Peel carrots and slice about 1/4-inch thick. Place in large, shallow skillet with enough to water just to cover. Add a generous pinch of salt and a good amount of butter. Bring to a simmer, and cook until carrots are easily pierced with a sharp knife.
Remove carrots from pan with a slotted spoon, and continue to cook until liquid is reduced to a glaze.
Remove from heat, return carrots to pan, mix to coat, and check seasoning. Serve immediately, or at room temperature (and this batch of leftovers was delicious in some shrimp/sausage fried wontons).
When I started this blog, my goal was to post at least once a month, and I've met that goal until recently. My spouse is in the armed forces and, of late, frequently away from home for long stretches, leaving adult energy stretched thin down here South of Sunnybrook.
I've always been a big fan of family dinners. I loved them when I was a kid, and I love them now. I find it harder to have regular family meals when the other adult is gone, but the ritual of dinner, the giving of thanks and sharing with each other, this is what keeps us sane.
I think the idea of family dinner can be intimidating sometimes. But a bucket of fried chicken around the table is "family dinner." Baked potatoes and broccoli is family dinner. I prefer homemade, but it certainly doesn't have to be fancy.
"It is what it is"
And on the night I took the picture above, I'd been working for a day or two at one end of the table, with beans drying at the other end, and the kids had colored there in the afternoon. As you can see, we just scooped out spaces for our plates and lit the candles (which "makes it special" according to my kids). By the time the fish was ready, I just didn't have the energy to lead a full-on table clearing, so I let it go.
Sometimes the perfect is the enemy of the good. On this night, we laughed, and shared, and had a great time surrounded by the detritus of our busy, bountiful lives.
And just after I posted this, a friend shared this link on Facebook. Quote: "...life on this little blue planet is too precious and fragile to be spent lamenting crusted Raisin Bran in the sink. That what really matters is grace, forgiveness, and understanding. And love. Always, unequivocally and without fail, love."
As today is the Labor Day holiday here in the U.S., I thought it fitting to begin the day with Labor (today: laundry and organizing) and then go for a pre-lunch Bloody Mary. Imagine my dismay when I realized that we had no Bloody Mary mix in the pantry. I did spy some V8 juice, but I'd much rather drink that plain than mix it with anything.
Looks delicious, doesn't it?
In general, I try to find the advantages of every situation so I told myself, "well, a V8 isn't really festive, but I guess all in all it's a healthy option," when I remembered that I have a freaking Kitchen Garden! I have an abundance of fresh tomatoes and herbs and such. Surely there is no need for me to go without my beverage of choice on this holiday. It's not exactly urban homesteading, but it's a nice degree of self-sufficiency.
I am glad I embarked upon this endeavor! And I strongly encourage you to try this.
If you can make a smoothie, you can make your own Awesome Fresh Bloody Mary!
Here are my ingredients: fresh tomatoes (Super Sioux and Martino's Roma), fresh parsely, fresh basil, one fresh serrano pepper (most of seeds/pith removed) leftover chopped tomatoes/onions (in bowls) from last night's dinner, cucumber, juice from one lime, horseradish, worcestershire, salt, pepper. Lemon is for garnish.
Chop tomatoes, cucumber and put in blender with other ingredients. Puree, taste, and adjust seasonings.
Now, some people may prefer to peel the tomatoes beforehand, but that is way too much trouble (and heat, and energy) for me. After pureeing, I just strained out the seeds/skin with a sieve, as described here. Seriously easy. The whole process, start to finish (including taking these pictures and two interruptions from children) was less than a half-hour.
Wow...could it be better than Zing Zang?
Becky's Bloody Mary Mix...I like the sound of it! The tiny chef inside said to put it in the fridge for an hour to let the flavors marry, but the tiny scientist inside wanted to try right away and an hour later to see if there was a difference. The tiny bacchanalian agreed with the scientist, so I went ahead and made an experiment.
