Calabacitas and Griddle Cakes

Being not Pueblo myself, nor having had the pleasure of meeting any Pueblo people, I can only assume that what I have prepared tonight is Pueblo food. At the very least, it was inspired by their cooking. I'm writing a story which features Pueblo cultures and I wanted to keep the ball rolling on our house's cook-from-your-fantasy-world theme. So here is Iain holding a plate of my approximate Pueblo meal, Calabacitas and Griddle Cakes:


But that one's a little fuzzy, so here's a close-up:


Calabacitas
From Mollie Katzen's Sunlight Cafe

Ingredients:
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 cup minced onion
1 cup minced anaheim and/or poblano chiles (I used a jar of piquillo peppers)
1/2 tsp salt
1-2 tsp chile powder
2 cups diced zucchini (about two 6" zucchini)
2 cups corn kernels
2 tsp minced garlic
3/4 cup cooked pinto beans (half a 15oz can)
grated cheese
pepper
lime wedges (we didn't have a lime so I just dabbed in some lemon juice)

1. Heat a medium skillet on medium heat with the oil. Add onion, chiles, salt, and chile powder. Cook this for 8-10 minutes, stirring frequently, or until the veggies are soft.

Cough, cough - you're seeing the corn and zucchini in this shot. It's because I didn't read ahead and mixed everything all together at the beginning and had to separate it out and yeah.

2. Add zucchini, corn, garlic, and beans. Cook this - stirring gently to keep the beans in tact - for 5 more minutes, or until the zucchini is just tender. Mollie cautions us not to overcook the zucchini. Take the pan off the heat once the zucchini is done to your liking.

This is what it looks like right after you add in all the stuff.

3. Sprinkle in cheese, add pepper and salt, and citrus. You are now ready to serve this.

Hopefully in the meanwhile, you have been making some
Griddle Cakes
from this site

Ingredients:
2/3 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp finely minced onion
1 12oz can corn, drained
2 eggs, beaten
1/4 cup melted butter
1/2 cup milk

1. Combine dry ingredients, mix the wet ones together then mix them into the dry stuff. But you could probably just mix it all together in one bowl. Then in a large skillet or a griddle, heated up to medium or medium-high, drop small spoonfuls of this mixture and let it cook until it is nicely colored and reasonably solid on the inside, like so:


2. There is only one step.

This is what your kitchen should look like:


Brilliant! Enjoy!

Yin-Yang Pasta: Red and White Wine Sauces

Howdy, and a happy MLK day to all! (I attempted to contrive some sort of segue from that into talking about the food, but it sounded too stupid to even come off as ironic, so I say again unto you, happy MLK day, and I'll leave it at that!)

Today I bring to you two twin recipes, born of the same stock (that is, my brain), which shall... I entirely forgot where I was going with that sentence. In fact, almost everything I've tried to type in the way of an introduction I've just deleted immediately afterward. The little people managing my brain would like to apologize for the lack of coherence, and assure you my ability to communicate will be restored shortly.

In the meantime, here are the recipes.

Red and White Wine Pasta Sauces

Ingredients:
Both:
1 lb pasta (I used mostaccioli for the red and lemon pepper papardelle for the white)
olive oil
1/2 an onion, diced (I used red for the red and white for the white :) )
10-15 mushrooms, sliced
4 cloves garlic, minced
salt
pepper
basil and oregano


Red:
1/3 cup red wine of your choice
1 28 ounce can of crushed tomatoes
1 healthy glug of balsamic vinegar

White:
1/3 cup white wine of your choice
1/4 cup olive oil
1 green pepper, diced
1 large tomato, diced


Music Listened To:
I don't actually remember what it was, but there is indeed a strong chance that it was my new Liz Carroll album entitled... Liz Carroll! On a side note, I have recently met the guitarist on that album, Dáithí Sproule over at the Session at Merlin's Rest, which was rather exciting. But, I digress...

Procedure:

1. Prepare the mushrooms: heat some olive oil in a skillet over high heat. You know, all of us have a different method of testing to see when the oil is ready. Emily's method involves putting in a little bit of the garlic and waiting for it to sizzle. Mine involves flicking water onto the oil and seeing if you hear a pop and sizzle. Bozzie's involves... I'm rambling again, aren't I?

