I used Jersey Royals this time but you can use Nicola, Charlotte or something like that. No need to peel. The spuds are cut into very thin rounds. I haven't got a mandoline but a sharp knife does the trick very well. I put them in a bowl with a goodly amount of extra virgin olive oil, salt and pepper, chopped garlic (not minced) and fresh thyme leaves. I got my hands in there to get the slices thoroughly coated, then spread them out in a single layer, or as near to a single layer as possible, on a big oven tray. If you haven't got a non-stick tray they'll stick like mad, so I suppose they could go on to greaseproof paper. I ease the pain by using more than one tray. The potatoes go into a hot oven (200C) for about 15 minutes.

The fish takes a scant five minutes. Get extra virgin olive oil in a frying pan hot. Dip the skin side only in plain flour, put the fillets in the pan skin side down (they do need to sizzle), season lightly on top and fry for three minutes, by which time the skin should be bubbling up golden and crispy. They need just a very quick fry on the top side, then they are served on top of a pile of the potato slices, skin side up. Just a few little dabs of the tapenade dotted around, and voila. A little sprinkling of freshly-chopped parsley on top adds a touch of class.

It's easy to make the tapenade by blitzing some black olives with extra virgin olive oil, seasoning and some chives, but to be honest the little pots that M&S sell are just as good.

I might try this with other fish that comes in thin fillets. I have some wild sea bass fillets in the freezer or I could try some dabs. I'm fussy about sea bass because most of what's caught is either farmed (and very inferior) or trawled, which damages the sea bed and results in a lot of by-catch. We're lucky to have a chap round here who catches the bass in his small boat with rod and line, who then supplies it to our fishmonger. It's superb fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 May 22 - 01:31 PM

I think one disadvantage of being single is that I can only have a limited variety of fresh vegetables in the fridge - otherwise, I don't get through them in time and hate to waste. Thus, weekly, I always buy large flat/Portobello mushrooms & iceberg lettuce (one "leaf" per day and a bit of cold water before going back in the fridge and they last for quite a while); then, for variety, I'll choose a different third veggie - radish, celery, pak choi, cauliflower, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 May 22 - 01:56 PM

...not sure if I could afford a leggy blond veggie lover, these days?!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 22 - 11:56 AM

And a new one for me on my last shop - crispy seaweed thins; having read on the packet that they contain vitamin B12 (often lacking in vegan fare). I've cut it up with scissors and fried it with the above mushrooms and some soy sauce - on toast...a nice taste of the sea without any fish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 May 22 - 12:46 PM

In order to lose some weight in the leadup to knee surgery I've started eating mostly fruits and vegetables, with occasional lean proteins like scrambled eggs, skinless chicken breast, etc. Wild caught salmon. Small amounts of cheese. I find that if I use a sharper flavored on like one in the Parmesan family (there are several cheeses that are hard and sharp and grated over food) I can get more bang for my cheese buck. Spooning some homemade Italian tomato sauce over a slice of chicken breast and topping it with Parmesan is keeping me on track (alternate day fasting). The goal is to take weight off of the knees and losing weight is also recommended to solve hip bursitis.

For now I've taken the wine out of my dinners, and I've eliminated most of the bread from my diet. On those alternate eating days I'll have a bagel or a slice of pizza, but keep it there.

This isn't permanent, but it is an acknowledgement that as I get older my diet has to change. And though it might be counterintuitive, I took some of the extra supplements out of my diet and find I have more interest in the fruits and vegetables. I find I reach for them first. Supplements apparently quash the cravings for foods that are sources of natural vitamins and minerals (see the writings of Mark Schatzker, a science writer for the Harvard medical community.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 22 - 12:57 PM

Agree, SRS, on losing weight for, in your case knee surgery (hope that goes well), and in my case, last year, long-lasting metatarsal pain in my club-foot.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 May 22 - 04:11 PM

My mum might have imposed cod liver oil capsules on me when I was a little lad. Other than that, I've never taken any supplement. I want to get all I need from a mixed diet of the best ingredients I can afford, and I'll eat everything (except apple sauce: yuk). I'm wary of going short of Vitamin D in winter but the fortified cereals I eat, the oat milk and the countless eggs I consume, maybe, do the trick...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 May 22 - 04:17 PM

Apple sauce is okay...but I think I'd rather a cider; to eat an apple these days, I must have a knife as the bottom teeth are a tad loose.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 May 22 - 05:21 PM

Those my doctor wants me to take are vitamins D and B-12. I have a low dose of iron along with a couple of prescriptions. I take fiber capsules and a probiotic (inexpensive acidophilous). The surgeon's list includes a couple of others, and when this is through I'll drop the extra ones.

I'm aiming at fruits and vegetables of different colors to help get a spectrum of micronutrients.

My brother recently told me about how he had a blood test showing a low level so decided to cut his cholesterol medication in half. After the next test showed it still low, he dropped it completely, and has been about to stay off of it. But he was rather deliberate in his approach.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 May 22 - 06:49 PM

First things first, I would never ridicule or criticise anyone who chooses to use supplements. But looking at the current wisdom on daily vitamin/mineral requirements, as far as I can see it there is some difficulty in obtaining vitamin B12 for SOME people, depending on what they choose to exclude from their diets. That would apply mostly to vegetarians or vegans. There is an issue with vitamin D for people who can't or won't expose their skin for a few minutes a day to the sun in spring, summer and autumn. The winter months could be a problem, but many cereals and non-milk milks are fortified, and there are always eggs and mushrooms. Older women with reduced bone density must, obviously, consider their position. Folic acid could be an issue for people who rely on ready meals and who don't eat greens.

If you eat a varied diet and avoid faddy ideas, you are going to get all the vitamins and minerals you need with a typical western diet (make that Mediterranean and you've definitely cracked it). And the rather inconvenient fact is that the supplements industry is ruthless and cynical and will sell you for many dollars/pounds what it costs them pennies to make. To my mind, we need a lot more regulation to prevent companies from promoting as health-giving useless rubbish such as glucosamine, chondroitin and "probiotics" (sorry, Maggie, but the evidence simply isn't there...)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 May 22 - 10:46 AM

Misread that tapenade recipe as having M&Ms in it. Ewww.

Tried a savory pie with almond flour crust. Worth the try. Not doing it again soon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 May 22 - 11:08 AM

As an older woman with bone density issues, vitamins B-12 and D3 are on my list of "must take" from my doctors, and they do blood tests to be sure the levels are high enough. The rest of it is subjective (the only other one you mentioned I take is probiotics - I take a simple lactobacillus because I don't eat yogurt every day.)

My elderly Labrador retriever gets a daily dose of glucosamine and chondroitin because the vet's Rx dogfood that contains extra is way expensive. I give him a good quality OTC dogfood for elderly dogs and supplement to bring it up to the level in the vet food. A lot of things we know about human health was initially tested by vets in our pets. I don't know if vets were ahead of the curve with the arthritis treatments, but it is of interest to a lot of people. You may be skeptical of their efficacy, but there is a lot of ongoing research looking into it.

Many American foods have supplements added, and in some instances, it is overkill. And I can't think of the last time I ate a box of commercial cereal. I don't eat many processed foods that have extra vitamins added. I use a little bit of milk, that has vitamin D, but that's about it.

This is a recipe thread, and one recipe for poor health is too much processed food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 23 May 22 - 11:41 AM

Does anyone here add dried chilli flakes to a pot of black coffee? Just a few. Maybe half a dozen to ten for a pot for three cups. Too much would be a disaster and too few and you wont notice.

It's not actually sweet to taste but it does add some of the 'notes' of sugar, but none of the carbs and none of the chemical worries of artificial sweeteners.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 22 - 11:49 AM

OK, I'll just say this, then I'll stick to recipes. Before that last post I did a lot of delving into the evidence, making doubly sure that I avoided websites that might have hidden connections with the supplements industry. It was not off the top of my head. Tonight, I have leftover cooked new potatoes from yesterday. I may incorporate them into a tortilla or I may make a cheese omelette and just have the spuds sautéed in butter on the side. There will be a nice salad alongside, whichever I do. Tried, tested and trusted!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 22 - 11:54 AM

I never take sugar in tea or coffee. I use dried chilli flakes a lot but I've never thought of putting some in coffee. I'll drink espressos or lungos unadorned, or I'll froth up some full-cream milk to make a cappuccino or a flat white. Our bean-to-cup machine went bang a few months ago so we replaced it with a Sage Creatista Nespresso machine which has a steam wand. Life is good!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 23 May 22 - 02:02 PM

Milk, cream and other white stuff sort of soften the bitterness in coffee. Sugar kind of brightens it. A small amount of chilli brightens it in a different way. I seem to remember reading that the Aztecs, or was it the Mayans, added chilli to coffee way back then. I can't claim to have invented it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 22 - 03:12 PM

Cocoa maybe Stanron - coffee originates in Ethiopia, where they have a formal coffee ceremony, similar to the Japanese with chado (the way of tea).

I think timely given Roland Garros is on, just the other day I tried heating half a cup of soya in a pan, then adding it to half a cup of boiled water, with my usual amount of coffee and tea - au lait (sort of, anyway)!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 23 May 22 - 03:42 PM

Oops, well I might have invented it then.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 22 - 03:53 PM

...anyone game to try Stanron's choffee? I do have some mild chilli powder on my spice shelf...maybe tomorrow?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 22 - 04:57 PM

Chilli powder and chilli flakes are not the same thing. The powder has all sorts of other spicy things as well as the ground chilli. Good luck with that!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 May 22 - 05:08 PM

...that's true, Steve, but then Indians are not shy when it comes to spicing their tea/chai!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 22 - 06:02 PM

I'm a simple man. I want big mugs of builders' tea and I want a simple cup of decent coffee, with or without milk as the fancy takes me. Instant coffee, to me, is the vomit of satan, and big bags of stale ready-ground aren't much better. No sugar, no chilli, no weird additives. I see no point in decaffeinated anything. Same with reduced-fat food. I want to be polluted. Chacun à son goût...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 23 May 22 - 06:33 PM

I'm not using chilli powder. The ones I use are Birds Eye Chilli Flakes. Birds Eye chillis are are on the hot side, hence the caution. I also add a few, just a few, to a pot of red lentils. . Also recommended.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 May 22 - 07:33 PM

I use chilli powder only for my inauthentic chili con carne. I use chilli flakes a lot in Italian dishes such as arrabbiata and puttanesca and spaghetti with prawns, lemon and rocket. Mostly it's the bog standard Schwartz dried chilli flakes, typically sautéed gently with sliced (not minced) garlic in extra virgin olive oil, but I use dried ancho chillies too which I like to crumble in my hands! I find shop-bought fresh chillies to be unreliable in terms of how perky they are and I regularly underdo it. I'm thinking of growing some this year and I'll see how I get on. Half a green one goes into my roughly-chopped guacamole. They are greenhouse crops in Cornwall. In the last few years, cheap boxes of padron peppers have appeared in shops more and more. I love them fried in hot olive oil until they blister then liberally sprinkled with coarse salt (white wine optional but strongly recommended). These days I cook them outdoors on my little camping stove as they are the world's worst spitty spatterers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 30 May 22 - 05:06 PM

With the options for vegans getting better by the year (if not by the weekly shop), been enjoying mini plant-based savoury pies from the supermarket - simply heated in the oven while I pan fry mushrooms and spring onions.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 01 Jun 22 - 10:51 AM

The French after a two-hour lunch, with a bottle of Bordeaux, & a café au lait, at Roland Garros: "Anyone for tennis?" :-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 10:12 AM

Traveling and eating in restaurants for 2 weeks. Fun trying to stay keto...

I love Italian restaurants. A big bowl of seafood fra diavolo, hold the pasta, mussels without the toasties, etc. Actually the easiest cuisine.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 11:33 AM

...as long as, I gather from Italians, the pasta matches the sauce &, once cooked, is added to the saucepan (rather than the sauce being poured over a plate of pasta).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 04:25 PM

That's the typical process but it isn't a golden rule. What is a golden rule is that you don't just dump sauce on top of pasta. The sauce must be tossed with the pasta, and almost always a good few tablespoons of the pasta water is added, not just to loosen the sauce but also to make the sauce and pasta bind together via the starchiness of the water.

Other golden rules:

There is no such dish in Italy as spaghetti bolognese.

There is no such dish in Italy as spaghetti meatballs.

There is no cream in carbonara.

There is no pineapple on pizza.

Dried basil is not used in Italy.

True bolognese rágù never contains garlic, oregano or basil.

All rules are there to be broken...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 04:41 PM

"See Naples and die" (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)...quite quickly, I think, if you asked for pineapple on your pizza!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 06:23 PM

Well we went to a pizzeria in Napoli, four of us, and each had a huge pizza, total cost for us all about €15. We were the only non-locals in there, always a good sign in Italy. We sat right next to the wood-fired pizza oven, just as well as we'd all just been soaked to the skin by a sudden tropical deluge (By the way, if you're in Naples and it starts to rain, 10,000 sellers of cheap umbrellas suddenly appear on the streets as if from nowhere). I asked for mine to be a pizza fritta, a deep-fried pizza in other words. When it arrived it resembled a Cornish pasty but at least three times as big as any pasty you've ever seen. Your man looked me in the eye with a look that was clearly nothing less than a challenge. The trencherman in me rose to the challenge and I ate the lot, around 2000 calories I should think. I could hardly move for the rest of the afternoon, but we did make it the couple of hundred yards to the Duomo, where we saw the bones of San Gennaro, the patron saint of Napoli who was beheaded in the Solfatara crater in the fourth century, in a large urn in the crypt. Catholics are the experts in presenting us with such unexpected horrors. Earlier, we'd spent the morning in the amazing archaeological museum. That was a shudderingly fantastic day!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 06:36 PM

One dish that causes major consternation in Italy is spaghetti alla puttanesca (whore's pasta, or prostitute's pasta as we call it in our house). Clearly, the sauce must have at least some tomatoes, garlic and plenty of it (sliced, never crushed) and olive oil. Definitely some sliced black olives. But does it have anchovies? Yes, in m'humble! Does it have chilli flakes? Yes again! What about capers? Definitely! Dried oregano? A must! But what about Parmesan? Never! Sacrilege!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 08 Jun 22 - 07:01 PM

...I mostly use rapeseed oil but, for a change, recently chose a small spray-can! of olive oil (from Tesco)...quite handy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 Jun 22 - 05:27 PM

Ok in 2 days back I have eaten 5 heads of lettuce. Aaahhhh. Somehow restaurant salads always have other stuff in'm. And the dressing is *never* a simple mustard vinaigrette.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 14 Jun 22 - 05:47 PM

Might a vegan coleslaw make a nice healthy change, Mrrzy?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jun 22 - 07:32 PM

Now here's a thing about lettuce, etc. The typical British pub-grub "salad" consists of week-old wilted lettuce, tasteless cucumber, raw onion slices that will give you bellyache for days and, for reasons best known to anybody but me, sliced-up raw cabbage. You might get a chemical golf ball half-tomato if you're lucky, and an indigestible slice or two of a strangely-coloured bell pepper. If it ain't red, it's not for eating...

It's a disgrace. There is lovely lettuce around. I eschew all those watery iceberg globes of Webb's Wonderful (Webb's Diabolical, more like). And those butterhead soft lettuces are just like eating flaccid bog paper. Little Gem is good if you can get it fresh. Even better is one called Sweet Gem. A very nice crunch. Here's a good trick with bought lettuce: cut off the bottom and stand it for a couple of hours in a jug of cold water. The crispness will unfailingly return.

I don't understand salad dressing. Mrs Steve loves a salad of lettuce, pepper and halved cherry tomatoes dressed with extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar (the thick, oozy Belazu stuff, not that watery three-quid aberration). I'm OK with that, but if I've grown the lettuce myself and I can get the amazing cherry toms from the Netherlands growers, or my own from August onward, I don't see the point of drowning their deliciousness with oil and vinegar...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Jun 22 - 07:38 PM

I forgot to mention rocket. I have a big bed of wild rocket that seeds itself every year. It's been there for fifteen years and I never have to do anything to it. A handful of freshly-plucked rocket transforms a salad, or a burger in a bun with caramelised onion chutney...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 15 Jun 22 - 01:59 PM

Nice to have that wild rocket, Steve; I recall getting some very nice tomatoes by chance from the compost heap down the back of our family's yard in Sydney.

I think I mentioned above that, being on my own and not a big eater, I find iceberg useful because by taking off a "leaf" per day, and running water over it before returning to the fridge (a bit like your method, I guess), it can last a fortnight.

And Mrs Steve is obviously your better half - "extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar"...only the best!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Jun 22 - 05:44 PM

Iceberg lettuce is crunchy, tasteless, watery shite. Redolent of the bog-standard pub "ploughman's lunch" which comes with a lump of factory "cheddar", a golf-ball tomato that tastes of nothing, grated carrot (is there anything more disgusting?), raw cabbage stalky stuff and salad cream if you're lucky. Oh, and a lump of dry Tesco bloomer. This stuff is not real food, and it's doubtful that any ploughman worth his salt would touch it with a ten-foot bargepole.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 15 Jun 22 - 09:16 PM

A vegetarian friend was kind enough to set me straight about iceberg lettuce - it has certain characteristics that make it the perfect lettuce to shred and top dishes with (never buy it shredded, they use some kind of vile preservative that hits my gut hard). There are salads that benefit from the extra crunch a little iceberg adds to other varieties of lettuce. For a long time I didn't buy it, but now I have iceberg and romaine both handy in the crisper.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Jun 22 - 03:16 AM

If you want crunch, Little Gem, treated with the trick I mentioned earlier, is much superior in m'humble. Morrisons in the UK are selling one called Sweet Gem which is even better. My own crop of Little Gem is nearly ready. The gold standard! The slugs love it too, but therein lies another tale...

I forgot to mention the other ingredient in "the ploughman's lunch," Branston Pickle. It's a matter of taste, of course, but I can't bear that stuff.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 16 Jun 22 - 06:43 AM

For a change, I got a jar of "mixed pickle" on my last shop, but usually have pickled silverskin onions - with a crunch that I have to be careful with given the state of my poor old teeth!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 21 Jun 22 - 12:29 PM

We had a salad for tea today. Little Gem lettuce (which incidentally is my first choice when I grow our own lettuce), onion and chives all chopped up as that’s easiest for us. I just put these in a plastic box to which I also added quartered cherry tomatoes before mixing it up and putting a portion on each plate – no salad dressing btw, no one here wants it. Also on the plate were slices of boiled beetroot, Aran Pilot potatoes (the one thing that did come from our garden’) with butter and Camembert, St Agur and Cheshire cheese.

Pudding was jelly with a can of pineapple chunks added and vanilla ice cream.

Parents enjoyed it, especially mum although she also had another reason to be happy. She’s had a lot of problems with her legs and I think today was the first day this year that she’s managed to get outside on her own. Needless to say, she wanted her tea outside in the sunshine. I’ll have to see how she’s fixed for getting back indoors in a bi.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Jun 22 - 09:22 AM

I love iceberg lettuce. So crunch, such refreshing, wow.

I love butter/Bibb/Boston lettuce. That texture is also marvy and clings well to dressing (or vice versa).

I love that Romaine comes in purple now.

I love rocket and arugula and mixed baby greens and baby bok choi and baby spinach...

If not honeymoon salad (lettuce alone)... Fresh cukes, in chunks. Any color bell peppers. Good cherry tomatoes, sliced. No raw veg that should be cooked, like cabbage, cauliflower or broccoli. Maybe celery.

But I am picky picky picky about dressings. No cream. No sugar. It ain't coffee, folks. Red wine vinegar. Olive or avocado oil. Salt. Maybe Dijon mustard. If so, nothing else. If not, herbs and garlic, but watch the herbs. Basil, minimal or it gets licorice-y. Tarragon, no. Just, no.

Also lemon juice, cumin and olive oil is a good alternate dressing. Still needs salt.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jun 22 - 09:32 AM

The corned beef and beetroot butty. The ingredients are Sainsbury's prepacked corned beef (six slices), butter, Baxter's sliced beetroot in vinegar (drained), and - the hardest bit - the bread. I chose a thinly-sliced loaf made by our local baker Pete (he's been around forever, his loaf being a seeded job which he calls his "Cotswold Crunch"). The crust is pleasantly crunchy but the bread inside is soft.

The resulting butty was a bit of a masterpiece. I have two golden rules when making a sandwich: first, butter the bread generously right to the very edge of each slice. Second, the filling, if something meaty such as ham, roast beef, corned beef or chicken, must be exceptionally generous and multi-layered, and never underdo the mayo/horseradish relish or mustard. If egg mayo, the filling must be so excessive that it oozes out when you bite into the butty, such that it would be unwise to try to eat it whilst not sitting over your plate.

My favourite shop-bought sandwich is the spicy M&S "best-ever prawn." The last time I ate one al fresco in Truro, a bloody seagull came at me from behind and cleanly removed half of it from my clutches. A tragedy of Shakespearean proportions.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Jun 22 - 09:36 AM

That was for two people by the way. And if you even think of using any kind of margarine, or worse, "low fat spread," I'll have to seriously contemplate having you arrested.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 01 Jul 22 - 02:19 PM

I sympathize with the seagull incident.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 01 Jul 22 - 02:38 PM

That seagull must wait hours for the appropriate tourist. Locals learned to be on their guard.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jul 22 - 03:52 PM

Heavy but very rewarding day at Bude Memory Café (Mrs Steve is the prime mover and I do loads of transporting of folks...). We had the local WI choir today who put on a great show, not just singing in chorus but also introducing a lovely lady belly dancer, a bit of jiving to sixties classics, a local lad with a gorgeous voice and a lady folk singer who was utter class. Got home far too late to cook, so I rustled up plates of picky-up grub, most of it bought in...

We had nocellara olives, sun-dried cherry tomatoes, two Italian salamis and some prosciutto crudo, vegetable samosas and my favourite tapa, fried padron peppers sprinkled with sea salt (the one bit I had to do myself). We started with a lovely glass of white wine, sitting in the evening sun, and we're currently polishing off a bottle of red from a Puglian village winery, Salice Salentino.

That'll do me!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jul 22 - 04:04 PM

I forgot to mention the tuiles. They're an amazing nibble with the aperitif. The only ingredient is finely-grated Parmesan cheese. I make mine on greaseproof paper. Three tuiles are more than enough per person. Get a big oven tray and cover it with greaseproof paper. Grate the Parmesan on to it. For two, you need enough to make six little mounds of grated cheese, each one about an inch and a half across. Each mound should be just slightly heaped in the middle.

Preheat the oven to 180C. Put the tray in the oven for exactly eight minutes. This is crucial. Take out the tray and very gently transfer the tuiles on to a rack to cool. They are ready in minutes but they keep for several hours. A gorgeous, crispy, salty snack that will have you topping up your glass.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Jul 22 - 04:02 PM

Made crab asparagus soup then decided to make salad with the rest of the ingredients. Steam asparagus by putting in glass spear end up with a little water in the glass, wrap with saran wrap, microwave 1 mn, let be for 5 then remove the wrap and cool.
Lettuces tomatoes asparagus crab pistachios. Dressing: add a lot of horseradish to my mustard vinaigrette. Yum yum.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Aug 22 - 11:45 AM

I haven't been cooking while my back was out but someone assembled a marvy gazpacho for me with garden everything, almost.

Stood long enough today, first time since July 1, to make cannibal zucchini boats:

Halve zucch, scrape out insides, salt boats. Mix insides with garlic marjoram oregano, put back in boats, grate fresh parm on top, in toaster oven.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Aug 22 - 01:01 PM

I haven't been doing much cooking while it's so hot that I could just plop food on the pavement to cook through.

