Voodoolily's Snacktastic Recipe Thread!!

[Nebu]

Jamie At Home is a great show. He really makes everything so simple and brings it all down to the basics: good ingredients, minimally fucked-with. Also, I'd hurt a kid for his rustic kitchen.

I think I need to find more of this.  My taste really is all about basics.  Food as close to its natural state as possible.  I'm not a fan of sauces or condiments, just give me straight food. 

I think I need to invest in a good food processor as well.  I pitched my last one because it seemed like cleaning it took more time than it saved.  My guess is that I just hadn't found enough uses for it.  The more cooking I do these days, the more I appreciate the few good appliances that I do own. 

[Signe]

When you roast a chicken, what do you like to stuff it with?  I mean besides stuffing.  Just looking for different ideas.  Normally, I just use lemons or apples, sometimes if I'm making mirepoix with it anyway, I'll make extra for the cavity.   

[hal]

Signe

Fennel bulbs. The licorice sent is amazing.

[voodoolily]

My favorite way to roast chicken is to stuff butter, lemon zest and herbs under the skin and then stuff the (zested) lemons into the cavity. Nowadays, I mostly spatchcock my chickens (or just quarter them) and sear them on the grill pan to get crispy skin, then finish in the oven. Cuts the cooking time significantly.

Stuffing ideas!

• Bay and orange
• Baby potatoes and thyme
• Carrots and cumin seed
• Parsnips and dill
• Spring onions and ginger (brush miso or soy on the skin)
• Garlic cloves, sweet peppers and eggplant with oregano

[Signe]

Thanks!  It'll have to be either bay and orange or the usual lemon (zesty this time though) because that's all I have of the suggestions today.  Still, I make a lot of chicken so I'll probably pretty much give them all a go in time.   

[Engels]

This morning I'm making a slow roast burgundy chuck roast.

Oven between 250-300, depending on your eagerness.

Needs:
chuck roast ~2 lbs
2/3rds cup of burgundy cooking wine
garlic paste/salt/cloves
marjoram
thyme

Overnight 'brining' in wine garlic and spices is optional. Can't hurt, but not necessary. Just put it all in a ziplock bag and leave it in the fridge

Sear the meat, or don't. Chuck roast is very fatty, so you don't really run the risk of making it too dry or tough as you would with a leaner cut like tenderloin.

Peheat oven to 275 or so. Stick the meat in, and cook for 4-8 hours. The lower the temp, the longer the cooking time, the tenderer it'll come out.

Most important factor is to make sure the bath is never boiling! Boiled meat = English = Margaret Thatcher = Armageddon

300 degrees is pushing it, unless you leave a crack open on the foil to prevent a 'pressure cooker' environment.

Use a baking pan with a tin foil cover or a caserole with a lid.

Put the meat in, along with a small 3/4 inch bath of 1/3rd wine, 2/3rds water

It should come out so that just the lightest poke with fork causes the meat to separate.

In the last hour or so, throw in potatoes and onions.

Small warning about cooking wines. Some of them are not fit to drink, and are VERY salty. If you get this kind, its fine for the meat, but not particularly great for the onions and potatoes, as it will entirely overwhelm them. To compensate, drain some of the liquid about half way through and replace it with water. That way the wine's worked its way into the meat already, but you won't have a nasty salty bath to cook the taters in later, just the nice meat juices.

[Hawkbit]

My best friend is Latino and he made a chorizo stuffing a few years back for a turkey.  That was freaking awesome. 

Lately for roast chicken we've used either an apple and cider, or nothing in the cavity at all.

Cut veggies (carrots/potatoes, maybe half an onion) into two-bite pieces, put in veggie/chickie broth in a roaster with a little olive oil, oregano and pepper.  Cook them for 20-30 min around 350F.  After the veggies have cooked for a bit, butter and season a whole chicken (take out the parts from the cavity), put it on top of the veggies for an hour and that's a tasty meal. 

[Paelos]

Chorizo makes everything better imo.

I went to a place called Aqua Linda in Athens, GA, and they made these king sized (footlong size) burritos with rice, refried beans, peppers, onions, and chorizo, then top them with chili sauce and the works (lettuce, tomato, sour cream). Without a doubt the best burrito I've had since living in Dallas, TX.

[nurtsi]

Had a small get-together with friends for Valentine's Day.



Entrée was mozzarella, cherry tomatoes, and rocket. Simple, as you just need good ingredients to pull this off. Sprinkle some good olive oil on top according to taste.

Main course: Beef Wellington with baked potatoes. Never done this before and jeez it was a lot of work. I've never had real Beef Wellington so I don't know what it should taste like, but this was good nonetheless.

