Freshness! And a giveaway!

A long, long time ago, the folks at Vegie Fresh contacted me and asked if I'd be interested in trying their product. It's supposed to keep your veggies nice and crispy-like, which I was into because nothing chaps my hide like soggy spinach.

Now, I'm not a scientist. I'm a cheapskate. So, my original plan to have a Vegie Fresh crisper drawer filled with goodies and a control drawer filled with goodies so I could compare them just didn't pan out. I wasn't about to just waste perfectly good vegetables in the name of blog science!

So, both crisper drawers got the Vegie Fresh treatment. My bags of spinach (which take me about a week and a half to eat) stayed mostly fresh until the bitter end. That last little bit got a little soggy, but after 10 days, that's not so bad! Plus, I just use it for smoothies, so I'm not above eating some slightly slimy greens. (Ew. Sorry for that confession.)

Some leftover cauliflower also stood the test of time pretty well - hanging on a good 11 days before succumbing to spots because I was TIRED OF CAULIFLOWER. The longer shelf-life stuff like peppers and onions stayed good at least a week until we got around to eating them. (Anyone else buying red peppers like a crazed woman lately? They are so cheap right now!)

On the whole, I was really pleased with the packet. Just toss it in the crisper drawer and let it save me some moo-lah!

Want to keep your greens dry, too? Vegie Fresh sent me a boat load of packets, all of which last about three months. Comment below and next week, I'll announce a winner!

Vegie Fresh did send me free samples for me to review, but these views are my own.

Dumplings Gone Wild

Last Saturday, it was just barely snowing and we decided to make us of our giant steamer for only the third time since we bought it more than two years ago. Dumpling Mania 2012 was on!

But first, a sale on kale (did that make you as happy as it just made me?) led us to the least appetizing-looking appetizer of all time: kale chips. We just laid the pieces out, sprinkled with olive oil and Mural of Flavor from Penzey's spices and toasted them at 350 degrees for 10 minutes.

They tasted about 10 million times better than they looked.

For the dumplings, Hubs and I used a simple recipe based on a few different dumpling recipes we found online.

1 pound of ground pork
1 1/2 tablespoons light soy sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 table spoon apple cider vinegar (because we realized too late we were out of rice wine vinegar)
2 cloves of garlic, minced

2 inches of ginger, smushed
NO hoisin sauce, though I was a big proponent of this
8 scallions, chopped

We mixed all that together and filled up dumpling wrappers. Into the steamer they went for about 15-20 minutes.

While they steamed, we got rolling on two sauces: a peanut butter chili sauce and soy-based sauce.

The peanut butter sauce was just 1 cup warmed peanut butter (use a double boiler!) and chili oil (3 table spoons). It made WAY more than we needed.

Our soy sauce was also simple, soy and scallions, with a little apple cider vinegar and sesame oil.

We also steamed a sweet potato, so we could feel just a smidge healthier about all this pork and salt.

It was delightful!

In general, Hubs and I aren't great Asian cooks, but we can do dumplings. It doesn't hurt that it's one of the all-time easiest dishes to make ever.

Pardon our less-than-chic dinner ware, the good old divided plate just made for the most utilitarian choice for our two dips. What can I say, we are not fancy folks.

Have you tried making dumplings at home? What the heck else should we be using this steamer for?

Beer for dinner

Being the loyal Bigger, Better, Best reader that I know you are, you've born witness to the culinary creations made my Hubs, me and our friend Guy. We're the proud creators of Oktoberfest pizza, Thanksgiving pizza and  the home version of Chopped. We're bloomin' food geniuses up in here, friends.

This past weekend, we got a hankerin' for kitchen tinkerin'. The theme for this one was a three-course beer dinner. Here's what we came up with:

Round One:
The booze? Crispin cider
The dish? Ok, so, you know chicken fries at BK? Well, these are pork fries in a tempura/Crispin batter, covered in: cumin gouda, green onions, dried cranberries and a sauce containing the following effed up shizzle: horseradish, cinnamon applesauce, more Crispin, dijon mustard and curry powder.

