Whole Wheat Pie Crust

Ingredients

• 5 oz whole wheat pastry flour
• 100g solid fat (see notes)
• 1/2 tsp kosher salt
• 2-6 tbsp ice water (depending on kitchen conditions)
• 1/2 tsp sugar (optional)
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon (optional)

Preparation

1. Cut the fat into little chunks and stick it in the freezer
2. Put the flour, salt, sugar and cinnamon (if you are using) in a food processor
3. Do 5 one second pulses
   
4. If you are using two types of fat, put the one that is most like butter into the processor and pulse 10 times. Put the other fat in and pulse 5 times.
5. Add 2 tbsp of water and pulse 6 times. Check the mixture to see if it holds together when pinched. If it does not, add 1 tbsp at a time and pulse 4 times until the dough holds.
6. Turn out the dough onto your counter and smear it out with the palm of your hand. Smear 3 or 4 times to get the whole ball of dough. Gather the dough up with a dough scraper and repeat
   
7. Pat the dough into a disc and wrap in plastic wrap. Push it nice and flat and chill for 30 minutes

Notes

• I like to do 85g unsalted butter and 15g lard This is about 6 tbsp/1 tbsp
  

Apple Streusel Pie

Ingredients

• A single pie crust
• 3 lb apples (As many as 4 lbs for a 9.5 inch deep pan and as little as 2.5 for a shallow pan)
• 3/4 cup sugar (1/4 cup white and 1/2 brown if you want)
• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar or lemon juice (I like the vinegar)
  
• 3 tbsp all purpose flour
  
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 1/4 tsp ground allspice
• 2 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into little chunks
  
• 1 cup of streusel

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 350
2. Mix the flour, cinnamon, ginger, allspice and sugar in a small bowl
   
3. Core and peel the apples
4. Cut the apples into thin slices, then in half, giving you thin half moons. You can go further if you want, making little quarter moons. This is good if you are trying to jam a large number of apples into a small pan, or if your apples are really big.
5. Toss the apples, the vinegar and the dry mixture together in a big bowl
6. Let the apples sit while you roll out the pie crust and line the pan. Toss them every now and again, making sure to get the juice at the bottom up to the top.
7. Put the apples into the pie pan and dot the top with the butter
   
8. Sprinkle the streusel on top - do not press it down
9. Bake for 30 minutes, then put the pan on a baking sheet and bake for another 30-40 minutes
10. Remove from oven and let cool completely on a wire rack before cutting
    

Notes

• To avoid working with the pie crust in a really hot kitchen, turn the oven on after you toss the apples, and before you roll out the dough. My oven takes about 12-15 minutes to heat up, and this is the perfect amount of time for me to roll out the dough, put it in the pan, and so on.
• You could do without the streusel and put a second pie crust on top. That is classic and oh so good. Make sure to cut vent holes in the top crust before baking. Also, brush the top with milk and sprinkle with sugar. I like to use big chunky sugar for this, as it looks nicer.
  

Steel Cut Oats: Basic

Ingredients

• 1 oz (1/4 cup) steel cut oats (Irish/Scottish oatmeal)
• 7 oz (3/4 cup) water or juice

Preparation

1. Put oats and water in a pot that you have a lid for, bring to a boil
   
2. Reduce the heat about as low as you can and cover. If you are using a gas stove, be careful not to reduce it so low that it goes out when you turn your back.
3. Let it go for 20 minutes. You can stir it occasionally if you desire. I don't, unless I am feeling antsy.

Notes

• Check my earlier post for a tastier methods and notes on fruit additions, etc
  

Steel Cut Oats

Ingredients

• A little bit of butter (Optional)
  
• 1 oz (1/4 cup) steel cut oats (Irish/Scottish oatmeal)
• 7 oz (3/4 cup) water or juice
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon (Optional)
  
• 1/8 tsp ground ginger (Optional)
• Pinch of salt (Optional)
• Dried or fresh fruit: Bananas, raisins, dried apricots, etc (Optional)

Preparation

1. Melt the butter over low heat in a heavy pot that you have a lid for
2. Add the oats and toast until you can smell a mild nutty scent
3. Add the water and bring to a boil
4. Add the spices and fruit
   
5. Reduce the heat about as low as you can and cover. If you are using a gas stove, be careful not to reduce it so low that it goes out when you turn your back.
6. Let it go for 20 minutes. You can stir it occasionally if you desire. I don't, unless I am feeling antsy.

Notes

• I make this at least six days a week.
• When I say 'a bit of butter' I mean whatever amount you feel comfortable with. You can get by on as little as 1 tsp. I usually just slice off a thin pat, it is probably about 1/2 tbsp.
  