Cheesecake and raspberry jam for dessert.

[Signe]

I haven't made Beef Wellington in ages.  I used to make it now and then when we were in Portsmouth.  I kind of enjoyed my kitchen there.  Not so much here even though it's much bigger.  My oven here isn't great - even though I made them replace it.  They buy cheap appliances.  I might insist on a good kitchen upgrade before I sign my next lease or maybe we'll just move.  I hate moving.  Do people really have parties for valentine's day?  I know couples like to do the lovey dovey thing - much to the joy of the Hallmark Card Company.  Was this a group lovey dovey thing?  Naughty!

Err... anyway.  What sort of pâté did you use? 

[Engels]

yummy stuff

That all looks very artistic, and looks like it tastes good to boot.

[nurtsi]

Was this a group lovey dovey thing?  Naughty!

Err... anyway.  What sort of pâté did you use? 

Well, if you're missing that significant other, Valentine's a good day to meet people who share the same fate and wallow collectively in self-pity. Or have fun. Beats staying home alone anyway.

As for the pâte, none at all. I followed the instructions of this jolly English chap. Just parma ham and mushrooms between the beef and the pastry.

[Signe]

The mushrooms are the pâté!  I guess that would make it rather less rich, but a bit too earthy tasting for Righ, though I love mushrooms and even mushroom type pâté.  I used to make a mushroom pâté with toasted almonds and wine that was yummy!  I'll have to dig up that recipe again.

I'm slightly disappointed that I don't get a naughty group lovey dovey story, but I'm happy you had a nice time.  Maybe next year you'll have someone to buy pink fur covered handcuffs for!  Of course, we never really bother celebrating any sort of holiday.  Not even our anniversary.  Even when we remember them!

[Bunk]

Advice needed!

I have a small 2 lb Buffalo roast defrosting in my fridge. I need some idea of what do do with it.

[Sky]

Did I hear someone recommend using a cooking wine? 

Also, you should definitely sear a chuck before braising it, that builds the base flavor of the whole shebang. I just did another "pot roast" yesterday, so it's fresh in my head :)

[voodoolily]

Did I hear someone recommend using a cooking wine? 

Also, you should definitely sear a chuck before braising it, that builds the base flavor of the whole shebang. I just did another "pot roast" yesterday, so it's fresh in my head :)

Don't use a cooking wine. Those have salt and garbage in them. Just get a bottle of something under $10. Buffalo goes tough fast, unless you can devote all day to a braise. Your slow-cooker should do the trick nicely.

Or you can dice it up and make chili. Again, slow cooker ftw. Let that shit go all day. Add the beans at the end (if at all).

[Sky]

So yeah, I braised a chuck yesterday. Love the low effort for amazing flavor. Scored a great deal at our local butcher shop, I love them. Stupid thing was so massive it wouldn't fit in my dutch oven to brown. Couple of nice bones for some marrow lovin'. After browning, I threw in the aromatics and thought to grab the camera. So we start this series at that point:

Onion, celery and carrot in oil left from browning the meat. After this some sugar and garlic joins the party.

Browned meat, finally decided to hack the bone in half.

Some beef and chicken stock goes in and the beef jumps back in the pool, into a 300º oven.

Three or four hours later, the whole house smelled 

Remove the meat...carefully. First try netted me a bare bone. So did the second :) This is what's left, plus the remains of the once-coherent meat.

Spoon off the fat from the last pic, reduce. Added some Pinot Noir, because that's what I had for a red. Cooking wine, ecch. Reduce again. Spoon over the meat, leave some to spoon on the taters. Zomg tasty, maybe 15-20 minutes of actual work.

[voodoolily]

Damn, Sky. That looks amazing. That kind of shit is so worth the work and wait. I'd hurt myself on a bowl of that and some crusty baguette.

[Signe]

We seem to have all gone chuck crazy.  I picked up a nice grass fed roast chuck the other day and have in the oven now and a nice crusty pane Toscano earlier today.  Spring is coming and slow roasted comfort food isn't quite as appetising in warm weather.  I think I'm ready for lighter food, though.  I'm looking forward to spring veggies and summer fruit.

[Engels]

So, I'm a bit confused. Sky, you put the cooking win in AFTER roasting/braising? I mean that's cool and all, and I can see why you would want to actually use a real wine rather than rot-gut cooking wine, but I have used it as part of the braising broth to start with, and the crappo wines work pretty well, from the results I get anyways.

VL is probably right that its healthier to use a 'real' wine rather than a SafeWay cooking wine or some such, but I was using some posh organic brand of cooking wine (still cheaper than a real bottle of red) that worked out well for me. Utterly undrinkable, mind you, but good for braising.

