What can you expect in the Food Thread on PF?

[larkspur]

Liquid smoke is usually used to flavor things like dips & meatloaf, things that wouldn't normally get any smoky flavor.

It is really good in marinade too.

 

[rhuthwaite]

These are some of the strangest and most amazing pictures I have ever see if you have a chane look at the World's Wackiest Food Photos

http://xtramsn.co.nz/lifestyles/0,,14164--0,00.html"

Page three has a gingerbread White House

 

[Astronuc]

Well, fish (salmon) is food, and this didn't look like enough to start another thread, but -

The Grand Cascapedia River, on the Atlantic coast of Canada, boasts some of the best sport fishing in the world. Its salmon stocks are in great shape and people pay big money for permits to fish there. Hoagy Bix Carmichael, son of the singer-songwriter of the same name, fell in love with the Cascapedia River. Carmichael took producer Bob Carty fly fishing and talked about the river's unusual history and of concerns for its future.

Fishing With Hoagy

Hoagy Bix Carmichael is the son of the great singer-songwriter, Hoagy Carmichael who gave us 'Georgia on My Mind' and 'Stardust'.

 

[wolram]

I cooked a beef brisket joint today, using Turbos method of browning it in a pan and then boiling it with vegies , it was delicious and tender too, next time i do it though i will wear asbestos gloves and a face mask, and open all the doors and windows.

 

[turbo]

I cooked a beef brisket joint today, using Turbos method of browning it in a pan and then boiling it with vegies , it was delicious and tender too, next time i do it though i will wear asbestos gloves and a face mask, and open all the doors and windows.

Good for you, Woolie! I do all the browning outside on a side burner on our propane grill because to achieve a respectable degree of carmelization, you will generate a great deal of smoke. My wife made just such a meal for us on Saturday while I was deer hunting, with cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes, onions, and turnip. If you have a camping stove that uses white gas (unleaded gasoline, actually, also sold as Coleman fuel), that's another good way to do the cooking outside, although you can set your pot on a glowing bed of wood coals or charcoal to do your browning. Play with that recipe a bit, and make BIG batches. The left-overs get better the second, third, and fourth days. They might be wicked on the fifth day too, but they never last that long, so I can't vouch for it.

If you will learn to make New England-style baked beans and flaky biscuits (not the sweeties you are thinking of), I will nominate you as an honorary New Englander. If you can learn to make a decent clam chowder, I may nominate you as an honorary Mainer - the highest honor to which a New Englander can attain, and a rarity for any non-native Mainer. If you or your parents emigrated to Maine, you are "from away" and will be for life. You may be well-liked, respected, even beloved, but you will still be "from away".

 

[wolram]

Eky thump, i better start learning about clam chowder, i have never had any,
shell fish are difficult to get round here, fresh muscles are not, i had to ditch over half of the last batch i bought, England is pathetic for fresh sea food

 

[wolram]

Do most people use milk or tomatoes in clam chowder? i think i would prefer tomatoes, as i have never been fond of mixing dairy products with meat or fish, except for stilton cheese on steak.

 

[Moonbear]

Do most people use milk or tomatoes in clam chowder? i think i would prefer tomatoes, as i have never been fond of mixing dairy products with meat or fish, except for stilton cheese on steak.

Gaaaaahhhh...tomatoes aren't allowed anywhere near good clam chowder! That's the southerner's version (Manhattan is south of Maine). Might as well toss some clam juice in a Bloody Mary.

New England clam chowder is made with cream and butter and so thick you can stand a spoon up in it.

Turbo, what's the current "local" view of someone moving to Maine if their grandfather was from there? Are they too far removed and still "from away" or is that close enough to return and be accepted as a native Mainiac?

 

[wolram]

Gaaaaahhhh...tomatoes aren't allowed anywhere near good clam chowder! That's the southerner's version (Manhattan is south of Maine). Might as well toss some clam juice in a Bloody Mary.

New England clam chowder is made with cream and butter and so thick you can stand a spoon up in it.

What is this American? fad for butter in cooking, butter is ok in cakes but with meat and fish dishes

 

[turbo]

Turbo, what's the current "local" view of someone moving to Maine if their grandfather was from there? Are they too far removed and still "from away" or is that close enough to return and be accepted as a native Mainiac?

