Justin & Meredith Winokur's Kitchen Cooking Notebook
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KitchenKatalog: Blog 264
Monday, March 17, 2014, 07:59 PM
We had a pretty simple breakfast: BATs (Bacon, Avocado, Tomato) We had Whole Foods' Black Forrest Bacon which we baked at 350 until it was crisp (Best bacon and best method to bake it). We also had a not-quite-ripe avocado, tomato slices and Brummel and Browns. The bread was a few slices of rye from last week's meals and small (slightly stale) rolls from Whole Foods.
Simple and good meal.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7669, 2014-03-17_195902
Sunday, March 16, 2014, 11:05 PM
We made African Peanut Soup with Meredith's regular recipe. The recipe is originally from 2013-11-09 except that we forgot all of the seasonings and skipped the peppers (hence why in the main thing, I said they were optional). However, despite forgetting these things, the soup was incredible! This is only my second time having it and I do not recall the last time exactly, this one was amazing!
We used a mixture of Better Than Bouillon and Osem. Also, it was a bit salty so we added another cup of water. We went heavy on the ginger and the peanut butter (hence those notes too). I also think that doing it in the cast-iron dutch oven and a really long simmer helped!
We also had a dozen oysters on the half shell. I am not totally sure what variety they were but e bought them at Fresh Market. They were not as good as ones we have had from Whole Foods. When I shucked them, they didn't seem to have much liquid ("liquor") though they seemed to be better later (how? I don't know...). Meredith and I each got a funky ones but the rest were...okay. Our stomachs still feel fine so I guess that says something.
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Original WP Post ID: 7658
Original WP Pub Date: 2014-03-16_230538
Sunday, March 16, 2014, 08:26 PM
Meredith and I made hamentashen to celebrate Purim.
We used my dad's dough recipe except we used coconut oil instead of butter. We used the extra-virgin kind to still give it a coconut flavor. (We used the TJ's brand). Anyway, different web sites suggest different ways to use it. Commenters of this Kitchn Post say to use 1:1 for volume. This StackExchange post says that butter is 80% fat whereas coconut oil is 100% so compensate accordingly. Coconut Oil Online says it is roughly 92% by weight of butter. I went with the latter since it seemed like a good mix. It follows The Kitchn's volume advice and is easy to do by weight. Two sticks of butter is 1/2 lbs ~= 227 grams so I used 209 grams.
We refrigerated it first to make sure it was solid (melts at 76F). I then creamed it as the recipe said. I was afraid of it getting too warm and melting so I stopped a bit early. This was a mistake as I found a few (some rather large) chunks of coconut oil in the dough when I was rolling it out. It was still very good so clearly either the dough was forgiving or it was the right amount of fat.
As per the suggestion on the page, I chilled the dough after it was made (about an hour). I do not have any experience with the original butter version but this was really, really hard to work with when that cold. It would crack and be hard to spread. I found that the second rolling where it was warmer was easier so I took the rest of the fridge. That helped a lot.
The dough held up very well. As you can see from the various photos, most held their shape well. It had a good crumb and almost reminded me of short-bread. Plus, you could really taste the coconut flavor which I_really_ liked!
On the note of the dough, I found 18 minutes was the right amount of time to bake them!
2014-03-18 Note: I had a few later and they were cold from being outside. The coconut flavor_really_ showed through when they were cold!
We made quite an assortment of fillings as noted below. We did run out so we resorted to some no-sugar-added cherry pie filling. However, that wasn't very good so we eventually stopped and just made cookies.
The other fillings are noted below
Took a large handful of blanched almonds and a bit of cardamom. I used the magic bullet to finely chop it and then I mixed in a large dollup of Trader Joes Fig Butter. I may have used a_bit_ too much cardamom but the filling was very good. This was my favorite!
Similar to the above but with pecans and coconut flakes finely chopped. I then mixed in Trader Joe's Mango Butter. A bit on the sweet side but it held up well and was different
This was Meredith's creation. First, she used the blender to combine about a 1/2 tsp of dried lavender buds with 1 tbsp sugar. She then cook 2 small (1/2 pint I think) containers of berries on the stove with 2 Tbsp water. As it cooked down she added 2 more Tbsp sugar. Towards the end , she mixed 1 Tbsp corn starch with the lavender sugar and added that. There wasn't enough lavender flavor so we crushed another 1/2 tsp of lavender and added it. The lavender flavor didn't come through as much until it cooled but then you could really taste it.
I was worried it wouldn't be thick enough to hold up but I was wrong. It worked out really well and was a nice (new) filing. We will make this again and use it for other things!
Meredith had this idea before I had read that halva was sometimes used as filling. We 3 Tbsp toasted black sesame seeds (not an easy thing to do because you cannot tell when toasted by looking at them) and then we ground them in the Magic Bullet until the released their oils and became like a paste. Then we added 2 Tbsp of honey and blended.
This worked out well even though it looked like tar filling. Unfortunately, there wasn't much. We only got 4 cookies out of it. We'll use more next time. It really did have the taste of Sesame Halva though!
I had these leftover from a while ago and I managed to not eat them (I put a sign on them that says "NO" so I don't!). I finned a few with either a mixture of the two, just health, or with heath on the others. They didn't really work. You can see in some photos that they drooped. I did use them to top the cookies at the end.
The fruit butters plus nuts really worked well. I would expand that with others. Maybe pumpkin butter! Or apple butter. Also, maple bacon filling would be interesting but probably sacrilege
Some general notes we figured:
Below are a bunch of photos:
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Original WP Post ID: 7623
Original WP Pub Date: 2014-03-16_202658
Wednesday, March 12, 2014, 08:56 PM
I made lentil egg rolls and spring rolls. I used the recipe on the back of the egg-roll wrappers (see photo from last time) with a few modifications. First of all, I used lentils instead of meat. I cooked 3/4 cup lentils in 1.5 cups water for 10 minutes and drained. Meanwhile, I finely chopped and sautéd mushrooms which gave the whole dish a lot of flavor. The only other changes were to go heavy on the ginger (also like last time), heavy on the oyster sauce, and add some soy sauce, sriracha and a bit of rice vinegar. I used half of a small head of cabbage while last time, it was a quarter of a large head.
The recipe doesn't say much about after adding the sauce. I kept it going until it all cooked down nicely. I also didn't let it cool before filling.
I decided to cook it hotter at 425°F for 15 minutes. As you can see from the photos, I did 6 egg rolls and 6 spring rolls. Two of the spring rolls were the large ones and they were too big. I had to eat it with a fork and knife. Also, the eggs rolls really were much better when it comes to heating/warming the rolls. But, the wrappers are a lot less healthy compared to the rice paper.
The rolls were very, very good! They tasted like regular egg rolls but fresher and less greasy inside. I will certainly do these again. They are "almost vegetarian" but I used real oyster sauce. If I want to do them fully vegetarian, I could use the vegan oyster sauce from 2013-06-17(the wrappers have egg in them so they won't be vegan).
Also, while I was cutting the carrot, it was a strange shape so I used my hands with the pan to go to the finger guard as I got closer. It would have been a fine plan had my hand not slipped. I took off a nice chuck of my thumb. Oops!
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7609, 2014-03-12_205604
Tuesday, March 11, 2014, 10:01 AM
After the failure of Reuben Crepes/Garden Rolls a few weeks ago, I decided to try again. I used the same basic fillers except I also toasted and sliced rye bread (see the photos below). The other fillings were 1/2 lean corned beef, 3 slices of light swiss, fat free thousand island, and sauerkraut. I further cooked the sauerkraut in a pan to get rid or more moisture. I filled them into 22cm rice paper wrappers (except the last one which was 33cm). I experimented a bit with different ways to rill them including
Anyway, I made 8 regular ones and one larger one. I put them on a pammed baking sheet, pammed them all, and baked them for 10 minutes at 350, flipped, and 10 more minutes. While it was not as catastrophic as last time, they still stuck. I didn't have this problem when I did it with eggs (see 2014-02-27) using non-stick aluminum foil so I will go back to that. Also some cheese spilled out but that may have only been in the ones that tore a bit.
