Archive for the ‘Recipes’ Category
This past week there was an article regarding deep frying in The New York Times. Not something that you would expect to see in The Times. There were even a few recipes as there was also a discussion of different types of breading that may be used when deep frying.
The article entitled “Everybody Outside With the Deep Fryer”, by Melissa Clark, made some great points regarding outdoor use of a deep fryer. When you deep fry indoors, whether using a cast iron, stove top deep fryer, or a counter top deep fryer, you always end up with a lingering odor in your house, not to mention a nice coating of oil on everything. Melissa’s husband decided to take their counter top deep fryer outside. They invited their friends to a deep fry party. Having a whole party devoted to deep fried foods allowed Melissa to play and experiment with different kinds of foods and different types of coatings. From sweet to savory, appetizer to entree, Melissa got to have fun, feed her guests, and didn’t have an oily, smelly, messy kitchen to deal with afterward.
Using an electric deep fryer outside is OK, but typically not recommended by the manufacturer. It is not an item that you could ever keep outside permanently. Some units can handle the outdoor exposure, but the heating element would need to be taken off after every use and brought indoors. If you really do deep fry all of the time, and you have a nice back yard, why not consider an outdoor propane deep fryer? These units are made to stay outside and range in size from small to large professional grade. Even if you don’t deep fry all of the time, having a propane fryer can add to your BBQ menu. While you are grilling steaks you can fry a batch of onion rings as a side dish. While grilling a nice tuna steak or some nice stripped bass you can deep fry a batch of french fries, hush puppies and clam strips. After smoking some delectable delights all day on your BBQ smoker, you can deep fry some candy bars, cookies, or fried dough for dessert.
Deep frying outdoors, especially in the hot, sultry summer months is an excellent idea. Whether you decide to get a propane deep fryer or just take your counter top deep fryer outside. Happy frying!
I just finished watching Bacon Paradise on the Travel Channel. I know that the world of bacon has exploded over the past few years, I had no idea that it was to that extreme. I have seen the blogs, the bacon salts, pictures of meats wrapped in woven bacon blankets, the bacon wallet, chocolate covered bacon, Bakon Vodka, and even bacon lip balm. That should have been an inkling. There are so many restaurants out there that are focusing strictly on the bacon.
Watching the program was a great inspiration to me. Given the fact that I love bacon, I now have more ideas for cooking with bacon than I had before. Yes, yes, I know. Bacon is probably one of the worst foods as far as being health conscious and cholesterol savvy. But, who doesn’t love bacon? Waking up in the morning to the smell of bacon and a pot of fresh coffee….mmmm.
Pork bellies are the American version of bacon. In Europe they use the back portion for bacon. Traditional Irish bacon looks more like thin sliced boneless pork chops. Bacon comes in other forms now as well. You can get lamb bacon now. For the more heath conscious mind set, turkey bacon and tofu bacon.
I have worked with rumaki before. For those of you that don’t know rumaki it is basically a chicken liver, a piece of water chestnut, soaked in Teriyaki sauce, rolled in brown sugar and wrapped in bacon and broiled or grilled. Not everyone is about the chicken liver. Myself included, but once you taste the combo of flavors and textures together…it just works. I have played with the recipe and made it with chicken breast and pineapple chunks. I have actually considered deep frying rumaki in my outdoor propane deep fryer.
There were a few of these restaurants on the program that actually bought in pork bellies, cured and smoked them on their premises. One place called “3″ in Arlington, VA actually has a pig roast once a month, but they place pork shoulder and pork belly under the splayed pig, so that the juices from the pig drip right down over everything while it is all in the roaster box together.
One restaurant, called Slater’s 50\50, Burgers by Design, actually makes bacon burgers. Not a beef patty with bacon on top…actually ground bacon made into patties. This young man started this idea by tailgating with friends in San Diego. At the time they were making 100 % ground bacon burgers. Mr. Slater has now added 50 % beef to the mix, ergo, 50\50. The light bulb just went on for me. I am ready to go out and buy a pound of bacon, a pound of ground beef and get out my meat grinder.
