The Dinner Dash

Lessons Learned: Volume I

In the short time that I’ve been writing about this, sometimes arduous, most of the time embarrassing, yet always rewarding journey of becoming a dad who can cook, I’ve developed a pattern; one that consists of simply making a few key notes that sort of capture the essence of the topic, while also providing a little uplifting of the spirit; a kind of “You’re doing great, but remember this, this, and this. You can do this! Now, go get ‘em!” halftime speech, if you will. This has evolved into the “Lessons Learned” section that I now tag onto the end of each post. This section is probably my favorite part of each post. Once I reach this point, it not only signals the end of another (probably too long) post, but it also means that it’s time to step back and take in the experience as a whole. It’s time to make sense of it all; to strengthen the foundation and move on to even better things.The “Lessons” section is just as much for me as it is for anyone reading. It sums up why I started writing on food in the first place. What started for me as a few note cards with little tidbits on them to help me keep from screwing up the next attempt at a meal, ended up spawning this notion that, perhaps, I should share some of this with other folks; folks, like me, who could actually use this information; folks, unlike me, who already have a wealth of knowledge but can offer some advice when they see a guy in need; and folks who couldn’t care less but could use a laugh or two every now and then.So, without further ado, I present Lessons Learned: Vol. I.  From An Introduction…

(Not actually a “Lessons Learned” section of a post at this point, but it seems appropriate to add.) I’m not a chef. I’ve never even taken a cooking class, but I’m finding that making good food is actually fairly simple if you know where to start. I’m not sure, but it may be something different for everyone. For me, I’m starting with an idea; an idea that food, like life, is important, but more important is what you DO with it. What am I doing with it? I’m creating those sacred moments with my family, and I’m sharing them with someone else. That’s what changed my mind about food. Maybe it will change yours.

From Chicken Enchiladas

1.      I’ve GOT to find a place in town to get some real, authentic, Mexican cheese.

2.      Poaching, at least in this case, is good and should be done liberally.

3.      Chile peppers in adobo sauce should be used sparingly!

      4.      And, dawg-gone-it, kids, pay attention in science class!

From Meatloaf

1.      Don’t over process the vegetables, thus making a pulp. It’ll make the meatloaf kind of soggy.

2.      I don’t think there could ever be a better way to cook asparagus.

3.      Maybe I SHOULD have tried the store-bought breadcrumbs or croutons for this.

      4.      I would do anything for love, but I won’t cook another bad meatloaf.

From Tater Talk:Mashed Potatoes

1.      It’s all about the starch 2.      Don’t try to eat undercooked Yukon Gold Potatoes 3.      When all else fails, French Onion Soup!

          4.      It’s STILL fun licking potatoes off of the beaters.

From Panzanella Salad

1.      Fresher IS better. 2.      Always call the in-laws first to try to save money. 3.      I think that I can’t wait to grow an herb garden…full of fresh Basil! 4.      Never include farm animals during quiet, memorable moments.

From Tater Talk:Potato Chips

1.      “Fast and easy” is not always necessarily synonymous with fast food and will probably still FEEL more “fast and easy” when done at home; or, at least more rewarding, anyway. 2.      It is definitely worth the extra money for a really good Mandolin slicer. 3.      Don’t eat paint chips; eat some awesome, quick, easy, and obviously MUCH healthier homemade potato chips.

From Chicken Picatta

1.      Capers are SO awesome. 2.      Keep an eye on the rice. And, for Heaven’s sake, turn it to low or even off after it comes to a boil. 3.      Keep an eye on what’s in the oven! And…Did you know that lemons, when burnt to a total crisp actually turn a shade of BLUE? Not saying you should try it…but…well…try it! Totally weird.

Aaaaaannnnnd… 4.      No matter what, nothing, not even the best Chicken Picatta in the world, is worth moving another woman into this house. There’s enough commotion as it is. (Sorry, Mo.)

From “Pizza Margherita”

 

     1.      If you’re ever in Atlanta, go to Fritti.

2.      I really have no clue when it comes to dough. I really need to study up on flour and yeast and stuff.

      3.      Meridith is right; life IS too short not to eat good pizza. So, fire up the grill, roll out the dough (once you figure out how to make it), and give those testy taste buds something to hold hands and sing about.

From “Fajitas”

1.      You don’t have to get on a plane to go enjoy really fine, authentic Mexican Cuisine. 2.      This is actually a pretty quick meal to prepare. This’ll be a routine dinner dash for me.3.      You don’t have to be in or around the Gulf of Mexico to experience a Hurricane; with a three year old boy around, every season is hurricane season.

From “Chili (con carne y frijoles negros)”

1.      Taking time with chuck roast is well rewarded.

 

2.      I probably won’t ever by chili powder in a store ever again.

      3.      Texas may be big on chili, but “It don’t know beans about my “chili con carne y frijoles”.

From “Makin’ Some Serious Dough: Pizza Margherita Revisited”

1.      Arugula just does NOT belong on a pizza

      2.      Weighing flour seems to actually be a key factor in successful baking. (I had figured that it was just some nerdy thing that Alton liked to do, but I actually measured out several cups, and each one was just a bit different; different enough to make just enough of a difference if measuring out more than about a cup for a recipe.) 3.      I forgot to put olive oil on the dough as I put it on the grill. I think this would have helped it to develop the crispy exterior for which I’m searching. 4.      I need to figure out how to make the dough more— stretchy.5.      Obviously, an umbrella is not enough of a defense for the Fresh Market Gnomes. Back to the drawing board.

From “Fish Fry Frenzy”

1.      Fried pickles are right up there with your first kiss, the birth of a child, and winning the lottery. 2.      So what if farm-raised fish has higher omega 6 content? Just don’t eat it for every single meal, and you’ll probably be ok. Otherwise, go catch your own wild fish, and don’t complain. 3.      If you’re worried about it, don’t sweat the added alcohol from the beer. It will all but evaporate during cooking leaving you with an awesome tasting, bubbly, crispy crust.4.      I’ve got the itch. Anybody wanna go fishing? Just don’t complain if I eat more fish than I catch.

From “Chicken Pot Pie”

1.      Roasting a whole chicken is actually pretty easy. Next step: raising one, killing it, plucking it, degutting it, cleaning it, THEN roasting it. I wonder— if my wife‘s parents have chickens, does that make them my— chickens-in-law? Look out Harwood chicken farm! 2.      I can’t wait to make another pie— maybe a sweet one next time. 3.      So, if my scheme to lure in fall worked, what in the world am I going to cook to ward off winter?

From “Custard Combat – The Saga Continues…”

1.      Any time I’m feeling just a little less than patriotic, I think I’ll cook a pumpkin pie. Is there ANYTHING more American? Well, maybe apple pie. Hmmmm….2.      It’s good to be King.

From “Meatloaf: Revisited”

1.      Meatloaf is a simple dish that should be kept simple. 2.      There’s more to tomato paste than meets the eye.3.      Why on Earth would anyone enjoy eating couscous?

From “Wingin’ It”

1.      Maintain the Oil Temperature 2.      “Frank’s. It’s gotta be Frank’s”3.      Chickens have wings for one reason: So we can EAT them. Ok, two reasons: to be used as leverage upon proposing to your potential spouse.

From “Cold Turkey”

1.      Easy with the lumberjack hands under turkey skin. 2.      Don’t trust some “high-falootin’”, high dollar thing just because it says “Food Network” on it. 3.      Any bonus is a good bonus; even if…I mean ESPECIALLY if it’s a frozen turkey (and a package of brown and serve rolls. And, oh yeah – we used ‘em).

From “A Toll Tale”

1.      Whatever you do, don’t overcook the cookies. It’s better to have them slightly underdone than overdone. And, keep in mind that they’ll firm up quite a bit after they’ve cooled for a while 2.      Shouldn’t there be a Ruth Wakefield holiday on the calendar? Well, maybe not according to George Boucher. Well then, can’t we just make it “Boucher / Wakefield day”?3.      Never underestimate a mother’s intuitive cooking prowess.

From “Mater Mayhem”

1.      If we can grow stuff, ANYONE can! 2.      Perhaps staging the garden so that only a certain amount of tomatoes are ripe at one time would be a little more practical.3.      Gardening isn’t the easiest work, but it is one of the most rewarding. I think this goes for cooking too.

From “Flat Iron Steak Salad”

1.      Cheap meat can be great meat.

      2.      Fast food does not necessarily have to involve a drive-thru window and another hit on the debit card.       3.      If you’re anything like us, and on a fairly tight budget, and even tighter on time, you can easily “iron out” a great meal with a flat iron steak.

Yesterday evening I was a little later than usual getting home, and I needed to come up with something quick, healthy, and GOOD to get on the table before the kids got home and began destroying the kitchen. I swear, it’s like we live in a restaurant sometimes; wiping down, sweeping, mopping, and washing dishes at least twice a day. The place begins to look like a disaster zone only minutes after the little monsters arrive – God, love ‘em!

I looked in the refrigerator and saw this flat iron steak I had bought a couple of days ago, and thought, “Well, I guess I could do something with that.” At the time, all I had really heard of this cut of meat is that it’s cheap, good, probably needs to be marinated, and shouldn’t be cooked to anything past medium – unless you prefer a fairly tough meat.  The problem was that I hadn’t marinated it. But, other than eggs, it was the only real protein I had on hand.  What was I to do?  I saw some leftover salad components, and came up with a plan. Salad is quick, this steak should be quick, both are cheap and good; throw ‘em together, and we’ll have a great dinner meeting all the requirments of this particular dash.

