Friday Food: Back to School

Friday 

Short version: Ram curry, rice

Long version: One child had been requesting curry, so I made some with a bag of ram chili meat. I only have sweet yellow curry powder, so that's what I used. 

I used the very last of my carrots in the curry, and I thought I didn't have any potatoes left, but then I remembered the small bucket of garden potatoes I still had. So I used some of those.

Very satisfying.

I always add dairy to curry at the end. This time, it was a bunch of sour cream.

Saturday

Short version: Epiphany tamales, truffles

Long version: I had to postpone our traditional Christmas Day tamales to Epiphany due to lack of time before Christmas. Techinically still Christmas. It counts.

I was out of onions, so I used some of the green tomato salsa in the meat, since that had onions in it. 

I don't have any homemade chicken stock this winter, and I needed stock for the masa mixture. I did have the liquid left from braising the pork roast a few days earlier, though, so I used that. I had just enough for a double batch of tamales.

I also had just enough tallow left from the big batch I had rendered a few weeks prior. And the last two jars of pressure-canned bull meat for the filling. 

They actually needed more spice, which is not something I typically say.

The truffles were Lindt milk chocolate ones. I always buy a big box of them--the 60-count one--to put in stockings on Christmas Day, and then some for Epiphany, too.

Sunday

Short version: Re-worked curry, leftover rice, chocolate ice cream

Long version: Most of the meat was eaten out of the curry, but there was a lot of liquid and some vegetables left. So I added some yellow split peas to it. 

I wasn't sure if the tomato in the curry would keep the split peas from getting soft--like the infamous baked beans debacle--so I decided to play it safe and cook the split peas before adding them to the curry. I just cooked them in water and salt until they were soft, then added the curry to it to heat all the way up.

Everyone liked the curry better this way, so I need to remember to use the split peas whenever I made curry. It does thicken it up nicely.

Monday

Short version: Bull enchilada casserole, baked fruit with cream

Long version: We woke up to an honest-to-goodness blizzard in the morning, which blew almost all day. This of course meant that we were home for school. And that meant the dreaded Zoom school.

Worst. 

Getting four kids--and myself--on and off Zoom meetings, as well as supervising their actual school work, puts me in a very bad mood. No one else was too thrilled about it, either, so I made a dessert to cheer us all up.

All I did was dump storebought frozen blueberries and strawberries in a casserole dish, add one very wrinkly apple languishing in the refrigerator that I peeled and diced, a bit of vanilla, and a bunch of the too-sweet peach jam from a couple summers ago, and then cook it. I actually microwaved it for about ten minutes, to get everything thawed and starting to release the juices, and then I put it in the oven with the enchilada casserole I had made between Zoom meetings.

The fruit was still way too liquidy when the casserole was done, and also not sweet enough. So I spooned out most of the juices and reduced those on the stove to a syrup, then added them back to the fruit with more sugar.

It was kind of annoying, but I got it done. And it was very good with cream poured over it.

Tuesday

Short version: Pork, mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, pureed squash

Long version: This was a pork sirloin roast, which is really too lean to braise like a picnic roast. But it was frozen solid, so I couldn't cut it into chops or whatever. Braising it is. That made it tender. Frying it in bacon grease took care of the leanness.

While the pork was in the oven, I also baked one of the garden squash. I always puree squash--this time with my immersion blender--because I really hate stringy squash. I added butter and maple syrup to this, which was very indulgent of me.

When my menus feature sauerkraut, squash, and frozen peas as the only vegetables, it means my refrigerator looks like this.

Slim pickin's.

This happens every winter. And that is what squash and sauerkraut are for.

Wednesday

Short version: Elk chunks, spaghetti, leftover mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, frozen peas

Long version: I had chunked up an elk tenderloin the night before and then put a marinade over it of salt, garlic powder, thyme, olive oil, and vinegar. Then they just needed to be fried when I got home from the First Communion class.

The eldest child made the spaghetti with, I think, butter, cream cheese, and a lot of black pepper.