Now that I am totally hungry and want bacon. I am going to a barbeque at a friend’s house this afternoon. He is all about the smoke. He has 2 BBQ smokers, a smaller grill and has just added a larger Char-Broil grill to the mix. I know that he is smoking a whole turkey, 2 pork shoulders and probably some beef too. There was no bacon to be involved…until now. I saw many places serving bacon on a stick or bacon lollipops while watching Bacon Paradise. I just so happen to have some thick cut applewood smoked bacon from the North Country Smokehouse in Claremont, NH. I am going to thread the bacon onto soaked wooden skewers, place them on the grill, and have them for appetizers. I have some cracklins that I have been saving to trysmoked as well. Think this will be the perfect opportunity to give it a whirl.
Well, now that I’ve made you hungry, go out and get yourself some bacon.
I am constantly stressing the fact that your outdoor cooking appliances may have more than one use. Your grill, for instance, may be used for BBQ smoking or even be used just like an oven.
Traditional turkey fryers are multi-functional as well.
You can deep fry, stew, steam, and boil with your turkey fryer.
A neat idea for a cold weather tailgate, is to have hot cider or even mulled wine. Using your propane turkey fryer is ideal for a chilled tailgate crowd.
You can opt for just hot cider. Once it is warm, serve it in cups.
You can do a spicier version for a more grown up taste. This will add a heartier flavor in that crisp fall air.
6 gallons apple cider (not apple juice…cider)
6 whole cloves
6 cinnamon sticks
2 Tbsp. whole allspice
Place everything in the turkey fryer and set it to low. Bring the cider to a boil, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat to very low, and let it simmer for about an hour or hour and a half. To serve, place a pat of butter in the bottom of each cup, and ladle the hot cider into the cups.
For Mulled Wine you want to basically follow the above directions, but using a red wine in place of the cider. You also do not want to boil the wine. Only to simmer! There are many variations to mulled wine. Some people actually add vanilla pods, oranges, nutmeg and brandy to the mix.
2 smaller batch versions to try ahead of time before you try it at the stadium is as follows:
4 c. sugar1 tbsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground cloves
3 med. oranges, thinly sliced
1 med. lemon, thinly sliced
2 c. water
1 gallon dry red wine
Having a deep fryer can make your life easier. You can cook food in half the time that it might take you to prepare something another way. I know that I can’t make a convincing argument that deep fried food is good for you. It is food that is cooked in fat. But if done properly, the food should quick cook, sealing moisture in and keeping the fat out. The key is to not let the food absorb the oil.You can cook meat, vegetables, fish, and tasty desserts.
Speaking of tasty desserts, doughnuts are a perfect reason to have your own deep fryer. Many people eat doughnuts for breakfast, but you can eat them for snack, for dessert, or anytime. These delectable pieces of fried dough are part of what make this world go round.
Some people like yeast- raised doughnuts. I prefer cake doughnuts. These are leavened with baking powder or baking soda. Some people like glaze. Some people like powdered. I like a little bit of sugar, or really just plain, warm, right out of the fryer, with a glass of ice cold milk.
Here is a great cake doughnut recipe:
5 cups all purpose flour
1 Tbsp. baking powder
2 tsp. ground nutmeg
1 1\2 tsp. salt
1\2 cup room temperature sour milk(milk with tsp. of lemon juice)
2 room temp. eggs
1 egg yolk at room temp.
3\4 cup granulated sugar
1\2 cup vegetable shortening, melted and cooled
1\4 cup molasses
1\2 rounded tsp. lemon zest
1\2 gallon frying oil
Sift the dry ingredients, except the granulated sugar, in a large bowl. In another mixing bowl, combine the granulated sugar, sour milk, eggs, egg yolk, melted shortening, molasses and lemon zest.
Gradually add the dry mix to the wet mix stirring gently. (Do not over mix, this tends to make tough doughnuts. You will still see a little flour.) Cover the dough with plastic wrap and let it rest in the refrigerator
for about an hour.