Here’s a little something to help put this cut of meat in perspective:

“The Flat Iron is, in this butcher’s mind, one of the most versatile pieces of beef. It takes to a marinade like no other, it’s tender beyond belief, and you can cook it with much success in many methods. Plus, it’s cheap. Since it is from the shoulder, it can be found for as little as $3/lb here in the Midwest, and probably not much more than that elsewhere. You can grill it, use if for stirfry meat, use it for fajitas, braise it, fanfry it. Really, it is a great little cut that hopefully you will want to go out and try. If your butcher doesn’t carry it, ask them to do some for you. IF they dont know how, refer them to the NCA’s site, beef.org, or explain to them what I just showed. It will be worth your time.” – (http://confessionsofabutcher.blogspot.com/2005/12/flat-iron-steak-hype-or-heart.html)

Having only heard of this cut of meat, and certainly never having bought or cooked one, I had to think a little about what to do to make sure it would be tender and delicious.  Here’s what I did:

First, I beat the heck out of it.  I thought that, since it hadn’t been marinated at all, and since I was gonna throw it on the grill and cook it pretty quickly, it might need a little help in breaking down some of the fibers. I pounded on it a bit with a mallet-style tenderizer until it was…well…a bit flatter and…um…more tender looking, I guess.

After profusely pummeling it, I felt a little sorry for it, so I gave it a good massage with kosher salt, black pepper, and minced garlic. Yes, you must “love on” the meat – this is a crucial step.  On a side note, the garlic I used was the preminced stuff in a jar.  I typically like using fresh garlic – even the motion of breaking it open and chopping it is, for some reason, somewhat therapeutic. But, we have this stuff, and, when speed is important, it really comes in handy.  The flavor is a little more mild, I think, but still…it works great.  Anyway, I really rubbed it down good; literally pressing in the seasoning.  I ended up with a really good-looking piece of meat.

Next: to the grill, I went.  Nothing really special to mention here, I suppose.  The grill was pretty hot. I cooked it for abou 2 1/2 minutes on each side, and felt it to determine the doneness.  That is one thing I could mention, I guess.  I’m still not very good at determining doneness by feel.  I’ve read that you can touch you thumb to each fingertip, and the feel of the muscle which articulates the thumb is a good representation of the feel of the meat at each stage. Basically…as you get closer to the pinky finger, the feel of that muscle represents how the meat should feel as it gets closer to well done.  I’m still not all that good at this, so…I still rely on a meat thermometer just to be sure. I was aiming for medium.  I think it was probably slightly closer to medium rare, but it looked great.  It was very tender, and quite the tasty piece of steak.

Cutting thin strips across the grain, I’ve read, is the way to go in preparation. This makes sense; thinner strips of muscle fibers equals easier-to-break-down meat.

I added the strips on top of a bed of salad fixins, covered it with a lemon, olive oil, salt, pepper, and honey dressing, topped it off with blue cheese crumbles, and we had ourselves a pretty darn good meal; and quick and cheap to boot!

Lessons learned

1. Cheap meat can be great meat.

2. Fast food does not necessarily have to involve a drive-thru window and another hit on the debit card.

3. If you’re anything like us, and on a fairly tight budget, and even tighter on time, you can easily “iron out” a great meal with a flat iron steak.

-DJ

It’s always been a dream of mine to own a home with a little bit of land.  I don’t really know why.  I think it probably just stems from fond childhood memories of growing up in a family of land-owners.  Perhaps all that running, jumping, hunting, fishing, horseback riding, and all the other things a boy growing up in the backwoods of east Tennesse would think to do for fun just had a lasting impact.  I guess this is why I was never content with living in an apartment – or renting anything, for that matter.  Perhaps Delmar O’Donnell from O Brother, Where Art Thou? sums it up best by saying, “You ain’t no kinda man if you ain’t got land.” I like the idea of having something to show for all my work, and – I need room.  Room for what?  I have no idea.  I’m not a kid anymore.  I don’t have time for all the running, hunting, fishing, etc.  Heck, I barely have time to write posts for this blog; or even COOK at all.  Either way, there’s something rewarding about having a patch of earth to tend to and to call your own.  So, a few months ago, when Sara and I moved into our new house, we were both pleased to be surrounded by our three little acres in the country.  In the midst of conjuring up foggy ideas about what we would actually DO with this place, one thing became abundantly clear:  it sure is a heck of alot of mowing!  So much mowing, in fact, that we developed a plan:  we’d just get rid of some of the grass and put in a vegetable garden. Yeah – that’d be MUCH easier.

Having absolutely NO gardening experience whatsoever was somehow no deterrent to either of us, and after seeking a little advice from Sara’s parents, we soon found ourselves standing proud in front of our first garden.   I took no chances, and installed an irrigation system to keep the little sprouts nice and hydrated in the heat of one of the hottest summers I can recall.  The weeks passed, and we watched the little seedlings turn into tall, proud plants.  Several more weeks passed, and – SUCCESS; our very own viable, veritable vegetable haven – full of squash, zucchini, carrots, peppers, and tomatoes; LOTS of tomatoes. 

We had rows and rows of tomatoes of different shapes and sizes.  It was like tomato totaliarianism! I LOVE tomatoes, but as I stood there looking at the tangled heap of stakes and vines and the army of red orbs all reflecting the sunlight like Archimedes Death Ray back onto my slightly confused face, even I thought, “Wow; that’s a lot of tomato sandwiches.”  It didn’t take long, however, to conjur up a plan.  What do you do to any viable uprising force?  You nuke ‘em, of course!  And, by nuke ‘em – I’m talkin’ SAUCE.  It was time to initiate Mission: MATER MAYHEM!

Like any successful mission, phases, or steps must be applied…

Step 1 –   Pick the tomatoes.  Duh, right?  Well, there are a few variables, but basically, from what I can tell, when it’s red (evenly around), and it’s slightly softened, it’s ready.  And, boy, did we ever have alot of ‘em ready.  I don’t know if it was actually the irrigation system, or perhaps we just had good soil…or…whatever, but we obviously did something right.

Step 2 -  Peel the tomatoes.  Now, I’ve tried making sauce a couple of times, and frankly, I just didn’t give it enough thought beforehand.  It was always kind of watery, and it would have bits and pieces of tomato cores and skins.  It just wasn’t all that good.  So, did some thinking and a little bit of online research, and came up with this:

First, bring a large pot of water to a boil and have another large vessel full of ice water.  Second, score little “Xs” on the end of the tomato with a paring knife (like this)http://msenplacehowto.blogspot.com.  Next, cut out the the top of the tomato where the stem would be (like this)  http://jamiecooksitup.blogspot.com/2010/09/home-canned-spaghetti-sauceworth-every.html After doing this to a few tomatoes, drop them into the boiling water just until the skin starts to look a little wrinkled.  It seemed like this took about 20 – 30 seconds; a little less for the riper tomatoes; a little more for the less ripened tomatoes.  Then, move them immediately to the ice bath.  This stops the cooking process, and, of course, makes them easier to handle. After a minute or so, the skin pretty much falls right off.http://johndlee.hubpages.com/hub/How_to_peel_a_tomatoLike I said, we had TONS of tomatoes, and this process took me…well…forever!  But it was well worth the time.

Step 3 – Process the tomatoes to a desired consistency.  I threw several of them into the food processor along with several cloves of garlic and a whole bunch of fresh basil and a bit of oregano and processed it all until it seemed – right.

Step 4 – Cook! aaaaannnd cook.  I had a lot of tomatoes, and I made two very large pots of sauce.  I think each pot held about 2 gallons of sauce before cooking down and probably cooked for about 4 hours or so.  Basically, I just cooked it down until a lot of the water had evaporated out and the sauce seemed nice and thick.  I guess I’d say – just cook until you reach a consitency or viscosity desired.

Step 5 – Season to taste. I had already incorporated the garlic, basil, and oregano in the processor, but at this point, I hadn’t added any salt, pepper, or other spices.  To be brief, I added to each pot 2 tbls of kosher salt, (it seems like a lot of salt, but this is to about a gallon and a half of sauce at this point), 1 tbls of black pepper, and 1 1/2 tbls of onion power; yes, onion powder.  I really like the taste onion powder brings to sauces, and honestly, I just didn’t want any chunks of onions in the sauce. You could certainly use chopped onions if you’d like though.  Oh, I also added 1 tsp of cayenne pepper; I think it added just the right “zing” component to it all.

Step 6 – Enjoy!

Step 7 – Place remaining sauce in gallon zip-top containers and freeze for the winter. Yum!

After eating a wonderful meal of Sara’s homemade spaghetti noodles, (deserving of a seperate post all their own), with this sauce.  We ended up freezing 2 gallons of sauce.  More tomatoes were ripe in another week, and we went through this whole process all over again.  We ended up with 6 gallons of sauce all together!  It’s already been a wonderful winter full of summer’s taste!

Lessons learned

1. If we can grow stuff, ANYONE can!

2.  Perhaps staging the garden so that only a certain amount of tomatoes are ripe at one time would be a little more practical.

3. Gardening isn’t the easiest work, but it is one of the most rewarding.  I think this goes for cooking too.

-DJ

In the midst of the 1930s, something magical happened: the Chocolate Chip Cookie was born.  Ruth Wakefield, owner of the Toll House Inn at the time, is credited for accidentally creating the clever cookie concoction.  Apparently, “Wakefield is said to have been making chocolate cookies and on running out of regular baker’s chocolate, substituted broken pieces of semi-sweet chocolate from Nestlé thinking that it would melt and mix into the batter. It clearly did not and the chocolate chip cookie was born” (Jones, Charlotte Foltz (1991). Mistakes That Worked. Doubleday).  Subsequently, She published a cookbook, Toll House Tried and True Recipes in 1936 containing the recipe.  And, apparently, during WWII, Soldiers from the Massachusetts area were often sent care packages containing these delicious treats.  They shared them with their friends, who, in turn, sent home requests all across the nation for more of the same.  And, thus, the Chocolate Chip Cookie craze was born.  It was during this time that Ruth sold her recipe to Nestle in exchange for a lifetime supply of chocolate.  And, now, we each get the original recipe printed on the back of any bag of Nestlé chocolate chips we buy.  Interestingly though, like many tales of origin, another side of the story popped up.  George Boucher, one time head chef at the Toll House Inn, claimed that

 the vibrations from a large Hobart electric mixer dislodged bars of Nestlé’s chocolate stored on the shelf above the mixer so they fell into the sugar cookie dough it was mixing, then broke them up and mixed the pieces into it. He [also] claimed to have overcome Wakefield’s impulse to discard the dough as too badly ruined to waste effort baking them, leading to the discovery of the popular combination (Wikipedia).

