2010-09-28 haul

Sweet potatoes? Hell yeah. I've been looking forward to trying some totally researched and over-engineered technique for making french fries. And sweet potato fries are so good. As well, I might try the similarly-structured but IIRC simpler version from the Les Halles Cookbook.



Plus leeks! Dill! Celeriac! Edamame! Fresh chicken! Feta!

broccoli celeriac carrot cheddar soup with sourdough

Yummy!

So, I've seen celeriac before. From a distance. It's certainly ugly, and I classified it as a root vegetable anyways, and we don't usually get along. But turns out, celeriac is awesome. Texturally like a potato, but tasting like celery, and actually quite pleasant to eat raw. I did boil it for a few minutes in acidulated water on the advice of a couple of random websites, to reduce the "bite", but I'm not really sure why, now. It was mild and fine. Moreover, it filled in for mass like the potato in most forms of this soup, *and* the celery that I never have around.





I finally made some proper sourdough, today, from Shoggoth the Starter. I went overboard with the steam, however, leading to a crust a good bit harder than I'd have liked. And it didn't rise in the oven nearly as much as I want, leading to a wide, flat loaf that's longer than my bread knife. Between the hard crust and the width, it takes multiple cuts to make a slice, which leads to jagged ends. :/



But it all comes together nicely:



This is perhaps the best soup I've made. I doubt there will be any left over for freezing, which is both good and bad. :)

Update: the recipe:

1 red onion, roughly chopped, very lightly caramelized
3 good sized cloves garlic, minced
2 large stalks broccoli, florets roughly divided, stalks peeled and sliced
1 celeriac root, peeled, half-inch cubes, boiled for 5 minutes in
acidulated water (juice of 1 lemon)
5 medium carrots, peeled and grated
1L chicken stock, plus a bit of water to cover veg
salt, pepper, tarragon

Simmer for ~15 minutes; you just want to get the broccoli tender.

Immersion blend.

Heat, but do not boil.

Add ~2 cups grated sharp cheddar, a handful at a time.

steak over corn salad with colcannon

The steak were the last two filet mignon from a PSMO I got at Costco in the winter … 2010-03-something was the date on the bag. After 6 months in the freezer, they weren't the best of steak, and I overcooked them as well. :/ I now wonder if the Food Saver is really going to be able to extend the life of steak in the freezer … I'll know in a year, I guess.

The roasted corn salsa was great. I wish I'd remember to toast the cumin before roasting the corn in the skillet, but here's to next time. Roasting fresh corn in a cast iron pan for way longer than you think you should makes it that much better, btw.

Colcannon is our favorite way to consume kale, and this batch was no exception. I'd have liked to had a bit more potato to kale, but this was fine, too. A good amount of butter helped this iteration of the colcannon, I do say.

beet latkes, kale chips

I usually don't know what to do with two CSA staples: kale and beets. Kale is like one of the most healthy foods ever, and I'd love to eat it more, but it's just … hard to swallow. And I'm simply not into the flavor of root vegetables.

For some reason, I decided to attack both of these things in one night.

I've been meaning to make kale chips for a couple of years; they are well regarded. While reading up on the how-to and what-not, I noticed people also make spinach chips. We had spinach, too, and no other plans to use it, so why not.



While the kale and spinach was in the oven, I started into the main course: beet latkes. I generally like potato pancakes, but I'm still not sure why I would like beets in the same preparation? I guess I thought the frying would ultimately help me consume them if the flavor wasn't good.



Even just after getting the veg basically prepped and shredded, the timer went off for the kale and spinach. The spinach, it did not survive:



Like shrinkydinks on the tray. Oh well. The kale chips were … okay. When they really were devoid of moisture, they were actually pretty good. Crisp and crunchy and salty and the roasting removes much of the bitterness that I dislike about kale. But – and perhaps because I overcrowded the trays – it was hard to get them evenly chip-y. And when under-crisped, even slightly, they are floppy and chewy and not very good. For kale chips, I'd recommend having a good amount of airflow, and test them out near the end of the cooking time.

And forgo the spinach.


Back to the latkes!



Upon introducing just some AP flour to help bind, the shredded beets + potatoes + carrots took on a fascinating color.



But fried up into a quite nice deep brown and beet red:




I liked these quite a bit, actually. Aud' found them disgusting. So it goes. :)

2010-09-14 haul

Unfortunately this framing doesn't show the wonderful basil, but it's the better pic of the two. I should really remember to use the 50mm f/1.8 prime instead of cutting corners and using the flash.



That cheese you can barely see behind the corn was pretty great … but now I can't recall what style it was. :(

ancho chicken soup with masa dumplings

This ancho chicken soup with masa dumplings recipe came up at just the right time.

Unfortunately it just wasn't all that. The dumplings were okay by me, but Aud did not like them at all. I should have cut the chicken from the leg bone before adding it; it was very unwieldy in the soup itself. And flavor wise, it was overall just so-so.







Along with this, we made some jalapeño-enhanced cornbread. Yum.



My Busi got Aud a wonderful scone pan, which turned out to be quite perfect for dinner-sized cornbread.

Cabbage Rolls

It is a cop-out, I admit, to make cabbage rolls. It's basically a trade: I will eat this single cabbage leaf. in return, I expect a mouthful of meatloaf to be inside. To me, this can be a nice trade. Especially if the cabbage is tender and the meat is awesome.

These rolls achieved that.

The meat of the loaf was hot Italian sausage. some onion, carrot and panko for filling. The idea was to get some fennel in as well, but that did not happen.



The sauce was heirloom regular and cherry tomatoes, peeled, squeezed and cooked for an hour or so, along with the mirepoix of fennel, onion, carrot and garlic. I took a stick blender to the sauce, as not only were the fennel and carrot as you'd expect, but those heirloom tomatoes were quite sturdy!




The sauce got a bit thick and dry, and the filling a bit hard on the second day. But the flavor was spot on. Wonderful.