Time to heat the oil. Get your counter top fryer, cast iron Dutch oven or other stove top deep fryer ready to deep fry. Heat the oil to 370 degrees F.
Turn dough out onto a well floured surface. Knead for 1 minute. Roll out to 1\2″ thickness. Cut rounds with a doughnut or pastry cutter (3 1\2″) then cut out centers with a smaller cutter. (1 1\2″) If you don’t have doughnut or pastry cutters, get creative. Use a washed, clean veggie or a large glass, and a shot glass for doughnut holes. Gather your scraps and re-roll and cut until done.
One of the best ways to avoid over absorption of oil, in fried foods is to not over crowd. Over crowding can cause the oil temp. to drop too low and prevent items from cooking properly. Only do 2-3 doughnuts at a time. Carefully drop the rings into the hot oil. Make doughnut holes if you like. They will float in about 30 seconds or so. Fry for another minute. Turn the doughnuts over and fry for another minute. Turn them once again and fry for one more minute, until golden brown.
Drain on paper towels or place 1\2 cup of sugar in a brown paper bag. Place doughnuts, about 2 at a time in the bag, and shake. NEVER LEAVE YOUR FRYER UNATTENDED! Store the doughnuts in a warm place until they are all done.
Get a cold glass of milk & enjoy!
My family has had some long standing Easter traditions. Typically Easter Sunday started out with a hunt in the house for a special basket with goodies and colored eggs.
As far as the main meal went, typically after a morning at church, or a sunrise service out on the Great South Bay we had a beautiful leg of lamb. Over the years, as I have grown older, I have tried to change up the menu in some ways. I have had smoked and spiral cut ham. I even roasted a leg of lamb in my 
Brinkamnn grill. This year I plan to roast a fresh ham on my grill.
Most of the traditions we had primarily came from my mother’s mom’s family. They were of German decent and were farmers in eastern Pennsylvania. Two of our traditions are actually recipes that we only make at Easter time.
One traditional recipe is actually a pickled beet recipe, but since I was a kid, I only knew it as pickled eggs. You make the brew and pour it over your beets, eggs and some sliced onion. Then you just need to let them set for a day or two before eating. They are a bit sweeter than your traditional pickled egg, but I like these purple eggs much better. The others are usually too vinegary for me.
Pickled Eggs:
1 can sliced beets
1\4 c water (I usually use the purple water that the beets were in…save the rest of the beet water too in case you need a little extra liquid)
1\3 c sugar
1\2 c white vinegar
1 small onion sliced thin or 2-3 pearl onions sliced thin
6 hard boiled eggs
1 qt sized large mouth mason jar
Peel eggs. Place eggs, beets, onions, alternately in mason jar.
Heat water, sugar, and vinegar to just boiling. Pour heated liquid over eggs and beets in the jar. (Now if you need a bit of extra liquid, pour some beet water in until everything is covered). Cover the jar. Let sit until cool. Place in the fridge. Let the eggs set for at least 24 hours before sampling.
I have also used this recipe for after Easter when we had too many leftover colored eggs. It is a better way to preserve hard cooked eggs.
Another traditional Easter recipe that came from my Gram’s family was orange drop cookies. My great grandmother’s recipe was big enough that all her 12 grandchildren always got a cookie or three.
Orange Drop Cookies:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
2 c sugar
1 c shortening
3 eggs
juice and rind of 2 oranges (about 1\2 c juice)
1 c buttermilk or sour milk
4 1\2 c sifted flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
dash of salt
Cream the sugar and shortening. Add the 3 eggs, orange rind and juice, and the milk.
In a separate bowl sift the dry ingredients, then add to the wet mix.
Drop by spoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until lightly browned.
Cool the cookies, then ice with the following:
1 box confectioners sugar, 1 tsp melted butter, juice from 1 orange(about 1\4 c), and 1 egg yolk.
