Cheese Chicharron

Cheese.  I’m a cheese snob.  It’s partly Sam’s fault, but Angie enables this habit.  I often spend more on cheese than all of my other items combined!  Plus, you’d be disappointed if I didn’t share some cheese recipes!  Speaking of the Packers...

This is a really yummy, snack or appetizer.  It is easy, peasy, lemon squeezy to make!  I saw this on Rick Bayless’ show.  He’s also on PBS and has several restuarants in Chicago.  I’ve been to La Frontera.  It’s really great.  It was summer, we ate outside, in Chicago!  

For the first time in my life, I have a gas stove.  If you know me, I’m always yammering on about how great cast iron pans are.  I don’t think that they’d be as great with electric.  I have two cast iron pans.  I’ve found glass lids for each of them.  I don’t think that “non stick” pans are good for us.  Plus, I like to cook things fast and super-hot.  That is very bad in a non-stick pan, but very good in a cast iron pan.  It takes some getting used to, but I make everything in my two cast iron pans, a 2 quart stainless steel sauce pan (like for boiling pasta), and my pressure cooker.  I even make toast in the cast iron pan!  It makes the items cooked nice and brown.  It can go from the stove top to the oven, and clean up is easy!  I just wipe them down with a paper towel, when they are cool, of course.  You can always just stick them in a really hot oven (450 or 500 degrees) for cleaning.  Mine are really seasoned, so nothing sticks.  You want to get the pan really hot before adding ingredients.  I often heat mine up while I’m preparing the ingredients.  

This is such an easy recipe, I feel a little bit bad (not really).  One ingredient!  Cheese!

About 1/4 to 1/2 cup finely shredded cheese.  You can try different kinds.  I used mozerella.  

Get the cast iron pan nice and hot.  Sprinkle the cheese around the pan, evenly.  You can roll the pan around to spread out the melted cheese.  If you use a cheese with more fat, you’ll need to “blot” the oil off of the top with a dry paper towel.  This is not necessary in a cast iron pan with a low fat cheese.  The edges will brown first, but be patient!  Start to loosen up the edges with a spatula and work your way in, toward the middle.  Once the whole piece will come lose, flip it over.  Both sides will be crisp and brown.

Remove from pan and fold in half.  It’s pretty “moldable” while it’s warm.  It’ll become brittle, like a chip, as it cools.  Serve on a large plate with salsa or guacamole.  Break off pieces and dip!  This is really good with a glass of red wine.  You’ll need to practice a little bit to see how much cheese works in your pan.  

French Bread

I deleted this recipe on my blog a few weeks ago, inadvertently.  I’m putting it back out there because it’s one of my favorites.  This is the first bread that I tried baking after I took a bread baking class last fall.  It is pretty foolproof!  It is made with love.  My cooking generally involves very few ingredients.  This bread is inexpensive to make and really doesn’t take very long.  While the dough is rising, you can do other things.  I’m not a very good baker, but have had success with bread and rolls.  To insure your success, buy some fresh bread or all purpose flour and quick rising yeast.  Why take chances with ingredients that may result in failure.  You can make a lot of delicious bread by spending less than $10 on fresh flour and yeast.

Yeast is a living organism.  Time, cold, too much heat, and salt will kill it.  Recently, I invested in a $20 food thermometer and a food scale.  My tap water does not get that hot, so I put some water in the microwave for 30 seconds.  That is too hot.  Just plain, hot, tap water.  This works.  What could be more simple?   Professional bakers often weigh their ingredients, rather than measuring them.  I’m not there yet, but it is convenient to weigh each piece of dough when making rolls.  I’m not a freak about everything being uniform and looking factory made.  I am a freak about improving the odds of evenly cooked rolls for a better product.  

I only have a few items in my kitchen that I regularly use that I spent more than $30 on.  My Kitchen-aid mixer is one of them.  I love this tool!  It makes bread making super easy.  The mixer is not necessary, but you don’t even need to knead it (get it? need to knead it?), if you have one.  The mixer does it for you!  This recipe is adapted from Food.com’sl Old Reliable French Bread. One more thing:  Don’t worry.  The worst thing that can happen is that it doesn’t turn out.  IThe ingredients don’t cost much and you’ll learn.  n cooking, and life, we learn a lot from our mistakes.  I should be really smart, by now!

