Camping, Princess Style

[Smithy]

13 minutes ago, curls said:

 

I'm having trouble getting to this recipe,  it is behind a pay wall. Any one else able at access it? 

 

I can see the recipe photo and it looks good. @Smithy I also like the salad recipe that you included and am so glad that your wooden salad bowl survived its multiple ice baths! It is a beautiful bowl.

 

I've sent a PDF of the article. If anyone else wants it, PM me.

[Smithy]

16 minutes ago, lindag said:

Do you have a planned time to begin your return trip or do you base that decision on the MN weather?

 

It's a little of both. We plan to leave this particular spot and start eastward again in a week, but we'll only be moving a couple hundred miles. Our general plan is to be home May 1, but if the weather continues to be as bad up north (and along our way) as we have then we may delay our arrival. This is the 6th snowiest winter on record at home. We aren't crazy about the weather along our way in our usual spots, either: central Texas keeps getting walloped; New Mexico is high enough that it keeps getting snow.

 

Truth to tell, I'm not crazy about leaving here yet. I've gotten comfortable and developed a good social life, so could happily stay here longer. I'd be singing a different tune if it were as hot as usual for this time of year! 

[Smithy]

Ribs again last night. I feel as though I'm showing the stereotypically dull "family vacation" slide show: "and here we are, standing in front of the Washington Monument...and here we are, standing by the Jefferson Memorial..." with nary a change. I did one thing different yesterday: sliced Yukon Gold potatoes and put them under the ribs, with the typical 1/2 cup or so of water in the bottom of the pan. It made for a one-pot dinner (except the greens we'd eaten earlier) but didn't really do the potatoes any good. They were done, but I think that so much water prevented them from absorbing much of the pork juices.

 

 

He complained that I hadn't put enough barbecue sauce on during the cooking. I left it off mine altogether. Now that he's settled on a favorite of the ones we've opened, I'm going to start adjusting the other one to my tastes.

 

 

 

Edited March 18, 2023 by Smithy
Replaced "quintessential" -- a lovely word, but not right here -- with "stereotypically dull". Also elaborated on bbq sauce. (log)

[Smithy]

Snack for breakfast today. Uptopic I mentioned making tahini sauce. Some of it went into hummus using chickpeas I'd cooked some time ago and stored in the freezer. 

 

 

I'm still adjusting the seasonings. It didn't have enough pizzazz, so in addition to the lemon I'd already put in I added a touch of white vinegar and more salt. Not bad. The other things I've learned is that my hand-crank blender simply won't get this smooth enough. I didn't want to climb the stepladder to get the stick blender, but the hummus needs it.

[Smithy]

It's easy to forget how quick and satisfying a tuna salad sandwich can be. Canned tuna, a touch of mayo, olive oil, salt-cured (and rinsed) capers. There's only a bit of mayo in there, so I put more on the bread along with several small spinach leaves.

 

 

This should hold me for a few hours. There's some for him too, if he wants it. No doubt he'll want to add Miracle Whip. Maybe he'll be satisfied putting it on his bread. 🙃

[heidih]

Agreed on the comfort and satisfaction count - along with egg salad sandwiches

[C. sapidus]

37 minutes ago, Smithy said:

It's easy to forget how quick and satisfying a tuna salad sandwich can be. Canned tuna, a touch of mayo, olive oil, salt-cured (and rinsed) capers. There's only a bit of mayo in there, so I put more on the bread along with several small spinach leaves.

 

 

This should hold me for a few hours. There's some for him too, if he wants it. No doubt he'll want to add Miracle Whip. Maybe he'll be satisfied putting it on his bread. 🙃

 

Agreed, tuna salad sandwich with something green and leafy makes a satisfying quick meal. I usually use chopped up dill pickles because I can never find our little jar of capers. Hot pickles or pickled jalapenos are fun, too.

 

Lots of ways to jazz up tuna salad. Hot sauce, mustard, curry powder, etc. Never a dull moment . . .

[Smithy]

We were gone several hours after my last post. Although I'd fortified myself with the aforementioned tuna salad sandwich, he'd only eaten his normal breakfast of fruit salad and cereal.

 

Can you say "hangry"? There was NO time for dithering or fussing over dinner when we got home.

 

We'd already decided on a pork steak (breaded, baked at 425F for 25 minutes) and vegetables. I'd planned on cauliflower tossed with tahini and yogurt, and roasted with shawarma spices. That would have had to share oven space with the pork steak. We quickly decided that there was no time for faffing about with juggling 2 dishes on 1 shelf. We settled for frozen vegetables of our choice, microwaved to preference.

