#turns out it had been cooked with a vegetable bullion

[dragonpyre]

How can you hate onions and garlic? I think we're going to have real beef here. Garlic is the best thing to happen to food since we domesticated grains.

They legit just don’t taste good to me. Like how some people hate the taste of broccoli, I hate the taste of onions. Garlic tho is on thin ice.

[kelleyish]

What’s up internet.  It’s Saturday.  I’m in kind of a crappy mood.

Had dreams about Chip last night.  Actually it was more like this morning, and i kept going back to sleep trying to keep them going, which usually ends up ruining them.  This time was no exception, started off really nice but ended with him living in another state and possibly cheating on me lol.

I reblogged a post last night, a vine from 2016 where a girl supposedly went back in time to 2011.  The 2011 girl said “great, so the world doesn’t end in 2012″ and the 2016 girl says “no but you’re gonna wish it did.”  I’m feeling that in my bones today.  This is truly the darkest timeline, from the view of my 2011 self.  My husband died.  I got fatter than ever.  Trump is president.  

Anyway, on the other end of things, I made a great dinner last night.  There is this store in Dallas, it’s been around for a long time catering to diabetic and low-carb eaters.  They have a line of bread products, I have probably mentioned them before, that are made of wheat flour but it’s been processed somehow so that you don’t digest it.  Now I do have some skepticism about these products, because they taste so good.  They have sliced bread, buns, and even tortillas that you’d never know were out of the ordinary, except of course that they cost 5 times more than normal bread.  They may cause stalls in people, but I haven’t yet stuck to the diet long enough to need to try cutting things like this out.

So, this store not only sells these bread products but also bags of the flour.  It’s also expensive as fuck, but it opens up a lot of opportunities.  So last night I made chicken and dumplings, and they were awesome.  I was worried when I mixed up the dough because it kind of seized up quickly when I added the liquid, and I wondered if they’d be too dense, but they were great.  I mostly winged the recipe but here’s what I did:

Soup:

1/2 large onion

2 ribs celery

2 tbsp coconut oil

1 can chicken broth

4 cups water

1 tbsp chicken Better Than Bullion

2 cooked chicken breasts, chopped ( i used rotisserie)

1 can green beans, drained (or some other vegetable of your choosing)

Scant 1/4 cup Wio flour

1/2 cup heavy cream

Dumpings:

2 cups Wio flour

1 tbsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 1/3 cups heavy cream (maybe more)

Chop up onion and celery and sautee in coconut oil in a large, wide soup pot or dutch oven until tender, about 5 min

Add broth, water, and bullion.  Cover and simmer about 20 minutes

While broth is simmering, make your dumpling dough.  Mix dry ingredients with a whisk, and then stir in cream with a spoon until just incorporated. I ended up using more cream, because my cream was very thick and the dough just kind of seized up.  It may be because it’s not normal flour. I was worried they would turn out too dense, but they were fine.  Set aside dough to rest in the bowl.

In another bowl, mix scant 1/4 cup flour and another 1/2 cup cream, set aside.

After broth has simmered, add your chopped chicken and green beans.  Stir in the flour/cream slurry to thicken and add texture to the broth.  If the soup seems too full of ingredients by now, consider adding some more water.  The dumplings will absorb some, and in the end I wished I’d added some more.  Also taste to make sure it’s salty enough.

Finally drop tablespoonfuls of the dumpling dough onto the simmering soup.  They need to rest on the surface to steam, but they also need a brief dunk in the liquid.  If you drop them from a few inches up they should submerge and pop back up.  If they don’t, just spoon a little liquid over them so they get wet on top.  My pan was very crowded by the time I finished, and I even had a little dough left over i just threw away.  Don’t be afraid to crowd them, they were fine.  Cover the pan again and simmer, don’t lift up the lid a bunch during cooking and let out the steam.  The recipes I looked at called for 20 minutes but I went for 30 because I was concerned about them being so dense.  I don’t know if you can overcook dumplings - if you’re concerned, you could fish one out at 20 minutes and try it.

Well, I started this post with self pity and ended it with a recipe.  That’s how it goes sometimes.