Did you just gag a little? Well, seriously guys, gag not. This was amazing. It all worked somehow and we were quite taken with this dish. It was like nachos, but classed up and on meat overdrive. Which sounds really appetizing, right?

Round Two:

The beers? Widmer IPA and Murphy's Stout

The dish? We poached orange roughy in the IPA and made a risotto with the stout and some mushrooms. The sauce is a lemon and caper mayonnaise. It was good, but not very photogenic.

Round Three:

The beer? Bell's Porter

The dish? A hodge podge. Now, it is important to remember that we were obviously having healthy samples of all these beers as we dined and so by the time we were ready to make dessert, I was feeling a tad impish. I took a chocolate cake mix, subbed in porter for water and dumped in a boat load of hot cinnamon and cayenne. Hubs tried to scoop some of the cayenne out, but I just put it back in. I'm a sneaky chef.

We topped it with a porter and chocolate ganache and served it up with some Ben and Jerry's Cinnamon Buns. The cake was more warm and roasty tasting than spicy and I can attest to it's deliciousness as I took the leftovers to work today and received hundreds of glowing compliments.

Plus, this might be the single most enticing food picture I have ever taken.

We did decide in the course of this dinner that we desperately need a fourth food-minded person to attend these loopy dinner parties because no one, even you dear reader, ever believes us when we recant the wonders of the tastiness of our meals.

We're taking applications. 

Dirty Little Secret

For as much as I blather on and on about doing awesome kitchen things like making my own cheese and stockpiling homemade cinnamon rolls, I'm actually a sad little mess when it comes to making main dishes on my own. That's Hubs' job. I'll help here and there, but the concept and execution is just not my gift.

True fact: I have ruined the following dishes in my culinary lifetime (in chronological order): Pop Tarts, Kraft mac and cheese, instant mashed potatoes, couscous, all manner of chicken dishes, tuna salad,breakfast-for-dinner, etc. My epic kitchen failures far out way my triumphs, but I choose to think those who love me find this endearing and good for their waist-lines.

This week, Hubs decided to play soccer with fellow science folk after work, which meant I was - at the last minute - left to my own devices in the kitchen.

Here's how it went down, internal monologue style:

(looking through pantry and fridge, calm as all get out) Hmm. Seems like Hubs won't be home for a while. It'd be so nice of me to have something at least started so he can finish cooking this dinner. Because surely he'll be home soon and I won't have to actually think up and make an entire dinner. Surely!

(I find a giant bag of rice) Oh! We never make rice, even though we buy rice like hoarders. I'll start some rice.

Rice and (look in the fridge) green onions? carrots? frozen veggies? bacon? No, That doesn't even sound right. Let's try the old freezer and see what happens.

(sneaky peeky in the freezer) Chicken! Rice and chicken - that's a real thing. Hmm. Rice and chicken and bacon? No. No. Get off the bacon train. Rice and garden tomatoes? Perhappppps. Oh, but self! How's about some kind of southwestern chicken bake! We have gross condensed cream of chicken soup in the back of the pantry. This sounds familiar! This might become food!

(Google how to thaw a chicken, make sure I use the USDA regulations and not some shady blogger's tips)

(Google "southwestern chicken and rice bake" because if that doesn't sound like real food real people in real kitchens make, I don't know what does. Find this.) Get crackin'!

And so I followed the recipe and made dinner. And it was ready right as Hubs got home. And everyone liked it and it was officially added to the list of things we can eat for dinner. And I spent the rest of the night basking in the glow of main dish success.

And that is the story of how I made my very first dinner for poor old Hubs since we got married in 2009.

The end.

Powdered Milk Magic

So, things got kind of weird last night. I wanted to make English muffins since I had picked up a new set of muffin rings this past weekend at Kitchen Collage. I'd made them before for a very ill-fated birthday breakfast for poor Hubs. One of the ingredients in the Alton Brown recipe for English muffins I use is powdered milk, which is apparently sold only in tonnage.

