andiesenji

I hesitate to mention it, as it is only marginally food related but (strange as it may seem) Edward Gorey's The Haunted Tea Cosy, is very popular with quite a few children. They really seem to enjoy the rather macabre drawings, especially the weird bugs. I collect Gorey and this particular book is in a bookcase right next to my DVD cabinet and kids just seem to gravitate to it. My next door neighbor's grandchildren (ages 10, 8 and 7) spent an hour reading it and laughing over the pictures just last Sunday. I was surprised but my neighbor, a retired teacher, said that it is similar to their fascination with monster toys. I never cease to be amazed with how sophistocated some children are nowadays.

I just cut the pumpkin into chunks, scrape off the seeds and strands and steam it for about 20-30 minutes which is usually long enough to make it soft enough to remove the skin. From that point it can be stewed in stock then pureed in a blender or with an immersion blender right in the pot when it is soft enough - I usually test it by sticking a fork in a chunk and if it falls right off the fork then it is soft enough to blend. And here is my recipe for a different PUMPKIN SOUP 1 large onion, diced 1/4 cup, butter (1/2 stick) 1/2 teaspoon Madras curry paste 2 1/2 cups, chicken or vegetable stock 3 cups cooked pumpkin cut into 1 inch cubes 1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt (1 teaspoon if regular table salt) 2 cups heavy cream 1/8 teaspoon each of allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper Melt the butter in a large sauté pan or wide shallow pan and allow it to just begin to brown. Add the diced onions and cook until translucent. Add the curry paste and stir well. Add the stock and bring to a simmer. Add the pumpkin and continue to simmer for 15 minutes. Using an immersion blender (or in small batches in a stand blender) Puree the mixture until smooth. (Return to the pan if using blender.) Continue to blend with a whisk while adding the salt, cream and spices. Reduce heat to low and cook, stirring often, for 10 minutes. Do not allow soup to boil. Ladle into bowls and garnish with a dollop of sour cream and sprinkle with toasted chopped pecans. Alternatively you can garnish with a teaspoon of mango chutney and crushed sesame crackers. This also works well in mugs for a carry-around starter. Serves 6 If you don't like curry, you can use alternative flavors, such as a herb mixture, a little hot sauce, siracha, etc.

And HERE is yet another incredible gadget/appliance that I am sure everyone is panting to rush right out and buy!!!!! (The Solutions catalog arrived in today's mail.)

I love the idea of making these items youself and giving them as gifts - can I ask how you do the drying? Do you need to buy one of those special drying machines or is there another trick? I've never even thought of making my own dried herbs, candied fruit, etc. but I'm intrigued! I have 2 large Excalibur dehydrators but herbs can be dried at room temp or in a very low oven. Some people even dry them in a microwave. Fruits can also be dried in an oven. When I was a child, peaches, pears and apples were halved or sliced and dried on the galvanized roof of a shed, covered with screen cloth to keep birds and bugs off. The metal roof would get very hot with the sun shining on it. Where I live is desert and we get a lot of sun. I often dry tomato slices in the sun on a sheet pan with fine nylon netting stretched over it. They will dry completely in a day when the temps are near 100. One of my friends, who lives in a tiny studio apartment with a miniscule kitchen, dries fruits and herbs from her landlord's garden, spread on a homemade screen over the tub in her bathroom using a heat lamp suspended about 2 feet over the screen. I think this is very clever but have never tried it myself. Gail also makes turkey jerky for gifts using this same method.

I am going to have Thanksgiving with my neighbors. Mr. Obregon has gone to his ranch in Durango, Mexico to shoot "a few" javelina. Roast pig definitely on the menu. Homemade tamale, chicken, beef and pork, pumpkin empanadas, bean and corn fritters, barbecue turkey, barbecue goat. I am going to make some squash casseroles, seed bread, cornbread, potato dumplings, fruit salad and whatever else is needed to fill in the gaps. Mrs. Obregon's sister, a molera from Morelia, Mexico. She is bringing a bunch of spices and is going to teach me about molé. I am really looking forward to it.