When the oil is ready, add the mushrooms and begin sauteing over high heat. Add about a clove of the garlic, a pinch of basil and oregano and, lastly, a splash of the wine. Heat until the mushrooms drink up some of the wine. Set aside.


2. Do them onions: Heat some more olive oil in the skillet. You know, all of us have a different... (kidding!) Saute the onions over low heat. Be patient - the best results come if they are cooked slowly. If you're doing the red wine sauce, go for about 5 minutes. If white, more like 10, since you're aiming for a generally sweeter taste. Gesture dramatically as the aromas arise.


3. Combine stuff: Add the remaining garlic and wine. For the red wine sauce, dump in the tomatoes, bring to a boil, turn down to a simmer and add the vinegar and other seasonings. For the white, add the remaining olive oil and seasonings and similarly get simmering. Nice slow cooking. Oh yeah, if you haven't already, boil the pasta. Generally you want your sauce simmering about the same amount of time you have the pasta boiling.

4. About 3-5 minutes from the end, add the tomato and green pepper if you're making the white wine sauce. Stir the sauce constantly either way. This is a good time to taste and adjust the flavors as desired. I cannot argue with adding more garlic if not garlicky enough or adding more vinegar if the red sauce isn't tangy enough.

And that's pretty much it. Add to the pasta and serve with a glass of wine! My housemates gobbled these up, and the smell is pretty great while its cooking. I'd have to say my personal preference is for the red wine sauce due to the complexity of flavor you get from the red wine, but both are definitely quality Yummies. My rambliness seems to have calmed down for the time being, although a bit too late for you all. Sorry!

Foccacia!

Ok, so call me a blog hog, but the boys are being lazy and I have ambition to post. It's winter, and winter is major bread-baking season for me.

This particular baking adventure of sorts came up last weekend when I watered my little rosemary plant in the living room and the smell made me smile. Plus, since my little rosemary plant was getting sorta big, I wanted to prune it. I added the caramelized onion topping purely because we had leftover caramelized onions from another meal; you are in no way obligated to caramelize onions specifically for this bread.

Focccacia is sometimes referred to as a flatbread, but I don't see it that way. There's yeast in it, and it puffs up significantly by the time it's done. It's awesome plain, dipped in olive oil, or sliced in half to serve as sandwich bread. This recipe came originally from the Rebar Cookbook, but I've altered it to suit my purposes (namely, a bag of whole wheat flour close to expiration and a consequent effort to deplete it).

Two-Topping Whole Wheat Foccacia

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups wrist-temperature water
  
• 1 TBS yeast
• 1/2 tsp. sugar
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 1/2 cups white flour
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (note: you could try using more whole wheat flour/less white, but for a light bread like foccacia I preferred to stick with mostly white)
• olive oil to drizzle over the top
  
• 5 minced garlic cloves
• 2-3 TBS minced fresh rosemary (you could use dried, but fresh is better)
• salt (I used sea salt-- a coarser one like rock or kosher would probably be better)
• black pepper
  
• 1/4 cup caramelized onion
• 1/4 cup feta cheese crumbles

Procedure

• Put the water into a large mixing bowl and sprinkle the yeast and sugar in. Let it sit until fragrant and foamy, about 5 minutes.
• Mix in the salt and olive oil.
• Add flour one cup at a time (I alternated white and wheat). If the dough gets too stiff to mix in the bowl, don't worry about it. Just dump it onto a floured counter and start the kneading process.
• Knead for 8-10 minutes, until the dough is smooth and elastic. Clean out the bowl of any clinging bits of flour and coat it with a thin layer of olive oil.
• Dump the kneaded dough into the oiled bowl, roll the dough so all surface gets oiled, and let it rise, covered, for 1- 1 1/2 hours, until it's about doubled in size.
  
• Punch the dough down and let it rise until it doubles again (this should take less time than the first rise). This is a good time to mince your garlic and rosemary.
  
• Pre-heat the oven to 350°F and oil a cookie sheet (preferably one with short sides-- but we're not talking a brownie pan here). Dump the dough onto the sheet and coax it outward to meet the edges of the sheet.
• Toppings! Drizzle olive oil generously (or not-so-generously, depending on your preference) over the surface of the bread, and follow it with some salt and pepper. This is where the foccacia splits, if you're choosing to follow the two-flavor recipe. Sprinkle the garlic and rosemary on 2/3 of the foccacia and the onion and feta on the other 1/3. (Obviously you could do it half and half too-- I just had appropriate proportions for 2/3-1/3).
  
