did this one! not the grilled one. https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/201 ... ecipe.html

Yesterday was leftovers, which is not very exciting, but necessary to clear the deck.

Today was something new for me: Chicken with 40 garlic cloves. Actually, it was 50 cloves and easily I could have offered more.

My one bow to panic buying, as we went into shelter-at-home, was garlic. I bought three or four bulbs at Jewel for a whopping price of just under $5. A few days later at the business Costco in Bedford Park, they had a three-pound bag for $5, too. In my whirl to get ready to close up and hide, I bought those, too.

A few months ago, one of my friends in another internet world made Chicken with 40 garlic cloves. I've been wishing to make it ever since. I am also making stock for Ramen, so the chicken back would be a good contribution.

I looked at two recipes: one from Alton Brown and the other from Ina Garten. Alton Brown lost my interest when a half-cup of olive oil was pour over the browned chicken pieces and baked. Ina only had three tablespoons of added fat and used a combination of cognac and wine to deglaze and simmer the chicken.


Alton Brown did suggest crusty bread to soak up the juices. I baked two tubes of croissants instead. I was tempted to do Red Lobster rolls, but I did not want a clash of the garlic titans. Plus the chicken with 40 cloves was more subtle and easily over taken by Red Lobster.

Our Franco-ish meal concluded with a green salad with an herbal dressing.

I plan to make a dessert later this afternoon, but more about that later.

Regards,
Cathy2

Prepared a nice, easy meal this evening . . .


Pork Roast
Had about half of this left after we ate, which we'll finish up over the next few days.


Sliced On The Board
You can tell from the all the juice on the board that I probably didn't let this rest quite long enough before slicing into it . . . but we were hungry!


On The Plate
With Spicy Joi Choi (soy, oyster sauce, garlic, ginger, doubanjiang) and Quinoa (sauteed mushrooms, onions, green garlic and not-sauteed fresh chives)

Bonus shot from the other night . . . vegetable soup . . .


'Clean Out The Fridge' Vegetable Soup w/Ham Bone
Cauliflower, zucchini, potatoes, onion, garlic, chicken stock and ham bone.
Really needed to move some veggies -- and a ham bone -- that were nearing the end of their usefulness. This was kind of a lazy out on my part but it was delicious, and accomplished the goal. I just sauteed everything in evoo, added the stock and let it cook for about 30 minutes. After all the veggies were soft, I hit it with the stick blender and let it cook down a bit more. I garnished it with fresh chives, evoo and homemade schug. Everyone had 2 bowls, so I guess it was a success.

Hopefully, we'll have carry-out dinners over the next couple of nights, which should allow me time for some baking.

=R=

My hubs 2nd most requested dinner that’s about my least favorite to make lol (so much prep!!!)

Big Salad!



Honestly, I usually do hard boiled egg, chopped avocado and roast turkey in addition to the ingredients shown, but I forgot/didn’t have them.

It was still delicious with fresh picked Acorn Acres Farm lettuces, wild celery & ramps, bacon, ham, sweet onion, mighty vine tomatoes, scallions, homemade sourdough croutons, three cheese mix and a 3-onion (ramp/shallot/sweet onion) & mustard seed vinaigrette.

Yet another day of "cleaning out the pantry".

Two years ago, I bought three of the large cans of Libby pumpkin for $0.50/ can just to find out that my baker friend had already stocked up and the DW has a real aversion to pumpkin pie. That was a complete surprise as she was served and ate it every Thanksgiving at her mother's house.

Today, I made a Cream of Pumpkin soup I had it for lunch and froze about two quarts of it. It helped me clean out the left-over half and half as well.

Later tonight, I am going to prepare Spicy Crispy Chickpeas in my air fryer. The local newspaper published this Adkins-friendly recipe. I am not that excited about chickpeas, it will be a good pay of using another boat anchor from my pantry.

Despite a slow start to this week, we were able to score a chicken and 6# of 80/20 ground beef. We were not to the "desperate stage" at this point but who knows if there will be a steady supply before July.

Pulled some dandelions from my fertilizer- and pesticide-free yard. Made a Korean dressing from soy, rice vinegar, garlic, scallions, sesame oil, sugar and gochugaru. Awesome. Served alongside some mandu that have been in my freezer.

JoelF wrote:Pulled some dandelions from my fertilizer- and pesticide-free yard.

How bitter were the dandelions? Had they begun to flower yet? I have this notion dandelions are more bitter after flowering, though not sure if it is true.

Regards,
Cathy2

Cathy2 wrote:

JoelF wrote:Pulled some dandelions from my fertilizer- and pesticide-free yard.

How bitter were the dandelions? Had they begun to flower yet? I have this notion dandelions are more bitter after flowering, though not sure if it is true.

