Nacho Supper

Its been a while since I have written. Life intrudes, as does death, and work has been out of control lately. I had planned to write a whole series of blogs on stuff I had cooked a few weeks ago, but time slips away, and I haven't gotten to it yet. I will. Eventually. With everything else that has intruded in the last few weeks, I haven't done a lot of cooking, and when I did, it was not all that creative. Mostly its easy stuff thrown together at the last minute.

Last weeks Nacho dinner was no exception.

I had no clue what to make for dinner that night, and to be honest, I was at a point where I didn't really give a rat's ass either. I texted Alan, and asked him "what do you want for dinner? Peanut butter sandwiches? Fish? Nachos? Eggs?"

As usual, he was a big help. His response: Sounds delicious.

In other words, he was no help at all. And that was when I spotted the big bag of organic corn tortilla chips. I knew we had a bunch of other stuff at home to throw on it, so nachos it was going to be.

Take a big cookie sheet and cover it with tin foil for easy clean-up-ability. Scatter the corn tortilla chips on it. Don't pile too many on top of one another, because they taste best when they all have a bit of cheese and saucey bits on them. I used blue corn chips because I think they are cooler. And I like the taste better. On top of these, I scattered a whackload of chopped up green olives (with pimento... yummers), green onions, lots of cheddar (a really old Balderson) and some jarred organic Neal Brothers Salsa.



I also added in some leftover chicken breast chopped up into little pieces from the night before. Then I threw more tortillas on top, and added more of all the toppings, and finally added a wee bit more cheese. Then I baked it at 350 for about ten minutes, until all the cheese was nicely bubbling. I made a small version of this in my toaster oven once. Worked perfectly.

My kids only complaint was that I didn't add enough cheese.



I was, however, lucky enough to get a picture of it before they all demolished it. Just.

Bubby Brisket. Ish.

I figure since its Passover I should write a blog about a typical holiday meal. Brisket! Making a good brisket is relatively easy, provided you cook the meat long enough. If you don't, it will taste like shoe leather.
My Bubby (grandmother for you goyim) used to make the BEST brisket. Ever. It was one of her staples. She only made a few different dishes, but the ones she made were always outstanding. Her repetoire consisted of:

- Chicken Soup (duh - what Jewish grandmother DOESN'T make chicken soup?) This also contained boiled chicken.
- Borscht (also a soup)
- Cukleten (which nowadays I call Tzizot, aka hamburgers/meatballs served like little hamburgers)
- Brisket
- Coffee
- French Fries (mostly reserved for the holidays)
- Fresh bread with butter (store bought bread from the Open Window Bakery)
- French Toast (positively DRIPPING with butter)
- soft boiled eggs
- Matza Brei (at passover time)

...And that's about it: but those dishes were made EXCEPTIONALLY well.

Her Brisket was truly amazing. Sadly, I never learned how to make it exactly as she did, but I did learn to make a tasty alternative.

Get a big ass oven proof pot with a lid. Line the bottom with whatever root veggies you care to add. I a variation of potatoes, sweet potatoes, carrots, celery and parsnip. Whatever I happen to have. This time, I had a few potatoes, carrots and celery. Toss in a boullion cube of whatever type of boullion you have. I used an organic onion soup boullion.



Place your meat on top. You can use a double or a single brisket. First cut or second cut. I prefer first cut single best, because it has less fat. On top of the meat, add a couple handfuls of brown sugar.



In a cuisinart, whiz up a couple of carrots and an onion and one more boullion cube.



Place this mixture on top of the meat and sugar. Then cover that with ketchup and mustard. I know it sounds gross, but it actually is very tasty when it comes out. I also added a good squirt of smoked jalepeno sauce. I need a little zip in my gravy, rather than just all that sweetness.



Then fill the whole pot up with orange juice. I use PC Organic OJ. The liquid should just come to the edge of the meat. In essence, you are braising the meat. If you don't have OJ, you can use any sort of liquid you have. Wine, pop, cranberry juice, etc. I like OJ, but I know a lot of people use coke. Personally, I would never use pop. Hate that crap. Wine would be an interesting choice to try one day though. It would change the flavor something fierce. I have a friend who uses water, and her brisket always comes out delicious.