[keto]

Chicken and Dumplings I made these last night and it turned out awesome. One thing to be aware of is that instead of using a normal keto substitute flour like almond or coconut, I used WIO Smart flour. I got it from this store in Dallas, it’s been around for a long time catering to diabetic and low-carb eaters.  They have a line of bread products that are made of wheat flour but it’s been processed somehow so that you don’t hardly digest any of it.  Now I do have some skepticism about these products, because they taste so good.  They have sliced bread, buns, and even tortillas that you’d never know were out of the ordinary, except of course that they cost 5 times more than normal bread.  They may cause stalls in people, but I haven’t yet stuck to the diet long enough to need to try cutting things like this out. Eat at your own risk.So, this store not only sells these bread products but also bags of the flour.  It’s also expensive as hell, but it opens up a lot of opportunities.  So last night I made chicken and dumplings, and they were awesome.  I was worried when I mixed up the dough because it kind of seized up quickly when I added the liquid, and I wondered if they’d be too dense, but they were great.  I mostly winged the recipe but here’s what I did:Soup:1/2 large onion2 ribs celery2 tbsp coconut oil1 can chicken broth4 cups water1 tbsp chicken Better Than Bullion2 cooked chicken breasts, chopped ( i used rotisserie)1 can green beans, drained (or some other vegetable of your choosing)Scant 1/4 cup Wio flour1/2 cup heavy creamDumpings:2 cups Wio flour1 tbsp baking powder1/2 tsp salt1 1/3 cups heavy cream (maybe more)Chop up onion and celery and sauté in coconut oil in a large, wide soup pot or dutch oven until tender, about 5 minAdd broth, water, and bullion.  Cover and simmer about 20 minutesWhile broth is simmering, make your dumpling dough.  Mix dry ingredients with a whisk, and then stir in cream with a spoon until just incorporated. I ended up using more cream, because my cream was very thick and the dough just kind of seized up.  It may be because it’s not normal flour. I was worried they would turn out too dense, but they were fine.  Set aside dough to rest in the bowl.In another bowl, mix scant 1/4 cup flour and another 1/2 cup cream, set aside.After broth has simmered, add your chopped chicken and green beans.  Stir in the flour/cream slurry to thicken and add texture to the broth.  If the soup seems too full of ingredients by now, consider adding some more water.  The dumplings will absorb some, and in the end I wished I’d added some more.  Also taste to make sure it’s salty enough.Finally drop tablespoonfuls of the dumpling dough onto the simmering soup.  They need to rest on the surface to steam, but they also need a brief dunk in the liquid.  If you drop them from a few inches up they should submerge and pop back up.  If they don’t, just spoon a little liquid over them so they get wet on top.  My pan was very crowded by the time I finished, and I even had a little dough left over i just threw away.  Don’t be afraid to crowd them, they were fine.  Cover the pan again and simmer, don’t lift up the lid a bunch during cooking and let out the steam.  The recipes I looked at called for 20 minutes but I went for 30 because I was concerned about them being so dense.  I don’t know if you can overcook dumplings - if you’re concerned, you could fish one out at 20 minutes and try it.

[bryancranstno-blog]

Tempura Soy Sauce

Classical, or French, cuisine defines a set of basic sauces called the five mother sauces, or in French, Sauces Grandes (grand sauces). These five fundamental sauces are utilized all over professional kitchens either on their own or as a base ingredient for lots more sauces that are elaborate. The five sauces that are basic perhaps not include a set of sauces called pan sauces that we'm additionally likely to use in this short article. Pan sauces are delicious and simple to help make sauces that utilize a natural product organic ginger dipping sauce that a lot of people just throw away while cooking without ever realizing what you can do with it. Mom sauces in French cuisines had been formally defined by two great French chefs, the sooner one, Antonin Carme, is most beneficial understood for producing an extensive recipe range of sauces into the early 19th century. Today towards the end of the century, his countryman Auguste Escoffier consolidated Carme's list of classical sauces into the five mother sauces that we know. Here's a range of all of the mother sauces aided by the sauces that are easier-to-make the beginning: Sauce Velout, white stock based sauce, thickened having a roux that is blond. Sauce Bchamel, milk based sauce, thickened having a white roux. Sauce Tomate, tomato based sauce. Sauce Espagnole, a strengthened stock that is brown, often using veal or beef stock. Sauce Hollandaise, an emulsion of egg yolk, lemon and butter. There are always a few terms in there that require clarification. First, three of these sauces use stock. To produce a sauce that is good really either need to get excellent stock or (much cheaper) allow it to be yourself. There's no navigating around this, utilizing cheap store purchased stock or even worse, bullion, will result in a bland, disappointing sauce. The other ingredient mentioned is roux. Roux is just a French word (pronounced "roo"), that is simply a 1-to-1 of fat ( such as for example butter, lard, veggie oil etc.) and flour by weight. For a sauce that is typical amounts to 3 table spoons of butter and 5 table spoons of flour. Roux is an ingredient that is interesting it comes down in several various variations and it has various names according to how long you cook the flour while the fat together. Cooking it for the extremely quick period of time (around one minute) yields white roux, then blond roux ( 3 minutes or more), peanut-butter roux, brown roux and finally chocolate roux. The longer a roux is cooked, the less of a thickening power it's. Here is a recipe for Velout sauce, the easiest regarding the mother sauces: 1) Put 3 table spoons of butter (40 grams) into a sauce that is small on medium heat and allow it to melt. 2) Add 5 dining table spoons (40 grams) of flour in to the pan and whisk constantly with the flour for approximately three minutes. Then stop if the roux starts to turn a darker yellow color before the time is up.

