07.22.07
Posted in cooking, food at 8:53 pm by Hanne Blank
Here is part of what you would have had:
Sockeye salmon steaks au poivre fumé (With my thanks to the glorious Barbara of Neopol Savory Smokery, who made the smoked black pepper! Hi Barbara!). For another view of the salmon steak, click here.
I served the salmon along with with spinach stirfried with ginger and garlic; spears of sweet Japanese cucumber; and jasmine rice.
For dessert:
That’d be fresh, peeled lychee in a bowl of ice, one of the easiest and most delicious finger-food desserts around. (Do it with cherries, too, it’s outrageous. Or tiny sweet plums, like Methleys. Fantastico. For extra points, serve in a big crystal bowl, or if there ain’t no one around but us chickens or you, like me, haven’t got a crystal bowl, any old bowl will do, really.)
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07.12.07
Posted in cooking, culture, domesticity, food, how to at 8:01 am by Hanne Blank
When got back to Maryland on Monday night from Ohio and my mother’s house, I had several of her old cookbooks in tow. I am very happy about this, because I have been sort of hinting to my mom for years now that when she was ready to give up her old cookbooks, I was ready to give them shelf space. Finally, after many years of my hinting, it was time.
I am nowhere near proud enough not to admit that my favorite of these older cookbooks, and the ones I wanted most for her to give me, are the sorta trashy ones. Parent-Teacher Association cookbooks from my grade school, for instance, the kind with recipes for s’mores and play-doh on adjacent pages. A totally cheeseball but fantastico cookbook that is a compilation of recipes from 1970s-era Deep Southern charity, Hadassah, League of Women Voters, and Junior League cookbooks, and which has the hands-down Intergalactic Blue Ribbon best recipe, ever, for hush puppies. (I note that this is also a cookbook in which there are a few recipes which include the instruction “advise your cook” of such-and-so, suggesting that the ladies to whom the recipes were attributed likely did not always actually cook them themselves. O tempora! O mores!)
One of my favorites, maybe my most favorite, is the 1965 Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. I learned to cook many things, particularly cookies, from this cook book, and most of the recipes are still pretty sturdy. It also has some excellent simple recipes for “variety meats,” as organ meats were known back in the day before Fergus Henderson made “nose-to-tail eating” a matter of some preoccupation for foodie trendsters, which could be revived to considerable benefit.
Then again, some of its recipes have not, shall we say, aged well. I present to you:
Bologna-Rice Skillet
(Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book, 1965)
One four-and-five-eighths-ounce package precooked rice (1 1/3 cups)
1/2 pound big Bologna, cut in 1/2-inch cubes (about 1 2/3 cups)
1/2 cup extra-spicy catsup
2/3 cup hot water
One 3-ounce can (2/3 cup) broiled sliced mushrooms
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
2 Tablespoons chopped green pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 Tablespoons butter
Combine all ingredients in skillet. Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently, till hot. Cover tightly, reduce heat, an let stand about 5 minutes or till done. Serves 4.
Mmmm, mmm, good, what? To make it up to you, though, here’s one of my favorite recipes from this cookbook from when I was a kid:
Apple Fritters
(Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book, 1965)
1 1/3 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 beaten eggs
2/3 cup milk
1 Tablespoon salad oil
3 cups small matchstick strips of apple [emphasis in original]
Sift dry ingredients together. Blend eggs, milk, and salad oil; add dry ingredients all at once and mix until just moistened. Stir in apple strips. Drop from tablespoon into deep hot fat (375 degrees F). Fry until puffy and golden, 3 to 4 minutes; turn once. Drain on paper towels. While warm, sprinkle with confectioner’s sugar. Serve at once. Makes 3 dozen.
For the record, these are kind of addictive, and you should save this recipe to make them in the fall when the first really good firm tart apples come in. I usually add some cinnamon and allspice and a tiny pinch of ground cloves, too. Oh, and substituting soy milk for milk works fine, though I haven’t tried them with egg replacer so I can’t say whether that works.
When I have time, I may root through some of the other cookbooks and share some of the more amusing recipes from those, too.
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07.11.07
Posted in arrrrgh, cats, cooking, domesticity, food, housekeeping, humor, original recipes at 9:43 am by Hanne Blank
First, buy a hunk of beef. A piece of round roast, eye in this case rather than bottom, because it was super-duper cheap because its sell-by date was today and I bought it yesterday when they were doing their darndest to clear it out and I knew I’d be cooking it today.
Next, put the hunk of beef in the freezer. It’s a lot easier to cut meat into small uniform pieces if it’s partially frozen, so leave it in there for an hour and a half or so. Not long enough to freeze all the way hard, but definitely long enough to firm it up thoroughly.
Remove the beef from the freezer. Unwrap, and place on cutting board. Get out your favorite butcher’s knife or cleaver and slice meat across the grain into finger-thick slices. Then take each slice and cut into four or five crosswise strips, and then cut the strips into 1/2-inch dice.