Close the pot up, pop it in a 350 oven and cook it for about 3 hours. I like to put a piece of tin foil in to really seal it, as I find my pot lid doesn't fit perfectly.



After 3 hours, take it out, remove the meat, and let it sit for a bit, until it is cool enough for you to handle. Slice it into thin slices on the bias, and put all the meat back in the gravy. If the meat isn't fall apart tender, cook it for another hour. It all depends on the size of the brisket. The bigger it is, the longer it takes to cook. Put it this way, its pretty hard to overcook this type of meat. And it tastes even better the second day.
I wish I could show you a picture of the finished product, but the little bastards devoured it before I could pull out my iPhone. 5 pounds of meat was instantly inhaled. I have made it twice in recent past, and BOTH FREAKING TIMES they got to it before I could snap a pic.

To all of you who celebrate Passover, Chag Sameach. To those of you who celebrate Easter, Happy Easter. To those of you who celebrate Ishtar, enjoy your sex. To those of you who celebrate something else, or nothing at all, enjoy the long weekend.

CONTEST WINNERS

Before I went on vacation to visit my sister in Costa Rica, I held a contest on my facebook "Swim In the Kitchen" page. The deal was that when I got to 50 "like's" I would hold a draw and the winner would get cookies.

Bruce McIntosh won the draw, and asked for a brownie blondie (instead of cookies) for his beautiful wife Laura.

So brownie blondie it is. I have made this for Laura once before, and I have to say, it was INCREDIBLY decadent. Like SERIOUSLY decadent. And totally yum. As usual, it is really easy too.

Preheat the oven to 325. In a stand mixer, dump 2.5 cups of brown sugar in with 3 eggs and a huge splash of vanilla.



Beat until light in color and nice and fluffy. You can see from the picture below just how much lighter in color it should look.



To this add 1 cup of melted butter. Add it slowly, while beating it, so that it is all incorporated. In a separate bowl, Add 1.25 cups of white flour, 1/4 cup of cocoa powder, 1/2 tsp of salt and 1 Tablespoon of baking powder. Mix the flour/cocoa mixture so you have a uniform look. This incorporates the baking powder through the entire mixture.

Before whisking:


Add this to the egg/sugar mixture, and beat VERY SLOWLY (otherwise you will get flour all over the place, and it is a BITCH to clean up). I turn the machine off and on, off and on, very quickly and repeatedly to do this. Most of the time I screw it up somehow and wind up covered in flour. So trust me when I say it is a bitch to clean up. ANYWAY. Just beat it enough to incorporate it into a batter.

Butter a 9 inch baking pan, then lay a layer of tin foil on it, pressing it in, and butter that. It makes it MUCH easier to take out afterwards, because this thing poofs up like you wouldn't believe.



In a double boiler (I use a small pot with 2 inches of boiling water and a little silver mixing bowl - its fine as long as the bowl doesn't touch the water) melt about 2-3 ounces of chocolate. I never measure. I just use a few good sized chunks. If you are using one of those foot long Lindt Dark Chocolate bars (like me), use about 3-4 rows. Set aside for a moment.



Pour the cake batter into the foil lined baking pan, and then pour the melted chocolate in a swirly pattern (or just dump it) on top, and use a spoon or a rubber spatula to swirl it in.



Put the whole thing on another baking try (remember, I said it poofs up? It also sometimes poofs over, and it is much easier to clean a baking try then the bottom of your oven. Again, sadly, I speak from experience.

Bake for about an hour. Check it after 45 minutes. If it wiggles too easily, it needs more time. It also depends if you like it super ooey gooey, or more crispy. I like it a bit more crispy, so bake it for the full hour.



You can see how much it poofed.

Today has been my total Kitchen day. I am doing an absolute TON of baking/cooking, and its ALL for other people. I made a ginormous lasagna, grilled chicken breasts with zataar, lemon and garlic, roasted asparagus in a balsamic glaze, spinach salad with a balsamic dressing, cinnamon pecan crispies and the brownie blondie. Recipes and blog posts to follow.

Its good to be back.

Eggstravaganza

The other day we made a key lime pie, which calls for egg yolks only. Since I hate to waste, I simply HAD to make another dessert using the egg whites. And the rest of the whipped cream. You know; purely in the effort of being a more conscientious human being. Waste not, want not!

