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Fun Quiz
January 9, 2010 | 
Author 
confusing semolina products
I was researching Matt’s great posting on Timpano di Tucci, trying to figure out what pastas I would use if I were to do it, and found this funny little Quiz:
I got 18/24, took it again with my wife (who surprised me at her knowledge of pasta types) and then got 21/24. What’s your score? Try it and post in comments!
A Tail of A Beast (of Burden)
Off again to the local meat cutter (Ward’s Meats and it’s just that: you buy an animal from the farmer, the butcher kills it, and off it goes to a local meat cutter for cutting and packing. Our cutter is Ward). This time the goal of the journey is beef bones, both for us (consommé) and the dogs (chewing and burying). Oh, and for sausage casings (I’ve yet to attempt to make these on my own. It’s a project for the future). However, this discussion will focus on neither of these.
In our lives, we try to get closer to the source of our food. Not only is it better for you and you know all about it, but you can get things that normally you would pay for in the store for free (trading homemade preserves for things you want really does work) I like to make beef broth, consommé and stock, but to do this I need a lot of good beef bones. You can’t get these at the local grocery store, and butcher shops are getting to be few and far between. So, since the butcher and the cutter end up with an awful lot of them (and offal) and they just get sent to the rendering plant anyway, I intercept them at the cutter. Normally, we don’t pay anything for them, and they’ll give you more than you can take. We got some bones, and he also gave us a complete ox tail, sectioned, that a customer didn’t take. Ward just wanted it out of his freezer.
Once home, I got to work on Ox tail soup. I thawed them, opened them up and rinsed them off.
A whole ox tail, cut up
That’s them. So, now that we are at the starting point of this recipe, what shall we do? Let’s start, I say!
Ingredients:
21/2 pounds oxtail, cut and trimmed
½ cup unsifted flour plus 2 Tablespoons
2 Tablespoons beef drippings or vegetable oil
2 medium yellow onions, peeled and minced
6 cups of water and 1 pint bouillon
2 Tablespoons tomato paste
2 teaspoons salt1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 bay leaf
½ teaspoon thyme
3 cloves
2 sprigs of parsley
2 medium carrots, peeled and diced
1 stalk celery, diced
1/3 cup sherry or port wine
Dredge the oxtails in ½ cup flour:
Dredging the ox tail
Once dredged, brown in drippings. You will need a large, heavy-bottomed stockpot for this:
Browning ox tail
Drain on paper towels after browning. Add onions to oil, turn up heat to medium and sauté till golden, but not burnt. Sprinkle in remaining flour, mix well and brown lightly.
Flour and onion
Slowly add the water and bouillon, stir in tomato paste, salt and pepper;
Adding liquid
Place bay leaf, thyme, cloves and parsley in a bouquet garni and add to pot.
Add bouquet garni
Return the oxtail to the pot, cover, and let simmer for 3 hours until the meat is tender.
Return meat to pot
Remove bouquet garni. Remove meat and separate from the bones, cut to bite size and add back to the pot. Add carrots and celery.
Add carrots and celery
Cover and simmer till carrots are tender, about 15 minutes. Add wine when tender.
I often wondered why this dish exists. There is a high bone to meat ratio, and its the tail. After eating it, I now know why. It has an incredible beefy flavor, and the texture is like tender rib steak. A wonderful soup, it went very well with a cold, rainy winter day in the northwest.
Look at the Orange Marmalade!
Moro Blood Oranges
Marmalade. I think that it’s the first preserve or canning that I ever attempted. I originally made it way back in the late eighties, and, on again, off again, have made it ever since. I can’t say that I ever have bought it since I learned to make it. That being said I must add that it is perhaps the most difficult of preserves to do correctly. And doing it correctly is all about learning from your mistakes. And they can be awful. Don’t worry, it’s not impossible, and what follows is a process I developed that avoids many of the problems that can be encountered on the road to a great marmalade.
I made two types this year: A Blood Orange Marmalade and a Sour (Dundee) marmalade. I was going to do this right up on the Sour Orange, but decided against that. Instead, I’m doing it on the making of the Blood Orange Marmalade. There are a couple of reasons for this. Most people that would attempt doing marmalade are probably going to use the Valencia Orange, the standard juice orange of California and Florida. The Valencia is a very different orange from the Sour (Seville) Orange. The Sour is very sour and very seedy. The Blood Orange, however, is a bud sport of the Valencia, so, except for its beautiful color, it’s almost the same thing (As a side note, Marmalade made with the Valencia actually has its own name. It’s called “Californian Marmalade”, and it was made famous by the King Kelly Corporation of Pasadena, California).
What makes the process difficult is making sure you have the proper pectin (not hard to do) and not caramelizing the sugar as you approach gel set point (Neither is this)
Let’s begin: Total ingredients:
4 lbs of whole Blood Oranges
2 lemons
16 cups of water
9 1/2 lbs of White Cane Sugar
Wash all of the Oranges and let dry. Using a Mandolin or a Slicer, slice the oranges into 1/8” thick slices, retaining all juice and discarding any seeds. Once sliced, cut each orange ring into four, quarter, parts. Add all oranges to a stock pot. We will get more than enough pectin for jelling by including all of the pith, pips and peel of the oranges.