• Use your fingertips to poke little dents all over the bread and let it rise for about 15 minutes.
• Bake for 20-30 minutes or until the bread is puffy and the garlic is golden.

Also...off topic, but in the interest of full disclosure, and because Bozzie wrote a pointed comment on my last post, I will just say that I am also writing a fantasy story of sorts and the stuffed eggplant (as well as any other middle eastern/Mediterranean recipes I might put up here) are based on my city of Gabrilim. But I also love middle eastern food for its own sake, so this isn't to say that I wouldn't be cooking middle eastern without my story. The story just gave me a little nudge in that direction. Anyway, enjoy the foccacia!

Greek-Stuffed Eggplant

So this dish came strictly from necessity; I had an eggplant in my possession the night before returning to Georgia for Christmas and knew that it wasn't going to last the break. I decided to bake it, thinking that it'd be easy enough to make it into eggplant pasta or something, but then I realized that I had half a red onion and some feta too and started just kinda experimenting. The results were far superior to what I'd anticipated. Amounts are approximate, and I'm sure this could be easily doubled.

Greek-Stuffed Eggplant

Ingredients

• 1 medium eggplant(or any size, really), sliced in half lengthways and salted(if you don't know how to salt an eggplant, see my post on eggplant pasta from the summer)
• A few TBS olive oil
• 1/2 red onion, sliced thinly
• a generous slosh of lemon juice
• 2-4 TBS tahini (which can be easily home-made, it turns out!!)
• 1 huge clove garlic (or a couple little ones)
• 2 tsp dried oregano
• 1-2 handfuls of parsley, chopped or ripped into little bits
• 1/4-1/3 cup feta cheese crumbles
• salt and black pepper to taste

Procedure

• Heat the oven to 400°F
• Put the salted eggplant onto a well-oiled baking sheet and coat both sides in more oil. You don't have to go overboard, but make sure the eggplant doesn't stay dry. Bake the eggplant until it's brown and slightly crispy on the edges-- 30-45 minutes. You'll probably want to flip the eggplant once.
• Heat olive oil in a skillet and saute the onion and oregano over medium heat until they're soft. The slower you do this, the better it'll probably taste. (This was the point in my evening when I was going "Oh geez, I have a lot of stuff to use up. Umm...let's get this side dish going and figure out what to do with the eggplant when it's done," so I was stalling for time a bit). Add the garlic, lemon juice, and parsley, and stir in the tahini.
• Once the eggplant comes out of the oven, wait a minute for it to be cool enough to handle, and then scoop out the innards. Do this carefully, so you don't go right through the skin. I used a spoon to get out most of it, then pulled out the rest with a butter knife, but whatever works for you. Throw the pulp into the skillet with everything else and mix it in well, chopping it into smaller pieces with a spoon.
• When everything's nicely incorporated, and you've thrown in some salt and pepper and whatever other seasonings you like to taste, scoop the whole mix back into the eggplant shells. Sprinkle the tops with the feta crumbles and more tahini (if you like) and then let it bake at 350°F for about 10-15 minutes, then broil for 2-3 minutes more (broiling is scary, so watch it carefully or it'll burn!)
• I ate mine just as it was, but I'm sure a spinach salad with kalamata olives would have made it even better.
  

Happy New Year, all!

Boswell Chili

Hey guys. Hope you've been enjoying your latkes, and now you can have the authentic Boshenke accompaniment. Boshenke being the communal name for Emily, Iain and myself, a merger of our last names that is an inevitable title for our forthcoming restaurant (forthcoming being in approx. three decades). This is based on my Dad's recipe, and is only slightly modified from it because I couldn't find some of the right ingredients in Ireland, where I first learned how to cook for myself. If you want to make this a meat recipe, you can sub out one of the cans of beans for 1lb. ground meat, cooking the ground meat in a skillet over medium-high heat until no longer pink, and draining off the grease that sweats from the meat for later use. Add it in with the beans, corn, tomatoes and spices.

