Basted Egg and Fried Parsley Sandwich on Gougère

By Cookbad

After my earlier gougère fail, I still had some of the dough left. . . or is it batter?

I decided to make large scale failing gougères, which turned out quite nicely, cheesey and between popover and brioche.

Then I basted some eggs, which is my new favorite way to make them.

You melt much more butter than is healthy to consume into a pan ocer med to low medium heat and let it melt.

Crack and egg into the pan and baste them by pouring the hot melted butter, spoonful by spoonful over the top of the egg until just as the very top of the yolk turns white, like in the below pict. Then it's done and can go on top of the sliced open gougère.

perfectly finished basted egg. Remove from heat when the top of the yolk shows white.

Then sautee up some chopped fresh parsley in the butter for 1-2 minutes, throw it on the egg, salt, eat.

Pizza + Beer = fun

I'd had more than a few spicy & sweets before I got took these less than awesome pictures.

By Cookbad

I made a really good pizza the other night. Maple Chipotle Soaked Pineapple & Ham Pizza and I served it with a beer cocktail that I named the Spicy & Sweet Shannon. the pictures are pretty bad. I'd had a few drinks, I was quivering with hunger. . . .

The Pizza:
Slice up some fresh pineapple. About 1 quarter a pineapple is enough for 1 pizza.
Cut into 1/8s and then slice them about 1/4 inch thick. Put them in a bowl with 1/4 cup maple syrup, 1/4 cup water and a chunk or two of canned Chipotle peppers.
Marinde for 30 minute or more.
When they have marinaded, put the pineapple in one layer on a baking sheet, pour over some of he marinade and broil until the tops start to brown a bit.
Get some ham and slice it up into strips.
Dress you pizza


Next, go here for detailed directions on how to make grilled pizza or do it however you want. Top with sauce, cheese, the roasted pineapple and ham. We made this pizza on a particularly shitty grill so it took forever and I eventually just decided to finish it up in the oven.


The Spicy and Sweet Shannon:
All these flavors can be adjusted to your taste.
Pour all this into a pitcher:
1/2 cup of lemon juice
1/4 cup of maple syrup
a few shakes of cayanne pepper
Ice
4 light beers

Pour over more ice.
If you are thinking that it sounds an awful lot like the master cleanse with beer, you'd be right.
Sounds gross, but everyone that tried it really liked it.

The pizza, was terrific. I have been thinking about it for days.

How to make Hollandaise Sauce & Eggs Benedict

A superfast and easy version of eggs benedict

By Cookbad


Hollandaise is so easy, I could make it hungover - and I will, next time because Eggs Benedict is a potent hangover cure.

All it is is butter, egg yolk, salt, pepper and lemon. It is a lot like mayonnaise, but made with clarified butter instead of oil.

In theory, it could be pretty easy to fuck up because you are trying to get the hot butter and eggs to emulsify without cooking he egg yolks, which cook pretty damn easily.

Here is my pretty hard to fuck up method:

Makes about 1.5 cups

4 egg yolks
1 1/4 cup butter
salt, pepper to taste
the juice of 1/2 - 1 lemon

Beat the egg yolks until they are pale.
Heat the butter in a small sauce pan and skim the white foamy stuff off the top. Keep it pretty hot but do not let it bubble. Let the milk solids in the butter sink to the bottom.

Melted butter after most of the foam has been skimmed.

discarded butter foam

Keep beating the egg yolks and very slowly pour in a bit of hot butter. Let it emulsify, then add some more, then a bit more until the butter is gone. Add salt, pepper and lemon juice, and you're done. Serve immediately. If you can't and you want to keep it hot, put it over a very low double boiler and stir often.

the finished unbroken product

It didn't break? Did it.

Now to put it to good use:

Eggs Benedict:

Makes 1 serving

Toast up an English muffin. If you don't have one, a nice thick piece of toasted good bread will do. If you want to make some english muffins, go here.

Poach 2 eggs.

Fry up some canadian bacon, ham or rashers of bacon. If you are making rasher and have some asparagus laying around, toss it in the pan with the bacon, It takes them about the same amount of time to cook and the asparagus is nice side.