• You can omit the toasting step. Give it a try, though.
  
• If you made it with spices and fruit, and you tend to add dairy, try it without, it is very good. I like dairy, but I have found that this is really good without it. If you do add dairy, add it to the pot at the end and warm it up a bit. Consider using yogurt or buttermilk for a little tang.
  
• If I don't have any fruit, I frequently add a dollop of jam when I serve it. It is pretty good that way, but a little sugary.
• If you have fruit, and you like to add sugar to your oats, try omitting the sugar and using fruit to sweeten your oats. I am not some anti-sugar advocate, but plain old sugar tends to dull the palate and wash out flavor. Add lots of fruit and you will get plenty of sweetness, without the homogeneity of sweeteners.
  
• Adding bananas before cooking the oats makes them really mushy when you serve. I like this, you may not. Also, if your bananas are green and under-ripe, cut them up and add them anyway, they will come out quite tasty.
• Peaches are great in oats, but remove the skins.
  
• Dried fruit is great in this. I default to raisins, but dried cherries and apricots are also good.
• Irish oatmeal is steel cut, Scottish oatmeal is stone ground. This recipe works pretty well for both. This will produce a slightly soupy oatmeal with stone ground oats, but it tastes fine, and if you do fruits and other things, it won't matter at all.
• Do not try this with any of the following: Rolled oats, Old Fashioned oats, Quick cooking oats or Instant oats. Those are for cookies, and not really all that good for eating, in my opinion.
  

Steel Cut Oats: Volume to Weight Conversion

1 oz oats to 7 oz water works great

Posole

Ingredients

• 12 oz dried white posole
• 1.5 lb pork butt, cut into 1 inch portions
  
• 1 quart pork stock
• 1/2 tsp cumin seeds
• 1 tbsp salt
• 2 bay leaves
• Leaves from 3 sprigs of thyme
• 1 small onion, diced
  
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 1 cup chile sauce

Preparation

1. Soak the posole overnight in water at least 2 inches over the level of the kernels
   
2. Drain the posole and put in heavy pot with 3 quarts of water
3. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer for 2 hours (I added a quart of hot water at the 1 hour mark to replenish, but this depends on environment more than anything)
   
4. Brown the pork in a skillet
   
5. Add everything else, simmer for 1.5 hours
6. Do not add any more liquid, let the mixture get to a stewy consistency

Notes

• This was crazy good
• Next time: Half posole and half black beans, same process.
  
• Next time, I want to use a bone in pork butt, not cut into pieces and put it in when I start the posole. After 3 hours of stewing, it should be falling apart, and I can use a fork to shred it back into the stew. If I do that, I would omit the pork stock and just add water with the rest of the ingredients.
  

Red Chile Sauce

Ingredients

• 4 oz/116g dried red chilies (California chilies was what I used)
• 1 oz dried ancho chilies
• 1 oz garlic
• 2.5 cups water
• 3 tbsp flour
• 3 tbsp oil (any kind, I like non-extra-virgin olive oil for this)
  
• 1/4 cup vinegar (red wine, apple cider are good choices)
  
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp dried oregano

Preparation

1. Remove stems and seeds from chilies, peel garlic
2. Steam chilies and garlic for 20-30 minutes
3. Split chilies and garlic into three portions and puree each portion, along with 1/2 cup water in a blender
4. Pour each batch of puree through a strainer into a bowl, pushing with a scraper or spoon
5. Return the pulp to the blender along with 1 cup water, puree
6. Pass this last batch through the strainer and then scrape the bottom of the strainer
7. In a saucepan, make a nut-colored roux with the flour and oil (Stir flour and oil over medium-low heat until the mixture is nut brown)
   
8. Remove the roux from the heat, and let it cool for a few minutes, then add the puree to the pan
9. Bring to a simmer (cover it with a screen!) and let it bubble away for 10 minutes or so.
10. Add the rest of the ingredients and let it simmer for another 10 minutes
11. Thin by adding water, thicken by reducing

Notes

• If you do not cool the roux, the sauce will splatter all over your kitchen. It can eject close to 3 or 4 tbsp of sauce! I am not joking. And, what it is flinging is pureed chilies, not something that is super easy to clean up. Wear an apron and DO NOT add the puree to a really hot pan!
• Use a screen over your pot. This is a super easy recipe, but it will fill your mind with bad memories and make you never want to do it again if you don't use a screen and if you add the puree to a hot pot. Epically if you get a drop of hot chile puree in your eye. I thought the time that I scratched the inside of my nose right after chopping fresh chilies was bad, oh my god.
• Steaming garlic and chilies smells so good.
  

