fifi

Just an update . . . We are doing some trials on some of our ideas. Here is one that is a winner. I bought some chorizo. It was in a casing but I took it out and fried it up as crumbles. First . . . I searched for a chorizo that wasn't lips and lymph nodes and found an all beef brand that only listed beef, paprika, salt, vinegar and garlic. The crumbled and fried off sausage has enough salt and low pH tang that I wouldn't worry about keeping it extra cold in its cooked state. I would get out the big skillet and fry up a few pounds of this stuff ahead of time. With some scrambled eggs (low fuel consumption and little heat) and a dollop of sour cream (also keeps pretty well) rolled in a tortilla, I have a delicious breakfast. What I didn't make, but would make sense, is the lime juice marinated onion. You thinly slice red onion and drench it in lime juice with plenty of salt and pepper. That is another thing that would keep with little refrigeration due to the acid and salt. We love this stuff and use it in tortilla roll-ups and salads all the time.

I have recently discovered refrigerator biscuits in packs of two. (Yes . . . I am a biscuit wimp. I am still trying to master "biscuits like Aunt Minnie's" but only attempt that for a group. In the meantime, I cheat.) The Delonghi does an excellent job. I mentioned above that we have used it to do 9 inch pies when oven space was at a premium. I really like the idea of freezing make-ahead scones and such. My sister has an excellent scone recipe. The little oven will do them proud. I do use the convection for baking as it seems to keep the temperature and browning very even for such a restricted space. Also above . . . The dehydrator is a dream. I do tweak the temperature a bit. I have the original oven with the knobs and the "DEH" setting seems to have a range. I played with it a bit while doing the horsemint and was able to keep the elusive flavor by keeping it on the cooler side. For the tangerine peels I ramped up the temp a bit. I am going to try to raid my sister's Mexican Mint Marigold and see how that works. If I can retain flavor in that one, I am golden. (Mexican Mint Marigold is our version of tarragon. Tarragon doesn't grow worth a flip here.)

I finally got around to reading last week's Whine and Dine. In the search for home fries, I couldn't pass this one up . . .

There was some useful information in The Houston Chronicle that I am just getting around to posting.

This is really interesting. I have always wanted to cook a Muscovy duck. A few years ago, the waterfront condo I lived in got overrun with Muscovy ducks. The damn things made ducklings like a duckling factory and they were agressive as hell. They ran off all of our mallards and intimidated my basset hound. Do they taste good and have good duck fat? (Why do I see a midnight duck hunt in my future? )

Now that I think about it, I think I did about the same thing. I braised it in the LC at my usual 250 F and I think I did "finish" it on top of the stove. The braising got the tender succulence I was after and the quick finish made the sauce separate as it should. OH . . . I used pork as well but I would bet the same idea would apply to beef. I didn't take any notes, either. Now if someone could tell me how to get the tumeric stain out of my cutting board, I would appreciate.

Smithy . . . Funny, my mother's name was Ruth and I can remember the same thing when we were at the compound on Oyster Creek when I was a kid. The well had limited tank capacity. Well . . . roofs need to be planned to catch water. My nephew and I did talk about stringing up some tarps. Funny thing is, we really didn't get any rain up there. Too bad. It was really dry. I have no idea why the folks don't eat fruit during a storm. They do otherwise. This isn't the first time I have seen this happen. Very strange. FoodMan . . . Why is it that the first thing there is a run on is the bread? Tortillas are so much more useful. Your family is truly blessed to have you as a baker. I forgot to mention that one of the hunks of bread that someone brought was this huge Challah Bread. I made toast out of some of the slices to eat with the (pork) sausage hash. The breakfast was cross cultural.

Yeah . . . We keep bottles of water in the freezer so that it is more efficient. I use them in my cooler in the car as well. My house site is in great shape. The rip rap at the shoreline has taken much harder hits. I would have loved to see the bay with the water blown out, the wind was all from the north and no surge. I could have spotted where the stone crab holes are.

