Experiment 21 - The Selection

Instead of reaching into the big box of recipes this week, I picked a file from one of the many disks I have files on.  Packrattery by electronics still is a terrible thing.

I did make a tasty chocolate pie not all that long ago, but the recipe I chose sounded really good to me.  I also liked the measurements being all presented in metric.  I don't know how useful that will make it to anybody else who might stumble upon this blog and try to make the recipe.  If possible, I'll try to jot down the conversions as I go when I prepare this on Saturday or Sunday.  I also liked that the actual preparation calls for using my stand mixer, but let's not get ahead of things!                                              

Irish Whiskey Cake with Dark Chocolate 
Ingredients:
340 g all-purpose flour
5 g salt
15 g baking powder
110 g unsalted butter
365 g sugar
10 ml vanilla
3 eggs
2 egg whites
100 ml Irish whiskey (Jameson recommended)
80 ml canola oil
125 ml milk
50 g good quality chopped chocolate

Experiment 20 - Veal Francaise

Ingredients list

Hey, welcome back, hope you enjoyed your long holiday weekend.  I traveled to Virginia Beach and rode my bicycle up and down the boardwalk a couple of times, once without benefit of sunscreen, so I'm paying for that mistake.  Once I got home Sunday evening, the chance to go have hot dogs* on the grill and drink beers with some friends was much more interesting to me than messing up the kitchen.  I did go out and grab the lemon and a bottle of wine in order to have everything on hand, but I didn't make this until Monday evening.  But hey, who else had Veal Francais for their Memorial Day cookout?

As noted previously, this was nearly identical to the Veal Piccata from week five, just subtract garlic and add eggs.

After taking the above picture, I squeezed the lemon for the required juice and measured out the wine.  From there it was all straightforward.  Combine the flour, salt and pepper in a bowl (or bag, they say).  Pound the veal until very thin and dredge it in the flour mixture, then set aside.  Beat the eggs in a separate bowl until frothy.  Melt the butter in a large skillet using medium high heat.  Then dunk the veal in the egg and place in the pan - don't overlap, and cook in batches as necessary.  Cook until golden brown, turning once.

Place the veal on a warmed serving platter, then add the wine and lemon to the pan, scraping up the crunchy bits with a whisk or fork.  Bring just to boiling then pour over the meat and serve.

I had mine with yellow rice, green beans, and red tomatoes.

Verdict: It was very good, but all in all, I'd rather have the veal piccata - garlic is always welcome, eggs, not so much.  And capers, gosh darn it, capers.

Lessons Learned - nothing new this week.
Tools needed - nothing new this week.
Skills needed - nothing new this week.


*If you have a Trader Joe's nearby, I highly recommend the all beef uncured hot dogs.  They're huge and tasty and have a crispy skin and are just all around wunderbar.

Experiment 20 - The Selection

A funny thing happened on the way to this week's selection post.  I lost the clipping.  But I'd already purchased the meat ingredient, so I was just about ready to crack open the America's Test Kitchen cookbook I got for Christmas, but I decided to search around the house one more time, et voila

Veal Francaise
(although technically, I guess that should be Veau Français, but hey, I gotta post what's on my clipping)

1/2 pound veal scallops or chicken breasts, boned and skinned
1/4 cup flour
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
3 eggs
1/4 cup butter
2 tablespoons dry white wine
1 tablespoon fresh-squeezed lemon juice

This one might be a lot like the Veal Piccata from experiment 5 --

I'll try to avoid the temptation to add capers, even though I think they're one of the best ingredients in the world.

Now, this being a holiday weekend, and me with plans to hit the beach for at least part of it, I might not get around to making this in a timely fashion.  Sunday evening looks promising, but there are no guarantees.  Please stand by.