Thursday

Short version: Chorizo and scrambled egg burritos, carrot sticks

Long version: I had to substitute this day, so I had taken out a bag of elk chorizo to thaw in anticipation of needing a quick and easy dinner after work. I did, and this was.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

Tamale Tips

It has become a tradition in our house to make tamales for Christmas. This is very in keeping with our current location, as tamales are a traditional meal in New Mexico. Every grocery store sells the ingredients needed to make them, conveniently collected together on their end caps around Christmas.

They are a lot of work.

Look how cute, though.

Despite the effort involved in making them, they get easier and faster to make with each attempt.

The problem is that, since I only make them once a year, I forget things from year to year and esssentially have to re-learn those things every year.

But I have this handy blog! I frequently search my own site for recipes I've found online in the past, or things I've done and can't remember. So I decided this year to post my own tips for making tamales, so I can reference them in years to come. And then, of course, they might help some of you. Should you also feel the urge to make tamales at some point.

It could happen.

Onward!

--I use this recipe for the masa mixture, except I don't put the chile in it. I did put some of the liquid from cooking my meat this time, but the masa could be more highly spiced.

--I never have lard, so I use tallow instead. If I don't have enough tallow--it uses so much tallow; SO MUCH--then I can make up the difference with butter or rendered sheep fat.

--I like the instruction to slap the masa mixture with your flat hand. If nothing sticks to your hand and it gets shiny from the fat, it's good to go. My children like doing this, too.

--Making a double recipe of the masa mixture does not give me 60 tamales, as the recipe says it will. I got 45 this time. But we ate exactly half of those, so that's about right for a double recipe for our family. These are very heavy. No one eats more than four.

--I never follow a recipe for the meat filling. I always use beef, because I think it's tastier when re-heated. Anything shreddy will work. But because there is so little in each tamale--only about two tablespoons of meat--it needs to be very highly spiced. If it tastes too strong on its own, it's good for tamales. I don't like really spicy tamales, which is why I make my own, but the meat mixture this year needed more spice in it.

--I always end up with a lot of extra meat when I've run out of masa. This is okay, because I can freeze it for another meal, but probably 1.5 pounds of meat would be fine, instead of the 2 pounds called for in the recipe I use for the masa.

--Forget the instruction to soak the corn husks "in a large bowl." No one has a bowl that big. Use the sink.

--A one-pound bag of corn husks has over a hundred husks in it. Soak about half of them. (I put the whole bag in this time, and then had to dry out all the extra ones to save them. Luckily, things dry easily here, especially by our woodstove this time of year.)

--I have to use a ruler to figure out how wide a 5-inch corn husk is. Eyeballing it does not work for me.

The tamale station, with a handy blue ruler so measure with.

--I cannot spread the masa mixture with a knife, despite the instructions. Instead, I roll a log of masa, put it on the corn husk, and smoosh it around with my fingers. This probably means that my layer of masa is thicker than it's supposed to be--and that's why I run out of masa before getting to 60 tamales--but it doesn't stick to my fingers. It does stick to a knife.

--These have to be tied to keep them together. And the pieces of corn husk to tie them cannot be too thin, or they will tear when pulled tight. So annoying.

--Children LOVE to help make tamales. If you have multiple children helping, set them up in a line on the counter, in order of their jobs, with a flat surface for each of them. The most competent child will at the end, tying the tamales together. The second most competent child is in charge of spreading the masa. The other two jobs are putting the meat mixture in the middle, and folding the tamale for tying. If you have another child, they can rinse off, measure, and cut the corn husks to size.

--It will take twice as long for an assembly line of children to make tamales as it will take you on your own. Accept this, put on some music, and settle in.

--This time, it took about an hour and a half to assemble 45 tamales. I did about half on my own, though, before the children came in from playing in the snow and wanted to help. I was in the kitchen preparing the meat and masa, soaking the husks, etc. for a little more than 2 hours. This does not count rendering the tallow or cooking the beef, which had already been done.

--I steam them using my giant pressure canner/cooker as a regular pot, and it takes one hour for them to be done.

Tamale pot. Tamales are just so aesthically pleasing.