Yesterday I made a batch of babaghanouj; lots of garlic and added a little smoke flavor (because this mimics the roasted eggplant - I baked them in my glass convection oven). Will be eating it with warmed up pita bread. I bought it still warm and froze it immediately after visiting the halal bakery. The eggplant and garlic used in the recipe came from my garden.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 10 Aug 22 - 02:14 PM

I am making a vegetable chicken egg noodle soup with black truffle hot sauce and a hybrid of spices between poultry seasoning with a speck of nutmeg and ginger. If it needs more heat I use Slap your Momma creole seasoning.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Aug 22 - 08:06 PM

The idea of a tapa with your summer evening aperitif came up on the lager thread, and I mentioned my salmorejo recipe. It's a chilled tomatoey "soup," though much thicker than regular soup, it's easy to make, and it's served in small bowls with a teaspoon and some little breadsticks. It keeps for days in the fridge, and actually improves with the keeping.

Just four points: you must use extra virgin olive oil, you must use good sherry vinegar, the quality of the tomatoes is paramount, and you do NOT skin the tomatoes. Ignore online recipes that add stuff such as green peppers, onion and anything else that I don't mention. Online chefs that simply have to be different get on my nerves!

The ingredients for four very generous servings are:

A pound and a half of the best vine-ripened large tomatoes you can get
A large garlic clove, peeled
Half a teaspoon of sugar
A pinch of salt
The yolks from two hard-boiled eggs
120 ml extra virgin olive oil (nothing else will do)
A generous dash of sherry vinegar (no substitutes allowed)
Stale white bread from a smallish baguette, crusts removed (though I use a submarine roll complete with soft crust)

Except for the bread, I just blend everything with my stick blender. I don't peel the tomatoes but I do cut them up and cut out the little core at the top.

The whole lot goes into a bowl with the torn-up bread and left to soak for a few minutes. Then it all gets blended again until fairly smooth. Voila! So simple.

If it doesn't seem thick enough, you can add a bit more bread and whizz again. It should be thick enough that when you pick up a teaspoon of it it stays a little bit rounded on the spoon, but this is not important.

The traditional way to serve this is in little bowls with some breadstick pieces on the side. On top, you sprinkle a mix of chopped-up hard-boiled egg and some small bits of Serrano ham. I always cheat and replace the ham with a pinch of crispy streaky bacon and no-one ever complains.

Have this with your Aperol spritz and you'll live forever!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 15 Aug 22 - 02:53 AM

Yesterday we had grilled cheese sandwiches, Campbell's tomato soup, and avocado with lime juice.

I improved the soup with sauteed onion, basil and black pepper. Then I heated it for a couple of hours in my smallest slow cooker. It was good.

Stilly, I liked your joke about the pavement.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Aug 22 - 09:39 PM

Mmmm garden tomatoes are being amazing this year

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 12:17 PM

I've finally broken down and ordered a used copy of the Alexandra Stafford cookbook Bread Toast Crumbs : Recipes for No-Knead Loaves and Meals to Savor Every Slice: a Cookbook. A friend has given me a couple of the loaves he made and they are amazing. I'm not eating as much bread as I used to, but these are wonderful specialty recipes and also make great gifts.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 12:24 PM

Mrrzy, I'm happy for you. My tomatoes are merely producing a smattering of Sun Gold cherry tomatoes. I can't grow full size because the squirrels destroy them.

Stilly, I have a similar cookbook. When I make its round loaf with sliced olives, it disappears rapidly at church fellowship. We don't eat it at home because of a draconian law that all bread must be whole wheat. (Gets boring.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 12:40 PM

Leeneia, Sungold are the only tomatoes I grow! Tomatoes only thrive in greenhouses in Cornwall as it gets a bit too chilly early and late in the season and is often too breezy in summer. I have an 18 foot greenhouse which, over the years, became gradually more shaded by tree growth. The three big culprit trees died of Dutch Elm disease last year so I had to get the tree surgeons in to remove them, and the resulting extra few hours of direct sun each day have had a miraculous effect this summer: I have a glut!   

I grow Sungold for several reasons: they are utterly delicious with a unique flavour; they crop right up to November; they are completely resistant to soil-borne tomato diseases, meaning that I can grow them in the same soil every year, you can never buy them ( probably because of their propensity for splitting a bit too easily, especially if you let them go a day too long dry at the roots.

I I always grow mine from seed, starting in April. We used to have a nursery that sold plants in individual pots cheaply (I need a dozen or more) but they are now astronomical in price bought that way. Not that the seed is cheap, but it's still much cheaper than buying plants.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 05:11 PM

I should have said farmers' market tomatoes. Got my aide making gazpacho as I type.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 05:36 PM

I have tomato sauce on just about everything but only occasionally buy tomatoes from the local supermarket - the best taste being "on the vine" but I've often heard home-grown can taste considerably better.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Aug 22 - 07:02 PM

No comparison.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 02:56 PM

Made a kind of English cauliflower cheese for the first time today:

Simply boiled chopped pieces of cauliflower for a while before tipping most of the water out of the frying pan; then added rapeseed oil, mustard (which apparently is quite traditional) & tomato sauce, plus a torn-up slice of vegan cheese; and stirred for a while.

Traditionally, it would be completed in the oven but, even without that, I thought it was quite tasty and a nice change.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 03:27 PM

Aide, unsupervised, did not chop finely, so it never made soup out of the intended-for-gazpacho veggies. Last time I supervised, so I thought this time it would be remembered that everything must be minced. Ah, well. If this is what I am complaining about I am a lot better!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 03:28 PM

It's high season for fruit & veg in Ontario, so I have a cauliflower in the kitchen. I will probably eat it steamed, dressed with sauce vinaigrette, and sprinkled liberally with freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

Now that I'm on my own most of the time, I occasionally eat a whole cauliflower by myself and call it supper. That will probably happen this week.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 03:40 PM

Similarly, I bought a cauliflower from the local supermarket for the first time in a while because it was considerably smaller than the usual size, and I knew even just I can get through it before going off - I don't like wasting any food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 18 Aug 22 - 06:40 PM

:D

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Aug 22 - 10:27 AM

Someone brought me a rotisserie chicken. I took all the meat off the bones and made stock with the carcass. Froze in ice cube tray, stored in dated ziplock.

I took all the meat and marinated it in toom, that garlic stuff, and hot sauce, and froze that.

Today I chopped onion green pepper cabbage, smashed some garlic, melted some duck fat, added hot pepper from neighbor garden and paprika, sautéed veg, deglazed with white wine, added the defrosted chicken and chicken stock, and that is barely simmering away. To serve, fill bowl with spinach, ladle hot soup over. Garnish with pistachios and crushed almonds.

Yes! I can stand long enough to cook again!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 22 Aug 22 - 02:46 AM

Toom ?

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Aug 22 - 05:06 AM

Mrrzy, I'm happy to hear that you can stand again. That must mean so much to you.
=====
A few weeks ago my newspaper had a recipe for Smothered Chicken, a southern favorite. Don't worry - the chicken is smothered in onions. It's really good. I suspect it started out as Mothered Chicken because the secret to making it really good is to watch it sedulously and raise the heat, then lower the heat, then raise the heat until the meat and the "gravy" are just the right consistency.

We served it to friends along with corn on the cob, broccoli and watermelon, having a regular American summer meal. They liked it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Aug 22 - 02:23 PM

Toom is a middle-eastern garlic paste. Just garlic, and a smidge of lemon. Fluffy fluffy yum.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 26 Aug 22 - 05:49 PM

Sounds good and would like to try it so did a search - Toom seems to be a brand of toum, the paste/sauce as you described.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 27 Aug 22 - 02:23 AM

Yup sounds good to me too. I'm addicted to garlic.

Dave H

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Aug 22 - 08:52 PM

Just buy garlic, in its papery coat, through which you can feel whether the cloves are nice and firm, and which you can sniff to find out whether it's fresh enough for you. Why buy garlic in a squeezy tube when you know that it's been severely processed? A big, fat bulb of garlic for 60p yields enough cloves to throw unpeeled into your Mediterranean potatoes along with fresh rosemary and extra virgin olive oil so that, half an hour later, you can suck the beautiful sweet middle out once you've bitten the end off the clove. You can't do that with garlic mush in a tube. Still, it's a free country.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 28 Aug 22 - 03:19 AM

Speaking of tomatoes just above, thought I'd pass on what I just saw on BBC Scotland's Beechgrove: with a surplus, they simply stuffed different varieties into a large jar (adding salt and oil plus basil or garlic, e.g.), turned the lid back a bit to let air out in the oven for a while, then fully tightened lid for later use...if you haven't already, worth a try maybe?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 22 - 10:08 AM

Sounds like ptomaine in a bottle. This lists the safest food preservation techniques.

Tomatoes took a hit from the heat this year, so the only use mine are being put to are sauce. Maybe this autumn we'll have a better looking crop.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Aug 22 - 02:56 PM

Made another batch of babaghanouj with homegrown eggplant and garlic. The environmental footprint is about 25 feet across the driveway to the side door of the house. I can use a very small portion and a half of a pita bread for part of lunch on my "fasting" days (during an alternate day fasting diet that has so far dropped 30 pounds). The combination of eggplant, tahini, lemon juice, garlic and the bread is satisfying in line with complex carbohydrates (the sesame tahini being similar to peanut butter when smeared on bread). Just a guess. Anyway, that and a hard boiled egg on the side and an apple is a nice lunch for a motivated dieter. (I'm about 10 pounds from my goal.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Aug 22 - 04:03 PM

Got me some pork my neighbor smoked. Not sure what to do for bbq sauce, usually I like mine sweet. Tomato vinegar hot spice, maybe.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Aug 22 - 04:20 PM

Maggie, your link advises that parsley freezes poorly. Absolute poppycock. Chopped fresh parsley freezes well for at least a year.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Sep 22 - 04:21 PM

Have I posted this before? Can't remember...

Here's a summery salad that has no cooking involved, which contains no gluten or any of the usual bready or potatoey carbohydrates, but which can be a complete meal in itself, and it's oozing with good health. It's the colours of the Italian flag, hence we call it tricoloure salad, though it's worth noting that avocado is a rare ingredient in Italian cuisine!

For two of us (extremely generously), the ingredients are half a pound of the best cherry tomatoes you can get, 250g drained weight of mozzarella (we buy the one called mozzarella maxi made by Galbani) and two firm yet ripe avocados. The quality of the ingredients is paramount. You also need some really good extra virgin olive oil.

All you do is peel and thinly slice the avocados into crescent moons, cut the tomatoes cleanly in half (I use a serrated knife, which avoids squidging) and cut up/slice/whatever the mozzarella into smallish bite-sized pieces. You can get all arty-farty and arrange the cheese and avo slices into a nice pattern, but I don't bother with that and simply throw them into a big mix. Then scatter the tomato halves on top, and drizzle the whole lot with a tablespoon or two of extra virgin olive oil. A final grating of black pepper and a few fresh baby basil leaves are the icing on the cake.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 02 Sep 22 - 04:34 PM

"Tricolore" is a better spelling!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Sep 22 - 05:29 PM

Leftovers soup: a yakburger with duck bacon. A lamb chop. Half a small steak. All meat chopped small (bone gnawed). The ripest tomato, also chopped. Into pot that still had a few brussels sprouts in a butter sauce. Beef broth, bring to boil, let sit a bit, and voilà, yum!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Sep 22 - 05:25 PM

Because toum tastes way better than plain roasted garlic. And no wait...

It started off as crab asparagus soup but I got carried away chopping garden things and now there is a brothy soup simmering, with, kind of in order of what went into the duck fat:

Hot pepper from neighbor, hot paprika, garlic powder
Onions bell pepper celery cabbage, fried rather a lot
White wine to deglaze
Fresh spinach, stir till wilted
Garden tomatoes
Chicken broth to cover.

If too spicy it will be served with sour cream or crème fraîche, I have both for taste-testing purposes. Then again it could also get some toum. Man, that stuff is sooooo goooood.

No asparagus or crab. They would get lost. Tomorrow!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 19 Sep 22 - 07:00 PM

I'm alternate day fasting (meaning about 500 calories tops on "fasting" days) and 1200 on regular days. Today I have a couple of hundred calories left to play with for dinner and I'll repeat the last fasting dinner - slicing fresh mozzarella (2 ounces gives me about 8 slices), with basil from the garden and 8 split cherry tomatoes from the garden. Drizzle with a little olive oil and Balsamic vinegar. It's a very light meal, but quite satisfying. (I'm down to the last six pounds to lose, and it seems to be going slow, but it is going.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 22 - 07:06 PM

That's like my tricolore salad except that you don't include some slices of avocado. I know that avocado is a bit calorific, but it's really good for you... With the avo, it's a complete meal for us on a warm summer's evening.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Sep 22 - 10:39 AM

Avocado is a great food for a healthy diet, a healthy fat, etc. But as you say, there are calories. And they have to be used all at once or frozen, pretty much. I have a lot of homemade guacamole in the freezer that was portioned into ice cube trays then frozen before dropping them into a zipper freezer bag. Each one is about 1/4 cup for calculating calories.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Sep 22 - 11:06 AM

You could replace some of the Mozzarella with some avocado... calories for calories?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Sep 22 - 04:42 PM

You try it and tell me how you like it. I'll stick with mozzarella on the Eggplant Parmesan. :)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Sep 22 - 06:34 PM

With the avo it's my tricolore salad (though we don't add balsamic vinegar - therein lies another tale, as I'm very fussy about balsamic) and we love it. It's good calories for everyday eating, though the cheese and avo are, admittedly, a bit calorific for a weight-loss aspiration. Actually, mozzarella is less calorific than most other cheeses.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Sep 22 - 08:30 PM

One of my fave lunchy things is a half avocado with the hole filled with vinaigrette. Eat with a spoon. No need of a plate, even.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 Sep 22 - 06:37 PM

As I may have posted a while back, I do similar to Mrrzy only with golden syrup...but I may try that savoury option next time...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Sep 22 - 06:42 PM

I've been known on many an occasion to cut an avocado in half, discard the stone and just scoff the whole thing via a teaspoon. You guys who can cut open an avo and eat only half of it must have the appetite of a sparrow!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 Sep 22 - 06:48 PM

Yes, in my case - so much so that I only "have half" (On the Buses, I think the TV serial was)! and then place the used atop the unused half in the fridge, to help keep it fresh for my next meal/next day!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 23 Sep 22 - 06:53 PM

...reminded me of an advert in Australia: "some men eat like sparrows; some men eat like lions" - for what it's worth, I was a bit more lion-like a couple of decades ago.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Sep 22 - 11:15 PM

Frozen pizza, a nice cheesy mushroom slice from one I found at my discount gourmet grocery, topped with a few slices of pepperoni and extra cheese, washed down with a Shiner Bock beer. Steamed broccoli on the side. As I near my weight loss goal and want to eat "normal" foods I really need to be careful with portion control.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 12:44 AM

Does anybody else look at YouTube much?

I've looked at several channels that purport to be German cooking videos, but I've noticed several things:

   they all use the same, predictable ingredients: onion, bell pepper,
   tomato, eggs, broccoli, common cheeses. Nothing new and
   interesting

    they involve lots of chopping & prep. Too much work!

    they make silly claims. "I make this every day."

    after all the work, the dish doesn't seem very appetizing.

I've been watching to improve my German and find new recipes, but I've decided these were made just to get views. Thank goodness for the "Don't recommend channel" button.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 01:09 PM

I have to limit sweetness so quality outranks quantity. I bought Elderberry jelly as well as French Black Raspberry preserves.
I can titrate the amounts easily and they are both delicious.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 04:56 PM

I think, SRS, the quality of frozen pizzas has improved a lot the last few years, and we can even get vegan options - I like mine with coleslaw (never tried it with sauerkraut, L..?) & ketchup on top.

And, D, I also like a French raspberry conserve - Bonne Maman is very good, readily available in England, and worth paying a bit more for, I feel.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 05:11 PM

...but please let me add this: out and about a fair bit the last couple of days with my nephew visiting Manchester, the lack of English restaurants and tea rooms (home cooking on the high-street) is shameful - not least for overseas tourists wishing for a taste or our fare.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 05:24 PM

"and we can even get vegan options - I like mine with coleslaw"

I don't think that Coleslaw is vegan !!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 05:35 PM

...vegan coleslaw is included in such (hopefully) fair-trade, these days, R.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Sep 22 - 09:56 PM

the lack of English restaurants and tea rooms (home cooking on the high-street) is shameful - not least for overseas tourists wishing for a taste or our fare.

WAV, You just can't stop doing it, can you? Stick to your bad poetry thread. We live in an international world and people can cook what they want where they want. Merchants and chefs set up to sell what they think will be attractive to consumers in an area. End. Of. Story.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 03:32 AM

Presumably vegan coleslaw uses eggless mock-mayonnaise.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 04:20 AM

Even normal coleslaw is something I find singularly unattractive. The very thought of vegan coleslaw...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 06:26 AM

I can't imagine slopping coleslaw on top of a pizza. Oh, the picture of horror in my mind...

Incidentally, I can't help reflecting that both pizza and coleslaw are both non-English concepts...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 07:26 AM

We have Mad Mike's which is a pretty fair giant pizza.
I tried the Croissant pizza that has an outstanding crust.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 05:46 PM

"Incidentally, I can't help reflecting that both pizza and coleslaw are both non-English concepts" (Steve)...and hopefully that, as indicated above, I have nothing against fair-trade.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Sep 22 - 07:57 PM

Well tonight we had a rather classy (in m'humble) Melton Mowbray pork pie from M&S. they are hellishly calorific, but we don't exactly do it every day. Everything else was out of the garden. We had salad consisting of Sungold cherry toms and some mini-peppers that I haven't grown before, which were sweet, crunchy, spicy and delicious. We shared the last cucumber I'm going to get this year. I made some oven chips with my Nicola potatoes, unpeeled, cut into wedges, par-boiled in salty water then baked for 20 minutes in groundnut oil in a very hot oven on a shallow tray. It was all delicious and everything from the garden is strictly organic. I suppose I'll have to confess that we both had a little splash of Hellman's mayo to lube the chips a little...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Sep 22 - 06:16 AM

Sounds great, S, only I go for the Plant Chef vegan pies; & also like their Cumblerland-like vegan sausages, as another change from my pottages/one-pot veggie and bean stews.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Sep 22 - 06:32 AM

Good luck with all that. Not for me. I've never understood why vegans make meat-shaped and meat-coloured food, vegan sausages, etc. I once saw vegan lamb chops in Sainsburys that were the same shape and colour as real lamb cutlets. You can get vegan streaky bacon in M&S that has the same stripey appearance as the real thing, though the copycat colours are positively lurid. I know not what tofu and quark are and I'm not buying them. It's too late to change me.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 27 Sep 22 - 06:48 AM

Never have, S, and probably never will try vegan lamb chops or bacon! but I challenge you to give those vegan pies (similar pastry, of course) and sausages a go (I was surprised by how tasty they are).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Sep 22 - 08:04 AM

Nope.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Sep 22 - 10:42 PM

Um, yeah, no thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 07:42 PM

Another *marvy* leftovers soup:

Meat from drumsticks leftover from roast chicken
Some leftover Crying Tiger [thai flank steak] with its sauce
About a third of an onion left from making körözött [a Hungarian spread]
Half a lime leftover from mojitos
Mystery demi-glace leftover from deglazing something and kept for just such a purpose
Nonleftovers: celery and a garden tomato, and some lemon-garlic butter

Heated butter, added garlic powder and hot pepper
Celery and onions, 5-7 mn in that
Meats, lime juice and sauces, tomato cut on top
Simmer lidded till tomato disintegrates

Serve with crème fraîche as it is sour enough.

Never to be repeated, of course!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 28 Sep 22 - 09:31 PM

Today a friend was over and we had lunch from leftovers in the fridge. A little bit of eggplant Parmesan, a small Caprese salad, a dish each of babaghanouj with pita bread. It all added up to a nice meal. It also cleared out several of the containers in the fridge when I was starting to run low of containers and lids.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Sep 22 - 07:39 PM

Today yak tenderloin steak seared in duck fat with mushrooms and thyme. A sauce to use up some cream with onions garlic celery in lemon butter. Cauliflower rice. All in one big bowl.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Sep 22 - 06:16 AM

I was cooking fish with boiled spuds from the garden, French beans and parsley sauce last night, so at the same time I thought I'd crack tonight's grub as well so as to avoid another spell of kitchen swelter. I made a big pan of peperonata, following, more or less, Rachel Roddy's recipe in the Guardian. It's ridiculously easy to do and it's healthy and delicious.

It's a large onion, one clove of garlic peeled and squashed but left whole, two red peppers, two yellow peppers, six large tomatoes, a splash of red wine vinegar and a teaspoon of sugar (you can leave that out if you want). And extra virgin olive oil. A big, heavy pan with a lid would be good.

You slice up the onion and fry it gently with the garlic in about six tablespoons of olive oil and a good pinch of salt for a few minutes. Cut the peppers up into thick strips and add them to the pan. Stir, then put the lid on and cook them gently for about 15 minutes. When they're going soft, chop up the tomatoes roughly (if you're fussy you can skin them first, but I see absolutely no need for this dish) and throw them in. Let all that lot bubble away with the lid off (crucial) for about 45 minutes, adding the red wine vinegar and sugar and stirring occasionally. Just check the seasoning and that's it.

We do what Rachel says and have it with sausages. I cook the bangers completely first, cut them into bite size, add them to the caponata, bingo. You could just have the caponata with crusty bread instead. Chips even. You can just leave the sausages whole and let them finish off in the caponata for a few minutes, but chopping them up first means that the flavours blend nicely AND that you can eat it with a fork out of a bowl in front of the telly. And why not. It's Friday night and a nice glass or two of red will wash it down in epic Italian fashion.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Sep 22 - 09:33 AM

That sounds marvy!

Got a double grocery delivery by accident so am going to try cold cucumber soup with cream. Ideas welcome!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 06 Oct 22 - 06:33 AM

Since last on here (I think it was this millennium), I have indeed tried splitting an avocado into a savoury & a sweet snack, as above - tomato- and soya-sauce in one seed-hole, & golden syrup plus single soya cream in the other. Also, where Americans tend to like peanut butter & jam on toast, I like to add such syrup & cream, as well.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 07:57 PM

Peanut butter and jelly go on bread for a sandwich. Butter OR jelly go on toast.

I'm nearing the goal of my weight loss effort over the last six months and am looking at the kinds of things I can start making that can be eaten over a space of a few days and stay good (versus something that has to wait until every other day to be eaten and won't keep long enough to be used completely). The New York Times ran a recipe for Yogurt Cake that is a less rich and lower calorie dessert than cheese cake. I love lemon, and I bet something like slightly sweetened raspberries would be good on top (the "macerated fruit" she mentions).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Oct 22 - 08:20 PM

Peanut butter is manna from heaven, but I've yet to meet a lover of peanut butter who doesn't confess to occasionally scoffing it straight from the jar (in my case, especially after a few glasses of summat non-non-alcoholic ...) I simply can't have it in the house. Damn. Begod, I could just eat some now. I haven't got any. Damn...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Oct 22 - 10:30 AM

...I prefer the smooth variety nowadays - rather than fragments of nuts getting stuck between my poor old teeth (I recently went to a dentist for the first time since repatriating, 1997, only to be told they are beyond having a splint).

And, a new trick for an old dog, I'm using scissors more-and-more nowadays to cut food straight into a pot - a bit like many Mediterranean folk do with a small knife.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 10 Oct 22 - 10:46 AM

I've been making soup recently, todays was Vegetable.