As I made the muffins and eyed the four tupperwares full of powdered milk that I own, I got a brain flash: why not make cheese with fake milk? I shall be the Kraft of This Humble Home, I crowed, eager to get the fake milk made and into cheese before Hubs noticed because I was 99% sure he was going to be skeezed out by powdered milk, just like I would be if I thought about it too much.

So I just got to steppin'. I mixed up a gallon of fake milk, using a half pint of whole cream I had lying around and tap water, plus 5 1/3 cups fake milk.

Then, I followed my regular mozzarella-making steps while the English muffin dough was rising. Aside form the fact that it had to sit off the heat about twice as long as regular milk mozzarella, it seemed to be going just fine.

I was pretty frantic between stirring the cheese curds and flipping the muffins, but I survived by the skin of my teeth.

When I finally finished, we had English muffin pizzas with the new cheese. And they were delightful.

The verdict? I'll totally make fake milk cheese again. Since I have to buy the fancy milk in glass bottles to make real milk cheese, the cost per ball ends up at about $2.50-$3.00 per ball, same as Bel Giosso at the store. But with fake milk, I can get my mozz fix for $.50-$.75 per ball (all I need to buy is the whole cream). Perfect for this cheapskate!

Trust the cheesemaker

I have made cheese. I am a cheese maker.

Making cheese is a tall order for a gal who has a physical inability to read a recipe from start to finish before starting to cook/bake/cheesemake. It's technical business, but I have succeeded (with zero cuss words!).

Hubs, being the thoughtful, cheese-loving soul he is, bought me this book a while back, but with the basement and the recovery period after the basement, I just wasn't in a cheese-making state of mind.

The local homebrew shop recently expanded and now has all the supplies needed for making all kinds of superfun cheeses. This, coupled with an intense need to make stuff, led to my Monday night cheese making party for one.

One ingredient in almost all cheeses is cheese salt. Can you imagine a single ingredient more dear to (and bad for - so we're talking moderation here, people) my little heart than cheese salt? It's like when people who are into social things and music things can see their two favorite bands in one concert. Cheese salt is the small-scale Lollapalooza of my world.

Anywho - makin' cheese. It's easy and I used a recipe from the book for 30 minute mozzarella, which is so delicious and easy, I don't know why anyone would even make the more complicated mozzarella, but whatevs.

You start by heating up whole milk (I used a local gallon of Picket Fence since it isn't Ultra-Pasteurized) and then you drop in some citric acid solution. Science!

It heats up and you stir, stir, stir while trying to keep the cats out of the trash and eating that milk gallon topper. Next, you drop in some rennet (that's the inside of a sheep or cow's stomach! I'm not vegetarian, but I used veggie rennet because frankly, I'm squeamish about stomach insides. Call me kooky.) and let the whole thing set and form a curd, which you'll cut down with a knife to make the next step easier.

Then, you stir and heat the curds and whey. Eventually, you're done stirring and heating up and the party moves to the microwave. You nuke and knead the curds until they look like mozzarella. It's pretty easy to tell when you're done because the cheese will pull and stretch like taffy. If you've got something that looks like mozzarella and pulls like taffy, good work!

I ended up with about 3/4 of a pound of cheese which tastes better than it looks here, in the ice bath they sat in for a half hour to get the right consistency.

I told you to trust the cheesemaker! She's a better cheesemaker than she is cell phone photographer.

We had some sliced over a grilled pizza last night. Bellisimo!

Have you tried making your own cheese? It wasn't as hard as I thought!

Slow Sunday

Last night, we finally had a creative dinner. We haven't had the energy to cook up the amazing and thoughtful dishes we were used to in our pre-basement days, but last night, we finally slowed back down and got cooking.

We kept it pretty simple - hummus and pitas - but it felt so good to be kneading bread and having something going in the slow cooker all afternoon.

