We made a rack of ribs on Sunday because I had to work late tonight. Why can’t people work normal hours like 6am-3pm? These late afternoon (3pm) meetings kill when I have to deal with traffic. Our ribs were pretty simple:
2 lbs baby back ribs
Chili powder
Garlic powder
Fenugreek powder
Squeeze of honey
Salt and pepper
Just slather the ribs in the dry ingredients then coat with honey to make sure it sticks. Wrap in foil and bake 250 degrees for 3 hours. Then warm up on low heat for about 30 minutes
Beans my wife made while I was stuck in traffic were awesome
1 tbsp BBQ sauce
1 tbsp maple syrup
salt
ground mustard seed
onion powder
chili powder
1 tsp dijon mustard
Can of kidney beans
small handful fresh cilantro
Mix all but cilantro together and cook over low heat for about 15 minutes. Add cilantro and cook for another 15 minutes. Done and super tasty.
For a starch, she boiled a few red potatoes. Easy weeknight meal with a little Sunday prep.
I forgot to grab the chicken thighs at the store the other day so we had to sacrifice the thick cut pork chops that we supposed to be grilled on Wednesday when we would have a bit more time. Flavors were right but pork is just not my favorite protein for a curry.
Our curry was:
1 C sheep yogurt
Cumin powder
Coriander powder
Garlic powder
Fenugreek powder
Salt and pepper
2 pork chops cut into 1/2 inch cubes
1/2 medium onion
3 carrots
1 can coconut milk
Mix together first 6 ingredients and throw in pork. Marinate in fridge for about 30 minutes or however much time you have. I like to do this overnight but wasn’t on the ball yesterday. With a glug of olive oil, saute the carrots and onion over medium-low heat. Once onion is translucent, add pork and marinade and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the coconut milk and simmer until pork is tender. We did it about 15 minutes but should have gone longer.
For the dahl:
1 C. red lentils
1 quart vegetable broth
Cumin
Coriander
Garlic powder
Simply throw everything in a pan and cook over low heat for about 25 minutes.
Our favorite rice right now is Indian Basmati. We just do a 2:1 ratio of water to rice and cook, covered over low heat.
My fermentation station is starting to take shape. At present, I have going: kombucha, garlic-honey, Sriracha mimic hot sauce, and Tepache. I bought some raw soy beans today to start a miso for the next year and to see what “fresh” tamari really tastes like. Then I remembered all of my fermentation jars are taken and my mason jars are running on short supply. Next weekend, the start of miso as I figure out where to find some more non-reactive jars/pottery. The fun part for me is that this are all experiments and I don’t know how they will turn out. Even better, the investment is in waiting time and not money or active time. For example, we bought a pineapple for dessert the other day. I took the peels with some ginger that needed to get used and mixed it with a cup of sugar and enough water to fill the vessel. If it turns black and nasty, I wasted a cup of sugar. The mock Sriracha is just a bag of Fresno chilies with a few cloves of garlic small bit of sugar and salt. Again, if it is nasty, I am out about $5 worth of chilies. Kombucha is the only thing that I am really excited about and have talked about it previously. I really like kombucha in the morning and think it sets me up for the day. I am growing to like mine more than the commercial varieties, though I have only made one batch and a second on the way. Happy fermenting all. If anyone has some suggestions about what I should try next, please send them along.
As a side note, my successful cured salmon has led me to try to make duck prosciutto over the next few weeks. A bit bigger investment than other experiments but $15 for a duck and $2 for salt, have cheese clothe and twine lying around. So at worst I am out $20 for an experiment. If it works, I had a ton of fun and didn’t get sucked into spending $35 for one breast at the farmers’ market.
As a second side note, I am pretty proud of the back splash in my kitchen that I put in when we moved in.
Today is Super Bowl Sunday and we had a wonderful time watching the Dog Bowl, Puppy Bowl, and Kitty Halftime Show. To get in the spirit, my wife thought we should used the flavors of a Super Bowl party to make dinner. Her idea and execution was to combine a nicely baked rockfish with some fresh salsa, guacamole and chips. To make the salsa:
1 roughly chopped heirloom tomato
4 green onions
1/2 Fresno chili
small handful chopped cilantro
1/2 C frozen fire roasted corn
2 shishito peppers
Juice from 1 lime
salt
Glug of olive oil
Just mix everything up and let set in fridge for an hour or so. You could easily substitute some fresh store made pico de gallo instead
You can either just buy some fresh guacamole or just mash up some:
2 ripe avocados
1/4 white onion finely diced
small handful cilantro
1 jalapeno or Fresno
Juice of 1 lime
salt
For the Rock fish, preheat oven to 350 degrees and put a glug of olive oil in the bottom of a pyrex pan big enough to handle your fillet of fish. Ours was on the order of a pound so we cut it up into portions and put in a 9×9 pan. Put a little salt on top and cook about 20 minutes or until nicely opaque.
