What's cookin' ?

[Veldan Rath]

I may be over hyping The Lasagna, as I've not had it for a few months. But I know it's better than certain spinach ones.

[littlelolligagged]

My spinach lasagna makes imaginary friends sing.

[earthJoker]

My lasagne al forno brings all the girls to the yard!

[Flixy]

Lasagna with spinach and fish and shrimp is also excellent! For vegetarian lasagna I usually make one with alternate layers of spicy tomato-mushroom sauce and broccoli-mustard-cream sauce

EarthJoker - I'm pretty sure al forno just means it was in an oven, like, well, all lasagnas? Or am I missing something?

[GGT]

ah, the language of food....

[Veldan Rath]

Salsa Chicken!

[earthJoker]

EarthJoker - I'm pretty sure al forno just means it was in an oven, like, well, all lasagnas? Or am I missing something?

Lasagne al forno is the dish, while lasagne is just the name of the pasta: http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lasagne

You may use google translate on this page.

[Flixy]

That makes sense, though even when I was in Italy most places lost the al forno bit.

Made some yesterday, it was excellent. Friend who had been to a restaurant the same evening and had lasagna there said mine was better when he tried

[earthJoker]

I assume it is clear that a restaurant won't serve you raw pasta. In the supermarket over here, you can get the pasta labeled as "Lasange" and the microwave dish as "Lasange al forno".

[Flixy]

Over here the pasta is sold as lasagne sheets funny, those small differences between countries. Must have slipped in the language here ages ago.

I suppose there are also lasagne dishes that don't go in the oven, but I don't think I've ever had that.

[earthJoker]

You have to be aware that we have an Italian speaking part and over 20% of the population has some Italian heritage. So we often stick to more original Italian terms.

[Aimless]

The freckled one is making Tjälknöl:

http://strictlypaleoish.com/2013/03/02/tjalknol/

[size=14pt]If I would translate “Tjälknöl”, it would be “Frost Lump” (“Tjäle” is the Swedish word for frozen ground, and a “knöl” is a lump), and it’ll all make perfect sense in a bit…

Tjälknöl is a fairly young dish, it was invented in the early 80′s, and as for many great inventions it happened by mistake, here’s the story:

Ragnhild Nilsson, the wife of moose hunter Eskil Nilsson, asked her husband one evening to thaw a frozen moose steak in the oven on low temperature. He did… and forgot about it, and Ragnhild found it still laying in the oven the next day.
She understood it would be rather tasteless eating it like that, so in an attempt to save it she placed it in a brine for a few hours. When they later ate it, they both found it to be not only delicious, but also extremely juicy and tender…
A year or so later, she submitted the recipe for a national contest to find new regional signature dishes, and won!
Tjälknöl was declared the new signature dish of Medelpad (a region of northern Sweden), and it was spread nation wide.[/size]

This was the first thing she ever cooked for me, on our first home-date, but even without the nostalgia it's really freakin' delicious. I can't wait till tomorrow mmmm... moose

[Aimless]

Oh god the meat was just so succulent... had it with polenta and some other delicious stuff but the meat just stole the show <3

[GGT]

I was running low on coffee, so I added some dark tea bags to the brew....it was pretty good!

[Aimless]

For dinner tonight:

Vichyssoise with delicious gruyère gougéres

Beer-cooler Flat iron steak (tastier than rib-eye, second only to the tenderloin in tenderness, cheaper than both)
served with gnocchi parisienne (more like spätzle parisienne or gnücchi pariesienne?)
and creamy sautéed wild mushrooms

I've nailed the pâte Ã* choux for the gougéres and the gnocchi and must also say that gruyère is def. the right cheese for these douchy cheese-puffs if you love steak and haven't tried this method already, try making it in a large beer-cooler in heavy-duty freezer-bags. I had mine in there for a couple of hours at about 55 C and then patted them dry and seared them quickly on each side. They came out juicy, flavourful and perfectly pink all the way through with no darker over-cooked areas. Even the thick seam of connective tissue running through these improperly processed steaks was made pliant by this low-and-slow approach.

Anyway, bon appetit and skål!

[Lor]

Tonight, I'll be attempting Τραχανά σούπα or souppa Trachana to some. I'll boil some chicken first and then use the 'broth' to cook the soup unless the wife decides she wants to try in which case I'll have to use a vegetable stock. Pesky veggies! .