For the pitas, we used Tyler Florence's recipe. The hummus was a Hubs creation, using garbanzo beans, home-made tahini (which is really just ground up sesame seeds and totally not worth the $7s a jar grocery stores charge), garlic and salt. We cooked the pitas on a pizza stone on the grill and were foodgeeking out over the fact that they really puffed and had pockets just like real, actual pitas.

As you can see, one recipe makes a boatload of pita bread and we totally overshot on our hummus needs.

The best part was the addition of zatar seasoning. It's a Middle Eastern blend of sumac, sesame seeds, thyme and salt that perks up anything it touches. We're seriously obsessed. There have been talks to a zatar seasoned burger with tzatiki or avocado. Gettin' pretty wild up in this kitchen.

Of course, after dinner, we acted like total nutsos and walked the cats around the patio. Niles loves the peonies almost as much as I do.

How was your weekend?

My own Throwdown: Alton vs. P-Dubs

First, a very happy birthday to the man who actually ate (and claims to have enjoyed) the Hollandaise sauce I made this morning, only after I woke him up with a smoke alarm. Happy birthday, Hubs and thank you for stopping the smoke alarm. You are the wind beneath my wings. And I mean that.

I believe you can see where this story, a recap of my grandiose plans to make a simple egg dish, is heading.

It all started yesterday, when I made a quick lunch time run to a small grocery store to grab what I needed: eggs, butter, English muffins and spinach. Much to my dismay, there were no English muffins to be had. So, I got my geek on and pulled up Alton Brown's English muffin recipe on my phone. The recipe didn't seem that difficult, but it did call for powdered milk, which said tiny grocery store also did not have.

Off I dashed to a bigger store, where I purchased the last remaining box of powdered milk. It weighed four pounds and seemed to have been packaged in the mid to late 80s.

Regardless, I was determined to make amazing English muffins.

Which I did.

Point: Alton

There is a learning curve, though. Less batter in the ring leads to fluffier, airy muffins, FYI.

So, with the muffins made, I went to bed for a brief rest before my early morning wake up call to prepare an amazing birthday breakfast for Hubs.

I used the Pioneer Woman eggs Benedict recipe. Now, I must saw that PW has never, ever steered me wrong before. Between her and Alton, I assumed my plan was foolproof. Not. So. Fast.

Her recipe asked me to poach and egg. "Just swirl the water and crack in an egg!" she wrote. Like it was nothing.

Four eggs, two pots of boiling water and one slightly scalded appendage later, I did indeed have poached eggs. But I'm not sure it was really worth it.

Meanwhile, I was supposed to be melting butter and preparing the Hollandaise (which! In case you aren't aware is just egg yolks and butter). An unfortunate series of events led to black, burning butter, a smoke alarm fiasco and a last-minute realization that I'd forgotten lemons - apparently a key ingredient.

And so, my Hollandaise was a watery mess of yolks, properly melted butter and bottled lime juice. It was way too rich for me and not at all the magical sauce I'd imagined when I learned that I'd be combining butter and egg yolks.

Negative point: Pioneer Woman

(Note: There exist no photos of the breakfast-making portion of this event due to the fact that I was frazzled, barely awake and burning everything that could be burned)

Hubs, however, rated the dish a 5 (on a scale of 1-10 of all foods, not just foods I've made) and is either a better liar than I thought, has a cold, rendering his taste buds useless or is way more enthusiastic about butter than I realized.

Winner: Alton, who has never given me directions that caused my smoke alarm to go off before 7:00 a.m.

Oh well. Tonight we're celebrating at Baru 66, a proper French restaurant, where I'm sure everything will be delightful and I can finally get this yolk-y taste out of my mouth.

Also!

Where are your favorite restaurant eggs Benedict? I'm sure they are lovely when made by wide-awake pros.