Boswell Chili

Ingredients
2 bell peppers
2 15oz or so cans of beans, whatever kind tickles your fancy
1 32oz/28oz/whatever big variety of can diced tomatoes
1 onion
5 cloves of garlic
10oz package frozen sweet corn, about 1 1/4 cups
1/3 or so of a thai pepper or as much as you like of another spicy variety
160z broth of some kind. I made my own from some leftover broccoli stems and scallions and the husks of onions and garlic I chopped for this meal. Pretty straightforward, just cut everything up, saute it in butter on medium or so heat to soften and release flavor, but don't let anything brown or cook too much, then cover in water and boil/simmer for 45 minutes - an hour. Instant veggie broth. Just be sure to drain it and toss the solids, they're kind of gross.
2 Tablespoons chili powder
1 teaspoon oregano
1 teaspoon cumin
1 Tablespoon salt
olive oil

Supplies
Large pot
Cutting board
Knife
Wooden spoon

Tuneage
Minnesota Public Radio! They had some sweet harp music on the air at cooking time.

1. Cut things - dice your onion, cut out the stems of the peppers and cut everything into nice little chunks, 1/4-1/2". Mince the garlic and spicy pepper. SAFETY WARNING: always wash your hands after you cut spicy peppers, *especially* if you are male and plan on going to the bathroom. There are certain things that are OK to visit a man's secret regions, chili oil is not one of them.

2. First saute - drop some olive oil into your large pot - a couple tablespoons, maybe? I never measure oil. Just put enough so that whatever you're frying doesn't burn, but not so much that everything gets soggy and greasy. Heat it up to just above medium and throw in all your sauteables - the onion, peppers, and garlic, and this is when you cook your meat, too, if you're eating omnivorously. Cook this until the onions are translucent, stirring well to keep things from sticking to the bottom.

3. Add and stew - throw in the tomatoes, corn, beans, broth, and spices - the salt, cumin, and chili powder. You don't have to be exact with the cumin and chili powder. I usually add a little more. This most recent recipe was blessed by fate and my approximate heapings turned out to be exactly right. Let this boil first, then reduce down to a gentle simmer and let it go for at least 45 minutes, preferably and hour and a quarter. Don't cook it so much that the peppers get really mushy. I have never had this happen but I believe it to be theoretically possible.

And you're done! Taste it at the end to make sure it's good. If it's not flavorful enough, add more salt and/or oregano; if it needs more of a kick, add chili powder; if it's too thin or needs fortification add some cumin. Dress it with grated cheddar. My dad puts cilantro on it and while I like cilantro, too, they didn't have it in Ireland so I never remember to get it.

Peace, love, chili!

Aerarbran Stew

Hello denizens of the internet! My post of a na latha (of the day anns a Ghaidhlig, which I am speaking in for no good reason) is a little bit dorky. Today, I bring you the best in regional foods of regions that don't exist!

Perhaps I should explain myself. Here at Yummies Kitchen, we do more than just cook. All three of us are also writers of fiction, and all of our works deal with fictional cultures. The other day, a thought struck us: what do they eat in these places? And then we decided to answer that question by cooking their food!

The culture I was exploring that created this dish is based in a forest with flora and fauna greatly resembling the North Woods. That means there were such things as edible roots, cherries, wild rice and mushrooms, which is exactly what I decided to make this dish out of. Exactly half of us were skeptical of combining these things (Emily and half of me) and the other half were really enthusiastic about it (Bozzie and the other half of me). It actually turned out better than I could have hoped, and the results caused Emily to say "I never would have thought it, but this turned out really well!"

Aerarbran Stew with Cherries and Wild Rice

Ingredients
3 cloves garlic
1 white onion
1 turnip
1 large potato
5 mushrooms
2/3 cup wild rice
1/2 cup rice
2/3 cup dried sour cherries
2 cups Veggie broth
1 tbs butter
salt and pepper

Materials
Knife and Cutting board
Medium-large skillet
Lid that fits over skillet
Wooden Spoon

Music Listened To
Amal and the Night Visitors was playing on MPR, I believe

1. Chop the onion and garlic. Peel the turnip and cube both the turnip and the potato. Slice the mushrooms.

2. Sautee the garlic and onions over low-med heat until translucent. They should taste generally sweet before proceeding.

3. Add turnip and potato. Add the broth, rice, wild rice, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil and simmer 5-10 minutes.

4. Add the cherries and mushrooms. Simmer 10-15 minutes, until the rice is soft enough to eat.


It's really quite a simple recipe, when it comes down to it, but it turned out delicious. It can work either as a main course, or you could have it alongside other dishes. Perhaps you may want to try it for your Christmas dinner, side by side with your favorite savories (or your fave saves as I have just decided I like to call them).