Regards,
Cathy2

Yes there were flowers (which I did not eat). Plain, the leaves were about as bitter as radicchio; dressed, the bitterness was nearly gone, maybe arugula-like. Salt blocks bitter receptors, sugar and vinegar help too.

JoelF wrote:Yes there were flowers (which I did not eat). Plain, the leaves were about as bitter as radicchio; dressed, the bitterness was nearly gone, maybe arugula-like. Salt blocks bitter receptors, sugar and vinegar help too.

Great! Thank you for the tips on what blocks bitterness.

Regards,
Cathy2

JoelF wrote:Pulled some dandelions from my fertilizer- and pesticide-free yard. Made a Korean dressing from soy, rice vinegar, garlic, scallions, sesame oil, sugar and gochugaru. Awesome. Served alongside some mandu that have been in my freezer.

I can hardly believe you've made me think about doing this too.

Mr. John Kass, of the Chicago Tribune, wrote about Liver Sausage and Sardines for his column Thursday. As the saying goes, he "done flung a craving on me" Yes, I realize the accompaniments may be a bit on the healthy side for liver sausage.


Liver Sausage, count me a Fan!

HI,

One of my friends wondered when I might make a pie. I decided to make Moosewood mushroom pie like Ms. Ingie long ago made for a dessert exchange. Made crust for a double-crust pie. This was filled with sauteed mushrooms, onions, thyme, salt & pepper, then an 8-ounce brick of cream cheese is melted into this to hold it together before slipping into a crust. Baked in a 400-degree oven for 35 minutes.



Uncharacteristically, I made dessert for lunch today. An AtlasObcura on Ozark Pudding caught my attention for two reasons: I was unaware of it AND Bess Truman served it to Winston Churchill after a 1946 speech in Missouri after he first uttered, "Iron curtain."

This has to fall into the category of desperation desserts made with a few ingredients in a short amount of time: an egg, 3/4 cup sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, salt, baking powder, half cup each of chopped apple and nuts. After 35 minutes in a 350 degree oven, this caramelized mound of apples, nuts and just enough cake to keep it together.



It was recommended to serve with whipped cream or ice cream. I never mentioned this element, my family accepted it as-is. My Dad dug every sugary morsel from the pan. Clearly, this was a hit.

Regards,
Cathy2

Well, here is something new. Two years ago, I came across a few cans of garbanzo beans. This recipe came across my desk and I tried it this morning.

SPICY CRISPY CHICKPEAS

16 oz can of chickpeas
1 Tbsp melted butter
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp chipotle chile powder

1) Heat air fryer to 390F.
2) Drain the chickpeas. Pat them down with paper towels, Remove the hull.
3) Toss all the ingredients in a bowl. Stir until the chickpeas are coated/
4) Place the chickpeas in the airfryer for 6 minutes at 390F. Shake the peas.
5) Repeat step 4.
6) Roast the chickpeas for three minutes.

Store at room temperature for up to three days.

jlawrence01 wrote:Well, here is something new. Two years ago, I came across a few cans of garbanzo beans. This recipe came across my desk and I tried it this morning.

SPICY CRISPY CHICKPEAS

16 oz can of chickpeas
1 Tbsp melted butter
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp chili powder
1/4 tsp chipotle chile powder

1) Heat air fryer to 390F.
2) Drain the chickpeas. Pat them down with paper towels, Remove the hull.
3) Toss all the ingredients in a bowl. Stir until the chickpeas are coated/
4) Place the chickpeas in the airfryer for 6 minutes at 390F. Shake the peas.
5) Repeat step 4.
6) Roast the chickpeas for three minutes.

Store at room temperature for up to three days.

Is there some sort of conversion chart for someone who has a traditional oven?

No conversion. I always use trial and error.

Dave148 wrote:Is there some sort of conversion chart for someone who has a traditional oven?

Here is a parallel recipe using the oven.

Happy Birthday!

Regards,
Cathy2

how does everybody feel about the "one pot pasta" concept, where you cook in a shallow pan with very little water/liquid and it is all absorbed, leaving a starchy sauce?

i did one tonight with orzo (first sautéing onion in butter and oil, toasting the orzo, adding some grilled artichokes) with stock and milk as the liquid. added parm and fresh mint at table.

it was very tasty, if stickier than orzo cooked in large quantity of water, drained, and tossed with butter would have been.

annak wrote:how does everybody feel about the "one pot pasta" concept, where you cook in a shallow pan with very little water/liquid and it is all absorbed, leaving a starchy sauce?

i did one tonight with orzo (first sautéing onion in butter and oil, toasting the orzo, adding some grilled artichokes) with stock and milk as the liquid. added parm and fresh mint at table.

it was very tasty, if stickier than orzo cooked in large quantity of water, drained, and tossed with butter would have been.

