December 31, 2013

2013: A Year in Shakes

I don't know about you, but every now and then, I have to have a good milk shake.  Supposedly, my mom consumed her fair share of  milkshakes while I was in the womb, so it's not surprising that I'm still a big fan of the delicious, slurpable ice cream treats.  Going to school in North Carolina, I was spoiled by having a Cook-Out just off campus.  They stayed open until 3am, and they could make any combination of flavors you could imagine for just a couple bucks.  It was perfect for my college wallet.

Fortunately, Justin loves milkshakes as much as I do, so it wasn't hard to convince him to indulge in a milkshake with our burgers and fries once a month.  With Good Stuff Eatery within walking distance to our old apartments, it was easy to head over there once a month to sample each month's special shake.  It was hard work, let me tell ya, but somebody had to do it!  So here's our assessment of the year's shakes, in order of preference:

The overall favorite was Samoa.  Yep, just like the Girl Scout Cookie!  But bananas foster was a close second, with caramel macchiato rounding out the top three.  The great thing about the shake of the month is that it features a seasonal ingredient as well, and while pumpkin and cranberries were natural picks for the fall, a nod goes to the creativity in picking a girl scout cookie for a less obvious month such as March.  Now, the other shakes weren't bad, but the fruitier shakes tended to be a bit too cloyingly sweet for our taste buds.

Also of note is the birthday cake shake.  If you visit Good Stuff on your birthday, they give you a free birthday cake shake.  I'm not a huge fan of cake batter-flavored things, so this wasn't my favorite shake, but if you like that sort of thing, I'd definitely recommend it.  This is all in addition to their regular shake offerings, which are pretty awesome in their own right.  Prior to the shake-of-the-month, the Milky Way Malt was my go-to shake, though the Vietnamese coffee shake is also high on my list.

There you have it...we risked sugar-highs and brain-freezes to let our loyal readers know what was shakin' in 2013.

December 29, 2013

Christmas: Unwrapped!

I hope everyone had an awesome holiday with friends and family.  Justin & I traveled out to California once again, to spend Christmas with my family.  And just like last year, there were many culinary adventures, including a cooking competition, and several cooking-related gifts under the tree.  So here's a quick round-up of all the new toys we'll be putting to use in the near future:
1. Nom Nom Paleo:  Though we aren't strictly following the Paleo diet, this is still an awesome cookbook to have in your arsenal.  Not only are there cartoons, and butt jokes, but she's got a ton of great tips alongside the recipes.  Plus, she's got a recipe for homemade sriracha!  And with the recent shutdown of the sriracha factory in CA, it'll really come in handy.
2. Pok Pok:  While we haven't been to the restaurant, we are huuuge fans of Thai food, and trying to recreate those distinctive flavors.  Not to mention, this cookbook was on just about every single "Top Cookbooks of 2013"-type list.
3. Vacuum Sealer:  Gone are the days of trying to suck the air out of a ziplock bag with a straw, and not inhale raw meat juices!  This should make our confit/sous vide efforts much, much easier!
4. Immersion Circulator: This was the perfect accompaniment to the vacuum sealer.  We no longer need to guess how hot our water is, and much like our immersion blender, we can use this guy in any pot we have.
5. Mini Food Processor: We were really in need of a new food processor.  Justin had a regular size processor, but it stopped working.  I had a mini one, but it had seen better days and the bowl would leak every time we used it.  So this was a perfect gift for us.  It's great for whipping up small batches of aioli, pesto, tzatziki, or any other kind of sauce you could imagine.
6. Garlic Press: We're huge fans of garlic, so you can never have too many garlic presses.  It sure beats chopping it by hand!
7. Mandoline: This versatile little tool is great for slicing veggies super thin.  Whether you want to make a slaw, pretty veggie ribbons, or chips, the mandoline is the tool for the job.  The one we got comes with 3 different blades, depending on how you want to slice your foods.  Just be sure to save your fingers and use the little guard.
8. Potato Ricer: On a recent trip to Ikea, while wandering around the kitchen section, Justin convinced me that we needed a ricer.  Since it was just a couple bucks, I agreed to the purchase.  We do make a decent amount of gnocchi, so I figured it'd come in handy.  But then came Thanksgiving, and while pressing some sweet potatoes through it, the arm totally bent, and placed the ricer out of commission.  Fortunately, we were able to salvage the gnocchi, and we now have a new food mill when we're ready to make gnocchi again.
9. Produce bags:  As you know, we get quite a bit of produce in every share.  These bags will help us sort and transport the produce we pick up.  They'll also be useful when we have to run downstairs to grab a few items from the grocery store.  That way, we are doing our part to be green and we won't have to spend the nickel to use those plastic bags in the store.
10. Bottle Opener:  Because you can never have too many bottle openers.
11. Ice Scream Spade:  Since Justin gave me an ice cream maker for my birthday, we've been making our fair share of fro-yos, gelato, and creams, so this will come in quite handy.
12. Real Snacks:  If left to my own devices, I could certainly snack all day long, so it will be fun to try out these recipes and see just how close we can come to making our favorite snacks and treats.
13. The Complete Joy of  Homebrewing:  As you may know, Justin and I are both big fans of craft beer.  We haven't tried home brewing yet, but this book gives us the perfect excuse to try it out.
14. Silicone Oven Mitts:  These bad boys slip on and cover almost your entire forearm, so you'll have no worries reaching deep into the oven. This gift was inspired by our guests who were holding their breath   when we flipped our dry-brined Thanksgiving bird.  