A perfect choice was a Pavlova. What is a Pavlova you ask? Its a meringue topped with fruit and jam, and whipped cream. Easy to make, delicious to eat, and pretty to see.

There are a few tricks to making meringue. First of all you need room temperature egg whites. And the egg whites have to be ONLY egg whites. If you even get a single DROP of egg yolk in there, you are screwed. The best thing to do is separate each egg, and once you are sure you haven't contaminated your egg white with any yolk, you add it to another bowl that you keep ONLY for the whites. That way, if you screw up one egg, you don't waste them all.

We only screwed up one white. So, we added 2 more eggs to it, and scrambled them. Hence, the kids lunch for Thursday was taken care of! Bagels with cheese and scrambled egg. Perfect! Like I said, waste not, want not!

So once you have your egg whites ready to go, put them in your SUPER CLEAN AND DRY stand mixer with the egg beater attachment. Remember, if your bowl or beater have any bit of oil on them, they won't whip nice and fluffy. Or at all. Seriously. If your bowl is nice and clean, your 4 small egg whites will whip to almost 6 times their volume! And egg whites are protein. A little goes a long way. They hardly have any calories! As well, when you are making them into meringues, most recipes call for 1/4 cup of sugar per egg white. I think that is WAY much. I use less than a tablespoon per egg white. It just doesn't need it.

So back to making a Pavlova. Which, until you add the whipped cream, is not fattening AT ALL.

Dump your egg whites in the stand mixer.



Turn the machine on a medium speed until they get foamy.



Once they start getting a little bit firmer, you can start adding your sugar, 1 tablespoon at a time.



Once they are nice and fluffy (hint: they will stand up on their own) they are ready to be baked.



You see how much more they increase in volume? They are HUGE and look like marshmallow clouds.

Shmear them out in whatever shape you want on a parchment lined baking sheet. You can make the parchment stick to the baking sheet by putting a little dab of meringue in the corners of the sheet.



Bake in a 200 degree oven for about 2 hours, then turn the oven off and leave the meringue in there overnight. The picture above is pre-baking. Once it is baked, you can eat it just like that, but usually I make smaller individual meringues for that. Its a perfect dessert if you are on a diet, or avoiding big carbs. You could even do it without sugar at all, which I think tastes fine. You could add ground up nuts to it too, and its super delicious.



Cover the meringue with a thin layer of jam. I used raspberry, because its what I had on hand. Any kind you like will work. Cover that with whipped cream.



Add fruit of your choice. I used strawberries and kiwi. Its what I had.



Refrigerate until you are ready and enjoy the remainder of your EGGSTRAVAGANZA.

The Pastry Shop of Mister E: Baker Extraordinaire

I was recently challenged by a friend to make Key Lime Pie. Ethan decided this was a challenge he could not and would not forgo. Or any dessert, for that matter. Although next time, I have been informed, the dessert we will be making will be Lemon Meringue pie.

This was also one of those "you learn something new every day" recipes. You see, I didn't realize there is a big, big, BIG difference between "evaporated milk" and "sweetened condensed milk". What is the difference you ask? About a pound of sugar. I have never used any sort of canned milk before, other than coconut milk. Which, come to think about it, would probably make a dandy key lime coconut pie.

Note to self: Use a can of coconut milk next time. And make a pecan crust like in Goaty Goodness so that Alan can enjoy it.

So the recipes for Key Lime Pie are simple enough, and are pretty standard. All of them seemed about the same.

Start with the crust. Melt 1/4 cup of butter on a low heat in a pot. Once melted, add 1 cup of graham crackers and stir.



Realize that there is no way this amount of graham cracker mixture will cover the bottom of the round pan to make a thick enough crust.



Melt another 1/4 cup of butter and add another cup of graham crackers, mix, and pour into the pan and fill in the last bits. Use the back of a spoon to smooth it and press it in. You are looking for even-ness all around. Bake this in a 350 oven for about 15 minutes.



In the meantime, make the filling.

Juice enough key limes (or regular limes, if so inclinded) to make up half a cup.



Zest a couple of limes, to make up about 1 Tablespoon of zest.



