Friendly friends! I am back from vacation. I am officially home, being an official, productive mom. I am putting my kids to bed before 8pm (after lots and LOTS of nighttime reading), we are eating only the healthiest of foods, and I've stopped drinking wine! Except for all of this is a lie.
Ok not all of it. I AM home. Vacation IS over. I am ATTEMPTING to be productive.
I even cooked up a Today Original pasta dish this morning, and if you missed it you can check out the segment and view the recipe here. Baby steps to waking up early.
But GUESS WHAT?! I am going to post a recipe every, single, day this week. So take THAT you lazy, indulgent, carefree, delicious summer. Take that.
Maybe it’s the billionaire(s) in the news lately, but for some reason I decided to take one of America’s most frugal meals, franks and beans, and give it a high-end makeover. Besides, all the other classic comfort foods have been fancified, hipsterized, and/or molecular gastronomized; so I figured I would take this one down. And by down, I mean up.
Usually, franks and beans is made by opening up a couple cans of baked beans, and heating it up with some sliced hotdogs. Not exactly something you’d serve to visiting dignitaries. However, by adding some fresh veggies, plain beans, and high-quality beef hot dogs, we can achieve something much healthier, equally delicious, and every bit as comforting.
So, how much more will it cost you to make this usually cheap dish, using these upscale ingredients? It’s tempting to say, if you have to ask, you can’t afford it, but that’s not the case. Sure, the Kobe hotdogs will cost you a couple extra dollars, but the rest of the dish is still quite inexpensive. I really do hope you give this a try soon.Enjoy!
Ingredients for 4 portions Franks & Beans:
2 tbsp unsalted butter
1 diced yellow onion
1 diced poblano or other green pepper
2 tbsp minced fresh cayenne pepper, or other hot red pepper
1 rib celery, diced
1 pound hot dogs, sliced (literally any other sausage will work here)
2 (15-oz) cans cannellini beans, drained, rinsed
1 tbsp light brown sugar
1/4 cup ketchup
1 tbsp Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
2 1/2 cup chicken broth, or as needed
salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/4 cup sliced green onions
- serve with buttered toast and champagne
0
comments:
How to Make Fresh Spring Rolls – Authentic is as Authentic Does
Based on the YouTube comments appearing under the newly posted spring rolls video, lots of people missed the part about this not trying to be a specific recipe, but simply a demo featuring the magic that is damp, rice paper wrappers.
Don’t get me wrong; I love the “authentic” spring rolls I so often order at my friendly, neighborhood Vietnamese restaurant. Loaded with sweet shrimp, and bursting with vermicelli noodles, they are among the most delicious things ever invented.
However, I do reserve the right to soak rice paper wrappers in water, and… (I hope you’re sitting down for this) ...not make those! What you see here is just what I had on hand that day, and the next time I do a batch of these, who the heck knows what they’ll encase. If I have a point, that’s it.
Speaking of soaking in water, many commenters suggested that I dunk these in warm water for just a few seconds to hydrate, instead of the longer dip in cold water. I’ve tried both methods, and had more issues with the warmer/faster approach. They seemed to get too rubbery, too fast, which I found made the rolling harder.
Anyway, to each his own, and that goes for water temperature, filling ingredients, and dipping sauce. By the way, there are no ingredient amounts below, since that’s up to you entirely. You should be able to get “rice paper wrappers” at any large grocery store with an Asian food section, but if not, they’re easily found online. I hope you give these, or something similar, a try soon. Enjoy!
One of my go-to "I have no idea what to cook tonight" meals is breakfast for dinner. It's different for the kids, it's easy, and you can get rid of all your leftovers. Just scramble eggs, and throw everything in it! I had never really thought about putting corn in my eggs until I had breakfast at Martha's 22nd Street Grill in Hermosa Beach, California. They make a white corn scramble that's to die for. During the summer, I almost always have leftover corn in the fridge, and I love slicing off the kernels into salads, pastas and now... scrambles! This was delicious, probably due to the cream and Boursin cheese I added (no judging) but also because of the delicious, fresh, summer corn.
