Whole Wheat? Cooked Romaine? Whaaaa? July 22, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Recipes.Tags: romaine, sausage, whole wheat pasta
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I watched Mark Bittman wrap romaine leaves around fish and poach it in white white. I tried it. It was amazing. It was beautiful. It was impressive. But that’s not what this post is about. This post is about Romaine.
We all think of Romaine as a salad leaf, meaning, it’s not getting cooked. We make salads out of it and call it a day. When the leaves cooked to a tasty perfection wrapped around fish at Bittman’s instruction, I saw my next obsession blossom: cooking Romaine.
Because I had left over from the the fish recipe, it was the perfect excuse to cook some up next. I came up with this pasta dish:
Whole Wheat Pasta with Sausage and Romaine
whole wheat pasta, any kind you jab with a fork
spicy sausage links
romaine leaves, sliced in 2″ pieces
fresh garlic, sliced
1 cup of white wine
red pepper flakes to taste
Brown the sausage links until they are cooked enough to cut (in 1″ chunks) and not spill out. After they are cut, put back into the pan and finish cooking. When the sausage is cooked, remove from heat, set aside and brown the sliced garlic in the same sausage pan with the liquid love that came from the sausage. When the garlic is sufficiently browned, add the white wine, scraping off the flavor crystals from the bottom of the pan. When the wine is hot, add the romaine. Cook on high heat, but not boiling, until the hardest of the center ridges of the romaine are slightly tender.
While all this is going on, boil the pasta al dente.
When the pasta and romaine are both done, combine into whatever pot will fit them both. Add the sausage. Add the red pepper flakes. Heat through. Eat.
Turning A House Into a Home With Homemade Sausage July 22, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Fun Gadgets, Projects, Recipes.Tags: BBQ, cheddar, chicken, jerk, pork, sausage, scallion, spicy
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As a home-warming gift to ourselves, R and I got a sausage making attachment for my fancy mixer. We’ve done it twice now, the first time taking about 3 hours longer than our second attempt. What resulted were recipes for the following: Sun-dried Tomato and Jalapeño Chicken, Southwestern Pepper Pork, Scallion and English Cheddar Pork, Jerk Pork, and Bloody Mary Pork. Our second batch was good ol fashioned, Spicy Pork.
We bought chicken breast and pork butt from my second home, Los Paisanos. Cut them in large 2″ chunks and froze the meat, which makes it much easier to grind. Freezing the pork is most important because grinding fat, which is all up in the pork butt, is tough on the machine unless it’s as cold as possible.
We used all natural hog casing preserved in salt. The casings need to soak in cold water for 30 minutes prior to sliding onto the stuffer. The only part of this process that grossed me the hell out was using the casing. For some reason, the smell of the rawness, which is not strong at all, stuck in my nostrils for days. I washed my hands 72 times, but I would still wake up in the middle of the night smelling hog intestines. Will this stop me from becoming the Snausy queen of NY? No.
I don’t have explicit amounts cause we didn’t do it like that. We just perused the fridge, grabbed, chopped or grinded, and threw that shiv together. Here’s the list:
Chicken Sausage: Chicken breast, fresh jalapeño, oil-marinaded sun-dried tomatoes, lots of fresh garlic. All ingredients went through the grinder, pureing it all. No extra fat was added. This caused for a healthy, but crumbly sausage.
Southwestern Pepper Pork: B’s sis came through after her trip through the southwest. She brought a very spicy, sweet, and delish pepper relish. We folded tons of this stuff to the pork and a fresh chopped jalopeno.
Scallion and English Cheddar Pork: This was B’s idea and it was inspired by a traditional sour cream and onion dip. We grinded the scallion and cut the cheese in chunks so that when it cooked, the cheese would be gooey and melty. This was inspired by those crappy cheese stuffed hotdogs.
Jerk Pork: This was my second favorite sausage. But I’m not going to lie to you. The reason why I can’t claim it to be my fave is cause we used a jarred jerk. BUT, I’ll tell you why. This jerk seasoning is so damn delish, it’s the whole don’t fix-it-if-aint-broke thing. Do your self a favor and go buy Grace Jerk Seasoning. Anyway, we added a whole bunch of this spicy goodness to the pork, and damn, all jerked out.
Bloody Mary Pork: Now, this is my ultimate fave, mostly cause the ingredients were most original. We just added the best of what you would add to a Bloody Mary, besides the tomato juice: prepared horseradish, Tabasco, worchester sauce, green olives with pimento, spicy pickled green beans, salt and pepper.
All in all, the sausages were pretty good but they need some improvement. Since they were all pretty cumbly, we decided we would add more fat to the next batch. Also, the flavors could have been a bit more strong, so we’ll double that next time.
