eG Foodblog: Jackal10 III - Smoking Bacon and a May Week picnic

[SobaAddict70]

How about pissaladiere with bacon?

[Marlene]

Real bacon bits for caesar salad, potato and spinach salads. Bacon and ham quiche, BLT's of course.

[jackal10]

Many thanks for all the suggestions. Brilliant. Keepp them coming. Some like Rumaki I've never heard of or tasted...

Bit busy here and some unexpected guests for supper. Made the Slad Lyonnaise, which was lovely and went down well. Pix when I get time.

Friday is also busy. I have a breakfast meeting in London - I'm keynote speaker at a conference on "Risk and Reward in Semiciductor startups", then back to Cambridge and students/teaching for 4 hours.

I'll post when I can...

[Varmint]

Do a variation of the classic southern (U.S.) coastal breakfast dish of shrimp and grits. Fry the bacon, then cook onions, mushrooms, and tomato in the grease, followed by the shrimp. Serve this mix along with crumbled bacon on polenta, preferably mixed in with aged cheddar.

Those smoked prawns could be mighty tasty in this dish.

[little ms foodie]

smoky bacon wrapped around filet mignon is one of my favorite things, simple and so good!

fresh pea salad with bacon and red onion or sauteed peas with onion confit and bacon batons

cheddar and bacon biscuits

Bacon Burgers stuffed with blue cheese

Bacon is such a wonderful thing isn't it??

[Dejah]

The thought of a BLT from your garden and oven has me drooling already. Freshly baked sourdough, toasted just enough, lettuce picked from the garden, tomatoes bursting with flavor, newly smoked bacon, and a good smear of real mayonnaise....it just can't get any better than that.

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Add a slice of raw Spanish onion on top of that BLT...can't be beat!

[fabienpe]

I'm about to have all this good and very flavoursome bacon. What should I do with it?

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Some random suggestions. I'll try not to repeat what the others have said.

1. Give it to me ;-)

2. Flammekueche (bacon, onion, crème fraîche on a very thin bread-dough)

3. Quiche Lorraine (the real one!)

4. Potée Lorraine (while we are in the area - bacon, porc fillet, porc tail, green cabbage, turnip, etc.)

5. Simply some vegetables slowly cooked with bacon (like they do at Louis XV)

6. Bacon bread

7. Bacon & wholenut kougelhof

8. Smooth creamy bacon sauce for some fish like john dorry

9. Raw on some nice bread which has been brushed with garlic (like they do in Ukraine I was told)

Fabien

[petite tête de chou]

It's more of a fall and winter recipe but Sara Perry has a wonderful recipe for a pear and apple crisp with a bacon and brown sugar topping. VERY good. click

[rooftop1000]

I just saw this on the food network here and it was truly DUH why didnt everyone or at least, why didnt I think of this.....Frittata in a muffin pan....bacon of course....

for all the low carbers out there, I mean it basically an egg muffin totally portable and totally tasty

even for a fancy luncheon offset on a nice green salad....

tracey

[Smithy]

Most of my bacon ideas have already been suggested. (Do you need a recipe for rumaki?) The only other thing that comes to my mind is a corn chowder with crisped bacon. Soften up some chopped onion in olive oil, add some chopped bacon and cook it slightly, throw in maize cut off the cob, chopped tomatoes if you like, diced potatoes if you like, and water or broth (generally chicken for me). Cook until nicely melded and thickening. Finish with cream and garnish with really crisp bits of bacon. I'm leaving seasonings out, but of course there should be salt and pepper to taste, and herbs or spices of your choice. I think I only just now thought of chives, despite the patch outside my door, but I think they'd do well as a garnish.

I notice that you use grams and kg for weight (mass, really, I know) but degrees F on your temperatures. Is that just because you're using a Yank thermometer, or do you think in Fahrenheit?

I want one of those ovens. I lust after that oven. I think we have room.

I didn't know you could get that texture of bread without kneading. That's fascinating. Anything more you care to tell us about bread would be greatly appreciated.

[jackal10]

5am. Grey dawn. I have a breakfast meeting in London, 2 hours travel away, and I need to catch up with my correspondence and post before I leave. Breakfast meetings are uncivilised. More coffee (Java and Mysore blend).

Thank you for excellent Bacon suggestions. I can see we will eat well...

Last night we made a Salad Lynonnaise, courtesy of Mrbigjas's suggestion. Thank you! Warning: Food Porn ahead.

Fried pieces of bacon and sausage, plain boiled potatoes, then fried garlic croutons in the bacon fat. Assemble with salad leaves from the garden, and a poached egg (or two in my case). The eggs are from our neighbors.

Drizzle with vinagrette, made with white balsamic and olive oil. The olive oil is brought back in bulk by our neighbors from Provence. Green and fruity. The plastic 5 litre jerrycan has a web site on it http://www.chez.com/huiledoliveenprovence/

Tonights wine is a 2004 Ch. Morgues du Gres Rose. I do think these southern French Costieres de Nimes and surrounding areas have greatly improved recently.