Experiment 19 - Won Tons

Ingredients list

Shopping was not too bad this week.  For once the "product locator" kiosk at Martin's   was actually helpful, and I found the won ton skins approximately where it said I would.  On the previous experiment, searching for "evaporated milk" came back with no results.  Searching instead for "carnation milk" worked.  Srsly, Martin's?  You make me miss Ukrop's on almost every shopping trip.  Just sayin'....

Anyway, back to the shopping.  The other thing I had trouble finding was ground pork.  It was right there in the meat case, cleverly hidden in plain sight.  Of course I had to buy a package of 1.25 pounds, when I only neeed 40% of that. Reminded me of my problem finding veal a few weeks back.  My kingdom for a butcher shop.  At the end of the day, though, I had everything I needed.

Prep work was pretty simple.  I used my handy Kitchen Aid chopper to make quick work of both the scallions and the water chestnuts.  (I'd almost purchased a can of sliced water chestnuts, but realized that figuring out how many slices make up one nut would have made it difficult to count to 8).  With the chopped items chopped, creating the meat mixture was simple.  Once again, my mis-en-place method was useful.  With everyting laid out (I use those little ramekins for everything!)

Beat the egg, then mix everything else (except the skins of course) together.

My recipe calls for each skin to be cut into quarters.  This resulted in teeny little squares.  The skin recipe (below) says that you should make 3 1/2 inch squares.  The store-bought skins I had were just a tad over 3 inches square.  I really think that extra 1/2 inch would have made a big difference.  But back to the main recipe.  Into each quarter, place 1/2 to 1 TEAspoon of the mixture.  Fold up the corners to meet and seal by pressing gently together.  Wetting your fingertips here can help.  I managed to make 24 tiny little won tons before I decided to use whole skins for the rest.

I have large hands and dealing with 3/4 inch squares of dough was just not working well for me.  Also,  I was only able to get a scant teaspoon full of meat into each of the tiny won tons.  I have to say, dog bless Betty if she actually make 48 of those little suckers for each time she made this recipe.  When I switched to full size skins, I used a tablespoon of meat mixture in each.  In the end, I used 18 skins in total, 6 of them quartered, plus 12 more.

To cook the won tons, boil 4 quarts of water, then add the won tons. Return to a boil and cook for 5 minutes.  Drain in a colander, and run cold water over them to cool.  Once cooked, they can be frozen, or left in the fridge for a few days.

I honestly don't recall how these were served at the work get-togethers mentioned in the selection post.  It was the 80s, what can I say?  I chose to serve warm, with some Trader Joe's gyoza sauce.

The leftovers might be used for some soup later this week.  There is also the matter of leftover ground pork, water chestnuts, scallions, and even wrappers.  Perhaps some kind of "Chinese" meatballs?  Who can say?

Verdict: Very tasty.  I think the tiny ones were too small, and the giant ones were too big.  Obviously, I need to figure out the Goldilocks size.

Lessons Learned - I usually write a shopping list based on the recipe.  Maybe I should take the actual recipe with me - that would avoid potential mis-steps like the whole vs sliced water chestnut issue.
Tools needed - nothing new this week.
Skills needed - nothing new this week.

Won Ton Skin preparation:
Beat the eggs, then blend thoroughly with the flour and salt and knead until smooth.  Cover with a wet paper towel and let stand 15 minutes.  Knead again, then roll on a floured boared until paper thin, making sure board is well-dusted with flour.  Cut into 5 to 6 dozen 3 1/2 inch squares.  If these are notbe be used immediately, the may be stacked together, with each piece being well-floured.  Wrap stack in foil and refrigerate.  This can be kept for about a week.  If squares befome hard or dry, re-moisten by wrapping them in a damp towel.

Experiment 19 - The Selection

And . . . we're back.  Yes, I took an unscheduled, unannounced week off.  Things were getting rather discombobulated and I needed to take a moment to refocus.  Also, last weekend I had multiple things going on outside the house, so the chances of making any specific recipe were pretty much non-existent.

At the place I worked back in the early 90s, we often had get-togethers outside of working hours.  This was back in the days when sometimes you actually liked the people you worked with, and didn't mind seeing them socially.  These events usually involved food, and one of the women I worked with, Betty, often would make this week's dish.  I could have eaten every last piece, every single time.  As with most of the recipes that I've kept stashed away for all these years, I've never before attempted to make these before.  Hopefully they will be as good as I recall.

Won Tons
1 egg
1/2 lb ground pork
1 Tbsp chopped scallion
8 water chestnuts, chopped
1 tsp salt
1/8 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp soy sauce
12 wonton skins

I think I actually have some sesame oil in the cabinet, although it's probably not any good.  Everything else should be easy enough to find at the market.  There is actually a recipe on the back of this piece of paper for the skins, but I'm going to go with store-bought this time, if that doesn't turn out to be a problem.  Just in case, though, I'll list the ingredients:

2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
2 large eggs

Experiment 18 - Chocolate Stout Silk Pie aka Guinness Chocolate Pie

Ingredients list

I'm not going to make any excuses, I'll just report once again that spring time keeps me busy outside the house.  Thus I didn't make this pie until Monday night, and it requires sitting in the refrigerator overnight, and then last night I went to see The Avengers, and by the time I got home, eating pie was in the cards, writing about it was not.

Simple prep, especially since I chose to use a pre-made crust crust.  I even chose a chocolate crust instead of plain graham cracker, because that's how I roll.

Nevertheless, I'll go ahead and transcribe the first part.  I'm not so concerned with any copyright issues on this one, since it came from email.

Preheat oven to 350.  Add melted butter to crushed graham crackers and mix until well blended.  Using fingers, press crust mixture into bottom and up the sides of a pie pan.  Bake crust for about 6 minutes until set.  (You can alternatively use a ready made graham cracker crust.)

[as I did]

For the filling....

Place chocolate, marshmallows and salt in a blender.  Blend until well mixed and chocolate is finely ground.

I have to admit, this part caused some problems.  I have mistreated my blender in many ways over the years, but it has always come through for me.  I fear this was almost too much, as the chocolate caked up around the bottom and I smelled burning.  I think a food processor would be the better appliance in this case.  In any event, I used some spatulas and some knives to mix things up and got things mostly mixed up.

Moving on .... in two separate saucepans (in order to prevent curdling), heat stout and evaporated milk until very hot, but not boiling.

Pour stout and milk into blender and blenf for one minute.  Add vanilla and creme de cacao and blend.  Pour into the crust and refrigerate overnight.

The very hot liquids took care of melting both the chocolate and marshmallows, so despite the issues with the blender, everything worked out fine.

If you hadn't figured it out from before, the creme de cacao was the ingredient that I found a substitute for.  SInce the recipe only calls for one tablespoon, I just couldn't see buying even the smallest bottle of CdC at the ABC store, so instead I chose to pick up a tiny bottle of Godiva chocolate liquer from the selection of miniatures.  And I still have leftovers.

(Sorry about the grainy photos.  The flash in my pocket size camera has died.  It's been tossed around and dropped and performed really well for 8 years, so I can't complain too much.  Next week I'll use my DSLR or phone.)

Verdict: It's GREEEEEAAAAAT.  Maybe just a tad too sweet, if there is such a thing.  Perhaps going with regular graham cracker crust instead of chocolate would help.

Lessons Learned - try to use the right appliance, despite what the recipe says.
Tools needed - nothing new this week.
Skills needed - nothing new this week.

Experiment 18 - The Selection

Usually the general process for this here recipe blog thing is "select, post, shop, cook, post".  Last night, however, I selected a recipe that included an ingredient that I wasn't sure if I could get in a reasonable quantity, so I went shopping first to check on that.