Make the hollandaise.

Place ham on bread or muffin, place poached egg on pork, slather with hollandaise.

Eat.

Atethat, who lives in the UK told me that there are no English muffins there (makes sense!) and also, she had only seen eggs benedict at restaurants that cater to tourists.

I think that is a crime.

Tepache

Homemade hooch. About 5% alcohol.

By Cookbad

Tepache is a slightly boozy drink made from mashed up pineapple, skin and all that is left to ferment for 5 days and according to Wikipedia, Tepache is commonly made by inmates in Mexican prison.

This is my first foray into Mexican Prison cuisine, so I'm excited.

This is how I made mine, which is based on Diana Kennedy's version:

Tepache 1 very ripe pineapple (about a 2 pounder) a handful of cinnamon bark, crushed up about 2 inches of ginger, sliced to coins then slightly crushed 10 cups of cold water 1 cup sucanat or brown sugar 1 can of light beer Chop up and then crush up the pineapple into a container large enough to hold all the ingredients. Cover with 8 cups of water. Add cinnamon and ginger. Cover and set in a warm place for 3 days. On the 3rd or 4th day put 1.5 cups of water and the sugar into a saucepan and bring to a simmer until sugar is melted. Let this cool off then add to the fermented pineapple along with the beer. Stir, cover and leave for another day or 2. Strain, strain again and then finally, stain thru cheese cloth. Serve very cold.

You could make it just with the rinds of the pineapple. A nice thing to know if you hate to waste any part of whatever you are preparing.

With all my booze projects I like to take a picture of the lucky person who first gets to taste whatever I have left to ferment. This time the picture as pretty tame, as the tepache was, surprisingly not bad at all.

"It tastes like I'm drinking something I shouldn't" was his first reaction, but he went of to finish the mug.

I have to admit that we tried it only after the beer ran out, and we were slightly past the point of being able to go get more, so we were really wanting to like it.

We didn't drink that much of it, so I cannot report on hangover severity.

UPDATE: I drank all of it over a 4 hour period of time. Adding fresh lime juice made it taste really good. Adding rum to it makes it taste good and will get you drunk. Very mild if any hangover.

Piña Colada

In the states it’s easy enough to find a decent drink mix to make these, but if they have it out here, I’ve not seen it. We wound up using a tiny bit of Peach flavor Robinson’s, which you can’t get in the states, but is a staple in every household in the uk from what I can tell. So really, these are very British Piña Coladas.

1part coconut cream
1part white rum (just because dark rum tends to make me sick)
1 part pineapple juice
Robinson’s to taste

Blend the first three ingredients well. If it’s a bit too strong add a little more pineapple juice, then add some Robinson’s just to sweeten it up (start with maybe half a shot, then taste and adjust). Pour over ice to serve.

These were so good! They are the perfect compliment to a beautiful sunny day, and so easy to make. I had many. I had the headache later to prove it too, but it was totally worth it.

My Own Sterling Vineyard Meritage

my very own meritage

recipe # 197

In the summer of 2003, my husband and I went with my inlaws to Napa to, amoung other things make our own Meritage and Sterling Vinyards. How fancy is that?

It was a great time. We stayed in a house in a vineyard, ate good food, stayed buzzed for almost 3 days straight and toured a bunch of great vineyards. I think Rombauer was my favorite. Good wine, nice folks and we ended up having a great picnic with the owners.

Anyway, 2 night ago my husband was collecting a bunch of stuff that we have had in storage for years when he came across my bottle. It had been in an attick which must have gone from 90+ degrees down to 40 over and over and over.
Merlot:: 59%
Malbec:: 0%
Cab. Franc:: 0%
Cab. Sauvignon:: 29%
Petit Verdot:: 12%

us making/designing the meritage

It was wrecklessly tannin heavy. We each got 2 bottles, had a blind taste test a few years ago and mine came in dead last. The flavor improved over the 40 minutes it took us (mainly me) to knock the bottle back-- but not much.

tags technorati : wine, recipes, meritage

Figs Soaked in Sweet Vermouth

delicious breakfast treat

recipe # 192

I got these figs from the farmers market, packed them into a jar, filled the jar with sweet vermouth and have been letting them sit for a week now. The recipe came from the Cafe Pongo Cookbook and suggests serving them with ice cream. I think that they might be good for breakfast over pancakes.