I have tried to pass my own family traditions on to my children over the years. We always colored eggs together, I had my kids hunt for baskets. We went to church and shared a nice meal together with family and friends. My own children are older now. Not old enough to have children of their own yet, but too old for Easter baskets and for coloring eggs with mom. I will miss those days, but treasure their memory dearly. Hopefully if my children are blessed with children of their own, they will share the traditions that I have shared with them.
Have a blessed holiday.
I am going to step away from my norm again of deep fryers, BBQ smokers, and grills.
Easter season is upon us. There are so many good things to eat that come with the Lenten and Easter season. Friday night fish fry, lamb, fresh ham, pickled eggs. The warmer weather also brings thoughts of getting back outdoors to grill.
My great grandmother was of German decent and lived in Eastern Pennsylvania. She had a traditional cookie recipe that she made every Easter without fail. I love this recipe. The cookies are, light, refreshing, and filled with orangy goodness. It is a very large recipe, and there really is no cutting it in half unless you can cut an egg in half. .So eat hearty or be willing to share.
I do not know the origin of the recipe, if it came from Germany or if it was an Eastern PA. thing. I would dearly have loved to meet this woman. From what I have heard, I believe that she was a really excellent cook.So here is my great grandma Greaser’s Orange Drop Cookie recipe:
2 cup sugar
1 cup shortening
3 eggs
Juice and rind of 2 oranges
1 cup buttermilk (or sour milk)
4 1\2 cup sifted flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
dash of salt
Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
Cream the shortening and sugar. Add the eggs, juice and rind, and milk. In a separate bowl, sift the dry ingredients, then add to the wet mix.
Mix well.
Drop by the spoonful onto ungreased cookie sheets.
Bake for 8 to 10 mins or until lightly browned.
Cool and then ice with following glaze recipe:
1 box confectioner sugar
Juice from 1 orange
1 Tbsp. butter
1 egg yolk
Mix together the above ingredients.. When cookies are cool, spread icing glaze on cookies.
Yes controversy.
I have been making Irish soda bread for years. My recipe comes from The Fanny Farmer Baking Cookbook. The prologue to the recipe even states that Traditional soda breads are NOT SWEET! They can accompany any meal.
My husband grew up in Ireland. He always told me that the recipe that I made, tasted just like Grandma’s. Though Grandma’s was cooked in cast iron in a peat oven. Mine was, and still is, baked in an 8″ cast iron skillet in my oven.
It irks me to no end when I go into a store during the St. Patrick’s Day season, and see Irish soda bread all done up with raisins, or caraway seeds, and then covered in a hard sugar cookie glaze. This is the farthest thing from traditional Irish soda bread that you can get. When Americans decided that traditional Irish fruit bread was traditional classic soda bread, I do not know. It is made with bicarbonate of soda (baking soda), therefore making it a soda bread or cake, but it is so far from classic soda bread that it is not funny.
Poor people in Ireland certainly did not have the sugar and raisins for daily bread. Why would you use sweet cakey bread with raisins in it to sop up your lamb stew anyway? But a nice moist, fresh piece of bread slathered with butter is perfect here. Left over bread was usually toasted and slathered with butter and preserves or put in the frying pan to sop up bacon grease and then toasted to perfection. Certain times of the year, you were lucky to get any fruit at all anyway. At Christmas time it was a very special present if you received an orange or other piece of fruit with your gifts.
Traditional Irish fruit bread has many names. Spotted Dog, Sweet Cake, Curnie Cake, Spotted Dick or Railway Cake depending on the area of Ireland that you came from. Given the sweetness of this item, it would be appropriate to sprinkle powdered sugar on top or maybe even a glaze of sugar. But this is not what you want to eat with your Shepherd’s Pie or your boiled corned beef, which by the way is another American tradition, not Irish. This is something you would eat for tea or after dinner as a dessert item.
I am going to include the recipe for both Classic Traditional soda bread, and Spotted Dog so that you may see the similarities, but the definite differences.