The result is a Bloody Mary with a nice initial "kick" from the pepper and a nice depth of spice from the horseradish. I was pleasantly surprised by the sweetness from the fresh tomatoes. I loved the citrus and cucumber mixed in there -- very refreshing! As I suspected, the flavor was overall better on the second one. I also went low on the salt, with the plan of doing a salt-rimmed glass, but (as you can see) I forgot, so I ground a little sea salt right on top and let it "melt" into the beverage as I sipped. That was quite nice also.
There is nothing like still-warm-from-the-oven bread on the dinner table.
I absolutely love freshly-baked breads and muffins, but have always found kneading/rising and the intricacies of yeast to be daunting. It all just seemed like a lot of work when I can pick up a really nice loaf of bread at the bakery for a special dinner. Then I started hearing/reading about "no-knead artisan bread" and was intrigued. Finally, about two years ago, I stumbled across this "Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day, Seriously" post and decided to give it a try.
Basically, it goes like this: dump ingredients into bowl, mix, cover loosely/let rise, put in fridge. Later, cut off dough, let sit, put in oven, eat yummy bread. Have I mentioned how my family raves about this bread? So, here it is again, with pictures. A printable recipe is here.
My ingredients: Flour (my "everyday" flour is a mix of unbleached white and King Arthur's white wheat), flaxseed meal, yeast, kosher salt, and warm water.
Put 1 1/2 Tablespoons of kosher salt and 1 1/2 Tablespoons of active dry yeast in a large bowl. If you are using the packets of yeast (this is what I bought at first), use two. Now that I make bread often, I buy yeast in bulk. I keep a jar of yeast in the fridge for regular use and store the rest in the freezer.
Add 3 cups of warm water (from the tap is fine). It should feel warm to the touch, but not hot.
Add 6 1/2 cups of unbleached all-purpose flour, using the "scoop and sweep" method to measure. This is a great place to experiment! Whole wheat, spelt flour, sprouted grains flour, etc. Here, I used 6 cups of my unbleached white/white wheat mix and 1/2 cup of flax meal. I love the subtle, nutty flavor of flax meal, it gives a beautiful color/texture to the bread, and it's also a really great thing to put into our bodies.
Mix until there are no more dry spots of flour. You can use a mixer if you have one, but I don't and I wouldn't use it for this even if I did. Here I am about halfway mixed; it's coming together, but I still have spots of dry flour.
Here, it's well-combined and ready to rise! I scrapes down the bowl sides also. I have a lid for my bowl with holes punched in the lid (more about that later), but you can just loosely cover your bowl with plastic wrap.
Bread rising: pictures from l-r at 2:30, 3:30 and 4:30, respectively. You can cut off a bit now for your first loaf or just pop it right into the fridge, which is what I did this time. I think the flavor develops better if it has some time to sit. With this amount of dough, I'll typically make three loaves over the course of 5-8 days. You can leave the dough in your fridge up to two weeks; it will develop more of a "sourdough" flavor as it sits.
You need to bake in a preheated, 450-degree oven. You can bake it in whatever you usually use in the oven: pyrex pan, pizza stone, cookie sheet, cast-iron skillet. I did try baking on a pizza stone with a little dish of water, but decided it was too fussy for me. Then I went searching for other options and loved the idea of using an enameled dutch oven as shown here at Oregon Cottage. I don't find that I need the parchment paper she uses and my dutch oven is quite large, but I use a little enameled stoneware baking with a lid. The crust comes out beautifully with this method!
Whatever you use, I recommend preheating the dish in the oven.
Here is the dough the following afternoon when I took it out of the fridge. As you can see, it lost a bit of mass as it cooled. Sprinkle some flour on the top and dust your hands. Have a sharp knife or kitchen scissors ready.
Pull and cut the amount of dough you want. Then stretch the dough to create a gluten cloak.
I did not even attempt to photograph myself shaping the loaf because this short video will be much more helpful.
Do note that your bread may look different from the bread in the video because she used 100% white flour and bread flour at that! Here is what my finished loaf looks like before I let it rest. You should really let it rest for at least 30 minutes, though 45 is better if you have the time. I have popped it in the oven after only 15-20 minutes in a pinch and it comes out fine, though it doesn't rise up quite as much in the oven.