Well folks . . . I am back, feeling very lucky for having dodged a really big bullet. I was in the evacuation zone so I spent 13 hours getting to the country place in Chappell Hills. That drive normally takes a little over 2 hours. The nephew and I stayed over to debrief and see what we would do differently next time. The way the hurricane cycle works, we are back in an active cycle like in the '30s so we are planning on having to do this again. Here is the situation . . . The country place has two houses. The main one got a pre-hurricane hit by lightening and took out the central AC. Two hastily installed window units huffed and puffed to keep part of the house reasonably cool. The well has potable water but it has a lot of iron so we use bottled water for drinking and cooking. As usual, we had very high temperatures after the storm . . . it was 108 F in Brenham for the first two days after the storm. No, that is not a heat index number. We had 7 people to feed and water. In summary: 1) We need to conserve water. 2) We need to keep heat out of the house. So, whether we have electricity or not (the range is electric) we need to look at alternate ways of cooking. 3) If using alternate fuel for cooking (charcoal, propane) think about fuel conservation. 4) We need to plan a bit better on supplies before they disappear from the shelves. The first adventure was what to do for breakfast. Eggs were nowhere to be found. That is a new wrinkle. I don't remember an egg shortage for hurricanes. Maybe all of the chickens flew north. Anyway, we had sausage and the makings for the trinity so I made a sort of sausage hash. We had a freezer full of chickens (rodeo purchases) so we smoked several. With "Aunt Linda's Scorched Squash" and my sister's Hawaiian macaroni salad, we had a good comfort food dinner the evening before the storm. That really made everyone relax a little and feel a whole lot better. Since the storm was pretty much a non-event, the next day I used the left over chickens to put the propane camp stove to the test. I boned out the meat and used the leavings to make a rich stock. The ultimate test was to make a roux on the camp stove. Success! We had the damndest pot of chicken fricassee we ever wrapped our chops around. Mayhaw Man would be proud. We even used the big Magnalite roaster that we found in a bottom cupboard. After we got rid of everyone else, my nephew and I stayed behind to put the place in order and debrief on what worked and what might work better. We warmed up the one package of shrimp and crab gumbo that I hid away and proceeded to get partly drunk. Keep that in mind when you read my list of learnings. I may have missed some. What we learned: Buy more trinity. I could have used a bunch more. In the first place. it makes just about everything taste good. (The sausage hash was outstanding.) In the second place, it is a sneaky way to get more veggies down the collective gullets. If you must have pasta, pre-cook it before you are in a water short situation. Rice is a better alternative. It is an efficient use of water and doesn't take as much fuel or produce as much heat. Couscous is even better. Cured sausages are a good thing to have around. They have many uses and aren't a spoilage problem. We had several links of fresh sausage and put them in the smoker. Precooked bulk sausage and ground meat would be a good thing to have around for many uses. Like the pasta, do that before the storm. Get more tortillas. For breakfast as well as any other meal, you can feed the folks without dirty dishes to have to deal with. It would have been nice to have a Weber. With indirect heat, we could bake just about anything. Of course, grilling is always an option and we could probably get more veggies eaten if they are grilled. I am thinking of having a welding shop friend to make up a griddle thing to put in the Weber. I am thinking quesadillas, pancakes, grilled cheese. Speaking of cheese. Buy more. It keeps and has a lot of uses. After all, that is why cheese was invented. Keeping milk cold is a pain if the electricity is off. Buy more potatoes. Buy more eggs. (What's up with that egg shortage?) Bean salsas are nutritious and add more veggies. Hit the Goya aisle. Anything that requires chopping (trinity, salsas) is a good thing. You need to give the folks something to do that is useful and keeps them out from underfoot in the cooking area. They can only play so much Monopoly and Scrabble. Plan ahead for cooking up stuff in the freezer if you don't have a generator to keep it running. Better yet, buy a generator. Save the empty water bottles to refill with tap water for the next time around. And I am still thinking of ways to get the folks to eat fruit. Bean salsas help. I will be stocking up on those jars of pre-made roux. But here is the one stroke of genius attributable to my nephew. . . He has some plastic shoeboxes that just fit in the bottom of the big cooler. Ahead of time, you freeze blocks of ice in them. Put them in the bottom of the cooler. This gives you a level surface to store stuff on and they don't melt as fast as chunks. If you run a piece of tubing from the drain to bottles, you reclaim the water and the food doesn't float. Any more survivalist ideas out there?