3) Add virtually any white stock you prefer. a stock where the bones or vegetables weren't browned (fried) prior to making the stock. Make sure the stock is space warmer or temperature. If it is too cool it may seize the roux. 4) Mix the stock and also the roux together completely then then add natural herbs; one smashed garlic clove, one tea spoon of cracked pepper corns, a sprig of thyme, a leaf of bay and sage leaf. You can test out the natural herbs you put into this sauce. 5) Increase the heat before the sauce boils and then reduce the temperature to low and allow the sauce simmer for half an hour. When done, strain it to eliminate most of the natural herbs. You're prepared to provide your Velout sauce. Observe that Velout sauce is not frequently served in restaurants as a result it is rather utilized as a base ingredient in order to make more elaborate sauces such as Sauce Parisienne, Albufera Sauce, Normandy Sauce an such like. Pan sauce on the other hand is a deliciously flavorful sauce that is also simpler to make than Velout and is indeed served in restaurants. Pan sauce gets its title through the means its made. When pan frying, or sauting, meat, you usually get some bits stuck to the pan following the meat is done. Instead of investing half a full hour scrubbing it well following the meal, it is better ( and much more effective at removing crust, particularly with cast iron pans) to make a sauce making use of these stuck caramelized pieces of meat as flavoring agents in pan sauce. Listed here is how you make a pan sauce: 1) First you will need to pan fry (saut) some meat, any meat you are able to think about on high heat. 2) as soon as done, you will be kept with small encrusted components of meat stuck to your pan which are called fond. Less when you make use of a non stick pan though. 3) Cut 2 shallot onions and a clove of garlic and fry them in the pan until the garlic begins to brown. This will not take a time that is long garlic has a propensity to brown quickly and if you're not careful, burn. 4) Turn heat to high and add 1/3 cup/80 ml of the wine you imagine would go well with the meat you're frying. Never worry a lot of in regards to the amount that is exact of you add. Clean the pan having a wood spatula to loosen the fond. 5) Let the wine mixture boil down to around a 3rd of its volume that is original should look somewhat syrupy. It is necessary though which you taste the combination constantly. If you think it has reduced sufficiently, on the basis of the style, then stop. You might end up with a pan sauce that is too intense to your taste if you reduce the mixture too much. 6) switch off the heat and whisk in 2 dining table spoons of cool butter until all of the butter is melted and incorporated. Warm butter is more difficult to add to the sauce also it might break meaning that the separates that are fat the liquid and you can view it. 7) Season with salt and pepper and soon you think it tastes right. Your pan sauce is able to serve.

[retro-revivalist-blog]

A Trip Across Town, A Stroll Down Memory Lane...

Hello fellow retro food enthusiasts. Here are some recipes for your enjoyment. Best, E

06/26/2017, Meal: Dinner, For: 3 people

I decided to cook my family an apology dinner of sorts. I’ve been a bit of a misery lately on account of all my stress. (I’m moving houses in a week and that’s making me a bit of a bear.) I was inspired by my father’s reminiscences of eating S.O.S. as a soldier during the Vietnam War. He has always extolled the virtues of chipped beef on toast to me, and to this day, I’ve never attempted any such a cooking endeavor.

Inspiration in hand, I went to the shops, only to realize that the price of one pound of beef seemed quite dear. I then got the idea, what if I substituted Textured Vegetable Protein instead? Dad likes it, and I knew I could get it cheap at the bulk store.

In case that didn’t turn out, I wanted some side dishes as back-up. I took it upon myself to try the 1948 ‘Banana Scallops’ as well as to whip up a few deviled eggs.

I tried the health food store in my neck of the woods first, hoping to buy a pinch or two of paprika, by weight. I could not find any paprika. I also needed exactly one beef bullion cube, but there was nowhere to buy individual cubes (I didn’t want to buy a whole container’s worth on account of the impending move.) So, I then had to choose between going to the nearby grocery where paprika, bullion, and TVP are wildly overpriced, or go to the cheaper stores on the other side of town.