Sliced Oranges in the pot
Next, completely zest both of the lemons and juice them. Hopefully, you have an assistant for this. This Juicer’s name is Max and he’s real good at what he does.
Max, the best little juicer love and money can buy!
Add Lemon zest and lemon juice to the Oranges, sans seeds.
Add zest and juice
Next, add the water and bring it to a boil. When it reaches a boil, turn down the heat and simmer for about 40 minutes (I do this covered as I do not want to reduce the orange solution). Continue simmering until the peels become tender to touch.
Now, with the fruit tender, add the sugar, stirring constantly until it completely dissolved.
...........add sugar.....
Now well start the boil process. This is where we are going to finish the cooking of the fruit, and set the gel of the Marmalade. During this process, you will need to stir almost constantly, as this will help to keep the sugar from caramelizing and the whole liquid from browning. You may need to modulate the temperature on the pot to keep it from boiling over. Try to keep it boiling on as low a flame as possible.
While waiting for a boil, place a small dish in the freezer to keep cold. We will use this to check the marmalade as it finishes.
Take a candy thermometer and keep a constant eye on the temperature. You will slowly approach 222°F. When it does, you are almost at gel set point.
Using a candy thermometer; stirring constantly
At this temperature, place about a teaspoon of the Marmalade onto the chilled plate; let it sit about 30 seconds to cool. When cool, swirl the plate to move the Marmalade around on it. If it thickens and “wrinkles” you’re there. If not, keep boiling, watching very carefully and stirring constantly.
When you check shows that it is gelled, It’s ready for jarring. We used a dozen ½ pint jars, as they will be gifts, but you can use any size you want. Ladle the marmalade into the jars, place on the lid and screw on the rings, making sure not to get any marmalade on the jars threads.
Ladle into jars
The finished product
Process the jars in a boiling water bath for 20 minutes, and you’re done. See? It’s not that hard at all, and it’s better than almost any you can buy.
Buttered scones with Earl Grey, anyone?
Posted in Fun Stuff, Recipes | 
Tags: Blood Orange, canning, Marmalade, orange marmalade, preserves | 
2 Comments »
Chili paste-easier and cheaper than you think-and better!
After my posting on making fresh sausage, Patrick posted a link to a chorizo recipe that I found to be incredibly enticing, tasteful and challenging. After reading it, I checked my stock of chili peppers in the larder and it found woefully lacking to attempt such a sausage. I have since stocked up, and, as fortune would have it, pork shoulder went on sale here. Well, combine the two things, and you have all you need to attempt Patrick’s chorizo. Well, plus other things, but I have them!
I am not going to go into the packing of fresh sausage in this posting as I already have and it is pretty much the same for all types (it’s just the meat and the spices that are variables). What I am going to focus on, however, is the making of the ingredients that make this one different. That’s the chili paste.
There is a great variety of dried chili’s out there, and making them into paste is pretty much the same for all of them. I have made these in the past, for dishes like Pozole (fantastic dish, BTW, highly recommend it), but I am going to tweak it just a bit to bring it in line with more traditional Mexican cooking and, I think, eliminate problems I have had in storing.
Ok, the chorizo calls for two types of dried pepper: Guajillo (pronounced wha-hee-oh, called Mirasol when fresh) and the Ancho (called the Poblano when fresh). For our discussion, I will only be dealing only with the dried varieties of each pepper.
Guajillo Peppers
Ancho Peppers
Chances are you will be buying these peppers by the bag, unless there is a really good Hispanic store next to you. Try to get peppers that are somewhat pliable and not too dry. It is much easier to work with them somewhat soft. If, however, you can’t obtain them this way, email me, and I’ll explain how to deal with the extremely dry peppers. (If time permits me, I’ll do it at the end of this article).
Remove the stem of each pepper and discard. Take a chef knife and make a slit in the pepper from tip to tip, and fold open. Remove all of the seeds from the inside (save some for spring if you wish to grow them). Also, remove any pepper ribs you can that are visible.
A cleaned pepper
When you have them all cleaned and ready, it’s time to make the paste. Take all of the cleaned peppers of one variety and soak in warm water for at least 30 minutes. They will become very soft.
Soaking peppers
Drain and discard water.Place in a blender (this is easier to get out without waste than a food processor) and add a couple tablespoons of vinegar (I used to use water, but this is the more traditional paste-making aspect I mentioned earlier) The vinegar will work the same as water, however, the lower pH of vinegar will eliminate much of the bacteria growth problems I have found in the past when storing excess paste. If you need more vinegar, add it a tablespoon at a time. Do his until it is a thick paste, and then remove from blender with a spatula.
Blend softened peppers with vinegar
There you have it, chili paste. I keep many varieties on hand, and my wife, not born in Los Angeles, wonders why. Hmmm, well, to be honest, not so much anymore.
