Opining Online

The 2000’s, the naughts, the aughts, or whatever not-quite-pleasing word you choose to refer to the decade just past was definitely the Decade of the Foodie. We’re human animals and need food to survive and we’ve always been obsessive about it one way or another.

Ever since religion was invented, someone has been telling humans what not to eat and how it should be prepared. And that there are times when no food should be consumed. Why is it spiritual to not eat? That could only happen when food and other consumer items became sufficiently available to give them up.

And then there is the idea of feasts to celebrate whatever we can come up with… often the same things we fast in order to contemplate.

Food can just get too complex if you think about it too much. So, I’m offering here two recipes you don’t have to think about to enjoy.

First up is Simple Potato Soup. I could probably get real philosophical about why I chose to make that on Christmas Eve. But, I’ll spare you.

Simple Potato Soup

3 slices thick-sliced bacon, chopped into 1/4 to 1/2 inch pieces
1 medium onion, chopped
4 – 6 medium russet potatos, peeled and cut into 1 inch cubes
6 -8 cups water
Salt and pepper to taste

Fry the bacon, pour off 1/2 the grease. Saute the onion in the remaining grease. Place the potatos, onions, and bacon pieces in a saucepan and cover with water 2 – 3 inches above the ingredients. Bring to a boil and cook until potatos are tender. Stir occasionally to break off bits of the potatos to thicken the juice. Check seasoning, serve with cornbread.

Of course you can expand this recipe. Make it decadent by adding a bit of cream, or make it healthier by reducing the amount of bacon. What I think should not be attempted is to dress it up by adding additional seasonings. If you want a different flavor, use a different meat, something like Polish or Italian sausage. The meat in this dish is meant to be seasoning, not a primary ingredient.

For our New Year’s Eve meal, dear hubby wanted chicken and rice soup. While the preparation isn’t as simple as that for potato soup, the ingredients are.

Simple Chicken and Rice Soup

1 1/2 cups chopped onion
1 1/2 cups chopped celery
2 cups uncooked rice
1 chicken, stewed, skinned, and deboned
Broth from the chicken, with water added to make 8 cups

Cook the chicken until the meat is falling off the bones and then a bit. Remove the chicken and strain the broth. We used a pressure cooker, an ancient electric one that I fear may stop working some day. A large pot is fine, but takes much longer.

Chill the broth so that the fat can be skimmed off. Leave a little bit… don’t be paranoid about a little bit of chicken fat.

Separate the chicken meat from the bones and skin. Again, leave a few bits of skin, but not large chunks. Refrigerate until the broth has chilled enough to remove the fat.

Boil the onions and celery in the chicken broth. When they are almost done, add enough water to make at least 8 cups of broth. Add the rice and chicken, bring to a boil, cover and reduce heat to low. The rice should be done in approximately 20 minutes.

Season with salt and pepper, adding water if the soup is too thick. Some types of rice absorb more water than others.

Salt and pepper only, please. Keep the seasonings simple too.

*Buying cheap cheese is worse than buying no cheese at all. When you have no cheese, you don’t waste time, energy, and other ingredients trying to make it edible.

*I hate the scrolling twitter widget. I hate anything on a website that moves unless I tell it to.

*History’s First Redneck Mummy (lower left panel)

*I love my battery backup, because I hate power outages.

*Am I the only person who cannot manage to order a Pizza Hut pizza online? I’m beginning to think they want to be able to say they offer online ordering, but are actively discouraging anyone from ever using it.

* New study reveals most children are unrepentant sociopaths (via Retriever). And then they grow up and design scrolling, flashing widgets for websites or tests for “security” that can’t be passed. For a more scientific view, see The Science of Success.

*Speaking of pizza — a quick perusal of our buying habits over the past year says that this family orders pizza on average of once a month, and that approximately 25% of these orders coincide with having company. Yeah, I am just that lazy.

*Is it the least we can do? Buy Local, Act Evil. Just a thought here… but, if I buy the best that I can for the least amount of money, is that not also ecologically sound? (Note: I’m not saying I do this — see cheap cheese.)

*Tundra. Just go, click, and scroll. That’s what I plan on doing for the next hour or so.

Time is also an essence. I think this is particularly true of cooking beans.

Why do beans seem to taste better when cooked one day and reheated the next? Because the essence of the bean and the essence of the juice and seasoning it is cooked in have then melded into a whole which is better than either was the day before.