Whichever story is true, whether accident or not, I think we can all agree on one thing: Chocolate Chip Cookies are certainly a blessing given to mankind!

I’ve been experimenting lately with varying recipes for the perfect “CCC”, and I think I’ve FINALLY stumbled onto a close to perfect one.  I started by simply copying a few standard recipes I found online.  I would try one only to be a little dissatisfied.  I would, then, alter the recipe slightly and try again; each time coming closer to my goal: a cookie that’s slightly crunchy on the outside, yet still sort of soft and chewy on the inside with PLENTY of chocolate chips in each bite. 

I was in the midst of my cookie conundrum a week or so ago when I received a call from my mother.  To be brief, she was excited to inform me that she had just won $1,000!  “That’s awesome!” I congratulated, “How’d you do it?”  Her reply was somewhat startling.  “I entered a cookie recipe contest!” She explained.  I was speechless.  My mother, the one who I can barely remember cooking, the one who almost burned down the house once while boiling a pot of water…(long story), WON a cookie contest?!  And, here I am, “Mr. Dinner Dash” still fumbling around with chocolate chip cookies?!  Oh, the irony!  The silver lining, of course, is not to be lost.  My mother is increasingly more interested in cooking as I am increasingly interested.  We’re now frequently discussing various ingredients and recipes, and even sharing some time in the kitchen.  This all makes me think back to the very first post here on the “Dash”, (which you can jump back to here if you’d like),  And, considering how I remember growing up, I hope she wins a $100,000 next time!  Although, we both laugh and know that winning some contest has nothing to do with it.  The best part about it is the time spent together around something so central as food. 

Anyway, the pressure was then on to get right down to business and make some awesome cookies!

To sum up my findings, and to follow up on requests to simplify my posts for easier recipe following, I’ll simply state the recipe and explain a couple of things as side notes.  So, here it is:

Dry Ingredients…

2 1/4 cups of bread flour (The bread flour will produce more gluten, thus making a chewier cookie.)

1 tsp. Baking Soda. (NOT Baking Powder…at least this has been my experience.   The soda is better suited for short cooking times, and in this recipe, will produce slightly less rise…which is what I want.  I used the Baking Powder in previous recipes, and didn’t like the “puffiness” of the cookies.)

1 1/2 tsp. salt (You might only want to start with 1 tsp.  I think the added 1/2 tsp. really helps to bring everything together and enhance the sweetness.)

Wet Ingredients…

3/4 Stick Unsalted Butter  (Apparently, melting the butter first will aide in the chewy factor)

1/3 cup Whole Milk  (I can’t explain much about the milk.  I just tried it after thinking that the dough needed to be a bit wetter, and it helped the final texture alot.)

1 cup Granulated Sugar

1 cup Light Brown Sugar

(Brown sugar and white sugar create different textures when melted.  The brown sugar, having molasses added, will produce a more moist texture, while the white sugar will produce a lighter, crispier texture.  I found that an equal part of the two worked out well.)

1 tsp. Vanilla Extract

1 Large Egg

1 Large Egg Yolk – (I started out using 2 eggs, but I think subtracting the one egg white has really helped the texture.)

Chocolate Chips…

2 Cups of Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips (I remember hearing somewhere that if you toss the chips in flour, the light coating of flour surrounding each chip will help to suspend them in the mix more thoroughly.  So, this is what I do.  It seems to work, although I’m not totally sure it’s necessary.)

Method… 

1.  Cream together the butter and sugar with the mixer on low.

2.  Slowly add in the other wet ingredients.

3.  Turn the mixer to medium speed until the mixture looks nice and light and creamy.

2.  Whisk together all of the dry ingredients.

3.  Turn the mixer back to low, and slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients.

4.  Slowly add the chocolate chips, and mix on low until thoroughly incorporated

5.  The batter will make approx. 24 cookies.  Bake batches of 6 at 425° for 5 min. (I realize this seems kind of high, but my thinking is that by cooking at high heat for a few minutes the sugar will carmelize on the surface more, thus creating that slight crunch on the exterior that I want.)

6.  Turn heat down to 225°, and bake for another 6-8 min, or just until the very outer edges of the cookies start to brown and the tops start to slightly crack.

7.  Let the cookies cool for AT LEAST 20 minutes.  They will come out looking not quite done.  But, like a good custard, they will firm up in the middle as they cool.  Waiting a full hour before consuming would be even better.

And, that’s it!  I’ve stuck with this recipe a couple of times now, and I’m very pleased with the cookies.  They have a slightly crispy exterior, the center is soft and chewy, and there’s a mouthful of chocolate in every bite.  I would say they’re a success.  And, if you happen to be in the Morristown, TN area this week, stop by The Java Garden downtown and give one a try!  They were such a success that I convinced Sara’s Mother to try to sell a few in their cafe.  I think they’re even giving away a few free samples.  So, what are you waiting for?  Head on over there, get your hands on one of these things, and let me know what YOU think.

Lessons Learned…

1.   Whatever you do, don’t overcook the cookies.  It’s better to have them slightly underdone than overdone.  And, keep in mind that they’ll firm up quite a bit after they’ve cooled for a while

2.  Shouldn’t there be a Ruth Wakefield holiday on the calendar?  Well, maybe not according to George Boucher.  Well then, can’t we just make it “Boucher / Wakefield day”?

3.  Never underestimate a mother’s intuitive cooking prowess.

-DJ

Just before Christmas, I received a bonus at work!  I walked into the lobby where the envelopes were being handed out to employees, and I stepped  into my designated area: a line corresponding to the first letter of my last name.   I anxiously awaited the prize.  I stepped up and received the efflugent envelope with a smile as if holding Willy Wonka’s last golden ticket.  Passing the security guard on the way out, I clasped the envelope tightly and gave a nod as if saying, “Good job. Keep up the good work.”  I could hardly stand the wait of the elevator ride back down to my department’s floor.  The doors opened, and not a soul was in sight.  I felt safe to open the envelope and lay my eyes on this year’s Christmas surprise.  I took out a pocket knife and carefully made a slit in the end; making sure not to damage anything inside.  I squeezed the envelope just enough to slide a finger and thumb over the edge of the slip inside.  I slowly pulled it out, and, as if scratching the last place on a lottery ticket, I took a hopeful breath, wondering what this Christmas would have in store.  My eyes widened; pupils dilated.  Then, I exhaled as if my last breath had just left me.  And, in an instant, I had turned into Clark Griswold; madly shouting through the halls,  “What?!  A frozen turkey?!  That’s it?  The big announcment, the beefed up security, all for a frozen turkey?  How am I gonna buy my kids a brand new pair of shoes – with a certificate for a frozen turkey?!  Oh, wait…there’s more…and a “free package of brown and serve rolls,” it says.   yippee.”

OK, ok…I wasn’t REALLY upset, and no, my kids don’t need new shoes.  Truth-be-told, between us and all the grandparents, (God, love ‘em), they’re spoiled rotten.  And, actually, I was glad to get anything at all as a gift.  It was unexpected, and I was thankful. (I DID, however, find it quite funny to see the security guards.)

So, a frozen turkey, eh?  I didn’t even try to hide the fact that I had no idea what I was going to do with a frozen turkey.  Well, ok, of course I knew that I’d go claim it.  And, of course, I knew that I’d cook it, and, with any luck, eat it.  It’s just…I had never dealt with a frozen turkey before.  A few years ago, Sara and I somehow managed to cook a turkey at home, but I think she did most of the work, and I can’t even recall how it was prepared.  I just remember putting it in the oven and checking the temperature for doneness.  And, surprisingly, It came out pretty well.  But a big, hard-as-a-rock, frozen bird seemed to be a different story to me.  Some research was needed.

I recently roasted a whole chicken, and it turned out well (more on that here).  So, I knew it could be done with a turkey.  But, this was a little different; it’s a much larger bird, it’s frozen solid, and it HAS to be good enough for a holiday feast.  The pressure was on.

As I sat in front of my computer scratching my head, trying to think of where to start to develope a plan, curiosity crept in, and I found myself digging up some info on the bird at hand.  First, I was intrigued to find that the native American bird got it’s name due to a little mixup by the early european settlers when they came across it.  Long-story-short, it was apparently, incorrectly identified as a type of native AFRICAN bird ”known as [a] turkey fowl (or turkey hen and turkey cock) due to the birds’ importation to Central Europe through Turkey.”(Wikipedia)  Hence, the name.  “Well, that’s good to know,” I thought, “but it ain’t gonna help me cook it.  Gotta get back on track.”

 Then, as my turkey trot continued, I got to thinking about how a certain idea gets thrown around a lot.  I think it’s even become almost a sort of…cliche’.  Around Thanksgiving and Christmas, you will, inevitibly hear someone utter something to the tune of,  ”Boy, that was a good meal.  Now I’m ready for a nap; must be the turkey.  You know turkey makes you sleepy.”  I’ve heard this a thousand times, and I’ve always been a little suspect, but never really cared long enough to see if there’s even any truth to it.  So, is there?

To be brief, not really.  It stems from the fact that turkey, like many other meats, contains something called Tryptophan: an amino acid that the body uses in a multi-step process to regulate sleep.  But, as  Christopher Wanjek from www.livescience.com puts it,

Turkey gets singled out for no other reason than being eaten during the biggest meal of the year.

In essence, big meals with any food containing tryptophan can cause sleepiness. The real culprits are all those carbohydrates from potatoes, stuffing, vegetables, bread and pie. The massive intake of carb-heavy calories stimulates the release of insulin, which in turn triggers the uptake of most amino acids from the blood into the muscles except for tryptophan.

