No recipe today

I need to overhaul this thing. For starters, I'm not fourteen and this isn't live journal. Black background? What the fuck. More importantly, I can come up with something way better than what this looks like now. Garbage I tell you. On behalf of my beautiful and loving wife, I should also blog more. Weekly segments, I thought would get me in the habit. I was thinking "Iron Man Monday" to celebrate my shiny new pan. Maybe. I dunno yet. Maybe "Roserade Recommends". Also I dunno yet. I'm thinking. But it's time for a change.

Merry Christmas!

Over low heat, melt half a stick of butter. Add a quarter cup of sugar and half of a little can of evaporated milk. Whisk like crazy. When boiling, add a quarter cup to a half cup of chocolate syrup to taste and two cups of regular milk.

Serve with ice cream at the bottom or whipped cream on the top. And be sure to share it with your loved ones. It makes three to four servings.

Merry Christmas!

Cooking for One

After the doctor, suddenly I feel absolutely terrible about eating the soup I made. I feel like I'm stealing Wife's medicine. Weird, I know but that's so she can get through Lap-bandy things easier. So I cooked just for myself. Another steak was my dinner. They were little, in a pack of three and cost 3 bucks. They were little. But the big thing I noticed was for one of my side dishes. I chopped up one carrot, since I figured that's all I needed. I added a tablespoon of butter and a pinch of salt, then browned them in a pan. Next, once again recalling the carrot episode of Good Eats, I decide to braise. Since I had no Ginger ale and hate the stuff anyway, I used...

Cherry cola. Just enough to cover the pan, so it was an eyeball. I slow cooked with the lid on until most of the liquid was down to a syrup then served. Amazingly, it was very very good.

Orange you glad I didn't say apple?

Okay, I'm going in order now.

Step one is www.bookcloseouts.com. They're awesome. Stupidly low prices and damn decent shipping. I love them.

Step two is this.



It too is awesome. From soups to smoothies to sauces to purees. It has a hollandaise recipe for God's sake. In fact, as I cracked open the book to find the proper spelling, through magic I landed on just that page.

Step three is my wife. I watched get a Lap Band fill today. I also talked with her awesome doctor and am now under orders to give her the tough love she needs.

Step four, the result of all this is Creamy Carrot soup.




1/4 cup (or one half stick) butter.
1 onion, finely chopped
1 leek also finely chopped
3 and 1/4 cups grated carrots
1 tablespoon AP Flour
5 cups hot chicken or veggie stock
2/3 cups heavy cream

Now, I didn't have leeks. I had them, didn't post about them and now they're gone. I also made soup. But for this, a second onion. Yay. I also didn't have heavy cream. Half and half instead. That gets used more. Heck, I'd use that in my hot cocoa. Oh! That reminds me. I also have a hot chocolate recipe for you guys. But later.

Butter cooks with the onions. Five minutes until soft, just the way wife likes. Then in goes the carrots. By the way, I don't mind saying, grating all those carrots is really hard work. Sheesh. The heat gets lowered then, on goes a cover and five more minutes.

Flour gets sprinkled in, then we stir for a minute or so. Then ever so slowly, we add the broth. We bring to a boil, then simmer for eight minutes.

Then we let cool for a smidge before sending it to the blender to die. Simmer more. Add cream. Season. Personally, I used cumin and curry powder. According to my idol Alton Brown, it's best to season carrots with botanical relatives to the carrot. Came out very very yummy. Wife, who doesn't like carrots by themselves even thought so.

As for that Hot chocolate, I'll post that later. That way, I have an excuse to make another post instead of one long one. Happy eating. I had my soup with steak. ^_^

Flying by the seat of my pants

Wife continues to enjoy it when I bullshit my way through the kitchen. So BS I do. Oh, and I know I promised dear meat to... whoever the Hell reads it. But I dunno yet.

Today was pork. I'm not sure what kind of pork. It was maybe a pound or less, all cut into six chunky strips. I seared first in a little bit of oil and a quick rubdown with salt. Once crisp on each side, out they went to rest. In the meantime, in all that oil and porky goodness went some roughly chopped onions. They were pretty big, actually. Mostly rings that I broke apart in the pan. I also tried to scrape all that porky goodness into the onions as they got nice and soft. Once done, onion and oil went into a little casserole. A nice bed for later, that was. Next came my braise. It was a cup of chicken broth and brown sugar. I'm not sure how much brown sugar, because it's rock hard and I just bashed it against my head and dropped chunks into the piping hot liquid. Garlic powder and black pepper in next, then mustard and Worcestershire and honey. Once into the casserole with pork and onions, it got to cook at 450 for a half hour.