You're still "from away." There's a joke in a book of Maine humor by Jim Brunell titled "Over to home and from away" in which a transplanted couple has a baby that is born in Maine. She takes him to the local general store, showing him off and saying "he was born in Maine, and he's a real Mainer". An old fellow playing checkers near the wood stove says "just 'cuz the cat had her kittens in the oven, that don't make 'em biscuits."

 

[turbo]

Woolie, just boil some chopped potatoes and onions, drain (save that water to use as a future soup-starter), and add cooked clams, salt and pepper, cream (and maybe some milk) and butter, and reheat until simmering. You can play with this basic recipe (everyone has a favorite variation or family "secret"), and come up with some great stuff. Some people use this as the basis for a more general "seafood chowder" with crab, lobster, haddock, cod, scallops, as well as the clams. There is a little restaurant in Bucksport called McLeod's that has seafood chowder to die for. The Snow Squall restaurant in South Portland had pretty good chowder about 15 years ago - I haven't been there for a while. This morning for breakfast, I polished off the last of the left-over oyster stew (made by the same method as the traditional clam chowder, with celery added to the potato and onion) - Killer!

 

[Evo]

Christmas Cookies.

I'm planning on making an assortment of homemade christmas cookies.

So far I'm planning on oatmeal chocolate chip, cherry winks, russian tea cakes, gingerbread cookies with lemon icing, reeses peanut butter cup cookies. Maybe some rum balls.
Fudge!

Ooooh, ranch oyster crackers would be good too.

Any other suggestions?

 

[turbo]

I don't have the recipe, but when I was a kid my mother used to make some really tasty cookies for the holidays. I think her basic recipe was a lemon-flavored sugar-cookie and after she had cut them out and laid them out on the cookie sheet, she would use the back of a measuring spoon to make a depression in the center of each and spoon a dollop of home-made crabapple jelly into each depression. Baking them kind of glazed the jelly, so they weren't sticky/gooey. I liked them best when they were still a bit warm from the oven, but they tasted great cold, too, especially with a glass of milk. If you like to experiment in the kitchen, you might try to make something like this.

 

[Evo]

I don't have the recipe, but when I was a kid my mother used to make some really tasty cookies for the holidays. I think her basic recipe was a lemon-flavored sugar-cookie and after she had cut them out and laid them out on the cookie sheet, she would use the back of a measuring spoon to make a depression in the center of each and spoon a dollop of home-made crabapple jelly into each depression. Baking them kind of glazed the jelly, so they weren't sticky/gooey. I liked them best when they were still a bit warm from the oven, but they tasted great cold, too, especially with a glass of milk. If you like to experiment in the kitchen, you might try to make something like this.

Yeah, thumbprint cookies. I have a good recipe for those.

 

[turbo]

I am stuffed from our Thanksgiving dinner. Smoked (fresh, locally raised) turkey (smoked breast-down with strips of bacon covering her back), squash, mashed potato, coleslaw made with with bread-and-butter pickles, New England baked beans, flaky biscuits, home-made cranberry sauce, and more. Killer meal!

 

[Evo]

I am stuffed from our Thanksgiving dinner. Smoked (fresh, locally raised) turkey (smoked breast-down with strips of bacon covering her back), squash, mashed potato, coleslaw made with with bread-and-butter pickles, New England baked beans, flaky biscuits, home-made cranberry sauce, and more. Killer meal!

Mmmmmm, sounds yummy!

 

[turbo]

Time for an easy do-it-yourself recipe. My wife made this a couple of days ago, and I finished the left-overs this morning. MMMMM!

Next time you're at the market, buy some soft flour tortillas the diameter of your round casserole dish or cake pan.

Saute some chopped onions, bell peppers and jalapenos with a little salt and pepper in a cast iron frying pan with butter or olive oil. When they've started to carmelize, stir in some hamburg and brown that, as well. Then stir in a can or two of black beans (drained). Lightly oil your casserole or cake pan and put in a tortilla. Cover with a layer of the browned hamburg/bean mix, put in another tortilla and repeat until your pan is full. Top it off with a layer of shredded Monterey Jack and bake in a preheated oven at 350 deg or so until the cheese starts to brown. Presto - a great black bean casserole. The more adventurous of you might want to experiment with adding some more spice to the mix, or if you have folks to feed that don't like things real hot, you can serve this with salsa on the side. I like our green tomato salsa with mine - just for the flavor of the salsa - the casserole was already spicy enough on its own.