1/4 cup Garlic & Herb Boursin cheese (or garden veggie flavored cream cheese), crumbled
1 T chopped fresh cilantro (or parsley)
Salt and pepper
In a large skillet, heat butter over medium heat. While heating, whisk the rest of the ingredients in a large bowl. Add to skillet, and cook until fluffy using a rubber spatula to stir eggs. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
0
comments:
Peach Financiers – Because French Bankers Hate Dirty Money
There are many different techniques used for making financiers, but as usual, I’ve chosen the easiest one. I would have been happy to try those other more complicated versions, but fortunately, I enjoyed this one so much, there’s no need.
I mention in the video that these are called “financiers” because they’re rich, and look like gold bars (if you use the traditional rectangular molds). Well, apparently that’s not quite right.
Word on the “rue” is that there was a bakery next to the Paris stock exchange that made these small almond cakes so bankers could enjoy them on the way to work, without getting their fingers dirty. I assume this is accurate, since I read it in the YouTube comments.
Anyway, not only is this an easy recipe, but it works beautifully with pretty much any summer fruit. Berries are popular, as are other stone fruits. Just don’t use too much. It’s merely a garnish, and adding too much could effect the texture and cooking time. I hope you give these delicious peach financiers a try soon. Enjoy!
Ingredients for 12 small cakes:
3 egg whites
1/2 cup white sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup almond meal (or finely ground almonds)
3 tablespoons flour
3 oz unsalted butter (6 tablespoons), toasted to a golden-brown
12 small sliced of peach
- I used mini-muffin pans, so you'll have to adjust your time if you used regular muffin tins, or other molds.
- Bake for 5 minutes at 400 F., then top with fruit, and continue baking until browned, about 10-12 minutes.
0
comments:
Eat Them to Save Them & Giveaway!
9:36 AM
0 Comments
I was in Alaska recently to go fishing and watch cooking demos, but more importantly to learn a bit about how Alaska helps to promote sustainability, protect the fisheries and in turn, the ecosystem. The effort that goes into maintaining the health of fisheries in Alaska is astounding and something I didn't really appreciate until I met and spoke with environmentalists, biologists, state officials and even politicians, all committed to the long term health of the fisheries.
Salmon fishermen are projected to harvest a billion pounds of salmon or 221 million fish this year in Alaska and yet consumption of seafood continues to decline in the US and is considerably behind chicken, pork and even beef. In Alaska, those responsibly harvesting seafood take a vested interest in maintaining it. What I learned about the sustainability of salmon fisheries has applications well beyond seafood. We all want more sustainability and biodiversity in our food and to preserve traditional foodways, but how? Sometimes if you love it, the best thing you can do is eat it.
Sustainable Seafood
Choosing sustainable seafood is getting easier to do. If you enjoy fishing, check out Trout Unlimited. It’s an organization dedicated to conserving, protecting and restoring North America's coldwater fisheries and their watersheds.
When it comes to eating seafood, one easy way to choose sustainable, is to choose Alaska Seafood which is also wild and natural and represents 60% of the seafood consumed in America. For seafood beyond Alaska, talk to your local fishmonger or explore the SeafoodWatch program to learn more about making the best seafood choices.
Heritage Breeds of Animals
The Slow Food Foundation for Biodiversity is dedicated to supporting biodiversity through various projects including the Ark of Taste and Earth Markets. Another organzation that specifically preserves and promotes rare and heritage breeds of livestock is the Livestock Conservancy. They even have a gene bank that saves the genetic material of rare breeds.
For consumers, bookmark the Eat Well Guide, which has 25,000 free listings of farms, farmers markets, restaurants, co-ops, and other places that offer locally grown, sustainably produced food.
Heirloom Varieties of Produce
Remember when all the tomatoes in the supermarket tasted bland? The tomato selection has improved, but for even tastier tomatoes, head to the garden.
One of the great joys of gardening and even shopping at a farmer’s market is enjoying varieties of fruits and vegetables that aren’t commercially grown on a large scale. Not all varieties of produce ship easily or have reasonably long shelf life.
By supporting farmers and growing your own heirloom varieties, you can help preserve biodiversity.
Take a look at the fun 2 minute video above featuring Hugh Acheson, and let me know in the comments what about it made the biggest impression on you. I will chose one winner at random on Sunday August 30th, 2015. You must be a US resident to win and have a US mailing address. Include your email in the comments form, only I will see it. Do NOT write your email in the body of your comment or it will be visible to everyone.
