I hear there’s suppose to be another Snowgeddon for the weekend. That storm passed over us a few days ago with little fanfare, guess it’s saving all its energy for the East coast.
This week, along with my recipes, I wanted to highlight one from valued contributor Schroedinger’s Cat, who always has great ones to share in the comment thread. Click here for the recipe for Dal with Red Lentils.
I’ll feature more in the coming weeks and if you have recipes to share for the recipe exchange, send me an email with the recipe, or links to the recipe and I’ll share them. It’s more fun this way.
For the rest of tonight’s recipes, from my blog:
I thought this week I would again just review what I had cookin’ in my kitchen. And tonight’s feature recipe was inspired by a photo request mid-week. We get requests from time to time to use our photos. No surprise they are almost always JeffreyW’s. I believe there is even a Wikipedia entry that features one of his photos. This week it was a request to use his Enchilada Pie photo, seen below.
First up this week was Chicken and Buttermilk Biscuit Pie, pictured above and recipe here.
Next was Cream of Potato Cheese Soup, (full dinner menu, recipes and shopping list are here).
Bixby has been out of homemade treats since just before Christmas, so I decided it was time to make a batch of Pumpkin-Peanut Butter Cookies, recipe here. I had forgotten how much he liked them – he barely let me finish making them – bugged me the entire time. Speaking of cookies, the next night it was Dark Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe here). I baked a dozen and then froze the rest as individual cookie dough balls to be baked later.
Speaking of Bixby, here is an update for the pet lovers, with bonus video.
You can see why there was a request to use Jeffreyw’s photo above. Here is his recipe for Enchilada Montadas. For tonight’s featured recipes, a variation on enchiladas and black beans that is quick and easy to put together:
Enchilada Pie
- 1 pound ground beef
- ½ large onion, chopped
- salt & pepper to taste
- ¼ teaspoon oregano
- ¼ teaspoon cumin
- 20 oz. enchilada sauce
- 8 oz. tomato sauce
- 10 corn tortillas
- 8 oz cheddar cheese, grated
skillet & 8×8 glass baking dish, lightly oiled
Add beef and onion to skillet and cook until beef is browned and onions are translucent. Add spices and sauces; let simmer while you prep tortillas. Tear tortillas into strips and use some to cover the bottom of a well-oiled casserole dish. Layer a portion of the beef mixture and cheese on top, then repeat (tortillas, beef, cheese) to fill up casserole; finish with layer of cheese. Bake 30 minutes at 350°
Black Bean Confetti
- 14 oz can black beans
- ½ green pepper, chopped
- ½ red pepper, chopped
- 1 tomato, diced
- 1 stalk celery, diced
- ¼ cup chopped fresh cilantro
- ½ to 1 tsp cayenne pepper
- salt & pepper to taste
- Dash of limejuice
saucepans & large serving bowl or platter
In saucepan, add ingredients (except limejuice) and heat on medium. Toss with limejuice and serve.
That’s it for this week. There seems to be a pretty big game this weekend – I was asked who I was cheering for, since I have family and friends in New England and of course live in Colorado – my response: unless it’s the Red Sox, I am Switzerland. So good luck to everyone. And to those in the path of the big storm, stay safe and warm. – TaMara
schrodinger's cat
Aaww thanks much! I have been quite lazy about posting recipes on my blog, but this will give me a much needed reason to post recipes.
proterozoic
The biscuit pie looks great, but the photo is 4029×2266 px and 2MB in size. You guys might want to resample it to a smaller size & save bandwidth and loading times
benw
The dal looks similar to a great red lentil dal recipe that I’ve been cooking for years, although mine uses coconut milk. Plain yogurt also makes a great, easy topping for a dal like that. Yum!
RSR
Going to make some blizzard chili tomorrow here in Philly. Probably get all those chicken parts out of the freezer for stock as well.
Oh, as for actual recipes: The chili is one of Cooks Illustrated/America’s Test Kitchen versions, and the stock is Alton Brown’s.
schrodinger's cat
@benw: If you put yogurt it becomes kadhi, in coastal regions of Maharashtra you do put coconut milk in dal, but I leave it out because it is high in fat. Also, toor dal is more commonly used in dal in India. I use red lentils (masoor dal) because it is more easily available and takes less time to cook than toor dal.
ThresherK
That chicken pie with biscuit topping is calling us. Maybe Sunday night.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
Bixby melts my heart. Especially with stories like his play with Denali. Thanks for sharing him. Perhaps he;ll learn to enjoy snow one day, LOL.
Mai.naem.mobile
Kadhi is a really good indian comfort food/soup but easy to screw up because you have to cook the yogurt without having it separate.
gogol's wife
I’m too tired to watch Hvorostovsky in Il Trovatore, but I caught his big aria. He’s amazing. I hope he gets his health back.