Onions, carrot, celery diced to about 5-6mm chopped tomatoes (tinned) sweet corn, peas and spinach leaves and chicken stock cubes.

Rather good it is too especially with homemade bread and homemade butter!!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Oct 22 - 01:21 PM

Chuck a tin of cannellini beans in there and you have a meal!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 10 Oct 22 - 03:52 PM

With a couple of vegan alternatives (stock and spread), I think I'd like it either way - noting that there are peas in Raggytash's recipe for protein.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Oct 22 - 04:33 PM

New meat: alligator. Was very like pork. Blackened, with braised cabbage. Delish.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Oct 22 - 06:01 PM

The only people in the western world who need to stress about protein are vegans, who need to ensure that they're getting the full spectrum of essential amino acids. A normal mixed diet will give you all the protein you need and more.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 11:35 AM

Yes and, according to the experts, B12 is the vitamin vegans have to be careful to get enough of; as I may have said a while back, I buy vegan cheese slices with added B12, rather than taking tablets.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:07 PM

I frequently post photos on Instagram of my garden and things around the yard, and there are the cooking photos that often involve my garden produce. Okra is just topping out now as the most productive crop, and I've fried and pickled a lot.

A friend who grew up in the next county south from here spent much of her working life in Indiana, then moved to the shore of Lake Michigan to retire. The further north, the less likely to find okra in her area farmers' market, and she has been known to verbally wince in the remarks section under my photos of fried or pickled okra. A couple of years ago the market got some good okra and I remember it was a big deal for her.

It dawned on me last week that I could send her some of my okra and if it only took 2-3 days it would be in great shape (what you see in the store is rather battered and was probably picked a couple of weeks earlier). So I took a Priority Region A box (US Postal Service gives a price break on this box - no idea why - but I use it when I can) and lined it with a layer of thin bubble wrap then filled it with okra, lined up enough to use the space as efficiently as possible. I managed to get four pounds four ounces of okra in that box, and it only cost $10 to mail. I mailed it on Thursday morning and she got it arrived on Saturday afternoon. The photo she posted on Facebook after she opened the box showed it was indeed in perfect condition.

The next day she posted photos of several jars of pickled okra, and the remainder was going to be fried.

I have so much okra (I put in five plants this year) that I always struggle to keep up with the fresh crop as I pickle it, eat it, and give it away. The US Department of Agriculture has inspection stations going into California, Oregon, Washington, and Arizona to do with vital produce such as oranges, apples, grapes, avocados, etc., but there is no vital okra crop in Michigan so we're safe sending these pods in the hibiscus family north to near the Canadian border. And my friend would easily have paid $10 for inferior okra at the local farmers' market. Win/Win.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:09 PM

B12 is added to lots of non-milk "milks" and breakfast cereals. I'd like to humbly suggest that the adoption of a diet for anything other than genuine medical reasons that then requires you to take supplements in our rich western world implies that you're going somewhat against Mother Nature. Boil an egg!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:35 PM

...don't think I'll get eggs on my next visit to the supermarket but, for the first time in several years, I may give the ladies' fingers another try..?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:37 PM

I've never eaten okra...

We don't cook on Wednesdays. It's cheese (eaten with Bath Olivers or matzos) and whatever nibbly bits I have in. OIives are a must. I have some stone-in nocellara ones which are delicious. Sungold tomatoes from the greenhouse. A few cashews or pistachios. Garlic cloves from a jar, Marché-style. The aperitif will be a glass of Portuguese Alvariño then a bottle of Nero d'Avola (er, there are two of us...)

I'm a bit worried about tonight's Camembert. It's spent two days stinking the fridge out and tastes very ripe. I think I might end up liking it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:45 PM

Maybe more recently than you, Steve, I have also developed a love of olives - Greek Halkithiki olives are particularly good, I've found.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 12:58 PM

I don't mind the little stoned manzanilla olives, dressed with lemon, herbs and garlic, but I prefer the big stone-in ones in oil. We use the cheapie black ones to make a simple tapenade and I put a good handful into whore's spaghetti (aka pasta alla puttanesca). I want anchovies in mine, Napoli-style, but if you leave them out you have a vegan dish. It's extra virgin olive oil, chilli flakes, sliced garlic, black olives chopped roughly, chopped parsley, passata or tinned tomatoes and capers. No cheese. It's deliciously spicy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 01:06 PM

The pasta I have in the cupboard (usually used when the sliced bread runs out before the next shop) is fusilli, so I may try it with that one day, thanks Steve.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 05:36 PM

Buy some spaghetti if you want whore's pasta. I have my favourites, but any shop will have DeCecco. It's great. Marks and Sparks (the bronze die stuff, made in the Alps) is very good too. I'm no fan of Napolina. Never buy cheap budget pasta. Even the good stuff at £1.70 up is cheap, and it's often on special offer. If it sez bronze die, or bronzo, on the pack, you're in business. If you see la Molisana brand, snap it up. It's the acme, the gold standard, the dog's danglies, of dried pasta.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 12 Oct 22 - 06:26 PM

I was watching a repeat on the Beeb of Michael Portillo in Hong Kong (as with me, a 2019 visit) earlier this evening and he filmed with a chap making hand-made noodles in his flat - he said good noodles should "dance in your mouth"...maybe, along with "al dente", that may be applied to spaghetti as well..?! I did try such noodles near where I stayed in the Wan Chai area of Hong Kong and they were good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Oct 22 - 12:29 AM

I have strawberry pulp frozen after juicing the berries to make jelly. The pulp is still very good for other uses and is often used to make jam after the jelly has been made. But I froze the pulp and have been comparing recipes online this evening. (What is it with these sites with the huge fonts and photos? Recipes on steroids. I just want the brief description and the ingredients. Maybe they make money the farther you have to scroll to read.)

I finally went to Martha Stewart Living and found her crepe recipe that uses strawberries, though the one I think I'll try first is from a different site for strawberry turnovers. It's getting the fruit consistency right with a few ingredients for the mashed berries that I'll work on. I'll look at the dough they suggest and decide if I want to make more of a turnover (with puffier dough) or simple hand pies (and can make my usual pie crust.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 22 - 08:44 AM

Things I have to cook to empty my fridge for my absence:
-Andouille sausage and a bit of kolbász
-A pepper and some celery (onions and garlic should keep, no?)
-Leftover cabbage and tomato glop, from a yummy veg soup I made and then only drank the broth of
-Some more cabbage
-A spherical zucchini thing

There will be soup.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Oct 22 - 12:31 PM

It does sound like a nice soup! Do you have any potatoes you can cut into hearty chunks to go in it? I think potatoes and cabbage are one of those Old Country combinations that adds up to a healthy complex carbohydrate.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Oct 22 - 10:49 AM

A friend mentioned pulling out his sister's apple cake recipe to share with his siblings on the occasion of his sister's birthday. I asked him to share. I could feel the pounds wrapping around my waist as I read it - equal parts flour and sugar and a cup of Crisco oil. OMG. It reads more like it's a batter for pancakes than an actual cake.

I finally found a good apple cake, maybe in Joy of Cooking? I sometimes have to go back through several of my favorite books to find the version of a particular recipe I've made and decided was a good one. That sister's recipe needs the oil cut in half and replaced by melted butter, for starters. And way less sugar.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 29 Oct 22 - 01:16 AM

I made a beef pot pie today. The beef was chuck roast, pre-cooked and cut into bite-size pieces. The secret is to mix the filling, get it hot, then bake it just long enough to bake the crust.

0. Spray or grease your baking dish on the chance that that will help
       with cleaning the dish afterwards.
1. Slice and cook some carrots - 5 mins in the microwave
2. Finely chop some onion
3. Put a can of low-salt mushroom soup in the baking dish. add maybe
       1/2 cup water so soup is not so thick.
4. Stir in 1 tsp powdered sage
5. Heat all the above in the microwave
6. Preheat oven to 425, maybe. exact temp TBD
7. Make a piecrust for the top with half a box of Jiffy pie crust mix
    (freeze the rest of the mix)
8, Put the crust on the top, crimp the edge, cut six slits about 3/4
      inch in the top to let steam out
9 Bake at maybe 425 for maybe 30 mins till crust is cooked through.

It was delicious. We also had sauteed cauliflower, oranges and strawberries.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 29 Oct 22 - 03:28 AM

Leeneia, at what point did you add the beef? Or am I being stupid?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Oct 22 - 12:25 PM

Pie crust is so easy to make from scratch. I don't care for the commercial ones in the freezer section, it's over-worked and kind of tough.

I do use filo pastry from the freezer section because that is a lot of work. Reminds me - I haven't made spinach pie in forever.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 08:42 AM

Following where the discussion has gone in the 'Mrzzy is living in interesting times' thread;

The last time I microwaved mushrooms they ended up tasting awful. Maybe I left them in too long. However, as I'm already cooking other stuff I may as well use the heat that's already there to cook the mushrooms. I have avoided using mushrooms in the microwave since but may well experiment in future.

Subject: RE: BS: Mrrzy is living in interesting times...
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 09:34 AM

Microwave mushrooms then throw them into the compost!

Start with butter, some garlic, and a dash of red wine if you want really wonderful mushrooms with the meal.

I have some dried mushrooms (an experiment) and they're okay to reconstitute then add to dishes. If I find them inexpensive at my gourmet warehouse last-chance store I usually buy and slice and lightly fry in butter or olive oil then freeze in small containers.

Steaming seems to leave the veggies in better shape, and when I store any leftovers (because I try to fix enough for a couple of uses) then I pour the remaining liquid over them. The dogs love to drink the leftover veggie liquid when the container is empty.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 09:39 AM

I transferred my last Mrrzy/interesting times post over here (above). Stanron made a good point. We do stray into food discussions just about anywhere. :)

The discussion went from steaming to mushrooms.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 12:19 PM

Even worse than "tinned button mushrooms" are those nasty little slippery rubbery beige things they serve in some cafés as part of "the full English breakfast." In the worst cases you'll find a tiny pot of lukewarm baked beans on the same plate, which have no business being anywhere near the eggs, bacon, sausage, fried bread and black pudding. Another minus point can be the tasteless half-tomato that is nowhere near cooked enough.

I've never tried microwaving mushrooms and I'm not about to try. The nutrients may well be better retained, but I'm cooking food, not medicine. Well seasoned, sliced and fried in butter, possibly with a sliced garlic clove and some chopped parsley, lovely. If the oven's on anyway, I put that same mix on a little oven tray and whack it in, though you need to make sure the melting butter coats everything. Just as good. I'm not cooking mushrooms in liquid any time soon. I never want them in beefy stews. If I want a nice mushroomy flavour in a stew I'll soak a handful of dried porcini and add the soaking water. Beware of the grit...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 02:23 PM

This afternoon I made a small batch of green tomato relish. The house smells wonderful! Chopped all ingredients then simmered for five minutes before spooning into canning jars and processing for 30 minutes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 02:30 PM

Right (*kersplosh*) ---

One thing I forgot when derailing the Mrrzy thread was: Peeling the mushrooms first is a waste of time IMHO. I clean off any residual growing medium, break the stem off (so the butter can get into the cap), and fry cap and stem together, in butter of course. If the base is mucky, or Herself's around, I'll make the concession of cutting off and discarding said base.

Waste not, get next year's grant cut.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 02:31 PM

Peeling mushrooms is an offense against good cooking. My aunt used to do it, it was painful to watch.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 16 Nov 22 - 09:30 PM

As indeed is washing mushrooms.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: MaJoC the Filk
Date: 17 Nov 22 - 11:30 AM

I don't wash grapes either: it washes off the volatiles in their private microclimate, which for me is most of the flavour, and replaces it with eau de waterworks. Somehow I've managed to train Herself to offer me unwashed grapes before denaturing her own, but it took time. Curiously, she's the one who accuses me of not having a good sense of smell.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Nov 22 - 12:36 PM

Well I do think we should be washing fruit and veg before we consume it. Most of it contains pesticide residues and grapes are no exception. In some orchards, apples are sprayed with pesticides more than twenty times before harvesting. I even wash oranges, clementines and lemons before using them. They are treated with fungicides so that they won't rot as quickly on the shelves. I make an exception for mushrooms because washing ruins them, but I would never eat them raw. Any growing medium left on them gets brushed off with my thumb. Some crops are grown in soil fertilised with treated sewage sludge.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 17 Nov 22 - 03:28 PM

The trick is to wait to wash it right before you use it; washing it ahead of time causes fresh fruit and vege, etc., to spoil faster.

Second batch of green tomato relish finished today and I had some at lunch - this is so good, and you can't use just a little. I made a sandwich with a link of Kielbasa style sausage, one with extra pepper (!) and must have slathered the toasted roll with at least a 1/4 cup of relish. That's all you need for a really great sandwich (the relish is tomatoes, peppers, onion, celery seed, mustard seed, vinegar, sugar, and a little salt.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 18 Nov 22 - 02:20 PM

I'm trying something new in the next few days. My newspaper has a recipe for roasted vegetables almond sauce (made from almond flour), and it sounded very tasty. So we will be visiting the chi-chi little rack next to the Bisquick and paying a high price for almond flour. They say you can make your own almond flour in a blender, but I don't think our little blender can make it fine enough.

Tonight we are having a Cajun dish with chicken, okra and the usual seasonings. I can't eat spicy food, so diners have to add their own hot sauce at the table.

About produce: we always wash all our produce.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Nov 22 - 04:23 PM

Made something like chili. It *needs* something. Advice?

Soooo good to be home with my own spice cabinet.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Bill D
Date: 21 Nov 22 - 06:38 PM

I just remembered a thing I tasted about 60 years ago. I was renting a basement apartment from a friend & his wife. One day she came down and knocked on my door...said she wanted me to taste something she had baked.
She gave me a slice/chunk of something that looked vaguely like cake, but not very thick.
   It tasted 'different'. Kinda nutty, kinda like dark bread or an odd cake, but chewy... hard to describe, but very nice!

"Well", she said, "I wanted to bake a cake, but didn't have the right stuff and no time to go to the store, so I took a box of "Jiffy Cornbread Mix" and a box of I.G.A Buttermilk pancake mix, and combined them with a little sugar and some milk."

I told her she had a great invention there... however, she kept the rest for herself, her husband and their son, and I never got another bite. I've been meaning to try that ever since! Maybe soon....

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Nov 22 - 07:48 PM

My mum used to make little patties out of leftover mashed potato, cheese and flour which she fried in butter. I thought they were the most delicious things on the planet. I make a sort of approximation of them when I have some accidentally-on-purpose leftover mash, and I like what I do, but there's always something missing...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Nov 22 - 10:45 PM

Why O why did I resist zoodles? Chicken zoodle soup. Mmm.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 23 Nov 22 - 12:11 PM

The holiday gift bread baking is underway, and I thought I'd note that while I used to fuss with oil and such to grease the pans, a while back I had too much ghee here and I started using that, spooning in some from a large jar that lives next to the stove and spreading with a little silicone brush. It spreads on nicely and adds great flavor. Now it's what I always use.

That is all. :)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Nov 22 - 03:05 PM

Ooh I can chop again! Improvement indeed.

So yeah what does my chili lack? Something to add oomph, but not particularly heat.

More better than bouillon? Tomato or anchovy paste?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 24 Nov 22 - 04:30 PM

To make a fluffy-cakey omelet, microwave the beaten eggs with a teaspoon or two of waffle mix and microwave on high for about 2 minutes.
Flavor once you get the hang of it in all sorts of ways. (fruit, meat, veggies)
With no flour it will just be fluffy.
The more flour or cocoa /chocolate the more a pinch of baking powder helps.
Its an omelet of a different color.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 25 Nov 22 - 12:40 AM

A vegetarian friend of mine told me about the "better than bouillon" paste and I keep a jar in the fridge to add a bit of a bump to various recipes.

Today I started making some tomato sauce from ripening tomatoes (at the end of the season everything is picked green and allowed to ripen in cardboard boxes and used gradually when there are enough). It was going to take a while so I poked around and found a frozen jar of Italian tomato sauce (the name of the recipe in the Ball Blue Book) from last summer. I heated a pan of frozen cheese ravioli then served it with my defrosted sauce. I'll finish cooking and pureeing the new batch later.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 25 Nov 22 - 01:09 PM

"So yeah, what does my chili lack?"

I can't find your recipe, Mrrzy, so I'll just say that I add cumin seeds to my chili early in the cooking, and at the end I take out a little liquor, cool it, stir in a tablespoon of cocoa powder, and mix it back   in. Not cocoa mix, pure cocoa powder.

Also, no-salt tomatoes taste better than canned and salted. I don't add any salt to our food (BP), letting people add what they want from the salt shaker at the dinner table.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Nov 22 - 10:50 AM

I'm doing a little holiday baking this morning (cranberry bars that will go in the freezer and be brought out a few at a time to go on plates of cookies given to friends and neighbors). Mostly I'm doing advance prep for tomorrow's family thanksgiving dinner, postponed from last Thursday due to travel plans. I'll make the cranberry sauce today (once I discovered how easy it is to make I swore off of the jellied canned stuff). The turkey is in a tub in the sink finishing thawing and will go in brine at bedtime. I'll have the bread machine set up so I can make rolls early and have them out of the way as I advance on two types of potatoes and a couple of large pans of roasted mostly-root vegetables. My ex will be bringing the apple and pumpkin pies (one kid doesn't like pumpkin and the rest of us love it, so we make two pies.) He'll be over here today getting a lesson in making pie crust (we have complained for years about the store-bought tough crusts he uses, so he's going to try homemade.)

I have a roaster oven that will be put into service possibly for the vegetables because I don't think the turkey will fit once it is spatchcocked. I also have crock pots and a toaster oven and at some point during the day any or all of those things could be pressed into service. First, clear the counters.

I love these meals but they are exhausting. At least this year, for the first time in recent memory, the whole family and their partners are here. It will be worth it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 27 Nov 22 - 02:21 PM

You are doing the real deal, SRS. I bet it will be delicious.

I think I will look up a recipe for cranberry bars.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Nov 22 - 09:42 PM

Thanksgiving: cornish game hens dry brined, then rinsed & dried, then buttered thoroughly on top, dusted inside and on top with black green white pepper, onion and garlic powders, smoked paprika, and on top large-grain salt. Up butt a lemon wedge, onion wedge, and garlic clove. In hot oven 15 mn, medium oven 30mn, very hot oven 15 mn. Eat skin off top before squeezing lemon from inside over rest.

Brussels sprouts: slice thinly, and separate slices with ability to maintain integrity from bits and pieces and lone leaves. Hot grease of choice, fry slices in single layer with Berber spice, flip individually as browned. When not all browned, lose patience and toss in the rest. Fry till crisp.

Hope someone else made pie because I didn't.

What I did make was mom's chocolate sauce that is the bottom of her black-bottomed ice cream pie, the kind of sauce that turns fudgy when it hits cold ice cream:

Stir constantly through whole recipe:
Melt 2 oz bitter chocolate in 6T coffee (or water)
Add 1/2c sugar and a pinch of salt, cook till it thickens, 10-12-15 mn
Add 3T butter and 1/2t vanilla extract. It is ready when everything has been stirred in. Leftovers will solidify in fridge, reheat slowly to eat rest.

Took 3 bird carcasses with brussels spicy grease and boiled down to a half-cup of delicious spicy buttery goop I haven't decided what to do with yet.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Joe Offer
Date: 27 Nov 22 - 10:49 PM

Saturday was my day for turkey soup. Since she died 10 years ago, I keep trying to replicate my mother-in-law's recipe. She lived with us the last ten years of her life, and she and I had the best time making turkey soup together every year (my vegan wife did not participate). But I was grunt labor, and did not take notes about the details because I thought my mother-in-law would live forever. My turkey noodle soup has been good since I took over, but not as good as my mother-in-law's. Any suggestions?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Nov 22 - 10:56 PM

A touch of balsamic vinegar is something that really brightens chicken or turkey soup.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 28 Nov 22 - 04:34 AM

I wonder if American Turkeys are better than the offerings we are sold in the UK which tend to be bland, to put it kindly, or absolutely bloody tasteless to be honest.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Nov 22 - 05:58 AM

We've given up on whole turkeys, partly for the reasons Raggytash gives. Mrs Steve and I adore all the underneath meat, the wings and the legs for cold the next day, but everybody else who comes to our house only wants breast. So by Boxing Day the carcass we're left with has brown meat only. So last year, along with our whole turkey, we tried a boned, rolled turkey breast joint from Pipers Farm (all free-range, traditional breeds, slow-grown, superb ethics but admittedly a bit pricey). It was lovely, so we're having two of those this year for two separate family visits, plus our usual boiled free-range unsmoked gammon, and no whole turkey. I'll miss the pope's nose, for which I never have any competition from the others, the fools. It's by far the tastiest bit of any turkey. I always make stock from a chicken carcass, but I'm not a fan of turkey stock, which can be a bit assertive.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 28 Nov 22 - 12:44 PM

For once, I have baked the year’s fruitcake before the first Sunday in Advent. It’s been doused with brandy and wrapped in plastic clingfilm, and by the end of the week I will have packed the outbound specimens in the relevant Christmas parcels for postage to parts else.

For most of my cooking life — some fifty-five years — I have listened while experts prosed away on the subject of flour: pastry flour, cake flour, bread flour, all-purpose flour. I get that the texture of many, perhaps even most, baked goods depends on choosing the right kind of flour, but fruitcake is definitely not one of them.

My recipe calls for all kinds of fancy stuff — two special kinds of raisins, unsalted butter, black treacle, kosher salt, free-range eggs, freshly ground nutmeg — but over the years I have abandoned all that and made it with ordinary no-name butter, basic molasses, and whatever raisins happen to be on special at Bulk Barn. This year, I replaced the cake flour (of which I had none) with the last of Edmund’s bread flour that had been sitting in the pantry for two years, and I think it may be the best batch yet.

Apparently, the only thing fruitcake really cares about is oven temperature — it has to be 275° Fahrenheit. Everything else is negotiable.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion's brother Andrew
Date: 28 Nov 22 - 05:45 PM

Charmion, I am drooling in anticipation.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 28 Nov 22 - 11:04 PM

I made a nice chicken dish today.

In order to reduce work in the kitchen, I cook meat ahead of time. For this dish, I brought home a package of chicken thighs, and right away I roasted them in oven at 350 for 1.25 hours. parchment paper to cut clean-up. We ate some, froze some.

Days later, I got the frozen thighs out and thawed them enough to carve. Made a sauce: sauteed onion, squashed garlic, one can of diced, no-salt tomatoes, juice and all. I sliced the thighs into long strips parallel to the bone and added it to the sauce, simmering gently until it all looked good.

