Ingredients:
Preheat oven to 450°F. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
Mix dry ingredients. Cut cold butter into dry ingredients and mix, so the butter is no bigger than pea-sized. Stir in milk all at once, until wet. Drop spoonfulls onto cookie sheet, about 1 inch apart.
Bake until done, about 15 minutes. Take out of oven and put biscuits on a plate to cool.
Makes enough for 2 people. Quick and easy. It can be easily multiplied to serve an arbitrary amount of people.
I move the biscuits from the cookie sheet to the plate by hand. They're rather hot, and the sheet is quite hot, so if you don't want to burn yourself you may want to use a spatula.
That's the normal amount of butter I use, though I vary it between no butter and 2 tablespoons.
A tasty variant uses 2 tablespoons butter, 2 ounces of honey, and 1/3 cup milk.
Ingredients:
Sauce:
Preheat oven to 300°F
Combine the sauce, bring to a simmer, and simmer for at least 10 minutes, stirring regularly. At this point the sauce can be used, or it can be refrigerated for use later.
While the sauce is simmering, cut up the beef, trimming off any excess fat. Then, using a bit of fat to get the skillet started, start browning the meat and then putting it into a large (13x9) baking dish. Pour off any excess fat as you go along.
While the last skillet's worth of meat is browning, splash in some wine (I use cream sherry) and let it reduce a bit after removing the last of the meat, and then add it to the sauce.
Mix the sauce and meat together in the baking dish, and then cover (I use a pyrex dish and aluminum foil) and put in oven.
Bake for 3 hours if not adding vegetables.
If adding vegetables, bake for 1.5 hours. Then remove it from the oven, stir in the vegetables, and replace the cover and put it back into the oven. Bake for an additional 1.75 hours.
This is good anywhere from no chillies through really hot and spicy, so add whatever amount of jalapenos, serranos, thai, or other chillies to taste.
I usually prep the vegetables after it's started baking.
This is really good with bread or over noodles.
The original recipe was from The Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook - Recipes for the Best Pan in Your Kitchen, by Sharon Kramis and Julie Kramis Hearne. I've altered it to suit my taste and cooking style.
The other day, I tried rye bread. It was similar to the time before, and still based off of mixer bread.
This time, I used 1/2 cup of molasses instead of the 1/4 cup sugar, and also mixed in 1/8 cup caraway seeds with the flour.
I was thinking of trying more caraway seeds next time, but Carol thought that the amount was just right.
The rise was decent. It's a bit denser than my other breads, but has that tasty caraway-rye flavor. Now I just need something to put on it, liverwurst or corned beef or cream cheese.
I purchased a pack of prime sirloin steaks from Costco, and decided to try different marinades on them to see how they compared.
I cooked all of the steaks the same way. I heated a pan, rubbed fat from the steak across the pan, fried covered over medium heat for about 12-15 minutes, flipping every 2-4 minutes, and then finished it by pouring sherry on it and frying it uncovered for another 5-7 minutes, flipping a few more times.
This is an easy way to fry up a steak without having to pay attention to it, and the steak ends up medium-rare, which is how Carol prefers it.
Marinades
Three of them ended up all being similar to how my steaks normally are. Tasty, but nothing spectacular to recommend them. The sesame seed oil one, however, was fabulous. A salty-sweet sesame flavor crusted the outside and permeated deep into the meat. Carol also thought that it stood out as the clear winner.
I'd been thinking for quite a while about using raw garlic directly in bread dough. For the first test, though, I couldn't resist using some pine nuts as well, since we had them around. I varied this off of my mixer bread recipe.
I used all white flour and olive oil. I put the garlic and pine nuts in right as I started mixing the dough, 1/2 cup pine nuts and 6 cloves (about 1 tbs) minced garlic.
The only weird thing was that once the dough was mixed, squeezing it caused the pine nuts to pop out. The end result was a delicious bread with a pleasant but not overpowering garlic and nut flavor.
I wanted to make a bread with some maple sweetness to it. I varied it off of my mixer bread recipe.
I used the 1/4 butter instead of olive oil, and 50/50 white and whole wheat flour. I put in 1/4 cup of maple syrup instead of sugar to proof the yeast, and added another 1/2 cup in when I blended in the rest of the ingredients.
It didn't seem to need as much water, I assume because of the liquid from the maple syrup. I baked it for about 32 minutes. I think that in general, for best results, I should be baking my bread longer than the 20-25 minutes of my first experiments.