As I grow farther and farther away from the original "random" selection idea, I find it harder and harder to make a choice that sounds good on the night I do the selection and sounds like something I'll still be interested in by the time the weekend rolls around.  Last night I was thinking "dessert" more than anything else, and finally stumbled upon a recipe that came to me in email.  See if you can figure out which item caused me to shuffle up the process this week.

Chocolate Stout Silk Pie, aka Guinness Chocolate Pie

Crust -
1 1/2 cups crushed graham crackers
1/3 cup melted butter

Filling -
12 oz. semi-sweet or bitter-sweet chocolate (chocolate chips work well)
24 large marshmallows
pinch of salt
2/3 cups stout
1/3 cup evaporated milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 T creme de cacao (liquer, light or dark will work)

The body of the email this arrived with also states "some female co-workers of mine call this 'PMS Pie', on the basis that it pretty mush satisfies any chocolate craving."  That's beyond my ken, so I'll leave it to others to judge.  Just throwing it out there.

Experiment 17 - Swiss Chicken Cutlets and Swiss Vegetable Medley

Ingredients lists

Another late post.  I've been busier than a hooker at a Secret Service convention.  And today is officially selection day as well.  I'll get to that later.

Shopping was pretty simple this (last?) week.  I needed to pick up some chicken broth, cheese, sour cream and vegetables.  Everything was where I expected to find it in the store for a change.  Here is everything laid out, ready to start the prep.

Let's start with the Vegetable Medley, since that has to cook a bit longer.  The hardest part was remembering to take the veggies out of the freezer and dump them into a colander for several hours to thaw and drain.  I did have to shred the cheese, since I'd bought the giant hunk of cheese seen above.  Once that was ready, everything got tossed into a bowl - with the exception of half the cheese and half the onion rings.  The recipe should have stated "1 cup cheese, divided" and so on, but whatevs.  I just dumped it all into the one quart glass casserole that I have and stirred it up with a wooden spoon to combine everything.  This got covered and placed into a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.

While that was cooking, I flattened the chicken thighs with my handy meat smasher tool (forgot to include that in any of the pictures).  Then I sliced off some pieces of cheese and rolled up one slice of cheese in each piece of chicken, and tied it tightly with kitchen twine.  The recipe says to combine the flour and pepper on a piece of waxed paper - I had some mixed up from something I had cooked earlier in the week, so I just used that.

I was then supposed to melt the butter in a large skillet in order to cook the chicken, but used olive oil.  This was supposedly a "healthy" recipe, why use butter?  And I couldn't skip sauteing up some onions and garlic in the skillet just before adding the chicken rolls.  Good thing I did, but we'll get to that in a moment.  The rolls were cooked over medium heat for about three minutes, turning frequently, until nice and golden.  Then the broth, win and dried oregano were added - except I used additional broth instead of wine.  The heat was brought up until the liquid was boiling, then dropped to medium-low to simmer for 10 to 12 minutes - until the chicken was well cooked and the sauce thickened a bit.

Soon after I got to the simmering step, the 30 minutes for the vegetables had elapsed.  It was time to top the casserole with the remainder of the cheese and onion rings, and continue cooking for 5 more minutes.

This was one of those times when all the timing worked out well.  I pulled the chicken from the pan and removed the string, then I pulled the vegetables from the oven.  I had bought some more fresh herb plants, so I was able to go ahead and garnish with parsley and oregano sprigs as instructed.

Verdict: Let's face it, Swiss cheese isn't really known for its bold flavor.  Both the chicken and the vegetables tasted OK, but they could have used a bit more.  A little bit of oregano popped up in a few bites of the chicken, but it was not part of the dish, it was a "oh hey, I'm here too" sort of thing.  Also, this is approximately how I've made chicken Cordon Bleu in the past (of course with ham in addition the cheese), so I'd just as soon make that anyway.

Lessons Learned - nothing new this week.  Wasn't I supposed to be learning things with this whole experiment thing?
Tools needed - nothing new this week.
Skills needed - nothing new this week.