Beginner's Notebook: A Hail of Bullet Points

In my last post, which seems like it was months ago, I wrote of my trouble in adapting myself to hot weather cooking. Despite some progress (detailed in part below), that's continued to be a struggle and I've been eating out more than I'm comfortable with. That's limited my kitchen time, as did a period when a temporary health challenge had me eating as low-carb as I practically could for a while.  Nonetheless, I have done a few fun things.

• In a previous post, I mentioned having started the process of preserving some lemons. During the waiting period, I heard an episode of "America's Test Kitchen Radio" in which the problems with that process were discussed, the conclusion being that it works so rarely that it's better to just buy preserved lemons. So it was with trepidation that I cracked open my jar: they looked okay. So I cut off a quarter, trimmed away the flesh, rinsed off the excess salt, and tasted. I was good, and I was still healthy a few hours later, so I chopped some up into some spinach I was sauteeing -- in that application, it was FABULOUS. The lemon pretty much disappeared, leaving behind a bright lemon flavor that didn't have the acidity of lemon juice. Delicious. (Admittedly, I sometimes have a little problem taking credit. This, however, is clearly a case of 10% good method and 90% luck.)
• The okra I pickled also tuned out quite nicely. The recipe I used was a bit more vinegary than I'd prefer, but the okra itself is quite tasty and has none of the vegetable's infamous sliminess.
• As far as heart weather cooking goes, even the cooking I'm doing is involving more assembly and less heat application. I'm eating a fair number of 'wraps", for example. (If you're not familiar with them, wraps are basically burritos that contain almost anything other than burrito filling.)  For me, these are typically containing some sort of meat, some cheese, some fresh veggies, some hummus or other sauce, and maybe some fresh cilantro. Pretty good.
• I'm eating more vegetables in general. Often this is just carrot or celery sticks dipped in hummus, but I've been cooking veggies, too. The other night I thinly sliced a small yellow squash and sauteed it with salt, pepper, and a little garam masala. It was very tasty.
•  Could I have made my own hummus? Yes. SHOULD I have made my own hummus? Yes. Would it have been easy? Yes. But I thus far haven't. I'll never be an Iron Chef at this rate!
• Avocados. 'Nuff said.
• I have roasted a chicken and a hunk of pork on relatively cool days. The key is to hide in the air conditioning during the roasting time rather than staying in the kitchen to work on other dishes.
• Cheese. Garlic cheese. Hot pepper cheese. Cajun-spiced cheese curds. All of these give joy to the mouth and staying power to light meals.
• This morning, before my apartment got too hot, I cooked a flank steak on my iron griddle. I used a tip from cooking show host Daisy Martinez and gave my meat sprinklings of salt, pepper and vinegar and let it sit for a while before cooking. I can't really define the difference the vinegar made, but it certainly did make a difference.
• While my meat was sitting, I did some sweet corn on my griddle then (after cooling) sliced the kernels off the cob. However, I don't think I left the corn on the grill long enough, though, to really make much difference in the flavor.
• Finally, I made gazpacho today, more or less from this recipe. It's good, it was easy, and it involved no use of heat. (Other than the pepper flakes I added.).

 So, I'm feeling my way forward. Slowly. And with frequent breaks to sit in the air conditioning!

Is Summer Cooking Vacation Avoidable?

I have trouble getting excited about cooking during the summer. And the last two summers, after winters filled with all manner of culinary experimentation, I've done essentially no cooking, instead falling back on old habits of eating out, ordering in, and basically living la vida sandwich. In other words, I was on cooking vacation -- unplanned, unwelcome, and unwise summer cooking vacation.

You see, as I've noted before, Kansas City is not the hottest part of the country (or the world) by any means, but it gets plenty hot and humid for me.  And, my kitchen is a long way from my window air conditioner. Additionally, I'm finding as I age that I don't regulate my body temperature as well as I once did, and several weekend cooking sessions recently have ended with me feeling a little bit icky. Last weekend I put a small fan on top of my refrigerator and drank ice water frequently, and still felt icky when I was done.