It ended up fluffy and delicious. It didn't taste much like maple, but it had a very pleasant mild sweetness to it. The top crust did have a mild maple and caramelized sugar flavor.
I intended this as a first step, but I think that it's a keeper as-is. It should also be a good base for other more complex breads.
I decided to try making rye bread. For my first attempt, I just varied it off of my mixer bread recipe. I went with using a very slight variation, planning to then adjust from there.
I used the olive oil, 1/4 cup of molasses instead of 1/4 cup of sugar, 1 pound of rye flour and 1 pound of all-purpose flour.
It ended up being a bit denser, with a pleasant faint sour tang. Next time, I'm planning on adding caraway seeds and possibly upping the amount of molasses. I'll see how that is, and keep adjusting.
Things to try:
So, awhile ago I'd decided to stop buying garam masala pre-blended and ground, and instead make my own. I'd made a couple of small batches of a fairly simple garam masala, but this time I wanted to make a more complex blend.
I went with the "Bengali-Style" version from The Art of Indian Vegetarian Cooking, by Yamuna Devi. This is my current favorite Indian cook book. She has 8 different garam masala recipes.
My immediate need was for a lamb curry.
Ingredients:
Dry-roast everything but the ground ginger together in a skillet on low heat, stirring occasionally. The spices should darken and there should be a nice aroma, but you should stop before anything turns black or starts smoking heavily. It takes about 15 minutes.
Transfer the spices to a plate to cool.
Once cooled, break up the chili pods, the cinnamon, and the bay leaves into small bits. Break open the caradamon pods and discard the husks. Then grind the mix in small batches, sieve to remove any unground bits, and then blend with the ground ginger.
Store mix in a jar until used.
Garam masala is generally added towards the end of cooking, sometimes mixed in just prior to serving.
I didn't have enough coriander, so I just used what I had.
Next time, if I make this style again, I'm going to do a half-batch. That would be much more reasonable amount for our usage level.
It grinds really readily, as it's much softer than untoasted spices.
We'll start by proofing the yeast in the mixer bowl.
While you're letting the yeast proof, prep the measuring cup with 3 cups cold water. This is also a good time to do any other necessary prep work (such as setting up the scale or mixer).
Now we add the remaining ingredients.
Time to start the mixer.
I use 3 cups cold rather than warm water because the mixer can heat up the dough.
Sometimes, it's not possible to wait for it to cool.
You can mix in other flours, but other flours don't rise as well as white bread or all-purpose flour. So you'll need to play around with the ratio of flours. You can also up the amount of yeast.
Instead of regular loaves, you can make other shapes. If you line cookie sheets with parchment paper, you can lay out cylinders for baguettes or roll the dough into small balls for rolls. Remember to slash a line in the top before you put them into the oven.
I have a sweet tooth to end all sweet tooths. And yet, somehow, traditional pancakes are too sweet for me. The heavy batter, when combined with incomparable but intense maple syrup, would leave me feeling rather queasy. Sometimes I would eat them without syrup, but they often didn't taste right that way either.
Eventually I discovered the secret to the perfect pancake experience. First, I make the batter from scratch. It's quick and easy and this way I avoid overly sweet mixes. (I have nothing against mixes and I'm sure there are some great ones out there, but all I can say is that when I discovered how easy pancake batter is to make, I tossed my crappy mix that gave me heavy, leathery, funny tasting cakes and never looked back.)
Second, I eat them plain or with jam, not with syrup. Don't get me wrong, I love maple syrup. It's just a bit much first thing in the morning. I prefer my sweets later in the day.
Once I discovered how to make a pancake I loved, I made a lot of them. My all-time favorite recipe was this one. Sadly, amaranth flour is not for sale in all parts of the country, but here in the Pacific Northwest it's part of the Bob's Red Mill line of specialty flours.
These pancakes are crammed with flavor before you dress them up at all. Due to the use of amaranth and whole wheat, they're also slightly higher in protein than traditional recipes.
And if you, like most people, like your pancakes drizzled with liquid tree blood, that works too.
Amaranth Banana Pancakes
Mix:
In separate bowl, mix:
Combine two bowls and mix. Adjust the thickness of the batter by adding a little water or a little flour if necessary. It will be thick and lumpy, but should be thin enough so that when you ladel it on to the griddle, it oozes into a disk about 1/4" thick.
Fry on griddle set to 350°F. It isn't necessary to butter the griddle, but doing so will give a slightly crispy, buttery edge. Fry one side until bubbles develop. Then flip once and fry until ready.
The above recipe serves a crowd. It can be cut in half if desired.