Experiment 22 - 24-Hour Omelet

Ingredients list

This is not actually an omelet.  I believe technically it is a type of strata.

A few things to notice about my ingredients - I used skim milk, because I don't ever have whole milk in the house.  I used the "Mexican blend" shredded cheese that I had on hand, because hey, why not?  And if you look close you'll see the bag of mustard seeds there.  I don't have any dry mustard, but I have the seeds and the infamous "motar" and pestle, so it's all good.

The preparation was very simple.  First, grease a small casserole or baking dish (approx 3 cup or 5" x 7").  I ended up using a dish that was too big, which may have presented a problem (more about that later) Butter the bread, then cut into 1" squares.

Scatter half the bread and half the cheese into the baking dish.  Then do it again with the other half of the bread and the cheese. Whisk together the rest of the ingredients,

 and pour over the bread.  Press down on the bread to help it soak up the egg mixture, then cover the dish with plastic wrap and stick it into the refrigerator for at least eight hours, up to 24 (see also: name of recipe).

When it's time to cook, just stick it into a 350 degree oven for an hour.

Mine came out a little well-done.  I think that's a combination of using a dish that was too big and having an oven that's not well-calibrated.

Verdict - meh.  Maybe if I had used the proper sized baking dish, it would have been better.  As it was, this just seemed like eggs and toast, all mixed together.  If I wanted a breakfast bowl, I'd go to Bob Evans.  Which reminds me, I had bought sausage to have with this, and I completely forgot to cook it.  D'oh!
Lessons Learned - pay attention to the instructions on the size of the baking dish!.
Tools needed - I really need some measuring spoons that can help me with the 1/8 and 1/4 tsp measures that many of these recipes have called for.
Skills needed - nothing at all.

Experiment 22 - The Selection

Another break in the action, courtesy of good weather and an attempt to have one of those things, ummmm, a "social life" I think it's called.  I'm not going to go nuts trying to do too many things in a week, and cooking is, for better or worse, lower on the priority list than some other things.  I'll see how the summer goes.  I'll post as often as I can, that's all I can say.

For this week I decided to search through a great cookbook I'd gotten for Christmas - Cooking for Two, 2010 from America's Test Kitchen.  I searched the ATK site  for a copy of the recipe that I could link to, but didn't even find their "full-size" version of the recipe.  There are other sites out there that seem to have no qualms with posting verbatim copies of ATK's work, but we don't do that here.  I might have trouble keeping up with the schedule I initially set up for myself, but one thing I won't compromise on is my avoidance of copyright issues.

So I was flipping through this cookbook and landed in the breakfast section.  I got tempted by a recipe for a 24-Hour "Omelet".  The quotes are because this isn't really an omelet as you'd normally think of one.  More details on that in the next post.  One advantage to this one is that the prep work is done the night before the cooking, and even though I'll be using the oven, it will be early in the day, before the heat gets too crazy.  (First day of summer here and suddenly the temperature hit 98 F)

24-Hour "Omelet"
1 tablespoon unsalted butter, softened
2 slices high-quality white sandwich bread
3 ounces cheddar cheese, shredded (about 3/4 cup)
3/4 cup whole milk
2 large eggs
1/4 cup grated onion
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon dry mustard
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1/8 teaspoon hot sauce

I will not even have to shop for this, I have everything I need on hand.

Experiment 21 - Irish Whiskey Cake with Dark Chocolate

Ingredients list

A few years ago, I spent most of the spring and summer unemployed, but still getting paid, thanks to a relatively decent severance package.  An intelligent, frugal person would have saved every extra penny during that time.  Me, I bought things from eBay and Amazon, including a refurbished KitchenAid stand mixer.  The reason I mention that is that I got to use my mixer for this week's recipe; I haven't used it much since that summer of leisure, I guess I was just preparing for the time I'd start a recipe blog and randomly choose a recipe that called for it.

I usually don't just copy and paste the instructions, due to possible copyright issues, but I'm going to go out on a limb here.  I can't find anything with this exact recipe name in my searches, so I hope there's no problem. I'm surely not making any money from this.  And I did throw in a couple photos and notes in between the steps.

But first, here are all the ingredients --

Directions:
0. Preheat your oven to 350°
1. Butter and flour a bundt cake pan
I used some Pam made for baking, that has both the oily stuff and the flour, because I'm lazy like that.
2. In a bowl, stir together flour, salt, and baking powder.
3. In a separate bowl, stir together whiskey, oil, and milk. Set bowls aside.
Since you've got the whiskey bottle open anyway, now would be a good time to have a wee glass o' the good stuff.
4. In a stand mixer, using paddle attachment, beat butter until smooth.
According to the label, one stick of butter is 113 grams.  Since the recipe called for 110g, I got crazy and used the whole stick.
5. Add sugar and vanilla and beat well.
Measuring the vanilla is the only time I had to check online for a conversion.  Turns out that 10 ml is just a tad over 2 teaspoons.
6. Add eggs and egg whites 1 at a time, beating after each addition.
7. Add liquid and dry alternately to butter mixture stirring just to incorporate.
8. Gently stir chocolate through batter.
9. Pour finished batter into prepared pan

(I took this photo mostly so you could see how much of a mess I generally make when doing these recipes)

 and bake in a preheated 350° oven 45-55 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the cake comes out clean or with just a few crumbs
10. Remove from pan to cooling rack and cool completely.
Completely?  But it smells so good, and warm cake is yummy.

Verdict: Oh my, yes.  Now bear in mind, this is not a "chocolate" cake.  This is a cake with small bits of chocolate in it.  And it's very very good.

Lessons Learned - nothing new this week.
Tools needed - I didn't have to buy anything this week, as I'd bought the KitchenAid mixer several years ago, just for this moment.
Skills needed - nothing new this week, although I used my relatively new skill of egg separating that I taught myself several recipes ago.

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.