Disclaimer: Giveaway courtesy of Seeds of Change, I was not compensated in any way, shape or form for this post.
0
comments:
Slow Roasted Alaska Halibut with Fennel & Tomatoes Recipe
When I was growing up we had a second freezer that I swear was packed full of halibut. My father got it somewhere and we ate it for what seemed like years. I remember that it was dry, tough and somewhat stringy. Was it terribly freezer burned? Only recently my mother told me it might not have been halibut. What it actually was will forever remain a mystery. But it was years before I tried halibut again and imagine my surprise to discover that it is a delicate, creamy and luscious fish.
Recently I was in Alaska to learn more about seafood so naturally I went fishing. Our boat caught a tremendous amount of halibut. Halibut can be very big fish and now I've come full circle and am enjoying having a freezer full of it. I believe the secret to cooking halibut is to be extremely gentle. It cooks up wonderfully when roasted slowly and is much harder to overcook at low temperatures. In this recipe you roast vegetables at high heat, give the fish a little rest at room temperature with a spice rub and then coat the fish with the juicy vegetables to help keep it moist while cooking it ever so slowly.
In 2014 Americans ate over 100 pounds red meat and about 100 pounds of poultry per capita, but only around 14 pounds of fish and seafood That's a shame because seafood is really good and even a small serving can be very satisfying. I find about 4 ounces is plenty.
* It's healthy--3 1/2 ounces cooked halibut has 140 calories, 27 grams of protein and 460 mg of Omega 3
* It's easy to cook
* It can be prepared very quickly
Note: If you don't have cherry or grape tomatoes, just use diced Roma tomatoes instead. Slow Roasted Alaska Halibut with Fennel & Tomatoes Serves 4 Ingredients 1 cup thinly sliced fennel bulb
2 cups halved cherry or grape tomatoes
4 garlic cloves thinly sliced
2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 halibut filets, about 4 - 5 ounces each
1/2 teaspoon paprika—any kind is fine, smoked, sweet or hot
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon onion powder
Instructions
Preheat oven to 450°.
Lined a roasting pan or baking dish with foil. Layer on the fennel then garlic and top with the tomatoes Season with salt and pepper and drizzle with olive oil. Roast for 15 minutes.
Meanwhile combine the paprika, salt, and onion powder. Pat dry the fish and sprinkle evenly with the spice mixture. Let the fish rest at room temperature while the vegetables are roasting.
When vegetables have roasted for 15 minutes, remove them from the oven and immediately lower the oven temperature to 200 degrees. Push the vegetables to the side of the pan. Place the filets in the center of the pan and pile the vegetables on top of the filets. Return the pan to the oven and bake for 20 minutes.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: My thanks to Alaska Seafood for hosting me on my trip to Alaska. I was not compensated monetarily to write this or any other post on Cooking with Amy.
0
comments:
Homemade Dill Pickles – Naturally Fermented, Whatever That Means
This is going to be an easy post, in that I know virtually nothing about fermenting pickles. The only thing I know for sure is how to make them, and for me, that’s enough. If you make a simple salt brine, add some spices, and submerge Kirby cucumbers in it for about a week, you get some fairly delicious pickles.
Maybe it’s dumb luck, or just overwhelmingly good karma, but fortunately I’ve not experienced any of the problems I’ve seen others lament; such as mushy texture, scary molds, or exploding jars. Apparently, cucumbers are one of the more finicky things to pickle, but that hasn’t been my experience.
Like I said in the video, I’ve only made these a handful of times, so maybe my time is coming, but I’m pretty sure if you measure your salt right, and store the fermenting pickles at an appropriate temperature, you should get something close to what you see here.
Having said that, I will refer any and all of your questions having to do with variations, troubleshooting, probiotics, and/or best practices, to the Internet. The purpose of this video is to simply show the process, and how ridiculously easy it is. If this seems like something you want to try, and it should, I recommend doing lots of research before starting, so at least you’ll have someone else to blame if things go horribly wrong.