I can't have a summer cooking vacation this year. Perhaps I should say that I can't CONTINUE to have one, since this past week has not had too many meals at home. That kind of vacation isn't good for my body, my skills development, or my wallet.
 
I have a few ideas. Veggie salads should be my friend. (Not leafy salads, though: leafy salads are okay, but more than one or two a week make me cranky. OK, crankiER.) I know a little bit about quick-cooking meat cuts, and sandwiches are a good option if not made with cheap white bread and processed cold cuts. Outdoor cooking is not a practical option for me.

But I'm just not feeling inspired.

So, I'd appreciate ideas: how do YOU feed yourself during the summer?

Beginner's Notebook: Dazed and Infused

I don't have a lot to report from this weekend's cooking. I didn't take on any projects, mostly contenting myself with throwing some dishes together out of stuff in my refrigerator that needed to be used. But I did pick up one fun little trick.

For a couple of decades, the one recipe I knew that seemed a little fancy was one my brother-in-law had taught me. It consisted of pasta tossed with olive oil, sliced black olives, and feta cheese. The thing that made it a little fancy is that, before the dish is assembled, the olive oil is flavored by warming sliced or minced garlic in it for a few moments. (If you hear any sizzling, turn the heat down.) The garlic is then disposed of before the oil is used.

A week or so ago, my neighbor lady asked me to make shrimp tacos for her. The shrimp I was using was precooked, so I decided to just flavor it with a saute with olive oil infused as I described above. Today, though, I though the zest of a lime in with the garlic. Although the result was a bit subtle and was buried by the salsa verde I used as a taco sauce, it was very nice right out of the pan. I'm thinking it might be very nice to cook fish or chicken.

Geocooking

This weekend I made dishes from Louisiana, the South more generally, from Morocco, and (sort of) from Ireland.

Gumbo

I mentioned a previous attempt to make gumbo that was foiled by suspect shrimp. Sunday, I had better luck. Gumbo, if you're not familiar with it, is a spicy roux-based stew from the Cajun country of southern Louisiana. However, the roux is not a thickener here: it is cooked to a copper color and contributes flavor instead. Traditionally, thickening is provided by either okra or file' powder: I used neither and it was fine.

The tricky part of gumbo is cooking the roux to that copper color but not past it. The recipe I used had the roux doing most of its cook time in the oven, providing the cook with a greater margin of error and freedom from near constant stirring. However, I screwed it up anyway and the first batch burned.

(Free tip: if you ever burn a roux, don't pour it out in the sink. What a horrible mess!)

The proteins I used were chicken, shrimp, and andouille sausage. Beside the sausage, the only seasonings were a little cayenne powder, a little thyme, salt, and pepper. Nonetheless, the finished dish has an intense, complicated flavor.

It makes me happy.

Okra

One of the things that spurred me on to do the gumbo this weekend was that I had been able to find some fresh okra. I was conflicted about using it, however – the neighbor lady I sometimes share with really dislikes okra, and I’d once had a different application of okra for which I had been wanting to try.

So I took that okra, and I pickled it! Here's the recipe I followed -- I'll let you know in a month how it turns out.

Roasties

OK, I confess: there's nothing that I know of that makes this dish especially Irish. But I learned about it from my friend Kate, who LIVES in Ireland, so it's SORT OF Irish, right?

Saturday evening, Kate was telling me about the polenta crusted roast potatoes she was planning to do for her mother's birthday party. I was intrigued and did a web search, and she confirmed that this recipe was indeed what she was talking about.

I used lard instead of duck fat - I don't even know where I'd BUY duck fat. (Kate says that she uses vegetable oil except at Christmas.) The amount of potatoes called for works out to around 4 lbs. (I cut this in half), and I used russet potatoes. The oven temperature works out to around 400 F.

They were delicious after salting! Crusty yet tender. Next time I make them (and there WILL be a next time), I'd like to try a dusting of parmesan and maybe some fresh herbs when they're right out of the oven.