The essence of time may not have a flavor of its own, but it is required to allow other flavors to grow and mature.

I’m not known for following recipes very well. So, I’m going to try to track this chili as it’s made.

1 lb of ground bison
1 small onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped

Brown the above in a tablespoon of butter. Bison is very low fat.

Add…

2 serrano peppers, de-seeded and chopped
1 mexican bell pepper, de-seeded and chopped (while this pepper is supposed to be a bit hotter than a regular bell pepper, it’s quite mild.
3 small tomatoes, peeled and chopped.
2 beef bouillon cubes dissolved in 2 cups water.
1 tablespoon cumin
2-3 tablespoons chili powder

Bring to boil and let simmer until the liquid has reduced by half. At this point, add garlic and onion powder to taste, if you want to add any at all.

Bring to a boil, then cool and refrigerate overnight. This is not a necessary step, it’s just that I didn’t start making this until about 9pm tonight. But, it does give all these flavors a chance to meld and make friends with each other.

Tomorrow… completion.

COMPLETION UPDATE: This was smelling so good, my husband went to WalMart to get a can of tomato paste and a small can of stewed tomatoes. Oh, and a bag of tortilla chips. We ate last night and it was really good. I’ll name this one Midnight Chili

I need a color job and some 1950s undergarments to make this real… but here I am:

Bite Me!

When freezing garden products for later use, it is extremely important to label the packages. Labeling them correctly would be even better.

I had a nice crop of peppers last year, mild red and purple bell peppers, mild jalapenos, and so very NOT-MILD habaneros. I chopped them up and froze them in little baggies. The purple bell pepper and the jalapenos were easy to tell apart. Not so the red bell peppers and habaneros, which I’d let ripen to the red stage.

But, because I think I will never forget which is which, I didn’t label the packages. Oh sure, the red bell peppers were thicker and bigger chunks, the habaneros thinner and tinier because you just don’t need a big chunk of habanero.

Today, I made clean-out-fridge fried rice. Yep, you guessed it, I thought that last 1/8 cup or so of frozen red pepper were of the mild bell pepper type, so I dumped them all into the skillet.

oops.

The fried rice is good, but it’s hot. Really, really hot. The kind of hot that stays with you, clinging to your lips, tongue, and cheeks. For hours.  

Most of the people I know who drink beer don’t need any excuse other than beer exists. However, at least for the first link, having a beer or two makes some things more palatable. Or not.

“Could it be the worst food product ever?” The answer is in the comments.

What better place on the web to visit while having a beer than Behind The Stick? To make it even better, What are the odds? comments contain a nice list of movies to put on your Netflix list for future Friday nights.

There is not enough beer in the universe for this — The Ontology Of Voltron, not Transformers — to make sense to me.

Tea Party first. Save the beer for the after party!

Do you doubt sometimes whether drinking beer is useful? Do you doubt the aesthetic effects? Here’s proving you have nothing to worry about: The Beer Can House.

I am stuffed. Oddly, there wasn’t a turkey, instead a hen which made the dressing taste all the better, I think. The dressing is some of the best I’ve ever had. My stepsister deserves the glory and she also made the rolls.

There was so much food. The dressing, chicken, ham, sweet potatoes, english peas, bacon-wrapped green beans, baked apples, spaghetti and cheese, cauliflower and broccoli salad, cranberry sauce, deviled eggs, a variety of homemade pickles, potato and cheese casserole, and probably a few things I didn’t even see, much less taste.

Dessert? ahh… pumpkin pie, pecan pie, coconut pie, pineapple cake, carrot cake, chocolate cake, and probably more. My memory is sluggish at the moment.

Why the surrey without fringe on the top pictured above? My stepbrother drove it to dinner today, but he got there before I did and I didn’t know about his new carriage and horse. I barely got this photo as he was leaving, the outfit being much speedier than I expected. I hope he didn’t get a ticket on the way home.

I hope everyone has as much fun today as I did!

This is more a technique than a recipe and should be called Southern Steamed Potatoes because the only way you can really ruin them is to use too much grease.

You can use lard, oil, Crisco, bacon grease… whatever you have handy, but you are not going to need very much.

Peel however many potatoes it’s going to take to feed your family. I’d guess that one medium potato per person should do it. Cut these into cubes of approximately 1/2 inch.

Chop up some onion. I like a proportion of 1/2 as many onions as potatoes. Onions are optional, but I like them.