[Flixy]

This thread annoys me, since I currently live in a place without a kitchen so I can't cook. There's a meal included in the rent, but it's served in the cafetaria, and the quality is.. well, it's not gross, but it's not exactly haute cuisine either. And I miss cooking myself!

[GGT]

Aw, I feel for ya, Flixy.

I made a nice pork tenderloin rub using kosher salt, cracked peppercorns, cardamom, cinnamon, curry, and rosemary. I threw in some sage by habit. Turned out quite well. Really easy and tasty meat dish without any fuss. Rub and roast, 30 minutes later the meal is ready.

[Aimless]

Just made some of the best burgers I've ever made.

Patty: Coarse-ground chuck, salt, pepper, an egg, a small amount of highly reduced juniper-flavoured elk stock, capers, fried/toasted onions.

Toppings: chevrette cheese, aubergine-slices fried in mustardseed oil

Bun: thinly sliced sourdough bread with little flakes of sea-salt.

Aubergines are just the best

[GGT]

Juniper flavored elk stock? Gee, thanks for sharing that special recipe ingredient.

[Aimless]

I don't know what kinda bizarre squid-laundering food-desert you hail from but juniper berry is one of the most traditional flavourings in game dishes in Sweden.

[GGT]

I'd have to shop in Minnesota, or maybe at an IKEA store to find juniper or lingonberry flavors. Elk or moose stock isn't so easy to find on US grocery shelves, either. It's hard enough to get venison like bison, and no 'traditional' grocery store sells deer meat.

[Aimless]

If it's any consolation we don't have your crisco and abundance of mayonnaise

I made a cake yesterday that I think may be one of my best ever. I blended a mixture of toasted nuts (walnuts, hazelnuts and cashews) into a nut-butter/paste, made a ganache-like mixture using a little cream and a lot of dark chocolate where half of it contained a creamy lemon-ginger filling, whipped some egg-whites into a stiff foam, mixed it all together (oh yeah, there was some sugar, vanilla and sea-salt involved too) and then chucked it in the oven for a while.

Everyone seemed to like it warm, but the texture and consistency of the gooey centre was not to my liking. It was the wrong kinda lava! But after a day in the fridge, holy crap, so frickin' delicious! The possibilities are ENDLESS

[GGT]

Anyone with eggs, milk, and oil can make a mayonnaise. Making, or finding, "elk stock", or "elk burgers" is entirely different.

[Aimless]

Well in that case sucks to be you

Made a really tasty and incredibly simple soup today. I guess you could say it's inspired by the vichyssoise and the basic idea can be adapted to many other ingredients.

Cook large chunks of peeled and seeded butternut squash in about 1.3-1.5 L chicken-stock together with half a thickly sliced leek (I prefer the white part for this), garlic (I used some that had been marinated in oil and herbs because I'm lazy and they were there) and toasted onion (because I'm lazy and because it's YUM). Add spices to taste, eg. nutmeg, fresh-ground pepper and a reasonably hot fresh red chili. Blend everything into a puree using a hand-held blender (be careful!). Remove from heat, add cream to taste and toss in some peeled shrimps. Wait a few minutes and then ENJOY

Everything in the recipe is "to taste" but I didn't taste it at all while cooking and fortunately it turned out PERFECT. You can replace the butternut with courgettes or a variety of starchy veggies, but I prefer butternut for the colour and for the mild but distinctive flavour (it's a pain in the ass to peel and cut though). I usually make this soup with home-made shrimp-stock but using chicken bouillon cubes is so very much easier and still delicious. You can replace the shrimp with fresh fish, eg. cod, pangasius, salmon etc. A bit of crunch is also nice, eg. garlic flavoured croutons, bruschetta, gougeres or just good old grilled cheese sandwiches it's good hot, warm or cold (becomes a lot thicker when cold). Some people may want to add some sourness, eg. lemon juice or tomato paste.

[rumrunner]

I'd have to shop in Minnesota, or maybe at an IKEA store to find juniper or lingonberry flavors. Elk or moose stock isn't so easy to find on US grocery shelves, either. It's hard enough to get venison like bison, and no 'traditional' grocery store sells deer meat.

All you gotta do is wait till deer/elk season, get the proper tags, and take your rifle to the mountains. Our is that just me? As far as things like buffalo(bison) they don't have enough fat in the meat. I mean no marbleing to speak of. It gives the meat a rougher texture and less flavor of its own. Adding other fats, such as cow, helps with the texture a bit and helps it cook through without burning. At least that's the case with what's available at the local mountain stores here.

[Flixy]

Made gnocchi with beetroot, with an orange-sage-butter sauce. It was okay, but to be honest not really worth the effort. Last night's beetroot risotto with bacon (and some rocket leaves) was a lot better, and way less work! (yeah, we had some beetroots to get rid of )

And Monday I made chicken with honey, soy sauce and rhubarb in the oven, a combination I wouldn't have thought of myself, but really tasty. Also very simple! Rub some chicken legs with olive oil, soy sauce and honey, put it in the oven, and after twenty minutes add rhubarb that's alright mixed with some honey and bake until it's done.

[GGT]

Rosemary for practically everything. It's the best herb in my garden. It's great on fish, chicken, beef, potatoes, eggs, cheese.. German Thyme is so-so, but Basil is a complete bust. Not sure why.

[GGT]

I made the best chicken dinner using a charcoal kettle grill. Marinated thigh meat in a brine solution, then used several spices (a spicy curry) as a rub, followed by a syrup-based glaze. The recipe called for sorghum, but I couldn't find it in my grocery stores so I substituted dark corn syrup and brown sugar and hoped for the best. Smoked the whole thing with apple wood chips on top of the charcoal.

Even though the first moments of grilling was engulfed in flame it turned out quite well. Fantastic flavors. Spicy, sweet, moist and juicy, with some burnt crust. Also soaked and grilled corn-on-the-cob in their husks, and made roasted red pepper "pimiento" at the same time, along with baby potatoes and Vidalia onions wrapped in foil. Yummy grilling.


PS, pretty much anything that begins with "C" is good in almost any meat recipe. Cumin, coriander, cardamom, clove, cinnamon, cayenne, chile, cilantro, chive, celery, caraway. Even cantaloupes, cucumbers, and coconut counts. If you don't want to use meat, use chickpeas instead.

[Aimless]

I made the best chicken dinner using a charcoal kettle grill. Marinated thigh meat in a brine solution, then used several spices (a spicy curry) as a rub, followed by a syrup-based glaze. The recipe called for sorghum, but I couldn't find it in my grocery stores so I substituted dark corn syrup and brown sugar and hoped for the best. Smoked the whole thing with apple wood chips on top of the charcoal.

Even though the first moments of grilling was engulfed in flame it turned out quite well. Fantastic flavors. Spicy, sweet, moist and juicy, with some burnt crust. Also soaked and grilled corn-on-the-cob in their husks, and made roasted red pepper "pimiento" at the same time, along with baby potatoes and Vidalia onions wrapped in foil. Yummy grilling.


PS, pretty much anything that begins with "C" is good in almost any meat recipe. Cumin, coriander, cardamom, clove, cinnamon, cayenne, chile, cilantro, chive, celery, caraway. Even cantaloupes, cucumbers, and coconut counts. If you don't want to use meat, use chickpeas instead.

I disagree with cantaloupe but GOOD JOB!

Good Food Weekend



Finished work early yesterday so I had time to roam around town for a while and found some nice (and, for us, unusual) bits of meat at prices similar to the not-very-nice overpriced meat to be found at most stores.

So, today, we had a kind of egg drop soup for lunch (nice reasonably spicy chicken broth thickened with okra rather than starch, with a few other thinly sliced veggies, some duck confit--and, of course, an egg) and, for dinner, a small dry-aged beer-cooler-sous-vide steak with assorted seaweeds, some pan-fried polenta (SO GOOD) and sauteed mushroom (one the ginger had found while out walking and that probably will not kill us).

And, for dessert, a very chocolatey chocolate zabaglione (zabaione, sabayon, Za'ab Ayon al'Chocolate). Basic recipe: whip three egg-yolks in a bain-marie (just warming up) with a bit of tasty sugar until very fluffy, let it heat up properly, mix in a small amount of really dark chocolate, whisk in a nice sweet wine (usually a marsala wine; I have had a bit of leftover moscatel dessert wine lying in the fridge for a while so I used that). Serve warm!

I love eggs and I esp. love custard.

Tomorrow, we'll have some leftover soup that I'll change a little, and for dessert I'll try my hand at cooking secreto iberico de bellota. There's just no easy way to say that. It's a part called "secreto" and the animal is a spanish breed of pig called iberico and this one was allowed to wander around gorging itself on acorns. It tastes delicious in restaurants, we'll see if I can do right by it