Justin & Meredith Winokur's Kitchen Cooking Notebook
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KitchenKatalog: Blog 269
Tuesday, February 11, 2014, 08:36 AM
I made low-fat patty melts and rutabaga chips. To make the patty melts, I made two 1/3 lbs patties. After they were done, I sautéd onions in the same pan. I kept having to deglaze with wine but it worked well enough. The onions didn't really caramelize too much but they had a lot of flavor. I then assembled with fat-free thousand island and a bit of shredded cheese. I spread Brummel and Brown "butter" on the outside of the bread and I tried to grill it. It worked better when everything was warm. (I had made lunch for the next day and refrigerated the stuff and then assembled dinner the next day). As you can see from the picture, it came out a bit messy. I was afraid of over-cooking the bread (I burned a slice the day before) and I was just having issues all around. Oh well, it still came out pretty good.
The rutabaga chips were also really good. I played with slice thickness and settled on the second-from-the-smallest (3/8" I think 1/8"). I baked them at 425 for 30 minutes. I flipped them and did another 5. Unlike potatoes, these crisped up really nicely. I wouldn't say they were better since rutabaga has a very different flavor, but I liked them a lot. I will do it again! (note, I may be wrong about the times. I seem to have lost my notes so I am using the best of my recollection)
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7244, 2014-02-11_083607
Sunday, February 09, 2014, 09:32 PM
I had done a bit of reading on seitan and most recipes call for a 1:1 vital wheat gluten to water (by volume) ratio. I decided to test it with sausages. I also tried adding all seasonings to the water instead of the dough. I used the following ingredients. I brought it all together and manually kneaded it for 5 minutes. I really liked how it came together. It was easier to form and felt like less of a mass of rubber.
Formed into 5 equal pieces (3 dinner, 2 lunch). Pressure steamed on setting 2 for 25 minutes. (But too much and not good. See below)
I decided to try cooking it like sausages but steaming in the pressure cooker. I do not know if it was the heat, cook time, method (in the aluminum foil) or something else, but I didn't love the texture or the flavor of this attempt. First of all, I forgot the salt! That was pretty noticeable. And too much seasoning. But it just didn't taste like seitan! So, next time, I will do the 1:1 ratio but with more normal ingredients. I think I will still cook it in the pressure cooker but I will simmer (without foil) instead of steam. You can also see that I tried 3 different shapes.
The soup was more straight-forward. I did the following:
I cooked it all for about 20 minutes, immersion blended it, and gave it another 5 minutes. The soup was pretty good. Not overly nuanced like last time but sweet and flavorful. And very easy. It was a bit thick. I would go with another cup of water.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7240, 2014-02-09_213229
Sunday, February 09, 2014, 10:56 AM
A pretty easy and simple breakfast. I baked some thick-sliced peppered bacon (from The Fresh Market) and served it with two fried eggs and toast from extra sour-dough from the night before.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7236, 2014-02-09_105645
Saturday, February 08, 2014, 08:42 PM
This was mine and Meredith's anniversary dinner. We had eaten a large lunch earlier so we didn't want anything too heavy so we went with seafood. We had Filipino (I think) coconut shrimp, mussels in white wine and roasted cabbage + broccoli.
Mussels: I did this so I know more about it. I lightly sautéed a bunch of scallions in some oil. Then, as they were almost finished, I added 4-5 minced garlic cloves. When they were all aromatic, I added about half a bottle of cheap white wine (Three Buck Chuck). Finally, I added a bit of crushed red pepper. I used the steamer insert to steam the mussels. Later, I actually decided to do another few minutes to cook them a bit more (this time without the basket).
They were really good, though I was disappointed by the number of dead ones before and after. The sauce was really, really good with the crusty sour-dough bread we bought.
Shrimp: Meredith did this so I am less completes sure of what she did. I think she followed the recipe below with a few major changes.