Separate 4 eggs, and dump the yolks in a stand mixer and whip them up nice and fluffy. Set aside the egg whites for use later. Add the can of CONDENSED SWEETENED MILK. Or in my case, add a can of evaporated milk. Take a taste after you have added all the lime juice, zest and a good wodge of vanilla. Realize it is INCREDIBLY SOUR. Spend 20 minutes reading up on the internet about the differences between condensed milk and evaporated milk. Smack yourself on the head and think to yourself, "DAMMIT. I should have gotten Pam Eisen-Goldfarb's recipe after all". Then discuss possibilities with your 11 year old pastry chef on ways to fix it.

He decided that we should add sugar by the tablespoonful until it tasted reasonably sweet. I think we added about 6 tablespoons, but I am not quite sure. I stopped counting after 3.

We then decided to add one more egg yolk, just for good measure.
Ethan really enjoyed separating the eggs.

All of the recipes I reviewed said to pour the mixture into the already cooked graham crust and to cook it for about 15 minutes in a 350 oven. We did that. And noticed it was still completely liquid, so we baked it for another 10 minutes. And it was still liquid. So we kept it going, checking it every 5 minutes or so. It ended up being in the oven for 40 minutes, and still had a substantial jiggle to the centre, but I figured if I left it in any longer the crust would burn. Turned out, it was perfect.

We let it cool overnight in the fridge, and the next day I whipped up some whipping cream in the stand mixture, and used it to decorate the pie. Last year I bought a pastry bag (which promptly disappeared) and a whole bunch of tips for making all kinds of cool shapes. Since I couldn't find the pastry bag anywhere, I folded up some wax paper and used that, with one of the metal tips shoved in the end. I could have used a ziplock too, but didn't think of it in time. It probably would have been easier. So I shmeared a huge wodge of whipped cream in, and oh so delicately started to pipe in the cream around the edges. I then added some slices of lime, and voila! Key Lime Pie.



I have to say... even with the screwup, it was delicious. So boo sucks to you Pam Eisen-Goldfarb! Our guest enjoyed it. I'm pretty sure it wasn't just the wine talking.



To see what we did with the egg whites, tune in to part 2. To be continued....

Miso Glazed Wild Call of Duty On Spinach

I went shopping yesterday and picked up some wild Pacific cod. When I told my kids we were having Cod for dinner, they said: "Oh COOL! Call of Duty!", which is their newest video game that I don't approve of. Hence, the miso glazed cod became miso glazed call of duty.

What I like about cod is its wild and has a lovely rich flavor without being "fishy". I generally don't like eating farmed fish, and I am trying stay away from fish that is really high on the endangered list, like Atlantic Cod.

So I made a really simple glaze to marinate the fish in. To a small pot add equal amounts of rice vinegar and Sake. I probably used between a quarter cup and half a cup.



I prefer to use mirin but I was out, so I subbed with the vinegar. As for the sake, it would have worked better if I had used normal sake that you heat, but I hate to open a big bottle of it unless I plan to drink it all because it goes 'off' very quickly. I used a small bottle of cold sake, which is more like a beer. If I wasted the rest (yeah right) I wouldn't feel so bad or wasteful.



Boil them together for a minute or two, shut the heat and add about 3 heaping teaspoons of sugar. Stir to dissolve. Add a huge wodge of a light miso. I like the Light Yellow Miso by Cold Mountain. It is japanese style shiro miso and is GMO free. Its extremely flavorful and can be worked into a TON of dishes. I used approximately an equal amount of miso as I did of the vinegar and sake, so between 1/4-1/2 cup. Whisk to dissolve



Always taste as you go, so you can adjust if necessary. You can also decide at this point that you want a bit more flavor or a change to the flavor. I decided to add a bit of garlic (2 cloves) and ginger, a small nob (shut up all you dirty minded people).




Once it cools, taste it again to see if needs any adjustment. Pour it all into your handy dandy ziplock bag, and throw in your fish to marinate. It can marinate up to a day in the fridge. I left mine for 3 or 4 hours.


For some reason, blogger keeps turning my pictures sideways and I can't seem to fix it. So you will have to turn yourself or your computer sideways if you want to see this picture a little bit more accurately. It did the same thing to my Upside Down pear cake yesterday. The picture of the pecan/pear/butter mixture was upside down. Well.... it *was* an upside down cake... I guess that is blogger's attempt at humor. I think they need to stick to their day job. (And to those of you who suggest the same to me.... bite me. That is all.)