Emergen-C vs. Trader Darwin's Drink Mix Booster

Trader Darwin's version of emergen-c

Emergen-c is a staple here in my house. I travel with it. I would put it in the kids bottles when they were younger. It is great over ice with seltzer, providing a less sweet 'healthy' alternative to soda. It is a smashing hangover cure.

The emergen-c/tequila/sprite cocktail is what I would drink at Circus Circus in Reno (dump) on my return home from Burning Man. My first step towards recovery/sickness prevention/health after so much self abuse in the desert. Ha.

I guess if you buy a whole box and you break it down, emergen-c isn't that expensive. About 30 cents a packet. But if you are consuming it in the quantity that this family does, we have sometimes hit as high as $20 a week to support out habit.

Yesterday at Trader Joe's I found what seemed to be a Trader Darwin's alternative to Emergen-C at half the price. I bought 2 boxes. Raspberry and classic lemon.

Trader Darwin's is a Technicolor pink that would be a wonderful hair color but might actually hurt my eyes if I was that hungover. It isn't overly sweet like the undrinkable airborne. Actually, it doesn't taste like much of anything. Just has a fun pink color and is good for you.

Meh, is I guess how I feel about it. I Prefer emergen-c, but might switch to TD's if I continue to feel poor.

Grilled Spam & Cheese with Sweet Chili Dipping Sauce

Simple, to the point, terrible for you, but quite good:

Grilled Spam & Cheese with Sweet Chili Dipping Sauce

The sandwich
Sharp or extra sharp cheddar
spam - orginal or spicy
hearty wheat bread
olive oil

assemble sandwich, heat pan, add a touch of the oil and grill until cheese melts.

dip:
2 tbs. good quality honey
6 dashes hot sauce

combine.

New Years Breakfast

Breakfast. Photo by Jordan

Pomelos, are for the most part something I would never buy. Maybe I would pick one up in Chinatown if I was feeling flush and lucky, but the cost is prohibtive, so I stick to grapefruit when I'm feeling like a large cirtrus.

Here, we have a pomelo tree. There is actually a whole orchard. There are limes, lemons, oranges, star fruit, avocados, pomelos, tangelos, tangarines, papayas and mangos (maybe others stuff too).

We are next to a guava plantation. In the guava plantation there is a jackfruit tree, which is pretty exciting as most Nothern Americans will never see one and if they are lucky enough to taste jackfruit it is likely from a can.

Anyway, pomelos, or Chinese grapefruit, pummelo, pommelo, jabong, or shaddock.

So I'm going to work with them. After I got tired of just soaking them in rum, this is what we made for New Year Breakfast:

Candied Pomelo Peel
(1) Peel pomelo, taking care to remove as much of the pith as possible, and reserve fruit for another use. Cut the peel into 1⁄4-inch-wide strips. Fill a small pot with water and bring to a boil. Add the pomelo peel and
(2) blanch for 1 minute. Remove peel and drain. Repeat 3 times, changing water each time (this removes some of the peel’s bitterness). After the third blanching, refill pot with 2 cups fresh water and 2 cups sugar. Dissolve sugar over medium-low heat. Bring to a boil, add the peel back to the pot, and reduce heat to low until the peel is translucent and almost no liquid remains, about 1 hour. Remove the peel from the pot and
(3) cool on a wire rack. Toss in granulated sugar (or dip in melted chocolate). Store in airtight container for up to one week.

I think this recipe was from NY magazine.

The recipe worked, but Kauai is pretty humid and they never really turned into a solid candy. They remained pretty sticky and floppy.