With other amino acids swept out of the bloodstream, tryptophan—from turkey or ham or any meat or cheese, for that matter—can better make its way to the brain to produce serotonin. Without that insulin surge, tryptophan would have to compete with all the other kinds of amino acids in the big meal as they make their way to the brain via a common chemical transport route. And not enough tryptophan would make it to the brain because other basic amino acids are far more plentiful in food

So, there you have it.  Eat all the turkey you can stand, and leave out the high carb stuff, and you might eliminate the need for that nap.  Well, Maybe not.

“Good to know, ” I thought to myself again. ”But that’s not gonna help me cook it either!  Get back on track, Morrison!”  I soon self-scolded.

Obviously, the first question to ask was this: How do I thaw this thing?  It made sense to just put it in the fridge to thaw; but for how long?  The answer was easily found via google, and it seemed that all respectable sites concurred: 24 hrs for each 5 lbs.  I had a 15 lb bird, so…doing a little math, I murmured, “Let’s see…5 pounds times 24 hours…divided by the square root…times pi…yada…yada…carry the one…OH, ok…3 days.  Wow, 3 days? Really?  Well, that’ll work.”  I did, however, find that if 3 days in the fridge seem too long for you, you can also just thaw it in cold water for about an hour and a half.  I feel that it’s also important to repeat a recurring order from the whitecoats by adding this: NEVER thaw a frozen turkey at room temperature!  This makes sense to me.  The turkey will start to thaw, and while the still frozen sections continue to thaw, the thawed sections, coming up to room temperature, will be more susceptible to bacterial infestation.  Yuk! 

Once the turkey was thawed, I geared up into flavor-enhancing mode.  I had heard from several sources that brining a turkey is the key to success.  So, I decided to go all out and make a brine.  I had already studied up a little on brining (more on that here if you’re interested), So I had a good idea of the process.  I only needed to find a large enough vessel to house the brine and the bird.  I dug through the shed and found the perfect thing:  an old plastic cooler that was just the right size.  I thought I had remembered seeing Alton Brown use something similar, but didn’t really feel like looking it up, honestly.  I knew that the turkey had to stay cold, and the insulated cooler would be perfect for that.  I added the brine to the cooler:

1 1/2 gallons of filtered water

1/2 gallon of ice 

1 cup salt

1 cup brown sugar

2 Tbls dried sage

2 Tbls dried thyme

2 Tbls dried rosemary

1/4 cup red wine vinegar

2 Tbls black pepper

Then, I added the thawed bird to the brine and closed the lid.  I put the cooler under the counter and let the brine do its thing overnight; only opening it occasionally to monitor the temperature.  It stayed at a safe 36-38 degrees.

Considering that I was told that it would take anywhere from 4 to 5 hours to cook, I started the cooking process early the next morning.  I took the turkey out of the cooler, and I could tell a slight difference in that it was obviously a little “plumper”  I assumed that was normal, and I scratched my head as I wondered how to prepare it for cooking.

I remembered seeing a few people stuff a mix of stuff under the skin to enhance the flavor and texture, so I decided to do the same.  I made a mixture of butter, homegrown, dried sage from Sara’s mother’s garden, salt, and pepper, and stuffed it under the skin.  It looked good except for the fact that I tore the skin on one side a little with my big, burly, man hands.  Guess I’ll have to either be more careful or have Sara do it next time.

 I wanted a good presentation, so I asked Sara to hand me the butcher’s twine.  I stood there looking more confused than – well – than a turkey.  I tried a couple of times to wrap it up with the twine, only to ask sara to get online to look up a good twine tutorial.  We ended up, go figure, on a clip from Good Eats.  I would watch the clip, then proceed, only to tear off the twine and repeat.  I’m a little embarrassed to say, it took me about 3 trys just to tie up a dead turkey.

Anyway, I finally got it tied up and looking nice, and I placed it in the oven (preheated to 325).  Occasionally, I took a spoonful of chicken stock and poured it over the turkey while cooking.  It cooked for about 2 1/2 hrs, and I checked the temperature with this new, handy dandy “Food Network” thermometer/timer thingy (because my insta-read thermometer went missing.  We’ll probably find it at the bottom of a toy chest in the kids’ room a year from now.) It was around 150 already.  That seemed too quick, and I began to doubt my thermometer…again.  Long-story-short, I had had the thermometer for a while stuck in a drawer because I had already suspected that it was highly inacurate from my previous attempts at figuring it out.  But, I did acknowledge that I could have just been using it wrong.  So, I decided to give it another shot with the turkey.  I was still in doubt, and had no choice but to go out and buy another simple, cheap, RELIABLE meat thermometer.  My fear was verified when it consitently read 10 whole degrees lower!  What’s the deal?!  I paid like 40 bucks for the “fancy schmancy” one!  I digress.

Once the turkey reached 170 degrees in the thickest part of the thigh, I took it out and placed some foil over it and let it rest for several minutes befor cutting.  It certainly looked and smelled great.  Time would only tell if it was worth all the effort.

The skin that was slightly torn on one side was a bit drier, and the sage under the skin made it look like it had little burnt places.  But it was perfectly presentable.  However, I decided to go ahead and cut all the meat off and serve it up with all the other “fixins” on the table for easy access.  The meat seemed moist as I was cutting it.  I tried a bite, and…it tasted VERY good!  And, that was all that mattered.  VICTORY! 

Did the brine do the trick?  I think so.  It was certainly a little salty, and it didn’t seem quite as dried out as turkey I’d had in the past.  However, I think in all my thermometer testing and switching mayhem, I might have juuuust slightly overcooked it.  The fancy thermometer read 180, and “el cheapo” read 170.  Perhaps it was right in between.  Either way, it still came out very well, and I was one pleased dinner dasher! And, most of all, we had a Christmas feast to remember.

(More photos!  Click to enlarge)

Lessons Learned:

1 - Easy with the lumberjack hands under turkey skin.

2 – Don’t trust some “high-falootin’”, high dollar thing just because it says “Food Network” on it. 

3 – Any bonus is a good bonus; even if…I mean ESPECIALLY if it’s a frozen turkey (and a package of brown and serve rolls.  And, oh yeah – we used ‘em).

-DJ

It’s a question frequently asked: ”If you could live on ONE food, what would it be?”  But, I’ve never tried to answer it myself.  First of all, I’m just not one for hypothetical conversation.  Secondly, I just don’t even like the thought of it; eating only ONE food.  I’ve just thought, “One food?!  That’d be horrible.  I like too much stuff to narrow it down like that.  Heck, I’m not even sure I’d want to live in a world where I had to eat only one thing all the time.”  I say this half in jest, of course.  I mean – of course, I’ll do whatever it takes to survive if I’m ever stuck in some post apocalyptic world .  And, when I’m forced to think about it, there is ONE food I think I could comfortably live on.  I just hope this post apocalyptic world still has some hot sauce.

Several years ago, I used to frequently go with a friend or two to this little joint in Knoxville called Spicy’s; particularly on Monday night – it was “All You Can Eat Wings Night”.   We’d keep the kitchen busy and close the place down after eating every piece of chicken in sight.  This is where my fondness for wings began.  I already knew by that point that I had a fondness for hot sauce.  I can vividly remember sitting at a table with my good friend, Daniel, in this cajun place taste-testing every single hot sauce on hand.  We’d dash several drops on a cracker and point out the particulars as if tasting fine wine.  “This one’s a little more “vinegary”", we’d note, ”This one would be really good in soup, and that one – well…you could just drink it straight up.”  With this in mind, it’s really no surprise that I grew to love wings so much.  And, it’s certainly no surprise that I grew to love the place and looked forward to those Monday nights.  Heck, Daniel even ended up working there for a while.  And, he and I, at the time, were in a band together, and we ended up with a regular gig at the place for a solid couple of years.  It’s safe to say that we both had our fill of wings; so much so, that we probably got a little burned out.  Well, I did, anyway.  Shoot, there’s only so much “lava sauce” a young man can ingest before needing to cool down a little.  So, eventually, I stepped back from the place; only going from time to time to get a quick fix.  And, that’s the thing about wings for me; it seems that, no matter what, my mouth eventually starts to water for them.  Nothing seems to trigger it.  My brain just seems to be wired to remind me on a regular basis that I need a wing fix.  I guess you could say…(oh…no, I’m not going to say it…I’m not…OK…yes, I am…) it’s HOT wired. *ehem*

If that isn’t convincing enough, this is:  On bended knee, on the front steps of what is now OUR house, I proposed to my wife, Sara.  It was a memorable moment to say the least.  What’s more; while still on bended knee, I had another proposition:  “Awesome!  Wanna go get some wings?”  And, to my pleasant surprise, she said “yes”…to both.

So, I’ve definitively nailed down an answer to this seemingly age-old question.  I now know what food I can’t live without: WINGS!  Now what?  Well, I’ve got to cook them, of course.

Several years ago, I thought I had the whole hot sauce thing figured out.  I could immediately pull out the appropriate bottle of sauce for any given occasion without question.  But, from time to time, I would experiment a little more and switch things up a bit.  Most particularly, was my experimentation with the wing sauce recipe.  I tried every sauce and every ratio of other ingredients I could think of.  For a while, I’d be set on one recipe, but then it would change.   It wasn’t until Sara’s dad, Steve, made wings for us one night that I began to hit on the perfect sauce for the perfect wings.  “Frank’s.” He would definitively say, “It’s gotta be Frank’s.”  I had what I thought was becoming a real winner by mixing a few different hot sauces with some other ingredients.  I would take an equal part of three different sauces and mix them with melted butter.  To that I would alter the recipe and experiment by; adding in things like honey, black pepper, worcestershire sauce, thyme, heavy cream, the list goes on.  I would batter the wings, I would steam them, bake them, fry them in different oils at different temperatures.  It seemed that I was trying every combination of things to make the PERFECT buffalo wing.  But, all the extra work seemed in vain when we would go to her parents for a “wing night”, and her dad’s wings would be awesome; albeit, not quite spicy enough for me, but still…awesome.  Other than dumping more hot sauce on them when I received a heaping plate, they really needed no other alteration to be…just right.