 

[radou]

Time for an easy do-it-yourself recipe. My wife made this a couple of days ago, and I finished the left-overs this morning. MMMMM!

Next time you're at the market, buy some soft flour tortillas the diameter of your round casserole dish or cake pan.

Saute some chopped onions, bell peppers and jalapenos with a little salt and pepper in a cast iron frying pan with butter or olive oil. When they've started to carmelize, stir in some hamburg and brown that, as well. Then stir in a can or two of black beans (drained). Lightly oil your casserole or cake pan and put in a tortilla. Cover with a layer of the browned hamburg/bean mix, put in another tortilla and repeat until your pan is full. Top it off with a layer of shredded Monterey Jack and bake in a preheated oven at 350 deg or so until the cheese starts to brown. Presto - a great black bean casserole. The more adventurous of you might want to experiment with adding some more spice to the mix, or if you have folks to feed that don't like things real hot, you can serve this with salsa on the side. I like our green tomato salsa with mine - just for the flavor of the salsa - the casserole was already spicy enough on its own.

Turbo, this recipes are worth gold, don't give them away just like that. I'd think about charging for them.

Joke aside, this sounds really good.

 

[Moonbear]

I agree, that sounds really yummy...and easy! I think the next time I have to bring something to a potluck luncheon, I might try that.

 

[turbo]

Turbo, this recipes are worth gold, don't give them away just like that. I'd think about charging for them.

Joke aside, this sounds really good.

I'll PM you with my mailing address. Once you try this one, you'll gladly send me $10. And it is REALLY good and it's falling-off-a-log easy to make, as Moonbear said. I'm glad my wife likes spicy foods - no matter which one of us is doing the cooking we're pretty liberal with the jalapenos and habaneros.

Edit: For those of you that are not watching your waistlines, you can put some shredded cheese on top of the beans and h'burg at every layer.

 

[scorpa]

Time for an easy do-it-yourself recipe. My wife made this a couple of days ago, and I finished the left-overs this morning. MMMMM!

Next time you're at the market, buy some soft flour tortillas the diameter of your round casserole dish or cake pan.

Saute some chopped onions, bell peppers and jalapenos with a little salt and pepper in a cast iron frying pan with butter or olive oil. When they've started to carmelize, stir in some hamburg and brown that, as well. Then stir in a can or two of black beans (drained). Lightly oil your casserole or cake pan and put in a tortilla. Cover with a layer of the browned hamburg/bean mix, put in another tortilla and repeat until your pan is full. Top it off with a layer of shredded Monterey Jack and bake in a preheated oven at 350 deg or so until the cheese starts to brown. Presto - a great black bean casserole. The more adventurous of you might want to experiment with adding some more spice to the mix, or if you have folks to feed that don't like things real hot, you can serve this with salsa on the side. I like our green tomato salsa with mine - just for the flavor of the salsa - the casserole was already spicy enough on its own.

Sweet something even I can make! That sounds very good, i don't think I've ever had black beans before but I am sure they are good.

 

[Astronuc]

Time for an easy do-it-yourself recipe. My wife made this a couple of days ago, and I finished the left-overs this morning. MMMMM!

Next time you're at the market, buy some soft flour tortillas the diameter of your round casserole dish or cake pan.

Saute some chopped onions, bell peppers and jalapenos with a little salt and pepper in a cast iron frying pan with butter or olive oil. When they've started to carmelize, stir in some hamburg and brown that, as well. Then stir in a can or two of black beans (drained). Lightly oil your casserole or cake pan and put in a tortilla. Cover with a layer of the browned hamburg/bean mix, put in another tortilla and repeat until your pan is full. Top it off with a layer of shredded Monterey Jack and bake in a preheated oven at 350 deg or so until the cheese starts to brown. Presto - a great black bean casserole. The more adventurous of you might want to experiment with adding some more spice to the mix, or if you have folks to feed that don't like things real hot, you can serve this with salsa on the side. I like our green tomato salsa with mine - just for the flavor of the salsa - the casserole was already spicy enough on its own.

Sounds like a multilayer quesadilla - one could use chopped or shredded chicken in place of hamburger.