But, they were a nice garnish for our New Years Breakfast:

FrenchToast with Pomelo Syrup
French Toast:
* 1 cup whole milk
* 1 egg
* 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
* 1 teaspoon grated orange zest
* 4 (3-inch) slices of any bread you choose
* 2 tablespoons butter
* Black pepper
* 1 teaspoon salt

Mix it up and use the butter to fry up the french toast.

pomelo syrup

Pomelo Syrup
1/2 cup pomelo juice
1/4 teaspoon salt
a bit of pepper
1/4 cup of sugar
a wee bit of red pepper flakes (optional)

mix, add to sauce pan and reduce for 20 minutes over medium heat.

mmmmmmm. . . .

Then there was the ultimate mimosa. To make it you have to get up at dawn, in Kauai, pick clemintines and oranges, juice them and them mix them with Veuve Clicuot. I would never normally mix that bubbly with anything, but the juice was equal to the champagne. It was a lovely morning.

Spam, kimchi and Egg Sandwich

surprisingly good sandwich

recipe # I don't know

So I got off the flight from the mainland to Kaua'i in an ativan haze and the first thing I did was head to the grocery store to load up on supplies. I had done some researching of hawaiian recipes, but for the most part I put things in my cart that I had not seen before or had 'produced in Hawaii' on the label. One thing I did get that was neither, was spam. As far as I've seen spam comes in the following varieties: low fat, low salt, garlic, spam and cheese, spicy spam, turkey spam, hickory smoked spam and regular spam.

All I knew was that Hawaii is the number one consumer of spam of all states in the U.S..
mmmm. . . .

So this is what I made my first morning:

Spam, Egg and Kimchi Breakfast Sandwich spam, any kind you like, but original is what I used--sliced thin and fried in a bit of oil. spicy kimchi, any brand you might have eggs--I used only egg white as I felt guilty about the spam. flat bread, pita, wrap - toasted or warmed. Assemble as you would any sandwich.

It is actually quite good and I feel secure also putting it into the hangover cures category. I think it wouldn't suffer if a bit of cheese was added. Maybe cream cheese. . . but that might be pushing it too far.

Rum

It isn't like there isn't anything to do in Hawaii, but you do find yourself with a lot of time on your hands. That combined with a lot of free fruit and rum rum rum things like pomelo soaked in rum for breakfast seems like a terrific idea.

Moving Day

We moved today and it only cost about 30% more than we thought it would. Weehoo! *said with huge sarcasm*

After a day like today I needed a drink (or 5). There is nothing left in the fridge. No juice, soda, seltzer. We have vodka and condiments.

So I made a desperate drink. Here is recipe for a What Is Left in the Fridge Martini. It is not nearly as bad as it sounds:
1 shot vodka
1 capful dry vermouth
pickle juice
pickled jalapeno pepper juice
bit of salt
ice
mix to the strenght and flavor you like.

It is basically a dirty martini with something other than olive brine. Caper brine, preserved lemon, pickled beets and really anything pickled (besides maybe fish) might be good.

Eating at NYC Decompression 2006

I have very little to report from Decompression 2006. I was there for only 4 hours during the day with the kids. I left before the party even really started. We planned on going back for the big fun and the long haul into morning. There was going to be Sparks all night and french toast served for breakfast. But, a bus hit our van on the way home. No one was hurt, but we didn't feel like going out again after that.

Still, I did have one wonderful thing:

Dub Pies. Meat and mushroom. Amazingly good meat and mushroom filling (comes in meat and cheese or vege too) in a very flakey almost pastry crust. Mr. Dub Pie was giving them out in small brown paper bags to all the volunteers early in the afternoon. Lovely treat. Thanks.

Photos from the kids lounge here.

Hard Cider: Part 2

homebrew

21 days ago I put up what I was hoping would turn into delicious booze. Yesterday, in celebration of Halloween and because the time was up, I took it out of its cool dark place and through some cheese cloth poured it into a glass.

As with the more of my experimental booze projects, I make my husband try it first.
And I observe his reaction:

not bad

He 'said' it was good and actually came back for more. A friend of mine came over later and she said, 'I don't know' a couple of times which I'm pretty sure means, 'not awesome'.