Cooking these requires a reasonably tight fitting lid. I have a cast iron skillet with a lid that weighs more than the skillet and it works perfectly. When my aunt cooks these for large gatherings she uses large electric skillets.

Coat the skillet with your choice of grease. Seriously, just coat it. We’re not deep-frying. Heat the skillet for a minute or so, then pour in the potatoes. Spread them out evenly, then spread the onions on top of them.

Cover with lid, and let cook — without stirring — for a while. I truly don’t have any idea how long! That helps you a lot doesn’t it? What you want to get is a nice brown crunchy crust on the bottom of the potatoes.

You still don’t want to stir these, but you do want to turn them. Using a sharp spatula (or turner or whatever you call it) to turn them over as much as possible. You probably won’t get them all turned evenly. Don’t worry about it. Scrape deep so you get all the crunchy goodness off the bottom of the pan.

Cover and let cook for another while. I’m thinking maybe 10+ minutes the first side, then 5+ minutes the other.

Add salt and black pepper to taste, and serve. Preferably with pinto beans and cornbread, but they are tasty for breakfast too.

Scientists Turn Tequila Into Diamonds.

That gives a whole new meaning to a Top Shelf margarita doesn’t it?

My husband is cooking and it’s really smelling delicious. Tonight he’s trying out Emeril’s Filipino Adobo-Style Chicken Thighs. This is a wonderful recipe because all we had to buy was the chicken. Everything else is stuff we generally keep on hand.

The dish is supposed to be served over Emeril’s Aromatic Jasmine Rice. My son-in-law got me hooked on jasmine rice a few years ago. I don’t think I’d want to go back to the plain white rice. We don’t have all those ingredients on hand. No fresh lemongrass, no fresh lime leaves, no coconut milk, no crushed peanuts. We’ll be improvising, but jasmine rice is so good, the dish will still be great.

So, what are you eating tonight?

My Momma never used yellow cornmeal or sugar in her cornbread, but everytime I’ve tried to make cornbread the way she did, it’s been bitter and inedible. Apparently I missed something important…

The closest I’ve ever come to making Momma’s cornbread is using Martha White’s White Cornbread Mix. Dextrose is in the ingredients list of the mix, so maybe Momma was sneaking some sugar in there while I wasn’t looking. It’s still not the same, but close.

 My Dad’s family makes a slightly different cornbread which is almost as good as Momma’s. (sorry Aunt Juanita — you are wonderful, but I still crave Momma’s cornbread.)

As taught to me by my father, who was taught by his sister, Juanita:

1/2 cup white cornmeal
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
2/3 cup flour
1 heaping tablespoon baking powder
1 tablespoon sugar (you can add more if you like it sweeter)
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups buttermilk (you can use plain milk + 1 tablespoon cider vinegar, but might need 1/2 teaspoon more salt)
1 egg
1/4 cup oil (I generally use canola, but most any fat, except butter, can be used. Butter burns too quickly.)Heat oven to 425 (I don’t how this would work in a dutch oven, I’ve never tried that) Place oil in your favorite cast iron skillet (10″ or there abouts) and put it in pre-heated oven. (Or you can pre-heat oven and place skillet on burner to heat it quicker.)Mix all dry ingredients in bowl. Whisk egg and buttermilk together.

After the skillet and oil is hot enough – it should be hot enough that the batter will sizzle when poured into the pan – pour the milk and egg into the dry mixture and mix well.

From the hot skillet, pour about 1/2 the oil into the batter and quickly mix it in. The addition of the hot oil will start the batter rising immediately. Pour the batter quickly into hot skillet and bake for 20 minutes.

Do not allow the batter to stand after it’s mixed. You can use cold oil, but it is still best not to let the batter stand after mixing. Mix the oil with the egg and buttermilk if you use cold oil. What you cannot do is pour the batter into a cold pan and expect it not to stick.

For use in a dutch oven – RonF, frequent commenter at Grim’s Hall, recommends:

Make up a double recipe, put 10 coals underneath the oven, 20 coals on top, leave for 20 minutes. Just wonderful.

I suppose this could be made with all yellow meal or all white meal, but I’m pretty sure the sugar amount would need adjusting for all white meal. The two meals have a different texture, I think, and definitely a different flavor.

My pantry holds a container with the mixed cornmeal. I buy two small bags of each and mix them together for every use of cornmeal.

Is this election fun or what? Go grab a beer and enjoy!