Classic Irish Soda Bread:
4 cups flour
1 1\2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking SODA
2 cups buttermilk (milk with tablespoon or 2 lemon juice…let it sit & curdle a minute before you add it to flour mixture)
Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
Grease an 8″ cast iron skillet. In large bowl toss together dry ingredients. Add buttermilk…stir briskly with fork til dough forms together in a rough mass. Knead on a liberally floured surface for about 30 secs. Pat into a 8″ round about 1 1\2 thick (mine is always thicker than that) Slash a large 1\4″ deep cross across the top. Place in cast iron skillet & bake 45-50 mins. or until nicely browned and the cross has spread open. Transfer to a rack to cool, then wrap in a slightly damp tea towel and let it rest for 8 hours. Wrapping the baked, cooled bread in a damp towel helps it to settle and makes it easier to slice.
Spotted Dick:
4 cups flour
2 tsp. sugar
1\2 tsp. salt
1\2 tsp. baking soda
1\2 cup raisins, sultanas, or currents
1 1\2 cup buttermilk or sour milk
1 egg (optional…you probably won’t need all the milk if you use the egg)
Preheat oven to 450 degrees F.
Sift the dry ingredients together. Add the fruit and mix well.
Making a well in the center, add the egg and\or milk. Using one hand, mix in the flour from the sides of the bowl, adding more milk if necessary. The dough should be softish, but not too wet and sticky. When it all comes together, turn it out onto a floured surface. Knead for a few seconds, just enough to tidy it up. Place in an 8″ cast iron skillet. Cut a 1\4″ deep cross in the top. Bake in the 450 degree oven for 15 mins. then turn down the temp. to 400 degrees F and cook for an additional 30 mins. or until cooked.
Serve freshly baked, cut into thick slices and spread with butter. Or you can cool and sprinkle with powdered sugar or put a sugar glaze on at this point.
I just became aware of something new. New to me anyway. I have never thought of a head of cabbage as an item to grill on my Brinkmann grill. I always think of cabbage as boiled with corned beef, or chopped and grated for slaw. Grilling it is simple enough to do. It would be great for a tailgate menu just for the simplicity alone. It would make a nice addition to any grill menu.
Take a whole cabbage. Remove the core. Fill the core with 1\3 stick of butter, salt and pepper. Wrap the whole head in foil, and throw it on the grill. Cook until tender. (Adding a strip of applewood smoked bacon or 3 in the foil might make some nice flavor too).
Another take on this simple but tasty side dish is to quarter the cabbage, rub it with olive oil, sprinkle with Cajun spice, or other spices, and throw it on the grill. Again, just cook until tender.
This would make a nice addition to a rack of ribs or pulled pork. There are many ways to make this one your own. Have fun with it.
A bit more hard core version of the grilled head of cabbge comes from the BBQ man himself :
(Based on a recipe from Raichlen’s BBQ USA) Take a medium to large head of cabbage and core out the top to a depth of about 3-4 inches. In a cast iron skillet, sauté a diced jalapeno pepper and half a small onion. Add approximately 8 ounces of chorizo or andouille sausage and cook. Once done, transfer the meat mixture to a strainer and collect the draining fat. In a bowl, add the meat mixture to 2 tablespoons of shredded cheddar cheese. Place the meat and cheese mixture in the head of the cabbage and top with more cheese and a tablespoon of butter.
Grill the cabbage for approximately 2 hours. If the cabbage begins to darken too much put an aluminum foil tent over it. When you can stick a skewer all the way through the cabbage, it’s done. Remove from the grill, cut into pieces, and serve.
Today I would like to deviate a little form the norm. I know that many people, before Lent, like to over indulge. Eat, drink, be merry and party, before the Lenten season begins. Many people eat richer, fattier foods and meats and drink lots of alcoholic beverages on Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras. They start up their deep fryers, get out their jambalaya pots, make gumbo, or crawdads, and drink until their heads hurt. My sister and I both decided that since Fat Tuesday will be on our deceased father’s birthday that we are both going to make Pop’s favorite dessert that day. Pop loved cream puffs. My mom used to make them for his birthday every year. Instead of a normal cream puff filling, she would make vanilla and chocolate pudding for the filling. So in honor of Pop’s birthday and Fat Tuesday here are two cream puff recipes.