Well, if you have hot stock (simmering) and add it a little bit at a time, you might get away with it. A lot of stirring/whisking will help with that. It is just easier to add cool stock in larger amounts and not waste as much energy stirring. But then, I am a lazy sort.

Good topic. But, I am split on this one. It depends upon the guests. I have some friends that I like to cook with. My kids fall into that category. Oddly enough, my son more than my daughter. He is quite a good cook. She is still learning at 35. I also have friends that I cook with in a recipe development mode and that is a whole different thing. We always clean up together. Then, I have some friends that I wouldn't want in the kitchen. Not because they are a problem but because, when I cook for them, it is a special occasion. I want them to sit at the side, sip wine, converse and wait to "be served." I wouldn't dream of having them help with clean up.

I have seen a lot of turduckens in my time but never, and I mean never, have I seen one that gorgeous. That is truly a masterpiece. Bravo!

When you say your roux "broke" I am assuming you mean that the liquid didn't incorporate and you had these nasty looking blobs. I have had that happen to me and the culprit was hot stock. It took some pretty heavy whisking to recover. I read that somewhere or heard it from someone making gumbo on TV, probably Justin Wilson. It is true. To cool stock quickly I freeze bottles of water and put them in the pot. If I haven't planned ahead to freeze water bottles, ice cubes in a zipper baggy works pretty well. The thickness will depend upon two factors: How dark the roux is and the roux/liquid ratio. As the roux gets darker, the starch is broken down and does not have the thickening power of uncooked flour. The ratio is of course, obvious. For the "teaching" recipe, 1 cup flour and oil taken to Upperline dark and 6 cups liquid results in a rather thin gumbo. I am not sure that a roux that dark can ever get "thick" on its own. Therefore putting the file on the table. I have tried to alter that truth on one occasion for reasons that are too long a story for here. What I did was make some light roux in a separate pan and stirred some in when it was all over. If you had a really dark roux and it was thick, I have no idea how you got there.

Your wish is my command.

Over in the casseroles thread I reported on a casserole I used to make with Campbell's Cream of Poblano soup. Years ago you could find it all the time, well at least around here. Then it went away. Then, a few months ago it came back. Now it is gone again. I checked the Campbell's web site and no luck. I tried to e-mail them through their "contact us" link but got an error message. I will try again. I am thinking that it may be a seasonal and/or regional thing. This is great stuff to have around. From time to time, the poblanos that we get in the market don't have any flavor. This is a great back up for casseroles and such.

I got the D70 with the kit lens and also the 60mm macro. Once you learn how, you can manipulate the "film speed" and f stop and vary the depth of field just like you would with any other camera. The trick is learning how. This camera can do the tango and slice a mango. I just have to take time to figure it out. I am retired and can't find the time. BTW . . . The kit lens is a heck of a deal. The camera store guy talked me into it. I am really glad he did. It is 18mm - 70mm and you can do some really good food shots with it. The tech reviews I read on it are amazing. Another thing I am glad I did was upgrade Photoshop Elements from 1.0 to 3.0. (I have never been tempted to shell out the bucks for the full blown Photoshop.) Then I got the Scott Kelby book The Photoshop Elements 3 Book for Digital Photographers. This is truly the most really helpful book I have seen on the subject. It steps you through several tricks that are really useful for fixing those food shots taken in less than ideal situations. (Kelby is the editor of "Photoshop Users" magazine and some others. He also has other books on Photoshop.) If things work out, I will be going on an excursion in a few weeks and will be giving myself a "crash course" in camera before I do. (That means reading the instruction book that came with it.) I will try to take some notes on settings and such and post here. (Oops, I just realized that I won't have to take notes. The camera records a load of metadata for each shot. Cool.) I am thinking that whatever I find out about the D70 will apply to any of the other "prosumer" digital SLRs.