A couple of more quick tips.  My kitchen is really chilly in winter, so after I run the hot water for the dough, I fill the mixing bowl with hot water, just to warm it up.  Of course, I dump that in to my plants before adding the ingredients.  When baking, I set all ingredients out on the counter before I begin combining ingredients.  There’s not much more frustrating than realizing that you don’t have quite enough of something when you’re half finished mixing the ingredients.  

French Bread - with a Kitchen-aid Mixer.  

1 1/4 cup warm water (hot from tap)

3 tsp. quick rise yeast

3 1/2 c. flour (bread or AP)

1 tsp. salt

2 tbsp. melted butter

Place warm water in warmed mixing bowl.

Add yeast and mix with water.

Add 3 c. flour.  Keep the 1/2 c. on the side.  Add if needed.

Add salt and melted butter.  Try not to let the salt or butter touch the yeast yet.  Notice that the mixer as no yet been powered up.

Knead with dough hook until ingredients are incorporated, but don’t over do it.

Wash out the bowl with hot soapy water.  When dry, add 1 tsp. oil.

Form the dough in to a ball.  Place the dough in the clean, warm, oiled, bowl.  Turn it over in the oil, so it’s oiled all over.  Otherwise, it’ll stick to the bowl and the plastic.  Yuck!

Cover bowl with plastic wrap or a clean, cotton dish towel.  Place it in a warm, draft free place.  Let the dough rise for about an hour.  The dough ball will double in size.

Remove the dough from the bowl and press it down.  They call this “punching”, but be gentle.  What did that dough ever do to you?  Don’t ever take out your aggression on bread dough.

Divide the dough in to half.

Shape.  You can just shape this in to a ball.  I like to roll it (or press with my fingers) into a rectangle.  Again, this is more gentle than rolling with a rolling pin.  Then roll up into a loaf.  Pinch/finish off the edges, if you’d like.  I prefer a more “rustic” look.  You can put the loaves in loaf pans, but I don’t.  I just bake them on a baking sheet.

Let the two loaves rise for another hour (about), again until about double in size.

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

Cut diagonal “vents” in to the top of each loaf.  Not real deep.  Maybe 1/8 to 1/4”?  These will look very cool when baking is finished.

Bake for about 25 minutes, turning the pan 180 degrees for even baking about half way through.  Bake until nicely browned.

Remove from oven.  Cool for 10 minutes before slicing.  This is the hardest part!

I like this bread with about everything.  My fav is to slice off the end, when it’s still warm, dipped in olive oil, vinegar, and diced, fresh herbs.  

I’ve probably made this bread about 15 times, and it works, EVERY TIME!  My goal is to use that entire little brown jar of yeast!  This bread lasts, wrapped in a plastic bag, in my cupboard for a week.  If I’m getting toward the end of the week and have lots left, make croutons or bread crumbs.  Trust me, you won’t want to waste any of this!

"Braised" short ribs (in the pressure cooker).

My friend, Maria, is always talking about her short ribs.  She can’t believe that I haven’t made them.  So, she talked me in to trying them.  She talks me in to a lot of things by convincing me how fun it’ll be.  I drew the line when she wanted me to “support” the Vikings before this last season started.  They had a pretty good year last year, with Favre at his finest, but I can not like the Vikings.  At the end of last season, I said that he was hurt.  I had a feeling.  I just teased her about how thankful I was that I never routed for them!  I didn’t dislike the Vikings as much as I did when Favre came here.  Enough about that. 

I went to the meat counter and picked out some lovely beef short ribs, not too fatty.  I’ve made pork ribs a bunch of times, but haven’t really used a recipe.  This recipe is adapted from “dadcooksdinner.com”.  This  can be made a day ahead.

4 lbs. short ribs

f/2 tsp. black pepper

1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper

2 cups chicken stock

1 cup red wine

1 onion (I cut this in large chunks)

4 cloves of garlic

1 bay leaf

2 tbsp. ketchup (or tomato paste, if you have it)

You can brown the ribs a little in the pressure cooker before the pressure cooking process.  I didn’t do this, to save time.

Put all ingredients in pressure cooker.  Bring to full pressure.  Reduce heat, but maintain pressure.  Cook on full pressure for 25 minutes.  Then start to release pressure.  Try to release pressure within 15 minutes.  Open the lid away from you, so the steam escapes from the back.

After pressure has been released, put ribs on one platter.  Pour sauce in a “fat separator” if you have one.  Otherwise, put all of the sauce in a bowl, cover, and refrigerate.  The fat will rise to the top of the bowl.  This sounds horrible, but it beats the alternative!  Refrigerating the ribs is an easy way to  further reduce the fat.  Mine had just a little bit - hardly worth the exercise.