Before baking, dust the top of your loaf with flour and then slash the top (I sometimes do an X design as well). I pop mine in the hot pan, put on the lid and cook for 15 minutes. Then I remove the lid and cook an additional 15 minutes. When it's finished, the crust should be brown and it should sound hollow when tapped. Remove to a cooling rack.
To store uneaten bread, turn the cut side down on a plate or cutting board. Sometimes I wrap it in a clean tea towel. I did try storing it in a plastic bag but the crust became soft right away and I found it was prone to mildew in the summer as we are in the humid South.
If you start making this often, as I did, you'll probably want to invest in a bowl with lid that is a good size for your fridge. I'd initially meant for this picture to show the holes drilled in the lid, but then I saw the cool reflection of my kitchen window in the lid and went that way instead. Just make sure the dough is mostly covered but has a way for any gases to escape.
I cannot believe how easy it is to make fresh bread for dinner! Basically, I make a ball, let it rest for 15 minutes, preheat the oven and my pan, pop it in when the oven beeps that it's preheated and cook for a half hour. It's simple to do while making other food -- or to have fresh bread for a leftover night. I love being able to take freshly baked bread when I visit a friend or neighbor.
Updated 4/8 to add picture of bread interior. This was the last loaf from this baking and had been in the fridge for about 6-7 days. The crumb is denser if I use a higher proportion of wheat flour, I have found. The little nooks/crannies make excellent buttered toast!
I hope you will try your own hand at making this simple and delicious bread! I encourage you to explore further, either via web search or here at the original Artisan Bread in Five web site.
So you're feeling all thrifty and culinarily advanced, making homemade stock in your kitchen. Maybe you're even kickin' it super-frugal old-school like your gramma and saving your veggie bits in a stock bag. Homemade stock is really easy, tastes incredible (especially compared to the high-sodium stuff from the store), makes your house smell great, and saves money. But you still need to be able to store it.
Stock "brick" sits easily, is compact, and easy to defrost in a bowl.
Like most people, I freeze my stock. I used to take the "flat bag" approach, but in my freezer approximately 10% of bags get mysteriously punctured. The only way to know which is to defrost and see if they leak! It took about a dozen episodes of losing half a bag of my lovely stock in the sink or microwave or fridge to decide to always use a container "just in case." Well, there's no easy way to put a flat bag in a bowl to catch any leakage! Now, if you have the perfectly organized freezer where you never toss items around and you also know you never, ever overfill your bags, then flat bags may work for you. Ditto for glassware. I prefer "stock bricks" myself.
Shown here just out of the freezer.
Filling 8-10 bags and fitting them into a 9X13 pan is easier (in my experience) than trying to freeze them flat. I can fit 8 bags with 3 cups each into a 9X13 and the other 2-4 in a saver of some sort. I do my best to make sure fluid is distributed evenly so they don't stick together (see photo above). I pull them out of the freezer after a day or so, separate them and store them back in the freezer. If any are stubborn, I let them sit on the counter for 5 minutes or so. You could run them under cool running water for a minute to separate, then stick them back in the freezer.
I used to freeze in smaller quantities, but I use more stock nowadays because it's a really wonderful way to add flavor. When I defrost, any extra goes into a mason jar in the fridge for use that week.
I am still using the plastic baggies. I would love a re-usable (or at least recyclable) alternative for freezing stock, so if you have a better option, please let me know. For now though, even with the baggies, my taste buds, my health, my budget and my planet come out ahead with homemade stock. Try some today!
My last summer before college, I dated a fellow whose mother always had a bowl of what she called "icebox pickles" in her refrigerator. She explained to me that it was perfect for summer because it required no heat, just mix and leave overnight in the fridge. Icebox Pickles take full advantage of a cucumber's natural crispiness and, as they're stored in the "icebox" (aka: the fridge), they're cool and refreshing in the heat of summer.
I'd never tasted anything like them before. I found my fork actually seeking out onions for the first time in my life; they were super-thin, just this side of raw, with a pickly-sweet crunch that perfectly complemented the cucumber.
This is a double batch, sliced super-thin with a mandolin, to give an idea of how much veg you need.
"Six medium cucumbers" is so very subjective!