Preserved Lemons

Years ago, I read about preserved lemons, an ingredient often used in Moroccan cooking, and always wanted to try it. I'm not even sure what I'll DO with them, but I often find the combination of "easy" and "exotic" to be nearly irresistible.

The procedure I used is on americastestkitchen.com. Basically you're cutting Meyer lemons so they're not quite quartered lengthwise, rubbing a LOT of salt into them, and putting them in a Mason jar and covering with fresh lemon juice. I'll shake them once a day for 4 days then let them continue sitting in the refrigerator for another 6 weeks. Again, I'll let you know how they turn out.

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Whew! And I don't even have a passport! 

Time Heals All Pies

Well, actually, time probably DOESN'T healed all pies. But it healed this one.

The other night, I set out to make the Icebox Strawberry Pie I'd seen made on the "Cook's Country" television show. The filling was made by cooking down 2 lbs of frozen strawberries, adding some sugar and some softened gelatin, then folding a pound of sliced fresh strawberries immediately before folding into the baked pie crust. (I used store-bought pie dough this time.) The big thing in this recipe was working with gelatin, which I'd never done before except for commercial Jell-O.

After the pie had set in the refrigerator for the specified four hours, I discovered that I had, well, strawberry soup. And, because I'd overfilled the shell, I had a strawberry soup mess. I took another look at my recipe and discovered that while I had added the lemon juice to my gelatin powder, I was supposed to add water. I figured that my pie was doomed to staying soup, but it was reasonably tasty soup, so I cleaned up a bit and stuck it back in the fridge.

24 hours later, I had actual pie. Go figure.

Beginner's Notebook: Quick Lessons From the Day

1. If you're going to make a dish (oh, say, gumbo) that relies on shrimp (in the recipe I was using), it's a good idea to sniff the shrimp BEFORE you chop your veggies.
2. On the other hand, meals made from abruptly orphaned ingredients have the potential for accidental fabulousness.
3. In the process of making cake doughnuts, I overworked the dough. I thought the final product was a little tough, though my neighbor lady didn't think so.
4. I still need to figure out how not to get overheated in summertime cooking situations. I don't think I stayed adequately hydrated today. I didn't get sick, exactly, but I wasn't feeling all that well when I finished up today.
5. I am unconvinced that deep frying is worth the hassle. I guess the smaller amount of oil my multicooker used would be easier. I'm glad I tried the stove stove top method, however.

Small Fry

I picture a scene from a cheesy war movie with the German officer preparing to torture the downed pilot. "Herr Pedersen, we have someone here you've been avoiding for a long time. His name is Frying. Deep Frying."

Deep frying. Kitchen fires. Unhealthy food. Oil to dispose of. Improperly fried food turning into a grease slick. Yeah, that deep frying. Did I mention kitchen fires? Greasy french fries. Overcooked chicken. Odors that stay around for days. Oily mist over the entire kitchen. Plus, the risk of kitchen fires. Who needs it?

I don't. Except I do.

One of the things that drives my kitchen adventures is the possibly baseless belief that I'm better off making for myself those foods that aren't good for me but which I can't lay aside completely.

And, every once in a while, I really-really-really want doughnuts.

And, while there are recipes for baked doughnuts, seriously: doughnuts are fried.

And, tonight, I made some. Sort of, anyway.

(I have deep-fried once before, the target food being tofu. I like tofu, prepared well, but that's hardly what deep-frying is for, now, is it?)

I think I'll spare you the saga of my search for a recipe and why I chose the one I did. But I settled on  Orange Sugar Fried Doughnut Holes,  from Food Network host Sunny Anderson.

I think I'll also spare you the play-by-play. But I didn't start any fires. And the doughnut holes were tasty. And, mixing orange zest into the sugar is a neat trick.

I will tell you that I'll be obtaining a doughnut cutter and that I don't intend on using pre-made biscuit dough again if I can avoid it. It's just not right.

But I deep-fried.

"You see, Herr Pedersen? It is YOU that have your methods."