Anyway, I made this paste specifically to make Chorizo. I adapted Patrick’s recipe from the comments on foodnuts to my sausage making. It is a great recipe. There was only one problem: the recipe called for a one to one of vinegar (cup) to one pound of meat. I would cut that volume of vinegar by about 1/3, as it is too soupy, and will come out of the porosity of the casing. (That’s why I say 1/3; it’s about how much I lost.) But, nonetheless, they came out great. Breakfast on Christmas will be Huevos Rancheros made with these.
Scarlet and dad grind meat for sausage
Recipe for the Chorizo:
9 lbs of pork shoulder
2 lbs fat
9 tbls Salt
1 pint of Guajillo chili paste
1 3/4 cup Ancho paste
9 cups vinegar (I’d cut back to 6)
14 tbls Paprika
9 tsp garlic powder
18 bay leaves, ground fine
3 tbls ground black pepper
4 1/2 tbls ground cumin
7 tbls ground oregano
4 ½ tsp ground marjoram
4 ½ tsp ground coriander
4 ½ tsp ground thyme
4 ½ ground allspice
Mix well; allow to sit refrigerated overnight; pack into casing. Here’s what the final product looks like:
The finished product! Chorizo!
They aren’t hot but they are very spicy! I look forward to a large meal of Huevos Rancheros, made with fresh eggs, homemade Pico de Gallo, adobo sauce and Escebeche!
Posted in Fun Stuff, Recipes | Tags: Ancho, Chili paste, Chorizo, Guajillo, Huevos Rancheros, sausage | 4 Comments »
Ode to Uncle Joe
The period from the Civil War to 1912 was defined by the Legislative branch of Federal Government. It starts with our first impeachment of a President, and ends with the election of a President that would begin the ascending power of the Executive branch. During this era Congress would wield its greatest power ever in history. The 20th century would be defined by its slow loss of power to the Executive branch. Never again, after the election of Woodrow Wilson, would Congress ever wield such power.
If the Congress was all powerful, who, therefore, in Congress, would have been the most powerful? Well, that would be the speaker of the House, of course, or didn’t you stay awake in government class? And of all the speakers of this era, none had the power and used it like Joseph Gurney Cannon of Illinois.
The Man, The Myth, The Legend
Known as Uncle Joe, he used his power as a tyrant over the House. No bill saw the light of day without him allowing it, as he was also head of the Rules Committee. Nothing in Congress happened without his permission. At times, things came to a standstill, loggerheads being broken only on his whim. Finally, the situation became intolerable, something had to give.
Like Humpty Dumpty, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. As the story goes, Uncle Joe got up from his speakers seat to relieve himself due to “nature calling”. When he left the chamber of the house, the members present, both Democrats and Republicans, quickly put together a resolution to remove him as Speaker. Upon his return, his supporters initiated a filibuster to block the resolution. After 26 hours, the filibuster ended, but the damage was done. Uncle Joe was no longer speaker of the house, and the era that was born in the tragedy of the Civil War came to an end. The rise of the Executive’s star was to begin, and we would enter an era defined by regulation. In history, even the greatest changes can come about for the simplest of reasons.
You must be asking yourself “What’s with the history lesson? Isn’t this a food blog? Well, Uncle Joe is famous for something else, and that’s Senate Bean Soup. Apparently one day he entered the dining room, looked at the menu, and exclaimed “Thunderation, I had my mouth set for bean soup! From now on, hot or cold, rain, snow or shine, I want it on the menu every day.” And it’s been that way ever since, never has a day gone by without it on the menu.
Dedicated cooks doing a daily routine
I love this recipe; it has become a staple at our house, our children call it “so good bean soup”. It is great on a cold winter night, and is pretty much a meal in itself. I try to make it as authentic as possible, which means making like they do in Washington, so I follow this recipe:
- 1 pound dry white beans, soaked overnight
- 1 meaty ham bone or 2 smoked ham hocks
- 3 quarts water
- 3 onions, finely chopped
- 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
- 4 stalks celery, with leaves, finely chopped
- 1/4 cup parsley, finely chopped
- 1 cup cooked mashed potatoes
- salt and pepper to taste
To begin: soak the beans overnight. In the morning, rinse beans, add to a stock pot with 3 quarts of water and the ham bone or hocks. Cover and simmer 2 hours.
Stir in the mashed potatoes and cook over low heat until the beans are almost tender, about 30 minutes. Add onion, celery, garlic and continue to simmer about an hour, or until the beans are tender. Remove the bone or hocks, clean of meat, dice it and return meat to the soup (I always add more ham to it than the bone will have). Salt and pepper to taste, and then serve. It’s very hearty and a wonderful meal. It also goes well with a salad tossed in a strong vinaigrette.
A great legacy left by a man of power, almost forgotten in our history books. Though, like Humpty Dumpty, he fell, the difference is in his case the king had no desire to use his men and horses to put him together again.
Posted in Dishes, Recipes | Tags: bean soup, ham, ham bone, joe cannon, navy bean, recipe, Senate, senate bean, soup, white bean | 7 Comments »