Sunday, November 29, 2009

I Want To Gut My Kitchen

and put in its place my dream kitchen.

That's all I have to say. Just putting it out there for The Universe, you know?

I'm expecting a new kitchen in the next few months then.

Sunday, November 22, 2009

Orange Beef Stir Fry

~ From Everyday Food


1 cup long grain white rice
1/4 cup freshly squeezed orange juice from 1 orange
1 tablespoon rice vinegar
1 tablespoon soy sauce (I added more for flavor – total of 3 tablespoons reduced sodium)
1 tablespoon light brown sugar
1 pound top or bottom round steak, cut into strips 1/4 inch thick x about 2 inches long
1 tablespoon cornstarch
Coarse salt and pepper
1 bunch (1 pound) broccoli florets, broken into small pieces
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 red bell pepper (ribs and seeds removed), cut into strips, 2 inches long x 1/4 inch wide

Directions:
Cook rice: Bring 2 cups of salted water to boil. Add 1 cup rice. Bring back to a boil. Turn heat down to simmer. Cover pot. Cook rice about 20 minutes. Check every 5 minutes or so. Fluff cooked rice with fork.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, combine orange juice, vinegar, soy sauce, and sugar; set aside.

In medium bowl, toss beef with cornstarch, season with salt and pepper; set aside.

In large skillet, combine broccoli with 1 cup water, season with salt and pepper. Bring to boil over medium-high heat; cook, partially covered, until broccoli is bright green and crisp-tender, about 4 to 6 minutes. Transfer to a plate. Discard water in skillet and wipe clean with paper towel.
In same skillet, heat 1 tablespoon over high heat. When pan is very hot, add half the beef and cook until browned, about 2 to 4 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer beef to plate with broccoli. Add remaining beef and cook until browned. Leave in skillet.

Returned reserved beef and broccoli to skillet. Add orange juice mixture and red pepper. Continue cooking over high heat until sauce thickens, about 2 to 4 minutes. Serve over rice.

Chicken Scampi

This is one of my favorite chicken recipes, adapted from several different versions of scampi recipes. Something about garlic, wine, and butter with chicken seems so natural and so delicious.



4 boneless skinless chicken breasts, cut into strips 1-inch wide
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons butter
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup white wine
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
Salt
Pepper
1/2 cup green onions, finely sliced
3 or 4 tomatoes (seeds removed), cut into large dice or 2 tablespoons snipped sundried tomoates

Season chicken breast strips with salt and pepper. Quickly brown on all sides in olive oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Reduce heat to medium. Add 1 tablespoon butter, and garlic. Let simmer a few minutes. When you can smell the garlic, add remaining butter, wine, basil, and oregano. Stir and simmer 10 minutes until sauce reduces to about half. Add green onions and tomatoes. Toss and simmer just to heat through.


Serve over cooked pasta or rice.

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

Chicken with Peppered Sour Cream Herb Sauce

Do you get a “taste” in your mouth for something specific? But don’t know what it is exactly. So you experiment? You know where to start but not sure what goes in the middle and how it’s going to end … kind of like writing a story. Only with sauce.

This is the “taste” I had last night. I wanted chicken with a peppery "French" kind of sauce - and wound up here…. It turned out to be a really good story.



4 chicken breasts; boneless, skinless

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 medium onion, diced

2 teaspoons (2 cloves) minced garlic

2 tablespoons butter

2 teaspoons sweet paprika

1 cup chicken stock

1 tablespoon Herbs de Provence

1 tablespoon chives

1 tablespoon coarse ground black pepper

1 cup sour cream, room temperature

Spinach or Tomato Linguine, 4 servings, cooked. (This is for contrast and a pretty dish. I didn’t have either so used regular spaghetti.)

Directions:

In large skillet, heat olive oil over medium-high heat.

Brown chicken breasts on both sides.

Add onions, garlic, and butter. Saute until onions are barely translucent. Sprinkle paprika over chicken, turning chicken to coat well. Remove chicken to plate, keep warm.

