peteyfrogboy

Okay, before I forget it all and/or fall asleep:

( This year's Thanksgiving feast: )

I was originally planning to make a batch of rolls for alasais's party tomorrow, and another batch for adelavanbrugge's company holiday feed today, but then I realized that my paltry pan of rolls wasn't going to make a dent in the factory full of hungry people. That left me with a spare batch of dough (I made a double batch of the usual bread dough) to play with. I decided to try making bagels. So far it seems to have produced a bagel-like product, if not a stunningly attractive one. They're cooling now...

Just a bit of crunchiness in the crust, soft and chewy inside, and I wish that I'd put garlic salt on more of them now. Om nom nom, as the kids say these days.

On Saturday, I had leftover filling from the char siu bao, so I made won ton soup. The won ton wrappers were basically just egg noodle, so I recruited D to help me make them. She cranked the pasta maker and helped me seal up the won tons. She didn't eat any, of course, aside from a piece of raw noodle dough.

This is the last baking entry from me today, I swear.

( The Blow By Blow )

I was home sick yesterday, so of course I did the natural thing and made up a batch of bread (I also made egg noodles for soup, but nothing exciting there). This time I changed things up by using milk instead of water. It took longer to rise because it was colder in the house (it ended up going about 24 hours total), but it got there eventually. I baked it at 400° for 30 minutes covered and 20 minutes uncovered. It came out nice and brown, with a chewy crust and yummy soft middle. I'm not sure if the softer crust was a result of the shorter baking time or the milk or both, but I like it. The previous loaves had really hard crusts right out of the oven, though they softened after being bagged for a while. All in all, this was a successful experiment, and I'm seriously contemplating whipping up another batch to make cinnamon raisin bread out of tomorrow...

UPDATE: I made up another batch of dough using the same recipe with the addition of 1/4 c. sugar. Half of this will go into a loaf pan as cinnamon raisin bread, and the other half will be made into steamed bao. Stay tuned for further developments.

Ever since madrun mentioned it a while back, I've been intrigued by the "Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes a Day" concept, but I'm too cheap to buy a $20 book to learn one technique. Instead, I let my google do the walking and found this article (and associated recipe) that seems to be pretty much the same idea.

( Details and Experiments )

So when adelavanbrugge went shopping earlier this week, she picked up some London broil that was on sale. I wasn't too enthused about the prospect of making it, since I've been out of the pot roast mood for a while. Yesterday she was shopping for lemons for something else and expressed a desire for hummus and tabouli. We laready had most of what we needed, so that became today's lunch plan.

( Details )

So I got a new (and better) immersion blender for my birthday, and tonight I put it to work (on something other than milkshakes). The stuff in the fridge wanted to be sweet and sour chicken, so I needed a sauce. Here's what I put in: (all measurements wildly approximated)

1 c. peach preserves
1/2 c. apple cider vinegar
1 t. green jalapeno Tabasco
1 T. olive oil
1 green onion, torn into 1" pieces (green part only)

The blender made short work of the sauce, and it turned out thick and smooth, and very tasty. I sauteed some cubed chicken breast that had been coated with flour and season-all and tossed the sauce over it. The breading on the chicken turned out to be a bad idea, as it turned the sauce into a gloppy mess, but the flavor was still good. I had half the sauce left over, and it may get put over pork chops later in the week.

Tonight's Supper:

Pork and Cabbage Stir-Fry

Slice three pork sirloin chops and marinate in:

Equal parts soy sauce, sherry, and sugar (plenty)
1-2 T. black soybean paste
A heaping scoop of garlic (from the jar)
Some five spice

Take one head of cabbage, cut into thin strips, and stir-fry in a hot wok with:
Enough veg oil to keep things moving
a generous sprinkle of salt
A little swirl of soy sauce
A few shakes of red wine vinegar

Put cabbage in a bowl, cook pork in a couple of batches and put in with cabbage.

Put remaining marinade in the wok, reduce some
Add some water and cornstarch to thicken

Serve over some of that super sticky rice that isn't your favorite kind but is better than nothing.

NOM

It's been a good food weekend so far.

( Noodle Soup )

( Honey Mustard Chicken )

( Portuguese Sweet Rolls )

( Apple Crisp )

More leftovers for supper, I reckon, and there will still be plenty left for when adelavanbrugge gets home late tonight. I also got a chicken and other requirements for a new pot of chicken soup. I'll probably do that tomorrow night.