 

[Rach3]

Great dinner today! I got 8oz/227g of Alaskan salmon from the market ($13/lb=$29/kg), added black pepper liberally, sauteed in olive oil, and served on a huge bed of boiled asparagus, with steamed brocolli on the side. Served with sake. Very easy&quick to make!

Yeah, I'm nowhere near as talented as some of the old guys here (turbo, I'm looking at you!). But I'm trying, at least.

 

[turbo]

Sounds like a multilayer quesadilla - one could use chopped or shredded chicken in place of hamburger.

Yep, or even make a vegetarian version. I had green tomato/jalapeno salsa with mine, and my wife topped hers with shredded lettuce and sour cream. Stuff like this is pretty versatile, and you can use what you've got on hand. Sometimes, our favorite dishes develop out of something thrown together. A couple of nights ago when I was busy with something else, my wife started shredding carrots and cabbage and other vegetables, so I thought she was going to make a cole-slaw of some sort to go with the thin strips of blade steak marinading in the refrigerator. Instead, she browned the vegetables in the big cast iron frying pan then simmered them in dry red wine while browning steak strips in olive oil with a little fresh-ground ginger. It started smelling pretty good in here, so I stopped what I was doing and warmed some basmati rice we had steamed the night before and set the table while she combined the meat and vegetables. That stuff was quite tasty served on a bed of rice.

 

[hypatia]

wow! You set the table? I think we should clone you.

 

[turbo]

wow! You set the table? I think we should clone you.

Are you sitting down? I also do the dishes.

 

[danscope]

your own excellent corned beef hash

Sounds like a multilayer quesadilla - one could use chopped or shredded chicken in place of hamburger.

Hi, This uncomplicated dish is a winner and worth tooling up for.
......
If you have a meat grinder ( the Kitchen-Aid mixer shines here) ...
get a largish package of corned beef ( plastic wrapped...about 2 to three lbs)
and put it into a large stainless steel (non-reactive)pan, and cover the CB with water by an inch. Bring to a boil and then turn the heat down and cover, and get this to simmer ( a very low boil...occasional bubbles). It can simmer for about three hours . Corned beef is a sorry cut of meat until you transform it.
... Peel and quarter some potatoes...( russet work fine ) and bring to a boil,then simmer for 6 or seven minutes until they are almost fork tender.
Don't over cook. Rough chop 2 onions.
... Saute two onions with olive oil and butter. Don't use canola oil for anything! poisonous
Season the onions...celery salt,pepper , Cook easy, not high heat. Just get them to clear a little, but don't burn them.
With a nice sharp knife, cut the cooked corned beef across the grain in one inch slabs. and then cut up into 2 by 1 by 1" pieces that will easily fit into your grinder. (I rinse my grinder with hot water first). Then, with the coarse
grinding cutter ...1/4 inch holes, put in a piece of CB, some onions, a piece of potato, and keep repeating. You should use slightly less potato than CB.
Once it is all ground, run a piece of bread through the grinder. It will become part of the hash and clean through the grinder. (Now clean grinder).
If you have a dough hook, use it to mix the hash in the great bowl. While mixing, you can season the hash. Ah...the seasoning: This from James Beard
,a great cook . He uses some fresh allspice berries and ginger. I use about
1 1/2 Tbs. of fresh ground allspice berries. and 1 Tbs. of Ginger.
and some fresh cracked pepper. For myself, I use some fresh Ginger and grate it with a stainless steel micro-plane , but you can slice it across the grain, smash it and chop it. ...Or just use powdered Gnger . While the hash is mixing , I sprinkle the seasonings here and there to get a good homogenous
spred-out of the seasons.
Once this is well mixed, put it into a large tapered plastic container,
like a 2 lb. Ricotta cheese container, or yogurt container. I usually fill 2 of these with this recipie. Freeze one. Refrigerate the other. Pack it in by spoonfulls, and avoid air pockets. Once it has chilled overnight, and the flavours meld, take it out, and knock it out upside-down. The whole will come out as a tapered cylinder. Slice about 3/4 inch and fry up in a no-stick pan with a little butter on the bottom. Use medium heat. You can burn CG hash if you work at it, but it is easily browned on each side in about 4 minutes.
After I flip it, I usually squish it down a little with the spatula. You get a little crust which people like. This stuff doesn't taste like canned corned beef hash at all. Hats off to James Beard for the inspiration.
This stuff keeps well in a refrigerator , cover directly within the container with some plastic wrap, for a week. It's usually disappeared by then.
A winner at any meal. Worth the effort.
Dan