If refrigerated, heat the sauce and the ribs.  

Top the ribs with the sauce.

Sit down and enjoy with plenty of napkins!

Pasta - no pasta machine necessary!

I had planned to go in to work for a while today, but just couldn't bring myself to do it.  I haven't stayed home on Saturday for several weeks.  I was missing all of my PBS cooking shows.  My fav is Lydia's Italy.  She inspired me to start making pasta a few months ago.

Pasta is simple to make.  It's just flour and egg, and water, if needed.  My grandma used to make it and hang it on the backs of chairs and everything else to dry.  (This is an unnecessary step.)  She used to cook it and serve it with crisp bacon, stirred in a tiny bit of bacon grease.  She added salt and pepper.  I would add parsley, and skip the salt!  She did not have a pasta machine.  She rolled it out on a cutting board and cut it with a kitchen knife.  May she rest in peace.  I smile thinking about her.  She modelled love, but also had boundaries.  My grandpa died young (53) and she met Everett and married him within months.  They were happy together until she passed.

As an adult, I've never cared for pasta that much.  In fact, I've been known to say that I could live without it.  My freind Shari eats pasta at least once a day!  We took a beginning pasta making class, also at Kitchenn Window.  It was super fun.  We made lasagna, fetacchini, ravioli and stuffed tortellini.  Really good.  They sell wine and beer by the glass in class, so this was a nice way to wrap up a week a few months ago.  I really wanted to learn how to make pasta for my Sam.  She loves it.  It's so hard to impress a young adult!  She will be coming to visit in a few weeks, so that'll be super fun!  There will be pasta.

Lydia uses packaged dry pasta most of the time.  I don't use it any more.  It's so easy to make and sooooo well worth it.  This pasta is not rolled flat, like you'd make it for spagetti, lasagna, or fettaccini.  You make ropes and cut them down in to small peices and roll each one with two fingers.  This would be great to make with children.  "Many hands make light work."  Let's do it:

1 1/2 all purpose flour

1 egg (room temp., if possible)

Seriously - that's it!.  I put some water in the measuring cup to add, if the dough is too dry.  In the midwest, my house gets really dry in winter, so I always need to add water.  You'll learn what it should feel like.

Pour the pasta on a cutting board and make a "bowl" or "well" out of it.  Crack the egg in the center.  I made a double batch.  Thus, the two eggs.

Stir the eggs, rapidly, with a fork.  Incorporate some of the flour as you go.  Continue to mix.  When ithe egg is not runny, you will start to knead the dough with your hands.  Since mine would not "come together, I ended up adding about 1/8 cup of water.  Continue to knead until all flour has been incorporated.  A dough scraper is a good tool for this job.  Roll the dough in to a fully incorporated ball.  Cover the ball with plastic wrap and let the dough rest for 20 minutes or longer.  This makes it easier to work with in the next phase, shaping.

With the dough scaper, or a butter knife, cut off a small bit of dough (about 1/4 cup to keep it easy to work with).  Wrap the rest of the dough with plastic, so it doesn't dry out.  Roll the small peice of dough in to a "rope", less than 1/2" thick.  It doesn't need to be perfect, but practice does help.  Slice the "rope" in to less than 1/2" pieces.  I was trying to make them small. 

(I have pics.  I'll put those up soon.)

Take each piece and press with two fingers, while dragging it toward you.  This takes a little practice.  Lay on a cotton towel while rolling out the others.  

Repeat by making a rope, slicing, and pressing. 

Drop in boiling water.  They'll cook up in less than 2 minutes.  Drain.

I topped these with a sour cream, herb, asparagus, and cheese "sauce".  Those were the ingredients that Sam and I used to put in our "Mother's Day Omelette".  With fresh pasta, "it's not aout the sauce", so make something great and use just a little bit!

Leftover black bean soup - in a hurry!

After putting the leftover soup in the fridge, a good nights sleep, and a long day at work, this is the perfect answer to:  What to make for dinner?

Since making this yesterday, the beans have absorbed most of the liquid.  Fill your bowl - halfway-  with bean soup.  Top off with chicken stock to thin back down.  I cut up about 10 stalks of parsley (quite a bit) and sprinkled that on top.

One word:  DELICIOUS!  Even better than yesterday!