That ended up being a lot more tips than I thought it would. It should be helpful next year when I'm planning my attack the tamales. 

Have you ever made tamales? Do you have tips for me?

Snapshots: Light

Let's start with a girl in a box.

She actually fell asleep in this, which was pretty funny.

When my sister visited in October, she left us some little seasonal decorative candles. I forgot about the Christmas ones until this week, so I put them all out at once.

In a blaze of glory, you might say.

I'm Church Lady this month, and when I got there early last Sunday, the morning sun was coming in through a side window at just the right angle to spotlight the Christmas tree at the front of the church.

It was more dramatic in person.

It's certainly woodstove season now.

Moody embers in the morning.

My brother and his daughter arrived Wednesday afternoon, and we immediately took her for a horse ride since we knew a snowstorm was on its way.

Good old Cora.

The next morning started mostly clear.

With some clouds to reflect the rising sun.

But later that same day . . .

Stoic bull in the snow.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

Friday Food: Pecan Pie for the New Year

Friday

Short version: Crispy elk tacos, still-frozen green peas

Long version: A. and one son were gone, so for the other three, I made tacos by quickly frying corn tortillas to make them pliable, putting in leftover elk steak, cheese, and salsa, and then frying them until they were crispy and the cheese was melted.

If the whole family had been here, I would not have done this, because I would have had to make too many. I made eight, and that's about the amount I want to deal with frying.

Saturday

Short version: Ram and elk stew, cheese, cornbread

Long version: I used one small bag of ram stew meat for this, plus the rest of the elk steak, and some beef tallow. So three kinds of animals contributed to this stew.

I made the cornbread because I found two bags of cornmeal in the big freezer when I was organizing it. I need to use more cornmeal.

Sunday

Short version: Elk chorizo and scrambled eggs, leftover cornbread, chocolate ice cream

Long version: I spent much of the day in the kitchen making the black-eyed peas for New Year's Day, as well as a pecan pie. The elk chorizo was the first thing I grabbed out of the freezer. It made a good, fast dinner, and was a good pairing with the leftover cornbread.

The only tricky thing about chorizo is that all the parprika in it makes it hard to tell when it's actually cooked.

When in doubt, cook longer. (This is with the eggs.)

The ice cream gave me the opportunity to finally use the last of the salted caramel sauce from the birthday dinner two weeks ago.

Monday

Short version: The whole New Year's Day shebang

Long version: On New Year's Day, we must ensure our health, wealth, and happiness in the new year with pork, greens, and black-eyed peas, respectively. And, in my house, rice for peace.

This year, the pork was a picnic shoulder that I cooked slowly, pulled apart, and broiled with the rendered fat and juices, mustard, and maple syrup.

I had no greens from my garden this year, but I did still have about a cup of blanched beet greens from summer before last that were still in the freezer. And then I decided sauerkraut counts, too. The cabbage was green at one point. And sauerkraut is delicious with pork.

I had made the black-eyed peas the day before. I had also made a pecan pie.

I have never made a pecan pie. I don't think I have ever even eaten a pecan pie. But one child enthusiastically informed me that pecan pie is his favorite, this while he was eating the pie provided by the school cafeteria for their Christmas meal.

I thought if he loved a Sysco pecan pie, he would really love a homemade pecan pie. So I made one.

And then I took a picture. 

I mostly used this recipe for the filling, except I toasted the pecans as recommended in this one. I was going to do the chocolate layer also mentioned in that second recipe, but that would have required yet another session of chilling, and I was kind of over the making of the pie by that point. So I just did the standard filling.

It was very good. Very nutty, and not too sweet. I whipped cream for it, too, although I have no idea if that is traditional. About half the family ate it with the whipped cream.

The only problem I had with it was that it was not very solid and pretty much fell apart while I was cutting it. I don't think it needed to bake longer. Maybe it was the fact that I used the maple syrup instead of corn syrup. The fact that all the pecan halves were left whole also made it harder to cut. 

I don't know. Everyone liked it, though, even if the pieces were not very aesthetic.