Pile the chopped meat at one end of the cutting board while you get out a large heavy cast-iron pan and put a small but workable quantity of oil in the bottom, and put it on a highish heat.
Turn around to find that your kitten has soundlessly levitated up onto the cutting board and is standing with one paw half on the blade of the knife, half off — the sharp side, too — and the other paw smack in the middle of your pile of meat while he does his level best to eat as much as he possibly can. Realize that shouting may result in a cat with a sliced paw due to cat’s foot placement.
Carefully, use right hand to grasp knife handle and press sharp edge of blade firmly against cutting board while grasping scruff of cat’s neck with left hand. Lift cat from cutting board, ignoring the chunk of meat dangling from his claw and the one hanging out of his mouth. Deposit cat on kitchen floor, where he will look offended and continue to eat the beef he managed to take with him.
Ponder what to do now that a cat has been dancing in your raw meat. Cat will now look up at you with wide pitiable eyes and meow at you in as plaintive a starving-orphan-kittycat fashion as he can manage. Vent frustration with cat by stomping, hissing, yelling, waving arms, and flapping your skirts at him until he runs and hides in the basement.
Return to kitchen, asking self the question “WWJD?” In this case that means “What Would Julia Do?” (Despite the fact that Julia Child never actually <i>did</i> drop a roast on the air (see Snopes for details), nor yet had a cat marching about in her ingredients, I feel sanguine that she would’ve figured out a good solution if she had.)
Resolve that
a) this meat will be first seared at a high heat, then boiled in and subsequently simmered all day in an acidic (tomato) liquid, so
b) it is unlikely to successfully breed any nasty bacteria despite having been partially trodden by my horrible kitten.
Wash the meat in plenty of cold running water anyhow, for the purpose of rinsing off any yuk or cat hairs introduced in the feline snacking process. Be sure to turn down the heat under your pan, or the oil will start to smoke. Note that at this point, your ankles are being made ardent love to, and that an insistent chorus of chirps and trills is emanating from under your skirt. (Yes, I have a singing pussy. He’s quiet when he wants to be, though, quod erat very much previously demonstrandum.)
Ignore Feline Aria of Loving Adoration And Hopeful Petition For More Beefy Goodness. Similarly ignore equally loving and similarly hopeful looks from the dog, who has come to see what’s going on because if the kitten is getting some of that meat, he wants a cut of the action.
Sear beef cubes heavily on all sides, then remove them to the stockpot.
Roughly dice four onions and saute until transparent in the oil and rendered fat from the beef, in the same pan.
While onions are cooking, open one large can crushed tomatoes and one large can diced tomatoes. Go to dump can of diced tomatoes into stockpot. Stumble badly due to treading on the tail of the aforementioned kitten, who until that instant had been operating on the assumption that if singing to me didn’t get me to give him anything, the least he could do was sprawl across the middle of the kitchen floor to keep an eye on things in case some meat magically flew out of the pot and landed on the floorboards. In attempt to not fall, lose grip on open can of tomatoes.
Chase tomato-splashed kitten in an attempt to grab him before he can get tomato on the couch (cream-coloured), upstairs carpet (light tan), or bedspread (light blue). Get an escort from the dog, who wants to know what’s going on, but really doesn’t care because he thinks this thing where we both chase the kitten up the stairs is a fantastic game.
Catch tomato-splashed kitten despite canine assistance. Without heed to how much tomato gets all over one’s own person, deposit kitten in bathtub and rinse clean, ignoring heart-rending yowls and pleas for someone, anyone, for the love of God, to contact Kitty Amnesty International.
Towel-dry and release kitten, who jets off into the bedroom to lick himself the rest of the way dry. Wonder why you didn’t think of just dousing him with water earlier, as the task of licking himself dry seems likely to keep him occupied for some time.
Return to kitchen. Open reserve can of diced tomatoes, add to stockpot, along with can of crushed tomatoes. Fill both cans with water and add that to the stockpot, too. Turn heat on under stock pot to a medium flame.
Clean tomato and/or tomato juice off of more kitchen surfaces than you thought possible. Scoop up as much from the floor as you can, and discard. Sop up the liquid with sponge and paper towel. Then mop the floor, which has now been mopped twice in two days, thank you very much.
Add chili powder, oregano, a handful of peeled garlic cloves (whole), and some epazote to the stockpot and stir. Notice as you are doing this that you missed several little spots of tomato juice on the cupboard-fronts.
Sponge clean the affected cupboard-fronts.
Look despondently at the other ingredients you’ve set out in order to do the other cooking you planned to do this morning, and instead of embarking immediately upon making tabbouleh or cha siu, go sit down with the computer for a bit instead while the meat and onions have a chance to simmer. You’ll put beans in later, as per usual. Do not under any circumstances think about the fact that eating raw meat tends to give the kitten an upset stomach.
No, really. Do not think about it. It’s not going to help, anyway. That train has left the station. There is nothing in the world you can do.
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