 

He chose frozen peas with a couple pats of butter. I chose frozen spinach dotted with crumbled feta. He also had toast, of course. 

 

 

We both loved the pork steak and our respective vegetables. Of course we also loved our respective beverages.

[heidih]

Frozen vegetables can be such a back pocket blessing. I get antsy if no frozen peas or spinach in freezer - just in case. I met a woman at Weight Watchers years ago who would rely on them when she got "hangry". She'd microwave a good bit and add those butter sprinkles,. Her hubby mocked her eating such volume but she kept her weight at a healthy level and enjoyed her veggies. 

[Smithy]

7 minutes ago, heidih said:

Frozen vegetables can be such a back pocket blessing. I get antsy if no frozen peas or spinach in freezer - just in case. I met a woman at Weight Watchers years ago who would rely on them when she got "hangry". She'd microwave a good bit and add those butter sprinkles,. Her hubby mocked her eating such volume but she kept her weight at a healthy level and enjoyed her veggies. 

 

My darling used to count on frozen peas or corn for lunch: a container (say, 2 cups' worth) of frozen corn or peas, with a touch of butter, microwaved until the butter melted. That was his routine lunch for a couple of decades of work before we met, both at his work and on his road trips. He has frequently spoken of how "cleanly" the energy burns from those midday meals, as opposed to a burger or other heavy fast food.

 

I have come to appreciate their convenience.

[Anna N]

11 hours ago, Smithy said:

I have come to appreciate their convenience.

Frozen vegetables nuked and topped with grated or crumbled cheese make a fine meal when time or energy are in short supply. 

[MaryIsobel]

On 3/18/2023 at 11:39 AM, Smithy said:

It's easy to forget how quick and satisfying a tuna salad sandwich can be. Canned tuna, a touch of mayo, olive oil, salt-cured (and rinsed) capers. There's only a bit of mayo in there, so I put more on the bread along with several small spinach leaves.

 

 

This should hold me for a few hours. There's some for him too, if he wants it. No doubt he'll want to add Miracle Whip. Maybe he'll be satisfied putting it on his bread. 🙃

A good tuna sandwich is a wonderful thing!

[MaryIsobel]

3 hours ago, Anna N said:

Frozen vegetables nuked and topped with grated or crumbled cheese make a fine meal when time or energy are in short supply. 

My soon to be son-in-law often eats an enormous bowl of broccoli and cauliflower with butter and shredded cheese for lunch.

[Smithy]

Sometimes, a simple dinner is all we want. So it was a few nights ago: brussels sprouts with bacon, in a balsamic vinaigrette. I think I've shown you this before. It's becoming a regular part of our meal rotation. We usually do it with another dish, but this was enough for us for dinner. Here's the before-and-after:

 

 

We had a gorgeous sunset that night, and commented again on how far north the sun has traveled. When we first got here, it was setting to the left of the leftmost tree (the snaggy branches) in this picture.

 

 

 

[Smithy]

Last night I took another crack at Shrimp Bolivar. I'd purchased peeled and deveined shrimp from a good grocery store on Monday. I already had the rest of the ingredients. I've noted before that it's one of those never-quite-the-same dishes; always good, but never as good as we remember the original. I looked around for my binder with recipes; unfortunately, that binder has become 3 binders and the one with Shrimp Bolivar notes is at home. So I had to look back at this 2015 post to see if I could get back to basics. Here's part of what I wrote:

 

Quote

 Fettucine or linguine, cooked until nearly done, drained and tossed with olive oil, garlic, butter if I'm feeling decadent.  Meanwhile, saute the shrimp in butter and/or olive oil, dried parsley and oregano; toss all together with grated parmesan and fresh parsley.  Salt and pepper to taste.

 

I skipped the dried herbs (maybe I shouldn't have) and used a mix of butter and olive oil. 

 

 

I confess to snitching quite a few of those shrimp before they got mixed into the pasta; they were delicious on their own! The finished dish was good too.

 

 

This time, the dispute was that he remembered and wanted short pasta. Egg noodles. Macaroni. Anything. I swear he's moving to spoon foods! I have never done this dish with short pasta. He swears I have. We got into a semantic discussion. He asserts that his memory is correct; I know it isn't (and have pictures to prove it from some of my efforts). To which he responded that I can't possibly know what's in his mind, and only he knows what he remembers! Well, that much is true. 🤷‍♀️ 🤣 It's probably a good thing we can't really read each other's minds.