Tuesday

Short version: Tuna-rice casserole, still-frozen peas, pureed squash

Long version: I had a lot of rice left over from the day before, so I used it to make a casserole with a big can of tuna. I fried a few pieces of bacon, diced those, and cooked onion and celery in the bacon grease. Then I put in some mayonnaise, milk, and grated cheese, along with salt and pepper. Kind of like tuna-noodle casserole, except with rice.

Wednesday

Short version: Elk burgers on homemade buns, roasted potatoes, green salad with ranch dressing, cookies

Long version: My brother and one of his daughters arrived for a quick visit this day. I had been making bread the day before, so I used some of that to make hamburger buns. 

Hamburger buns rising on the counter. The two glass pans on the bottom have the buns in them. I stacked the bigger pan on top of the smaller one, and then covered the bigger one with a cutting board, thus creating a tower of buns. This way they didn't take up all my counter space while rising.

I used the very last two bags of ground elk to make the burgers. I'll have to get out some of our excessive elk stew meat to grind. Ground meat is much easier for me to use than stew meat.

It belatedly occurred to me that I had replicated a very standard traveling meal of hamburgers and french fries. Sure enough, my niece did indeed have a hamburger while traveling, but I'm confident mine was better.

The cookies were standard chocolate chip, except I replaced some of the butter with peanut butter. So good. 

Thursday

Short version: Carnita-ish tacos on corn tortillas, pinto beans, brownies

Long version: Real carnitas fry in their own fat after all the liquid from stewing it has evaporated. These weren't real carnitas, because all I did was stew the pork roast, then remove it, shred it, and fry it in its rendered fat with cumin, chile powder, and paprika.

Since it was a snowy day and we were all home all day, I made the corn tortillas myself. 

I used my last jar of pressure-canned pinto beans, so that's going on the list of things I need to make soon, along with more ground elk.

And the brownies were extras from . . . some holiday event that required a baked treat. I can't actually remember. Whatever it was, I had stashed some extra brownies in the freezer so as not to add to the sugar overload during the last week of school. That was an excellent idea, as they came in very handy for dessert this night.

I didn't make a separate vegetable, but there were lettuce, tomatoes, and onions out for topping the tacos.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?

A Recipe for Happiness

Any of you who have been reading here for more than a year will know that I make the same thing for our New Year's Day dinner every year: pork for health, greens for wealth, and black-eyed peas for happiness. My New-Orleans-raised mother always made this, and now I do.

Every year, for my entire adult life. 

That means that I've been talking about this here for fifteen years now, and yet, I have never given you a recipe.

So now I will.

New Year's Day Black-Eyed Peas 

Ingredients

1 pound of dry black-eyed peas

1 ham bone

4 tablespoons canola oil, lard, or bacon grease

4 tablespoons flour

1 large or two small onions, diced

1 bell pepper, diced (I always use red, because I don't like green, but green is traditional)

2 stalks celery, diced

4 cloves garlic, minced

1 small can plain tomato sauce, or half a can tomato paste

1 bay leaf

Method

1) Pick through and rinse off the black-eyed peas. I always pick through them and rarely find anything, but this last time I found a pea-sized rock, which is why I always do it.

2) Soak your black-eyed peas in a big pot. You can soak overnight, but I never think ahead that far. I just cover them with water, bring them to a boil, and then turn off the heat and leave them to sit for an hour or two.

3) Drain the water off, and put fresh water in the pot to cover the black-eyed peas and the ham bone. I always have a ham bone from Christmas, and this is a good use for it. If you don't have the bone, you can just use ham, but don't put that in yet.

4) Simmer the black-eyed peas until soft, about an hour or so. The ham bone won't be soft enough yet, but that's okay. It can stay in there.

5) Dice up all your vegetables so they're ready to add to the roux. It will look like too many vegetables. It is not.

This is what makes it taste good.

6) Make a roux with the oil, lard, or bacon fat. Heat the fat on medium heat and then sprinkle in the flour. Use a flat spoon to scrape and stir the flour around. This will take fifteen minutes or so. It will look pretty separate the whole time, but that's fine. You can be a little more negiligent to start, but once the flour starts browning, you really need to stir pretty constantly. When the flour is a medium dark brown color, it's done.