One thing I can tell you for sure is that you have to use pure salt for this. Table salt can contain additives like iodine, which inhibits the bacterial growth necessary for this to work. I’m also giving you weight measurements for the salt, since the size of the salt crystal can really effect measuring by volume.
Other than getting your brine right, just be sure to get very fresh, very firm pickling cucumbers to make this with. If your cucumbers start off soft and mushy, your pickles will be terrible, and not have that loud crunch associated with the finest examples. I really do hope you give this a try. Enjoy!
Ingredients:
2 pounds very fresh Kirby cucumbers, washed thoroughly
Handful of fresh, flowering dillweed
For the brine:
8 cups cold fresh water
8 tablespoons Kosher salt (By weight, you wants exactly 80 grams. The brand of kosher salt I use weighs about 10 gram per tablespoon, but yours may not, so it’s best to use a scale if possible.)
4 cloves peeled garlic
2 teaspoons whole coriander seed
2 teaspoon black peppercorn
3 or 4 bay leaves
4 whole cloves
- Ferment at room temperature (I hear that between 70-75 F. is ideal) for about a week. Check every day as these can ferment fast. They are done when you like the taste. If you go too far, they start to get soft, and the inside gets hollow. Keep the brine level topped off.
- This makes extra brine for topping off.
Pickling Spice Note: I tend not to like a lot of spices in my pickles, so I believe the amounts listed here are fairly puny compared to most recipes. Feel free to find one of the many pickling spices recipes online, and use that instead.
My baby turns ONE on Thursday. Today, August 17th, was my due date, and it feels like just yesterday that I was waddling around, complaining about still being pregnant, shoving absurd amounts of carbs in my mouth. Now she's almost one, moving into toddler-ville, drinking real milk and trying to walk. I would do it all over again, each and every loooong pregnancy, just to savor these baby years. Yet I know they must grow up, and therefore we must celebrate and that means CAKE. We had a little pre-party the other day, and I baked a homemade Funfetti Cake following this recipe. It was moist, delicious, and easy. And um, fun... DUH.
Instead of one of those giant number candles, I made a "1" using a wax paper stencil I made myself. Simply cut out a design, place over the cake (gently), add your sprinkles and remove!
(And in case you're keeping track, for Jack's 6th birthday I bought an ice cream cake because that's what he wanted and I only pouted about it for a week or so.)
I always have a pitcher of unsweetened iced tea in the refrigerator and this Summer I’ve been experimenting with making shrubs. I’m not a soda drinker, so these drinks appeal to me because they are very refreshing and not very sweet.
Teapigs is a British tea company operating in the US. They make a most unusual line of matcha drinks. One has grapefruit, another apple and one has elderflower. None of them have any added sugar, just the natural sweetness from fruit juices. I tried all three and I’m hard pressed to say which I like best. They are each quite good. I like the bitter edge to the grapefruit, the fruitiness of the apple and the floral quality to the elderflower. They are a bit pricey at about $3.99 each, but such a nice treat. Think of it as a healthier indulgence than a cappuccino. It’s available in many locations.
If you’ve been to Rome in the Summer, perhaps you’re familiar with the lemon and coconut stands found in piazzas. The CEO of Jones Soda Co. is married to a Roman and discovered the drinks on one of her many trips to Italy. Lemoncocco might sound weird but is absolutely divine! It’s got the slight velvety creaminess of coconut and sharp tang of lemon. It’s not carbonated. It’s less than 100 calories for 12 ounces. It’s available in Calfiornia, Washington, Oregon or you can order it online.
A few months ago I got to be a judge at a beer festival. I was really happy to find out I’d been assigned to the category “Summer sippers” because it was a particularly hot day and I got to try the most refreshing drinks. The winner was not a beer at all, but a flavored cider. The judges chose Lemon Saison from Common Cider. Recently Common Cider sent me some other flavors.
The ones I’m most fond of are Blood Orange Tangerine and Lemon Saison which isn't surprising since I like citrus flavors. They are both crisp and refreshing with a bit of effevessence, but not too much and only about 6.5% alcohol. No artificial flavors or colors. Check the online locator to find them (California and Nevada only so far).
Another cider I’m very impressed with is Golden State Mighty Dry Cider. It’s made by the same folks who make DeVoto Cider, which produces exquisite all estate ciders that in are in somewhat limited supply.
