This past week I had made a beef stock that made me want more. It was based off of a chicken stock I had in my freezer and a pound and a half of short ribs. They were boiled together with some onions to make a base for soups. The first was a simple vegetable soup with the beef from the short ribs, but in its final concoction after I had added the powder pack from a beef ramen package that it reached a scrumptious stock. I drank it for breakfast the other day and wanted more.
I’ve always wanted to make soups and stocks. I thought that that could be my thing as a home cook — to make good soup. I love soup, so right now I am chasing after making a decent beef stock. There’s no actual soup I am looking to make with it, but I’m chasing after the flavor of my mom’s soup. That’s were I start.
I’ve asked how she makes her beef stock. Boil the beef until all the impurities come out. Dump the water. Clean the beef. Add back to a pot. Boil again with onion until you like. Simple and easy. Right?
Here’s my try. I’m following her steps, and using leaks and onions as the aromatics. I have a 12 quart stock pot. In goes beef ribs and marrow bones with a head of onion and leaks. It’s simmering away right now. We’ll see how it goes…
Actually, it came from thinking that I should be eating more oatmeal in the morning. Plain oatmeal isn’t the most delicious, so I thought some toppings and mix-ins would make it better. I thought that I would look forward to it more. So, I went to my local Trader Joe’s and bought a whole bunch of nuts and dried fruit — several bags. Pecans, walnuts, almonds, dried blueberries, dried ginger, dried bananas — that sort of mix.
Yet, in the end, I did not eat any more oatmeal.
So I decide to turn it into trail mix. Again, there’s a lot of that to make it. Like I have at least 3 pounds worth of mixture which is a lot.
Hey, you’ll be getting a nice Marry Christmas present soon!
I am on a paella kick. I thought I was going to be on a wok kick, but once I found out how easy it is to make a single serving of paella, I have made about 4 of them in the past week.
I’ve made it with cod, chicken and green beans, cod and green beans, and just some chicken.
You really need the paella pan. I purchased mine at PaellaPans.com. You also really need the round Spanish rice. Beyond those two things, I believe its open to your imagination.
First saute garlic, onions, and other vegetables in some fine olive oil. Next is the sofrito with some tomato and paprika. Salt to taste. Then what ever your main ingredient is — chicken, meat, or ? It goes in. Finally rice and some stock. Boil at medium high for about 10 minutes. The water should be just about boiled away. Lower to medium low for another 5 minutes. Finally, for the socorat — the crunchy rice — bring the heat back up for another 2 minutes.
You’re down!
Let sit for 5 minutes covered then enjoy.
I’ve been following Spain On A Fork‘s recipes. He also has given me the directions. I just follow them generally. It’s strange that a lot of recipes tell you ten minutes at high. They’re usually doing a larger portion and yet it is the same time for my smaller portion. Also, follow the Spaniards and don’t mix seafood and meat. But you can do it anyway.
Mayhaps tomorrow will be another paella for dinner?
This guy has some nice specialty dogs. I especially like what he has done with the bacon. I am getting hungry for some hot dogs. I’m about to dial up his food truck and get him to send me some!
I should quit my job and start up my hot dog stand. I’ve got two specialty dogs myself. My original and first: fresh diced jalapeno with Cheez Wiz and crumbled feta. My second one which hasn’t been perfected yet: corned beef, mustard, and onion. I just can’t get the frying of the corned beef correct to distinguish it from the hot dog.
I butchered a beef brisket for the first time in my BBQ life. Butchered in all meanings of the word.
For Thanksgiving, my brother wanted to smoke a brisket in addition to the requisite turkey. It was going to be the third meat along with some spiral ham. He said to come over on Wednesday afternoon to help him prep it and throw it on the smoker. Little did I know that he meant for me to be the one to prep it since he still had some work to finish up.
Now, I like trying to smoke meat, and I prefer to do ribs. Ribs is simple. There’s still some trimming to do if you want, but not like there is on a brisket. My brother had purchased it from Walmart, and it was about 13 lbs. It looked okay, but I question whether it was the best cut of meat. I was supposed to trim this up? How?
The first thing you should know is that you need a sharp knife. I did not have the sharpest of knives so when I started trimming, the meat did not come off as buttery smooth as I would’ve liked. Of course, since it was my first time, I had know idea if I was doing it correctly. I relied on my experience trimming ribs to guide me through this. I know to take off as much fat and make it as smooth as possible. I went and did this. It didn’t look half bad after 20 minutes. There were pockets of meat that I didn’t know what to do, but I powered through and had a slab of brisket ready for the smoker.