Done roux.

7) Add all the vegetables except the garlic to the roux and cook on low heat until the vegetables are soft. Then add the garlic and cook just a minute longer.

8) Dump all the vegetables into the black-eyed peas, add the bay leaf, the tomato product, and ham now if you didn't have the bone, and simmer the whole thing on low heat uncovered for a long time. Like two hours.

9) When the ham on the ham bone pulls off easily, remove the bone from the pot, let it cool a bit, and then pull all the ham off. Shred it and put it back in the pot and continue simmering.

10) Toward the end of the cooking time, you need to be scraping the bottom of the pot and stirring it frequently so it doesn't stick. This is also when you want to taste it and see if it needs more salt. I wait until now to do this because the ham adds quite a bit of salt and the whole thing reduces so much that it would be easy to over-salt it earlier in the cooking.

When the black-eyed peas have broken down quite a bit to thicken it all and there isn't much liquid left, it's done.

Done black-eyed peas. You can see it's about two inches lower than when it started cooking.

Some of my kids like these on their own, and some like them on rice. Either way, add butter and vinegar to taste at the table.

This makes a lot of black-eyed peas, but if you're going to spend four hours making anything, you'd better make enough for leftovers. Also, they freeze really well, so don't be afraid to make a lot. It just means more happiness--and delicious food--for you.

Happy New Year!

Snapshots: A Christmas Church

I forgot to include this first photo in the last post about food. So let's just drop it right here, shall we?

All the things I froze or canned that were used in our Christmas Eve chili. 

I learned something from my eldest son this week. He had put a can of seltzer in the freezer to chill quickly and left it in there a little too long. It was too slushy to drink normally, but apparently, you can use a can opener to cut the top off of cans like this and it makes a very clean cut on the can.

The lid, on the other hand, is crazy sharp, so use caution if you try this.

I am still befuddled as to why only one part of that is sharp, but it is.

And last, my favorite thing from last week.

Our neighbor about half a mile away lives right next door to the old stone church in our mostly abandoned village. Every Christmas season, he sets up three spotlights on the side of the church. Due to the darkness that surrounds the church, this has the effect of making the church glow for literally miles.

I can see it out my kitchen window, and I love it. I had never gotten a photo of it, though, so I took the kids with me on a night walk to the church so I could take a picture of it.

Dramatic.

A closer look.

I didn't realize until after we had started walking that there was a full moon that night, so we didn't even need the flashlights we had brought.

That's the moon obscured by clouds in the sky, and on the ground are the spotlights. Kinda looks like the ground is on fire, though.

There you have it! My life, snapshotted.

Friday Food: Christmas and Birthday

First, thank you so much for all the good wishes and congratulations on my birthday. It's fun to hear from all of you.

And now, food.

Friday 

Short version: Leftover elk goulash, rice

Long version: Last time I made goulash, I froze a container of it for some later day. This was the day. I didn't have the kitchen motivation to peel and mash potatoes, so I made some rice instead.

We did not have a vegetable. Except the sauerkraut in the goulash, so I guess that counts, right? Right.

Saturday

Short version: Hot tuna dip, crackers, crudites 

Long version: We had Mass at 4 p.m. for our Sunday obligation. That meant we would be getting home after 5 p.m. and everyone would be ready to eat right away. Which meant I needed to have something very fast for dinner.

As soon as we got home, I cut up some carrots and radishes and put those out with the leftover ranch dip from a school party. This kept everyone busy while I made dinner. And also got some vegetables into them.

I had a ton of crackers left from the crackers and cheese I had brought for the elementary Christmas party, so I thought maybe I'd make tuna salad and serve it with the crackers.

But then I got fancy and made a hot tuna dip, instead. I'd never made anything like that before, so I looked up a recipe and kind of followed this one.

Really, though, you could just dump the entire dairy section in with a can of tuna, and that's pretty much the dip. A whole block of cream cheese, butter, sour cream, mayonnaise (I used the rest of the ranch dip, which has both in it), grated cheddar . . .