Golden State uses all West Coast apples of many different varieties. It clocks in at 6.9% alcohol and has no added sugars or water or concentrates. It’s a very pure and unadulterated product. It's great on its own, is also amazing when combined with a fruity shrub. It's a hard cider, but much better than most you may have tried before.
At the Fancy Food Show in January I tried Belvoir presse style drinks with elderflower. I’m a big fan of elderflower which is much more popular in Europe than it is here. It’s a little bit fruity and pleasantly floral. It pairs well with lemonade and mixes beautifully with white spirits like gin.
The two flavors I've tried of Belvoir are the Elderflower and the Elderflower and Rose. Both are floral, very refreshing and have just a hint of lemon juice to balance the sweetness. They are labeled lemonade in the US, but really are more like a floral sparkling drink. Look online to find where to buy them.
Disclaimer: Some of these products were provided to me as samples or I tried them at an event. I was not monetarily compensated to write this or any other post on Cooking with Amy.
0
comments:
Grilled Pattypan Squash with Hot Chorizo Vinaigrette – Almost Stuffed
Michele does a fantastic, sausage-stuffed pattypan squash, which was actually how these were supposed to be prepared, but someone, and we won’t name names, didn’t pay attention to buying ones of a uniform size, which is kind of a big deal if you want them to bake evenly. Okay, it was me.
In an attempt to redeem myself, I decided to grill them instead – a cooking method where any size will work – and top them with a hot chorizo vinaigrette. It’s something I’ve wanted to try for a while, and it really turned out to be a wonderful combination.
The ingredients below are just a rough guide, and you’ll have to figure out your own amounts, depending on how much squash you grill, but I do recommend a 1-to-1 ratio of sherry vinegar to olive oil/rendered chorizo fat.
I used a veal chorizo, which was very lean, so I had to add a good amount of olive oil. If you use pork chorizo, you’ll have a lot of rendered fat, so you may want to drain off most of it, keeping a few tablespoons, before adding your oil and vinegar.
Speaking of oil, don’t put any on your squash before you toss it on the grill. I used to do this myself, because it seemed logical, but it’s a bad idea. The dripping oil causes flare-ups that can make your veggies taste like gasoline, which is not good eats. Other than that, not much can go wrong with this simple summer dish. I hope you give it a try soon. Enjoy!
Ingredients for 4 portions
8 pattypan squash
kosher salt to taste
6-8 ounces fresh, raw chorizo sausage (crumbled fine, and browned well in olive oil)
*you want to leave about 2 tablespoons rendered chorizo fat in the pan
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/3 cup sherry vinegar (or, use any vinegar you like)
splash of water to maintain moisture level if needed
I'm trying to figure out how to start this post, but I'm extremely distracted by my own photo, because even though I just ate exactly what I'm looking at, I WANT ANOTHER. How do you say, this is the best grilled cheese ever? Oh, just like that. THIS IS THE BEST GRILLED CHEESE EVER. Of course, you have to be into the sweet and savory combo, and you have to not care that nothing about this is good for you. Meaning, I don't think bread that is slathered in mayo and cooked in bubbly butter as a vessel for ooey, gooey cheese is diet food. Eat some fruit with it or something, I don't care, just EAT IT. I followed this recipe... and loved how she added the sweet relish after cooking the sandwich on the stove. It kept it cool, which was a nice contrast to the crispy, hot sandwich.
Bread and cheese cooking in bubbly butter... all is right in the world.
I'm just back from the incredibly wild and unspoiled state of Alaska. I was on the trip with food writers and chefs as well as a seafood importer. I got a chance to talk with a lot of people involved with Alaska seafood including a biologist, a conservationist, a manager from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, the proprietor of an oyster farm and even a senator and commercial fisherman. I was impressed with their efforts to keep the seafood industry sustainable and environmentally friendly.