The forecasts for my area are all over the place. I have no idea what’s going to happen tomorrow, only that we’re not getting the brunt of it.
schrodinger's cat
@Mai.naem.mobile: Low heat and patience are required, which I lack, so I haven’t made kadhi in eons. Plus you need home-made yogurt, which husband kitteh makes, the original culture is from Delhi, a gift from my Sikh friend. The store brought stuff is not sour enough.
debbie
@RSR:
ATK’s chicken chili is the best!
Mnemosyne
The teriyaki place I’m having a quick dinner at is under the impression that half an orange = fruit salad. Um, no.
benw
@schrodinger’s cat: I don’t cook the yogurt in, I just throw some on top, like a poor-man’s raita.
If I could make a good Malai Kofta at home, I’d probably never eat anything else!
schrodinger's cat
@benw: Do you have Madhur Jaffrey’s recipe books? I have found her recipes to be fool proof. I am sure she has one for malai kofta.
ETA: Try paneer makhanwala first, its easier and has a similar favor profile.
SiubhanDuinne
Someone else heard the same thing. JPL, Raven, Mingobat (Karen in GA), SIA, and other Georgians will especially appreciate.
benw
@schrodinger’s cat: Thanks. I don’t and when it comes to cooking I need to be fool-proof.
Mike J
Be careful out there.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mike J: Eek!
seaboogie
Replying late to a query two days ago from a commenter about olive oil – since I have put myself out there as an expert.
Yes, olive oil has a lower smoke point than some other oils (e.g. peanut), but you can pretty much do anything except sear or stir-fry with it if you are doing it right. Saute is fine if you heat the pan first (but not super hot) and then add oil and whatever you are sauteeing so the oil is not left to cook by itself, but as an ingredient that provides the lipid slip and slide in the pan, plus flavor. Is how the chefs do it.
The better, fresher and tastier your EVOO, the more you want to use it gently or as a condiment to preserve flavor and health benefits (polyphenols = antioxidants). Just don’t ever buy “Pure” olive oil, as it is defective oil that has been processed to get rid of the nasty taste. Total waste of money. I can hook you up with affordable sources of fresh EVOO from the mills for about the same price, and will try to check in – in a more timely manner.
seaboogie
@efgoldman: Here in NorCal we’ve been enjoying some rainy days (drizzle all day and a nice soaking, windy precipitation right now), courtesy of El Nino.
Just want to thank you east coasters for taking it in the shorts from The Little Boy so that we can geta bit of relief from our drought here on the west coast. Even as I enjoy the “greening” (grasses growing and brilliant with chlorophyll, mosses alive on the old oak trees), I check the Sierra snowpack conditions, as that is what waters us through the summer – all the stuff I see flows down the creeks into the ocean.
Dand
Make your own sauce. Make flour gravy only add equal part flour and chilli powder. Dash of cumin and pepper to taste – add hotter pepper to further adjust temperature. Combine in sauce pan with oil, heat up, slowly add water and whisk to right consistency.
NotMax
Meant to post this link, reprinting the article from 1967, on the chili thread not long ago.
Damn good basic chili recipe included.
NOBODY KNOWS MORE ABOUT CHILI THAN I DO
Excerpt:
seaboogie
@SiubhanDuinne: “I guess I’ll just work from home tomorrow”.
The Hitler/Bunker meme is always entertaining – and this was a good one. I always enjoy the moment when he takes his glasses off with crabbed, trembling hands that prefaces the tirade, and the women comforting each other in the corridor.
Anne Laurie
@seaboogie: Palates in our household are unsophisticated, but I’m going to try your EEVO suggestions (at least once we’re in tomato season). Will refrigeration help preserve bag-in-a-box designer oil, or will chilling just damage it?
The local (Korean) H-Mart carries grapeseed oil; wikipedia claims its smoke point isn’t much above that of olive oil, but persuading the Spousal Unit to use grape oil for burger-searing meant he could stop disabling the smoke alarm first.
Chili’s (see opening sentence) is selling a side dish of asparagus with garlic & roast cherry tomatoes. The out-of-season asparagus is woody, but the tomatoes are fantastic — I need to find a way to fix them at home, once we’ve got cherry tomatoes overflowing in our garden this summer!
PurpleGirl
I may try the chicken and buttermilk biscuit recipe when I can go and get chicken at the store. My complex has its own commercial building with a Key Food. It’s snowing now (1:23 am) but later in the morning the maintenance crew will get the walkways cleaned. I did go out to get some basics for the weekend — the chicken will be extra. Hoping the Key Food will have more biscuits, they were out of them this afternoon when I went over there. Or maybe I can make my own with Bisquick that I have on hand.
PurpleGirl
@Dand: Did you see the Google doodle yesterday — in was in honor of Wilbur Scoville who developed the scale for pepper hotness.