 

In other news, yesterday evening's cloud formation was fascinating. High winds, front coming through.

 

[Smithy]

We went to the grocery store yesterday in a vain attempt to make it the final shopping trip before we leave here. (We already know some things we missed!) I haven't shown you much of this store chain's stock this year. It's too late to start now, but I did snap a couple of photos to show how well their "loyalty card" program pays off: in other words, how much money one can save simply by letting them track the purchases. (There's also a gas/diesel disount based on money spent.) We didn't buy either of these huge chunks of meat -- no room, no need, no crowds to feed, and they're still expensive. Still, look at the price difference! If you were planning a party, the Fry's loyalty program would be A Good Thing. If you weren't planning a party, you could go broke saving money. 

 

 

 

He's been complaining about the chili powder we have with us: too bland, and somewhat bitter to his tastes. We explored the spice aisle. Fry's carries at least 5 different brands of spices in neat bottles, and they were on "buy two get a third free" sales, but they still were more expensive than the bagged spices. We came away with a variety to try.

 

 

(We always keep cumin and paprika around, but these bags are convenient for refilling bottles.)

 

We also went to the barbecue sauce section so he could get more of the Kinders Hot BBQ Sauce, his current favorite. I decided to try another version. Haven't opened it yet, but there will be opportunity in the next couple of weeks.

 

 

Once we got home, we had to find a place for everything. Our vows to keep the inventory down so we can find things has lasted about as well as a drunken New Year's resolution.

 

 

 

 

Spring is finally, finally! arriving...just as we're about to leave the area. Boo! These blossoms are about a month late.

 

 

On the bright side, I'm not whinging about the heat.

[Anna N]

50 minutes ago, Smithy said:

On the bright side, I'm not whinging about the heat.

Whinging? Sam would not approve. I know because I asked him. 😂

[Smithy]

1 minute ago, Anna N said:

Whinging? Sam would not approve. I know because I asked him. 😂

So did I! 😄

[Dave the Cook]

A while back, we were discussing bang-bang shrimp, and I tried to tempt you into trying something different, but it wasn't on your dance card then. Anyway, I sense your time on the road is growing short and you might want to give deep frying one more shot. If you want to try it, here's the deal: it's based on Heston Blumenthal's fish and chips, filtered through a Harold McGee column in the NYT. The idea is that what makes fried coatings chewy and/or tough (another word for durable, but that's for chicken or chicken-fried steak) is gluten. It's also demonstrated in Kenji Lopez-Alt's pie crust, as featured by ATK.

 

The trick is to prevent gluten formation. For this, the recipe uses two methods: 1) start with as little protein as possible. You need some to provide structure to form the coating, but in many recipes, you can replace half the wheat flour with a non-wheat, protein-poor flour, like cornstarch or rice flour; 2) replace some of the water with alcohol. This does two things: first, alcohol interferes with gluten formation, and second, it evaporates at a lower temperature than water, relatively speaking, so you don't have to use up heat to get rid of water.

 

So here's what we use:

3/4 cup (90 g) white rice flour, plus a couple tablespoons for dusting the food

3/4 cup (85 g) all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon fine salt

3/4 cup (180 ml) vodka

3/4 cup (180 ml) club soda or mild beer (an American lager is fine)

 

Fried at 375°, This makes a light, feathery coating. We use this batter for shrimp destined for tacos. Even leftovers, which are usually very disappointing when it comes to fried fish, are crispy.

 

After a (very) little experimentation, we revised to make a slightly more substantial coating:

3/4 cup (90 g) white rice flour, plus a couple tablespoons for dusting the food

3/4 cup (85 g) all-purpose flour

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

1-1/2 cups (360 ml) beer (here, the flavor of the beer matters a lot more)

 

If you didn't believe me about the gluten, the differences in those two recipes (especially the liquids) should convince you. We use this batter for fish and chips. Leftovers are better than average, though not as good as the previous recipe.

 

 

[Smithy]

Many thanks, Dave! Yes, I hope to be frying fish in the next few days, and there's still shrimp in the freezer. Of course I have questions...

 

1. If I can't find rice flour (it may be at home) what would be the substitution amount for cornstarch? Same weight? Same volume? Or neither? Or should I add rice flour to our shopping list 🙂 ? 