Pumpkin Soup

Here is a conversion of a recipe I found online. I had to mess around with it because I lacked a few of the ingredients. The original is here: http://www.fatfree.com/recipes/soups/pumpkin-soup

Ingredients

• 15 oz cooked pumpkin puree (1 can)
  
• 10 oz water or vegetable broth
• Juice of 1 orange (just under 1/2 cup)
  
• 2.5 oz dry sherry or apple juice
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 1 celery stalk, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp cardamom
• 1/4 tsp ground coriander
• 1/4 tsp ground cumin
• 1/4 cup plain yogurt

Preparation

1. Puree cooked or canned pumpkin, vegetable broth and orange juice in blender or food processor. Set aside
2. In a large soup pot, heat sherry or apple juice over medium-high heat. Add onion, celery and garlic and sauté until soft but not browned, about 10 minutes. Add spices; cook, stirring, 3 minutes. Add pumpkin mixture and bring to a boil. Lower heat to medium and simmer 10 minutes.
3. Remove from heat; transfer 1 cup of soup to a small bowl and stir in yogurt. Return to pot and blend well.

Notes

1. Overall, this was pretty good. I did everything but the yogurt step before going to class and reheated the whole thing with the yogurt when we got back. Great texture, but a little much on some of the spices (and I really like all the spices)
2. I used the apple juice, and it was good, but I think the sherry would be really good for next time.
   
3. The cardamom was way too strong. The original recipe may have been calling for pre-ground, and I did mine from pods. 1/4 tsp may be more appropriate next time.
4. The little chunks of onion and celery were appealing, but I think that I will run the garlic, onion and celery (maybe carrot) through the food processor first next time.
5. This was meant to be a fat-free recipe, and it was good, but I think a bit of butter was what this needed. So, the first step should be to soften the veggies in butter, then deglaze with sherry or juice. Then everything else is the same.
6. The chicken broth was fine, and is what I had on hand, but maybe doing it with water next time would be good. For nothing else, just to see if it had a better taste.
   

Pink Beans

Ingredients

• 1 lb pink beans
• Water
• 1 lb ham shank
• 2 Bay leaves
• 2 cups chicken stock
• 3 small potatoes, cut in 1 inch cubes
• 2 small onions, diced
• 8-ish cloves of garlic, minced
• 8 oz roughly chopped green olives
• Some tomato sauce. I passed a 10 oz tomato through a food mill and added the juice. A 6 oz can or whatever, really would be fine.
  
• 1/2 oz of cilantro or so, chopped
• Salt and pepper

Preparation

1. Soak your beans overnight, or do a quick soak, or don't soak at all
2. Rinse your beans and add them to a heavy pot with the bay leaves, the ham shank and enough water to cover the beans by 2 inches or so
3. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 1 1/2 hour or so. Replinish the water as it cooks off (there should always be about 1 inch). As you near the 1 1/2 hour mark, don't replenish the water, try and get it so that when you take the next step, the water is at the level of the beans.
4. Add everything else and cook for another 35-45 minutes. The beans should be tender and the potatoes should be cooked. There should be enough liquid to make a thick gravy for the beans, this should not be too soupy
5. I pulled the ham shank out when I added the rest of the ingredients, shredded the meat and put it back in. If you do this, make sure you discard the skin, as it will be tough and chewy
   

Notes

• This was so damn good, I almost cried

Beef Stock (White Stock)

Ingredients

• 6.37 lbs beef bones
• 1 lb 8 oz white onion, cut into halves
• 4 oz carrot, peeled, washed and cut into manageable chunks
• 4 oz celery, washed and cut into manageable chunks
• 2 oz cilantro
• ¼ oz thyme
• 3 bay leaves
• 4 cloves of garlic, unpeeled
• ½ tsp black peppercorns
• 2 cloves

Preparation

1. Put bones in pot, cover with water, bring to boil
2. Reduce heat to a simmer, and begin skimming froth
   
3. When froth is mostly gone, begin skimming some of the fat
   
4. Brown two of the onion halves in skillet over medium heat
5. Stud two onion halves with a clove each
6. Tie the cilantro, thyme and bay leaves together with some sort of unbleached natural fiber string
7. When you have either removed most of the fat, or are tired of skimming, drop the vegetables and spices into the pot and cover with upside-down steamer insert
8. Simmer for 8 hours or so
9. Remove the vegetable matter and bones, then strain the stock at least twice through a strainer lined with cheesecloth
10. Cool and chill until a layer of fat forms on the stock, remove the fat layer and you are finished.
    