Pretty wine, pretty bottle, also with a web site http://www.mourguesdugres.fr/

Finished the bread. After 4 hourly turns, shaped and put into a banneton (wicker basket) to prove slowly, retarded in the fridge. It will happily sit there until needed when we bake tomorrow. The porous basket and cloth allow a slight skin to form, improving the crust. The coil basket will leave a nice impression on the bread. The Baneton is from http://www.brotformen.de/. For this bread, one of the keys is to get the hydration right, hence the calculations. Bread is very sensitive to small variations in hydration. Its a brown bread, and brown flour adsorbs more water, but is also more tolerant. You won't get a high rise or very open texture since the bran in the bread pucntures the gas cells. Apart from that another key is gentle handling, since you don't want to knock out all the gas that you have carefully built up. Also temperature during fermentation (85F) is important for sourdough. When baking good bottom heat is also important, but more of that tomorrow.

Took the prawns and the cheese out of the smoker after about 5 hours.

Prawns promise well, The stilton was a little warm, but should be interesting after it has cooled in the fridge and set up and the smoke flavour permeated.

I like the bacon bread ideas. I should have kept some dough back - I make a great bacon and cheese bread, with chunks of bacon and cheese in the bread. Bacon and smoked stilton bread, maybe?

I used Farenheight for the benefit of our US readers. Noramlly I use and work in centigrade. I used metric weight measures because they are much easier to do the calculations in. Digital scales and digital thermometers can make even lazy cooks like me accurate, and are the single biggest impovement to my cooking yet.

The oven is built around a shell from http://www.fourgrandmere.com

Edited June 10, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[jackal10]

Took the eggs and bacon out of the smoker, as I'm not sure what time I'll be back tonight. The bacon has had 36 hours of smoke, and I'm sure that will be OK.

The eggs had 12 hours in the smoke, and the one I sampled was surprisingly good. Call it breakfast. They are now all resting in baggies in the fridge.

I'm now off to Lodon, no doubt trailing a faint redolance or cherrywood smoke...

Edited June 10, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[rjwong]

Now a problem. More feedback please folks. BTW I see lots of reader, but few posters...

I'm about to have all this good and very flavoursome bacon. What should I do with it?

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Count me as a poster now. Your foodblog is quite informative, visually appealing (mind you, Cambridge is prettier than Oxford, ehh?), and vicariously delicious.

As for the bacon, make a Cobb salad: chopped lettuce, diced tomatoes, diced hard-boiled eggs, diced avocadoes, crumbled blue cheese, diced chicken, diced cooked bacon bits, with a covering of blue cheese dressing.

[slbunge]

I've been trying to get my arms around how you are using your brick oven as a smoker. Is it as dead simple as it appears? Seems like you organized some very high quality wood shavings into a bed in the hearth, lit it, and monitored the temperature near the meat. I assume you added fuel throughout but I'm just surprized that the fire stayed lit and under a controlled smolder.

Glad to hear about the eggs. I may try that later this summer.

[Toliver]

The eggs had 12 hours in the smoke, and the one I sampled was surprisingly good.

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They sound fantastic. Oh, the endless possibilities of smoked eggs!

edited to add: To go along with the bacon theme, smoked-egg salad sandwiches with bacon crumbles (though you'd probably need to "cut" the smoked eggs with regular boiled eggs so the smokiness wouldn't be overwhelming).

And a not-so-typical spinach salad topped with mandarin oranges, slices of spring onion and crumbles of smoked boiled eggs served with hot bacon dressing all sprinkled with some bleu cheese crumbles.

Edited June 10, 2005 by Toliver (log)

[Jinmyo]

I've done oolong tea smoked eggs but not real smoked eggs. I'll have to remedy that.

Good show, Jack.

[Grub]

Love this log. It's awe inspiring and mouth-watering -- mind, I can't help but feel a tad envious of anyone capable of making food this good looking, heheh. Fantastic.

I'll second the suggestion about pasta alla carbonara...

[jackal10]

Too kind...its fairly plain food, and my preentation leaves a lot to be desired...

I'm sure Carbonara will feature soon, as will a Cobb salad, but maybe not in this blog timeframe.

The smoked eggs idea came from Keith Erlandson "Home Smoking and Curing". The eggs were seasoned with salt and pepper before smoking. I guess they are similar to tea-smoke eggs, but less sharp - I find tea smoked food quite acrid from the smoldering sugar.

Slbunge: The sawdust is quite ordinary, except that its hardwood and with no or very little MDF. Its straight out of the dust collector at a local joinery shop. I think its mostly from the planer/thicknesser, and they have been processing mostly cherry and oak. Its just put in a heap about 3 inches wide by 2 inches thick all around the edge of the oven floor and lit at one end. Once its got going is just smolders all the way round. No flame to speak of. These two days took about a pail of sawdust. I didn't add any. I thought I might have needed to relight it, but it sorted its self out. I'd guess it would work in any fireproof box like a large BBQ, especially one with a seperate firebox, where the draft can be controlled.