Anne Laurie
@NotMax: H. Allen Smith was one of my favorite authors when I was in high school, probably to deleterious effect on my prose style. I still have several of his collections — not including the paperback he spun from your linked article, but I suspect it’s probably included elsewhere (like all former newspaper writers, HAS recycled his own work as prolifically as he could get paid for it).
seaboogie
@Anne Laurie: Yay you! Chilling does preserve olive oil to a certain degree, but one you take it out of the fridge, leave it out. Olive (and all other) oils expand and contract with heat and cold, so moving in and out of chill kind of wears it out like an elastic band. Cool and dark are your best strategies with oil. Also, if you are going “bag in a box” from Seka Hills and don’t plan to use it up within about 3 months, then bottle it in dark bottles or clear bottles that you keep in a cupboard, away from light. You are trying to balance the exposure to air element (oxidization v. olive oil’s anti-oxidants) and contact with plastic, which is also an oil – so not ideal long term. SH bottles their oil on demand, so they are freshly packaged, just siphoned off their tanks when you receive it.
So – if you are waiting for tomato season* – don’t order a bag-in-box now, wait until you are ready to use it so that it is freshly packaged. However, if you want to get cooking all the glorious winter veg, and pasta and beans and such – get yo’self some and start using it right now.
FYI – olive harvest season wrapped up in CA at the end of November through December (for those who make crushed flavored oils – citrus and such). Right now it is sitting in tanks and gets racked (siphoned off, leaving the sediment that can impart negative flavors over time). Once it has been racked once or twice, it gets bottled, so is more stable, flavor-wise. Delicious fresh olive oil is never filtered.
*Once tomato season starts, you want a super flavorful, more peppery oil and touch base with me then – I’ll tell you who has the good stuff in bulk, as available.
Glidwrith
@schrodinger’s cat: Store bought is far too sour for my taste, but I have a co-worker who claims sweet versions exist. Would you have an idea of where to look or what microbe to use?
seaboogie
@efgoldman:
Yep. Oily fruit on the ground wherever it lands. Even at the mill where I consult on retail merchandising, they have these gorgeous old trees planted just outside for atmosphere, and there are little olive plops all around the trees – because they produce too little fruit for them to mill.
NotMax
@Anne Laurie
Chilling won’t damage it but may turn it cloudy or more viscous. Also there’s always the possibility of picking up stray odors from other stuff in the fridge. If temperatures stay up in the eighties or nineties, then refrigeration will help a lot in preserving the oils.
Otherwise, storing cooking oils away from heat and in a darkened or shaded area generally does just fine. (Heat and light will break down oils over time.)
Might consider canola oil instead of grapeseed oil, to save some coin. Or even peanut oil, so long as allergies aren’t a problem.
Also too, an easy dish using cherry tomatoes. (Although rather than tossing the cheese directly with the pasta, would suggest making the sauce by melting the cheese by stirring it in some of the pasta cooking water in a pan over appropriate heat. Easier to correct for seasoning that way, too.)
seaboogie
@Anne Laurie:
Grapeseed oil smoke point is 420 degrees, v EVOO at 405 – so it’s kind of a quibble. That said, I used grapeseed oil on the BBQ for sear (and no smoke alarm) and olive oil indoors, on more medium heat. We are probably talking sear v. flavor, and what that imparts and what is important to you.
Grapeseed oil not for flavor, I’ve tasted it (like a professional) and thought – not that in my mouth – not so much. It is pretty neutral, though.
seaboogie
@NotMax: Excellent and accurate points WRT to oils. Anne Laurie, if you want FRESH grapeseed oil, here is a link
I used to work for these guys, but they fired me for insubordination. Long story. Their olive oil is exceptional, grapeseed oil is after my experience there – but they are also wine-makers. Also, they are Republican douchebags, but that’s not why they fired my ass – also, one of the best days of my life.
Betty Cracker
@schrodinger’s cat: I recently tried dal for the first time, made by my cousin’s Pakistani-American boyfriend. It was wonderful!
@Dand: I second the suggestion to make one’s own enchilada sauce. I use this recipe. Once you make your own, you’ll never go back to canned!
Zinsky
The enchiladas look yummy!
schrodinger's cat
@Glidwrith: If you make your own yogurt, it will be sweet when it first sets, it will grow sour as it sits. You can get a yogurt starter from Amazon or from the farmer’s market.
When the yogurt is sweet you can eat it as is. I drain the whey from store brought yogurt and eat it with fruits and nuts as a snack.
In Indian cooking yogurt is used as a souring agent and in marinades, for those applications sourness is the key.
schrodinger's cat
@Betty Cracker: My Pakistani roommate used to make dal with spinach it was an awesome accompaniment for her spicy chicken curry.
Dal is an entire family of recipes and every state in India has its favorite versions. You can change the dal used or the spices used in tempering the oil, the souring agent (tamarind or lime or kokam) the variations are endless.
Dand
@Betty Cracker mine is from an old women from Saltillo, not exactly written in stome but pretty close. Always works.