I have done this for Mac and Cheese.

I now use far less water when cooking pasta. It is time consuming to get a large volume of water to boil. It is another pot to clean, and often one that will not fit in the dishwasher.

I have also throw pasta into a pot with the sauce. It's like using no-boil lasagna, you may need to add extra water.

Tomorrow I plan to cook a Chinese dish using fresh pasta bought last week. This I will likely cook in its own pot, because it will cook quick, needs to cool down quick, then be stirred into a sauce. I probably won't use as much water as suggested.

Regards,
Cathy2

Cathy2 wrote:

Dave148 wrote:Is there some sort of conversion chart for someone who has a traditional oven?

Here is a parallel recipe using the oven.

Happy Birthday!

Regards,
Cathy2

Thanks and Thanks!

We've used the Cook's Illustrated one pot recipe, scaled up to feed 150. Very good, much more simple than white sauce plus boiled noodles.

After 40 days of lockdown, I have to admit that I am getting bored with life in general. There have been two sources of amusement that have kept this interesting.

First, for the first time in forever, I have gone full frontal assault on my pantry trying to use up all of the old stuff. We last did this in 2014 when we were moving out of Woodstock and Cathy2 was able to assist in getting rid of a lot of pantry items including my Tobasco product collection. Each week, my wife and I go through the pantry and put five items into a basket similar to chopped and I try to use up those ingredients during the week.

Second, the second source of amusement is to catch up on some new recipes. Everyday, Food and Wine sends me 12-24 recipes. Also, I see a lot of recipes on YouTube. I have probably added 10-20 recipes to my files and will try some of them as soon as I can adequately source the products. I do not know why Food and Eime is sending me the recipes each pay but they have been entertaining. I try to avoid those types of e-mails.

One frustration with the food media is that their recipes seem to presuppose that you have full access to a fully stocked grocery store like several months ago. For many, that is not the case. I can thing of dozens of things that I just do not have access to at this time. I have been trying for three weeks to get a red onion, smoked neckbones and a pork butt. Yet a lot of these recipes call for ingredients that are ahrd to find and will be for a while.

Cathy2's recipes, like usual, always tend to require simple ingredients that everyone has and can be made in these times.

Re: chickpeas. I love them and make a crispy version of them -- with roasted and seasoned pistachios -- that is really awesome. I just fry them on the stove top in some peanut or canola oil, then drain and season them. The raw pistachios don't get fried, obviously, but get a light tossing in oil and seasoning, then get briefly roasted, after which they're added to the chickpeas. Very addictive, great stuff.

This morning it was more 'cleaning out the fridge' cooking . . .


Breakfast Quesadilla

Store-bought flour tortillas (the only acceptable use for flour tortillas, imo), eggs, cheese, garlic chives, mushrooms, bacon, etc.

=R=

jlawrence01 wrote:Cathy2's recipes, like usual, always tend to require simple ingredients that everyone has and can be made in these times.

Thank you for your thoughts, because I am stuck like everyone else dealing with what we already have or alter to make it fit.

Sometime ago, I bought some frozen corn on the cob to make a shrimp boil during Lent. I almost never buy frozen corn on the cob, but it seemed more fitting than dumping a bag of cut corn. Yet home as we were, we never had our Friday shrimp boil.

Yesterday, the corn on the cob was pulled from the freezer due to a miscommunication. It was already partially thawed when I saw it, so I stuck it in the fridge. I advised we would be having a shrimp boil on Sunday.

I scanned this recipe from a cookbook club selection called Tasty Latest & Greatest. You boiled potatoes in water with mustard seed, coriander seed, allspice, dill, bay leaves and salt. They did call for red chili pepper, but that is just not appreciated around here.

After boiling potatoes for 15 minutes, then add your corn to boil for 10 minutes. They also called for smoked sausage, but I could not find where I cleverly put this sausage two hours before. Skipped the sausage, the added the shell-on shrimp once I was happy with the potatoes. These shrimp were done in less than three minutes.

I used a spider to lift everything out of the pot onto a pre-heated platter. It was served with commercial cocktail sauce (my sister commented multiple times I should have made my own: catsup and horseradish) plus melted butter with a smashed clove of garlic. At the table, I had a half-loaf of French bread to sop up the liquid.


I harvested the first rhubarb from the yard with enough to make a pie and about two cups more to freeze for the future. How we got to pie is documented here.


We have been eating rhubarb pie since I was five-years-old. There was an established patch at a home we lived too-briefly in Massachusetts. There was no pie left after this meal.