Reduce heat to medium. Add chicken stock to pan, deglaze the pan. Add Herbs de Provence, chives, and coarse ground pepper. Let simmer about 3 minutes. Add sour cream and mix well with whisk. Let simmer about 10 minutes.

Place chicken over linguine noodles and pour sauce over.

C'est Magnifique !!

Monday, November 16, 2009

Artos: Greek Celebration Bread

Artos is a Greek celebration bread, made in a variety of ways, with lots spices, a touch of honey for sweetness, and adding nuts and fruits, depending on the holiday. Christopsomo, usually baked at Christmas, may have dried cranberries, cherries, and walnuts. Lambropsomos is baked for Easter and may have dried apricots, golden raisins, and nuts; it is formed in the shape of a braid, and may have dyed red eggs baked into the loaf.

I didn’t get too fancy with making this; or, actually, I thought just the basic recipe was going to be fancy enough. The aroma from the dough while making it was totally heavenly. The spices and almond swirling around in the mixer …. mmmmm.

I made 3 loaves. I hadn’t planned on it but I made the entire poolish recipe so I had enough to make 3 loaves. I gave 2 of them away.

So here’s the poolish:


And the first proof:


And the final product:







Text message from my friend, Linda: OMG, it's fantastic. Sweet touch of spice. I like it.

Yes, that's it: Sweet Touch of Spice!

Next adventure: Bagels.





Friday, November 13, 2009

Deviled Ham

When was the last time anyone saw or heard of deviled ham? I think it's likely been several decades since I last bought that stuff in the can.

I was pleasantly surprised when The Mister (BTW, before I get too far into this blog and keep referring to my husband as The Mister, he has a name, and it's Kaz). He will be aptly referred to herein as Mr. K. That's better.

Well, as I was saying, he brought home a Honey Ham. I usually take all the slices off the bone, wrap up meal portions and freeze them for later. Then there is always the part on the back of the bone where there is still a lot of really good ham but takes some work to cut it up and it's never pretty. It's great for soups and/or sharing with my best buddy as a special treat. I usually put that in the freezer for a later date as well.
This time, I made deviled ham. After climbing up on top of the fridge and manipulating the box with the grinder out of the cupboard, I hooked it up to the Kitchen Aid. After removing the obvious fatty parts of the ham, I packed the grinder tube and turned on the Kitchen Aid. I almost filled up the mixer bowl...that made a lot of ground ham. There were probably 3 to 4 cups of ground ham in the bowl.

Deviled Ham

3 to 4 cups ground ham
3 tablespoons Miracle Whip
2 teaspoons Spicy Brown Mustard
2 tablespoons dill relish.

Add some party crackers or mini pita breads and you've got a special treat!

Anadama Bread

First off, let’s just say that even with the mistakes, I was so happy with how this turned out and that I finally discovered what I’ve been doing all wrong these many years when my attempts at making a loaf of bread have failed. Apparently, I have a heavy hand with a measuring cup. I’ve been adding too much flour, which causes the bread to be too dense. From now on, I will weigh the ingredients.

That being said, the first loaf in the BBA Challenge is called Anadama Bread. It’s made with cornmeal and molasses. The recipe calls for coarse cornmeal (polenta). I had regular grind cornmeal. I live less than an hour SE of Chicago, near a busy shopping district off a major US Highway. One would think finding coarse cornmeal would not need to turn into such a treasure hunt, but it has. I also cannot find SAF Instant Yeast locally. I ordered that from King Arthur Flour and tracked the shipment all over the East Coast (how fun). I may have to order cornmeal as well, but to start the bread, I used what I had.

Now for some of the science of it all:  the weights versus measures dilemma and my ensuing confusion. Mr. Phillips, my HS Chemistry / Driver’s Ed teacher immediately came to mind. Alton Brown would have been a better vision.

The recipe directed me to use 1 cup of cornmeal (6 ounces) and 1 cup of water (8 ounces). Whoa! 1 cup IS 8 ounces, not 6, right? You’d think I hadn’t spent the last 4 months reading the book! I was so confused. Well, I wound up weighing out 8 ounces of cornmeal, which came out to more like 1-1/2 cups. My wires got all kinds of crossed. So there we have mistakes #1 (regular, not coarse cornmeal) and #2 (too much regular cornmeal). I added the water, covered the bowl with plastic wrap, and let it soak overnight.