I'm not sure it would be possible to get more fat into one dish.

It tasted good, although a bit overwhelmingly creamy. I didn't add the finely chopped vegetables, since I had put some out already, but I think that would have helped.

Sunday

Short version: Frito pie, molasses cookies and eggnog

Long version: We had our Christmas service this night at 7 p.m., so I really had all day to make a fancy dinner, but I, um, didn't.

Instead I made chili the day before, bought a bag of Fritos, and served Frito pie for dinner. 

This was mine. It does look sort of Christmas-y with the green lettuce and red tomatoes, so I'm gonna call it seasonally appropriate.

Okay, so it's not a traditional Christmas Eve meal, but I do not regret it at all. Both because Frito pie is delicious, but also because I had a very relaxing day reading and taking a walk and cleaning my house and NOT spending hours in the kitchen.

There have been a lot of hours in the kitchen lately. I appreciated the break.

I did make eggnog this day, using this recipe. (I always have to thin it out with milk after it's chilled.) We had it when we got home from church, with some of Grandma Bishop's molasses cookies. An excellent combination.

Monday

Short version: Christmas ham, scalloped potatoes, green salad with maple vinaigrette, mushrooms, chocolate roulade

Long version: Let's see . . . the ham had pineapple juice, mustard, and maple syrup on it. 

I didn't use a recipe for the scalloped potatoes. All I did was use the mandolin part of my cheese grater to slice the potatoes very thin--by far the worst part--and layer them with lots of salt and pepper and a little garlic powder over each layer, then pour in cream and milk on each layer, building it up until I got the top of the Pyrex dish.

And then I baked it with a pan underneath, because this will most certainly make a disgusting mess in the oven if not contained.

I added a bit of maple syrup to the vinaigrette, too, which was tasty.

Mushrooms are not traditional with this meal, except apparently in our house. Many years ago, a toddler son quite politely declined some mushrooms offered by the MiL by explaining that he only ate mushrooms on Christmas. I suspect he said that because Christmas was so far off in his toddler mind as to be an infinity away, and therefore he would never have to eat mushrooms.

Joke's on him, because now we have mushrooms every Christmas, and everyone has to have at least one piece. This is only a trial for two of my children, as the other two actually like mushrooms.

This year, I went out to see if there was any parsley still hanging on in the garden and found, despite many nights well below freezing, that there was. I harvested some of that amazingly hardy herb for the mushrooms.

So I have now used something from the garden in every holiday meal this year. This is very pleasing to me.

The Christmas buffet.

I did not take a photo of the chocolate roulade, because it cracked and tore in places when I rolled it, oozed cream all over, and was generally not at all photogenic this year. It was still delicious, though.

Tuesday

Short version: Toasted burritos, carrot sticks

Long version: I used the leftover chili and cheese to make burritos, then fried them in butter. I guess this is not a real chimichanga, because it's not deep fried. So we'll call them toasted.

Wednesday

Short version: Birthday sausage, roasted potatoes, salad with vinaigrette, brownies with ice cream

Long version: This is what I chose for my birthday dinner. I made it, too. That way I'm assured of getting exactly what I want.

What I wanted.

There were three kinds of sausage: a green chile and cheese sausage one child had requested at the grocery store, boudin, and plain smoked sausage. I ate the plain one, because I do not like spicy things.

My eldest son made the brownies. I had bought the fancy Dreyer's chocolate and peanut butter ice cream, thinking A. and one boy would be gone hunting, so a smaller container of ice cream would be enough. But then they were here, so A. got the gallon tub o' chocolate, and everyone got to have both. Also leftover salted caramel sauce, if they wanted it.

Thursday

Short version: Elk steak, garlic bread, green salad with vinaigrette, leftover brownies

Long version: I've been baking bread non-stop this month--between co-workers and neighbors, I've gifted 24 loaves of bread--but we haven't had a lot to keep for ourselves. So I haven't been making garlic bread lately. Gifting season is over, though, so now all the bread I make is for us. And I made garlic bread.

Okay, your turn! What'd you eat this week?