The recipe was simple, right, and reminiscent of what I remember seeing done at Spicy’s.  It went something like this: 

1 – Cut wings.

2 – Drop in hot oil.

3 - Shake wings in a mixture of hot sauce and butter.

4 – Serve.

After eating bucket-loads of Steve’s wings, I came to a conclusion; well, three conclusions, actually:  1 – Although arguable, I’m finally convinced that the perfect hot sauce for buffalo wings is Frank’s Red Hot.  2 – The perfect wing is a SIMPLE wing.  3 – I guess wisdom really does come with old age.  (Sorry, Steve…couldn’t resist.)

I guess I should ask the obvious question at this point:  What IS the perfect wing?  MY answer is this:  It’s got crispy skin, moist meat, and is covered in a sauce consisting of (your favorite sauce here (which, for this application, i might add, SHOULD be Frank’s Red Hot)) and butter.  That’s it.

So, how does one go about making said wing? 

Like I said, it seems that I’ve tested every notion and tried every piece of advice only to come to one conclusion: it’s just not that complicated.  You cut the wings, fry them in hot oil, and cover them with a buttery hot sauce.  If there is ONE key, it is this:  Manage your oil temperature.  Other than that, I can only add a couple of details.  So, this is how it breaks down:

1 – Cut the wings: 

Take a (very sharp) Chef’s Knife, and cut the wings at each joint. I’ve tried a few suggested methods for doing this, and after cutting literally hundreds of wings, I’m still not sure which is best.  Again, it’s just not as complicated as some might make it.  Just lay them out flat, cut at the joint, and throw out the tip.  You could certainly buy precut wings, but it’s definitely more economical to cut them yourself.

2 – Fry the wings:

Heat Peanut Oil to 380 degrees in the heaviest pot you’ve got.  Cast iron would be nice.  From what I’ve learned, it’s crucial to keep the temp up around 365.  Bring it up to 380 and slowly start putting in the wings.  If your pot retains heat well enough, the temp should drop to only around 350 or so. Keep your eye on the temperature trying to maintain it near 365.  Don’t let it drop below 340 if possible; the wings will take on the oil, they’ll take longer to cook, and, chances are, you’ll overcook them – making them chewy instead of crispy.  Repeat all this with batches of around 8 wings – depending on the size of the pot.  Basically, watch the wings, moving them from time to time until they’re fairly brown, most of the “bubbling” has ceased, and they start to slightly float.  Then, your done.

3 – Coat the wings with sauce.  I think this is about the only part of the recipe that can be altered to taste / preference.

  Again, my perference here is Frank’s Red Hot.  I like ‘em HOT…so alter this accordingly.  I generally mix a ratio of 3:1 (3 Tbls hot sauce to 1 Tbls butter) making a total of 1/4 cup of wing sauce.  I add a 1/4 cup of sauce to every 4 wings.  So…do the math, and go from there.  Like I said, I used to make this MUCH more complicated, only to find that there’s just nothing else needed other than hot sauce and butter.  So, mess around with your favorite sauce / butter combination, and you can’t go wrong.  Now, I WOULD like to add one more tidbit here.  One problem with wings that I’ve found is that you’ll go through all the trouble of maintaining your oil temp and watching the wings to make sure they come out with a nice, crispy exterior, only to shake them vigorously in a large, covered bowl of sauce.  You let them sit for a minute as you prepare to serve them, and once they get to a plate, they’ve lost a lot of crispiness due to the sauce sort of steaming and …”de-crispifying” the skin.  What I do is this:  I melt the butter with the sauce in the microwave as the wings are cooking.  I let it sit for a little bit to slightly solidify as the butter cools.  Once the wings are done cooking and have had a chance to cool slightly, I serve them. THEN, I pour the slightly solidified sauce over the wings at the table JUST before consuming.  This seems to work well.

4.  Ranch or Blue Cheese is served on the side for dipping, and Celery…well, celery is OPTIONAL, in my opinion.  But, I DO like the look.

And…that’s it; the perfect Buffalo Wings!

Lessons Learned:

1 – Maintain the Oil Temperature

2 – “Frank’s.  It’s gotta be Frank’s”

3 - Chickens have wings for one reason: So we can EAT them.  Ok, two reasons:  to be used as leverage upon proposing to your potential spouse.

-DJ

This is just a simple, brief update on my experience making a good meatloaf.  I’ll spare you any lame, “…Anything for Love” references this time.  My last attempt ended successfully, but still, my meatloaf needed improvement.  I used toasted French bread instead of dry breadcrumbs, and I pureed the vegetables before mixing them in.  The meatloaf ended up tasting good, but the texture was just weird; it was too “soggy”, and it didn’t hold together well enough.  It was also too spicy. 

Here’s the recipe from the last one:

To the food processor…

• 1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1 teaspoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme
• 1/2 onion, roughly chopped
• 1 carrot, peeled and broken
• 3 whole cloves garlic
• 1/2 red bell pepper

Add the above to…

• 18oz Ground Chuck and 18oz Ground Sirloin

For the glaze…

• Ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, hot sauce, honey, and cumin

But…

Like I said, with this recipe, it ended up being too moist, and it didn’t hold together well.  It was also too spicy, and—well—just not “meatloafy” enough.  It was too busy.  There were just too many things going on at once confusing the pallet.

It was obvious that I needed to simplify. 

First, to address was the texture.  I had over processed the vegetables, thus breaking up too many of the cell walls leading to major water leakage.  So, this time I simply chopped them with a chef’s knife into fairly small, even pieces.  I also simplified the list of items.  I incorporated only a carrot and half of a fairly large onion.  I used garlic powder instead of fresh garlic, and I left out the bell pepper.  Instead of my ever-so-loved homemade croutons, I used store-bought, Italian-style, dry breadcrumbs.

Let me jump ahead a little for a minute and talk about the glaze in order to set up and discuss my next alteration.  The glaze tasted pretty good, but again, it just seemed too busy.  For once, I have to disagree with my much respected friend, Alton Brown.  I used his recipe for it thinking it sounded good, but, in the end, again, it was just too much.  I’m beginning to think I’m just a meatloaf purist.  Either way, it was obvious to me that a really good meatloaf needs only one adornment: ketchup; good quality, straight out of the bottle, ketchup.  There’s just something about the way it plays; it’s just—right. 

So, I had an idea: not only would I dress the meatloaf with plain ketchup, I would try to imbue the mixture with that “tomatoy” note by adding some tomato paste.  I know, this seems to go against my whole notion of drying things up a bit, but the vegetable, breadcrumb, and spice mixture needed something other than the meat to act as sort of a common denominator to bring it all together and to help it bind with the meat.  Not wanting to feel so credulous, I wanted to see if my notion to add tomato paste as a binder was plausible.  So, I did a bit of searching, and was actually pleased to read a few things.

First, I went to my usual initial source, Wikipedia to get some general information, and felt strangely enlightened by the simple definition of the stuff.  It states:

Tomato paste is a thick paste that is made by cooking tomatoes for several hours to reduce moisture, straining them to remove the seeds and skin, and cooking them again to reduce them to a thick, rich concentrate.

So, really, there’s just not that much moisture being added.  But, I had to wonder, “If there’s not that much moisture, what, exactly is holding the stuff together and making it a paste?”  Wikipedia briefly mentions something called “Hot break” and suggests that it has something to do with something called “pectin”.  I dug a little deeper to find that the term “hot break” refers to the method of making such pastes by “heating the tomatoes at temperatures ranging from 85 to 100°C” (http://www.fenco.it/eng/tomato-paste-processing.asp).  I stumbled onto another site (http://www.tomato-paste.biz/news/onews.asp?id=73) to discover that during the hot break process, ““pectic enzymes” are inactivated, inhibiting the breakdown of pectin, creating a more viscous product.”  So, the heat stops the enzymes from breaking down the pectin.  Cool.  The info on Wikipedia explains that “The main use for pectin is as a gelling agent, thickening agent and stabilizer in food.”  So, to break it down a little…tomatoes are heated and essentially dehydrated, but in a way that preserves the pectin molecules, thus keeping the substance thick and pasty.  “Excellent!” I thought.  “I was actually right on.”  The verification of my hunch gave me the confidence I needed to move forward knowing that using it should certainly help the consistency and flavor of my meatloaf!

 I added 8oz of tomato paste to my mixture, and, for a little added insurance, I added one large egg as well.  So, now the recipe looks like this: 

• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon fresh thyme
• 1/2 onion, diced
• 1 carrot, diced
• 1 tbls garlic powder
• 8oz tomato paste
• 1 large egg
• ½ cup Italian-style dry breadcrumbs
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon kosher salt

Add the above to…

• 18oz Ground Chuck and 18oz Ground Sirloin

For the glaze…

• Ketchup  - nothing else.

Cook for an hour and 20 minutes at 325. The meatloaf  came out looking quite well.  I started cutting it and immediately knew that my plan was a success.  It was still moist, but not too moist.  It held together well.  And the taste…was right on!  I won’t lie; I’ll still need to tweak it just a little next time, but it was ALMOST perfect.  I’ll keep you updated. To the side, I added a simple salad with my own honey balsamic vinaigrette, and I paired  it with a portion of couscous with carrots and celery.  Now, I was going to add to this post something about the couscous, because, frankly, I had never even heard of the stuff until just recently, and I thought it’d be neat to dive into it a bit.  But, not only because this post is beginning to get lengthy, but also because I just simply don’t have that much to say about the stuff other than—well—no matter what I do to it to try to make it good, to me, it’s not even worth the effort.  Maybe somebody out there has some sort of trick to it (probably something like, “Just add in a cup of bacon fat and some peppers.” or something).  Heck, I added a whole stick of butter to it, for crying outloud.  I mean, what in the world ISN’T good with a stick of butter?!  Couscous, that’s what.

