kayb

Can't believe the Ski House cookbook didn't tempt me, as much as I love winter meals. But the breakfast recipes didn't look that different from stuff I already do. I escaped this morning!

Was reading Jacques Pepin's "Essential Pepin" last night, and his quiche recipe calls for four eggs, 1.5 cups whole milk and .5 cup heavy cream. I've used most everything imaginable in a quiche -- chopped ham or bacon or browned sausage, sundried tomatoes, roasted asparagus, steamed broccoli, green peas. I tend toward Gruyere or Emmenthaler for the cheese unless I'm making a southwestern quiche -- whole kernel corn, fried diced potatoes, rinsed black beans -- and then I use queso blanco or Monterey Jack and cheddar. I don't blind bake the crust. In fact, I generally don't use a crust at all. Have also shaped half- cooked hash browns into a crust.

Those are some PRETTY biscuits.

I have not. The sorghum I cooked last week was the first I'd ever cooked. After a dismal experience at trying to pop quinoa, I'm not certain I even want to try sorghum. But I did see several recipes with the popped variety. Lots of recipes and info at this site.

Having wanted sweet-and-sour pineapple meatballs for a solid week (in another era, I'd swear I was pregnant), I gave in and made them today. Two pounds of ground beef with a panade, two eggs, some ketchup, and some seasoning made 44 small meatballs (I'd say ping pong ball sized). I baked them for 35 minutes at 375F, then dumped them over into a sauce made of 12 oz pineapple juice as well as the juice from a can of pineapple chunks; a quarter-cup of soy sauce, a quarter cup cider vinegar, a half-cup brown sugar, and two tablespoons of cornstarch. Added the pineapple chunks and simmered for 30-ish minutes. Served over plain white rice. Hit the spot. I had been craving it so badly apparently I neglected to take time to take a pic. But I have three healthy servings in the freezer, and one in the fridge, so perhaps there will be a repeat later this week.

I've been doing some reading on sorghum since I made my maiden run at cooking it and adding it to my carrot/sweet potato soup t'other day. I think I'm going to try my hand at a sorghum salad that has cucumbers, Kalamata olives, sundried tomatoes, cherry tomatoes, feta cheese and a lemon viniagrette -- a vaguely Greek salad. If my oregano has not succumbed to the frost, I might put some fresh oregano in as well, along with some parsley. If it's good, I'll include it in the Christmas buffet as it'll be a good option for the gluten-free (celiac) daughter. I'm pretty entranced with this grain, not least because I've loved sorghum syrup all my life, but only ever saw the grain used in "sweet feed" for horses or cows. As I'm under a doctor's orders to boost my protein intake, and sorghum offers 18 grams in a one-cup serving, I'm thinking if I could make a salad that included sorghum and say, grilled chicken and other stuff, it'd knock a big hole in the day's protein requirement. The stuff is tasty, and has a nice chew about it. Next up: buckwheat groats, which I've had in the pantry for a while but not tried.

From reading the website description, it doesn't appear they're a lot different from steel-cut. As mentioned above, possibly finer. I wonder if one could give steel-cut a whiz or two in the blender and achieve the same effect?

I have discovered yet another reason I love my CSO. I was toasting pecans while doing three or four other things, and I set it to convection back for four minutes, tossed the pecans when it dinged, and set it for four more. Had it not been for them being in the CSO, I would have likely burned them, as I do not have an oven timer that functions.

Leftover potato salad.

Infant. I think of that, and of the party/cover band from the DFW area. Fine dance band for us "old folks."

@Anna N -- what kind of dressing is that? Mayo and....?

Now that would be a handy creature, but for the fact I'd need a spot to put the cart. Space in my kitchen, too, is at a premium, so my IP lives in a cabinet except when in use.

I don't see a doggoned thing wrong with that. Though I might have toasted the bread and foregone heating the cheese.

Here in the Mississippi River Delta, goat was always a prevalent meat in the African-American community. I have been to many a goat barbecue; a whole goat, roasted over coals for several hours, periodically mopped with a vinegar-based barbecue sauce. It's wonderful. Takes well to barbecuing, but it wants a slow, slow cook. There's also a Jamaican restaurant in Memphis that does goat curry periodically. That's some of the best stuff I ever ate. It's in a fairly mild (odd, for Jamaican cuisine, I guess) curry that appears to be either yogurt- or coconut-based, since it's creamy. I detected no coconut taste, though. @Nicolai, I want to tag along on one of your eating-out excursions. In what city are you finding these wonderful dining options, or is it various places? @FauxPas, how did you like the slow cooker mode for the beans? I got rid of my slow cooker when I got my IP, but I find I never use the slow-cook mode and things I might once have slow-cooked I just do in pressure cooker mode now. I've heard the slow cook mode is less than desirable because it heats only from the bottom.

Here you go.

I made a batch of spiced wafers this week. Some of them are going into Christmas gifts. Many are going into my mouth. They are So Freaking Good with coffee. Thank you, whoever brought up that topic and led me to the recipe!

I have her Bread Bible in dead-tree edition. It's marvelous.

Made a Christmas lunch yesterday for some friends who included a vegan. The soup was a carrot and sweet potato soup with cumin, fennel and coriander. I cooked it in the instant pot, pureed it with the immersion blender, and stirred in some cooked sorghum. It was excellent. I'll be making it again. Recipe here. As I find it easy to overdose on fennel, I cut that to a teaspoon. And I used both ground cumin and ground fennel, as I couldn't lay my hands on seeds. Dessert was cranberry pecan sweet rolls, made with egg replacer and vegan butter. As there is only one egg and two tablespoons of butter in the dough, the subs didn't appear to harm it.

Most dangerous food -- fresh corn on the cob, just-removed from the pot and slathered in butter. Pizza cheese cannot hold a candle to the burns this can inflict on the roof of your mouth. It helps if you, like I am, are a fool for the taste of fresh, buttered corn on the cob.

Some days, you get hit with an urge. This morning, I'm craving meatballs, not in a marinara sauce, but plain old cocktail meatballs I can put in a sweet/sour sauce. Ground beef is thawing, and that will be the name of dinner tonight, probably with fried rice and maybe some sauteed sugar snaps.

Meat loaf, mashed potatoes and purple hulled peas at my favorite diner. Wednesday is meat loaf day.

Other "better the next day" foods: cooked pinto, navy, Great Northern, etc., beans. Most soups. Most anything in a tomato sauce. Marinated veggies, as long as they're hard veggies. Pot roast. That said, there are things that are absolutely atrocious the next day. Any noodle dish in a cream sauce doesn't seem to fare well. In fact, most anything in a cream sauce doesn't fare well. I don't care for fresh summer veggies reheated in their original state; but leftover summer sqash sauteed with onions can be most excellently repurposed into squash casserole. I'd use that leftover steak in steak--and-eggs for breakfast, or barely heated as part of a stir-fry or fried rice. Or in a beef pot pie.

I have never yet seen a kitchen cabinet install that went either (a) smoothly, or (b) on time. Good luck! (The floor is beautiful, but that window wall is still my favorite.)

Baking is easy. Making chocolates intimidates me! (As does some of the gorgeous cake-decorating that goes on around here.) Welcome to the group. You'll find lots of expertise, in both professionals and highly skilled amateurs.

I glanced at eBay thinking I might find a decent price on one. $1,739 at Amazon was the best I saw. Not for me, not this year.