Black Bean Chili

Ingredients

• 1 lb dried black beans
• 10 oz sausage
• 2 yellow onions, ¾ inch dice (approximately 1 lb)
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 can of whole plum tomatoes (Mine were San Marzano)
• 5 cups chicken, beef or vegetable stock (I used chicken)
• 4 dried chipotle chilies
• 4 dried guajillo chilies
• 1 1/2 tsp ground mustard
• 1 1/2 tsp cumin seeds, ground
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tbsp tomato paste

Preparation

1. Pick over the dried beans and soak them in 8 cups of filtered water overnight (I am being picky with the filtered water. In my opinion, however, it is important to use the same water you drink for most cooking applications.)
2. Open the can of tomatoes and use your fingers to crush the tomatoes. They do not have to be a perfectly smooth consistency, just broken up.
3. Create the chili base by putting the tomatoes, their liquid and the 5 cups of stock in a large saucepan. Start to warm it up. If your tomato can is unlined, you may want to put the contents of the can in first and simmer it for a few minutes. I do this to cook off the aluminum taste. You can actually smell it cooking off. This also works for canned pumpkin, etc. Simmer for 5 minutes or so, and then add the stock.
4. Put the sausage in a skillet and brown it, breaking up into smaller pieces as you go. The size of the pieces is up to your preference. With 10 oz of sausage, it would be best to do small chunks in order to better spread it out in the chili.
5. Cut the stems off the chilies and shake out most of the seeds. Grind them and add the powder to the base. I use a coffee grinder. I grind them until they are pulverized, but not too fine. It is OK to have a lumpy, non-uniform texture. I try not to make it too fine, as I do not want to be breathing the particles for the next few hours. If you are not used to chili powder wafting around your kitchen, you may want to skip this step and use pre ground powder. Probably 3 tbsp would be the equivalent, but I do not know. If you have another method for grinding chilies, use that.
6. Dump the rest of the spices in the base. Keep warming it, but the goal is not to get it to a boil or even a simmer. Just get it warm so that the slow cooker is not starting out cold. I find it easier to mix powdered spices in a liquid rather than dumping them into the crock at the last minute. This is totally my thing, and is not required for success. If the liquid does come to a boil or simmer, it is not a big deal, I am just trying to stress that the temperature of the base before it goes into the crock is completely unimportant, just warm it a bit.
7. When the sausage is done, remove it from the pan using a slotted spoon. You can just dump it in the base if you want, or reserve it for a little bit. If you want to taste the base before putting the beans in, you may want to reserve it, because it may not be cooked all the way through.
8. Remove most of the fat from the pan, leaving 1½ tbsp or so, and sauté the onions and garlic until the onion is translucent. If you choose to not use the pork fat at all, use a different skillet and 2 tbsp of olive oil instead.
9. Rinse the beans, put them in the bottom of the slow cooker and then add the onions and garlic. Pour the base over the beans (funny phrasing) and add the sausage if you left it out. Stir it up and set the slow cooker for 8 hours on high.
10. Do not put salt in for the cooking. Add it before serving. If you want, put the chili in a pot, season it and simmer for 10-30 minutes while dinner is coming together. You could also just salt it in the slow cooker when the time hits 7 hours, 30 minutes
    

Notes

• This was pretty darn good.
• Next time, I will just do the beans, water and bay leaves in the slow cooker, and do everything else separately. I can put the sauce aside, and combine the two before serving. It would probably be best to let them simmer on the stove for a half hour while I am setting the table, etc. I could add the sausage to the beans, too, to give them a bit of flavor.
  

Mojito Sauce

This is an adaptation of Daisy Martinez's 'Garlic Sauce' from her 'Daisy Cooks' cookbook. It uses roughly the same ingredient list as Daisy, but a different approach to make something more like a vinegarette.

Ingredients

• Juice of 1 Lime
• Juice of 1 Lemon
• Juice of 1 Orange
• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup apple cider vinegar (She calls for white, but suggests that you play with this.)
• 10 cloves garlic
• 1 medium onion, peeled and cut into chunks
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 1 oz cilantro

Preparation

1. Mash the garlic and the salt together using a mortar and pestle. Do not use a food processor, but using the side of a knife would probably work just fine
2. Put everything except the oil and cilantro in a blender, and pulse until pureed
3. Turn the blender on and slowly drizzle in the oil
4. Add the cilantro and pulse a few times. You are just looking to distribute it throughout. (You could pour the sauce into a bowl and mix it in if you object to blending the cilantro.

Notes

• Make this. Make it soon and start putting it on everything. Put it on sandwiches, put it on crackers, mix it with rice, put it on potatoes, stir it into soups. If the dish you are eating is too spicy for you, a bit of this mixed in will take away some of the heat.
• Really, make this, and go buy Daisy's book.
  

Roasted Eggplant and Saffron Soup

From epicurious.com: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/2720.