It wasn't bad. It also wasn't wonderful. It was encouraging. Next time around I'm going to use champagne yeast and only the smallest amount of sugar. I'm going to get going on that. If it put it up in the next couple of days it will be ready in time for Thanksgiving.

Hard Cider: Part 1

tags technorati : hard cider, booze

Sandwich of Shame

try it. . . you know you want to. . .

recipe #115

Bacon at breakfast made me so happy, and Joy of Cooking from the 70s so interesting and full of such great retro food I thought I would make a good lunch from it.

That is when I found the Sandwiches of Shame.

I could only bring myself to make one of them, but I will post both shocking recipes.

The first is innocently named:
Peanut Butter and Tomato Sandwich *
Preheat broiler
Toast on one side:
a slice of bread
Spread the untoasted side with:
peanut butter
mixed with:
Chopped cooked Bacon
Bacon Drippings
You may top this with:
A thick slice of tomato
Season the tomato with:
1/4 teaspoon of brown sugar
salt and paprika
Put the sandwich under the broiler for 2-3 minutes.

Then, you are supposed to eat it. . . which I did. . . and . . . I . . . liked. . . it. . . .

If I were drunk I would have loved it so much I would have sat down and written a strongly worded thank you letter to Irma Rombauer and fallen asleep at the computer before I was finished.

My son liked it too, but he will happily drink his own bathwater, given the chance.

* Just so you know I made it will all organic ingredients on whole grain bread with tons of omega-3 to make myself feel less gross.

This sandwich is even more shocking, simply called:
Peanut Butter and Bacon Sandwich
Combine:
3/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons pickle relish
1/4 cup minced bacon
Toast on one side
4 slices of bread
Spread the untoasted side with 'mixture'. Broil the sandwiches until the tops are brown. Slice them diagonally.

Irma suggest to, "try this combination on the unconverted." Ha!

I would try this as a closed sandwich, then deep fried. But again, only if I'd been drinking.

tags technorati : sandwich, shame, bacon, wrong

Tamarind Granita

Today I learned that tamarind is an important ingredient in Worcestershire sauce.

I'm giving my sister, Bronwen credit for this one. It is really good. My daughter actually ate 2 servings of it even though I thought it would be too tart for her. It would be a good cocktail base too. Add some vodka and you've got a nice drink.

Here is the very simple recipe:
Tamarind Granita
1.5 cups of sugar
3 cups of water
1/4 good tamarind concentrate

In a saucepan combine water and sugar, bring to boil then remove from heat. Add tamarind concentrate then cool to room temp. Throw mixture into an ice cream maker for 20-25 minutes than store in the freezer. The mixture will not harden like sorbet.

photos shortly.

And . . .

An interesting article from The Journal of the American Medical Association stating that the health benefits of eating fish out weigh the health risks.

Hard Cider

recipe #96

I went apple picking with my sister last week with the sole purpose of getting a boat load of apples I could turn into booze. I peeled them, ran them thru the juicer I have used maybe only twice in the 5 years I have owned it and then poured it in a seltzer bottle.

I read a few different websites that tell you how to make hard cider. Some are very picky and specific with wine making ingredient. others just say shove it in a cool dark place semi-covered for a month or so. I choose the middle route. I added some sugar, a bit of yeast and covered with plastic with only a tiny hole poked in the top. I'm going to try it in 3 weeks.

UPDATE:
When I woke up this morning the cider had done this:

spewing all over my wall

The final product can be seen here.

Absinthe

the green fairy

recipe #86

The truth is that you cannot really make absinthe without a distiller. I looked into one. I found them for $200 and up. The 200 dollar one was made from an old beer keg and for sale on ebay. Other distillers were for sale with photos of topless women standing next to them. Hot stuff, but still, not enough to make me shell out the big money. Plus, I'm not sure I could safely distill in my apartment w/ 2 small kids. Maybe when we move to LA and get a back yard I can set up my illegal moonshine/absinthe shop.

So, without distilling, I had to fake it. I soaked a mess of stuff-- most importantly wormwood in everclear for a week. I added a wee bit of salvia to the mix just incase the wormwood fails to cause its desired effects.