Today we decided to have turkey burgers and chips for dinner. In a normal family that would mean a simple turkey burger and some Ruffles. In our family that means an experiment with miso-turkey burger, homemade sweet potato chips with various dips, and some toppings that most people wouldn’t think about.
For the dips, we made two. One based on an idea of Ranch and the other on Tzatziki. For the Ranch, mix together:
1 carton plain goat yogurt
handful dill
shake of garlic powder
2 green onions
handful cilantro
some dried oregano
some dried basil
salt and pepper
Mix it all up and done.
For the Tzatziki:
1/2 cucumber, grated
1 carton plain goat yogurt
shake of garlic powder
salt and pepper
For the miso-turkey burgers, we mixed:
1 lb ground dark turkey meat
2 Tbsp red miso
1 inch grated ginger
3 cloves grated garlic
Mix it all together and let rest in fridge for at least an hour. Then grill, either inside or out, until done. Make sure they are not pink anymore.
For the chips, we tried a bit of an experiment in that we used the “ripple” side of the mandolin tonight as well as the flat side. We did 3 yams/sweet potatoes and sliced them thinly. Fry over medium heat until the bubbles nearly stop and they are slightly brown.
This is only 1/4 of what was served
Serve everything with some vegetables for toppings and whatever topping you want.
As an additional experiment, we made soy-honey onion jam. We used:
3 onions, halved and sliced into 1/8-1/4 inch thick slices
1/4 C. olive oil
1/3 C. rice vinegar
2 big squirts honey
1/4 C. soy sauce
Put onions and olive oil in pan over low heat for about 30 minutes until onions start to turn translucent but not brown. Mix together other ingredients and add to the pan and continue to cook over low for another 30 minutes. When liquid separates from oil, turn off heat. Let cool and using a slotted spoon separate onions from oil and set aside in a mason jar. Cool and serve whenever you want a little pizzazz.
For my wife’s birthday, we made meatloaf and mashed potatoes. As always, I make way too much mashed potatoes because I love making gnocchi and potato pancakes. Since we had another early dismissal today due to weather, the whole gang is in on the action. For the gnocchi:
2 Cups leftover mashed potatoes
4 eggs
About 2 Cups flour or enough to make it “look right”
salt
Blend everything together in the stand mixer until it has the right consistency by adjusting the flour. Wrap in plastic wrap and let rest 30 minutes. In batches roll into about 1/2 inch wide logs. Cut logs every 1/2 inch and pinch slightly. You could use a fork to give them the traditional shape but we didn’t bother. Let rest while you make all the rest of the meal. Then boil in salted water until they float.
For the sauce, we used:
1 green pepper
1 red pepper
2 medium shallots
3 cloves garlic
1 can tomato paste
1 can whole peeled tomatoes
1 can tomato puree
Handful of basil
Some left over thyme, because….
Salt and pepper
Saute the veg until translucent. Add tomato paste and saute until it gets nice and dark red/brown. Add tomatoes and puree and herbs. Simmer for about 30 minutes.
For the meatballs:
1 lb ground beef
2 eggs
salt and pepper
dried oregano
dried basil
1/2 C milk
Enough breadcrumbs to make the right consistency
Mix everything together and put in fridge to get the bread crumbs nice a soft. Roll into small balls and through into the simmering sauce until they have cooked through.
Make the gnocchi and serve with sauce and meatballs.
Some of those that have commented have asked me to include some pics of the intermediate results. Will try going forward.
My year long experiment has reached the conclusion of its first month. My metrics for success are that I continue to enjoy both cooking and logging my ideas/recipes/experiments. Cooking has become more fun because we are now having longer discussions about how to style the food for the pictures, what we would change next time, what everyone wants to eat for the day/week depending on how far in advance we are planning. Having never cataloged what we eat, I am amazed that within a month, we never ate the same thing. This wasn’t planned, this is just how we live. Even better I have had conversation with friends, coworkers, yoga teachers about what we are thinking about tonight/this weekend. It has been a success in the first month and am happy I am doing this. Best comment I have received from someone was “I tried your Bao recipe with some small modifications in the cut of meat and my wife said it was the best thing I have made. I told her it was your recipe and her response was, sorry.”
11 months (or more) to go and hopefully I will start repeating some recipes so that the cataloging is faster. But 31 days in, 34 posts, 2 dinners out, and lots of fun experimenting and cooking.
The best thing I have learned is that my love of fermentation has been renewed though not with beer but with food. I will be sharing my “fermentation station” in the future as a ode to Brad Leone from Bon Appetite. We had to make a special place in the kitchen for all the experiments that I have in mind. Living in the suburbs has its advantages of having a huge kitchen.
Keep cooking and experimenting and getting the kids involved.