Lessons Learned 

1 – Meatloaf is a simple dish that should be kept simple.

2 – There’s more to tomato paste than meets the eye.

3 – Why on Earth would anyone enjoy eating couscous? 

-DJ    

I’ve been on the ropes; down in the bunker; beaten back by a forceful opponent; an opponent that needs no introduction and simply goes by a one-word name: Saranator – well, ok…two words…THE Saranator.  Down in the baker’s bunker, I’ve pondered my approach since our last quarrel, and, with a new drawing on the board, I have a plan.  It’s a simple plan, really.  It involves very few fancy levers, pullies, or high-tech maneuvers, and the result is some unassuming thing that looks much like a simple wheel.  No, I’m not reinventing the wheel, I’m simply pushing back with a little plan I like to call The Postapocalyptic Pumkin Pie Power Punch.  That’s right, a pumpkin pie.  It’s really just another custard, and I plan to use it to elcipse the glory of Saranator’s, and  even MY own cheesecake.

Fall is finally here, and, the way I see it, it’s time to capitalize on the, already attached, feel-good…felicity that comes with such a wonderful time of year.  I’m going to pull out all the stops, and attempt to make the best pumpkin pie the world has ever seen!!!  Well, ok; I’ve never made a pumpkin pie before, and I’m not even going to pretend that I know what I’m doing, but if there’s one thing I’ve learned thus far, it’s that a little bit of research and thought goes a very long way.  I may not make the best pumpkin pie ever made, but it should certainly suffice to return the custard crown to its rightful owner.

I already had my pie crust made.  You can read more about that here.  Because the dough that I had left over was made for a savory pie, I simply added about 2 tablespoons of sugar to it as I rolled it out for my pumpkin pie.  All I had to do now was to figure out how to make the custard filling.

I read several recipies, some calling for canned pumpkin puree and some calling for the dismantling and cooking of a whole pumpkin.  And, although cooking a pumpkin seemed daunting, I read in a few places that cooking the freshly dismantled pumpkin and pureeing it would make the best tasting filling, so that’s what I decided to do!  I figured that I’d need all the help I could get if I’m going to knock that brownie bottom cheescake right on its brownie bottom.  “But what kind of pumpkin do I use?” I thought.  After a little searching the answer was clear, but brought about another question: “A PIE pumpkin?  It’s really called a PIE pumkin? Go figure.”

So, what makes a Pie Pumpkin the perfect pumpkin for preparing pumpkin pie, you might tongue-twistingly ask?

The Pie Pumpkin develops a golden yellow inner flesh that is high in beta-carotene and fiber, and contains other nutrients such as protein, complex carbohydrates, vitamin C, and potassium. The sweet flesh of the Pie Pumpkin is used in baking pies, puddings, soups, savory dishes, and stuffings served with poultry. A purée, made from Pie Pumpkins is canned and available in food stores or it can be made from the flesh of a fresh pumpkin (from here).

And, to expound on its counterpart,

In North America, decorative pumpkins are carved into jack-o’-lanterns in honor of Halloween. Pumpkins bred for this purpose are usually meant to be very large, mostly hollow and flat-bottomed for stability. The side effect of the large growth is that the flesh of the pumpkin is usually watery and bland. Although the seeds inside decorative pumpkins are excellent for toasting, the flesh should not be eaten, as it is usually tasteless. Common varieties of decorative pumpkin include Howdon biggy and Connecticut field”  (from here).

Now, isn’t that something?  I never even knew anything at all about pumpkins except for how to hack away at one enough to make a goofy-looking, not-so-scary face.  My plan was starting to come together.  There was one more question though: What ELSE, besides a crust and some pumpkin puree, makes a pumpkin pie? Well, it’s a custard, which means that it is a baked puree of some sort that contains cream and eggs.  From everything I’ve read, pretty much any type of cream will work for this.  I’ve read recipes containing everything from evaporated milk to heavy cream to cream cheese.  Since I’ve had some experience with it already, and because I just figured it would probably taste really good, it just seems to make the most sense at this point to use cream cheese.  “It’ll be like pumpkin cheesecake!” I thought.

Last, and certainly not least, to deal with were the spices.  There were a few variations, but the commonly used spices are cinnamon, ginger, cloves, allspice, and nutmeg.  The only thing to figure out, really, was how much of each to use.  I figure that it’ll probably take several attempts to know for sure EXACTLY how much of each to use to best suit personal taste, but for now I’ll simply base what I do from a recipe, and slightly alter it.

Ok, so I need to puree the pumpkin, add cream cheese, eggs, and spices, and mix it all up.  Then, pour it in the crust and bake it.  My plan is taking real shape.

I started by cooking the pupmkin.  I came across several different methods; the one that intrigued me most, though, was steaming.  I cut the pumpkin in half and scooped out the “gunk” with a large spoon.  Then, I cut the pumpkin lengthwise into even sections.  I had about 3 inches of water just starting to boil in the bottom of a double pot steamer.  (This is basically a pot with a fitted strainer with some room at the bottom; we use it all the time to cook pasta.)  I threw in the pumpkin pieces, and put on the lid.  I set the timer for 30 minutes and turned to tend to the crust.

I already had the dough made for the crust, (again, you can read more on that here).  I rolled it out, and formed it to a disposable pie tin.  (We don’t own a single real pie dish.  Well, we do now – thanks to Sara’s mom.  Anyway…)  I gathered my spices and pondered my recipe for the filling.  Here’s what I came up with:

• I average pie pumpkin
• 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
• 3 large eggs
• 1/2 cup cream cheese
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

There was one thing left to deal with: the whipped cream.  I’ve made whipped cream several times now, and, frankly, I’m just not sure why anyone would even buy whipped cream.  Well, ok…I get it; it’s quick and easy.  But, after making whipped cream for the first time, it was kind of like when I made Sara’s croutons (talked about here); it was just – better.  It tasted better, it had better texture, and it was actually cheaper to do.  Anyway, I whipped up about a cup of cream with a teaspoon of vanilla extract and (edited)about a tablespoon (NOT a half a cup) of sugar, (thanks, Dianne), until it was…well…whipped cream.  Yup, it’s just that simple.  It probably could have used juuust a touch more sugar though.  I didn’t really measure it out.  I think I’ll stick with a tablespoon…and probably actually measure it next time.

By this time, the pumpkin was cooked.  I wasn’t totally sure how I’d know if it was done or not, but It seemed obvious once it was done.  It was soft, and the skin came right off of the flesh.  I deskinned the pumpkin and put the pumpkin flesh into the stand mixer with the cream cheese and sugar.  Once it was all mixed up, the temperature had come down quite a bit, and I started to slowly add the eggs one at a time.  Then, I added all the spices.  Once everything was mixed up, I noticed that the texture was still pretty grainy.  So, I poured it into the blender, and I blended the filling until it was smooth and creamy.

Once blended thoroughly, I poured the filling into the pie crust and put it in the oven at 400 degrees.  I approached it much like a cheesecake by cooking it for just a few minutes in pretty high heat then lowering the heat quite a bit and cooking it for a while.  After I cooked it at 400 for 15 minutes, I lowered the heat to 225 and set the timer for one hour.  After an hour, I turned off the oven and opened the door.  The one thing I’ve learned from cooking cheesecakes is that if you overcook the custard or if you suddenly dramatically alter the temperature, it will inevitably crack and turn into the San Adreas fault.  After I let it sit in the oven for about 25 minutes, I placed it on the counter to cool for 2 hours.  Then, once cooled, I covered it and put in the fridge to cool for a few hours.

After a few hours of cooling, I couldn’t stand it anymore; it was midnight, and I just had to have a piece.  I took out the pie and the whipped cream.  The pie looked awesome, and it looked even more awesome with a huge dallop of whipped cream on top.  But did it taste awesome?  You bet it did!

The Saranator came downstairs the following morning to find a note:

The Saranator,

There is no fate but what we make.

Hasta la vista, baby!

-D

She took the pie to our various official taste testers, and came home with her head bowed in defeat.  Yes!!!  I have taken back my crown and my rightful place as Custard King.

Lessons Learned:

1 – Any time I’m feeling just a little less than patriotic, I think I’ll cook a pumpkin pie.  Is there ANYTHING more American?  Well, maybe apple pie.  Hmmmm….

2 – It’s good to be King.

-DJ

Well, people—you can thank me. That’s right—go ahead; thank me. I did it. The blistering summer heat is over, and I am proud to say that immediately following my successful attempt at making some of the most awesome, (and inviting), chili (con carne y frijoles negros) around, Fall finally arrived. My plan worked. (You’re welcome.) I lured in the season with the smell of, truly, the best chili I’ve ever tasted. Now, it’s time to say, “Welcome! Make yourself at home! Take off your shoes and stay a while.” And, how am I going to do that: by whipping up something else warm, hearty, and tasty; something classic; something—American; How ‘bout Chicken Pot Pie?! There’s only one problem: it’s not really American. Oh, well; neither is chili when you get right down to it, and it seemed to do the trick.

Hailing from right off the western tip of Great Britain, the “Cornish Pasty” is definitively noted as the father of the pot pie. So, to make a great attempt to keep this short, I’ll just put it this way: The pot pie is basically a bastardized version of some English thing that looks like a hot pocket. Apparently, the inception of the “Pasty” was wrought by the fact that, way back in the day, some miners needed a hefty meal with a built-in handle that they could keep in their pockets and eat down in the mine. Hence, the “Pasty”: a hefty portion of meat, vegetables, and gravy wrapped up in a pastry dough in a sort of crescent shape, thus creating the “handle” for the dirty-handed miners. There—enough history. What’s really important to note is that I LOVE chicken pot pie no matter from what or where it comes.