A few years ago, I began trying to reproduce these unique pickles (with two unsuccessful attempts), when I found a recipe for "Marinated Pickles" on the recipe blog for my CSA, and suddenly I was in heaven. The recipe required no cooking, no heat -- cool and crunchy, all the way, so I adapted it to suit what I keep in my pantry/garden. Slice veggies thinly, toss it all together in a jar or bowl, and leave it in the fridge overnight. Easy, Fresh, Crisp. Summer!
Marinade (because it's technically not a brine if you don't boil it), before vigorous shaking.
The recipe is below, and calls for cucumbers and onions, but as you can see I added some green pepper and super-thin carrot. Use what you have.....
UPDATE, Summer 2018: After several years of experimentation, I have significantly reduced the amount of sugar from 1/4 cup to 1-1.5 TBSP. I kept cutting it and not finding a difference in flavor...until I went below 1 TBSP this year. Try this for yourself! See where your palate notices the change.
You eat with your eyes first. But adult eyes and child eyes often see things a little differently. Who cares? Does it really make that much difference if the priority is an appealing balance of colors or enough "white space" on the plate or just making sure the food is not touching more than necessary?
Tonight's dinner: Jasmine rice with peas/carrots, free-range pork chops and a medley of roasted yellow squash, pattypan squash, garlic chunks and kohlrabi. A little freshly-baked wheat bread rounds out the meal. For some reason, many children, including mine, seem to prefer their food as segregated as possible. Should we call it "deconstructed" instead? It's not terribly hard to manage generally, so I try to honor that preference without being ruled by it, as evidenced by my rather brazen addition of peas/carrots to the rice.
The biggest differences between kid/adult plates are onions and veggie portioning. I topped my rice with sauteed onions and orange-pineapple jus from the pork pan. The kids got one piece each of yellow squash, pattypan squash and kohlrabi, while my plate is piled high with all those plus some garlic chunks. The bright green, orange and yellow of the veggies are offset brilliantly by the white rice and white plates, so this was a colorful and appealing early summer meal.
Not counting the bread, this could easily be a 40-minute dinner. The bread baking takes about an hour (counting time necessary to preheat the oven), so technically it's an hour prep. Swapping fresh bread for heat-and-serve rolls or skipping bread altogether makes pork chops one of my favorite "go to" meals after a hectic day on the go. I'll include a rundown after the break.
Dinner doesn't need to be fancy. Heck, it doesn't even need to be homemade. Really, it doesn't even have to be dinner -- it could be breakfast. It just needs to be time together to share and nourish body and soul.
For the record, the children ate rice, peas, carrots, bread/butter and pork. It was not surprising that they didn't touch the squash, but they did ask what each one was called and (amazingly) no one disparaged this vegetable that still holds a strong "yuck factor" for them both.
In my fridge this week, we are in CSA heaven already. We only got one head of kohlrabi, not enough to try this kohlrabi puree, so that will have to keep. We have sugar-cured sliced ham, napa cabbage, bok choy, a massive head of broccoli, some gorgeous purple onions and assorted salad greens. I finally have beets enough (lower shelf in the middle) to make these Beet Chocolate Cupcakes, so that will definitely happen this week!
Also bottom-right I have some jasmine rice with peas and carrots (right next to the highly-recommended Summer Shandy). My time-saving tip of the week is to cook twice as much rice or pasta as you need and store the rest for quick sides or to make up easy vegetarian meals. The peas are homegrown! Next batch will have our own peas and carrots, if those ever last long enough to make it inside.
I have gone a bit crazy with cold summer beverages. You can see some homemade lemonade (in the Mason jar), so easy with citrus simple syrup, but there is also some green tea and cold-brewed coffee. Yes, that's right, I found a way to make a superb iced coffee -- no heat required because it is getting HOT here in the mid-south. I will share details in a future post!
These? I'm gonna be eating in January with some fresh Amish pasta from my CSA.
Don't you hate peeling tomatoes? And then seeding them? It's a lot of messy, messy work. But it's worth it for homemade marinara, right? I thought so....until I received a harvest bounty from my father of several pounds of cherry tomatoes. I really wanted to make marinara, but how could I peel all those teeny, tiny tomatoes?