Surfed there from Vodkapundit, via Jules Crittendon.

First thing I read today was in a doctor’s office waiting room. I was thrilled that he’d put out a recent copy of the Southern Medical Journal. Surely, I didn’t understand some of the terms used, but if I’d chosen Glamour, I wouldn’t have understood why any of the content was important.

One article was about a 17 year old Hispanic male who had a reaction to concurrent treatment for HIV and active TB. I was mainly horrified that one so young led such a life where he was exposed to either. So very, very sad.

Another was about a 61 year old woman who unknowingly aspirated a hazelnut. I think I remember the nut and the age of the woman correctly. My first question was how one could unknowingly do that. Then it noted that other than the breathing problems that prompted her to get treatment, she had no other health problems except schizophrenia. Perhaps that explains the unknowing part.

The take-home message for me from that article was that aspirated foreign objects are relative rare in adults, but quite common in children, especially ages 5 and under. The most commonly aspirated objects are nuts; the most common nut is the peanut. Note to parents: no nuts until after age 5.

Online, I’ve been reading mostly health or science topics too. Crooked Timber has a great post, Fat Hominid, on fad diets and evolutionary psychology. The comments are good too. If you can stomach reading about eating rodents and insects.

Then I surfed on over to ScienceBlogs where I eventually found a link to Encephalon #49 at Neuroscientifically Challenged. It’s always amused me that we must use what we’re studying to learn about the brain. And yes, I’m easily amused.

From the inimitable Dr. Boli:

Now observe that we could, without altering the lists at all, change the headings above the lists to “Things That Are Healthy to Eat” and “Things That Are Not Healthy to Eat.” The correspondence is perfect. Things that taste good are things that are healthy to eat. It follows, of course, that the things that taste best are the healthiest to eat.

My Plan!

Not “MY” plan, my friend Sarah’s plan. I’m not that ambitious or diligent.

Because it’s Monday. And I’m in Louisiana, though I’m not doing laundry today.

•2 cups dry small red beans
•16+ cups water
•4 slices bacon, cooked & crumbled, reserve drippings
•1 teaspoon Tony Chachere’s Creole Seasoning (or too taste)
•2 cloves garlic, minced fine
•1 bay leaf
•3 cups Trinity*
•3 medium carrots, minced
•More water
•2 teaspoons beef base
•2 pounds polish, link, or cajun sausage
•4 cups cooked white rice** (I prefer Jasmine Rice)

“Look & Pick” the beans, removing any trash, rocks, or severely discolored and deformed beans. Rinse beans well, changing water at least 3 times. This step reduces the flatulence-making property of beans. Cover with 8 cups of the water and let them soak overnight in refrigerator. The next day, remove any “floaters” and drain the water off the beans.

In a large heavy pot, cover the beans with 8 cups water and bring to a boil. Cover the pot and reduce heat to low and simmer beans for at least one hour. In the meantime, sauté the Trinity*, garlic, and carrots in the reserved bacon drippings. Add the crumbled bacon, the Tony Chachere’s Creole Seasoning, then add the entire seasoning mixture to the partially cooked beans.

Bring back to a rolling boil, then reduce heat and simmer for several hours, adding water as necessary. The beans are done when they begin to “pop” or split and are tender all the way through. (For this step, I use a pressure cooker, even though it’s only 300 or so ft. above sea level here. I like for the carrots and trinity to “dissolve” and thicken the soup.)

High altitudes require using a pressure cooker. If you’re at 4000 ft, you can boil beans for a week and they won’t get done.

Check seasoning and adjust to taste, keeping in mind that the rice is somewhat bland. If the bean soup is not as thick as you like, smash some of the beans to a paste for thickening. Do not use a roux to thicken.

Slice and brown sausages, or grill them whole or in serving size pieces. Your taste, your choice. Serve the beans ladled over cooked white rice, the sausage on the side and a wedge of cornbread, all accompanied by some blues, of course.***

*Trinity – equal parts chopped celery, chopped green pepper, chopped onions. I prefer green bell peppers and red onions, and chop the inner tender celery leaves as well as the stalk.

**Rice – Cover 2 cups uncooked white rice with 4 cups water. Add 1 teaspoon salt. Bring to a rolling boil, cover, and simmer over lowest heat for 20 minutes, then “fluff” with fork. Do not stir rice during cooking or standing time.