Next Sunday is Mother's Day and if the rhubarb plant cooperates, we will have more rhubarb pie.

Regards,
Cathy2

we made the serious eats detroit pizza yesterday with some Local Foods pizza sauce and brick cheese we also scored from there. quite good, if a little heartburny!

trader joes is carrying vacuum sealed fresh fish fillets; we got some cod the other day and made a sam sifton recipe for cod cakes tonight, which we've done before. pretty nice, with a white cabbage/green apple/green onion slaw on the side.

if anyone is looking for unusual food sources, we recently signed up for imperfect produce delivery, and they have a bunch of off-the-beaten-path product to add in each week, like smoked sable, which we're trying for lunch tomorrow.

on a hike today we found a lot of garlic mustard, so a little side salad of that also in the mix.

has anyone made their own bagels? I'm looking at serious eats, peter reinhart, trying to decide if i should.

Another fear conquered, thanks to Corona cooking—pie crust!

Needed to find an all-butter recipe since I didn’t have shortening or lard which most seem to call for. But this came out great! The pie filling was a bit too runny but probably because it only set for about an hour. The leftover piece (!) is solid but I think I’d still like a bit more to it.

Still, very, very happy with this as a first effort and I’ll be trying again for next week’s Mother’s Day meal—maybe do an apple Rhubarb since I’m sure I’ll have enough from my plants in the garden by next weekend.


Apple Pie from scratch!

boudreaulicious wrote:
Needed to find an all-butter recipe

https://www.chicagotribune.com/dining/ct-xpm-2013-08-21-sc-food-0809-hoosier-mama-book-20130821-story.html

ronnie_suburban wrote:Breakfast Quesadilla

Store-bought flour tortillas (the only acceptable use for flour tortillas, imo), eggs, cheese, garlic chives, mushrooms, bacon, etc.

A couple weeks ago I came across an older recipe from the New York Times for something vaguely reminiscent of jian bing, the Chinese street food crepe.

In NYT Genevieve Ko wrote:Making jian bing is a specialized skill and not easily recreated, but this approximation delivers the pleasure and convenience of an omelet cooked onto a thin pancake, the pancake here being store-bought flour tortillas.

The recipe is a total bastardization, but it's kind of an interesting idea, basically cooking scrambled eggs with a tortilla on top. I tried it a couple times and was intrigued enough that I'll probably return to it when I have a few additional ingredients. Not sure it will change your mind about store-bought flour tortillas, but it might be worth a try.

(Could some non-subscriber let me know if this recipe is accessible? I think it may be part of NYT's no-paywall quarantine recipes.)

annak wrote:did this one! not the grilled one. https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/201 ... ecipe.html

I made them, too. Typical J. Kenji López-Alt recipe - good but not great and definitely flawed. Still, I really enjoyed the process, which I feel helped prepare me for taking on some recipes that will be more worthy of my time and ingredients down the road . . .


First rolling, brush with light sesame oil


Jelly-rolling it into a tube


Coiling up the tube


Coiled up


Rolled out a second time, and brushed with sesame oil a second time


1/2 cup garlic chives


Spreading the garlic chives out evenly


Jelly-rolling again, this time with garlic chives


Coiled up once again, garlic chives within


Rolling out the dough a third and final time, with the garlic chives included


Cooking in just a touch of peanut oil


An easy flip


Sliced up, on the board

The main problem with this recipe is that there's no salt called for in the dough. We made the soy sauce-based dipping sauce and yes it's salty but the pancake still needs some salt of its own. Otherwise, it's bland and requires that every bite be dipped in the sauce. It's a pretty critical omission. As I was making it, I was concerned about there being no salt but I decided to follow the recipe, anyway. Not a smart move by me. Oh well. I'm not much of a dough/pastry person, so I still learned a lot and as I said up top, I look forward to applying my newly developing skills to more worthy recipes.

=R=

annak wrote:has anyone made their own bagels? I'm looking at serious eats, peter reinhart, trying to decide if i should.

Eleven years ago, there was a terrific thread: How cost-effective is it to make homemade pantry staples?

It was based on an article of the same name from Slate.

Ann Fisher made the Jo Goldenberg recipe, though the original link is not working now, which was before SeriousEats took an interest in this recipe. If you want, I can send you a copy of the original Jo Goldenberg recipe. I made it a few times and remember it fondly.

Regards,
Cathy2

cilantro wrote:

boudreaulicious wrote:
Needed to find an all-butter recipe

https://www.chicagotribune.com/dining/ct-xpm-2013-08-21-sc-food-0809-hoosier-mama-book-20130821-story.html

Used this one: https://www.inspiredtaste.net/22662/flaky-pie-crust-recipe/
—super simple and worked great!