When she combined it all, it seemed to curdle but that didn't affect the flavor. I really liked them. You could taste all of the coconut flavor (probably from the flakes). I would make this again in a heartbeat.
(as an aside, it calls for 1 lbs of shrimp for two people!!!)
Cabbage: This was nothing special. Just the normal roasted cabbage but with some (old) broccoli that I had around thrown in. Kind of a let down with the other stuff.
Head-On Coconut Shrimp (from Burnt Lumpia)
Local Copy -- password is the name of my dog, all lower case
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7232, 2014-02-08_204217
Thursday, February 06, 2014, 07:12 PM
Meredith and I made an easy dinner. We started with the crispy roasted potatoes I have done before, but with purple majesty potatoes. As I noted the last time, I used a lower heat. I did 450 but kept the 20 minutes. However, I only did the other side for 6 or so. I again just did half-moons since you have to turn them halfway and this helps. They were in fact rather crunchy, though I thought maybe a tad dry.
We did the salmon the usual way on the stove then oven. And, since the oven was already cranked up, we just did the asparagus for 5 minutes with the smoking salmon. That actually gave them a bit more flavor. The 5 minutes at 500 was perfect for "normal" people, though I prefer them a bit more cooked. The salmon came out dry. I do not know if I went too long, the fish was thinner than I am used to, or this was lower quality salmon but it was far from as good as it often is when I cook it this way. Oh well.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7228, 2014-02-06_191211
Thursday, February 06, 2014, 11:08 AM
I made roasted broccoli and seitan chorizo for lunch. I just laid out the broccoli and roasted at 425 (or so) for about 30 minutes. The chorizo was the normal recipe cut in half. I do not know why but I needed to add some more water to get it to all come together. I tried not breaking it into pieces and just chopping as I went. Honestly, it was much easier this way but I didn't like the outcome as much, There were too many kind of burnt crumbs and the rest just wasn't as good. I may try to do a bit of both next time since this was easier; especially with a smaller pan.
Anyway, the lunch was good. Lots of food from the broccoli but few calories.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7224, 2014-02-06_110829
Tuesday, February 04, 2014, 11:04 AM
I made cabbage fritters based on zucchini and broccoli ones. It was actually closer to the zucchini as I used half an onion and I didn't use feta. Anyway,once I had sliced up just half a cabbage, I already had so much so I only used half. And then, through playing, I ended up with a whole cup of flour and 3 eggs. Plus some water. Mixing it was rather difficult but it finally kind of-sort of-maybe came together. I was able to form it and it cooked fine, though I let it go longer. I did 350 for 30 minutes or so, flipped and did another 30 minutes. I should have used a higher heat but they eventually cooked.
They actually tasted really good. I am not sure if it was the batter or the cabbage, but there was a nice subtle flavor. I would do it again but I'd be more prepared for (a) the amount of prep time and (b) the longer cook time.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7220, 2014-02-04_110442
Monday, February 03, 2014, 10:36 AM
I made fresh rolls and spaghetti squash. First the rolls since that was the bigger thing. I made a bunch for lunch and dinner the next few days. I filled them with sautéd kale, julienne cucumber, julienne carrots and imitation crab. I finely chopped the kale so it was small pieces. And I deseeded the cucumber, but I do not think that was needed. I used a new trick to the paper. Since they are so large, I filled a tray with water and I used that to wet the rice paper. These came out pretty good. Lots of veggies! They took a bit longer to prep and make than I would have liked but it wasn't too bad.
In the background, I made spaghetti squash with sauce. The sauce was a combination leftover pizza sauce from the other day and fresh home-made sauce. I tried something different too. I put a can of tuna in for protein and a different flavor. That was a mistake. It wasn't_bad _per se, but it was strange! Oh well.
The nice thing about this meal is that it made a large dinner portion and a few lunches! And the rolls were pretty. See the pictures below.
Original Wordpress ID and Date: 7215, 2014-02-03_103636