Then came the new part: I flavored it with smoked paprika and powdered sage. (What! no basil?!) It was good! I salted mine at the table, the DH did not.
==========
Previously, in accordance with my less-effort policy, I had cooked and frozen a pound of penne pasta, and some of that went into the pot too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Raggytash
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 06:40 AM

Charmion, what on earth is Kosher Salt, does it differ from normal salt, or sea salt and if so how?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 07:03 AM

The Nigella one-pan method:

Grab your biggest baking tray, or even more than one. Scrub but don't peel spuds (calculate as per person) and chop into half-inch chunks. Grab two large or three smaller chicken thighs (skin on, bone in) per person. Chop up a big onion or two into large wedges. Slick everything generously with extra virgin olive oil, spread out well on baking tray(s) and season well. Put into preheated oven at 200°C. After 15 minutes move everything around to prevent sticking (or you could use baking paper I suppose) and add some well-slicked large pieces of red pepper (cut each pepper into about four chunks) and a big handful of unpeeled garlic cloves, as many as you like. Eight or nine per person. Back in the oven for another half hour, bingo. It's good to sprinkle everything with some fresh chopped parsley at the end. The chicken skin is especially good, and sucking out those sweet cloves is sheer bliss. If your house isn't incredibly airy, you'll smell this cookery for at least 24 hours. Put a bowl on the table for everyone to dump their gnawed chicken bones into. Good living, I tell you. You could make stock with the leftover chicken bones, but it turns out to be somewhat garlicky, which you may not want.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 07:16 AM

I'm very fussy about certain things, such as never using any olive oil other than extra virgin, banning all dried herbs from the kitchen except for oregano, etc., but I use cheapo Morrisons table salt for everything from de-icing my front step to using in my favourite recipes. I've never bought into this fancy Maldon ripoff malarkey. Tell me I'm wrong...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 09:34 AM

Raggy, kosher salt is coarse culinary salt free of additives such as iodine. It can be either mined salt or sea salt. The name — which I think is peculiar to North America — comes from its use in dry-brining meats, a traditional technique of Jewish cookery; it’s not produced under the supervision of rabbis.

Recipes that call for it often come from commercial sources, especially restaurants. It’s preferred for its flavour — none of the metallic aftertaste some people pick up from iodized salt — and its rough texture, which produces the crackly effect of the skin of the very best jacket spuds. A recipe that calls for kosher salt might not taste right if made with ordinary salt, which runs more grams to the teaspoon — commercial cooks typically weigh all their ingredients.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 09:42 AM

I can't help feeling that it's the quality of the actual spud that's paramount...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Charmion
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 10:38 AM

Oh, yes, Steve, the actual potato is the most critical input to an excellent jacket spud. But the oven temperature and skin treatment also matter. Less.

At this time of year, I dearly love a jacket spud. Or two.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 11:27 AM

The density of the salt is important - the Kosher salt isn't as salty because of the more granular shape of the crystals.

This morning I've looked high and low for my Julkaka recipe; I can visualize it and suspect it is tucked into the pages of a cookbook (this was a handwritten recipe from a friend). I'll also check the computer files to see if I had the wisdom to scan it at some point in years past. I visited the nuts and candy shop in town where they had a bag of some nice candied fruit that should be perfect in the xmas bread (it's a Scandinavian fruit bread not nearly so dense as fruitcake).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 11:34 AM

Some spuds just can't cut it as a jacket spud. They go all mushy and watery in the middle. I grow the variety called Nicola, which isn't at all good for mashing (glue...) but which makes great oven chips and jacket spuds. I just give 'em a scrub, prick them lightly a few times with the point of a knife (stops them exploding in the oven) then sprinkle them with salt while they're still a bit damp. No oil. Into a preheated oven at 200°C for about an hour, depending on size, straight on to the shelf. When they come out, I give each one a bash with my fist, not quite enough to bust the skin. Then it's a simple case of far too much butter.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 12:02 PM

Russet potatoes are the king of the baked potatoes here in the US. They make a great potato skin (what Charmion is calling the jacket). When I was a kid we used to cut the hot baked potato in half length-wise, make a mound of the white potato for the butter or sour cream or whatever else (bacon, chives) and then butter, salt and pepper the hot skin and eat them first. I haven't eaten it that way in years.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 12:35 PM

A good thing to do is scoop out the middles and mix it with some good cheddar cheese and bits of crispy bacon. Stuff it all back in the skins and put it back in the oven for 15 minutes. Or you could mix it with blue cheese such as Gorgonzola and some shredded smoked mackerel, then back in the oven for a bit. Don't do what some abject Brits do and dump a tin of baked beans over the spuds. A horrible waste of a decent potato is that. Though baked beans on the side of the stuffed spuds isn't the worst thing you can do.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Nov 22 - 08:37 PM

Hmm second try at Alfredo and the same thing happened... It smelled like Alfredo (1, 2, 3, where's-your-breakfast) but the cheese insisted on turning into its own blob and never unified with the butter. What am I doing wrong?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Dec 22 - 05:38 PM

This recipe thread is beginning to be quite long on its own.

Over the last few days I've had a couple of disappointments in the baking department. I was converting a bread (it's actually almost a batter) from the old recipe with egg beater and bowl to one that would work in a bread machine (through the kneading, then shape into small loaves and bake) but one of the three batches was a blob. And it took two tries to get the spritz (that are made with a cookie press) to come out right. I am pretty sure it was operator error, but I've made these so often over the years it's hard to conceive what I could have done that would literally render both of them trash-worthy.

The rest of the baking was good and I'll be distributing small bags to friends and neighbors of a mix of these things each wrapped in waxed paper.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 21 Dec 22 - 01:41 AM

Just a menu idea. It's good and cold, and I wanted something rich and warm for dinner, so I made turkey mole in the slow cooker, made cornbread (Jiffy mix) and let the DH make a nice salad. I always like a little sour cream with a dish like this.

Perfect to eat when a cold wind buffets the house.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 22 - 06:08 AM

I love eggs in any shape or form (though I prefer to start with ones that are egg-shaped). I suppose we all have our own ways of cooking them. I like soft-boiled eggs mushed up on buttered toast but I love cold hard-boiled ones at picnics. For the mix for an egg sandwich (always called egg butties in our house), I boil them until they still just about have a slightly runny middle, then chop them up painstakingly before mixing generously with mayo. I fry eggs in butter, never anything else. I have a glass lid that fits my small frying pan and I just put in the eggs on a medium heat, put the lid on and leave them to it. No basting required, then I don't waste the butter, using it to fry a slice or two of bread whilst keeping the eggs warm. Butter has become astronomically expensive here in the last few weeks.

I cook omelettes on one side only in butter, until there's just a touch of runniness left, then add whatever (cheese usually), fold it over and leave in the pan for a minute. Scrambled, I pour the mix into a nonstick frying pan of hot butter then almost immediately turn the heat off whilst braking everything up with a spatula. They must be very soft and almost runny for me. Half a minute too long and you have rubber shavings, very disappointing.

For omelettes and scrambled, my three golden rules are:

Three eggs per person
Don't overdo the beating
No milk, just salt 'n' pepper

I've been messing about recently trying to get nice poached eggs. I use a non-stick frying pan with water at least an inch deep that is just gently simmering. No salt, no vinegar, none of that daft swirling of the water. I just slide in the eggs one at a time. I found I can do three at the same time, though I tweak the heat to keep the simmer going. It's hard to know exactly when they're done but two or three minutes seems about right. I then put them on a sheet of kitchen towel on a warm plate to dry them a bit so that they don't make my toast soggy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 22 - 06:11 AM

I did correct "braking" but I sent the wrong edit! I'll try to get it eggsactly right next time...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Dec 22 - 05:39 PM

Ganache is very forgiving. Tried to make truffles out of the leftovers. Can reheat add cream or choc, recool resolidify rather ad infinitum...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jan 23 - 07:09 PM

I've just made a huge batch of Mrs Steve's mum's stew. Tragically, I never met her, as she died of cancer just before I met Mrs Steve 49 years ago.

It's ludicrously simple. The only ingredients are shin of beef, carrots, swede and shallots (or onions). Everything gets chopped up, the meat and spuds into one-inch pieces, the swede into half-inch chunks, the carrots into rounds about half an inch deep and the shallots just sliced however you want them. The whole lot goes into a big pan of water and is simmered for as long as it takes, maybe two and a half hours. No stock, no wine, no spices, no herbs, just salt and pepper.

As for amounts, that's a variable feast. I like to think that the meat, carrots, swede and onions are in roughly equal volumes, but I don't sweat it.

I make it the day before, reboil it on the first day, portion it out into the required number of days (I make enough for three days for the two of us, which means about 1.25 kilos of meat) and put today's lot into a big pan. That gets heated through, and when it's bubbling away I put in some dumplings for twenty minutes.

Dumplings: 100g self-raising flour, 50g shredded beef suet (Atora this end), a pinch of salt and enough water to make a fairly stiff but not too dry dough. That can be rolled into six or eight dumplings that are just floated on top of the stew.

We tend to serve this on top of a few extra boiled spuds in great big bowls and eat it in front of the telly. If you're cold when you start to eat it, you'll be bloody hot by the time you've cleared your plate. To me, though I know it's subjective, this is the ultimate winter comfort food. And no cooking for the rest of the week!

Just one thing about the beef: any cut good for slow cooking would be good, I'm sure. We've always gone for shin. I get mine from an online butcher and it needs no further prep. If you buy it from a butcher you may need to remove some tough skin. What look like awful sinewy bits render beautifully after all that long cooking so no need to go mad with the trimming!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 09 Jan 23 - 03:30 AM

Sounds very much like my Bob-standard beef casserole, the only differences being:
1) Liquid is half a pint or so of beer. Any sort, from pale ale to Guinness, will do.
2) Start off in a slow oven (300°F, 160°C, gas #2), and wind the temperature down as needed to keep the pot just on the point of boiling.

I opine that since water boils at 100°C and isn't going to get any hotter, any additional heat will just be wasted. The only exceptions are pasta, where the movement is needed to keep it from sticking, and of course if you're reducing stuff. I invite discussion.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Jan 23 - 04:49 AM

I've thought about doing it in the oven, but my big Le Creuset, full to the brim, would be a bit of a menace to keep taking out to check its progress/stir it/add seasoning. My hob is induction and doesn't throw out any sideways heat. The ring is turned down so that I see just a few tiny bubbles on top. In other ways I'm a big fan of slow cooking in the oven. I'll put in a big piece of lamb or pork in the morning, set it to 110°C after an initial hot blast and forget it until teatime...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Jan 23 - 08:18 AM

Sounds delightful. I don't know if I could make anything without spices, though.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Jan 23 - 09:02 AM

You can cut down the herbs and spices if you start with high-quality ingredients. We spent a week in Puglia in southern Italy, ate superb food all week and didn't detect any herbs and spices. Simple grub with best-quality ingredients. The best bruschetta I ever had in my life was at a little café in Lecce. It consisted of lovely local bread, lightly toasted, topped with just extra virgin olive oil and chopped tomatoes. No garlic, no oregano, no basil. When I made my stew I tasted the raw carrots and swede for sweetness. I've been known to ditch whole batches of both if they didn't taste sweet and fresh.

Hope you've all thrown out that nasty little tub of dried basil!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jan 23 - 11:25 AM

Dried basil tastes less like licorice than fresh. I dislike the licorice flavor, so I prefer dried.

Am going to try a choucroute garnie, which to me means saurkraut in wine with sausages. To be authentically Alsacian I would need juniper berries... so, inauthentic. Faux.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jan 23 - 05:15 PM

Dried oregano is fine, but dried any other herb will find no place in my cupboard. If it isn't fresh, I'd rather leave it out. I have found that I can freeze fresh flat-leaved parsley for a good few months and it's more than satisfactory.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Jan 23 - 05:51 PM

I made a very nice mushroom and spinach soup yesterday which tasted great today. I used about 2 1/2 pints of not too strong chicken stock (home-made).

I fried four chopped banana shallots in butter along with a finely-chopped medium potato. After a few minutes I crumbled in about 400g chestnut mushrooms and added a slug of sherry, the zest of a lemon and a handful of fresh parsley. Once the mushrooms were well softened I added the hot stock, brought it to a simmer and left it for about 15 minutes.

After that I added a whole 200g bag of ready-washed baby spinach, left that to wilt for a few minutes then whizzed the whole lot, leaving it a bit rubbly rather than too smooth. The seasoning was a bit trial and error but I got there in the end. The aim was to have a hearty soup that we could drink from a big mug. It was lovely and we have enough left for two more lunchtimes. A lot of mushroom soup recipes call for cream or milk, but we both felt that the soup was delicious without that. You could easily leave out the sherry.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Jan 23 - 09:32 PM

I have made a surprising discovery: I don't like bratwurst. I thought I liked all sausage-type stuff but maybe not *this* place's bratwurst... but no. I don't like any of it.

I wonder why.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 13 Jan 23 - 12:54 PM

the other day I discovered that sweet potatoes taste good with mace. I sliced them thinly, stirred the mace into the oil and sauteed them.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Jan 23 - 02:56 PM

Anytime we have tuna in any form it is required WHEN we serve it TO YELL SURPRISE!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Jan 23 - 03:25 PM

Ok bbq party questions:

A) Sauces
I usually make mine hot, sweet and sour. Think brown sugar vinegar hot pepper in a tomato base.

Trying new ideas, because keto. So one idea is still tomato based with vinegar and hot pepper, hot and sour but not sweet.

Another idea for the hot-pepper wusses is maybe maple syrup mustard? Garlic honey mustard is a thing, and this one can be sweet, but should look different, unconfusably. I have maple syrup but not honey.

Other ideas? I'd like to make several, like 4.

B) Ribs
I have 2 full racks, d'où 4 sauces desired. The ribs will be pre-par-cooked low slow oven. I am thinking one rack in dry rub and one in pineapple juice? Other ideas?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Jan 23 - 11:42 AM

Aw really? No answer to my alfredo question either. I think the thread is too long, again.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 23 - 08:14 AM

Apropos of my 10 Jan mushroom soup recipe, I've made it several times since. On one occasion I didn't have any stock so I used a stock cube. That soup was very disappointing. I've just made a batch using home-made veg stock. I had a couple of carrots and some celery threatening to go to waste, so I made stock using them, along with a few shallots, a bay leaf and fresh thyme from the garden. The soup is delicious, and it's vegetarian. Had I used olive oil instead of butter it would have been vegan! I completely forgot to add the garlic, and we didn't miss it one bit.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Feb 23 - 08:18 AM

I've just realised that I forgot the garlic on Jan 10 too!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 15 Feb 23 - 12:53 PM

Smoked pork with dry rub. And the cheesesteaks tasted Just Right.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 21 Feb 23 - 01:04 PM

Sounds good, Mrrzy!

Here's a good and easy recipe for a cold winter night.

1. Put some chuck roast in a slow cooker. Don't bother to brown it.
2. Add chopped onions. Don't bother to saute them.
3. Add 1 - 2 bay leaves.
4. Pour in 1 cup of beer.
5. Cook on Low till meat is tender - prob. 8 to 10 hours.
6. Refrigerate till next day.
7. Remove and discard fat from top.
8. Slice meat thinly, trim fat.
9. Check amount of liquid. If needed, add water to make a decent
   amount of gravy.
10. Thicken liquid with 2 T of Wondra flour. Boil at least 2 mins to
    cook flour
11. Return meat to liquid, heat through.
12. Just before dining, stir in 2 tablespoons ketchup.

Serve with noodles or mashed potatoes to hold up the gravy. Salt at the table. This dish has a very Old World taste that reminds us of winter in our Wisconsin homeland.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Feb 23 - 05:51 PM

Mixed ground bison and venison with food-processed onions garlic parsley. Greased loaf pan, powdered with hot pepper. Layer of thickly-sliced cabbage, layer of meat, repeat, end with cabbage on top. Pressed down hard, enclosed, set overnight. Next day in medium oven for hours, made tomato butter sauce on stovetop with too much hot pepper.

Served slices of meat/cabbage with sauce and sour cream. The hot sauce balanced but I should have salted the cabbage. 3 of us ate about half the whole meatloaf and most of the sauce. I added a smidge of soy sauce to mine.

Next day the half reheated beautifully but there was less sauce. Ate about half.

Next day added goose broth from the solstice to the quarter still left, made a yummy bowl of soup. Yummy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Feb 23 - 01:59 PM

This is a new area of cookery for me, Mrrzy. I've made cabbage layered with meat before, but never bison and venison. And I've never put pepper on the bottom of the pan.

When you say "hot pepper," do you mean cayenne powder?

Thanks for the info.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Feb 23 - 06:17 PM

I did a single-tray tray bake tonight that worked a treat, though there will be slight tweaks next time...

For two of us, I scrubbed about a pound of salad spuds (the ones that hold together when you boil them), which I cut into half-inch chunks. I confess that I par-boiled them for five minutes, though I'm not sure they needed that. They went into a big bowl with a chopped-up red pepper, some chopped (not crushed) garlic, a few sliced shallots, a 150g skinned and chopped-up genuine Spanish chorizo (not that "cooking chorizo" rubbish), a big glug of extra-virgin olive oil, a tablespoon of sweet smoked paprika and seasoning. I gave that lot a good mix and spread it all out on a baking tray lined with greaseproof paper. That went in the oven for half an hour at 180°C.

The coup de grace was that, once I'd put that into two bowls, I topped it with two fried eggs in each bowl. Imperative that they were runny.

It was delicious. But the tweaks next time? Cut the spuds slightly smaller and don't par-boil. I wanted 'em crispier, frankly. Also, a bit more oil. I think I'd spread the mix more thinly over two oven trays in order to get everything a bit more crispy. I might even add a small dusting of ancho chilli flakes. But it was all really good, and it won't be long before I try it again with tweaks!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Feb 23 - 08:40 PM

I get dried ground pepper from a friend's garden but cayenne would work, or hot paprika...

Tried a meat pie keto recipe combo. Not a successful pie but a successful exeriment!

*Almond parmesan crust was yummy but didn't go well with the pie. Taken from a quiche recipe, would probably be good with quiche. Made ahead, baked.

*The meat filling was delish. Bison onions garlic browned with a cube of goose broth and some psyllium husk capsules, highly experimental but thickened it nicely and it held together beautifully without needing tomato paste. Sprinkled marjoram on the crust and on top of the filling. Made the day before.

*mashed topping of cauliflower and broccoli, dried, then butter and garlic and onion powder. Made and cooled before pie assembled.

Baked an hour at 350. It was beautiful. But the topping didn't go well with the filling tho it was good, and the crust really didn't go with either.

When assembled baked and served the botton crust did not hold together but the filling stayed marvelously in the slices. The topping browned nicely.

So, the filling was ace, the topping meh, the crust nsuccessful but tasty.

And I still have a couple of weeks till Pi Day...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Feb 23 - 04:23 PM

We've had several days of cold and overcast weather, prompting me to make comfort food. Breakfast yesterday was homemade buttermilk pancakes (the extras are frozen for future breakfasts). For tonight I have the crockpot out, currently simmering the beef for stew that I'll assemble as the afternoon progresses. This is a relatively low-power crockpot even on its "high" setting, but it's nice to not have to hover over the stove for a couple of hours.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 01 Mar 23 - 03:14 PM

Yes, there's nothing like having the crockpot doing the work for us, filling the house with delicious smells on a cold winter day.

Well, how cold is it where you are, Stilly?

Other news: the DH and I got a kick out of a video we saw today - little kids in Pasadena, California screaming with joy and running around their playground, catching small hailstones.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 04 Mar 23 - 11:12 AM

New leftovers soup:

Canbage raised in chicken broth with Bavarian spices
Berber-dry rubbed pork loin
Duck-bacon swiss cheese beef burger

With

A little white wine and goose broth to deglaze the pork pan
A handful of cherry tomatoes

Yum. Again.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Mar 23 - 04:58 PM

Fruit pizza for Pi day, made with shortbread cookies ground fine with just enough butter, prebaked, for crust. Slightly sweetened cream cheese for the middle. Strawberries, blackberries, pineapple. Glazed with a little maple syrup with lemon juice.

The crust worked beautifully.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Mar 23 - 02:56 PM

Against all internet advice I broiled the bison steaks. Not even a bit dry or tough, just yum. Ha!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 27 Mar 23 - 12:31 PM

I like chicken pineapple black bean entre. Just google your favorite recipe and if you want to make it international just add a couple more ingredients. For Thai add a tablespoon of peanut butter and a smidge of ginger or coconut milk or for Mexican add cumin and salsa. etc.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 27 Mar 23 - 04:40 PM

I had a rotisserie chicken here that still had a lot of meat so yesterday made a chicken pot pie filling. I don't bother to make the crust any more (or at least, not very often). I use broken up crackers on top.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 31 Mar 23 - 01:37 PM

That's a new idea. Chicken pot pie is one of the DH's favorite things.

Sometimes I like to make chicken gumbo for variety, but I cannot handle hot, spicy foods. So I used chicken thighs and Klement's snack sticks, which are spicy but don't burn my mouth.

We are all experienced cooks here, so I'll just give a brief recipe. The secret is in how you handle the lemon.

saute onion, garlic, green pepper celery

brown chicken, cut sausage in pieces. Add 1/2 cup water? Use your judgment.

prepare a lemon. grate the peel and toss it in. remove all the pith you can. chop up flesh, saving the juice

after a while, add chopped okra,

cook gently till chicken is done.

10 mins before serving, add the lemon

5 minutes before service, stir in some dried thyme

let guests salt their own at the table

Either serve like a stew or serve with rice on a plate.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 31 Mar 23 - 06:14 PM

This week I am joining the ranks of those who must reduce sodium intake. A new medication has a possible side effect of slight increase in blood pressure, and this week I learned from my slightly-younger brother that he has had to cut out salt to avoid taking blood pressure medications. We have always been pretty much in lock step with some of these health/lifestyle changes so I'm making the move before I'm told I need to. (I have a physical coming up next month.)

Cooking-wise it means some of my shortcuts will leave the building. The chicken and beef and veggie bouillon all have salt as the first ingredient. The smokehouse almonds and the sesame sticks are history. Potato chips will be scarce. I think I can figure out popcorn with less salt (they do make a potassium chloride product that can substitute in some places). The smoked sausages I love will be scarce or very small portions. Smoked salmon, likewise.

So, throwing the question out there - those of you who have already made the salt sacrifice, what kind of cooking changes did you make?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Apr 23 - 12:31 PM

Does anyone here ever make their own mozzarella or cottage cheese? I make yogurt occasionally, but haven't tried the other two.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 07 Apr 23 - 10:57 AM

I like salsa omelets. The last two ingredients depend on my mood.
Italian moods would include cheese and oregano, if Mexican, a bit of cumin and hot pepper relish. We don't have blood sausage so I'm rarely in an English mood. If an American mood happens then it's just ketchup or a full blown western omelet.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Apr 23 - 11:38 AM

I found a kind of dark printout of a recipe for a rum cake that my ex likes (he's not much into sweets). A friend emailed him a photo of her recipe and it doesn't print well.

As I transcribed the recipe into a new Word document to save this morning I almost added the note "Don't ever actually make this." It sounds really rich and terribly sweet, so I'm surprised the ex would even touch it.

Making some refrigerator pickles today. Lots of garlic and just a little heat, to make them interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Apr 23 - 04:46 PM

Someone asked me what my favorite thing to cook was.

I was stumped.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Apr 23 - 07:21 PM

Spaghetti with prawns, lemon, sundried tomato paste, chilli and rocket.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Apr 23 - 03:38 AM

Dammit, I forgot the splash of white wine!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Apr 23 - 09:37 AM

On the other side of the dietary hoity-toity class-conscious entitlement fence,
are vanilla bean brown butter (orange clove) rice crispy treats. :^/
or (Lemon etc)
Upgrading prosaic snacks/meals is cheap and fast for a stressed planet. Soy flour can often replace regular flour and has protein.
Limiting meat by 90% is as meaningful for global warming as electric cars and trucks. Idealism has its place but the hunger and desire to have or eat what pollutes most or what others can not have is an easy gluttonous greed to overcome. Still, man can not live by tortillas alone.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 09:02 AM

Big on spashes of white wine, here. In recipes, I mean.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 09:10 AM

Just simmer the alcohol away, that's all. I never miss white wine out of risottos. Elizabeth David uses red wine in her boeuf en daube, but she boils it in a small saucepan and sets fire to the vapour before adding it to the beef. Good fun, is that! Residual alcohol in a finished dish is not good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 11:06 AM

When clearing some storage shelves in the garage I discovered a lifetime supply of smoker wood chips. I will have to consider making more meals with smoked meat. Chicken with smoke flavor is wonderful in fajitas, but not so much in chicken pot pies. Same with beef, some dishes are good, others it is too much.