I thought, "Well, I have a 'puree' option on the blender." I could not believe how easy it was to make a tomato puree with whole tomatoes, a blender and a strainer. I just had to see if it worked with big tomatoes as well, and am happy to share the delicious results! Just half/quarter or roughly chop the larger ones and leave the babies whole, as shown in the photo above.
Puree till smooth in blender, then press through medium strainer.
Fill the blender about 1/3 full and add a splash of water. Pulse until tomatoes are well-chopped and moving freely (add more water sparingly, if necessary). It can be helpful to stir or shake the blender between pulses. Once it's going, hit puree. And let it go and go -- I probably left it on for a good minute or two. Then set a medium or med/fine strainer in a bowl and pour. You can see my setup above.
Push the tomatoes through the sieve with a spatula. I think I ended up with a lot less tomato in my compost bin this way. But also, I didn't heat the stove (for this portion anyway). I didn't use ice cubes. I had minimal cleanup. Judging by what's left in the sieve, I think this marinara has more fiber, though it is lovely and smooth in texture.
Looks like the makings of a "marinara mix" seed drying operation, no?
It took me about a half hour to garner a gallon of tomato puree this way. That's barely enough time to get your water boiling and the first batch of tomatoes peeled with the traditional method. Granted, I added some water, so I have to let it cook a bit longer, but that doesn't require my constant attention....just good smells and occasional stirring.
Before you start the whole puree process, go ahead and chop a few cloves of garlic (to taste -- I used a good half a head) and mince an onion. Let those cook slowly on LOW/MED heat while you handle the tomatoes. Just before I added my tomato puree, I tossed in 1/4 tsp of chipotle chili pepper powder. You could also add some red pepper flake as the onion/garlic cook. I also added 1/4 tsp of cinnamon and grated in some nutmeg.
The puree will be pinkish-red and foamy.
Raise the heat a bit since the tomatoes are cool and, well, there's quite a large volume being added to the pot. I had about a gallon of tomato puree. What you want is a nice gentle simmer and you should stir regularly. If you come to stir after 15 minutes away and the surface is smooth and unbroken, then raise the heat a bit. If you come to stir after 15 minutes away and it's bubbling actively, then lower the heat (I might even pull it off the burner for a minute or two). I put the lid on after adding the tomatoes to help it come to a higher temperature more quickly. Then I removed the lid so it could reduce. I found that my "blender puree" seemed to have a pinkish foam on the top for an hour or two until it reduced.
Herbs outside today include basil, parsley, oregano and thyme.
You can add whatever herbs you like and/or have on hand. I cut what you see above and ended up with about 2-3 Tbsp parsley, 3Tbsp or so of basil, about 1.5 Tbsp oregano and 1 Tbsp thyme. I also grated in a small carrot. After it simmered for an hour or so, I tasted, then added salt, pepper and a combination of agave nectar and white sugar. All seasonings are "to taste," but keep tasting as it reduces and add a bit here and there. Oh, and you really do need to add the sugar to counter the acidity of the tomatoes. If you want less refined sugar, you could add some more carrot or grated beet, but be sure to *taste* as you go and after another half-hour.
Halfway done. I added more basil toward the end.
Stir it regularly. Once it's getting close to the consistency you want, hit it with an immersion blender. My goal is to wind up with something that coats a spoon nicely with small flecks of onion or herb, but I want a well-integrated sauce with a smooth consistency.
Before the immersion blender, my marinara almost seemed "separated," perhaps because of the extra fiber from the bits of skin that made it through. It was nice immediately after a stir, but heavy on the bottom after about 10-20 minutes. However, after using the immersion blender, it was a smooth texture, dotted with bits of tomato or onion or herb. Perfect!
Now, if you don't have an immersion blender, you can always blend it in batches. It really makes a big difference in the texture of the finished product, so if you're at all unsure, just do it After blending, if you want a "chunky" sauce, you'll need to add in some diced (skinned/seeded) tomatoes, but I didn't do that because I am okay if I never have to skin another tomato again.