It was my wife’s birthday today and everyone gets to choose when it’s their birthday in our house. She made it easy and decided on meatloaf and mash potatoes. We tried a new meatloaf recipe since I have been watching way too many Italian cooking shows recently and tried to tie in some of the meatball ideas into a meatloaf. The basic idea was to create a milk and bread slurry and mix it in with the typical recipe. Here was our idea:
1 C. coarse bread crumbs
1 C. whole milk
2 lbs ground beef
1 lb ground pork
3 carrots, finely diced
3 celery stalks, finely diced
1 onion, finely diced
dried oregano
dried basil
4 eggs
salt and pepper
Make a slurry out of the bread crumbs and milk. Meanwhile, saute the carrots, celery and onion in a glug of olive oil. When nearly translucent, add oregano, basil, salt and pepper. In a big bowl mix everything together and mix until a pretty uniform consistency. Put into a couple loaf pans. Tonight we tried two toppings. This is a contentious issue in our house as I tried to experiment when I should just stick with ketchup. So one was ketchup and then I notice the dregs of a bottle of semi-cheap balsamic vinegar that needs to be used. I turn about a 1/2 cup balsamic into a reduction over medium heat for about 10-15 minutes. Top the meatloaf with what ever topping you want. Bake at 350 degrees for about an hour or until a temp of about 160. Make sure you let them rest for a bit.
For the mash potatoes, we had about 4 lbs of Yukon gold and russet potatoes from some earlier meals so we just cut them up and boiled until they were nice and soft. To make them mashed, I used my Christmas present to myself of a stand mixer and added:
1 pint sour cream
1 stick butter
salt and pepper
Mix it all up with the whisk attachment. Done.
Somehow everyone thinks gravy is hard and are amazed that I seem to serve gravy whenever people come over. This one is super simple.
1 box (quart) of beef broth
1/4 cup of flour
1 C. cold water
Reduce the beef broth by about half then mix flour and water into a slurry. Add the slurry to the reduced broth and continue to stir until it achieves what you want in terms of consistency.
Last, some greens. The dino kale was on sale at the market so that’s what we made. Just a simple saute in some olive oil for a couple minutes and done. Wife and son were both happy so a successful birthday.
Our make ahead this week is a simple chicken enchilada. Some nice comfort food because the Polar Vortex is supposed to hit us later in the week. We were also able to find blue corn tortillas at the market this morning so got even more excited. We decided to make our own sauce to see how it would turn out.
4 vine ripe tomatoes, roughly chopped
handful of cherry tomatoes
1 onion, diced
Chili powder
Coriander
Cumin
Fenugreek powder
Cayenne pepper
Cinnamon
Salt
2 Cups chicken broth
Saute the tomatoes and onion until the tomatoes are starting to fall apart and the onions become translucent. Add all the spices and chicken broth and simmer for about 15 minutes. Put everything into a blender and whiz it up. Put back in pan and reduce until it gets to the right consistency, about 15 minutes for us.
Meanwhile, we poached 2 chicken breasts in broth to make shredded chicken. You could just you a rotisserie chicken to make it easier. Mix some of the sauce with the shredded chicken and a handful of chopped cilantro and 1/2 a diced onion.
To make the enchiladas, warm up the corn tortillas in damp paper towels in the microwave for about 30-45 seconds. Fill each tortilla with the chicken mixture and roll placing seam side down in a 9×13 pan. Continue until you run out of filling. Pour rest of sauce over the top and top with shredded cheese. This week we used a cheddar-jack blend with some cotija that we had leftover from last weeks corn salsa. Bake uncovered at 375 degrees for about 20 minutes or until it is nice a bubbly. We heated it up mostly in the oven and then popped it in the microwave for about 4 minutes because we were hungry.
Early dismissal today due to a snowstorm so we had a bit of unplanned extra time in the kitchen as a family. We had planned on eating the make ahead from Sunday but decided it could wait until tomorrow. Tonight we were able to have a full two course meal with an appetizer and all. We had calamari and monk fish in the fridge so we thought a bit of fried calamari for an appetizer and the monk fish for dinner.
Calamari is super simple and think people should eat it ate home rather than just when they go out. In the summer, we marinate it with garlic and lime juice and then quickly grill it. Tonight it was fried. Simple recipe:
1.2 lb calamari (we just used bodies but I like the tentacles too) cut into rings
1/2 C flour
2-3 Tbsp Old Bay
Put the flour and Old Bay in a baggy and add calamari rings and shake up. Put about 1/4 inch of canola oil in a pan and fry about 2 minutes per side. Sprinkle with a little salt and serve. I drizzle a little Sriracha but you could do whatever you wanted.
Picture is only half as I couldn’t keep the family away while I cooked the second batch.
For dinner we just used the same dredge as the calamari and fried it as well. Because, why not. I really like monk fish but make sure you remove the membrane as if you don’t it turns out super weird. I fried them turning a couple times to get all sides until an internal temperature of 140 degrees and then let rest for about 5 minutes. For the sides we did some beets sauteed with salt and pepper and some pink rice. As a special treat, my son was playing around with some flour, sugar, water, baking powder, and frozen corn. He really wanted to make a little dough and we threw it in the oil to see what would happen. Was a really nice pseudo corn doughnut. Cooked in a couple minutes. As with everything, I like to encourage experiments and just see what happens. He is now making some weird ice cubes as well.