And, as is our philosophy at Yummies!, don't just do it by the book! Improvise a little! I was thinking that next time I'd try to get some wild mushrooms instead of button or crimini. Maybe you're more carnivorous than me, so try putting some white meat in it! Or maybe a splash or white wine? The choice is yours!

We now close with the prayer of thanks I came up with on the bus knowing one would be required:

We thank the forest
We thank the earth
for our food
and for our birth.

Latkes!

Ok. So basically what happened is that I didn't get to make latkes on Sunday (the day I'd planned because my friends came over to bake cookies and we had tons of fun but didn't finish up until almost 9 and we'd all eaten so many cookies/so much dough that something as heavy as latkes was completely out of the question. So instead I waited until Tuesday, which was the next day that the Ia(i)ns and I would be able to eat dinner together. This also happened to be the day Bozzie was making chili. He'd thought about cornbread as a side, but that just didn't happen.

Latkes go as deep into my memory as anything. I don't remember the first time we made them, but I have a number of images of my Dad standing in the kitchen, apron on, potato in one hand and grater in the other. (Ok, so sometimes we used the cuisinart too). Latkes are deep-fried, so there's no point in trying to make them healthy, but they taste amazing. Believe me. I'm not normally one to go for fried foods. Since latkes are a traditionally Jewish food, there are probably as many recipes as there are Jews in the world. This is the one my family uses. Happy Hanukkah!

Potato Latkes

Ingredients
Note: This recipe is given in proportions rather than exact amounts. The numbers in parentheses are what I used, and I made about 20 latkes from the batch. Each person ate about 3-4 and we had leftovers.

• Potatoes(6 medium)
• 1 onion for every 2 potatoes (3 medium)
• 1 egg for every 1 potato (6)
• 1/4 cup flour for every potato potatoes(1 1/2 cups)
• 1/4 tsp salt for each potato (1 1/2 tsp)
• Black pepper. Lots.
• Ditto on the canola oil

Procedure

• Put up a pot of water to boil
• Scrub the potatoes. You can peel them if you like, but I wouldn't suggest it. Grate them into little bits like hashbrowns. You can use a food processor, but, as my Great Grandma Rhea from what is now Belarus said "Latkes are no good unless they have a little bit of knuckle in them." (Apparently this phrase was not her invention--I've heard it tossed around by other Jewish grandmothers).
• Parboil the potatoes for about 5 minutes. You don't need them to be completely soft, but you want them to get cooked enough that they run no risk of tasting like raw potato once finished. You may have to do this in batches, depending on how many potatoes you have.
• Meanwhile, grate the onions and stick them into a large mixing bowl
• Drain the potatoes into a colander, rinse with lots of cold water, and squeeze out the excess moisture. I found the method for this to be picking up handfuls and squeezing them repeatedly, then tossing them in the mixing bowl.
• Throw in the eggs, flour, salt and pepper, and mix well. It'll look pretty gooey and white at this point, most likely. That's a good thing.
• Get the oil going. I pour 1/4-1/2 inch depth on the bottom of the skillet and the way I test its readiness is by throwing in a little tiny piece of latke. When it starts sizzling, you're in business.
• Using a spoon (or whatever really) scoop latke mix from the bowl and throw it into the skillet. I usually do three at a time. Let them sizzle along and press them down a bit with a spatula or spoon. The time will vary wildly, and so will the temperature you need to keep the skillet on, because the oil keeps getting hotter. When it's nicely browned on one side, flip it and let it cook until it seems done on the other side. Taste the first one to make sure it doesn't need more salt. If the batter seems too thin, add some flour.
• When the latkes come out of the skillet, have a plate layered with paper towels ready so they can drain. Once they've drained a bit, it's a good idea to put them into an oven on "warm" until it's time to eat. You can cook all of the batter and reheat the leftovers in the oven (a microwave will do too, but that doesn't lend the nice crispy quality of an oven or toaster oven). You can also store batter in the fridge for a few days.
• For the record, applesauce is a much better accompaniment for latkes than chili, but chili worked surprisingly well. Some people like sour cream on top. I'm not really sure why. In fact, I'm not really sure why people like sour cream on top of anything....