I love smoked sharp cheddar cheese, but it doesn't take much and on the top shelf only.

What else might I smoke? (This is a "Little Chief" aluminum box with 3 shelves and a heating element in the bottom where the pan of chips is set.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 11:14 AM

We eat lots of smoked mackerel, which I love, and I love proper kippers even more (not those floppy things in a boil-in-bag with a lump of butter therein), but I'm not a fan of smoked cheese or smoked bacon. I can occasionally get thick pieces of uncoloured smoked haddock here which is amazingly good in a fish pie alongside some other fish that isn't smoked.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 12:40 PM

I make smoked salmon after marinating in a salty brine, but I could do a simpler brown sugar rub and see how it turns out.

I should probably think about making a tray to put wood chips in for when I use the gas grill. Smoke flavor in anything cooked in that would be good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Apr 23 - 03:29 PM

I don't think you can get smoked salmon here that isn't farmed fish. I never consciously buy farmed fish, and I always ask.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 14 Apr 23 - 12:42 AM

I only go to the trouble of smoking wild caught salmon. It costs a lot more but it is worth the expense. Costco here in the US sells frozen Sockeye salmon in about 5oz portions, skin on, that are as good as you'll get in general year round. In mid-May the Copper River Salmon season starts, and sometimes you can get it fresh enough down here to be worth smoking.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 19 Apr 23 - 10:49 PM

Watching YouTube videos I've come to realize how many people think that cooking for the family consists of dumping commercial products in a slow cooker and letting it cook itself.

Here's a recipe I just saw:

cut up chicken breast meat
one cup chopped onion - toss it in raw
one half jar of orange marmalade
one cup of Sweet Baby Ray's barbecue sauce
4 T soy sauce

Nothing was said about how you serve it.

The finished product was very watery, and I doubt if I would like it if I made it. I suspect this would be a pretty expensive dish, with that marmalade and BBQ sauce in it.

I'm glad my mother showed me how to cook.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Apr 23 - 02:00 PM

One slow cooker recipe my ex tried that was great, but incredibly salty, involved buying those jars of salted beef (you know the ones I mean, with the metal lid you pry off, then you can use the jar as a drinking glass?) and wrapping chicken breasts in those then adding a can of cream of mushroom soup and I think some sour cream. Really rich, really salty.

I have some chicken and some beef to put in the smoker for a little while today. I figure if I'm cutting out salt I'll add other flavors instead, and I forget about the smoker (out in the garage most of the time) but I enjoy smoked food. I'll make fajitas with the chicken and grind the beef to make into a nacho mix that has onions, hot peppers, tomato, and a lot of black beans to make it healthier and delicious. I use that in tortillas to make burritos (pan fried, maybe they should be called chimichangas, except I don't use nearly as much cheese as restaurants do), tacos, nachos, etc.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 21 Apr 23 - 11:42 AM

Aargh was layering beautifully, alliums on the bottom, meat in the middle, mushrooms on top, ran out of room after the meat so had to transfer everything into a bigger pan.

There went my layers. But it should be a marvy dish at the end anyway. Kinda strogonoff-y kinda paprikás-y.

Somewhere someone put lengthwise-sliced dill pickle sticks in their stroganoff. I really liked that. Got the pickles out but in the confusion of pans, forgot to put them in.

Baked whole cauliflower slathered in lemon butter with a bunch of white pepper. Pour most of the flavored butter into whole cauli while cauli is upside down, then turn it over and smear it all around the outside too.

Fridays I cook things that take an hour or more. The meat is already in the oven. When my massage therapist arrives I'll up the temp and put the cauliflower in. Then when the massage is done, so is our lunch!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Apr 23 - 12:48 PM

Ooh today cold and rainy, made soup with the broth from above dish and the rest of the cauliflower. Added more tomatoes, and a smidge of anchovy paste for salt. And crème fraîche.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 24 Apr 23 - 06:58 PM

Are you familiar with Chef Jean Pierre on YouTube? I love watching him cook, and I love listening to him talk. Cutest septagenarian around.

A while ago he recommended the Wusthof offset deli knife. I use Wusthof knives which I was given as a birthday present 47 years ago. So I decided to order one.

Back up for 1960. I was a high-school freshman, and my favorite class was German. At that time educators were using what they called the spiral curriculum, in which they introduced a topic, say in the fifth grade, returned to it in the eighth grade with more detail, then inflicted it again sometime in high school. You can probably imagine how boring that got. But in German class, everything was new.

About our fourth week, we learned that something had disappeared. Est ist verschwunden. Boy oh boy, a real German-sounding word! No more of that simple "Der Katz ist schwarz" stuff.

Back to nowadays. After some minor surgery, I decided I deserved a treat, so I ordered a Wusthof offset deli knife on Amazon. Days passed, and sadly, Amazon reported that mein Wusthofer abgetsetzerdelikatessenmesser ist verschwunden. It had been spotted at a warehouse in Delaware, and after that they didn't know nothing. I got a refund.

Later, after a trip to Texas (spotted 90 kinds of birds), I ordered it again. This time it arrived with only a slight delay, and boy is it something! I needed to slice up some Thuringer for fellowship at church, and it glided through it effortlessly. I recommend Jean Pierre and the Wusthof offset deli knife.
========
Myrrzy, I'm going to try your whole baked cauliflower soon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Apr 23 - 10:05 PM

Ooh, report back!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Apr 23 - 10:55 PM

This weekend I smoked a beef flank and ground it to make into a recipe I use for tacos, nachos, burritos, etc. Beef, onion, poblano peppers, garlic, and I tried a new chipotle chili powder that is nice. Ground black pepper, cilantro, a batch of black beans (about 3 cups cooked), and tomatoes (both diced and sauce) round out the recipe. A tiny amount of NaCl is added in cooking, I'm primarily using KCl at the table. Came out pretty good with the smoke.

I'm reading labels and am looking for tortillas with lower sodium (or I can make my own) - it is the tortillas that are the culprits in recipes right now. I've always done a lot of my own cooking so reducing or eliminating salt is the easy part. It's the convenience foods (breads, tortillas, dressings, etc.) that need replacement, reduction, or I should make my own.

Leeneia, I recently bought an 8" ceramic knife to use for cutting up fruit, cheese, etc. and it's really sharp. Not as expensive as the new one you bought, but a lot sharper than my otherwise very nice Cutco knife set.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 27 Apr 23 - 11:17 AM

A ceramic knife? Is the blade made of ceramic?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stanron
Date: 27 Apr 23 - 01:49 PM

I bought a ceramic knife some years ago at a local Aldi store. Aldi is a German based supermarket chain that sells odd hardware and other unusual stuff as well as cut priced food. I bought it on a whim as I was intrigued by the idea of a ceramic knife. It's brilliant. A short white ceramic blade with a very good cutting edge. I later bought a couple of diamond faced sharpening plates and it's as good today as ever.

The funny thing is that recently I thought I'd buy another but I can't find a single one on Ebay and looking elsewhere they are all surprisingly expensive. I guess I'll stick with what I've got.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 02 Jun 23 - 06:20 PM

I'm making granola this evening, I worked out a recipe that is good but not overly sweet like most recipes seem to be (I accomplished that by doubling the ingredients except the honey and oil). I am using a large roaster oven lined with parchment paper this time - the baking sheet in the oven seems precarious because it's loaded pretty full and I don't feel like making two batches.

While looking up the most recent iteration of my granola recipe I reviewed a few others (in the computer file.) Yorkshire Pudding caught my eye. For those Americans who make the same batter into popovers, how do you serve them? The whole beefy drippings and such sounds a bit much.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 03 Jun 23 - 01:25 PM

The roaster oven was too hot in one corner so the parchment and granola were lifted out and onto a rimmed baking sheet to finish in the oven. It came out good, barely any sweetness, mostly the flavor of the toasted oats and nuts.

As to my question about Yorkshire pudding, here is the link I saved as a PDF for future reference: The Best Yorkshire Pudding Recipe from Serious Eats by J. Kenji López-Alt.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Jun 23 - 09:59 AM

Somebody tell me how to make *good* gazpacho. Mine never succeeds.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Jun 23 - 06:27 PM

Don't bother with gazpacho. Make salmorejo instead. It's a sort of thicker version that you eat from a smallish glass with a teaspoon, sprinkled on top with slivers of jamon (I prefer crispy bacon meself!) and chopped hard-boiled egg. The Andalucians eat it with some little breadsticks. I've just remembered that you avoid carbs, so this is not for you, as it relies for its texture on bread. Sorry about that. I think I've posted my salmorejo recipe before. It's a real treat as a starter or a tapa. I remember eating it in a little bar in Granada, with a view of the Alhambra on the hillside above. Beat that!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 11:20 AM

Ooh, Steve! Not a chance!

Ok, I got one to work. Took 3 days.

1. Cover bottom of nonreactive bowl wih hot pepper, cover that with cumin, cover that with salt. Cover with red wine vinegar, let sit while chopping.
2. Crush then mince one large clove garlic, into the bowl. Mince one small onion, into the bowl. Stir.
3. Mandoline 1 large seedless cuke into tiniest pieces, in my case thin slices sliced into very thin strips. Into bowl. Stir. (Next time I'll salt these separately. Might get more juice.)
4. Dice tomatoes, about twice the amount of cuke. Mostly small, some medium. Into bowl. Stir, adjust seasonings (needed a little more salt). Into fridge, covered.
5. Go away. Cook other things, leave the house, resist all temptation to eat your not-yet-gazpacho. I gave it a day and a half-made in am then waited for next day's dinner.
6. The next day, it was delicious and tasted right, but hadn't turned into *soup* yet. Added small can of tomato juice.
7. The *next* day, I had marvelous gazpacho.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 11:25 AM

That sounds interesting. I am avoiding sodium, but potassium salt should work the same way to pull liquid from the vege.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Jun 23 - 05:36 PM

Indeed!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: leeneia
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 09:06 PM

A few weeks ago, on a gray, drizzly day, the DH brought home a butternut squash, the big kind with a hard skin and seeds in the big round end. But soon the temperatures shot into the 90's, and I didn't feel like using the oven for a long time to bake it.

So I invented Italian winter squash, and tonight we had it with pizza. It was good.

First phase.

Cut a small slice off the bottom of the squash to keep it from rolling around. (safety). On the top surface, drill a hole into the seed cavity to let steam escape. I use a corkscrew.

Put the squash in a large slow cooker, getting as much of the squash in contact with the ceramic as you can. Add 1/4 cup water. Cook on high for 3-4 hours, till tender when a sharp knife is thrust into it.

Remove from cooker, let cool some, then refrigerate. If you want to serve it the day you cook it, cool until safe enough to handle.

Second phase.

Cut the squash in half longways, scrape out and discard the seeds and fibers, and remove the flesh from the skin.

Put a goodly splash of olive oil in a big sauce pan and add 1 tsp Italian seasoning and grinds of black pepper to taste. (I did 12 grinds.) Stir.

Add the flesh of the squash and moosh till smooth with a big spoon or strong spatula. Stir to distribute oil and spices. Heat through over medium-low heat and serve, salting at the dining table as desired.

Notes: my sister says that a drywall saw from a DIY store will cut hard winter squash when raw. I haven't tried it myself.

Tomorrow we will have this dish as an accompaniment to Train Smash.

One squash will probably serve two people for three dinners. I'm sure it will freeze well.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 21 Jun 23 - 11:39 PM

I would use a coping saw - the battery-operated reciprocating saw would go through it too fast. [gales of laughter!]

I'm growing a new squash this year, one of the "gray" squash (also called Calabash) and have noticed something important - the stems are really hardened, and even if they split they become woody. The squash vine borers can't get them. I've bought these squash frequently (whatever is on sale) but now I think they will be the main one I grow. Zucchini and yellow squash are so vulnerable to the beetles and the borers.

Squash cut into chunks (not slices that are harder to turn in the skillet) and cooked in olive oil with some onion, bell pepper, and marinara sauce is a summer staple here. I sometimes melt in mozzarella cheese or top it with a lot of Parmesan.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Jun 23 - 05:02 AM

Butternut squash cut into little cubes and roasted in the oven with the spuds is very nice with, say, roast chicken. I do the safety flat bottom thing too, then use one of those Y-shaped veg peelers with the swivelling blade. Butternut squash makes very nice soup too. Ad if you buy one it keeps for ages in the veg rack.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Jun 23 - 05:52 AM

Arrgh! I know it sounds a bit like a recipe, but that should have gone in the joke thread!

---

Moved to the joke thread - where I see you pasted it also. So now to go remove the dup post. :) ---mudelf

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 26 Jun 23 - 11:03 AM

I forgot abut Italy's egg drop soup, straccatelli! Rediscovered in the North End in May, but today I made something like it:

Melted some butter, bloomed some hot pepper in it, cooked down a chopped tomato, added some cauli rice, then some hot chicken broth. Carefully added a lot of grated parm to the top, carefully put a duck egg onto the parm, turned it off, lid went on, waited till it stopped bibbling, carefully into bowl. Got most of the runny yolk in one big bite, yum.

My larder is empty as I am about to travel. I have no onions or spinach or garlic in the house, but there was that one tomato and some cauli rice...

And a deglaze with white wine step before the broth, maybe, next time. It is yummy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Jun 23 - 11:30 AM

This is never a time of year to travel for me, with the garden just entering high-production mode. As it is I'm cat sitting for a friend who has a modest collection of pots with tomatoes and peppers and one okra plant she has managed to keep alive for three years. I water every day during this trip. Her potted okra is a tiny thing compared to the monster Clemson spineless I grow every year.

I'm doing more cooking because of the whole sodium management thing, and though my fridge is more full than usual, it is working. The times I eat foods that have higher sodium they're in small amounts and are a treat. An example would be a snack of few whole wheat crackers with a dry salami slice and a slice of cheese on each. Or a small amount of smoked salmon. I'm not buying so much cheese as I used to and I need to figure out if I can get my favorite sharp cheddar in smaller containers; the ones that Costco sells will go completely mouldy before I finish them. You can freeze cheese, but it degrades the consistency to do it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 01 Jul 23 - 11:16 PM

Tonight I concocted a one-skillet dish with fresh stuff from the garden - calabash or gray squash, pepper, onion, garlic, tomato, basil - and stuff from the freezer - lean pork sirloin, sauteed mushrooms, more peppers, plus some fridge dairy drawer provolone that needed using. I did it in stages, olive oil for the slices of pork, then after setting it aside, the onion and peppers cooked in the pork oil. Once they were tender, I mixed in the sauteed mushrooms, then spooned it into a bowl and put the cut up squash in the skillet and let it saute/steam for a few minutes. I added some quartered small tomatoes, then as they softened, I added the cut up provolone and julienned basil. Put back the other vege and pork mix and let it cook together for a few minutes. I used Nu Salt (potassium salt) and Mrs. Dash for seasoning, in addition to the freshly ground pepper. The only salt came from the provolone.

It. Was. Amazing.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Helen
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 03:04 AM

Hubby has just made a batch of grapefruit and orange marmalade using grapefruits from the tree in our yard. Looks yummy and I'm hoping we'll have crumpets with marmalade tomorrow morning for breakfast to try it out.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 05:55 PM

Beach beach beach
Fish crab legs crab legs crab legs fish

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Helen
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 06:04 PM

Not being a big seafood eater, Mrrzy, my only response to that is Yuck! LOL

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 18 Aug 23 - 08:24 PM

Oooo! Fish for dinner! Sounds good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Aug 23 - 03:44 PM

Came back. Had to go get more crab.

Then I made pork chops (dry rub berber spice, preheat oven to 325°F, brown one side in very hot cast iron with avocado oil, flip, add cherry tomatoes, cover, into oven) with mushrooms (lots of garlic/parsley butter, thyme, in covered pan), all in oven for 1 hour.

The idea is, when my massage therapist arrives, slide everything into oven. After 1-hour massage, flow off table and into kitchen to eat.

So all such recipes require an hour of cooking time. Ideas welcome.

We devoured the pork chops and most of the mushrooms and tomato glop. Next day, leftover mushrooms and their sauce plus the tomato glop all pork-flavored made a kickass soup.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Aug 23 - 10:25 AM

A friend mentioned mango bread (a quick bread) in an Instagram post this week and I asked for her recipe. I'd never heard of it but it is easy to imagine it being a wonderful bread, and I have several ripe mangos. She said she adds ginger to the recipe (she mailed a photo of the clipping). Like using cinnamon on peaches or nectarines. Hmmm. I have dried ginger in the spice cupboard but I also have several hands of it in the freezer. I might grate some of that.

Will post later if it is good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Aug 23 - 12:09 PM

I've tried Marcella's mushroom, ham and cream pasta sauce twice now and I can't make it good. It's very stodgy even with a lot of pasta water (which she fails to mention is needed - naughty!). It's way too creamy and buttery for our taste. I have a feeling that I don't want cream in any pasta sauce, and I think I'll stick to olive oil-based ones in future (except for carbonara!)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Aug 23 - 09:44 AM

I cannot Alfredo. It makes glue, every time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 08 Sep 23 - 03:27 PM

What about salads? I like a simple avocado salad made with cubed avocado, capers, finely sliced shallot, chopped cherry tomatoes, and either a nice arquebina olive oil and lemon juice drizzled over or a simple vinaigrette, then a good handful of chopped parsley over the top. The local eastern European shops have huge bunches of flat-leaf parsley and dill for around €1.75 each, fresh every Friday.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 10:45 AM

I got the recipe for a tricolore salad from a pack of Sainsbury's cherry tomatoes. "Tricolore" being the three colours of the Italian flag. It can be a complete meal for two if you make enough of it. It's two mozzarella balls cut into bite-size pieces, two avocados sliced into crescents (or chunks!) and a big handful of the best cherry toms you can get your hands on, each one halved. You can get all artistic with the arrangement or you can just more or less bung everything into a big salad bowl. Sprinkle the whole lot generously (don't you just hate "drizzle?") with your finest extra virgin olive oil, grind some pepper over it all and scatter some torn basil leaves over. Not dried basil! You can add salt but I don't think it needs any.

Oddly, they're not big on avocados in Italy though they're gaining ground. Avos are getting a bit political these days as they're regarded as an extremely environmentally-unfriendly crop as well as one which can be rather exploitative of the people who grow them. Dunno...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 11:49 AM

Mmm, sounds good.
This One-pot fish stew by Mark Moriarty is extremely good, though fiddly to make. It's my wow 'em dish for guests in winter, and usually results in a complete cessation of conversation as everyone gobbles with head down.
Mark Moriarty is a young chef who has or had a programme on RTÉ in Ireland.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 01:02 PM

Halve avocado, remove pit, fill holes with salad sressing. Eat with a spoon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 03:39 PM

Sounds good. Though I enjoy the sensation of peeling the skin away from the avocado too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 04:26 PM

I don't want to know about any "salad dressing" that consists of anything other than extra virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juice. If you demur, I suggest that you're buying inferior salad ingredients!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 04:42 PM

Matter of taste, though; I like various different forms - a classic French vinaigrette, a vinaigrette with crushed garlic, a vinaigrette with a spoon of moutarde à l'ancienne…

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 09:55 AM

My salad dressings are 3:

Salt red wine vinegar olive oil Dijon mustard (about 1/3 oil 1/3 vinegar 1/3 mustard)

Salt herbs garlic olive oil apple cider vinegar (more vinegar than oil. Crush the garlic, leave in big chunk. Leave chunk behind when serving so it keeps on flavorin')

Salt lemon juice cumin olive oil (even amounts liquids, more cumin than you'd think))

There are not in order of amount. Always put everything in the acid first, except the oil and mustard. Do not add those till salt, at least, is dissolved. Add oil in fine stream while whisking madly at end. Store in lidded jars not in fridge. The herb one turns green.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 12:18 PM

This summer I have assembled small pizzas on flatbread and they bake a few minutes in the toaster oven. As hot as it has been anything else heats the house too much. The type I've loved for this is Iraqi samoon bread, easy to remember in that they're kind of salmon shaped. ;) I use homemade sauce (tomato & Italian seasonings, thinly sliced bell peppers and onions, and some kind of sausage cooked ahead. Lately I have some Slovacek sausage, but I use mild Italian also. Top the veg with slices of provolone and top the cheese with the meat and heat. I buy the bread fresh at a local Halal market and it goes directly into the freezer for this kind of meal. I had been using a tandoori bread but it is thinner and more likely to spring a leak where sauce runs through.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 08:26 PM

Sorry, Thomson. Of course I agree that dressings are a matter of taste. Mrs Steve likes bought dressings, and I came across a really nice mustardy dressing in a bar in Andalucía this week. But, for me, I want to taste the separate ingredients of the salad and I try to buy the best quality I can find. Avocados in shops often have black bits in them, corresponding to the clumsy thumbprints of customers "checking for ripeness." I use the Galbani mozzarella, very reliable, and cherry tomatoes produced by Wim Peters in the Netherlands.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 05:46 AM

Having read a scary article about the Mafia control of mozzarella and its links with their control of garbage disposal a few years back, I use Aldi's very good Irish-made buffalo mozarella. They had a great ad for it, with a farmer riding a buffalo and saying "Ciao, sorello" (I think it was) to some passing nuns, but I can't find it online, alas.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Ed.
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 06:12 AM

Thompson,

You can find the Aldi ad that you refer to here

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 02:08 PM

Thank you, Ed!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 12 Sep 23 - 07:10 AM

Reading a thriller set in Venice recently I came across lascivious descriptions of a small, spiny fish called goby, which is apparently used to make a stock for a particularly delicious risotto…

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Sep 23 - 06:42 PM

TV food: Montalbano.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Sep 23 - 05:45 AM

Ah, but Montalbano never gets to actually eat any of the delicious food put in front of him. He lifts the fork, opens his mouth, his telefonino chirps and he puts it to his ear, says "Pronto" and a moment later, sighing sadly, is on the road chasing another demonic criminal.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Sep 23 - 07:05 PM

So true.

But if you read the books... ah, Adelina's mullets sound marvy!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Sep 23 - 09:36 AM

We got back from a week in Andalucía last weekend. We had my sister with us, who loves all things Spanish. We went to the same bar for breakfast and evening grub almost every day, it was that good (and 100 yards from our house!). They had tostada with tomatoes for breakfast but I went for stuff that was more eggy and bacony. In the evening we always ordered about four or five tapas to share. Whilst we varied what we ordered, most times we had garlic mushrooms, Padrón peppers (sine qua non in m'humble), cod croquetas, among others, and, star of the show, pil pil prawns, which I'd never heard of but which is going to become a fixture in my house from on. All you need is some peeled, raw king prawns, garlic, chilli flakes, extra virgin olive oil and sweet paprika. There are loads of recipes online and I haven't made it yet, so watch this space!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Sep 23 - 10:24 PM

I am interested in those prawns. My tapas place does something they call Catalan that sounds like that, but the prawns do not stay raw.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 23 - 06:09 AM

Nah, the prawns are cooked in the recipe and the dish is traditionally brought to the table still sizzling in one of those little brown tapas bowls. Just a thought, though: half the joy of the dish is mopping up the juices as well as eating the prawns. That really needs bread, which is carbs. You'd have to do a deal with your friend: you get the prawns, they get the juices. In fact, in Spain that did kind of happen, as my sis can't stand prawns in her mouth but was more than happy to snaffle up the juices! The downside is that she got more than her share of the juices....