I'm going to test it out on folks at Playa del Fuego this weekend.

I'll post the results.

BTW, this is the face my husband made when he tried it.

ewwww

It is true, it tastes something like soap even after the warm water and sugar has been added. Oh well. Maybe folks won't notice after some starter shots of tequila.

UPDATE:

Absinthe NOT a hit at Playa Del Fuego. Here are a couple pictures as proof:gag

not awesome

Well, to be really honest I stopped offering it to people after the 2nd person to try it gagged and needed to go sit down and chew gum to get the taste out of her mouth. It occurs to me today that maybe she was just being dramatic.

mad good

recipe #79 and 80

Cemitas de Carne Enchilada

For chile-marinated pork
6 dried guajillo chiles
1 dried ancho chile
4 thin (1/2-inch) rib pork chops (1 lb total), bones discarded
1/2 teaspoon cumin seeds
1/4 teaspoon black peppercorns
1 whole clove
1 (1/2- by 1/4-inch) piece cinnamon stick
2 tablespoons cider vinegar
2 large garlic cloves, quartered
1 teaspoon dried oregano (preferably Mexican), crumbled
1 teaspoon salt
2 to 3 tablespoons vegetable oil

For sandwiches
4 Mexican cemita rolls
2 ripe California avocados
1/2 cup fresh cilantro leaves
6 oz Oaxacan string cheese
4 canned chipotle chiles in adobo (optional), finely chopped
1/2 large white onion, thinly sliced
1 large plum tomato, thinly sliced crosswise

Prepare chiles and pork:
Discard chile stems and cut guajillo and ancho chiles open lengthwise with kitchen shears. Discard seeds and ribs.

Heat a dry 10- to 12-inch heavy skillet or griddle over moderate heat until hot, then toast chiles, a few at a time, turning and pressing down with tongs, until softened and fragrant, about 10 seconds per side.

Transfer chiles to a bowl, then cover with hot water and soak until softened, about 20 minutes.

Flatten pork while chiles soak:
Trim fat and sinews from pork and pound between 2 sheets of wax paper with flat side of a meat pounder or with a rolling pin until meat is about 1/8 inch thick.

Marinate pork:
Heat skillet over low heat until hot then toast cumin, peppercorns, clove, and cinnamon, stirring constantly, until fragrant and cumin is a shade darker, about 1 minute. Transfer hot spices to a blender and add vinegar, garlic, oregano, salt, and soaked chiles with about 1/3 cup soaking water, then blend until smooth. Transfer half of chile paste to an airtight container and chill or freeze for another use, then put remainder in a small bowl.

Spread a thin layer of chile paste in middle of a sheet of plastic wrap large enough to wrap all of meat and put 1 pork chop over paste. Spread a thin layer of chile paste on top, then continue layering meat, spreading each piece with chile paste. Wrap stacked pork in plastic wrap and marinate, chilled, at least 2 hours.

Cook pork and assemble sandwiches:
Heat 1 1/2 tablespoons oil in a 12-inch heavy skillet over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking. Season pork chops with salt and sauté, in batches, adding more oil as necessary, until just cooked through, 1 to 2 minutes per side. Transfer chops as cooked to a sheet of foil and keep warm wrapped in foil.

Preheat broiler. Cut rolls in half horizontally and arrange, cut sides up, on a large baking sheet. Broil buns about 6 inches from heat until golden, about 1 minute.

Halve, pit, and lightly mash avocados in peel with a fork, then spread thickly on cut sides of rolls. Season avocado with salt, then top with papalo. Make sandwiches with pork, cheese, chipotles (if using), onion, and tomato, pressing sandwiches together.

Cooks' note:
Pork can be marinated up to 2 days.

This looks very long and intricate, but it isn't too bad and the chilie sauce can be used for so many other things. It is a great sandwich. I loved it.

I looked pretty hard for the cemita rolls (well, not that hard really) and never found them, so I used a brioche instead. goooood.

For the plantians, which I never made before I put them in the brunch sandwich, You just slice up very ripe ones and fry them in oil. Add salt. Serve with lime wedge and sour cream.