So the other day adelavanbrugge decided she wanted to make chili. I have a mild allergy to something in chili powder (I think), so she looked around for a recipe without chili powder. She found this recipe for a "white chili" which looked pretty good. We didn't have exactly what it called for, so I scrounged through the pantry and fridge for reasonable substitutes. Here's what we came up with:

Black Chili

1 3/4 lb boneless skinless chicken breast, cut into 1" cubes
1 cooked mild Italian sausage (leftovers in the fridge), diced
1 small onion, diced
1/2 c. chopped green onion (from the freezer)
1 c. medium salsa (in the fridge a while, but seemed just fine)
2 cans black beans
2 1/2 c. homemade chicken broth (from the freezer - had to add 1/2 c water to make the full amount)
1 t. garlic powder
1 t. dried oregano
1 t. ground cumin

NB: many measurements wildly approximate

It went together pretty much like in the original recipe: sauteed the chicken with the onion in some olive oil, then tossed it all in the crock pot. The juice from the black beans, of course, turned the soup very dark, hence the new name. It was going to cook for 6 hours on low on a timer, but I ended up staying home sick today (and I forgot to turn the actual switch on the crock pot on this morning anyway) so instead I cooked it for 3 hours on high.

I don't know if I'd call it a chili, but it's darned tasty. Next time around, I may have to pull out the andouille sausage that's been hiding in the freezer...

Sadly, it looked better than it tasted:



It was fun to make, but I'm reminded of why we usually make cakes out of a box. The frosting was really tasty when I'd just made it, but even it wasn't much good after all was said and done. Ah well.

It's been a long day. Things I've done:

- Made waffles for breakfast
- Made two experimental squirrel-hair paintbrushes
- Made stir fry for lunch (chicken breast, cabbage, mushroom, green onion, snap peas, broccoli)
- Inventoried adelavanbrugge's clothes for GW - need to make a couple more chemises, but otherwise she should be okay.
- Made 10 aglets, with 6 more cut and ready to shape
- Made two-layer chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream frosting (the girl's idea; she did a good job of reading the recipe and doing some of the easier mixing bits)

Yesterday was:

- Lots of laundry and dishes
- Rebuild the girl's closet (yay for elfa!)
- Make up an experimental "Italian" meatloaf (in the oven now, we'll see how that goes)

I am tired now. Tomorrow will be helping the folks at the school disassemble and move office cubicles, and then getting myself and the girl up to Camp Grandma for the evening.

I know I'm Posty McPostalot today, but I'm sure that won't last long. I had pie dough left over from the chicken pie (I had originally planned to put a top on it, but I was able to just fold over the excess from the bottom), so I made an apple pie with the remaining Fujis we had on hand. On the plus side, I can now say that I am able to make a good crumb topping. On the minus side, I went a bit overboard on the nutmeg, but I can live with that.

I boiled a chicken on Friday, and we've been slowly decimating the bits since then. Last night I decided that I was tired of just eating chicken pieces, so I decided to take the rest of the meat and make it into a pie. I made another lard crust, which turned out lovely, but I'm still not entirely happy with the pie filling. The last one was much better flavor-wise, though as I recall it had ground pork in it, and pork is just plain better than chicken. I did get it more moist than last time, using up the last of the chicken broth that I didn't freeze. Inside with the chicken were also carrots, peas, a little bit of onion and a Granny Smith apple. It's still good, but I'd like to have a more cohesive texture, and more flavor next time.

So tonight was a flurry of cooking and prep for the week ahead.

1) Tonight's supper + four lunch portions: cheeseburger macaroni with peas. This recipe came from Publix when adelavanbrugge was shopping. Brown ground beef, add beef stock, water, and macaroni, cook until done. Add evaporated milk and Velveeta, melt. Heat up frozen peas and mix in. Very tasty.

2) More ground beef cooked and seasoned for adelavanbrugge's Friday lunch enchiladas.

3) Pork butt cut up into chunks, half put in the freezer. The other half went into the crock pot with half a Vidalia onion and a bottle of raspberry vinaigrette. That all went into the fridge to cook tomorrow for supper, with salad and corn on the cob.

I got a new type of rice last time I went to the store. I forget exactly what it said on the bag, but it's definitely different from what I'm used to. The grains are long, smooth, and very sticky. I was eating some of it that was left over and thought that it would be good to make sushi out of.

( Experimentation! )

I am currently unable to move. That was a very yummy supper.

The menu:

A 14 lb. turkey, oven roasted with salt, pepper, basil, and olive oil under the skin on the breast
Mashed potatoes with feta and garlic
Scratch-made egg noodles (yay new pasta maker!), cooked in chicken broth
The best gravy I think I've made so far (butter roux and turkey drippings, no need for extra seasoning)
Rolls, cranberry, veggies, etc.

And dessert yet to come...

We've been in search of some new recipes for the limited amount of cooking time we have during the week, and we decided to take a stab at making meat pies tonight. Here's a rough approximation of the recipe we ended up with:

( Recipes )