 

[turbo]

I just got done preparing a couple of pounds of jalapeno peppers (remove stem, slice in half lengthwise, and scoop out seeds and placenta) for one of tonight's treats at the family get-together. We will stuff them with cream cheese and crumbled crispy bacon, top them with shredded Monterey Jack, and broil them until the cheese browns. We taking up a bunch of other stuff, too, but those are my favorites. I insist on making a big batch because we've got some nephews that aren't shy about eating these poppers, and I want to get at least a few of them before they're gone.

We've also put together a vegetable tray with two kinds of dips made with chives, garlic, wine, goat cheese, etc. One of the dips is loaded with our home-made habanero sauce - that will reduce the competition a bit.

I hope everybody has a wonderful holiday season - in our family, it's all about food, games, and socializing.

 

[arunbg]

Hey, long time no contribute, but it's nice to see that you guys are keeping the thread going

It's that time of the year again ... it's X'mas !
A time for celebration and what better way to do it, than enjoying good food surrounded by the ones you love.

Although I am not Christian, I still love to celebrate X'mas. Though we don't have extravagant feasts, we still celebrate it in our own little way here.
There's the ceremonial cutting of the cake, and what a cake it was !
Then we hung a paper star lantern outside our home, as is customary.
It looks beautiful by night.

I am having a hard time right now tellin myself that I have go back to college and hostel life early tomorrow

I am sure you all have your own Christmas celebrations to talk about, so let us hear them.

Spread the joy...

 

[danscope]

Hi, And have yourself a Merry little Christmas Too!
Dan

 

[Astronuc]

I have several hot sauces from this place.

http://www.dinosaurbarbque.com/index.php

Devil's Duel Habanero Pepper Sauce (not too hot, but great Habanero taste)
http://www.dinosaurbarbque.com/viewProduct.php?p=43
Fiendishly Hot... the all natural blend of fresh herbs and those evil flame-licking habanero peppers bring hellfire to your tongue!


http://www.dinosaurbarbque.com/viewRecipe.php

http://www.dinosaurbarbque.com/viewProduct.php?p=37

 

[Moonbear]

All my plans to sit around the house eating away have gone totally awry! I'm sick. Anyone have a good recipe for water? I can't even get that to stay down. I'm going to brave some chicken broth though, in the hopes that some nutrients get absorbed before it comes back up, because the only thing worse than being sick is being sick and hungry and not able to eat.

 

[Evo]

All my plans to sit around the house eating away have gone totally awry! I'm sick. Anyone have a good recipe for water? I can't even get that to stay down. I'm going to brave some chicken broth though, in the hopes that some nutrients get absorbed before it comes back up, because the only thing worse than being sick is being sick and hungry and not able to eat.

Oh Moonbear, that's terrible! Do you have any REAL coca cola? The cola syrup is good for releaving nausea. I won't tell you what I eat when I'm sick, it'll just make you sicker, but it works for me.

 

[Moonbear]

Oh Moonbear, that's terrible! Do you have any REAL coca cola? The cola syrup is good for releaving nausea. I won't tell you what I eat when I'm sick, it'll just make you sicker, but it works for me.

Nope. All the stores are closed and my friends and co-workers are out of town, so there's nobody local to call and plead for them to bring me medicine for my tummy. I attempted some chicken broth, though, and that seems to be staying put (it took effort to sip it slowly rather than gulp it down, because it tasted so good). I had to drink some Pepsi too, which didn't go down as easily, but I was adding a caffeine w/drawal headache on top of everything else (I didn't have my morning coffee, because I was trying to avoid caffeine to prevent any further dehydration).

This is a horrible whatever it is, because I AM hungry and have my normal appetite, but nothing was staying down. What I would give just to have a lemon to squeeze into some water to get some vitamins in.

And Ember is sitting here surrounded by her piles of new toys, and nobody to help her play with all of them.

 

[Evo]

Oh, that's terrible. If I was closer, I'd bring you something. Main thing is to not get dehydrated.