Ingredients

• 1 medium russet potato (about 8 ounces)
• Olive oil
• 1 large eggplant (about 1 ¼ pounds), unpeeled, cut into 1/4-inch-thick rounds
• ¼ cup olive oil
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 4 garlic cloves, chopped
• 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano, crumbled
• 5 cups chicken stock or canned broth
• 1/8 teaspoon saffron threads

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Pierce potato with fork. Place potato on oven rack and bake until very soft, about 1 hour. Remove from oven and cool. Line 2 baking sheets with foil and brush with olive oil. Arrange eggplant rounds on prepared sheets. Bake eggplant 15 minutes. Cover with foil. Bake until very soft and brown, about 30 minutes longer.
2. Heat 1/4 cup olive oil in heavy large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add onion, garlic and oregano and sauté until onion and garlic are translucent, about 10 minutes. Cut potato into pieces. Combine potato, eggplant and onion mixture in processor. With machine running, gradually add chicken stock and blend until smooth. Transfer to saucepan. Add saffron and bring to simmer. Serve hot. (Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Cover and refrigerate. Reheat before serving.)

Notes

• This was great, as is. I also tried adding a dollop of plain yogurt when I served it, and once when reheating it, and that was also really good.
• This amount was too way much for just Erin and I, I think half would do the trick for a main course plus leftovers. Half would probably be a good amount for four people’s soup course.
• I think that if I was serving this for the in-laws, I might try peeling the potato and eggplant, in order to get a smoother looking soup. As for color, it was all right, but maybe a little too swampy looking. Removing the skins would also help this, but the roasting process would still probably turn the eggplant slices brown, so I don’t know. Maybe I could roast the eggplant whole, and then remove the skin like with the potatoes. That may affect the flavor. The chicken stock would also lend a hint of tan, but tan would be better than the bluish-green color that it ended up being.
• The whole soup barely fit in the food processor, so a half recipe would also help in this regard.

Slow Cooker Squash

Ingredients

• 1.45 lb gold acorn squash
• 1 cup apple juice
• 1/2 cup couscous
• 1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp. ground allspice
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1/4 cup toasted pumpkin seeds
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1/2 yellow onion, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1 cup hot water

Preparation

1. Boil apple juice; add couscous, cinnamon and allspice. Cook for 5 minutes. Add raisins and pumpkin seeds, set aside
2. Soften onion and garlic in oil; add to couscous.
3. Divide the couscous between the squash halves; place in slow cooker.
4. Add hot water to bottom of slow cooker, cook for 7 hours on low, 3 on high

Notes

• This was OK. For a squash of that size, it would have been best to cut this recipe in half. Also, the pumpkin seeds were a bust. I think that slivered almonds would be best. Possible additions would be cranberries, pistachios or sunflower seeds.
• The squash barely fit in my slow cooker, so it may be best to do this with the same size gourd and half the recipe.

Baked Rigatoni

I used 2 lbs of rigatoni to make baked pasta. I used all of the 9 cups of the Bolognese from 9/8/2007, 1 lb of mozzarella cut into little cubes and 1 lb in slices. I tossed the pasta, the sauce and the cheese cubes in a bowl and put them into my massive enameled cast iron lasagna pan. I topped the whole thing with the sliced cheese and baked it off for 35 minutes at 350 degrees. The power went out with 16 minutes left, so the gas oven was not going to cycle. I kept the door closed and left the pan in for an extra 15 minutes, and it worked fine.

It was OK, but I have made better. The sauce was only alright to begin with, so next time it will obviously be different.

Chicken Stock (White Stock)

Ingredients

• 8 lbs chicken bones
• 1lb 4 oz yellow onion, cut in half and nothing but the sticker removed
• 4 oz carrot, peeled and cut in half
• 4 oz celery, cut in half
• 1 oz cilantro
• 1/8 oz thyme
• 2 cloves of garlic, unpeeled
• 2 bay leaves
• 1/2 tsp black peppercorns
• 2 cloves

Preparation

1. Put chicken in pot, cover with water and use a steamer insert to keep the chicken submerged.
2. Bring to boil
3. Reduce heat to a simmer and begin to skim the froth
4. When froth is mostly gone, skim the fat
5. Prep the vegetables and spices
6. Cut onion into halves
7. Push the cloves into onion halves
8. Cut each of the celery stalks and carrots in half
9. Wrap the cilantro, thyme and bay up with some sort of unbleached natural fiber string (You know, like cotton)
   
10. When the fat is mostly gone, remove the steamer insert and put the veggies and spices in the pot. Return the steamer insert to the pot.
11. Let simmer for 8 hours or so, or until the bones crumble when you squeeze them with tongs