To resolve my confusion, I turned to pages 27 and 28 in the book and highlighted two areas: “….professional bakers prefer to use weights…,” and “…the weight is always the preferred amount, not the volume.” I made an Excel table of the chart on page 28, laminated it and stuck it to the inside of the cabinet where I keep all my magical baking supplies.


From that point, the rest of the bread making was easy. Until it came for the final proof, or second rise, in the pan. I didn’t spray the top of the dough with oil, and I used a towel to cover the loaves. I forgot to set the timer for the rise time, too, and got busy making vegetable beef soup. I’m really not sure how long the dough had been proofing but I knew it was likely nearing 90 minutes.



The dough had at least doubled in size but had not crested above the pans. I let it go a bit longer. It seemed to be actually shrinking and I was getting a bit worried, so I put it in the oven. I wonder what might have been if I had sprayed with oil, topped with plastic wrap, and set the timer….Maybe not much. I suspect the extra cornmeal was the culprit here.



Although a few mistakes were made, the bread turned out with a really nice crumb and really good flavor and finally, the weights / measures thing sunk in.


Next bread on the BBA Challenge list is Artos:  Greek Celebration Bread. This one looks really good and if it turns out nicely, it would be perfect for the upcoming Holidays! I'm making that this weekend.

Thursday, November 12, 2009

BBA Challenge

I have had such trouble baking bread. I've carefully followed instructions all these years only to have my loaves turn out dense and doughy and kind of sour tasting, regardless of the recipe or method used. I wasn't even getting good results with a bread machine. So disappointing. But I never gave up. I finally ordered a copy of The Bread Baker's Apprentice by Peter Reinhart with the hopes that I could find some answers. Oh, it has been the best book ever. If you're serious about wanting to make the best bread possible, this is a must-have in your cooking library.

Just about the time I bought it, I found this on the InterWebz: BBA Challenge How perfect was that! Well, except that I hadn't even read the book when the challenge started in May. I finally finished it last month and then set out to order supplies - like a scale (a MUST) if you're going to be baking bread. And Instant Yeast, which I had to order from King Arthur Flour as I could not find it locally. I picked up a few loaf pans from Chicago Metallic and a French rolling pin to get started.

I'll be following along the challenge. I started with the first loaf, Anadama Bread, last weekend.

About DomestiKitchen

My vision for this site is to become an all-things-eat-drink-and-be-merry place to post recipes and pictures of flavorful and nutritious food, gadget and cookware reviews, my experiments & misadventures in testing new recipes in my kitchen, sharing thoughts on food, cooking, and baking from someone who thinks she finally figured out what she wants to do / be when she grows up…cook, play foodtographer, feed people, and make them smile. Mostly though, it's about having fun with cooking.

I’ve been trying recipes, making food, and sharing with others off and on over the years depending on my enthusiasm and encouragement at any given time. I’ve shared the tasty results of my efforts with coworkers over the years, and I’ve been bombarding my friends and family with recipes I think they might like.


Sadly, The Mister is a very picky eater and reluctant to allow me to delight and/or insult his taste buds, whichever may be the case. I’ve learned to work around it and though it may take years, eventually he’ll come around to at least tasting something different.

(Disclaimer: This is not his picture, but I'm sure I've seen a similar expression when I've presented him with Mushroom Sauce for his steak.)


I believe in using the freshest ingredients from local sources as much as possible. I’m not likely to post odd ingredients that you can’t otherwise find at your local big box grocery store. No foie gras here (poor duckies) or octopus tentacles. No caviar or quail eggs. And I’m not buying into putting fried eggs on a bed of frisee and calling it GorMay. You won’t find micro servings and probably not even the fancy sauce pulled across the plate underneath the main ingredient (well, probably not).

Some recipes are not perfect. I’ll share the bad with the good, the successes and failures. I have a rough time with bread, and apple pie is just a crapshoot for me. Sometimes I get it, other times, not so much.