The bell rings, then I separate the pork. It rests some more and all that liquid flavor goes back in the pan with three tablespoons of flour. It made a wonder sauce once wife added a bit of adobo in it.

As for flavor? Well, the pork came out nice and juicy. There was also nice pork on pork action thanks to the sauce. Wife was happy. So I'm happy. She made a nice cheesy veggie/rice mix topped with french fried onions. I liked it. But it's her recipe so she should post it.

Pan Fried Chicken

I am not ashamed to say that the first time I tried to pan fry, I failed. Not terribly, but I failed. First on the list, I didn't have a big enough pan. No where near enough to cook enough of them at the same time. This time is different and a heavy aluminum vessel under my protection is indeed big enough to support four drumsticks at once.

Next comes the oil. I knew how much I was supposed to use, though I think I overdid it a wee bit this time. It was heating said oil. You see, I have no thermometer. So, aside from guessing, I had no idea when it was time to cook the bird. Luckily, you can find everything on the internet.

Drop a grain of rice into the oil. If it floats to the top and starts popping and cooking, it's ready to go. If it sinks, wait a little longer. Big hint for the potential readers of this blog.

As far as the chicken itself was concerned, I soaked them all in heavy cream beforehand. Maybe thirty minutes. Heavy cream as I had no buttermilk. And I have to say, touching uncooked and slimy chicken as its soaking in that stuff.... bleh. Felt like finger banging a dead woman. But anyway, I used Adobo, like I do in everything. I used a lot. A lot a lot. They were bright orange on both sides before they hit the All Purpose Flour. Oh, and a pinch of salt, some more adobo, a bit of cayenne and a half a tablespoon (maybe) of baking powder. They rested until the oil was ready, then fry.

Twelve minutes on one side. Flip. Turn heat up to medium. Another twelve minutes. Drain. Rest. Nom. I have gravy on mine.

Coming up next: deer meat.

Potato Chip Chicken

First off, I'm upset that I can't think of a more clever name for today. But I suppose that all my smarts were drained into tonight's meal. Second, I really really need to post here more. But anyway, onto dinner.

Potato Chip Chicken, which I first heard on an episode of King of the Hill, is stupidly easy to make. I was astounded. I mean, yeah, I know how to bake a chicken breast but all the prep work was seasoning my cutlets (Adobo, as always), dipping into melted butter, then coating with smashed chips. I was amazed though, as most fancy breast recipes call for a more traditional dredge of flour-egg-bread crumb. As for the potato chips, I used Sour Cream and Onion. Yum. It took more than a simple smash though. A heavy pot, a plastic bag and years of unresolved aggression towards my mother did little to create the fine grains of powder I'm used to. In order to defeat them, I sent them off to my little food processor to put the spurs to them. And that was it. Bake until white on the inside. Boom. Done. Big deal. Very very good, though. They tasted basically fried.

But this is the important part. I have been itching time and again to try and create a homemade sauce. Don't care which one. Just wanna. I figured now was my chance. With a potato chip flavor, I thought some kind of dip accompaniment would be best. Luckily, on hand was a packet of french onion soup. So flavor was not an issue. But how to build? As I recall from a leek soup recipe which I promise to post soon, butter + flour does the trick as a base. I was impressed with All Purpose's thickening power. So with... I think half a stick (I'm guessing) of butter and two tablespoons (I measured this time), I was on my way. Maybe... a quarter cup of that chicken broth went in once things looked gooey and then I started to whisk like hell over low heat. Next, a half cup of mayo and a full cup of sour cream I had combined beforehand. In they went, with much more stirring. In fact, I was a little panicky as I mixed, afraid of... I dunno, anything. I had never done a sauce before. But oh well, must truck on. In went that onion pack and a few shots of Worcestershire. Amazingly enough, it came out really really good. Very proud of myself, I am for this feat.

Not as proud as that leek soup. But that's another post.