Notes

• I used mostly store bought backs and necks this time around. Over 7 lbs store bought and less than 1 lb home. This batch is mostly bones.
• I separated the fat during cooking, after most of the skimming had been done, and before I added the veggies. The yield was about a cup of fat, but I probably lost quite a bit more during the skimming.
• I used a ladle to skim the fat, first getting mostly fat and putting it into a 2 cup measuring cup. I then started getting a lot of water, so I put the fat into a smaller vessel, and started pulling fat and water from the pot, dumping into a measuring cup, and then skimming the narrower neck of the measuring cup. This worked really well. I skimmed the fat from one measuring cup to another, and returned the leftover water to the pot. This took a couple of passes, but I got most of the fat.
• I think the 4 oz each of celery and carrots are fine, but onion should be 1 lb 8 oz, I think.
• It took about 3 hours to get from putting the pot on the stove (The bones were mostly frozen and the water was at about 40 degrees) to adding the veggies and spices. 1 hour to boil, 1 hour to skim froth and 1 hour to skim fat and then prepare the veggies. It should also be noted that I made breakfast for Erin and I did the dishes during this time. I left the pot to simmer starting at about 11:00 AM. I thank that next time, I could have the veggies chopped and the spices ready the night before, and I could be more attentive and reduce the 3 hours to 1.5 or less.
• The amount of stock that I had was 796g, 1 lb 12 oz, 28 oz, 3 ½ cups
• It had been in the fridge for 3 days, and had set pretty well. A thin layer of fat had formed, and because the stock was set, it was fused in place. I could not remove the fat without removing the very concentrated stock, as well.
• I warmed the stock over low heat and then cooled it down to 85-90 degrees. To cool, I put the stock in a metal bowl and put the bowl in the sink and used the faucet to run cool water on the sides of the bowl.
• I put the bowl in the fridge, and after 20 minutes, I was able to skim a thin layer of fat off of the top, and using a 3 inch fine strainer, I could pick up some of the floating clouds of fat that I disturbed. I put the bowl in the freezer to cool it quicker (It had gotten to 77 degrees). After 20 minutes, it was at 66 degrees, and it had set again. The remaining layer of fat was very thin, so I gave up and put it back in a saucepan and warmed it over very low heat.
• When the stock was back at about 135 degrees, I boiled some filtered water and prepared 4 glasses. I put a little salt in each (less than 1/8 tsp kosher salt) and put in the glasses, from left to right, 1/8 tsp, ¼ tsp, ½ tsp and 1 tsp. I then tared each glass and put in 50g of the boiled water (this is about ¼ cup)
• The two left glasses were clearly not the right mixture, as they were almost clear and tasted of nothing but salt water. The two right glasses were weak, as well, but closer to what I was looking for. I added 1½ tsp stock to the left glass, and 2 tsp to the right. Now the two glasses were 2 tsp and 3 tsp per ¼ cup. The 2 tsp was pretty good, so I then tried doing 1 tbsp per ½ cup and this experiment worked fine. At that ratio, 2 tbsp would make a cup, and 2 tbsp is what fits into my ice trays. It was still a little weak, but that is fine, as I can always double up if I need stronger flavor.
• After spillage (3 cups tasting, 2 spilled), my yield was 41 cups.
• This stock was very collagen heavy, but it was low on flavor. This is fine, but I think I am going to try a brown stock next time to see if I can get strong flavor and good density.
• I did not let the bones get to breaking point, so I think I could have made it even denser.

Ingredients (Amended)

• 10 lbs chicken bones
• 1 lb 8 oz yellow onion, cut in half and nothing but the sticker removed
• 4 oz carrot, peeled and cut in half
• 4 oz celery, cut in half
• 2 oz cilantro
• 1/4 oz thyme
• 4 cloves of garlic, unpeeled
• 3 bay leaves
• 1/2 tsp black peppercorns
• 2 cloves

Preparation (Amended)