So, it’s meat, gravy, and vegetables? That sounds pretty easy. Oh, but then there’s that dough. If you’ve read my pizza posts, you know how inexperienced I am with any kind of dough. I could probably just buy a boxed dough in the freezer section of the grocery store, but I’m sort of trying to get away from buying this stuff. I want to know exactly what’s going into it, and I like the feeling of being able to control how it turns out. Also, there are two other reasons that I want to be able to make these kinds of things myself—well, ok—three more, actually: 1 – I don’t like keeping a bunch of boxes and crap crammed in the pantry and fridge taking up space just in case I need them; always having to scour through to see if I have this thing or that thing when I can just have fewer essentials on hand all the time; being always ready to make something like a simple pie dough. 2 – I am absolutely positive that making these kinds of things from scratch saves money. 3 – I just like being in the kitchen making stuff. So—I definitely need to study up on pastry dough.

First, from Wikipedia:

Pastry is distinguished from bread by having a higher fat content, which contributes to a flaky or crumbly texture. A good pastry is light and airy and fatty, but firm enough to support the weight of the filling. When making a shortcrust pastry, care must be taken to blend the fat and flour thoroughly before adding any liquid. This ensures that the flour granules are adequately coated with fat and less likely to develop gluten. On the other hand, overmixing results in long gluten strands that toughen the pastry. In other types of pastry, such as Danish pastry and croissants, the characteristic flaky texture is achieved by repeatedly rolling out a dough similar to that for yeast bread, spreading it with butter, and folding it to produce many thin layers of folds.Many pie recipes involve blind-baking the pastry before the filling is added. Pastry dough may be sweetened or perhaps unsweetened.^[3] 

Ok, so two keys are duly noted: More fat and less mixing.  So—how much fat IS more fat? And how much mixing IS two much mixing? I’ve seen a pastry dough made a few times on tv, but never really paid attention.  I need some help.  In my incessant searching online, I discovered several takes on the standard pastry dough; all being fairly straightforward and similar.  It seems that the use of butter AND shortening is required to obtain the desired texture.  I wonder why. (Search mode: factor 11) After a bit more research, it starts to make more sense. Wikipedia offers up some useful information by stating, “…it is now known that shortening works by inhibiting the formation of long protein (gluten) strands in wheat-based doughs.” 

More searching led me to another useful tidbit from this site: http://onlinepastrychef.wordpress.com/tag/shortening/.  Author, Jenni Field, explains,

This is why: the water in the butter mixes with the flour in the recipe, forming some gluten.　 Gluten=chewy cookie.　 The butter melts to a thin liquid quickly.  Melted fat=lots of spread=thin cookie. The milk solids brown in the oven.　 Browned milk solids=well, you know, brown cookies.Since there is no water in the shortening to mix with the flour, there won’t be any gluten development, and you’ll get a more tender cookie. Since the shortening melts at a higher temperature and more slowly than butter, the cookies will tend to hold their shape and be puffy, rather than thin. No milk solids to brown=lighter cookies.

Sure, she’s talking about cookies, but it’s quite applicable, and now it’s all starting to make sense. Time to roll out the dough!

Here’s what I came up with:

3 cups all purpose flour

1 tbls kosher salt

1 stick of very cold unsalted butter (cut into ½ inch cubes)

¾ cup of vegetable shortening (added about a tablespoon at a time)

5 tablespoons of ice cold water.

You know something else, I’m not really sure why everything has to be so cold either. There’s an interesting article here (http://www.helium.com/items/317853-how-to-use-ice-water-in-pastry-making). It basically explains that the cold water is used so that the butter stays cold and doesn’t melt. Apparently the cold and firm “globs” of butter scattered throughout the dough will expand before melting, thus causing little pockets of air. This will help to make the dough puff up and be flaky. Cool.

I blended the butter, flour, and salt first so that each little cube of butter was coated and dispersed sort of evenly. Then, I added in the shortening about a tablespoon at a time (for the same reason). (The shortening was at room temperature, and I thought that by getting each spoonful coated with flour before fully mixing would help to keep it from sticking to the butter, thus keeping the butter from being more prone to melt.) Then, I slowly added the water with the mixer on low just until it was all blended well enough to coalesce.

So, why not blend more? Gluten. I’ve just started understanding just what it is and what it does, and making this dough is really causing it all to sink in. When flour sucks in moisture, long strands of protein sort of tangle and come together, thus making gluten. The way I understand it, and the best way I can describe it is by saying that it’s kind of like a bunch of rubber bands all tangled together. The more the dough is worked, the more flour comes in contact with moisture and the more stretched out and tangled up the bands become. This, as stated earlier, is why shortening is used: to create less gluten so the dough is puffy and flaky instead of flat and stretchy—like a pizza dough. I placed the dough on a board and rolled it up into a ball. I covered it tightly with plastic wrap, and I put it in the fridge to stay cool. The info I gathered differed a little on this, but cooling it for about an hour seems to be a good minimum time.  Now, for the filling.

Wanting to save money, and because I like the dark meat on a chicken, I got a little ambitious and bought a whole chicken. There was only one problem: I had never roasted a whole chicken in my life. Then again, I had never made a pastry dough either. Here goes nothin’.I placed the chicken in a large roasting pan and lathered it with olive oil, salt, and pepper. I had some fresh thyme, so I laid several stems over the chicken. I rough-cut some russet potatoes and a white onion and scattered everything about. And, just for good measure, I laid a couple of tablespoons of butter on top. I put the chicken in the oven at 350, and turned the timer on to an hour. Now, I have heard that one should wrap the chicken with some butcher’s twine in order to keep everything tight as to evenly cook the bird. I don’t have any twine, and, honestly, I’m still not convinced that this makes all that much difference in an average sized chicken, but what do I know? Either way…I cooked it until the thigh measured 165 degrees. I’m told that it will continue cooking for several minutes after taken out, so I figure that the thigh should reach somewhere around 170, (the govmn’t recommended minimum), after sitting a little. The chicken was cooked, and to my surprise, it looked great! It was now time for the vegetable, gravy filling.

(click on image for larger view)

I took the remnant juices and what-not from the chicken and put it through a sieve; ending up with about a half a cup or so of chicken goodness. I remembered that the best way to make a thick sauce is to start with a roux. I had never even heard of a roux ‘til I met Sara. They lived in South Louisiana for a while, and the roux was about as ubiquitous as salt. Basically, you just mix some flour with some type of fat over heat to incorporate the flour as to eliminate clumps in your mixture. For typical gravies that don’t require any added flavor from the roux, you just cook it for a minute or so just to cook out any raw flour taste. This will thicken the sauce without altering the flavor and without making any clumps of flour in the sauce. For other sauce-based dishes, such as gumbo, you pretty much want to cook (very, very slowly without ever taking your eye off of it) until it is quite brown. This adds a distinct sort of “nutty” flavor, for lack of a better word, and it can be cooked anywhere from a golden brown to a dark, almost black, thick consistency. For my sauce, I simply took the fatty juice from the chicken and threw it in a pot with about a tablespoon of butter and 2 tablespoons of flour and mixed on medium heat for a couple of minutes until a well-defined roux was established. Then, I put in a cup of heavy cream and a box of chicken stock. I tossed in a hefty pinch of kosher salt, about a whole tablespoon of freshly ground black pepper, and a couple of bay leaves. I cut up 2 carrots, and, thinking that they’d need a little more time to cook than the other stuff, I tossed them into the mix to start cooking them. Then, I tossed in about 2/3 cup each of frozen corn and peas.

By this time, the chicken was cooled off enough to start tearing apart. It was cooked well. It was juicy, and the meat easily came right off the bone. I hand-shredded the meat and tossed it into the pot with the vegetables and gravy mix.While I let it all simmer, I figured it was time to work on forming the pie. I took the dough out of the fridge, and unwrapped it from the plastic wrap. I remember seeing someone on tv once roll out a similar dough between two pieces of plastic wrap. (I think it was Michael Chiarello). I remembered liking the little trick when I saw it, and I thought this would be the perfect time for it. It worked beautifully, no flour, no mess, and the dough didn‘t stick to the rolling pin, or, in my case, a big wine bottle. I rolled it out to about a ¼ inch thickness, and placed it in the dish. What was really cool about the plastic wrap trick was that when transferring the dough, all I had to do was handle the plastic wrap – not the dough; so the dough was safe from my “nonculinarily”- trained hands. I “blind-baked” the bottom crust of the pie in a large ceramic dish. I remember seeing somewhere that you can use some uncooked beans laid on top off some wax paper to sort of hold the crust in place and to help it keep its form. I didn’t have any uncooked beans, but I DID have some rice. It worked well. I cooked it at 350 for about 12 minutes, and it came out nice and flaky and slightly brown. Sweet! It was now time for the filling. I scooped in the filling and rolled out my second dough for the top. I laid on the top dough, and cut four slits in it to let out steam. I put the whole thing in the oven at 350 for about 15 minutes, and I’m proud to say that it came out to be what you see in the pics. After coupling it with the potatoes that roasted with the chicken, it was the perfect meal. And, I know what you’re thinking, “So, did it taste as good as it looked?” Actually, it tasted even BETTER than it looked. I can’t even describe how good it tasted. It was simply the best chicken pot pie I’ve ever had. Now, the potatoes, on the other hand, could have used a little more T.L.C.; they were pretty bland— nothing some butter and salt couldn’t fix though. 

(click on image for larger view)

Lessons learned:

1 – Roasting a whole chicken is actually pretty easy. Next step: raising one, killing it, plucking it, degutting it, cleaning it, THEN roasting it. I wonder— if my wife‘s parents have chickens, does that make them my— chickens-in-law? Look out Harwood chicken farm!

2 – I can’t wait to make another pie— maybe a sweet one next time.

3 – So, if my scheme to lure in fall worked, what in the world am I going to cook to ward off winter?