This recipe fried apple pies is pretty much exactly the way I make them except I use lard in my pie crust. There is an Amish or Mennonite cookbook somewhere in my collection that has a little different recipe. The Amish and Penn Dutch are very adept at making these tasty little treasures. I think the name of the cookbook is "Good Food that Really Schmecks" and I was searching for it a while back and couldn't find it. If you should come across it, take a look. I bought mine about 35- 40 years ago.

I like to give things I make that are somewhat unusual as homemade gifts - candied ginger, glacé fruits, dried fruits, dried sliced shallots, dried sliced garlic, things that most people no longer do at home. Also dried herbs from my garden, bay and/or rosemary and sage wreaths. Tea herbs such as anise hyssop, various mints, sachets made from lavender, costmary (also known as "bible leaf") etc. I sometimes still make cheese, cream cheese, ricotta, other fresh cheese. Occasionally aged cheeses but no longer as much as I did in years past. I also make some cakes that keep well, some fruited cakes, a cocoa/fruit cake that is unusual and tasty. I used to make a lot of cookies but not this year.

This can be made ahead of time refrigerated or even frozen then just heated to serve. If you have a problem with oven space on the big day, this is one good make-ahead side. Baked squash with apples and chutney. 2 medium sized butternut squash, peeled and sliced crosswise 1/2 inch thick. 1 stick butter sliced into pats 3 tart apples, peeled, cored and chopped into 1/2 inch dice 2/3 cup mango chutney (Major Grey's is okay) 2 tablespoons maple syrup Mix the chopped apples with the chutney and syrup. Arrange half of the squash slices in a buttered baking dish so the slices overlap by half for the first layer. Dot with half the butter evenly over the squash. Spread half the apple/chutney mixture over the squash. Arrange the remaining squash slices in the opposite direction, again overlapping the slices. Dot with the remaining butter Spread the remaining apple/chutney mixture over the squash. Cover the baking dish with foil and bake in a 325 degree oven for 45 minutes. Remove the foil and continue baking for an additional 30 minutes. A fork should easily penetrate through to the bottom of the dish without resistance. If the squash is still a bit firm, continue baking for another 15 minutes. Serves 6 to 8 Medium butternut squash would be 10 inches in length and 4 inches in diameter at the narrow end. You can also use 4 large acorn squash or equivalent.

I posted the site for lots of apple recipes on the other apple thread. In case you missed it here it is again. Recipe Source, once known as SOAR The original list of recipes was started at Berkeley in the early 90s and one could get to it using Compuserve or Delphi or one of the other services with which to connect to workgroups, user lists, etc., that charged by the minute. My Compuserve bill used to be huge, compared to today and the connection was via a 600 baud modem - talk about slooooooow!

The newer refrigerators with automatic defrost remove moisture from the refrigerator as well as from the freezer. Ever notice how things will dry out faster in the newer appliances? In my ancient huge side by side Kelvinator (32 cubic foot monster) I could leave a head of lettuce or a bunch of leaf lettuce on any shelf and it would stay fresh for a couple of days at least, longer in the vegetable bin. I kept that thing for 30+ years, gave it to a friend and it is still working. They don't make them like that anymore! (4 ft wide and 6 ft tall) In the newer appliances it will have dry blackened leaves on the outside in less than a day and the leaf lettuce will practically disintegrate unless wrapped or in a plastic bag. The Apple Farm on Angeles Forest Highway has an old walk-in cooler with unpainted wooden walls inside, cooled by an antique compressor outside that runs off an old engine that looks like it came off an equally ancient washing machine. I store apples in my pantry that has its own air conditioning unit that keeps the temp around 55 degrees. Chilly but not cold. I have some milk crates in which I store them with each layer separated by loosely crumpled newspaper. I also keep them away from other fruits and vegetables as they tend to cause other fruits to ripen too quickly.

Check out Recipe Source It used to be SOAR years ago - the first online recipe place, back in the days when Compuserve cost by the minute to be online. See the list on page 1 then - - Click on pages 10, 16, 30, 45 and 81. Some of my favorites are on those pages. Apples In Gilded Cages Apple Cheese Bread pg10 Apelkuchen pg 16 Apple Cream Cheese Pie pg 30 Apple Oat Muffins pg 45 Winter Apple Chutney pg 81 There are lots more but I have tried these with great success. Do check out the sorbets on page 58 and the Apple-Pie-In-A-Scoop. Use carmelized apples instead of the canned stuff.