Good ol’ Spicy Pork: Our second batch we did a traditional spicy pork sausage with more fat. This time the sausages were perfect in texture, but again, we still need to add more flavor crystals. We added onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne, thyme, mustard powder, salt and fresh black pepper.
In conclusion, making sausage is not all that hard. Making it good, thats another thing. But watch out Jimmy Dean. I’mma comin.
Stone Soup Sunday July 14, 2008
Posted by sicatmeow in Projects, Recipes.Tags: broccoli, dip, heart of palm, lemon, ricotta, sausage, sesame, stone soup, swissh chard
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It was time to clean out the kitchen and do something with those leftovers. But as usual, I went overboard and ended up cooking all sorts of things to supplement my meal. In the end, B and I ate, what we have come to refer to as, A Little Bit of This and A Little Bit of That. Including, sesame broccoli, sauteed swiss chard with garlic and lemon, heart of palm salad with sausage, and a heart of palm and swish chard dip. I also served goose liver country pate (shut up), marinated mushrooms, pickled curried tomatoes, corn tortilla chips and country sour dough bread. Obvi, there are repetitions of ingredients here, this is because I wanted to play as much as I could. Check the recipes below. They are in the order of what I enjoyed best.
Read on and cook on…
Sauteed Swiss Chard
1 half bunch of of thoroughly washed swiss card
2 cloves of garlic, chopped
fresh lemon juice
olive oil
salt
Toss olive oil into a large sauce pan. Add heat. Throw in garlic and swiss chard. Give a little stir. Add a bit more olive oil on top of the swiss chard. Cover and let wilt. Once wilted, remove cover, stir well. Cook until the stems are chewable. Just a cut a piece and try it. Remove swiss chard from pot, put in serving bowl, and salt and lemon juice to taste. I, of course, add a ton of juice.
The inspiration for this dip came from your traditional artichoke and spinach dip. Thought I would just funk it up a bit and see what happens. I thought it was great, B thought it could use some salt. Try how you like.
Heart of Palm and Swiss Chard Dip
1/2 can of heart of palm, drained and finely chopped
half bunch of heart of palm, steamed
3 heaping spoonfuls of ricotta cheese
After the swiss chard is steamed, squeeze really well so that the loose liquid drains. Chop finely and add to mixing bowl with heart of palm. Add ricotta cheese and mix well. Serve with tortilla chips or bread.
This also is an easy one…
Sesame Broccoli
broccoli, how ever much you want to eat, cut small and steamed
sesame oil, hot or not
cayenne pepper
sesame seeds
salt
After the broccoli is just steamed, meaning, it has some firmness to it still, remove from steamer and let cool. Add sesame oil, and garnish with sesame seeds, salt and cayenne pepper. It’s hard for me to tell you how much cayenne to use cause I’m a freak about spice, so use your best judgment. Just know that most people find it pretty hot, so a slight sprinkling should do it. Serve at room temp. I didn’t add it this time, but some soy sauce might be a good addition to this salad.
I actually found this salad to be a little odd, but B loved it. But then again, you put some sausage in his face and he’s pretty much just going to like it. Fine… me too.
Heart of Palm Salad with Sausage
1/2 can of heart of palm, drained and sliced
1/2 cup of dried Italian Sausage, cubed
handful of fresh flat leafed parsley, chopped
So, since everything that you buy here is prepared already, this is the easiest thing to make. Just assemble the three ingredients, and shiv, you got yourself a salad. By the way, I thought about adding lemon (duh) but doubled back when I thought about the mix with the sausage. Dunno, what do you think? Try it and let me know? Also, I used a spicy dried sausage, but feel free to use a sweet, or even a chorizo. Ooh, that’s what I shoulda done…
Here is what else I added to the schmorgas (say it our loud, you know you want to):
Pickled Curried Tomatoes: By the way, these bad boys came from Rick’s Picks. Def check them out cause their creative blends will make you popular at a bbq.
Pickled Mushrooms: These shrooms came from a whole different pickler (yes, so trendy right now) in the farmer’s market. I can’t for the life of me remember their name. Dr Pickle, Dr Pickler, Mr.Pickleman. If you know, lemme know so I can give credit where credit is due, cause, damn, these were good. (My mouth is literally watering as I type this.)
Fancy Bread: And finally, some damn good bread B brought home. (By the way, he ate that whole bowl.)
And that’s it folks. But, I’m not going to lie to you. Not all of this was from my cupboards. It all started with the broccoli going yellow. I bought almost everything else. The pate we had, the pickles we just always have, but the swiss chard, sausage, heart of palm, parsley, bread, was all bought for this meal. It’s just that I get so carried away and excited when I get to not only cook, but cook like, 6 different things. Also, you’ll notice I didn’t feature the pate. Mostly cause I feel shame. :(
Anyway.