1. Put chicken in pot, cover with water and use a steamer insert to keep the chicken submerged.
2. Bring to boil
3. Reduce heat to a simmer and begin to skim the froth
4. Push the cloves into onion halves.
5. Wrap the cilantro, thyme and bay up with some sort of unbleached natural fiber (i.e. cotton) string
6. When froth is mostly gone, skim the fat
7. When the fat is mostly gone, remove the steamer insert and put the veggies and spices in the pot. Return the steamer insert to the pot.
8. Let simmer for 8 hours or so, or until the bones crumble when you squeeze them with tongs.
9. Remove the chicken remains and vegetable matter, then strain the stock at least twice using a piece of cheesecloth and a strainer.
10. Cool the stock, refrigerate and then skim the layer of fat that forms.
1. This layer should appear as the stock cools, so if you cool the stock in the sink until it temps between 58 and 65 degrees, you could probably just chill it for a few hours to get it to around 40 degrees.
11. Reduce the stock
12. When the stock is reduced quite a bit, put a bit of salt at the bottom of a glass. Tare the glass, add 1½ tsp of stock and then enough filtered, warmed water to make 2 oz/56g. Drink a little bit and see how it is. If it is weak, reduce the stock some more. If it is too strong, dilute the stock in the glass until you get the correct ratio, than dilute the concentrate in the saucepan using the same ratio (see note below).
1. The goal is to find out if 2 tbsp (The volume of a cube in my ice trays) of the concentrate is equivalent to 1 cup of stock.
13. A 1/4 cup of liquid is 2 oz or 56g and 1 tbsp is 3 tsp, so 1½ tsp of concentrate makes 1/4 cup of stock.
14. To dilute the stock, start by repeating the exercise above to get a ¼ cup of stock. Add 1 oz of water and taste. If it is still too strong, add 1 more and so on until you get the right mix. If you added 2 oz water to the original 2 oz, you now have doubled the amount of liquid needed to dilute the concentrate. You can either make smaller cubes (1 tbsp = 1 cup) or double the liquid in the saucepan and keep the original ratio (2 tbsp = 1 cup).
1. The math for the above is: (concentrate) multiplied by number of ounces you ended up with over the number of ounces you started with. If you had 32 oz of concentrate in the pot, and when you did the glass experiment, you started with 2 oz, and added 2 oz, you will do 32 x 4/2 = 64. 64 is the amount of concentrate you want to end up with, so subtract the amount of concentrate you have (32) and you end up with 32 oz of water to add to the pot.

Bolognese Sauce

I made Lidia Bastianich’s Bolognese Sauce (from the Italian American cookbook) today, with a couple of minor changes. I used 1 lb 7.25 oz of ground beef and 1 lb 2 oz ground pork instead of her suggested 1 lb beef and 1 lb pork. I increased the veggies by a little bit, but pretty much kept everything the same. The sauce was a little off, and I cannot put my finger on why. It was still very good, however.

Notes

1. Lidia indicates that the evaporating of the water and the browning of the meat will take about ten minutes. In my experience, this ends up being closer to 30-40 minutes. I have to push (and press) the meat to the sides, exposing a large well in the center of the pot where the water collects. The water will boil away over the course of about a half hour, and then it takes another 10 minutes or so for the browning.
2. I used dry bay leaves in this batch, and I am pretty sure I used fresh ones last time. Fresh bay keeps for so long, and is cheaper, so I really should try to keep it on hand more often.
3. 3 cups of canned tomatoes = 1 can.
4. These were a new brand of tomatoes, so that may have contributed to the flavor
5. I ended up with close to 9 cups of sauce, instead of the 6 cups she predicts in the recipe
6. Next time...
• I want to use fresh bay leaves, I want to know if there is a difference, in general, between dried and fresh bay.
  
• I am going to weigh the veggies before chopping, maybe an simple ratio could be found.
• It might be fun to use beef, pork or chicken stock in place of water to replace the evaporated water.

Steel Cut Oats: Volume to Weight Conversion

I tried a weight conversion for steel cut oats, but I was unable to come up with an easy ratio. Currently, I do 1/4 cup of oats to 7 fl oz of water (just over 3/4 cup.) When weighed, this all works out to 60g of oats and 400g of water. Simplified, this is a 3/20 ratio, and is not that friendly. The amounts that I use are based on experience, so I might want to play with a friendly ratio, in grams or ounces, and see if I can make it cook up right.

Cabbage Gratin

Ingredients

• 1/2 head of cabbage, cored and cut into 4 wedges
• 1 12 oz can tomato sauce
• 2 sausages, out of their casings
• 1 tsp dried oregano
• 4 small sunburst squash, quartered
• 1/4 c plain yogurt
• Parmesan cheese
• Salt and pepper

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 375°
2. Braise the cabbage and squash in about a half inch of water, covered, over low heat for 10 minutes
3. Put the tomato sauce, oregano, salt and pepper in a saucepan, and warm while the cabbage is braising
4. Brown the sausage in a skillet, breaking it up as you go, use a slotted spoon to get it out so that you leave most (but not all) of the grease
5. Put the cabbage and squash in a gratin or other short sided baking dish
6. Stir the yogurt and sausage into the tomato sauce and then pour it over the vegetables
7. Grate the cheese on the top
8. Bake for 20 minutes

Notes

1. This was really good. As soon as the weather starts to turn cold, this is going to be on the table all the time.
2. The sunburst squash was just something on hand, and it was certainly not a key part of the dish. Potatoes would be great here, but they would have to be partially cooked first, I would think. I don't know how long I could cook the cabbage, but it may work to just throw in some raw, quartered potatoes and let the whole thing go for 45 minutes or so.
   