I only hope that I can save enough to put a couple of bowls of this in the freezer to enjoy later!

Black Bean Soup with Chicken

This is another really healthy recipe for the pressure cooker.  This is super easy, and makes the kitchen smell really great.  It's pretty cold here, so this is perfect.  Again, stick with proportions for liquids and solids in the recipe, but different seasonings can really change a simple dish like this.  You could even change the theme, with different seasonings and/or garnishes.  I purchased the black beans in bulk at the co op.  They look much better and are probably more fresh than those in the plastic bag at the grocery store.  Older beans are "okay", but will likely need to be cooked longer, after removing the chicken.  (You will want to discard the skin.)

Recently, I started keeping a nice, fresh bunch of Italian Parsly in the fridge at all times.  I buy this every Friday.  Fresh parsly is a really inexpensive way to really spruce up just about anything.  I don't think I've ever spent $2 on a bunch of parsley.  Cilantro would be great with this, too.  It's not as "sturdy", so I buy it when needed, but seem to waste most of it.

This recipe is also adapted from my class at Kitchen Window:

• 3 cups of chicken stock and 4 cups of water (or 7 cups of water, if you don't have the stock)
• 1 pound dry black beans (about 2 1/2 cups)
• 1 whole chicken (I use Smart Chicken.  Every little bit helps!)
• 2 whole bay leaves
• 1 medium onion, chopped
• 3 medium carrots, chopped
• 4-6 garlic cloves, mashed or chopped
• 1 1/2 tsp. cumin seeds
• 1/2 tsp. black pepper
• 1 tbsp. olive oil
• 1 tsp. salt (if you used all water.  I didn't add salt.  I used about 1/2 water and 1/2 stock)

Directions:

1. Rinse the beans and pick out stones.  Soak in a large pot, if you have time.  This is not a critical step.
2. Heat the oil in a 6 quart (or larger) pressure cooker.  Add the onions, carrots, and cumin.  Cook over medium-high heat, stirring frequently. until veggies begin to soften.  
3. Stir in the water, chicken, garlic, and bay leaves.  Add beans (with soaking liquid, if soaked).
4. Cook on high pressure for about 25 minutes.  Turn off heat and allow the pressure to come down naturally.  For the pressure to come down with my pressure cooker (Fagor), it takes about 15-20 minutes of sitting on the stove, with the heat turned off.  Open the lid away from you to prevent a steam burn.  Those are nasty!
5. Remove the chicken carefully.  It should be falling apart.  (Mine broke in half taking it out.)
6. Taste beans.  If they are not tender, cover and simmer (without pressure) until cooked through.  
7. Remove bay leaves.  
8. Puree soup, if desired, with as little vegetable and liquid as possible. You could either let it cool a little and blend it or use an immersion blender.  I did not puree mine.  I did remove some of the liquid and "mashed" the soup to thicken the broth a little bit.
9. Remove the chicken from the bones and seperate from fat.  Break the chicken up in to small peices.  
10. Return the chicken pieces to the pot.  Check the seasonings.  Add more salt and pepper, if needed.  
11. Garnish with fresh tomato, avacado, parsley, and a tiny bit of sour cream.  You could also top with some salsa.

The difference between cooked dry beans and can beans is like night and day.  For most recipes, I prefer dry beans.  They are much less expensive than canned.  Canned are convenient and more "mushy".  I'd use canned black beans to make bean burgers, but that's about it.

Tip of the day:  Find a really great spice/seasnonings store.  Milwaukee is the home of Penzey Spices.  Here is their link:

http://www.penzeys.com/
Their staff is awesome and their product and prices are way better than the grocery store.  I also try to support this little store and it is very conveniently located for me.  One of the guys there, Tom, is a cheesehead, so he will always greet me like a sister!  He's really excited for the superbowl, too.  Mr. Penzey (founder) passed away recently.  His funeral made the news in Milwaukee.  The employees at his store found this humorous, in a loving way.
http://search.jsonline.com/Search.aspx?k=penzey+funeral&s.x=0&s.y=0
As my buddy, Maria, says, "What were they supposed to do?  Lug Mr. Penzey in his casket down the streets of downtown Milwaukee for 6 blocks?"  LOL.  Only in Milwaukee!  They are freaks about parking!

Enjoy this soup in good health.  I'm getting ready for the big game this weekend.  On the menu:  orange danish rolls; roasted brussel sprouts with fresh herbs; and short ribs!  Maybe pasta?