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 23 - 06:24 AM

I looked up some recipes for your Catalan prawns and I found one similar to the pil pil recipe on the website food.com (GAMBAS AL AJILLO (SHRIMP W/ GARLIC) CATALONIA). Some other recipes over-egged things a bit too much but that one looks good. Not sure that you need butter, but hey, when is butter ever bad?   One difference is that, in the three places in Andalucía I had the dish, the garlic was not minced but was cut into quite large pieces, maybe each clove cut into about four or five, and plenty of it. We almost wrestled each other to get at those lovely, sweet chunks of garlic. I've said it before and I'll say it again: throw your garlic crusher in the bin! All you need is a sharp little knife. I have one of those cheapie silicone tubes which you put a clove into and roll on the worktop - and out comes a perfectly peeled clove!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 12:32 AM

That Aldi/Buffalo cheese video ad sounds like it's narrated by Ardal O'Hanlon. Anything he does brings a smile!

Shifting from topics pescatorial and camarónes, it's time to think about baking something to celebrate the autumnal equinox. Anyone have any suggestions? Do you have a celebratory meal or particular dish?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 02:40 AM

Been thinking about trying Grant Loaf again after gobbling up many slices of what tasted very like what I used to make in Connemara a couple of weeks ago.

Here's one of the many versions online (I've tightened it up a bit:

Add 1 ½ level tablespoons of dried yeast to 1 ½ rounded teaspoons of dark Barbados sugar (you can use honey, but I like burnt liquorice taste you get off molasses)
whisk in 1 ½ tablespoons of blood-heat water in a small bowl.
Leave yeast to activatee and foam, which takes 20-30 minutes. I found that placing the bowl in a larger one filled with warm water sped the whole process up.
Weigh out 1 ½ pounds of stone-ground wholemeal flour into a large bowl and mix in a teaspoon of salt. If you don’t have somewhere warm like an airing-cupboard, put the flour in an oven at the lowest temperature possible and let it warm through.
When the yeast is ready, make a well in the flour, pour in the frothy mixture and slowly pour in one pint of blood-heat water, mixing thoroughly with your hands. The dough should be quite sticky, though you may find you don’t need all the water.
Split the mixture between a large and a small greased loaf tin and allow the dough to rise for about 45 minutes (I put it back in the still-warm oven).
Bake for 40 minutes at 200°C.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 09:39 AM

I get a spoon, or just drnk the un-soppable-with-bread delicious ain't-gonna-miss-these juices and sauces like soup. Because so right about needing to consume the liquid. But nah, bread is not the only vehicle. It is the best. I miss it. But not necessary.

En parlant de bread, I'm not finding cooking time this morning for my masseur, so am providing sandwich bar: French ham, Hungarian salami; kaiser and Vienna roll (not for me); lettuce tomato cuke; mayo mustard horseradish hot sauces; Swiss and Havarti [Oxford semicolon?], and will quick-fry green beans and broccolini with garlic, cumin and hot paprika in olive oil for my main. I'll have sandwich fixings for my salad (my dressing, not condiments).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 10:50 AM

Thompson that's an old fashioned, I might say obsolete, way of proofing yeast. The quick fast-acting yeasts have been around for many years. Many are called Instant, and are simply mixed into the flour. No proofing necessary.

The garden is kind of empty after the heat, but the eggplant plants have a couple of small orbs and I'm getting a few okra. Tomatoes later. So nothing homegrown and homemade for right now. I'm starting zucchini and cucumber to hopefully get a small crop next month. I do have a lot of herbs in the yard that survived; I wonder how one would make their own Zatar mix. Maybe some homemade pita bread with Zatar spices on top would be nice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 03:52 AM

It would be old-fashioned, Mrr, it's a recipe from the 1940s! Verray good.
Has anyone tried bean pie? Sounds like such a bizarre idea, but I'm thinking of trying it; I suppose cannelini would be the nearest beans I could get here to navy beans?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 02:14 PM

Made brussels sprouts chips again. Great application for mania.

For each sprout, cut the tough bottom, discard. Remove loose leaves, to a bowl. If sprout is still dark green, or much bigger than the others, slice another bit off the bottom, remove newly-loosened outer leaves. Put tip and leaves in bowl. When you have a small pale-green sprout, stop, go onto the next sprout.

This takes hours but is oddly satisfying.

You end up, from the bigger bag of sprouts, with a huge bowl of leaves and a small pile of similarly-sized, pale green, sprouts. Or, just keep going. You end up with an immense bowl of leaves. Takes forever. So satisfying.

For the leaves, in the bowl I sprinkled garlic powder, lots of fresh-ground green and white pepper, and a lot of salt. Added some avocado oil, and with gloves, spent a long time massaging oil and all into individual leaves. (I told you it took mania.) Heat broiler and sheet pan, broil 1-2 mn at a time. Eat the crunchy ones, stir the rest around, repeat. By the time the last ones are dark and crunchy you will have eaten the while bag of sprouts.

It has to be garlic powder. Garlic is too wet.

Or, put the dark ones in the serving bowl, and share.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 08:29 PM

This for two people. I happened to have a scant pound of braising steak so I decided to loosely follow an online recipe for Italian beef stew (cheers, Vincenzo!).

Make a soffritto with carrots, onions and celery (as ever) with extra virgin olive oil. Don't cut the veg up too small. You want texture in the stew. Ten minutes' cooking.

Cut your beef (about 400g) into bite size pieces. Stir-fry it with the soffritto for a few minutes, to brown all round.

Add a tablespoon of plain flour and stir for a couple of minutes.

Whack up the heat and add a glass of red wine - keep stirring.

Add about 350 ml of passata or your own tomato sauce. Keep stirring.

Season, then add about 350ml veg stock. I always make my own with onions, celery, carrots, peppercorns, thyme and bay. Simmer for at least two and a half hours. Add a small stick of fresh rosemary.

After one hour, peel a pound or more of spuds, cut into quite big chunks and add to the broth. Discard the rosemary.

Apart from checking the seasoning, you're done. I made this the day before and it was delicious. I did think it wasn't going to work out as a stew because it seemed to be too tomatoey and full of rosemary needles. Ut, begod, it was a triumph, and what a winter dish!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 09:56 PM

I found myself wishing I'd assembled tonight's dinner in a Pyrex container because it would have been perfect baked in the toaster oven. I had ~5 ounces of thick slices of baked chicken breast topped with homemade Italian tomato sauce, and that was topped with provolone. A poor man's quick chicken Parm. The microwave was ok, but it didn't come out the way I was imagining when I assembled it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Sep 23 - 11:11 AM

I've had a summer of breakfasts with blanched peaches or nectarines (I love the flavor of the white ones if you can find them) cut into slim slices, microwaved for a minute, then sprinkled with a teaspoon of cinnamon sugar. A half-cup of vanilla yogurt on top of that, followed by a half-cup of my homemade granola. Great for fruit, dairy, and fiber and it's like eating a bowl of cobbler for breakfast. The season for those fruits has passed so I'm back to a 50/50 mix of boxed raisin bran and my homemade granola. Occasionally I peel and slice an apple, cook it until it is soft and add a little cinnamon and sugar then use it the same way.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Sep 23 - 11:53 PM

Stilly, I was fed a version of that when I was recovering from Covid and it was wonderful. In our case:
Greek yogurt, unflavoured, with chopped mango, blueberries and strawberries, topped with muesli and some rich Irish organic milk. I think there may have been a dash of honey in there too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Sep 23 - 11:42 AM

Going to try plain yogurt instead of sour cream. Opinions? For calming the too-hot, not qua yogurt.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Sep 23 - 04:29 PM

I had a fair bit of leftover sauce from the dish I posted on the 24th. I'm on my own this weekend (nothing sinister to read into that! ) and I had some meatballs that came with an order from a really good online butcher that I use - I hadn't really wanted them, but adding them to my order got me over the threshold to save £5 postage!

Anyway, following the instructions on the pack, I browned the meatballs for a few minutes then simmered them for about twenty minutes in the leftover sauce. They were very nice, but two things: they were quite dense in texture, and they, well, just lacked a bit of character.

Sometimes you need to use bought ready-made things in your recipes so that you can bolster your opinion on your own cooking (as well as saving time in emergencies). I've made Marcella's meatballs a good few times, and you do sometimes wonder (if you're highly self-critical) whether you've done a good job. Well, though tonight's meatballs were fine, give me Marcella's any day. Cheered me up, it did!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 06 Oct 23 - 02:02 AM

I love the Ikea plant "meatballs" - very nice with a tomato sauce and served on rice.
However, I also used to love their "seaweed pearls" - really delicious imitation caviare made of seaweed, so nice on buttery toast with lemon juice. And I loved their "Kalles Kaviar", a tube of sweet and savoury pink paste, based on salted cod's roe with this and that - really nice with a fried egg. And their "Knäckebröd" - big wheels of rye crispbread.
But there seems to be a worldwide policy in Ikea to stop stocking these foods. Ikea has always had a policy, too, that food will not be listed when available in the shops' online sites. It's a mad policy in these days of automatic, internet-based restocking…
Now, I don't know what the story is about these particular foods - the "seaweed pearls" seem to have simply disappeared; Knäckebröd is now sold in small packets; the Kalles Kaviar may be no longer stocked because, madly, cod, the fish that fuelled the great European expansion, the fish that was once the reliable food of the world, the fish that was once normally two metres long and 1.5 metres around the centre, is now an endangered species. Perhaps Kalles Kaviar is simply no longer made?
Ikea's policies on food are deeply odd. You'd imagine that Scandinavian foods would be a loss leader - on my trips to the shop to buy these, I'd often spend a few quid on a duvet cover or some glasses or, indeed, a kitchen trolley or table.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 02:37 AM

If you're looking for non-salty stock, Kallo do a cube called "Very low salt vegetable cube" - we use it here (usually in combination with homemade stock and one of those chicken gloops called stock pods) to bring down the salt level.
Cheese: I'm a traditionalist, and like an occasional gorgonzola on peppered toast, as beloved of Sam Beckett. I'm looking sideways at a little Milleens cheese the last few days, and it's looking back at me; the makers say it's so individual and delicious because their cows graze in herby fields where the grass and herbs grow naturally - particular cows have particular favourite spots and their milk tastes of the herbs in those spots.
Last night I found I had a longing for a paradisal stuffed courgette dish I used to get on visits to Paris from a particular market stall - apparently the shop belonging to the stall burned down a few years back (with dramatic rescue of the two people sleeping upstairs by the people from the shop opposite, who were also sleeping upstairs in their shop when they were woken by crackling and burning). This dish involved those sliotar-sized, or slightly larger than cricket-ball-sized, courgettes, stuffed with a tomatoey fish and rice stuffing, and cooked in stock, all of which flavours mixed… oh, heaven!
I'd bought a gourd, a long yellow thing, more rugby-ball-sized, maybe hoping for the Irish team (sob). I went to cut it in half, but it was tough as old (rugby) boots, so I started softening it in the oven. This went on for, literally, a couple of hours before I could halve it; meanwhile I took 450g of mince (ground beef to Americans) and cooked it up with chopped onion, a tin of Italian tomatoes and a chopped pepper, a good dose of oregano and a dash of dry vermouth to loosen it out, then when the rugby ball finally softened enough to be cut, scooped out the seeds and filled in with the mincy mixture, and poured in some home chicken stock.
It was good, but nothing like the fish-stuffed courgettes.
Unfortunately, for any fish dishes other than fairly plain ones, I've lost my favourite ally, the sauce from heaven, XO Sauce. While this was shocking dear (about €15 for a jamjar of it), it gave a distinctive underlying loveliness to any fish soup or stuffed fish dish. It's disappeared off the market here - none of the oriental shops have it, they say they can't get it any more and have no explanation. If anyone knows what happened and why, it would mend at least a small crack in an old person's heart.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 02:44 AM

Oh, I forgot that in that gourd stuffing I added a handful each of quinoa and amaranth to give it heft.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 09:08 AM

Toaster-oven breakfast: duck bacon on a (missing the word- grill-thing you put things on so the fat drips down) but under it, for the grease to drip onto, lots of cherry tomatoes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 06:19 PM

"Duck bacon" ???

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 08:36 PM

So. Very. Good. Thick, marvy. And yields duck fat! Not that bacon grease isn't the bomb.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 05:27 AM

I had duck bacon in a salad from a hospital canteen while a relative was in a French hospital - razor-thin slices of delicate salted duck meat laid into a multi-leaf salad with a package of thick dressing provided. Absolute comfort food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 05:28 AM

The French, incidentally, have a much nicer take on the sandwich. They lay out the fillings on a tray behind glass; you choose the filling of your desire, and they slice a section of baguette lengthways, butter it and lay the filling in. Fresher and tastier than the anglo sandwich.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 02:57 PM

Ok, this was funny, and à propos for the time of year.

Made a kind of steak au poivre with a yak steak. Used black, white and green peppercorns, some lightly crushed, most whole.

There were mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes, in the sauce.

At one point I saw the freakiest thing: several little things were LOOKING at me.

Turns out if you sear steak au poivre with whole white peppercorns, they acquire little black spots...

And if they show up, spots up, in *pairs* --- they look like tiny eyeballs.

A mushroom slice in the sauce immediately turned into a tiny, bloody, face, looking right at me.

I jumped about a mile, saw several other "eyeballs" and then laughed hysterically.

New Halloween idea!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 06:10 PM

No pineapple on pizza. No cream in carbonara. No bloody mushrooms in stews.

(Though a bit of porcini soaking water can be a thing of beauty...)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 01:10 AM

Mushrooms in stews are or were an Irish thing: you throw in a handful of mushrooms about 20 minutes before the finish.
But if we can agree that the English can have baked beans as part of breakfast, while shuddering delicately away at the idea, we can agree to differ on the misheroons.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:09 AM

Quartered flat mushers plus a dollop of anchovy sauce added to a beef casserole used to work very well for me. A passable mock steak-and-oyster stew.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 05:51 AM

Baked beans are a revolting addition to the full English, and I ask for an extra egg instead. A slice of Macsween's black pudding (available at M&S) is, however, a thing of great beauty. Those nasty little rubbery mushrooms oft included, slimy things, are very unpleasant. I love mushrooms cooked in butter and well-seasoned, then sautéed or done in the oven until all the water has gone from them. But I think they're pretty ruinous in stews. Each to his own. One man's fish is another man's poisson...

I won't buy button mushrooms. Pointless wee things.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 06:10 AM

One thing a good few recipes suggest is to soak dried porcini and use the soaking water (mind the grit!) then chop the fungi and throw them in. This latter step I will never do. The soaking water adds a lot, but the mushrooms have a horrid texture in m'humble.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 02:01 PM

I recently introduced a vegan friend to flats (button mushrooms that have been allowed to grow up, and are about 15cm across) cooked slowly with a little olive oil under them till the cup fills with juice. The expression of astonished pleasure…
Soaked dried mushrooms are ok; I use them in risotto; but I soak them in hot water and when it's cooled to warm I chop the formerly dried mushrooms into little slivers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:07 PM

Mushrooms are for flavor or texture but not nutrition.
It takes as much energy to digest mushrooms as they have food value.
The butter or other additives are more nutritious than the mushrooms.
Minerals are another exception.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:27 PM

Ach, that's what nutritionists say about different things at different times. I remember when seaweed was considered a nutritionless eccentricity.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 07:26 PM

Well I think that mushrooms, as long as they are not button or from a jar, are highly nutritious and highly delicious. We eat them as a side veg at least four times a week, and, in the rare circumstance that we have some that urgently need using up, I have them for breakfast on a slab of buttered toast. I like the big flat ones stuffed with this, that or the other, but just-opening chestnut ones, either sautéed in butter or done in the oven if it's on anyway, are my particular nirvana. Just make sure the water has all gone then add another four minutes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 09:44 PM

Steak au poivre is not a stew!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:31 AM

I would have some sautéed mushrooms with a rare steak. If you have a good-quality steak (gimme ribeye), why drown it in a sauce? Just a spot of seasoning, applied immediately before frying. I want some chips and a few lightly-cooked cherry tomatoes with a good steak, maybe some peas or broad beans.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 07:51 AM

What you would have done does not make steak au poivre a stew.

My sauce is delicious. Please stop insulting people, me in particular, for having different taste than you. "Drowning" is an insulting term, before you ask.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 01:01 PM

Gosh, I'd have thought that expressing your own taste in a food thread is valid even if it doesn't always concur with other people's. If I told you that basil, oregano and garlic just seems wrong in bolognese sauce, you disagree and told me I was insulting you, I'd think you were very strange. No insult intended. A good steak with its beautiful beefy flavour is not something I'd want to, er, cover with a sauce, that's all. I'm sure your sauce is perfectly delicious.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 04:53 PM

Steak au Poivre is something I've never heard of, but it is certainly not a stew. I usually use a little olive oil and mostly the drippings from the steak to saute onions and/or sliced mushrooms, add a splash of red wine, and have that with a rare tender steak. Lots of ground pepper and some granulated garlic (time saver versus using the garlic press). It ends up with a little "pan sauce" to go over the meat.

The "no nutrition" view of mushrooms was a long held view but is dated.WebMD on Mushrooms: Mushrooms are a low-calorie food and pack a nutritional punch. Loaded with many health-boosting vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, they’ve long been recognized as an important part of any diet.

This afternoon I have corralled all of the tomatoes around here, many of them getting to the point they have to be used. They were blanched and peeled, cut into large chunks, and they simmered a while. This included some purchased roma tomatoes and some grape tomatoes and a few small ones from the garden. I'll run them through the food mill and remove a lot of the seeds (I don't mind if there are seeds) and I'll use them to make some Italian style sauce (according to the Ball Blue Book recipes) to freeze. Chop onion, garlic (yes the press for this), bell peppers, herbs, and then freeze in pint jars.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:09 PM

Ah, you and your garlic press! ;-)

I don't use garlic with steaks, but hey ho. Just a drop of groundnut oil (or, as you say, use the fat from the steak trimmings) and salt and pepper, then a couple of minutes on each side with high heat. I also cook braising steak, cheap cuts that take slow cooking. I might do the whole slabs on top in a covered pan on top my mum's way, or I might cut them into chunks, brown them, simmer in red wine for a bit then add whatever to make a stew over about three hours. Satisfies the folks who don't like the sight of blood... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:33 PM

Ah, and it occurred to me it wasn't clear that the seared steak had been removed, but some of the peppercorns had hung around to play deglazing...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 21 Oct 23 - 02:40 AM

Sounds like one to make at home: Harrods' £32 (gawp) sambo has fresh sourdough, truffle butter, “gold” mustard mayo, mushrooms, seared wagyu steak from Japan, with beer-braised onions and rocket on the side.

"The second-best mouthful came when the beef, mustard mayo and rocket collided with the beer-braised onions, creating a quartet of contrasting textures and tastes: jammy, peppery, savoury and hot.

"Then the truffle and porcini butter arrived, and a grilled, but chilled, portobello mushroom, and everything slid downhill on a tidal wave of umami."

Tell me this, how do you beer-braise an onion, and how do you make truffle butter?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 23 - 06:26 AM

It isn't often that a shop-bought confection can match home-made, but the M&S "Best Ever" prawn sandwich, under a fiver, comes pretty damn close!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 09:37 AM

Wait, a *sweet* prawn sandwich?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 10:13 AM

Confection is a word that refers to something confected—that is, put together—from several different ingredients or elements. Often confections are sweet and edible, but confection can also be used to refer to a finely worked piece of craftsmanship. In other words, the lacy box containing chocolate confections can be a confection itself. Tracing back to the Latin verb conficere (“to carry out, perform, make, bring about, collect, bring to completion”), confection entered Middle English as the word confeccioun, meaning “preparation by mixing ingredients; something prepared by mixing, such as a medicine or dish of food...

from Merriam-Webster

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 10:42 AM

I'm a half-pint shy of two quarts of homemade Italian-style tomato sauce; onions, bell peppers, and homegrown garlic (through the press), oregano and basil finely chopped. Non-sodium salt, freshly ground black pepper (the only kind I use these days), and a little red wine. This batch also had some reconstituted mushrooms, soaked for a long time then cut quite small. Good for flavor, won't be recognizable because I used the stick blender to reduce the size of any chunks to quite small. I added some commercial low-salt tomato paste for a richer color and flavor and to thicken it. Much of this is with purchased tomatoes since my garden produced so little. Divided into three pint and one half-pint jars, all of the sauce is in the freezer.

When I make sauce from my homegrown tomatoes it's a day-long process of picking the perfect tomatoes, washing then cutting in half and setting them into the steam juicer. They steam for up to an hour and in the process release upwards of a gallon of clear yellowish juice. Then the steamed solids are run through a food mill that separates the skin and seeds to one bowl and the sauce solids to another. That is simmered down and either canned plain, or it is made into the Italian style sauce (Ball Blue Book recipe) and any of this output is processed in the hot water bath and stored in the pantry. It is possible to can the juice also, but I usually freeze it in quart jars.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Oct 23 - 11:29 PM

The house smells wonderful this evening after making a batch of yeast dinner rolls. I often add a generous sprinkle of granulated garlic and grind a tablespoon of oregano into the ingredients when the bread machine starts. I use the machine to do the mixing and kneading, but when it is on the manual setting it stops before baking so I take it out and shape into rolls or put bread dough in a loaf pan. I can use potassium salt for making the bread, but find unsalted butter disappointing to spread on them. I suppose I could add my Nu Salt to the butter, but I think I'll just use the sweet butter and know it's adding a measurable amount of sodium to my intake for the day.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Oct 23 - 08:35 PM

Ok, cause, ew.

Stuffed cloves from 2 heads of garlic up the butt of a cornish game hen, sprinkled inside and out with onion powder salt hot pepper. Butter under skin with more garlic. Started in very hot oven, turned down after 20mn. On grill over pie dish. While hen was resting, put asparagus spears in the drippings with all the garlic from inside the bird, roasted 15 mn. Still crunchy. Ate the skin first, of course. Meat juicy juicy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Oct 23 - 12:47 PM

I had to look up "Cornish game hen." They don't come from Cornwall and they are not gamey! I can't think that such a titchy and fast-grown thing could develop much flavour, but I see that you add a lot of flavourings anyway. I cook two sizes of chicken: big five-pounders that I roast for about 110 minutes at 190C, seasoned and buttered all over, a lemon, knob of butter and shallot in the cavity, covered with foil that's removed for the last 30 minutes, and smaller ones, about 3.5 pounds, that I cook "Marcella's way," well-seasoned, no added fat, just two small, pierced lemons in the cavity, half an hour breast down at 180C, same again breast up for half an hour, then with the heat whacked up to 200C for a final 20 minutes. I get the chicken-for-one idea of the mini-hen, but who doesn't love a stack of leftover cold chicken in the fridge for two or three days?

The two of us get three hearty lots of chicken from the big one and a possible bonus sandwich, and two lots from Marcella's. Scraps go in the freezer for a future risotto, or the cat might get a little treat...

I don't put stuffing in the cavity. Instead, I make it into portion-sized balls and bake it on greaseproof paper for 25 minutes while the parsnips and roasties are cooking and the chicken's having a rest. We both devour the skin, but, luckily for me, Mrs Steve always fails to spot that the parson's nose has mysteriously vanished...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Oct 23 - 10:25 AM

They aren't cornish or game, indeed, but really chicken-y.