December 10, 2013

It's Pie Style Jack II: The Em"pie"re Strikes Back!

If you're like us, you've probably spent the week after Thanksgiving eating nothing but leftover turkey and side dishes.  In an effort to not just recreate our Thanksgiving dinner plates, we got creative and turned our leftovers into turkey pot pies!

We started by quartering a few potatoes and peeling a few leftover carrots, and popping them into the oven to roast them for about 15 minutes.  Since they typically have a longer cook time, roasting them first helps minimize the time your pot pies need to be in the oven.  Plus, it gives them a nice roasty flavor.
While those are roasting, you can make your dough to top your pies.  We kept it simple by combining 1 cup of flour with 1 cup of chilled butter, and a splash of vodka.  Try not to overmix the dough, as you want the butter to stay as cold as possible.  Once our dough came together, we wrapped it in some plastic wrap, and stuck it in the freezer to get it cold again.  This will help give you a nice, flaky crust.  If you're making your dough in advance, you can just keep your dough in the fridge.
Once the dough was chilling, we started building our pies.  We chopped up some fresh onion, and dropped them into our little bowls.  Then, each bowl got a healthy spoonful of our leftover green bean casserole.
Then we chopped up some turkey meat, and added those to each bowl.  At this point, the potatoes and carrots were also done, so we chopped those into smaller pieces and tossed them in the bowls as well.
The one thing that was missing was a bit of a gravy.  So we added in a few spoonfuls of our turkey stock, as well as a splash of milk.  Then give everything a little toss and turn in the bowl so it's all mixed up and coated in the stock and milk.

Then, just role out your dough, cut it into circles wide enough to top your bowls.  Make sure you cut slits in the top to so the steam can escape (clearly the 2 on the right were our first crusts).  You also want to beat an egg and brush each crust with the egg wash.  This will give you a nice, golden brown crust.
Be sure to place your pies on a baking sheet to catch any gravy that may spill out of your pies.  Pop them into a 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes, or until your crusts are cooked through, and golden brown.
The crust was buttery and really flaky, almost like a biscuit.  It was the perfect topper for our pot pies, and a great way to repurpose our leftovers.

December 8, 2013

I. Wanna Stock and Roll All Night!

We're all about using as much of an animal as possible when we cook, and not letting anything go to waste.  So once we sliced as much turkey off the bone as we could, we threw the carcass into a stockpot with some water to make a delicious stock.  Just like we did with the pig head last Christmas, the turkey bones sat on the stove for a good 4 hours.

It's really easy, and you can do this with any bones, whether you've got a chicken, shrimp/lobster shells, fish bones...you can make a pretty mean stock out of just about anything.  Since we knew we'd mostly be using the stock for soups, we also threw in some celery stalks, carrots, and a bundle of sage, thyme and rosemary.  If you want a more plain stock, you can leave those items out.  Then just fill your pot with enough water to cover the bones.
Let it simmer away for 3-4 hours.  Any meat that was left on the bones will fall right off, and you'll be left with a rich, delicious stock.
You'll want to first pull out as much meat as you can.  I first tried using a slotted spoon, to separate the meat from the liquid, but that was taking too long.  I then changed up my method, and just poured the contents of a pot through a strainer.  The liquid went into a plastic container, and the meat was in the strainer.  That allowed me to just pick out the celery and any small bones that had separated from the carcass.  

Once you've separated out the big chunks of meat, towards the bottom of the pot, we switched to using a finer mesh strainer.
We were left with several containers of stock, and bowl of shredded turkey.
Since we knew we wouldn't be making soup right away, we put the turkey into a plastic bag, and put him in the freezer for safe keeping.  We kept one small container of stock in the refrigerator, but the rest went into the freezer as well.  So now we have the makings of a delicious soup!