I just remembered a "recipe" that uses a canned soup that is usually better than not. It was something we did with left over chicken in the fridge when my son lived with me. We would layer it with cooked pasta or rice. (We always cooked enough to have left overs for during the week.) Adding peppers and onions, maybe some salsa, we would bind it together with Campbell's Cream of Poblano, not diluted. It was usually topped with bread crumbs or crushed corn chips and maybe some cheese. Corn chips and a Mexican style melting cheese was the best. We ran through a period there where no matter how pretty the poblanos were in the market, they didn't have any flavor. We tried making this type of dish starting with all fresh stuff and it just wasn't as good. Then the Cream of Poblano disappeared from the shelves. Now it is back, here at least. I may have to make this again.

Ok . . . Canned bicuits have come up. There is one place where there is no substitute and that is duplicating my great Aunt Minnie's chicken and dumplings. No. She didn't use them but rolling them out on a floured board and cutting them into strips is the only way we have been able to duplicate her wonderful, chewy, sinkers. Oh . . . You have to get the really cheap store brand biscuits for this to work. And, I have made a casserole out of the chicken and dumplings. I just layer into a pan and top with breadcrumbs and bake to bring it all together. Sometimes I add peas and carrots. The left over chicken stock, now thickened with the flour from the dumplings, is recyled into a cream of chicken soup. Speaking of the pie . . . I did Mayhaw Man's recipe here. If you scroll up the recipe is here. That is one heck of a casserole. And, I would call it more of a casserole than a pie. I have made it a couple of times since. After a couple of trials, I think I have the rice quantity right and have gotten the dumplings right (cheap biscuits) and it is a new family favorite. It really is more of a casserole than a pie in my mind. But what a casserole. However, if you think of casseroles as "easy one-dish meals" this ain't it. This one is labor intensive but worth every minute and dirty dish. Oh my . . . gotta make that "pie." I see that Mayhaw Man has put the recipe in RecipeGullet here.

I am going to keep this on-topic by commenting only on duck tongues. First, a disclaimer. I am not an adventurous eater when it comes to odd animal parts. It is not usually the squeamish factor but more a matter of texture. I don't mind eating meat off of bones. There is nothing better than good ribs or fried chicken. But once you start getting into the grisley range, I lose interest. I never have liked chicken gizzards. My great aunt used chicken feet in the broth for her chicken and dumplings (to contribute the gelatin) but we never ate them. Oddly enough, when it comes to duck tongues, there is a taint of elitism that I can't shake. Yes . . . I know. Duck tongues are a case of using something that would normally be thrown away. But, maybe it was all of those ancient history classes with the descriptions of Roman banquets where the decadent ate rare odd bits just because they could. Bottom line . . . Would I try it? Yes. But from the descriptions here, I wouldn't be surprised if I didn't enjoy it.

I find that the internal temperature on most fatty cuts doesn't get "fork turning tender" until it approaches 200 degees F. I go by my internal remote temperature probe. I am not sure what a pernil is.

Yes mam! By all means. That is the size and shape that I find most versatile. Way back when I started collecting the stuff that was recommended as my first piece. By golly, the recommendor was right! Can't wait to hear what you do with that hunk-o-cow. I am thinking I want to do some beef this weekend. Back to the book.

I get confused about "blade roast" as well. It looks just like bone-in chuck to me.

Not at all. Merges sneak up on you. You will look silly if you don't try that recipe. I just talked to my son and we discussed this very topic since this thread being bumped up reminded me of the scallops. He said that he has had the dish at several really good restaurants in Chicago and DC. He said that Mom's (actually project's) is still the best. I take that seriously. He can be a tough critic.

Anna . . . I am wondering what you mean by Shepherd's peppers. I have found that red bell peppers often have a tougher skin than green ones. It may be because they remain on the bush longer to ripen. But then, I have also run into the same thing with green ones from time to time. You could also roast them a bit under the broiler and peel them. Yes, that is probably too much work. Ever so often I get lucky and find a big bag of red peppers for really cheap since they are about to go off. I cut them in quarters and roast the whole batch close under the broiler and peel them. Then I put them in portions in the freezer.

I have now made project's recipe several times. I am under orders, with extreme penalties for disobedience, to not "mess" with the recipe.