In my inventions of foods that cook for an hour during my massage, I put a lot of butter in an oven-proof dish with hot pepper, smoked paprika, and the cloves from several heads of garlic, melted for 10 secs in microwave. On top I put a lot of broccolini, sprikle of salt, marjoram. Did not stir. Into cold oven, lidded. Turned oven to 250 when massage therapist arrived. At the end of the massage, checked the broccolini which was *perfect* - crunchy still, and when stirred up with the garlic, yum. Never used that low an oven before. Am going to try it with mushrooms next.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Oct 23 - 10:27 AM

I am ashamed (in the voice of the lobster from finding Nemo): I am loving the pre-peeled garlic cloves. Lazy, lazy.

Subject: RE: 500 Error - Blocked threads? You can help
From: Thompson
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 02:03 PM

I can read the recipe thread but can't post this:

Parsnip season; I bought from a farmer the other day three gigantic parsnips (knowing from experience that these freshly-dug roots will be tender and delicious). I'll probably chop them in batons, steam them and then bake them in a cheesy sauce with a dessertspoon each of mustard and honey, as usual, but any other suggestions welcomed.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 27 Aug 23 - 09:44 AM

I cannot Alfredo. It makes glue, every time.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 01:02 PM

Halve avocado, remove pit, fill holes with salad sressing. Eat with a spoon.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 09:55 AM

My salad dressings are 3:

Salt red wine vinegar olive oil Dijon mustard (about 1/3 oil 1/3 vinegar 1/3 mustard)

Salt herbs garlic olive oil apple cider vinegar (more vinegar than oil. Crush the garlic, leave in big chunk. Leave chunk behind when serving so it keeps on flavorin')

Salt lemon juice cumin olive oil (even amounts liquids, more cumin than you'd think))

There are not in order of amount. Always put everything in the acid first, except the oil and mustard. Do not add those till salt, at least, is dissolved. Add oil in fine stream while whisking madly at end. Store in lidded jars not in fridge. The herb one turns green.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 12 Sep 23 - 06:42 PM

TV food: Montalbano.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 13 Sep 23 - 07:05 PM

So true.

But if you read the books... ah, Adelina's mullets sound marvy!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Sep 23 - 10:24 PM

I am interested in those prawns. My tapas place does something they call Catalan that sounds like that, but the prawns do not stay raw.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 09:39 AM

I get a spoon, or just drnk the un-soppable-with-bread delicious ain't-gonna-miss-these juices and sauces like soup. Because so right about needing to consume the liquid. But nah, bread is not the only vehicle. It is the best. I miss it. But not necessary.

En parlant de bread, I'm not finding cooking time this morning for my masseur, so am providing sandwich bar: French ham, Hungarian salami; kaiser and Vienna roll (not for me); lettuce tomato cuke; mayo mustard horseradish hot sauces; Swiss and Havarti [Oxford semicolon?], and will quick-fry green beans and broccolini with garlic, cumin and hot paprika in olive oil for my main. I'll have sandwich fixings for my salad (my dressing, not condiments).

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 02:14 PM

Made brussels sprouts chips again. Great application for mania.

For each sprout, cut the tough bottom, discard. Remove loose leaves, to a bowl. If sprout is still dark green, or much bigger than the others, slice another bit off the bottom, remove newly-loosened outer leaves. Put tip and leaves in bowl. When you have a small pale-green sprout, stop, go onto the next sprout.

This takes hours but is oddly satisfying.

You end up, from the bigger bag of sprouts, with a huge bowl of leaves and a small pile of similarly-sized, pale green, sprouts. Or, just keep going. You end up with an immense bowl of leaves. Takes forever. So satisfying.

For the leaves, in the bowl I sprinkled garlic powder, lots of fresh-ground green and white pepper, and a lot of salt. Added some avocado oil, and with gloves, spent a long time massaging oil and all into individual leaves. (I told you it took mania.) Heat broiler and sheet pan, broil 1-2 mn at a time. Eat the crunchy ones, stir the rest around, repeat. By the time the last ones are dark and crunchy you will have eaten the while bag of sprouts.

It has to be garlic powder. Garlic is too wet.

Or, put the dark ones in the serving bowl, and share.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Sep 23 - 11:42 AM

Going to try plain yogurt instead of sour cream. Opinions? For calming the too-hot, not qua yogurt.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 09:08 AM

Toaster-oven breakfast: duck bacon on a (missing the word- grill-thing you put things on so the fat drips down) but under it, for the grease to drip onto, lots of cherry tomatoes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 08:36 PM

So. Very. Good. Thick, marvy. And yields duck fat! Not that bacon grease isn't the bomb.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 02:57 PM

Ok, this was funny, and à propos for the time of year.

Made a kind of steak au poivre with a yak steak. Used black, white and green peppercorns, some lightly crushed, most whole.

There were mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes, in the sauce.

At one point I saw the freakiest thing: several little things were LOOKING at me.

Turns out if you sear steak au poivre with whole white peppercorns, they acquire little black spots...

And if they show up, spots up, in *pairs* --- they look like tiny eyeballs.

A mushroom slice in the sauce immediately turned into a tiny, bloody, face, looking right at me.

I jumped about a mile, saw several other "eyeballs" and then laughed hysterically.

New Halloween idea!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 09:44 PM

Steak au poivre is not a stew!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 07:51 AM

What you would have done does not make steak au poivre a stew.

My sauce is delicious. Please stop insulting people, me in particular, for having different taste than you. "Drowning" is an insulting term, before you ask.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:33 PM

Ah, and it occurred to me it wasn't clear that the seared steak had been removed, but some of the peppercorns had hung around to play deglazing...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Donuel
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:07 PM

Mushrooms are for flavor or texture but not nutrition.
It takes as much energy to digest mushrooms as they have food value.
The butter or other additives are more nutritious than the mushrooms.
Minerals are another exception.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Aug 23 - 10:25 AM

A friend mentioned mango bread (a quick bread) in an Instagram post this week and I asked for her recipe. I'd never heard of it but it is easy to imagine it being a wonderful bread, and I have several ripe mangos. She said she adds ginger to the recipe (she mailed a photo of the clipping). Like using cinnamon on peaches or nectarines. Hmmm. I have dried ginger in the spice cupboard but I also have several hands of it in the freezer. I might grate some of that.

Will post later if it is good.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 12:18 PM

This summer I have assembled small pizzas on flatbread and they bake a few minutes in the toaster oven. As hot as it has been anything else heats the house too much. The type I've loved for this is Iraqi samoon bread, easy to remember in that they're kind of salmon shaped. ;) I use homemade sauce (tomato & Italian seasonings, thinly sliced bell peppers and onions, and some kind of sausage cooked ahead. Lately I have some Slovacek sausage, but I use mild Italian also. Top the veg with slices of provolone and top the cheese with the meat and heat. I buy the bread fresh at a local Halal market and it goes directly into the freezer for this kind of meal. I had been using a tandoori bread but it is thinner and more likely to spring a leak where sauce runs through.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 12:32 AM

That Aldi/Buffalo cheese video ad sounds like it's narrated by Ardal O'Hanlon. Anything he does brings a smile!

Shifting from topics pescatorial and camarónes, it's time to think about baking something to celebrate the autumnal equinox. Anyone have any suggestions? Do you have a celebratory meal or particular dish?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 10:50 AM

Thompson that's an old fashioned, I might say obsolete, way of proofing yeast. The quick fast-acting yeasts have been around for many years. Many are called Instant, and are simply mixed into the flour. No proofing necessary.

The garden is kind of empty after the heat, but the eggplant plants have a couple of small orbs and I'm getting a few okra. Tomatoes later. So nothing homegrown and homemade for right now. I'm starting zucchini and cucumber to hopefully get a small crop next month. I do have a lot of herbs in the yard that survived; I wonder how one would make their own Zatar mix. Maybe some homemade pita bread with Zatar spices on top would be nice.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 09:56 PM

I found myself wishing I'd assembled tonight's dinner in a Pyrex container because it would have been perfect baked in the toaster oven. I had ~5 ounces of thick slices of baked chicken breast topped with homemade Italian tomato sauce, and that was topped with provolone. A poor man's quick chicken Parm. The microwave was ok, but it didn't come out the way I was imagining when I assembled it.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 26 Sep 23 - 11:11 AM

I've had a summer of breakfasts with blanched peaches or nectarines (I love the flavor of the white ones if you can find them) cut into slim slices, microwaved for a minute, then sprinkled with a teaspoon of cinnamon sugar. A half-cup of vanilla yogurt on top of that, followed by a half-cup of my homemade granola. Great for fruit, dairy, and fiber and it's like eating a bowl of cobbler for breakfast. The season for those fruits has passed so I'm back to a 50/50 mix of boxed raisin bran and my homemade granola. Occasionally I peel and slice an apple, cook it until it is soft and add a little cinnamon and sugar then use it the same way.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 04:53 PM

Steak au Poivre is something I've never heard of, but it is certainly not a stew. I usually use a little olive oil and mostly the drippings from the steak to saute onions and/or sliced mushrooms, add a splash of red wine, and have that with a rare tender steak. Lots of ground pepper and some granulated garlic (time saver versus using the garlic press). It ends up with a little "pan sauce" to go over the meat.

The "no nutrition" view of mushrooms was a long held view but is dated.WebMD on Mushrooms: Mushrooms are a low-calorie food and pack a nutritional punch. Loaded with many health-boosting vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants, they’ve long been recognized as an important part of any diet.

This afternoon I have corralled all of the tomatoes around here, many of them getting to the point they have to be used. They were blanched and peeled, cut into large chunks, and they simmered a while. This included some purchased roma tomatoes and some grape tomatoes and a few small ones from the garden. I'll run them through the food mill and remove a lot of the seeds (I don't mind if there are seeds) and I'll use them to make some Italian style sauce (according to the Ball Blue Book recipes) to freeze. Chop onion, garlic (yes the press for this), bell peppers, herbs, and then freeze in pint jars.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Ed.
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 06:12 AM

Thompson,

You can find the Aldi ad that you refer to here

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 08 Sep 23 - 03:27 PM

What about salads? I like a simple avocado salad made with cubed avocado, capers, finely sliced shallot, chopped cherry tomatoes, and either a nice arquebina olive oil and lemon juice drizzled over or a simple vinaigrette, then a good handful of chopped parsley over the top. The local eastern European shops have huge bunches of flat-leaf parsley and dill for around €1.75 each, fresh every Friday.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 11:49 AM

Mmm, sounds good.
This One-pot fish stew by Mark Moriarty is extremely good, though fiddly to make. It's my wow 'em dish for guests in winter, and usually results in a complete cessation of conversation as everyone gobbles with head down.
Mark Moriarty is a young chef who has or had a programme on RTÉ in Ireland.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 03:39 PM

Sounds good. Though I enjoy the sensation of peeling the skin away from the avocado too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 04:42 PM

Matter of taste, though; I like various different forms - a classic French vinaigrette, a vinaigrette with crushed garlic, a vinaigrette with a spoon of moutarde à l'ancienne…

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 05:46 AM

Having read a scary article about the Mafia control of mozzarella and its links with their control of garbage disposal a few years back, I use Aldi's very good Irish-made buffalo mozarella. They had a great ad for it, with a farmer riding a buffalo and saying "Ciao, sorello" (I think it was) to some passing nuns, but I can't find it online, alas.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 11 Sep 23 - 02:08 PM

Thank you, Ed!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 12 Sep 23 - 07:10 AM

Reading a thriller set in Venice recently I came across lascivious descriptions of a small, spiny fish called goby, which is apparently used to make a stock for a particularly delicious risotto…

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Sep 23 - 05:45 AM

Ah, but Montalbano never gets to actually eat any of the delicious food put in front of him. He lifts the fork, opens his mouth, his telefonino chirps and he puts it to his ear, says "Pronto" and a moment later, sighing sadly, is on the road chasing another demonic criminal.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 22 Sep 23 - 02:40 AM

Been thinking about trying Grant Loaf again after gobbling up many slices of what tasted very like what I used to make in Connemara a couple of weeks ago.

Here's one of the many versions online (I've tightened it up a bit:

Add 1 ½ level tablespoons of dried yeast to 1 ½ rounded teaspoons of dark Barbados sugar (you can use honey, but I like burnt liquorice taste you get off molasses)
whisk in 1 ½ tablespoons of blood-heat water in a small bowl.
Leave yeast to activatee and foam, which takes 20-30 minutes. I found that placing the bowl in a larger one filled with warm water sped the whole process up.
Weigh out 1 ½ pounds of stone-ground wholemeal flour into a large bowl and mix in a teaspoon of salt. If you don’t have somewhere warm like an airing-cupboard, put the flour in an oven at the lowest temperature possible and let it warm through.
When the yeast is ready, make a well in the flour, pour in the frothy mixture and slowly pour in one pint of blood-heat water, mixing thoroughly with your hands. The dough should be quite sticky, though you may find you don’t need all the water.
Split the mixture between a large and a small greased loaf tin and allow the dough to rise for about 45 minutes (I put it back in the still-warm oven).
Bake for 40 minutes at 200°C.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 23 Sep 23 - 03:52 AM

It would be old-fashioned, Mrr, it's a recipe from the 1940s! Verray good.
Has anyone tried bean pie? Sounds like such a bizarre idea, but I'm thinking of trying it; I suppose cannelini would be the nearest beans I could get here to navy beans?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 27 Sep 23 - 11:53 PM

Stilly, I was fed a version of that when I was recovering from Covid and it was wonderful. In our case:
Greek yogurt, unflavoured, with chopped mango, blueberries and strawberries, topped with muesli and some rich Irish organic milk. I think there may have been a dash of honey in there too.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 06 Oct 23 - 02:02 AM

I love the Ikea plant "meatballs" - very nice with a tomato sauce and served on rice.
However, I also used to love their "seaweed pearls" - really delicious imitation caviare made of seaweed, so nice on buttery toast with lemon juice. And I loved their "Kalles Kaviar", a tube of sweet and savoury pink paste, based on salted cod's roe with this and that - really nice with a fried egg. And their "Knäckebröd" - big wheels of rye crispbread.
But there seems to be a worldwide policy in Ikea to stop stocking these foods. Ikea has always had a policy, too, that food will not be listed when available in the shops' online sites. It's a mad policy in these days of automatic, internet-based restocking…
Now, I don't know what the story is about these particular foods - the "seaweed pearls" seem to have simply disappeared; Knäckebröd is now sold in small packets; the Kalles Kaviar may be no longer stocked because, madly, cod, the fish that fuelled the great European expansion, the fish that was once the reliable food of the world, the fish that was once normally two metres long and 1.5 metres around the centre, is now an endangered species. Perhaps Kalles Kaviar is simply no longer made?
Ikea's policies on food are deeply odd. You'd imagine that Scandinavian foods would be a loss leader - on my trips to the shop to buy these, I'd often spend a few quid on a duvet cover or some glasses or, indeed, a kitchen trolley or table.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 02:37 AM

If you're looking for non-salty stock, Kallo do a cube called "Very low salt vegetable cube" - we use it here (usually in combination with homemade stock and one of those chicken gloops called stock pods) to bring down the salt level.
Cheese: I'm a traditionalist, and like an occasional gorgonzola on peppered toast, as beloved of Sam Beckett. I'm looking sideways at a little Milleens cheese the last few days, and it's looking back at me; the makers say it's so individual and delicious because their cows graze in herby fields where the grass and herbs grow naturally - particular cows have particular favourite spots and their milk tastes of the herbs in those spots.
Last night I found I had a longing for a paradisal stuffed courgette dish I used to get on visits to Paris from a particular market stall - apparently the shop belonging to the stall burned down a few years back (with dramatic rescue of the two people sleeping upstairs by the people from the shop opposite, who were also sleeping upstairs in their shop when they were woken by crackling and burning). This dish involved those sliotar-sized, or slightly larger than cricket-ball-sized, courgettes, stuffed with a tomatoey fish and rice stuffing, and cooked in stock, all of which flavours mixed… oh, heaven!
I'd bought a gourd, a long yellow thing, more rugby-ball-sized, maybe hoping for the Irish team (sob). I went to cut it in half, but it was tough as old (rugby) boots, so I started softening it in the oven. This went on for, literally, a couple of hours before I could halve it; meanwhile I took 450g of mince (ground beef to Americans) and cooked it up with chopped onion, a tin of Italian tomatoes and a chopped pepper, a good dose of oregano and a dash of dry vermouth to loosen it out, then when the rugby ball finally softened enough to be cut, scooped out the seeds and filled in with the mincy mixture, and poured in some home chicken stock.
It was good, but nothing like the fish-stuffed courgettes.
Unfortunately, for any fish dishes other than fairly plain ones, I've lost my favourite ally, the sauce from heaven, XO Sauce. While this was shocking dear (about €15 for a jamjar of it), it gave a distinctive underlying loveliness to any fish soup or stuffed fish dish. It's disappeared off the market here - none of the oriental shops have it, they say they can't get it any more and have no explanation. If anyone knows what happened and why, it would mend at least a small crack in an old person's heart.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 02:44 AM

Oh, I forgot that in that gourd stuffing I added a handful each of quinoa and amaranth to give it heft.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 05:27 AM

I had duck bacon in a salad from a hospital canteen while a relative was in a French hospital - razor-thin slices of delicate salted duck meat laid into a multi-leaf salad with a package of thick dressing provided. Absolute comfort food.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 05:28 AM

The French, incidentally, have a much nicer take on the sandwich. They lay out the fillings on a tray behind glass; you choose the filling of your desire, and they slice a section of baguette lengthways, butter it and lay the filling in. Fresher and tastier than the anglo sandwich.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 01:10 AM

Mushrooms in stews are or were an Irish thing: you throw in a handful of mushrooms about 20 minutes before the finish.
But if we can agree that the English can have baked beans as part of breakfast, while shuddering delicately away at the idea, we can agree to differ on the misheroons.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 02:01 PM

I recently introduced a vegan friend to flats (button mushrooms that have been allowed to grow up, and are about 15cm across) cooked slowly with a little olive oil under them till the cup fills with juice. The expression of astonished pleasure…
Soaked dried mushrooms are ok; I use them in risotto; but I soak them in hot water and when it's cooled to warm I chop the formerly dried mushrooms into little slivers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:27 PM

Ach, that's what nutritionists say about different things at different times. I remember when seaweed was considered a nutritionless eccentricity.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Thompson
Date: 21 Oct 23 - 02:40 AM

Sounds like one to make at home: Harrods' £32 (gawp) sambo has fresh sourdough, truffle butter, “gold” mustard mayo, mushrooms, seared wagyu steak from Japan, with beer-braised onions and rocket on the side.

"The second-best mouthful came when the beef, mustard mayo and rocket collided with the beer-braised onions, creating a quartet of contrasting textures and tastes: jammy, peppery, savoury and hot.

"Then the truffle and porcini butter arrived, and a grilled, but chilled, portobello mushroom, and everything slid downhill on a tidal wave of umami."

Tell me this, how do you beer-braise an onion, and how do you make truffle butter?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 26 Aug 23 - 12:09 PM

I've tried Marcella's mushroom, ham and cream pasta sauce twice now and I can't make it good. It's very stodgy even with a lot of pasta water (which she fails to mention is needed - naughty!). It's way too creamy and buttery for our taste. I have a feeling that I don't want cream in any pasta sauce, and I think I'll stick to olive oil-based ones in future (except for carbonara!)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 10:45 AM

I got the recipe for a tricolore salad from a pack of Sainsbury's cherry tomatoes. "Tricolore" being the three colours of the Italian flag. It can be a complete meal for two if you make enough of it. It's two mozzarella balls cut into bite-size pieces, two avocados sliced into crescents (or chunks!) and a big handful of the best cherry toms you can get your hands on, each one halved. You can get all artistic with the arrangement or you can just more or less bung everything into a big salad bowl. Sprinkle the whole lot generously (don't you just hate "drizzle?") with your finest extra virgin olive oil, grind some pepper over it all and scatter some torn basil leaves over. Not dried basil! You can add salt but I don't think it needs any.

Oddly, they're not big on avocados in Italy though they're gaining ground. Avos are getting a bit political these days as they're regarded as an extremely environmentally-unfriendly crop as well as one which can be rather exploitative of the people who grow them. Dunno...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Sep 23 - 04:26 PM

I don't want to know about any "salad dressing" that consists of anything other than extra virgin olive oil and fresh lemon juice. If you demur, I suggest that you're buying inferior salad ingredients!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Sep 23 - 08:26 PM

Sorry, Thomson. Of course I agree that dressings are a matter of taste. Mrs Steve likes bought dressings, and I came across a really nice mustardy dressing in a bar in Andalucía this week. But, for me, I want to taste the separate ingredients of the salad and I try to buy the best quality I can find. Avocados in shops often have black bits in them, corresponding to the clumsy thumbprints of customers "checking for ripeness." I use the Galbani mozzarella, very reliable, and cherry tomatoes produced by Wim Peters in the Netherlands.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Sep 23 - 09:36 AM

We got back from a week in Andalucía last weekend. We had my sister with us, who loves all things Spanish. We went to the same bar for breakfast and evening grub almost every day, it was that good (and 100 yards from our house!). They had tostada with tomatoes for breakfast but I went for stuff that was more eggy and bacony. In the evening we always ordered about four or five tapas to share. Whilst we varied what we ordered, most times we had garlic mushrooms, Padrón peppers (sine qua non in m'humble), cod croquetas, among others, and, star of the show, pil pil prawns, which I'd never heard of but which is going to become a fixture in my house from on. All you need is some peeled, raw king prawns, garlic, chilli flakes, extra virgin olive oil and sweet paprika. There are loads of recipes online and I haven't made it yet, so watch this space!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 23 - 06:09 AM

Nah, the prawns are cooked in the recipe and the dish is traditionally brought to the table still sizzling in one of those little brown tapas bowls. Just a thought, though: half the joy of the dish is mopping up the juices as well as eating the prawns. That really needs bread, which is carbs. You'd have to do a deal with your friend: you get the prawns, they get the juices. In fact, in Spain that did kind of happen, as my sis can't stand prawns in her mouth but was more than happy to snaffle up the juices! The downside is that she got more than her share of the juices....

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Sep 23 - 06:24 AM

I looked up some recipes for your Catalan prawns and I found one similar to the pil pil recipe on the website food.com (GAMBAS AL AJILLO (SHRIMP W/ GARLIC) CATALONIA). Some other recipes over-egged things a bit too much but that one looks good. Not sure that you need butter, but hey, when is butter ever bad?   One difference is that, in the three places in Andalucía I had the dish, the garlic was not minced but was cut into quite large pieces, maybe each clove cut into about four or five, and plenty of it. We almost wrestled each other to get at those lovely, sweet chunks of garlic. I've said it before and I'll say it again: throw your garlic crusher in the bin! All you need is a sharp little knife. I have one of those cheapie silicone tubes which you put a clove into and roll on the worktop - and out comes a perfectly peeled clove!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Sep 23 - 08:29 PM

This for two people. I happened to have a scant pound of braising steak so I decided to loosely follow an online recipe for Italian beef stew (cheers, Vincenzo!).

Make a soffritto with carrots, onions and celery (as ever) with extra virgin olive oil. Don't cut the veg up too small. You want texture in the stew. Ten minutes' cooking.

Cut your beef (about 400g) into bite size pieces. Stir-fry it with the soffritto for a few minutes, to brown all round.

Add a tablespoon of plain flour and stir for a couple of minutes.

Whack up the heat and add a glass of red wine - keep stirring.

Add about 350 ml of passata or your own tomato sauce. Keep stirring.

Season, then add about 350ml veg stock. I always make my own with onions, celery, carrots, peppercorns, thyme and bay. Simmer for at least two and a half hours. Add a small stick of fresh rosemary.

After one hour, peel a pound or more of spuds, cut into quite big chunks and add to the broth. Discard the rosemary.