My goal in cooking them is to crisp the wrappers, melt the cheese, and let the flavors meld. I think that I do not need 20 minutes at 350 and instead would do better with less at a higher temp. (I did 15@425 last time). Also, I do not think there was much benefit to flipping them but I'll decide later if I want to do that.
They were really good though! Even the ones that tore still had the classic Reuben dichotomy of flavors where you a bunch of unique flavors. And they were pretty easy to make!
I also made rutabaga chips like last time. I did 1/8" slices and roasted them at 425 for 15 minutes, flipped them, and did another 10. Some burned so I think next time, I will go a bit lower for longer. Also, letting them cool helped them crisp more.
Also, a note on names. I have decided to call_baked_ rice paper rolls "spring rolls" and if they are fresh, then "garden rolls" or "fresh rolls"
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Original WP Post ID: 7598
Original WP Pub Date: 2014-03-11_100150
Monday, March 10, 2014, 08:25 PM
NOTE: The dip part of this is now in My Recipe Book
Meredith has been talking about this soup for a while so I finally decided to give it a try. First of all, I am not totally sure what it is supposed to be called so I'll stick with my boring name (but it will always be Meredith's Soup in my book).
Anyway, I followed the recipe below with the following general changes:
As far as following recipes goes, I guess I was pretty close (I even used real garlic when called and actually grated it as best I could)
The soup was incredibly good. Lots of flavor and complexity. It was also pretty hearty as a meal given the egg and the beef. It would actually probably be fine with ground beef in the future and maybe (just maybe!) lentils (not really sure)
I was debating trying to lower the olive oil and I still may try to do so but honestly, I didn't think that 1/8 cups == 2 Tbsp (plus whatever else from the rest) was really_that_ bad.
I would definitely do it again. And I imagine soon enough, I will be adding it to my recipe book once I tweak it to be where I want it.
2014-03-12 Update: A few notes having eaten this for lunch two days later. The first is that I shouldn't have added the croutons for lunch until I was about to eat. They just disintegrated. The second is that it was a bit....for lack of a better word... udgy cold. Too much oil and a strange texture. I'll heat it up next time.
Photos:
The West Lake Hybrid (from Lady and Pups)
Local Copy -- password is the name of my dog, all lower case
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7590, 2014-03-10_202529
Sunday, March 09, 2014, 11:38 AM
I made patty melts as I have done before but this time, I used fresh ground bison. I formed it into patties, topped it with some salt and pepper, and I cooked it on the cast iron pan. Each patty was about 3/8 of a pound. Meanwhile, I sautéd/caramelized onions. When they were all finished, I spread Brummel and Browns on the rye bread, topped it with the burger, the onions, then some fat free thousand island and finally a slice of low fat swiss. After having so much through last time, I decided to break out the griddler to cook them. It worked well enough except that on the top where there wasn't burger, just got soggy. It works better for flat and even sandwiches.
I also [attempted] butternut squash chips. I sliced the top part into 1/8" slices and I put them on a baking sheet with parchment paper and pam. I roasted them at 450 for 15 minutes, turned them and then intended to do another 15 but stopped around another 8 minutes when I saw they were browning. When I flipped them at 15, they felt very soggy still making me wonder if there is a better way to cook them. The parts that weren't burned were pretty good!
I also made a stove-top butternut squash hash with the bulb-part of the squash. I started them on the pan and then eventually added a bit of water and loosely covered it. This helped it all cook. Then I sautéd them once they were more cooked through. I made that for lunch the next day but when I tried one, it was pretty good.
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Original WP Post ID: 7583
Original WP Pub Date: 2014-03-09_113858
Saturday, March 08, 2014, 11:35 AM
I wanted a fast and quick meal so all I did was top some chicken with Emril Essence and cook it on the pan. It was actually really good and flavorful. The only thing is that I must have missed the thickest part when I took a temperature reading since there was a part not really cooked enough. I threw it in the microwave (which of course, over cooked it all)
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7574, 2014-03-08_113549