December 4, 2013

To Brine, or Not to Brine?

I grew up always having a smoked turkey for Thanksgiving, which was easy to do when we lived in California.  After moving back east, colder weather came into play, and usually put a damper on our smoking plans, which is exactly what happened this year.  With about a week to go until the big day and a projected temperature of only 38 degrees, smoking the turkey just wasn't in the cards, and we resorted to oven roasting the bird.

Many people will recommend brining the turkey, to help retain moisture, particularly in the breast meat.  Wet brines are fine and good, but they require a lot of space in your fridge, and can leave your meat with a slightly mushy texture.  Instead, we tried a dry brine, which we found here.  One perk to dry brining is that you can apply the brine while your turkey is still frozen!  This was a huge time saver for us, since it took about 3.5 days for our turkey to completely defrost.

First, you'll want to get your brine ready.  As the recipe suggests, you want about 1 tbsp. of salt for every 5lbs. of turkey.  We had a 16.6lb. turkey, so we used a little more than 3 tbsp. salt.  Because we still wanted to try and get a smokey flavor, we used 2 tbsp. of applewood smoked salt, and 1 tbsp. kosher salt.  In addition to the salt, we added in some smoked paprika, again for some smokiness, along with some chopped thyme, rosemary, sage, and juniper berries, which we crushed in our mortar and pestle.

Now it's time to rub it all over your turkey!  Since our turkey still had to defrost, we placed him in a brining bag.  That way it would collect the water, and it'd be easy to dispose once Thanksgiving day came.  Before rubbing your salt mixture on the bird, be sure to pat him dry with paper towel to get rid of any excess moisture.  Also make sure that any gizzards and organs have been removed from the cavity.  Sprinkle a bit of your salt & spice mixture in the cavity too.  Then you'll want to use about 1 tbsp on the breasts, and 1 tbsp on each leg/wing/thigh.  If your turkey is defrosted already, be sure to get in all the crevices.

Once you've rubbed him down, you can seal up the bag.  Try to get as much air out of the bag as possible.  It can be a little tough, so it's best to have an extra set of hands to help you do this.
Now you can just pop your bird into the refrigerator, breast side up, for 3 days, and let the salt work its magic.  If you remember, give your turkey a little massage each day.  We massaged ours through the bag, just to keep our hands clean.
After the 3rd day, you'll want to remove him from the bag, and refrigerate him for at least 8 hours, uncovered.  We first put the brine on our turkey on Monday, so Wedensday night, before we went to bed, we took him out of the bag, gave him one last massage, and let him sit overnight, uncovered, in the fridge.


At least 1 hour before you're ready to cook your bird, be sure to take him out of the fridge, and let him start to warm up.  We also gave him an additional dusting of my Grandpa's secret rub, the one he'd use on his smoked turkeys.  As when roasting a chicken, we prepared some aromatics to put in the cavity to add a bit of flavor, and also keep the breast moist.  We stuck to traditional ingredients here, roughly chopping up some carrots, onion, celery, and lemon, and making a bundle of rosemary, sage and thyme.


We stuffed what we could into the cavity, and the rest went into the bottom of the roasting pan, so we'd get some added flavor to the pan drippings, in case we wanted to make gravy later.  Also make sure to tie the legs together, closing up the cavity as much as you can.  This will also help prevent the meat from drying out.

Now you're ready to roast!  Heat up your oven to 425 degrees, and place your bird, breast side down, on your roasting rack.  I know this is atypical, but trust us, it works!  We also brushed some softened butter onto the skin of the turkey to help it brown.  When you're oven comes to temperature, throw your bird in for 30 minutes.  This will help get the bottom nice and brown.
After 30 minutes, pull your bird out of the oven and flip him over.  Remember that the pan and bird are extremely hot.  Be sure to have oven mitts or dish towels handy to help you flip the bird without burning yourself.  While you're trying to flip the bird, you'll also want to lower the oven temperature to 325 degrees.  Give him another coat of butter, and pop him back in the oven until a thermometer, stuck into the thickest part of the thigh, reads 160 degrees.
For us, it took about 2.5hrs. more.  Most will say that poultry needs to be cooked to an internal temperature of 165 degrees, but we knew that if we pulled him out when he reached 160 degrees, the carry-over cooking would bring him up to 165.
Be sure to let him rest for at least 30 minutes before you start carving into him.  While he's resting, you can give him a foil tent to keep him warm, and you can now use the oven to cook your side dishes, like our green bean casserole.

The dry brining method was a success!  The breast stayed nice and moist, and the smoked salt we used added a subtle smokiness to the meat.  It was a great alternative to actually smoking the turkey.