Variations:
•Substitute finely chopped pancetta, ham, or sausage for bacon
•Eliminate the bacon, slice & saute the sausage and vegetables, adding all to beans. •Skip the side serving of sausage. For a lower fat version, use less sausage.
•Substitute grilled pork chops or chicken for the side of sausage.
•Use pinto or black beans. You could also use kidney beans, I suppose. I don’t like kidney beans, but if you do… use them.
 
Now for the blues***

Click here to listen to (or download) a sampling of the music of Huddy Ledbetter, aka Leadbelly. Click here to hear more snippets of some of his songs and Woodie Guthrie’s performed by Little Richard, Brian Wilson, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, U2, Sweet Honey in the Rock. That CD — Folkways: A Vision Shared – A Tribute to Woody Guthrie & Leadbelly — is one of my favorites.An updated recipe from the one I originally posted at Pajama Pundits.

What I didn’t expect from my trip to Arizona was Green. Compared to Louisiana, Phoenix is green this time of year. Green grass (if it’s watered) and, of course, all colors of green cactus (including blue-green). And sun…

The day I got back to Louisiana was overcast, all the deciduous trees were nothing but grey limbs… it was dreary.

But… the brightest thing about Arizona was my granddaughter. Here she is finishing off her first birthday cake. Ain’t she cute?

No, her Nonna is not biased at all. I’m not sure she actually ate any of the cake, but she had a grand time squishing it and rubbing it into her hair. It was a lot of fun seeing her play will all her pals from Gymboree and the local Mom’s group.

Other highlights of the trip were The Temper Tantrum – Nonna spent almost an hour laughing at the sweet angel as she threw a big one, then finally sighed loudly and decided to play with her toys and books. She has earned her nickname “Stinkerbelle” honestly.

Then there was the raw tuna. My favorite son-in-law (don’t confuse him with my other favorite sons-in-law) will eat almost anything. I got him a sushi kit for Christmas, but this was a sort of raw tuna salad. His mom and dad loved it. I tried it. I didn’t love it. It didn’t really taste bad, but raw tuna is very, very chewy. Very.

At the last minute, I decided to fly rather than drive. I had a nightmare about my car (10 years old, 150,000+ miles) breaking down between Pecos and Van Horn, where I know my cell phone does not work… and then there’s that long stretch between Van Horn and El Paso, where I can’t remember if my cell phone works, or not.

The bad part about that is that I did not get to try the traditional Chile Relleno at Dos Compadres in Midland, or Odessa. That means that, so far, the best Chile Relleno I’ve ever eaten is at Papa Poblanos in DeQueen AR. That’s right… Arkansas. I was born and raised in SW Colorado and NW New Mexico, but Papa Poblanos, well… it’s one hell of a Chile Relleno.

Bill Jempty of Wizbang has chosen Mississippi State Representatives W. T. Mayhall Jr, Bobby Show, and John Read to receive his Knucklehead of the Day award.

These three morons have sponsoring the following legislation:

An act to prohibit certain food establishments from serving food to any person who is obese, based on criteria prescribed by the state department of health; to direct the department to prepare written materials that describe and explain the criteria for determining whether a person is obese and to provide those materials to the food establishments; to direct the department to monitor the food establishments for compliance with the provisions of this act; and for related purposes.*****

(2) Any food establishment to which this section applies shall not be allowed to serve food to any person who is obese, based on criteria prescribed by the State Department of Health after consultation with the Mississippi Council on Obesity Prevention and Management established under Section 41-101-1 or its successor. The State Department of Health shall prepare written materials that describe and explain the criteria for determining whether a person is obese, and shall provide those materials to all food establishments to which this section applies. A food establishment shall be entitled to rely on the criteria for obesity in those written materials when determining whether or not it is allowed to serve food to any person.

House Bill 282 was introduced Friday, Feb. 1.

Sandy Szwarc, of Junkfood Science fame asks:

Is this a tongue-in-cheek bill, meant to point out how absurd the war on obesity has become? Or do lawmakers actually believe the myths that gluttony is the cause for obesity and that it is the government’s role to force people to eat and live how it deems best?

Rep. Mayhall answered her question that the bill was serious, though regrettably (hallalujah!) he doesn’t believe it will pass. He hopes it will call attention to the problem and what obesity is costing the Medicare system.

What is obesity causing the Medicare system? Someone want to give me some hard figures on that? I don’t want “but it must be costing because fat people are unhealthy!”