Justin & Meredith Winokur's Kitchen Cooking Notebook
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Home > 45
KitchenKatalog: Blog 45
Saturday, January 01, 2022, 07:08 PM
I again made our super crispy seared salmon (which is now a page in our recipe book). I followed that guide including having to do the edges a bit.
I also made Roasted Broccoli Soup with about a doubled amount of broccoli and cheese.(well maybe not quite double the broccoli but about 7 oz of cheese. Maybe a tad too much). I didn't do anything too special on the soup. It came out very good as usual though maybe a bit thinner than I like.
See the smoke coming off the grill.
Saturday, January 01, 2022, 11:53 AM
I made English Muffin Bread [King Arthur Flour] with no real changes to the recipe. My only note is that the rising dough stuck to the cover. Next time, I may just skip covering it. It seems like it makes less than the Trader Joes version. I will have to weigh them next time.
I used nearly all of it for Croque Monsieur (turkey and ham) on English Muffin Bread.
It wasn't bad. Not as good as Trader Joes' but still decent. And very, very easy!
Friday, December 31, 2021, 05:14 PM
I have been wanting to make a turkey for a while and especially with Brooke and Nathan visiting, I had more turkey eaters! I bought an ~13 lbs turkey and spatchcocked then dry-brined it. I actually did this two days ago but didn't cover it since I thought we'd be cooking it the next day (oops).
I then used a fresh "poultry herbs" (sage, rosemary, thyme) and followed the butter instructions from Herb-Rubbed Crisp-Skinned Butterflied Roast Turkey [Serious Eats]. I also added 3 or 4 cloves of fresh garlic to the butter.
I baked it at 465°F on our oven (so probably ~450°F nominally). I turned off the convection to keep some of the smoke down which was a mixed success. The thermometer was in a breast and when I took it out at 150°F, I probed all around and it was a tad too hot in the legs but on my last probe, I did the other breast and it wasn't enough!!! Ugh!
I moved the thermometer and put it back in for a while.
More or less, it wasn't too dry. Maybe a few places here or there but mostly moist. And pretty flavorful. Maybe not the most amazing one ever but pretty good! And the skin was super crispy!
For the gravy, I followed the basic recipe from Recipe Tin Eats. At least as far as amounts. But I used chicken and vegetable better than boullion and went (too) heavy on it. Also, following Serious Eats, I added soy sauce and then I also did some Worcestershire sauce for extra umami. Well, it came out a tad salty and the Worcestershire was the dominant aroma (and, to a lesser extent, flavor). Not bad by any means but not idea. I wouldn't do that again.
But this gravy did work a lot better than last year's.
I also roasted brussel sprouts.
Wednesday, December 29, 2021, 08:32 AM
Meredith made a double batch of Double Chocolate Chunk Muffin Tops [Liz Moody]. She made them (again) with black walnuts and the rest of the changes from last time.
She reported that they were pretty good. It turns out I do not like black walnuts so I skipped them.
Tuesday, December 28, 2021, 07:00 PM
Meredith and Caroline prepped Candy Cane Cookies [A Beautiful Mess] and then the three of us made them from there.
They prepped the dough a few days before we made it. We just kept forgetting or not having time. Then, when we went to make them today, the dough was hard as a rock. We had to let it sit for a long time (perhaps too long) before we could shape them.
We followed the directions for shaping but it was tough. I found that if I rolled the strands then twisted, it shaped a tad better.
They also spread a lot. Perhaps based on the timing and being out too long. And weren't very crisp. But either way, they were really good. A nice bite of peppermint but not too strong.
Tuesday, December 28, 2021, 06:46 PM
Meredith and I made a double batch of Tortellini with Sausage and Mascarpone [What's Gaby Cooking] from What's Gabby Cooking. We followed the recipe more or less but doubled it and use Rao's tomato sauce. It was really good. Indulgent for sure but worth it.
Sunday, December 26, 2021, 07:02 PM
We made fondue for Christmas Dinner (though we pushed it a day). We made one batch ourselves and used most of a Trader Joes pack.
We used Cheese Fondue [Serious Eats] replacing Appenzeller with ??? (Probably Comte). We also didn't have or use kirsch and skipped the nutmeg. Ours was okay but needed more salt. And maybe the kirsch was needed. All together, it was fine but not as good as Trader Joes'.
We made two servings but ended up just saving one for another time (may freeze it)
We largely followed last time since we were really happy with it.
All roasting at 400°F.
Sunday, December 26, 2021, 08:58 AM
Christmas Sandwiches with black forrest ham. The "family" pack of rolls fit perfectly into that pan.
I think I used way too much green onion! And I guess despite going 15 min in the oven, I should have used more.