3. I think it would have benefited from a little garlic and a diced onion softened in the sausage grease.
4. It might have been good to start the sauce with a roux, just to give it a little more body.
5. Homemade sauce would also perk this up. Cream might work in place of the yogurt, but it might need more acid, like vinegar or red wine.

Baked Yokon Gold Potatoes

Because I had the oven already on at 375°, I roasted 4 medium potatoes for 45 minutes, and they came out perfectly. I first poked holes, coated them with oil and sprinkled kosher salt on them. I put them directly on the rack. They came out perfect, with all the fork holes turning a golden brown. Maybe next time I will try for a pattern of some variety. The potatoes were about 4 oz each.

Baked Rice

I finally bothered to do the volume to weight conversion on Alton Brown’s baked rice recipe that I have been using. The volumetric version is a bit inelegant and unwieldy to scale up or down. It uses 2 parts water to 1 part rice by weight, however, and that is a little prettier. Here is the original recipe on the Food Network site. I did the weight conversion below, with the amounts from the original recipe in parentheses.

Ingredients

1. 1 part rice (10 oz/283 g/1.5 cup)
2. 2 parts water or stock (20 oz/566 g/2.5 cup)
3. A bit of a lipid (1 tbsp butter)
4. Salt (1 tsp)
   

Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 375°
2. Boil the liquid, lipid and salt in a heavy saucepan with a lid – I use a 2 qt Dutch oven
3. Add the rice, bring the liquid back to a boil. I am not going to counsel you against stirring the rice, go ahead if you want. I do, and it feels great.
4. Cover and bake for 1 hour.
5. Remove from oven, and fluff the rice with a fork immediately. Let it stand 10 minutes or so before serving.

Notes

1. This really is the perfect way to make rice. It won't boil over, it won't scorch and the texture is perfect. I have not tried one of those $300 Japanese rice cookers, however, so maybe I will change my tune later.
2. The lipid and salt are for flavor, as far as I know, you can omit them or play with the amounts.
   
3. You can add whatever you want to the rice before cooking. Carrots, celery and onions are obvious. Nuts and dried fruit work great, too. If you add any dried fruit, either add more liquid or macerate them first to prevent them soaking up too much of the cooking liquid.
4. AB's version calls for medium or short grain brown rice, but I have tried this with a number of different kinds of rice, and it works fine every time. If you are on the fence about brown rice, though, try it using this method. It is really good for you and it has way more flavor than white rice. Save the white stuff for risottos and pudding. Definitely for pudding.

Slow Cooker Chicken

Here is my first, but only mildly, successful attempt at a slow cooker chicken.

I did not want a rack made of aluminum foil balls like some recipes suggested, so I took a que from Alton Brown and used vegetables instead. I took two celery stalks cut in half and two carrots cut in half, and made a little grid at the bottom of the pot to hold the chicken out of its juice. I put a half onion in the middle to give further support

Ingredients

• 3.5 - 4 lb chicken, brined in a 1/4 cup salt to 1 gallon water ratio solution for at least 8 hours.
  
• 1 cinnamon stick
• 4 cracked allspice berries
• 1/2 tsp peppercorns, cracked
• 2 crushed cloves
• 6 cloves garlic, crushed
• 2 dried bay leaves
• 3/4 c cream sherry
• 1/2 c water

Preparation

1. Put everything but the chicken in the bottom of the crock pot with the 'rack'
   
2. Put the chicken on the ‘rack’
3. Cook for 1 hour on high
4. Cook for 9.5 hours on low

Notes

1. The chicken ended up being pretty good, but it was a little bit dry. The ‘rack’ fell apart, but it ended up not mattering. The chicken eventually fell apart, so it dropped into the liquid anyway. I am going to try a shorter cooking period next time. It temped at 190°-205° when it came out, so I think that a few hours shorter would do the trick. So, for a 4 lb bird, 7-8 hours on low or 1 hour high and 5-6 hours low. I should also warm the sherry and spice mixture before putting it in the pot, so that the chicken recieves heat right away. I fear that as the chicken sat, waiting for the heat, the tissue relaxed and released the brine. A little bit of heat in the pot may help to fix this, but I just don’t know the science.
2. The sauce was great. I took out the bay leaves and the cinnamon stick, separated the fat, and then ran it through the food processor. I made a quick roux with olive oil and flour, then brought the puree to a boil and reduced it for about 10 minutes. I passed it through a strainer before serving. It was, by far, the best part of the meal. For a variation on the sauce, it might be fun to dump a little curry in the pot and leave out the cloves, cinnamon and allspice.