Today's been busy. To London early. The coffee stall at the station (http://www.amtcoffee.co.uk/ has saved my life (or should that be bacon?) on several occaisions. Quite a decent 4 shot expresso. The corporate breakfast turned out to be miniature hot dogs and flabby bacon rolls, in strange soft fine grained sweet glazed rolls, almost like baked Bao, or bridge rolls.

Gave my talk, and then back in time for lunch in College (tomato and red pepper soup, boiled beef with parsley dumplings, cheese - Sage Derby). Prof Laurie Hall tells me he has got his new hot air oven working, so he can watch bread actually baking inside his NMR machine and see how the structure changes. He is also looking at how an egg cooks. ( http://www.hslmc.cam.ac.uk/index_hires.htm follow posters and food), .

Then teaching for four hours, and home for supper. Sausages, new potatoes, cabbage...and bacon.

Still got exam marking to do, but that might have to wait until tomorrow. Also tomorrow bake off the bread, and other prep for the picnic, and maybe get out in the garden. Any requests?

I'm going to slump in front of the TV, maybe with a glass of scotch. The last, alas, of the 1972 cask strength Strathisla, in a Gordon and McPhail bottling, I think...

Edited June 10, 2005 by jackal10 (log)

[Marlene]

Best keep that scotch out of sight of my husband. Strathisla is a favourite of his. Looking good Jack.

[SobaAddict70]

The bao gave me an idea...

How about a rendition of pork bao, only this time with bacon and mushrooms? You know, like a re-interpreted version of a Chinese steamed bun and a Cornish pasty?

Well, maybe not mushrooms. Without knowing how the bacon tastes, I'm kind of at a loss to suggest an accompaniament.

Soba

[tejon]

Caramelized onions go really well with bacon - the sweetness counters the smokiness and salt of the pork.

[jamiemaw]

Thank you Jack, for the tour around your garden, smoking aparatus, the asides on your multi-tasking career(s) and the town and gown references.

I have splendid memories of Cambridge. My best friend, Angus Stewart (aka 'The Burly Canadian'), captained the Blues to back-to-back victories over Oxford in the mid-seventies. His now-wife attended King’s. Now I try to look in on the town as often as possible, especially when accompanying Mr. Stewart as he seems to drink for free in the town.

I’ve particularly enjoyed your relaxed expertise in bread-making, herb-invigilation, bacon curing (if you haven’t read Maynard—The Adventures of a Bacon Curer yet, you must soon) and egg trading with the neighbours. Clearly the last reminds of crossover between your lecturing in matters entrepreneurial and your need for quality proteins.

I was also very impressed by the series of safeguards built into the exam marking system at your college. Have you thought of recommending this system to those who edit Michael Winner?

In addition to the punting preparations, I'm hoping that you might take us inside your local and perhaps a favourite restaurant. And, by the way, have you smoked any game: grouse, pheasant, lark, venison et al? Mind you those rabbits look eminently (and imminently?) smokeable too. A little hare-raising might be just the thing, although garden pigeon Stroganoff might suit your next inclement evening.

Looking forward to the big punt.

Yours, etc.

Jamie

Edited June 10, 2005 by jamiemaw (log)

[jackal10]

Thanks. Moreton's book is wonderful. My friend Henrietta Green, author of the Food Lovers Guide http://www.foodloversbritain.com/ says she met him, and his bacon was indeed excellent.

The exams are for the University, not college. I'm sure Mr Winner is above any reccomendation from me..

Don't really have a local. The most famous pub in Cambridge is the Eagle, apparently the real place where Crick and Watson discovered the secret of life.

http://www.worldstudysolutions.com/locatio.../EagleHome.html Click on history to see the bar ceiling from WWII, where the US air crews wrote the names of those who did not come back in candle soot...

oops...I was trying to turn the skin from the bacon into the definitive porky scratchings. Unfortunately I forgot them, and they burnt. Fortunately it was only half of the skin...

A disadvantge of the Aga is that you can't smell things burning in the oven, as the oven is vented to the flue.

The working end of the kitchen

[Smithy]

Jack, I'd be interested in knowing how you use sorrel and horseradish. I enjoy them both and have some pet uses, but I'm always on the prowl for more. Hmm. Now that I think of it, all I do with burnet is put it in my salads. Do you do something more creative with it?

[jackal10]

Sorrel schav is for borscht like soup (comes out grey green), or for omlettes.

Horseradish sauce chrain is for gefillte fish and for beef. The very young leaves, when they are still fern-like make nice salads. The roots tend to get dug up for Pesach, which keeps it in check. Some make horseradish flavoured mashed potato, but I can't see the point - it dilutes the flavour too much, and I suspect they make it by just reaching for the jar of horseradish sauce. However freshly made horseradish sauce (grate horseradish outside), with a little vinegar, sugar, salt is a relevation

Salad burnet I agree is over-rated. I don't know why people make such a fuss about it. Its not even vey decorative. Mine is not prolific enough to do anything sensible with, except put the occaisonal cucumber flavoured sprig in Pimms.

Edited June 10, 2005 by jackal10 (log)