The One Plate Thanksgiving Dinner

Thanksgiving is a time for tradition, a time for family. Well, in the Bigger, Better, Best neck of the woods, we tend to enjoy getting creative with traditions (except for the scared ones, like quoting every line of Christmas Vacation, pancakes on Saturdays and listening to the Muppets and John Denver whilst decking the halls) and we are the only ones of our particular DNA structure within a five hour radius.

And so, we decided to celebrate Thanksgiving a little early, with pals, and by creating a one-dish meal that captured everything Thanksgiving. Literally.

Remember when we did something similar with Oktoberfest? Well, the "Let's make this holiday into a pizza" bug bit again and this time, we were hellbent on getting an entire Thanksgiving feast onto a pie.

Of course, we had to start with a turkey. Hubs went for a whole bird, just a little 10-pounder, and salt brined with with lemon peel and lots of herbs.

 It was hands down, the best turkey I've ever had (sorry, Dad).

We mixed our regular pizza crust with a cornbread mix that was flavored with sage and other herbs to give it a stuffing-ish taste.

After the crust baked on its own for a few minutes, we spread a thin layer of mashed potatoes on it.

Then came a cranberry sauce, flavored with a Thai chile and spicy cinnamon as well as fried green beans and onions.

I lost the wishbone and any discernible chin-in-profile.

 We also made up a gravy to top the pizza with.

 And here is what we ended up with:

 It was delicious and really tasted like a full Thanksgiving meal with every bite.

Your family might revolt if this was real Thanksgiving, but for a couple of culinarily curious kids the week before the big day, this was totally radical. Dude.

We've got gas

Pardon me for playing to the lowest form of comedy all week. I'm tired.

Anyway, after we got the gas line and electric hookups set for the stove (turns out, when you get an amazing Craigslist deal, it might be missing a few key pieces - like the regulator required to keep the house from becoming a gas bomb), it was time to give it a test run. Of course, Hubs donned his safety goggles and a blanket, just in case.

Once we established that our house wasn't so vengeful as to blow us up, we caulked that puppy in and secured it with some extra screws.

Tonight we'll add a panel to the cabinets beneath, to cover up where the old knobs used to be and finally put all our pots and pans back where they belong. Talk about a wild Friday night, right?

Oh, and in case you're wondering - the first official meal cooked on this fabulous new stove was a fried egg for Hubs' breakfast. We were highly entertained by how fast the pan got hot; this stove will provide hours of entertainment.

What are your weekend plans?

Bummy Burners

Back in January 2009, when Hubs and I were walking through this house for the very first time, we stood in the kitchen and had this conversation:

Hubs, voice heavy with disappointment: "Oh, it's not a gas stove."
Me, taking a cue from many an episode of House Hunters: "No, but that's something we can switch out real easy."

Oh, silly old-time Alexson! You didn't know that a million other projects would pop up before you got around to this one.

Here's what we've been cooking on for the past year and a half-ish:

Gag, y'all. (I mean, it's listed on Craigslist and you totally want it. You're getting slee-eeepy. Look at the swinging watch. Buy. The. Stove.)

It's original to our 1955 house and you can see the avocado finish that once was, before it was spray painted (I. Know.). Of course, the paint has seen better days, as evidenced here:

The paint, though, isn't the worst part. The knobs just don't make sense. Warm - low - 3 - 2 - high? What the heck, GE? Now you tell me how a gal's supposed to get her queso properly melty with a crazymixedup set-up like this. Is 2 hotter than 3? That is just bananas.

This is why, in true Bigger, Better, Best style, we decided to call up a plumber (who is also loyal reader Stormy's husband!) to hook up a gas stove. We figured that as long as the basement is torn up and we're stimulating the heck out of the local economy, why not throw one more project on top? Bigger, better best fo' life, kids.

I found a pretty sweet gas stovetop on Craigslist for a steal over the summer - it will be quite the upgrade!

Fun fact: This might be the most practical project we've done to date!

Can't wait to show you the finished project. We were missing a small but important piece that should be here soon. Then, it's on, yo.

Oktoberfeast!