Unfortunately, it wouldn’t fit in the smoker, so I had to cut it down into the ‘flat’ and the ‘point.’ There’s a seam of fat that separates the two. I started cutting it, but after a bit I lost where it went. I just continued until there were two parts. I then seasoned with some rub that my brother had bought. It was standard: salt, pepper, garlic powder, etc. I added some extra salt, which will come back to haunt me, then put it in the smoker.
The plan from here was to start at 200 F for six or so hours, then wrap the meat up in pink butcher paper for another 8 or so hours at 225 F. The meat went in at 5:30 which meant that roughly around 11:30 we want to wrap. I let my brother handle this part of the smoking.
On Thanksgiving morning, my brother called with some anxious news. Even after that overnight smoke, the meat was at 160 F. Since we were targeting 200 F to be done, we were perplexed. He said he was going to raise the temp up to 300 F to get the meat as moist and pliable as possible. I told him that he could also throw it in the oven to finish it off if he needed to use the smoker for the turkey. Eventually, he did for an hour and by the time lunch rolled around he had the brisket out of the smoker and in a cooler for hours.
First smoked brisket
The moment of truth arrived and he plated it up. Not too bad. Not the greatest, but it was our first try. I have no idea if it was any good given that I am a novice to brisket.
I’ve been watching more brisket trimming and smoking videos. I wonder if I can make it in an oven?
So I made some ribs tonight for dinner. I’ll save the story for another day. Let’s just say low and slow for hours on end. I started cooking after my 2 o’clock meeting. I just finished cleaning up. Yeah. Low and slow for hours on end.
But as the title indicates, I want to talk about the side of fries I made with the ribs. I wasn’t going to deep fry them. I don’t want the mess. So I was going to do them in the oven.
“But the ribs!”
Yeah. What to do. What to do?
I had two russet potatoes. I cut them into fries, threw them in a water bath to remove starch for about 30 minutes, dried them, and spread them out on towel to dry out. Tossed them with some vegetable oil and salt before spreading out again on a pizza pan — that’s the largest pan after my half sheet which at that moment was being used for the ribs.
I planned to “par-boil” the fries before upping the heat in the oven after the ribs were done. So into the oven at the low temperature while the ribs were going. This was close to when the ribs were done — about 30 minutes.
When I pulled the ribs out and covered with tin foil, I upped the temperature in the oven to 450 F, flipped the fries around, and slid them back in for 20 minutes. They didn’t look too great before they went back in. Perhaps I was wrong on this “par-boil” method, and that they’ll turn out soggy.
But after the first 20 minutes they were developing a good color and were slightly crisp. I planned for another 20 minutes, but pulled them out after 10 because they were nicely brown. Crisp. And a bit over done tending towards burnt.
I think they were dried out too much in the “par-boil” method. They were crisp but the inner wasn’t nice and soft. It was missing.
Overall, it was a great dinner, which took too long to get. It shouldn’t be done on a Wednesday, but on a lazy Sunday.
I have been to Germany. I have eaten pretzels in Bavaria. The best is the smaller pretzel style bread. We would get some with breakfast, and all you need was butter. So the best.
I think I want to give this a try. Why don’t you as well?
It’s been a while since I visited the bookstore. I was there today and bought a book! (Actually, I went last week but there’s really nothing to report from then.)
First, they changed the layout of the store. I walked in (last week) and the shelves were moved around so that I don’t know where the genres were any more. I walked about re-familiarizing myself with a place I’ve been to hundreds of times.
I went for a book on BBQ. We’ve got a smoker. I want to know the best secrets into making savory smoked foods, so I picked out a BBQ guru, Myron Mixon’s book, BBQ&A with Myron Mixon. Hopefully, I learn his secrets and start making some yummy BBQ.
I sort of made something decent today. As the title indicates, it was a black bean and corn salsa. I’m eating it with some tortilla chips. I’m sure this will taste better once the flavors meld together overnight. Yeah, I’m eating it right now it’s so good to me. Here’s how it came together.
About a 1/4 to 1/3 cup of dry black beans soaked overnight or like I did for the day about 8 hours. I soaked for 6, but did a quick soak where in you put it in a pot, bring it to a boil, then turn off the heat and let sit for an hour or so. After the beans where “soaked,” I dumped them into a pot and simmer for an hour. I added some salt, ground cumin, and ground coriander.
The other ingredients where a small can of corn kernels, one shallot diced, diced cilantro, and the juice of a lime. Throw all these into a bowl, add some salt and pepper to taste, mix well. Then add the black beans. Mix and check for seasoning.