December 2, 2013

This is How We Casserole!

One of my favorite Thanksgiving dishes is green bean casserole, so when Justin and I were developing this year's menu, I was pretty adamant about including it.  Turns out it's really easy to make a dressed up version of the traditional dish.  We used this recipe as a guide, and were on our way!

Instead of using the standard, canned fried onions, we decided to fry up some shallots.  We thinly sliced 4 shallots (which you can do ahead of time, though it made our fridge smell like onions), and they were ready to be fried.  The beauty here is that you don't need to make a batter or coat them in flour.  Just heat a pan with some oil, and drop the shallots in.  Be careful not to drop too many shallots in the pan at once.  They crisp up pretty fast, and you want to be able to pull them all out before they burn.  Once your shallots are fried, you can set them aside while you cook up the rest of the dish.
Bring a big pot of water to a boil, and drop in your green beans or hericot verts, just to blanche them.  Make sure you have an ice water bath ready, so as soon as you drain your beans, dump them into the ice bath to stop the cooking process.

While that's happening, you can whip up your creamy mushroom sauce.  You want about 3/4 lb. of mushrooms.  Just get whatever kind of mushrooms you like, and slice them into bite sized pieces.  For our casserole, we went with shiitakes.  Melt some butter in your pan, and saute your mushrooms.
When you first drop your mushrooms into the pan, season them with pepper.  You'll see the mushrooms first release their liquid, and then reabsorb them.  When they've reabsorbed them, that's when you season them with salt.

Once they cook down, you'll sprinkle them with a couple tablespoons of flour.  Toss them around so the mushrooms are coated.  The flour will start to form a bit of a paste, but this will help to thicken your sauce.  Once the flour has cooked down a bit, add in your vegetable or chicken stock and some heavy cream.  You want a 3 to 1 ratio of stock to cream, so depending on just how saucy you want your casserole to be, you can adjust accordingly.  I don't like my beans to be swimming in sauce, so we stuck with 1 1/2 cups of stock, and 1/2 cup of heavy cream.  This was the perfect amount of sauce for about 1 1/2 lbs. of beans.
Stir everything together and let it simmer until it thickens.  Once your sauce has thickened, you can toss in your beans.  You want to make sure they get evenly coated in the sauce.
Then pour everything into your baking dish.  Make sure you transfer all of the sauce into your dish too.  Top it all with your fried onions, and pop it into the oven for about 15 minutes.
You want the green beans to heat up again, the sauce to be bubbling, and the onions to really crisp up again.  This from-scratch version of green bean casserole doesn't require much more effort than the traditional dish, plus it's a bit healthier since you know exactly what's going into it.  You can pick your mushrooms, and you're not getting all that extra salt or preservatives from the canned mushroom soup and fried onions.  Not to mention, it tastes extremely delicious!

December 1, 2013

Bog Heaven

Every turkey needs the perfect cranberry sauce, and this one did not disappoint.  If you're taking on the task of making the entire Thanksgiving meal, this is one dish you can make in advance.  In fact, it tastes better if you make it a couple days in advance because it allows all the flavors to really develop as they mix and meld together.

For each bag of cranberries, you'll want 1 cup of red wine and 1 cup of sugar.  We had 2 bags of cranberries, so we started with 2 cups of wine and 2 cups of sugar.  You can use any kind of wine you like.  If you want sweeter cranberries use a sweeter wine.  If you want to highlight the tartness, use something more tannic. We just happened to have some cranberry wine on hand, which really added a cranberry punch to our sauce.  Let it simmer and reduce on the stove until you end up with a thin syrup.
Once it's syrupy, add in your cranberries.  I like my cranberry sauce to still have some whole cranberries, while Justin likes them to really cook down, so we compromised.  We added about 3/4 of our cranberries to the sauce initially, and let them cook down.  Then we added the rest towards the end, just so they could soften, but still stay whole.  If you want them to all cook down, add them all at once.  If you want them to be more whole, just cook them less.
Give your berries a good toss in your syrup, and just let them sit on the stove and simmer away.  You'll start to hear them pop as they cook.  Then you'll want to add in a liberal amount of black pepper, and just a tiny dash of salt to help cut the sweetness, along with some chopped mint, and orange zest. Fresh herbs and a little citrus help balance the dish and make for a more complex flavor profile.
Once you have your desired consistency, you can pull it off the stove, and transfer it to your serving dish. Just remember to pull it out of the fridge about 30 minutes before you're ready to serve it, just to take the chill off it.  Garnish with a sprig of mint, and voila, a delicious side dish, fresh out of the bog.