Apart from checking the seasoning, you're done. I made this the day before and it was delicious. I did think it wasn't going to work out as a stew because it seemed to be too tomatoey and full of rosemary needles. Ut, begod, it was a triumph, and what a winter dish!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Sep 23 - 04:29 PM

I had a fair bit of leftover sauce from the dish I posted on the 24th. I'm on my own this weekend (nothing sinister to read into that! ) and I had some meatballs that came with an order from a really good online butcher that I use - I hadn't really wanted them, but adding them to my order got me over the threshold to save £5 postage!

Anyway, following the instructions on the pack, I browned the meatballs for a few minutes then simmered them for about twenty minutes in the leftover sauce. They were very nice, but two things: they were quite dense in texture, and they, well, just lacked a bit of character.

Sometimes you need to use bought ready-made things in your recipes so that you can bolster your opinion on your own cooking (as well as saving time in emergencies). I've made Marcella's meatballs a good few times, and you do sometimes wonder (if you're highly self-critical) whether you've done a good job. Well, though tonight's meatballs were fine, give me Marcella's any day. Cheered me up, it did!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 17 Oct 23 - 06:19 PM

"Duck bacon" ???

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 18 Oct 23 - 06:10 PM

No pineapple on pizza. No cream in carbonara. No bloody mushrooms in stews.

(Though a bit of porcini soaking water can be a thing of beauty...)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 05:51 AM

Baked beans are a revolting addition to the full English, and I ask for an extra egg instead. A slice of Macsween's black pudding (available at M&S) is, however, a thing of great beauty. Those nasty little rubbery mushrooms oft included, slimy things, are very unpleasant. I love mushrooms cooked in butter and well-seasoned, then sautéed or done in the oven until all the water has gone from them. But I think they're pretty ruinous in stews. Each to his own. One man's fish is another man's poisson...

I won't buy button mushrooms. Pointless wee things.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 06:10 AM

One thing a good few recipes suggest is to soak dried porcini and use the soaking water (mind the grit!) then chop the fungi and throw them in. This latter step I will never do. The soaking water adds a lot, but the mushrooms have a horrid texture in m'humble.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 07:26 PM

Well I think that mushrooms, as long as they are not button or from a jar, are highly nutritious and highly delicious. We eat them as a side veg at least four times a week, and, in the rare circumstance that we have some that urgently need using up, I have them for breakfast on a slab of buttered toast. I like the big flat ones stuffed with this, that or the other, but just-opening chestnut ones, either sautéed in butter or done in the oven if it's on anyway, are my particular nirvana. Just make sure the water has all gone then add another four minutes.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:31 AM

I would have some sautéed mushrooms with a rare steak. If you have a good-quality steak (gimme ribeye), why drown it in a sauce? Just a spot of seasoning, applied immediately before frying. I want some chips and a few lightly-cooked cherry tomatoes with a good steak, maybe some peas or broad beans.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 01:01 PM

Gosh, I'd have thought that expressing your own taste in a food thread is valid even if it doesn't always concur with other people's. If I told you that basil, oregano and garlic just seems wrong in bolognese sauce, you disagree and told me I was insulting you, I'd think you were very strange. No insult intended. A good steak with its beautiful beefy flavour is not something I'd want to, er, cover with a sauce, that's all. I'm sure your sauce is perfectly delicious.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 20 Oct 23 - 05:09 PM

Ah, you and your garlic press! ;-)

I don't use garlic with steaks, but hey ho. Just a drop of groundnut oil (or, as you say, use the fat from the steak trimmings) and salt and pepper, then a couple of minutes on each side with high heat. I also cook braising steak, cheap cuts that take slow cooking. I might do the whole slabs on top in a covered pan on top my mum's way, or I might cut them into chunks, brown them, simmer in red wine for a bit then add whatever to make a stew over about three hours. Satisfies the folks who don't like the sight of blood... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 21 Oct 23 - 06:26 AM

It isn't often that a shop-bought confection can match home-made, but the M&S "Best Ever" prawn sandwich, under a fiver, comes pretty damn close!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 19 Oct 23 - 03:09 AM

Quartered flat mushers plus a dollop of anchovy sauce added to a beef casserole used to work very well for me. A passable mock steak-and-oyster stew.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 09:37 AM

Wait, a *sweet* prawn sandwich?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Oct 23 - 08:35 PM

Ok, cause, ew.

Stuffed cloves from 2 heads of garlic up the butt of a cornish game hen, sprinkled inside and out with onion powder salt hot pepper. Butter under skin with more garlic. Started in very hot oven, turned down after 20mn. On grill over pie dish. While hen was resting, put asparagus spears in the drippings with all the garlic from inside the bird, roasted 15 mn. Still crunchy. Ate the skin first, of course. Meat juicy juicy.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 10:42 AM

I'm a half-pint shy of two quarts of homemade Italian-style tomato sauce; onions, bell peppers, and homegrown garlic (through the press), oregano and basil finely chopped. Non-sodium salt, freshly ground black pepper (the only kind I use these days), and a little red wine. This batch also had some reconstituted mushrooms, soaked for a long time then cut quite small. Good for flavor, won't be recognizable because I used the stick blender to reduce the size of any chunks to quite small. I added some commercial low-salt tomato paste for a richer color and flavor and to thicken it. Much of this is with purchased tomatoes since my garden produced so little. Divided into three pint and one half-pint jars, all of the sauce is in the freezer.

When I make sauce from my homegrown tomatoes it's a day-long process of picking the perfect tomatoes, washing then cutting in half and setting them into the steam juicer. They steam for up to an hour and in the process release upwards of a gallon of clear yellowish juice. Then the steamed solids are run through a food mill that separates the skin and seeds to one bowl and the sauce solids to another. That is simmered down and either canned plain, or it is made into the Italian style sauce (Ball Blue Book recipe) and any of this output is processed in the hot water bath and stored in the pantry. It is possible to can the juice also, but I usually freeze it in quart jars.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 24 Oct 23 - 11:29 PM

The house smells wonderful this evening after making a batch of yeast dinner rolls. I often add a generous sprinkle of granulated garlic and grind a tablespoon of oregano into the ingredients when the bread machine starts. I use the machine to do the mixing and kneading, but when it is on the manual setting it stops before baking so I take it out and shape into rolls or put bread dough in a loaf pan. I can use potassium salt for making the bread, but find unsalted butter disappointing to spread on them. I suppose I could add my Nu Salt to the butter, but I think I'll just use the sweet butter and know it's adding a measurable amount of sodium to my intake for the day.

Subject: RE: 500 Error - Blocked threads? You can help
From: Thompson
Date: 31 Oct 23 - 02:03 PM

I can read the recipe thread but can't post this:

Parsnip season; I bought from a farmer the other day three gigantic parsnips (knowing from experience that these freshly-dug roots will be tender and delicious). I'll probably chop them in batons, steam them and then bake them in a cheesy sauce with a dessertspoon each of mustard and honey, as usual, but any other suggestions welcomed.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Oct 23 - 10:13 AM

Confection is a word that refers to something confected—that is, put together—from several different ingredients or elements. Often confections are sweet and edible, but confection can also be used to refer to a finely worked piece of craftsmanship. In other words, the lacy box containing chocolate confections can be a confection itself. Tracing back to the Latin verb conficere (“to carry out, perform, make, bring about, collect, bring to completion”), confection entered Middle English as the word confeccioun, meaning “preparation by mixing ingredients; something prepared by mixing, such as a medicine or dish of food...

from Merriam-Webster

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 27 Oct 23 - 12:47 PM

I had to look up "Cornish game hen." They don't come from Cornwall and they are not gamey! I can't think that such a titchy and fast-grown thing could develop much flavour, but I see that you add a lot of flavourings anyway. I cook two sizes of chicken: big five-pounders that I roast for about 110 minutes at 190C, seasoned and buttered all over, a lemon, knob of butter and shallot in the cavity, covered with foil that's removed for the last 30 minutes, and smaller ones, about 3.5 pounds, that I cook "Marcella's way," well-seasoned, no added fat, just two small, pierced lemons in the cavity, half an hour breast down at 180C, same again breast up for half an hour, then with the heat whacked up to 200C for a final 20 minutes. I get the chicken-for-one idea of the mini-hen, but who doesn't love a stack of leftover cold chicken in the fridge for two or three days?

The two of us get three hearty lots of chicken from the big one and a possible bonus sandwich, and two lots from Marcella's. Scraps go in the freezer for a future risotto, or the cat might get a little treat...

I don't put stuffing in the cavity. Instead, I make it into portion-sized balls and bake it on greaseproof paper for 25 minutes while the parsnips and roasties are cooking and the chicken's having a rest. We both devour the skin, but, luckily for me, Mrs Steve always fails to spot that the parson's nose has mysteriously vanished...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 01:11 PM

A friend shared a Spaghetti Carbonara recipe that looks quick and easy and quite delicious!

1 box (16 ounces) spaghetti noodles
1 tablespoon olive oil
8 slices bacon, chopped (can use Pancetta)
1 medium white onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
4 large eggs, beaten
2 cups Parmesan cheese, grated, plus 2 tablespoons for topping
1 pinch salt and black pepper, to taste
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped (optional)

Instructions

In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook spaghetti until al dente (about 8-10 minutes). Drain. (Can reserve a cup of pasta water just in case you want a thinner sauce.)

Toss with 1 tablespoon of olive oil, and set aside.

In a large skillet over medium heat, add chopped bacon and cook until crisp; remove and drain onto paper towels.

To the same skillet over medium heat, add chopped onion. Do not wipe down the skillet before adding the onion.

Once onion is translucent (about 3-5 minutes) add the minced garlic, and cook for one more minute.

Add the spaghetti noodles back into the pan and toss to coat and heat through. Reduce the heat to low.

In a medium bowl, mix together eggs and parmesan cheese. Add this to the noodles and cook, tossing constantly with tongs until eggs and parmesan develop into a light sauce over the noodles.

Add in bacon, salt and pepper to taste, and top with remaining parmesan cheese. (And chopped parsley for garnish if you so desire.)

Serve immediately.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 03:05 PM

Arrgh, Maggie! No onion, no garlic, no oil, no parsley! You can use pecorino, Parmesan or a mixture. I wouldn't add salt as there's salt in the bacon, cheese and pasta water, and loads of black pepper is essential. My infallible (honest!) guide to carbonara is the late-lamented Antonio Carluccio's YouTube. It doesn't get better. Ideally we should use guancale, the cured pig's cheek, but I can't get that round here. Pancetta is great as long as it's in cubes, not thin strips, but I use unsmoked bacon lardons and I get all the fat I need by dry-frying them for the ten or twelve minutes that the spaghetti takes. All I'm saying is that that's what I do, as does Antonio, and if you ignore all this and carry on with all those extra ingredients I'm sure that it'll be delicious. But no true Italian would call it carbonara!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 03:10 PM

Steve, please stop with the dogmatic rejections other people's posts, here and elsewhere! You can politely agree to disagree with things, but just because you don't like onions and garlic and such you don't need to act like I got it wrong. I am not going to look for cured pig cheeks and a recipe without the ingredients I listed strikes me as quite bland.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 03:14 PM

Carbonara: spaghetti, browned guanciale, black pepper, pecorino Romano and beaten eggs. Bacon and eggs, with spaghetti.

But the above sounded delish.

Accidentally made pot roast...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 04:02 PM

Well said, Mrrzy. Maggie's recipe is probably utterly delicious, but carbonara it ain't. Hey, Maggie, I love onions and garlic. I don't know where you got that from, but true carbonara has neither. Most Italian chefs suggest pancetta cut into small cubes if guanciale isn't available. The eggs are one per person plus one extra yolk the way I do it, and a key step is to add the egg/cheese mix to the pasta/ bacon mix only when you've taken the pasta bacon mixture off the heat in order to avoid scrambled egg. You also need to save plenty of pasta water in order to loosen the sauce. I've made carbonara many times according to Carluccio's recipe, more or less, and it's super-simple and super-easy as long as you don't scramble the eggs!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 08:27 PM

I think (no dogma here) that the heart of Italian cooking is its simplicity and its dependence on getting the best ingredients you can lay your hands on. There are fierce culinary battles in Italy about how you make bolognese sauce, puttanesca, arrabbiata, and pizza. Numerous trips to Italy have taught me that it's best not to do battle with the people who really are in the know. If you choose the finest ingredients then you don't need to waste money on a load of herbs, spices and other flavourings. So, no cream in carbonara, no garlic in bolognese or carbonara, no onion in carbonara, no pineapple on pizza, no minced garlic and no ready-grated Parmesan, ever.

I'm not being prescriptive, just telling you like it is. But it's great to do your own thing, and if it works for you no-one has the right to complain. Just try not to say that you're making carbonara when you're not, that's all.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 08 Dec 23 - 10:37 PM

And the pasta shape matters. There is no *spaghetti* bolognese in Italy, I've read.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Dec 23 - 03:54 AM

Correct. Typically they would use a ribbon pasta shape. You do see spag bol on "tourist men2'us" everywhere, however! No "spaghetti meatballs" either! And no cheese on fish!

On the other hand, there are no rules... ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 09 Dec 23 - 03:56 AM

My reading glasses are not by my side...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 Dec 23 - 10:21 AM

No rules? You *are* the rules [grin]!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 09 Dec 23 - 11:25 AM

You can dictate what you think is the "right" way to do things, but for many people, the practical aspect of cooking is to use what is in the cupboard and not always have to run out to find the perfect shaped noodle if it's not on the shelf. I could make it—there is a pasta machine cutter thingie in my closet but I don't use it often. There are lots of shapes of pasta in air-tight containers in the cupboard. Whatever the shape is can be irrelevant if there is an appropriate surface area.

A chicken breast is thawing this morning to bake this afternoon and use for several different meals this week. I find I rarely have a large amount of almost any meat at most meals, it is usually part of something else, like shredded on a salad or in strips with onions and hot peppers and sauce and toppings in a taco or fajita, etc. I have a few tomatoes ripening from the last plant of the season (picked green a couple of weeks ago) that will go nicely on a chef salad - a bed of lettuce topped with the meat, cheese, a sprinkle of nuts and seeds called Tours Mix (a local specialty), Italian dressing (I like a Balsamic one), and the rim of the plate holding quartered tomatoes and halved hard-boiled eggs. This is probably an American concoction. (As is the way more robust Cobb Salad - I get a version at a local seafood place with crab, bacon, cheese, avocado, and a Greek dressing.)

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 10 Dec 23 - 08:56 AM

My kitchen was so clean I cooked in the microwave.

Cabbage
Spices
Cherry tomatoes
Lid! Made lovely soup.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 10 Dec 23 - 12:57 PM

Well some pasta shapes work much better with some sauces than others. We can give helpful ideas here without being accused of being dictatorial, I think. If you make a nice bolognese ragu, then serve it with spaghetti, you'll end up with a little puddle of sauce left in your bowl because it didn't stick to your pasta very well. That's why they never eat it that way in Italy. Not saying that anyone has to follow that as if it's an edict! My family always want it served on spaghetti so I have to give in. They also want garlic and basil in the ragu - yikes. Worst of all, I've been served up spag bol as a heap of spaghetti with a pile of sauce dumped on top. I've had it every which way and I think the Italian (very simple) approach is easily the tastiest. But whatever stirs yer loins.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 11 Dec 23 - 11:03 AM

Garlic is good in everything savory.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 11 Dec 23 - 11:29 AM

Whatever lights yer fire. I love garlic but I just don't want it in everything. I always either squash it with the flat of the knife or slice it up fine. I threw my garlic crusher away years ago. Another good thing to do is to wrap the separated but unpeeled cloves, as many as you like, in a piece of foil with some extra virgin olive oil and bake in the oven for half an hour. You can squeeze the innards out into your dish or just suck them out. Gorgeous.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 22 Dec 23 - 07:56 PM

Does anyone else find the texture of brined pork to be repellent?

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Dec 23 - 12:03 PM

I read you can crisp garlic in the microwave.

You can.

Crushed a ton of garlic, salted slightly, oil to completely cover, deep bowl with lid.

In microwave in 1mn bursts, stir; down to 30 secs as the garlic browns. Took a while. Smelled divine. The lid pops off.

When all the garlic was a deep brown, drained it.

Ended up with a jar of garlic oil and a pile of crunchy, crunchy garlic, to put on top of a lot of things!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 28 Dec 23 - 06:03 AM

Next time you have baked potatoes, do an extra one accidentally on purpose (two if they're not very big). Next morning, microwave them for about 90 seconds. Put them in a bowl and cut them in half. Smother them with a handful of little chunks of diced cheddar cheese, the stronger the better. Microwave for another 90 seconds. Eat. I cut mine up first with kitchen scissors so that I can eat with just a fork but you don't have to do that. A breakfast fit for a king in under five minutes!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Dec 23 - 11:58 AM

Mmmmm. Mashed are best when made with baked potatoes. And I like Nora Ephron's idea, a thin slice of cold butter on each individual bite.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 29 Dec 23 - 01:41 PM

I brined sockeye salmon this week and smoked it as a gift for family members. Soy sauce, pickling salt (no additives in it), sugar, dried onion and garlic, and white wine. It came out great.

I also marinated lamb to make souvlaki - white wine, olive oil, lemon juice, bay leaf, salt and pepper. Another hit with the family.

A friend brings in bakery cookies from her son's bakery and they really are dreadful, too sweet, white flour, and coated with brightly colored icing. We managed to send them on their way when she went out for the day with her daughter. Someone else can toss them. (I made small crispy Finnish cardamom cookies this year that are pretty darned addictive.)

The next few days will all be leftovers.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 30 Dec 23 - 09:48 AM

Ah, the sweets I didn't make this year, all mom's old recipes:

Florentines
Daiquiri balls

The ones I didn't get a care package of:

Marzipan
Mud cookies

I vent my resentment here...

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 31 Dec 23 - 03:03 PM

My new thing is the cold oven. Usually I sauté aromatics, reserve, sear meat, deglaze, add veg, all on stovetop, then pop in preheated oven. I then have a dirty pan, plate, and utensils, and stovetop, too. And a chopping board and knife.

Kitchen stays much cleaner, and I haven't noticed any taste or texturre difference, if instead I layer everything, raw, and pop into cold oven, then turn oven on.

Made a venison paprikás by putting garlic (should have been bacon grease, I know, Mom) on the bottom of the dish with hot paprika, then onion and celery with marjoram and some salt, then cherry tomatoes and zucchini for some liquid, then the meat dry rubbed with more paprika and smeared with beef bouillon paste, then mushrooms with thyme and a little more salt, and a hefty splash of wine. Nothing but knife and chopping board to wash. The added preheating time wasn't as much as the saved sautéing, reserving, searing etc. time, either.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: BobL
Date: 01 Jan 24 - 08:03 AM

Interesting. One of my pizza recipes says bung it in a cold oven with the heat turned up to maximum, give it 15 minutes instead of the usual 10. Works just as well as preheating.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 24 - 09:38 AM

We bought a cooker with an induction hob a couple of years ago. We have one or two pans that aren't compatible but, apart from that, we think it's brilliant. You can get things up to the boil ultra-fast and nothing ever burns on to the hob. If you carelessly splatter stuff all over it it's just an easy wipe-up, no scouring or scraping. Learning how to control the heating-up and simmering is a learning curve, but we got there!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 02 Jan 24 - 11:48 AM

Garlic OIL, sorry.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Jan 24 - 03:21 PM

Ok, new cut of meat, for me: what they called Easy-carve leg of lamb, which is boneless on top but not bottom.

Day 1: Put a lot each of that peeled garlic I love, whole white peppercorns, and rosemary, and a little each of grosgrain mustard and olive oil, into a food processor, made mush.
Untied the leg, opened that end up, crammed every nook and slathered the outside with the mush, wrapped the leg tightly in parchment paper. Put in fridge.
Day 2: brought leg to room temp. Unwrapped, rewrapped the meat around the boneless end, retied it tightly. Put leg in roasting pan. To keep the mush that was falling off from burning, put some white wine in bottom of roasting pan. Just before sticking into preheated 450 oven, poured a little garlic oil onto the top, rubbed that in. Hot oven 15 mn, then 350 for an hour. Let sit out of oven while deglazing roasting pan, finishing any accompaniements, and so on. Pour deglazed juices into separator.
It made a marvy crust. Marvy juices. The lamb was perfectly rare -in fact, I wouldn't have minded another 15 mn, but I took the edge piece.

Success at first leg!

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 03 Jan 24 - 06:15 PM

Boil up your lamb leg, feed it to the cat and go out to buy a whole shoulder of lamb on the bone. If your butcher removes the neck fillet yet still wants to sell it as "whole shoulder," change your butcher. Put the lamb into a big roasting tin, season it lightly and insert four or five sprigs of fresh rosemary into its cracks and crevices. Put it into an oven at 120°C and leave it untouched for at least six hours. You can whack the oven up for the last 20 minutes to crisp up the outside. Let it rest for at least half an hour. Believe me, you will never regret doing this. And you won't need a knife to "carve" it.

As for cooking it with garlic, I'd say that's fine (with whole cloves) if you have a big gathering who will help you to devour the whole lot. If you want meat for cold, however, it's best to leave the garlic out.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 Jan 24 - 01:57 PM

Leftover lamb, fried with zucchini and a lot of cumin and ginger. Used most of the meat. Bone and fat and all will make broth, later.

Subject: RE: BS: The other recipe thread is too long
From: Mrrzy
Date: 03 Feb 24 - 03:40 PM

I made my own paté, waaay easier than pie. 7 mn, from get the duck fat out of the fridge, to put the mixture into a ramekin to put back in fridge. It is delicious. No idea it was so simple.

What happened was, when I thawed my duck from the farmer, it had no liver in it, which I noted to the seller. Apparently they don't include the duck livers like they do with the geese, but because I was disappointed, have a free pound of duck livers.

So I found a recipe for 1 duck liver, followed it (mostly), found the mixture too runny so in went a second duck liver, looked good. Then I made another one with the other 3 livers just by hand, based broadly on the recipe.

I can't tell'm apart.

Original recipe ingredients: 3 oz duck fat, 1 large shallot, 1 duck liver, 1/4 t herbes de provence, 1 peeled crushed garlic clove, 1/4 t salt, 1 t cognac.

Melt fat, add the some onion I subbed, the garlic, the bouquet garni I subbed; after a bit, add the liver, in pieces, dried better than I did, wow that was some splatter, you should see my forearm. Once the liver has no pink, put in food processor with the cognac, process to mush. This is where it was too runny, so I fried up that second liver in the still-greasy pan, and processed some more. Put in ramekin to solidify.

So for the second one, I used 3 livers and only 1 oz of duck fat plus another oz of my garlic oil, a little more onion, everything else pretty much the same. This is the one I've been eating with cornichons, to avoid the bread.

The other one is frozen, for science. The recipes all said it would freeze well.

A recipe I haven't tried, but might some day, is this:

8 oz. duck liver, chopped
1 oz cognac
1 1/4 cups heavy cream
6 tbsp. unsalted butter, cubed
1 1/2 tsp. kosher salt
3 egg yolks

Heat oven to 300°. Line a 9" x 5" x 2¾" loaf pan with plastic wrap, letting at least 4" hang over the edges; set aside. Purée liver, cognac, cream, butter, salt, and yolks in a food processor until smooth. Press mixture through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl. Spread into prepared pan; fold excess plastic over top of pan. Place pan into a 9" x 13" baking dish; pour boiling water into dish to come halfway up outside of pan. Bake until slightly firm, about 35 minutes, or until an instant-read thermometer inserted into middle of mousse registers 150°. Chill until completely firm, at least 4 hours.

Any of you guys made your own?