Back to the fish. Once it had marinated for an appropriate amount of time, I fast grilled it on a cast iron pan, and then finished it in the oven. I laid each partially cooked piece of fish on a bed of spinach, and poured a little marinade on top. Baked it for about 8 minutes, and then broiled the top for a minute or so, to get that lovely glaze. While I would love to show you pictures of all this, I couldn't find my phone so you will just have to take my word on it. It was good. Miso Glazed Call of Duty rocks. I found a picture online (photocredit: www.dallasnews.com) of what it looked like, sorta.



All in all, prep time was about 5 minutes, and cooking time was under 20 minutes.

Upside Down Pear Shaping Cake

This cake turned out DELICIOUS. Like seriously outstanding. And it was SUPER easy. I won't say "easy as pie", because I have always found pie making to be not so easy. Where did that stupid expression come from, anyway? Maybe I should say it was a "piece of cake", since in this case, it was! Sadly, I ate several pieces of cake. And I am starting to look like a pear. But I digress.

The cake.

Upside down pear cake is simple to make, delicious to eat, and looks beautiful too, despite my crappy photography skills.

Slice up some pear. Or you could use apple, or pineapple, or just about any sort of fruit you want. I think it could work with lots of different types. I chose pear, and I ended up using only one large pear, but next time I think I would add more, to make a thicker upside down top. Slice it so that it is about 1/4 inch thick, give or take.



In a small pot, melt about 1/4 cup of unsalted butter, and once it is melted, add about 1/2 cup of brown sugar. Mix it all together. Add about a teaspoon or so of cinnamon and mix.



Pour about 1/3 of this mixture in your pan. I used a square pan, probably about 8 inches wide. I've never measured it. In future, a bigger one would probably better, as you shall soon see. Lay the pears down in an artful fashion over the sugar/butter mix, to cover the whole pan. Add a bunch of pecans or walnut and make it look pretty. I didn't measure the pecans, I just added until it looked right. Pour the rest of the sugar mixture over the top of the pears and pecans.



Set this aside while you make the cake batter. In your stand mixer, beat 3 eggs, a huge wodge of vanilla, 1.5 cups of cane sugar (or whatever kind of sugar you have) until fluffy and light. Add bits of butter, 1 chunk at a time, until you use 3/4 cup of unsalted butter. Probably it would be best to add totally room temperature butter with the sugar, then add the eggs, but I forgot to take the butter out of the freezer so had to do it this way. Either way, it worked handily. Once all the butter has been relatively incorporated, add a cup of sour cream. This is was makes the cake so FREAKING moist. In a separate bowl, mix together 2 and 1/4 cups flour, and take out 2-3 tablespoons of the flour, and replace it with and equal amount of cornstarch. I use organic cornstarch. Add 1 and 1/4 teaspoons of baking soda, 2 teaspoon of baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon of salt, and sift it all together. In two batches, add it to the wet batter. Turn your machine on slowly and very briefly to incorporate the flour. Pulse it, in fact, unless you enjoy cleaning flour off your entire kitchen.



Shmear this batter over the pear mixture and bake in a 350 oven.


Cooking time depends on how big your pan is. If it is not huge, like mine, you will need to bake it for 50 minutes or so. Check it periodically. What you want is the centre to bounce back nicely. I started checking after 30 minutes, and initially you could see the centre was still liquid in the way it moved.



Lesson learned: Put a pan under this to catch all the drippings that bubble up and over. Unless you enjoy scrubbing the crap out of your oven afterwards WHICH I REALLY HATE TO DO.



I really hate the toxic fumes from things like Easy Off, so I googled how to naturally clean this mess. What I found was to spray white vinegar all over it, and then pour baking soda on it and let it sit. For a loooooong time. Then scrub.



Actually, with a little elbow grease it came off. Eventually.



Looks pretty good, no? So back to the cake. Once the centre no longer wobbles like a weeble, take it out of the oven and let it cool for about 10 minutes.



Once it has cooled, put a plate on top of it and flip it over. It should pop right out. If it doesn't, I don't know what to tell you, but it will probably still be delicious.



Holy. Amazing. Yumminess. I am DEFINITELY making this again. As soon as I no longer look pear shaped.


Please note for all the stupid people out there: I only cleaned the oven once the cake was completely done, and the oven had fully cooled. Thank you.