-DJ

I can remember going on fishing trips with my grandfather, Ken, several years ago. While I was untangling my line, he was yanking in fish after fish after fish. He had a “reel” knack for finding the best crappie holes on the lake. There were times when we’d come home with too many fish to even count. Did I feel bad about eating 50 percent of the fish when I only caught about 3 percent? Nope. I’d watch as he’d masterfully fillet each fish and get it ready for my Grandmother, Inge, to fry them up for the family. I still remember those huge fish fry nights with clarity and lick my lips thinking about that fish. Was it the fact that the fish was as fresh as possible that made it so good? Was it because Inge’s frying was superb? Was it simply because I had actually caught some of the fish myself? Or, am I just romanticizing some “Rockwellish” family moment? Whatever the reason, and no matter how you look at it, one fact cannot be eclipsed: if prepared with care, fried fish is just dang good.

I’ve tried frying fish a couple of times, and it’s been—well—just ok. Usually, it’s something simply going slightly wrong that makes all the work seem in vain; the batter is too fluffy; the oil is too hot or not hot enough; etc. And, it’s usually just because I didn’t put enough thought and research into it. Well, this time I’m making a solid vow: my fried fish will be the best in the world! Well, ok—it probably won’t be the best in the world; I’m not that presumptuous, but it WILL be REALLY awesome and certainly worth the time. Heck, it might even rival the fish I remember eating at Grandma’s house.

Sara makes some pretty good fish by using a store-bought boxed batter, and I’m usually a little disappointed in the fact that it’s actually better than my homemade, deep-fried, wet batter encrusted fish. These two types of batters are really the only two I’m aware of when it comes to fried fish, so it’s time for a little experiment. I’m going to pick out some good fish, make two different homemade batters, and fry them up to see which “reigns supreme.”

I went by the Fresh Market to pick out the fish and to see if I could snag some rice flour. (It seems like I remember Tyler Florence describing how it could make a super crispy fish batter.) Long story short, (and, yes, the gnomes got me again; I’ve practically given up the fight), I picked out some rather tasty looking Tilapia. But, to my dismay, for the first time, I was let down by my favorite food store. Would you believe that they don’t have any rice flour? I talked to a couple of people there to ask if, perhaps, I could just make it myself at home by grinding up some rice. “Probably, I’m not sure though. There’s probably more to it” was the reply. I had already searched for the stuff high and low in town. Anybody know where I can get some rice flour? I got home, and I prepared my work station. Since I couldn’t get the rice flour, I decided to reach for good ol’ all purpose flour. There was only one problem: we were out of a.p. flour! Shoot. What to do? What to do? We DID, however have some BREAD flour. I was a little worried that it might be too fluffy, and that was always my problem in the past. I wouldn’t quite get the consistency right, and my oil temperature would be all outta whack, and the fish would just wouldn’t get crispy and golden brown and delicious. I didn’t have a choice though. I would have to make my batter with bread flour. For the other batter, I would use a base of corn meal.I don’t know a lot about cooking fish, but I do know that, usually, a mild, tender whitefish is used when frying. Not knowing a lot about it, I bought the tilapia because it looked big, and it was on sale; seemed like a good deal to me. Also notable, were two facts: 1 – It was in the Fresh Market. (Heck, the word “fresh” is already attached.) and 2 – It said “farm-raised”. Since I know virtually nothing about fish, (except for how to sometimes get lucky and catch a few bass or crappie out on the lake), I think some research is in order.After, literally, hours of reading, there are really only a few points to hit on:1 – Some people think that it was a Tilapia that St. Peter caught when Jesus told him, “…Take the first fish you catch; open its mouth and you will find a four-drachma coin. Take it and give it to them for my tax and yours.” Although, the Bible doesn’t say, and personally, I don’t care. What’s this got to do with cooking anyway?

2 – This fish will eat virtually anything, thus cleaning up the water it’s in. For this reason, “tilapia are becoming the plant control method of choice, reducing/eliminating the use of toxic chemicals and heavy metal-based algaecides” (Wikipedia). However, “many…that have been introduced into waters outside of their natural range have become nuisances.” They breed like crazy; large fish farms actually pump the fish full of testosterone in early development in order to keep the female population down, thus keeping down the entire population. Weird, huh?

3 – We’ve gotten so hungry that the only way to keep up with demand is to do a bit of mass breeding of some quickly growing fattened up fish on huge farms. Is this really any different than any other farm-raised animal that we eat? I don’t think so. We do the same thing with our cows, chickens, and pigs, right? So, what’s the big deal about calling a fish “farm-raised”? Truth be told, “farm-raised” may actually be somewhat synomymous with “farm-dulled” when it comes to fish. But, I’m ok with that; what else am I supposed to do, go venture off to the fish’s native tropical waters and yank a bunch out myself?Aaannnd…

4 – Apparently, eating a piece of “farm-raised” tilapia is worse for your heart than eating an equal amount of bacon or hamburger! What?! A few recent studies have shown that because their natural diet is changed, and the fish are pumped full of corn at the farms, it increases the amount of omega 6 fatty acids, (which have proven to be heart unhealthy in great proportions), in relation to the ever so heart healthy omega 3 fats. There’s some debating going on, but here’s the thing: I’m making “FRIED” fish; I’m taking a piece of fish, dipping it in flour and beer (more on this in a minute), and I’m dropping it in hot fat. I don’t think I’ve been too concerned from the start about what this or that fat content is. Sure, if I was planning to eat fish every single day for every meal, I’d probably reconsider, but as it stands right now—at this moment—for this meal—bring on the fat!

Here’s what I did…

I started the way I often do by consulting Alton Brown via Youtube. His recipe calls for 2 cups of All Purpose flour a tablespoon of baking powder, and a single 12oz beer. I mixed together just that. But, for some reason, it just looked too thick. I tried mixing it with a whisk, but it just “gunked up” the whisk, so I ended up going with a wooden spoon. There’s just something nice about using a wooden spoon anyway; don’t know what it is; it just— feels nice. Anyway, I ended up altering the mixture a little. I think the fact that I was using bread flour might have had something to do with it. Either way, I ended up using another half a beer. I thought that maybe the bread flour wouldn’t need the baking powder, but I threw it in anyway. The rest of the ingredients are for seasoning, and I’m sure they can be altered any way you choose. I ended up tossing in about a tablespoon of kosher salt, 2 tsp. of fresh ground black pepper, an undetermined amount of garlic and onion powder, and, finally, a hefty splash of hot sauce. I figured the batter should sit and sort of come together for a few minutes, so I turned to the fish. I took each large filet, and I cut them into quarters lengthwise. Following Alton’s advice, I used corn starch to dredge the fish so that the wet batter would stick to the dry corn starch on the fish. You can do this with flour too, but for some reason, the corn starch just looks and feels right.I guess I should mention that during this whole process, I was heating up a large pot of peanut oil. I’m not totally sure if there’s a better oil for frying fish, but I already had the peanut oil on hand, so I went with it. Once it got up to about 325 degrees, I watched it closely. (I’ve messed up and gone WAY past the smoke point of the oil in the past.) I’ve got this cool infrared thermometer, and, very surprisingly, it actually works well for monitoring deep fry oil. I know— you wouldn’t think so, would you? But, I’ve actually tested it against other thermometers, and it’s right on. Anyway, once the oil was up to 365, I dropped in about 3 pieces of the fish. The temperature dropped to about 340 immediately, but soon recovered, and after a few minutes of watching and turning the fish, the pieces were golden brown and ready to go. I repeated this process until the rest of the fish was finished.Now, for the other batter, I simply cracked a few eggs and whisked them together. I dipped the fish into the eggs and then into a mixture of corn meal, salt, pepper, and some Italian-seasoned panko breadcrumbs. (Aren’t panko crumbs an asian thing? Either way, they’re really crispy, and we had them, so it sounded good.) I’d say it was about a cup of corn meal and a cup of the panko crumbs mixed with about a tablespoon of salt and a teaspoon of pepper. I just eyeballed it til it looked good. I followed the same process, except I lowered the temperature of the oil to 350 before putting in the fish. I figured that the wet batter, having more water (from the beer), would cause the temp to drop more, and it would need the oil to be a little hotter. For the dry batter, I figured a lower temp would suffice. By the end of it, I thought it was a good move.

We had all this fish, and we needed something to go with it. So, I asked Sara to help me peel and cut some potatoes for fries. “We’ll have fish and chips.” I said proudly. “Shoot, and why not some fried pickles too?” “Heck, let’s have a fry fest!” Sara added, “There are some mushrooms in the fridge; let’s do them too.” My reply: “I hate mushrooms, but bring it on.”

So— long story short, we had a plate full of delicious, golden brown, fried goodness. There was only one question— well— two, actually: 1 – Does any of this even taste good? 2 – Which fish is better? The answers are: Yes! and both, respectively. We found ourselves going back and forth between the two different styles of fried fish. So, we’ve now got 2 really fantastic recipes when needed. Truthfully though, I think I liked the wet batter more. Surprisingly, the bread flour worked out well. Actually, I think it might have even been the key factor in making the batter so fluffy and crispy. I’m not really sure though. All I know it that it was everything I wanted in my fried fish. And, there’s another mentionable thing: the farm-raised tilapia was incredible! Maybe that higher fat content has something to do with it. Again, I digress, Who cares? Let’s just eat!

Lessons learned:

1 – Fried pickles are right up there with your first kiss, the birth of a child, and winning the lottery.

2 – So what if farm-raised fish has higher omega 6 content? Just don’t eat it for every single meal, and you’ll probably be ok. Otherwise, go catch your own wild fish, and don’t complain.

3 – If you’re worried about it, don’t sweat the added alcohol from the beer. It will all but evaporate during cooking leaving you with an awesome tasting, bubbly, crispy crust.

4 – I’ve got the itch. Anybody wanna go fishing? Just don’t complain if I eat more fish than I catch.

-DJ