[voodoolily]

Just use cheap non-cooking wine as a braising liquid. If you can't drink it, don't use it! It has nothing to do with "healthy", it has to do with preferring to not use shit product in my food.

[Numtini]

I use "premium boxed" wines for cooking. They last a long time, they're cheap, and they're not offensive.

[Engels]

I'm using this cooking wine which is specially made for cooking. It -is- undrinkable, and they do put salt in it for the very purpose of cooking.

[Sky]

Dude, you're not going to win this one. There is a cooking rule about wine: if you can't drink it, you can't cook with it. I use the little bottles that come in four-packs, they're just the right size for most stuff I cook. I usually end up cracking a second little bottle for myself, though I prefer the whites.

[Engels]

Its not really about winning or losing the arguement here. The wine itself would probably be drinkable, ostensibly a better wine on its own than your joe average plonk wine from a box. Its just that this company adds salt to it. That's it. That's all they do.

[Trippy]

Its not really about winning or losing the arguement here. The wine itself would probably be drinkable, ostensibly a better wine on its own than your joe average plonk wine from a box. Its just that this company adds salt to it. That's it. That's all they do.

The problem with the added salt is you lose some control over the seasoning of your dish. It's the same reason why they recommend you use low(er) sodium chicken stock if you are buying it from a store instead of making it yourself. That way there's less of a chance you will over-salt your dish.

[Engels]

This is true. The first couple of times I used that cooking wine, I used too much and although the meat itself came out grand, the resulting gravy was virtually useless. This last time I used too little, it seems, and the stuff wasn't quite salty enough.

[Sky]

The number one rule of cooking is to use the best possible ingredients. Since you seem to be grasping for any defense possible of your horrid shit fucking obnoxiously awful crap that you want for some reason to add to your food, well then, go for it. Sorry for trying to help.

I guess I shouldn't bring up unsalted butter?

[Engels]

Hey, Trippy used a good arguement. He gave me a logical reason to use 'real' wine. Talking about 'rules of cooking' without actually backing them up with a good reason only makes me more recalcitrant, since I'm always skeptical of people touting rules.

[voodoolily]

You get a pass for using the word "recalcitrant".

Fuck, I'm just glad people are cooking. The main reason I just use wine is that I can nip from the bottle, but the salt is really the clencher. I don't salt my stocks either, I just salt the food at the end.

[Bunk]

So based on Sky's inspiration, I did my buffalo roast last night. I started a mir pois (I learned that this is a fancy word for carrots, onions, and celery on Iron Chef), seared the roast, and threw it all in the slow cooker with a bit of chicken stock and an entire bottle of pale ale. Unfortunately only had four hours to get it done, so I turned up the heat a bit - it wasn't fall apart tender, but it wasn't chewy either.

Added some beef stock to the broth and reduced it to a gravy and served with garlic bread. Was quite yummy, though I wouldn't pay the extra price for the buffalo in the future over beef.

[Engels]

VL: Is that a philosophical difference, or a proven taste preference, or some other thing? My grandma always held firm that one salts while cooking so as to not have to use salt at the table. Her meatballs ruled, so, uhm, I thought she must be right!

[Trippy]

I'm pretty sure the "I just salt the food at the end" part is in reference to her unsalted stocks (hence the comma). I would be shocked to hear that VL doesn't season as she goes.

[Sky]

mir pois

Mirepoix  

I only salt meats prior to cooking, almost nothing else needs it. I've cut SO MUCH salt out of our diets, not for a health thing, just to enjoy natural flavors. The only salt in my pot roast/gravy was from the intial s&p on the meat when I browned it. I've got a nice herbes de provence mix that I based on a store-bought mix. The store version had so much goddamned salt that it's a joy to enjoy the flavors now with my own mix.

Since we're on salt, I haven't used table salt in a long damned time. I've been using kosher because of Alton, though I don't have his cool little container (yet). But it's very easy to add by hand and seems to have a less harsh taste.

[voodoolily]

I'm pretty sure the "I just salt the food at the end" part is in reference to her unsalted stocks (hence the comma). I would be shocked to hear that VL doesn't season as she goes.

It depends.

I usually season as I go with the exception of cooking beans, soups or stews. The skins on beans go tough when cooked in salted water, and soups/stews tend to concentrate down as they cook, running the risk of oversalting themselves. Meats always get salted prior to cooking. I usually don't salt vegetables during a saute, because I don't want to draw the moisture out (I want a sear). But if you're doing a slow-cook, like to caramelize onions, then salt at the beginning.