I decided to go to the other side of town. Turns out, there was a murder along the bus route yesterday or the day before, so the ENTIRE ROUTE was delayed. I left the house at noon and got back at four, but I returned with all the ingredients I needed, and only paid about $7.00 Canadian, instead of over $20. As I had a bus pass, it was only my time that it cost me, and time is something I am willing to sacrifice for a good deal.

Fortune remained on my side as I staggered home to find my family waiting, and prepared all 3 dishes relatively easily. All turned out, and all were successful. Three for three. That said, I was quite tired after, as I’d been running around all over town and missed lunch, so I only got about 200 calories in me before 4:30 pm. Given that, I decided to use mayonnaise instead of lower fat yogurt for my deviled egg mixture, and mayo in the banana scallop sauce as well – I could afford the extra calories today.

Without further ado, I present the recipes, with my revisions. I will also link to the originals that inspired my edits. I have not yet calculated the calories but once I do, I’ll update this post with them.

TVP S.O.S.

Original Recipe (with Beef) found here.

My internet searching told me that 1 cup of minced TVP (dry) is about equal to 1 pound of ground beef. I also added dehydrated onions (a couple of tablespoons) to the mixture as the gravy thickened.

Ingredients

1 cup dry minced Textured Vegetable Protein 1/4 cup all-purpose flour 1 cube beef bouillon 3/4 teaspoon salt 1 pinch ground black pepper 2 1/4 cups milk 1/4 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce 2-3 tablespoons dehydrated onion flakes Healthy splash of canola oil

Directions

To cook the TVP I added 1 cup of water to a sauce pan, and set it to boil. I added the TVP and the bullion cube and stirred as the water got hot. I realized rapidly it wasn’t moist enough (beef has more fat) so I added some oil by eye, just so it wouldn’t immediately burn.

Rapidly, this was proving to be still not enough moisture, so I added about half of the milk, and the flour, and Worcestershire sauce. I also added the onions. I stirred until everything was mixed well, then I added the remaining milk.

After that, you just simmer and stir until it eventually thickens up nicely.

I served it over a toasted slice of white bread – just like Dad remembers it. He said the taste was pretty darn close to perfect, given that I was using a meat substitute. At a fraction of the price it really was worth it. Hearty and filling, this was a real ‘comfort food’ dish.

Banana ��Scallops”

These I followed closely to the original recipe, except I halved the original, as we had no need of 6 bananas for a side. Three made plenty. I also managed to forget to halve my batter mixture, so I had more than necessary. But in the below edit, I’ve halved it for you correctly. I also used canola oil in lieu of fat as I hadn’t any fat at hand.

Ingredients

3 green-tipped bananas 1/8th cup evaporated milk, undiluted (I used 2%, unsweetened) 1/4 teaspoon salt Just over 1/4 cup bread crumbs or corn meal Canola oil (pour enough to cover bottom of pan. Add more as needed.)

Directions

Peel bananas and cut into 1-inch pieces. Add salt to milk. Dip each piece in milk; roll in crumbs. Fry in oil until browned, turning frequently. (I had my pan on 5 initially and had to turn it down to about 2 and watch them like a hawk – they cook FAST.)

Once cooked, remove and cool.

I whipped up a basic spicy mayo with a couple of tablespoons of mayo, a squirt of chili sauce, and a pinch of paprika.

Deviled Eggs

I made these earlier, and only made three. I didn’t follow a recipe and just made them from memory, with a bit of advice on the mayonnaise ratio from my Mom.

Ingredients

3 eggs (hard boiled) Paprika (to sprinkle) Mayonnaise Salt Pepper Optional Garlic Olives

Directions

I boiled 3 eggs until hard, and put them into cold water to facilitate easier peeling. With the eggs cooled, I peeled them, sliced them in half, and carefully scooped the yolks into a bowl. I mashed them and added mayonnaise by eye, until it achieved the desired consistency. I spiced it with pepper and salt to taste, and refilled the eggs. I then topped each egg with a slice of a garlic stuffed olive (optional) and sprinkled liberally with paprika.

I arranged them around a bowl of red cabbage slaw (store-bought) just so we had some acid as a palate cleanser.

THE VERDICT

All the food went over very well. Mom fell in love with the scallops – Dad thoroughly enjoyed his S.O.S. Both of them were touched by the gesture of a home-cooked meal and of old, familiar flavours, spruced up to fit modern product availability and our budget.

All in all, these are all foods I intend to make again, and I would urge any of you who are curious to try them too!

Warmest regards, - E