2. By "plus a couple tablespoons for dusting the food" do you mean after it's been pulled from the oil? (Why?)

3. About what size did you cut that fish to?

4. Did you cook the potatoes in the same oil, but without the coating?

5. What accounts for the slightly more substantial nature of the second coating? The extra carbonation from doubling the beer? The only other difference I see is the amount of salt.

 

Edited to add: so far I've found garbanzo flour in the Princessmobile. Do you have any ideas about how it would work in place of the rice flour?

 

Edited March 22, 2023 by Smithy (log)

[Margaret Pilgrim]

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

Edited to add: so far I've found garbanzo flour in the Princessmobile. Do you have any ideas about how it would work in place of the rice flour?

 

Reading Dave's instruction, it appears that the reason for rice flour is to diminish gluten totals.    Garbanzo has no gluten so would probably work as a sub.

[Dave the Cook]

All excellent questions. In order:

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

1. If I can't find rice flour (it may be at home) what would be the substitution amount for cornstarch? Same weight? Same volume? Or neither? Or should I add rice flour to our shopping list 🙂 ? 

 

Cornstarch is a decent sub (1 for 1) for rice flour.  Having said that, we get ours at a Hispanic market, one of which I'm pretty sure you're near.

 

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

2. By "plus a couple tablespoons for dusting the food" do you mean after it's been pulled from the oil? (Why?)

 

It's for dusting the target food before dipping in the batter. It helps the batter adhere. Dust the slightly wet fish with a bit of starch, and you get a sticky surface for the batter. Yes, it seems a bit nonsensical, but it works. 

 

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

3. About what size did you cut that fish to?

 

That's a six-ounce grouper filet there. Four pieces means 1-1/2 ounces per piece, right. (Please check my math.)

 

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

4. Did you cook the potatoes in the same oil, but without the coating?

 

Same oil,  but because the fish holds so well, it was a no-brainer to do the fish first, then the fries. BTW, those fries are per the JAZ Technique™, but store-bought frozen fries are allowed.

 

2 hours ago, Smithy said:

5. What accounts for the slightly more substantial nature of the second coating? The extra carbonation from doubling the beer? The only other difference I see is the amount of salt.

 

(I'd add more salt to the first recipe. Oops.) You're sort of there, but the real difference is the lack of 80-proof vodka, which would evaporate much faster than the extra beer, giving you a lighter result, albeit without as much flavor. To put it another way, in the second recipe you're trading the lightness of vodka for the sturdiness and potential flavor of beer. By the way, in the first recipe, you could use any 80-proof spirit, like gin or rye or rum or tequila. though the flavor will differ a bit (bourbon or cognac/brandy are not recommended).

 

3 hours ago, Smithy said:

I've found garbanzo flour in the Princessmobile. Do you have any ideas about how it would work in place of the rice flour

 

I've never tried it, but I think @Margaret Pilgrim is right; it should be fine, gluten-wise. Flavor, I dunno.

[Smithy]

3 hours ago, Dave the Cook said:

Same oil,  but because the fish holds so well, it was a no-brainer to do the fish first, then the fries. BTW, those fries are per the JAZ Technique™, but store-bought frozen fries are allowed.

 

 

Next question: do you have a link to, or would you please describe, the JAZ Technique™? I haven't found it in the forum posts. I am seriously jonesing for frie that look like that.

 

And sorry for being picky, but when you say ...

 

Quote

Cornstarch is a decent sub (1 for 1) for rice flour. 

 

...do you mean by weight or by volume? Or doesn't it matter much in this case?

[Dave the Cook]

I'll gladly describe the JAZ™ fry method tomorrow, when I have a little more time. It's not complicated, but requires explanation. If you need to shop in the meantime, all you need is a couple of russet (aka Idaho) potatoes and a sheet pan with cooling rack  We use half-size, roughly 13" x 18". A salad spinner is helpful but not essential, as long as you don't mind sacrificing a few paper towels.

 

Weight or volume of rice flour or cornstarch doesn't matter much. If the two substances differ in the quantities we're talking about, I'd be surprised.

 

I forgot that you should salt the fish before dusting with rice flour/cornstarch. It's not a chemistry thing, it's just for flavor.

[lindag]

Most stores that stock Bob's Red Mill products have his rice flour.

Common in the West.

The Red Mill Store is located just outside Portland OR in Milwaukie OR.  I visited the store on numerous occasions when I lived in  Portland and spoke to Bob himself.

(Sorry for the name-dropping).

Edited March 23, 2023 by lindag (log)