Last year, we planned to have some friends over for a hearty dinner before heading out to Oktoberfest. Our plan was to somehow build a German pizza to get us all jazzed up for the evening's festivities. We started out not really knowing how we'd do this, but we were armed with brats and kraut and lots of mustard.

Everyone added a little twist to our original idea and soon our kitchen was fill of steam and people cooking. We made a giant soft pretzel crust, topped with brats, a mustard cream and kraut on the side. When we sat down to eat, we enjoyed the most amazing pizza ever.

So, this year, we replicated the pizza. With a few updates, it was even better than the original - crispy crust and melty swiss with mustard.



And, for our second Oktoberfeast, we added an appetizer - German eggrolls.

We made some schnitzel (pounded and breaded pork with sage leaves) and rolled it up with apple, kraut, eggs and capers. I know that sounds really gross, but the sauerkraut mellowed out and it was super awesome.

Next year - the pressure is on to add another great course. Any ideas?

Chopping Tips, A Cautionary Tale

Lights up. Sunday night. Husband and wife are preparing dinner. Husband is making burger patties and wife is standing over a mandolin slicer, a small pile of sweet potatoes beside her. A fryer bubbles away on the counter.

Wife: Have you seen the finger guard for this thing? Slicing without it makes me nervous.
Husband: No, but don't worry about it. I'll slice the potatoes when I'm done with this.
Wife: (picking up a large washed and peeled potato) I can do it alright so long as it's a big potato. (Begins using the mandolin to slice the potato for potato chips).
Wife: (examining the chips she has sliced) Shoot. These are too thick. They won't be very crispy. (Turns dial down to make slices thinner) Are you sure you haven't seen the finger guard? I'm getting close.
Husband: No, but just wait and I'll do it.
Wife: (slicing quickly because clearly, she found her groove and can do no wrong) EXPLETIVE! (begins jumping up and down) My finger! I lost my finger!
Husband: (turns to her in a panic, then to the counter top, presumably to find the missing finger bit) Where?! Are you OK?
Wife: (looking at finger, notices a not small chunk is missing from the tip of her right index finger) OK, I didn't loose it, but I can't look at it anymore. I have to lie down. What if I'd left it on the thick setting? This could be much uglier. We need to clean the baseboards in here like whoa.
(Husband brings tissues and wife lays on kitchen floor, holding finger in tissue above her head. Husband returns to mandolin to ensure no finger parts will be on the menu and to finish slicing chips. Her view:)

(After the husband has chopped and fried the potato chips, the wife slowly gets up and tries a potato chip. She smiles in approval, knowing that at least her digit-mangling resulted in a tasty batch of spicy sweet potato chips.)

And scene.

Seriously, people, this is not, could not be a work of fiction. Typing is slow going up in here.

Lesson: either find the damn finger guard or wait for a pro to step in. Impatience for fried foods maims.

Love,

The 9.5 Finger Bandit

Baby steps

One of my goals this summer was to can something. Maybe a salsa, or a jam, or a sauce - I didn't have anything pinned down yet. But, after realizing that resurrecting our basement from a teensy bit of water (seriously, who knew less than an inch of water could wreak such havoc?) would be a much larger job than anticipated, I chucked the goal of canning and figured smaller goals like not crying on the phone to the insurance guy and trash people might be a little healthier.

Then, I discovered freeze canning. Flipping wistfully through my old Better Homes and Gardens cookbook (that's the plaid one. Everyone has one.), waiting for some contractor or other to call me back with a quote, I saw a section on freeze canning - or, canning for people who cannot emotionally handle real hardy woman canning. Having just gotten a bag of apples from our beloved CSA, I decided the apple butter recipe would work. It was really easy and it tastes better than any apple butter I've bought at a store.

Basically, you just boil down some apples and simmer them with some spices until thick.

Just what I needed to boost my confidence and remind me that though the basement is overwhelming, Hubs and I are truly, truly blessed. We have great jobs, our health, fabulous friends and family and a buttload of apple butter. What more could we ask for?