1 cup boiling water
1/2 cup salted butter
1 cup pastry flour*, sifted
3 eggs
Cream Puffs II:
1 cup boiling water
4 tbsp. unsalted butter
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup all purpose flour
4 large eggs
Cream puffs are a very light and delicate and hollow pastry of French origin. Although they are a simple bakery staple to prepare, a certain procedure needs to be followed for success.
Sift the flour so that there are no lumps.
In a saucepan, bring water and butter to the boiling point. Add the flour, all at one time, and stir briskly using a heavy wooden spoon, stirring constantly and in a circle until the mixture begins to leave the sides of the pan and form a ball. The mixture will become smooth, leaving the sides of the pan clean.
Stir over low heat to dry the mixture for 2 or 3 minutes. The mixture will lose its stickiness. Add the unbeaten eggs, one at a time, beating each egg in thoroughly before adding the next egg. The mixture should be smooth and shiny. (Note: This may be transferred to a bowl, cooled for 3 or 4 minutes, then beaten using a hand mixer.)
Drop by large spoonfuls onto a greased or parchment-lined baking sheet (or use a large pastry bag with a plain nozzle to pipe the mixture).
Bake in a preheated 400°F oven for about 30 minutes. Allow to cool slowly. (You can leave them in the hot oven with the door open for a few minutes).
When cool, use a very sharp knife to slice off the tops and fill with vanilla cream pastry filling (see below), chocolate or vanilla pudding, ice cream, flavored whipped cream, etc. Top with fruit sauce or drizzle with honey. Melt some chocolate or use chocolate curls. Or just sprinkle a little powdered sugar over the top.
These same recipes can be used to make eclairs; the only difference is in the shape that is piped onto the baking sheet.
(*Pastry flour is a flour made from softer (or lower protein) wheat than all-purpose flour. It is useful in making products in which gluten development is not desirable, such as cookies and pastries. Gluten is the protein in flour that gives breads their “chewy” quality. If pastry flour is not available, you can make a reasonable substitute by combining 1/2 cup cake flour with 1/2 cup bread flour or 1/4 cup cake flour with 3/4 cup all-purpose flour for use in this recipe.)
It’s the time of year when many people have a store of game meat in their freezers. Sometimes it may end up being an over abundance. Finding new and interesting things to do with all your hunting stores can be a challenge. That goes the same for any type of cooking in general. Sometimes we can find ourselves in a rut, cooking the same things over and over again. I like to shake up the menu once in a while, and try new and different things, Sometimes they work out, sometimes they don’t. Some recipes are good enough to tweak and try again.
Someone was kind enough to give me some extra of their venison. (Their freezer had more than it could handle). I had a roast, cubes, steak, and ground meat. I grilled the steak as it was. The cubes became chili. The roast became a beautiful sauerbraten. (I am now positive that venison was what sauerbraten was intentionally designed for. Not beef. It was the best sauerbraten I ever made!)
I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with the ground meat. I hunted around for some recipes.
Here is an interesting venison recipe that I came across in a Celtic Folklore cookbook. I have tried this recipe myself and found it quite good.
Venison Balls In Sour Cream:
2 lbs ground venison
4 large potatoes, boiled and mashed
2 medium onions, grated
1 egg beaten
seasoned bread crumbs
1\2 stick of butter
1 tbsp oil
1 3\4 cup sour cream
salt and pepper to taste
Mix together venison, potatoes, onions, egg, enough bread crumbs to help hold everything together, salt and pepper to taste.
Shape mixture into balls.
Heat the butter and oil in a deep cast iron skillet.
Fry the meatballs. When sufficiently cooked, add 1\2 the sour cream and simmer for 20 mins. Add the rest of the sour cream, bring to a boil and serve immediately over cooked egg noodles.
Also tastes great with Heinz Savory Beef & Zesty Onion Gravy.