My itinerary was jam packed. I flew in a sea plane over glaciers, foraged along the seashore and into the forest, fished for salmon and halibut (and caught one of each). I tasted all five species of salmon, and I also got a chance to observe some cooking demonstrations where I picked up some great cooking tips. One recipe I couldn't wait to try at home came from Chef Fernando Corsi, who lives in São Paolo. It was his version of a very traditional Brazilian recipe called moqueca. If you look for recipes online you will find they vary greatly. I think it might be more about technique than anything else. Vegetables, coconut milk and aromatics are layered in a clay pot and topped with seafood. But you can make it any pot you happen to have.
Americans eat less seafood than other proteins like chicken, pork or beef and that's a shame because seafood is really healthy and delicious. Almost 60% of the seafood in the US comes from Alaska and is wild, natural and sustainable.
Chef Fernando Corsi used local Alaskan fish and shrimp rather than what he would find in Brazil and emphasized how flexible this recipe is. Not only is it a satisfying combination of flavors--tomatoes, onions, peppers and lime, cilantro, garlic and ginger, it's also because it is extremely quick and easy to make. Served with rice it's a terrific one pot meal. Could it help convince you to eat more seafood? I certainly hope so!
Note: One key ingredient in Moqueca is dende oil, but the chef showed us how to use turmeric and any plain oil instead. If you have palm oil feel free to use it.
Moqueca
Serves 4
Ingredients
5 Tablespoons coconut oil, or other vegetable oil
2 Tablespoons turmeric
2 teaspoons grated ginger
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 onion, red or white, sliced into rings
2 bell peppers. sliced into rings
1 small hot chile such as serrano, sliced
2 medium sized tomatoes, sliced into rounds Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 can coconut milk
Sprigs of cilantro, chopped
3/4 pound shrimp, peeled
3/4 pound firm white fish such as halibut or cod, cut into bite sized pieces
Juice of one lime
Instructions
Heat the oil in a medium heavy pot. Add the coconut oil and turmeric. Add the ginger and garlic and cook over medium heat for about 2 minutes.
Layer in the onions, tomatoes and peppers then season with salt and pepper and cook for 3 minutes.
Season the seafood with salt and pepper and add to the pot along with the coconut milk. Cook just until the fish is cooked through. Stir in the lime juice then taste and add more salt and pepper if desired. Garnish the stew with the chopped cilantro and serve over rice.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: My thanks to Chef Fernando Corsi for the recipe and to Alaska Seafood for hosting me on this trip. I was not compensated monetarily to write this or any other post on Cooking with Amy.
When I'm on vacation and in an unfamiliar kitchen without my own arsenal of kitchen ingredients, I love to make up recipes. Oh, when you're on vacation you love to relax, shop, get facials? You sound normal. I sound not normal. However, I gotta be, gotta be, gotta gotta be me (all I listen to is the Teen Beach 2 soundtrack). I made up this salad the other day, and while it may not look very appetizing (I think it could use some chopped chives on top?), it really, really was. Roasted vegetables, fluffy quinoa and crunchy garlic croutons... a perfect side dish for just about anything!
1/3 cup olive oil, plus more to make croutons with
1 tsp cumin
Zest of one lime, plus juice for salad
Salt and pepper
4 ears corn
1 box quinoa, cooked
4 pieces bread, chopped into small pieces
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup crumbled cotija cheese
Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Break up cauliflower into florets and place on a baking sheet. In a small bowl, whisk together olive oil, cumin and lime zest. Pour over florets and toss with hands. Season with salt and pepper. Wrap each ear of corn in foil. Roast corn and cauliflower in oven for 30 minutes. I use this time to make my croutons. In a large skillet, heat a couple tablespoons of olive oil over medium heat. Add bread and garlic, and cook for 10-15 minutes, stirring often, until bread is golden and crispy. Once veggies are roasted, place cauliflower in large bowl. Let corn cool enough to handle, and then slice kernels off and add to bowl. Add cooked quinoa and croutons to bowl, and toss. Finally, add cotija cheese and squeeze some lime into bowl. Season to taste with salt and pepper!
I’ve wanted to film an updated version of this caramel chicken for many years. It was one of the first videos I ever posted, and its unexpected popularity made me realize that there were actually people (non-relatives) watching these videos.
The original vision for Food Wishes was an online cooking school, where I’d charge tuition for a series of courses that would mimic the culinary school I’d just left. I started filming a few recipes each week, knowing full well that only a handful of people would see them, but I had to learn my new craft.