I have several Ice Cream cookbooks. One particular favorite is the Williams-Sonoma one - I can't recall the exact name, it has a purple cover with a photo of a dish of ice cream. It has good basic information and also a lot of sources in the glossary. The illustrations are great, as in all the W-S cookbooks. The actual number of recipes is not huge - less than 50, however there are a lot of variations and there is a chapter on making fancy frozen desserts using ice cream, sorbet, gelato, etc. I also have Bruce Weinstein's Ultimate Ice Cream cookbook which has hundreds of recipes, some quite unusual (and quite good). Besides sweets there are also savory ones and I have made the avocado one several times. The Tomato gratina is exceptional. He doesn't include a lot of detail about the basics of preparing ingredients or why you do certain tasks in a certain order but the recipes themselves, with the combinations of flavors and flavorings, is worth the price of this very inexpensive book. Robert Marshall's book is an excellent professional text. It deals with every phase of ice cream from theory to making to selling. I am pretty sure you can find it at Alibris.com at a discounted price. ABEbooks is another source but they are usually more expensive.

I just posted about dried apple slices on another thread. This site has the basic instructions. I use 7-Up or a lemon lime soda instead of ascorbic acid, to keep the slices from discoloring.

You can dry apple slices - give them a bath in 7-up or any citrus soda - drain and spread on a cooling rack or on parchment paper on a sheet pan. Dust with cinnamon, cinnamon and sugar or a mixture of spices of your choice (I like a mixture of cinnamon, allspice and a small amount of cloves) and place in a very low oven until dried - they will be flexible and chewy. The sugar concentrates and the dried slices will taste sweeter than raw. Dried apples can be stewed as you would any dried fruit, carmelized and make the best fried pies. Full instructions are HERE. I use a hand-cranked corer/peeler/slicer because it makes even slices which are spiral-cut. When you cut straight down across the stack of slices you end up with perfectly even slices which dry easier than wedges.

If they are very hard it is very difficult to get them to absorb moisture. I have tried without success with the whole berries, never with the ones cut in half. It is the sugar content that keeps dried fruit flexible and edible. The sugar works on the cellular level. You can see how this works especially with freezing fruits like strawberries. Frozen alone, they shrivel and become dry and hard and completely mushy when thawed. If you add some sugar they will freeze and then thaw in much better condition. Same with drying unless they have a very high sugar content - however barely ripe strawberries dry better than those that are fully ripe.

Heavens, I am blushing. As I said in an earlier post, I do not always make everything from scratch but like to know that I could if I had to. I love the flavor as well as the texture of freshly made cream cheese, butter and etc. There is just something about it that one couldn't find except in some of the old-fashioned delis that used to make their own. Now the food police and people suing at the drop of a hat have put paid to that. The hysteria over lysteria means no more home made goodies sold in stores, at least here in Calif. I used to be able to buy "clean-out" cottage cheese when I had large dogs, from Alta Dena dairy. It was the stuff that was in the system between different types of cottage cheese and was sold in big bags, cheap! It was perfection good, just two kinds mixed together. Now they can only sell it to hog farmers, by law...

Here is another suggestion for quicker drying. Another suggestion is to cut them in half but that seems to me to be extremely time consuming. I do a lot of dehydrating in two large Excalibur units - there are a lot of tricks I have learned over the years. With fruits that discolor, such as apples, a bath in 7-up or similar soda (I actually use the store brand) works as well as a solution made with Fruit Fresh (or whatever the stuff is now called) or Vitamin C powder, which some people recommend. Berries can be tricky, you have to have the right balance of heat and air to get them to the perfect finish and each batch is different. However blueberries are fairly easy and have a high sugar content. Even the frozen ones dry well and are very sweet when finished. Grapes, particularly the Red Flame Seedless, with particularly high sugar content, are the easiest and the result is the most consistent.

You have to actually cook them a little so the skin breaks, otherwise they will never dry, just get hard like a marble. You will need enough simple syrup, half strength, or less, figure 3/4 cup sugar to a cup of water. Bring to a high simmer, not quite boiling. Pour in the washed and cleaned cranberries, stir well, let the heat come back up till you can see a few bubbles, 3 minutes or so. Stir again to bring the bottom berries up to the top. As soon as you can see about half of them popped, remove from heat and leave in the syrup for 30 minutes. Using a slotted spoon or strainer, lift the berries out of the syrup and spread on your dehydrator screen over a sheet pan to catch drips. As soon as most of the syrup has dripped off the berries, place into the dehydrator. Shake the trays every 8 hours or so to keep them from sticking in place. They are done when they have shrunk a bit more than half their original size and are still a bit soft but not too tacky. Taste is important. Do a small batch first to see how they turn out then do the rest, making adjustments as needed. Some cranberries are exceptionally tart and may need more sugar 1:1 ratio instead of 3/4:1.

There is also one that a fireplace builder or wood oven builder can order for you. Also from Italy. Fireplace cooking

I do the same thing, I love the flavor of butter and a sweet with any winter squash - I often use maple syrup or granulated maple sugar (The Indians in the northeast knew their stuff long before the white man arrived). I also mix chopped apples and some kind of chutney, mango, Major Grey or similar, scrape the strands out of the squash halves into a butterd baking dish, top with the apple/chutney mix and bake in a 300 degree oven until it is hot through. With the spicy flavor of the chutney you don't really need any other seasoning - I dot with butter before I add the chutney. I usually split the squash in half and bake them, cut side down until a fork easily pierces the squash, then let it cool. Baking it cut side down seems to extract a lot of the liquid. I also ladle Alfredo sauce over the cooked strands and bake until hot through.

Here is a trick - slice the apples and steam them using a little acidulated water. It only takes about 5 minutes, or less, steaming - I use a bamboo steamer over boiling water in which I have either squeezed a little lemon juice or added 1/2 teaspoon of ascorbic acid. I spread the slices over the bottom of the steamer, place it over the boiling water and cover. I test with a fork at 3 minutes as some apples cook more rapidly than others. Granny Smith, Rome Beauty and Braeburn take about 5 minutes.

Andi! Carbon-Off? Tell me all about it. Please. I thought that I knew about all of the dangerous chemicals available. ← This is the stuff:Carbon off. One of the guys who works at my local Smart & Final, who knows how I am always experimenting with roasting and scorching stuff in my outdoor cooker, happened to mention they had a new cleaner for really black, burnt-on goop and brought a can to me. I tried it and it works. I used it on some really old, crusty, black, steel, sheet pans and they cleaned up beautifully, with little effort.

Wonderful description of your applesauce extravaganza! I love the aroma that goes all through my house (and around the neighborhood) when I make a batch. One of my favorite childhood treats was the little half pint jars that were canned for me and my cousins, red hots, cinnamon candies were stirred into the last of the applesauce just before filling the little jars. The color and flavor made for a perfect treat as these were usually saved for when we were ill. Apple custard pie or Marlborough pie was not just a New England dish but in western Kentucky also and showed up at church socials. Often it was made with a crust of crumbled saltines or Ritz crackers instead of pie crust. I have no idea why and when I discussed this with my aunts, they are as much in the dark as I am but do recall some people made them this way.

They haven't lowered their prices when prior knockoffs appeared on the market in England, Germany, Italy and etc. I bought one of the made-in-China knockoffs at Marshall's to use in my barbecue/smoker and it has held up very well, except for a large chip off the enamel outside where it was dropped on the patio cement. I used Carbon-Off to get rid of the burnt on black stuff and it is still bright red. I still have a lot of Descoware from the 1960s that is still in good shape. It was available here in the US long before I ever saw any Le Cruset. I think Le Cruset got a big international boost from Elizabeth David after she opened her kitchen shop in London. In her biography it states that Le Cruset produced the blue to her specifications - it was the same color as the package color of her favorite cigarettes!

You can make a layered pie, finely chopped pecans cooked in maple syrup until thick, spread in a very thin layer on the bottom crust, followed by a layer of your favorite pumpkin pie, then topped with a layer of egg custard flavored with a sweet sherry or brandy or rum if you wish. (If you can find it, Savory & James Cream Sherry is very smooth and excellent in this type of recipe.) This is pretty, tasty and the combination of flavors complement each other beautifully. I use one of the Emile Henry rectangular baking dishes and make the same amount of pie dough I would use for a top and bottom crust pie to line the bottom and sides of the baking dish.