Caramel Chicken, Circa 2007
As the library grew, so did the audience, and I realized that instead of charging for the content, I could give it away for free, and maybe survive on the ad revenue that YouTube was just starting to offer. Above and beyond that, I was getting emails and comments, telling me that what I was doing was making them happy.
This wasn’t something I’d anticipated, and while at the time I would have preferred money, it was great to hear, and inspired me to push on. The rest, as they say, is history, and every time I got an email asking for an updated version of this recipe, I would fondly remember how all this came to be.
So, whether you were here from the very beginning, or you’re brand new, and will be trying caramel chicken for the very first time, I really hope you give this fast, easy, delicious, and historically significant recipe a try soon. Enjoy!
Makes 4 large portions:
2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut in about 1 inch chunks
1/2 cup sliced, seeded jalapeno peppers
1/2 cup sliced, seeded mild red chilies, or bell peppers
If you’re familiar with the White Lily brand, you probably know it’s a Southern company, famous for flour that is used in biscuits. It’s been a very long time since they’ve introduced a new product, so they invited a bunch of mostly baking bloggers (and me!) to come visit wheat fields outside of Spokane to learn about their latest venture—wheat flours with tracability and blends with red and white grape seed flour.
Red and white grape seed flour from Whole Vine is blended with flour from Shepherd’s Grain and sold in 2 pound resealable bags. It’s designed to be an optimal blend, offering cup for cup replacement of all purpose flour. Plans are to offer it nationwide. Although the flour is a blend, each bag has a traceability code allowing you to see and learn more about a farmer whose wheat is in the specific bag.
To produce the flour, White Lily partnered with Shepherd’s Grain, a cooperative that has roots in an 1888 farmstead farm. The goal of the company is to provide long term sustainability in agriculture. All the grower members of the cooperative are "no till” farmers who rely on the diversity of crop rotation, cover straw and soil science to try and imitate nature rather than fight with it. As a result they have fewer issues with rain erosion of topsoil, and concentrate on returning value to the land.
I didn't know much about tilling so I asked a scientist about it and this is what I learned: Tilling dates back to 1790 when Jethro Tull advocated it in a book on farming. Initially plowing prairie led to yield gains, making nutrients more available but it also has serious negative consequences. Tilling leads to sterilization of soil, and 33% of organic matter is lost in the first two years after tilling. It also leads to greater needs for fertilizers, creating a viscious cycle. In changing over to this older way of farming, growers do need to invest in different types of seeding equipment. Bottom line? Healthy soil requires less inputs which is more economically and environmentally sustainable.
Within Shepherd’s Grain most of the 42 growers have farms that are an average of 4K acres. Shepherds Grain also includes a seed company and a research company. Shepherd’s Grain is focused on quality and consistency of grain, rather than quantity. They want to reconnect farmers and food, so you know where your food is coming from, that's why there is a traceability code on each bag. The research company is very focused on the infrastructure of the soil and the diverse, dynamic habitat it creates. They are also trying to find a correlation between human nutrition and the micronutrients in grain. Apparently there is very little known about the terroir of grain, which impacts flavor significantly.
After trying a number of baked goods using the white and red grape flour, I adapted a recipe I found on Best Ever Cookie Collection and used the red grape flour which has a slightly sweet flavor profile and less gluten than regular 100% wheat flour. These flours are easy to work with, and add just hint of color. They are particularly good in dense desserts and crackers.
Note: For the fruit I used plum amazin's but you could use dried cranberries or any other dried fruit bits
Red Grapeseed Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars Makes 16 squares
Preheat oven to 350F degrees.Grease a 8x8-inch pan with cooking spray.Beat together the oil and sugar until well combined.Beat in eggs and vanilla. Add the flour, baking powder and salt, stirring until well combined. Stir in chocolate chips, dried fruit and nuts.
Spread the batter evenly into the prepared pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until golden brown and a wooden toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let cool completely before cutting into bars.
Enjoy!
Disclaimer: My thanks to White Lily for inviting me to learn more about their flour and about Shepherd's Grain, and also for providing me with flour to use in recipes. I was not compensated monetarily for this or any other post on Cooking with Amy.
.png)
0 comments: