What's Cooking (Take Three!)

when I have problems with pizza dough it's usually because the humidity makes it difficult to roll out

I don't miss humidity. It was 6% here yesterday. Quite comfortable. Out of curiosity, what kind of difficulty do you have when rolling out the dough?

Frequently, my menu is impromptu if I find a deal on something at the grocery store. This week I made shrimp scampi, bbq ribs with corn on the cob, turkey breast in chipotle sauce, Persian Pomegranate Chicken (Fesenjan) accompanied by basmati rice with butter chicken sauce and paneer. And, of course, one night with a huge ribeye with fried potatoes (haven't had that kind of spuds in years) and a tossed salad.

I'm writing this thinking I should get a sourdough sponge going tonight for waffles tomorrow.

I made some awesome sourdough waffles this morning, riffing on a King Arthur's recipe. They were incredibly light and tasty. Even my first wife commented on them.

I used my 1847 Oregon Trail sourdough starter to make a sponge the night before. I had to adjust the quantities of flour because it was way too soupy at first. I added some ap flour, ww flour, and hazlenut flour until it was somewhat thicker but still very pourable. Coconut oil was my oil of choice. Yummy!

when I have problems with pizza dough it's usually because the humidity makes it difficult to roll out

I don't miss humidity. It was 6% here yesterday. Quite comfortable. Out of curiosity, what kind of difficulty do you have when rolling out the dough?

If it's too humid and the dough is too wet/alive, then it either sticks to the surface or rips when rolling. The amounts of extra flour required to tame those issues cause their own problems. It was pretty humid yesterday but the cooling of the dough helped a lot.

(Humidity right now is 82%, not sure what it was yesterday, will be climbing in next few hours as we potentially get some overnight rain)

82% - yuck!

Busy day in the kitchen: made a batch of gravy, a la Thanksgiving, a batch of biscuits (to go under said gravy), and a red wine braise of turkey thighs (kinda like dindon au vin). Not bad for my first ever batch of biscuits. Turkey thighs are hefty pieces-parts but the red wine braise goes well with the dark meat.

[Jenise]

Jeff, I've never thought of braising turkey--I get the dark meat/wine thing, I've done a Tuscan style red wine braise with duck. We just don't see turkey broken down into parts around here. Sometimes the breast for obvious reasons, and turkey legs will be all over the place in about two months for Dungeness crab bait. But thighs--no.

Friday night we had one of the most splendid take-out meals of our captivity, a generously portioned prime rib dinner for four from a local hotel wherein each item was prepared to perfection. The salad was fresh and ice cold, the meat (a 3 lb whole boneless prime rib), garlic potatoes and grilled asparagus were piping hot, and there was also four yeasty, fresh rolls, butter, sour cream/horseradish sauce, a tub of jus, and two cheesecakes. They left out nothing! Yesterday we had the cold prime rib leftovers for lunch. I made a cream of asparagus soup out of the leftover asparagus, and tonight the remaining potatoes will become Bangers & Mash. This dinner just keeps on giving! (And it was only $60. Insane. I left a $30 tip.)

Jeff, I've never thought of braising turkey--I get the dark meat/wine thing, I've done a Tuscan style red wine braise with duck. We just don't see turkey broken down into parts around here. Sometimes the breast for obvious reasons, and turkey legs will be all over the place in about two months for Dungeness crab bait. But thighs--no.

Turkeys were always available in supermarkets, whole or just the breast, for TG. Maybe 10-20 years ago I started to see turkey cutlets for sale. They're OK but they dry out very easily; somehow, having sliced through the meat makes it easy to lose moisture through all the cut ends. But in the past two years or so I can get wings, thighs, and legs fairly often (perhaps once every three visits to the supermarket).

I've never heard of Tuscan red-wine braised duck! Sounds really good... but Google is not helping me. These three recipes don't resemble each other at all!
https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/101 ... -gremolata
https://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food ... legs-14324
https://alickofsalt.com/2019/01/10/brai ... agu-pasta/

So, Jenise, what did you do? My imagination says it is something like the first one but that sauce sounds wrong to me.

(And it was only $60. Insane. I left a $30 tip.)

Brava.

[Jenise]

Jeff, those are three interesting takes on the idea, but only the first resembles what I remember, minus the canned tomatoes and the gremolata, which I think is a nice addition. I don't even remember where we found the recipe. We includes my friend Annabelle, it was one of those big dinners in L. A.

Thanks, Jenise. I'm a fan of gremolata, as a condiment, but it seemed to me that all those tomatoes would drown out anything accomplished by the wine braise.

[Jenise]

It doesn't. They caramelize and soften with the wine and meat--it's a Tuscan classic for a reason. I think I've remembered where the recipe came from, one of my books. I'll look it up!

[Jenise]

Feeling Mexican today. I have six boneless skinless chicken thighs marinating in a mixture based on dry vermouth and Tapatio hot sauce with a bit of olive oil. To deck out the plates, Spanish rice and maybe creamed fresh corn with green chiles. I'd rather do grilled zucchini slices over corn for lower carbs, plus they look so colorful, but I don't have any and I'm NOT going to the store! For a starter salad, maybe baby romaine halves grilled and finished with a gazpacho-like salad dressing and little bits of fried corn tortilla.

Seriously in need of a fish fix, required a 70 km round trip for fresh but worth the effort, and it was a nice drive through the hills.
So it was crispy skin Atlantic Salmon on a melange of green peas ( a mash flavoured with mint and fennel and sugar snaps steamed)

Sounds nice, Barb. I hope you bought more than one piece, after such a long drive!

[Jenise]

We had a really warm day yesterday with calm waters, so had dinner outside. We started with a plate of mushrooms--salted and oiled, then roasted for ten minutes. When they cooled, I filled them with Laura Chenel goat cheese and topped them with garlicky sourdough crumbs. There could not be a more perfect food in the world for the ten year old Beaujolais I opened. We followed the shrooms with a main course salad made of spicy greens from my garden: arugula, mizuna, tatsoi and a few others plus loads of fresh tarragon, chives and flat leaf parsley, cooked russet potato slices and peas, all dressed with fresh lemon juice, EVOO and maldon salt. It was absolutely fantastic, and only while eating it did we realize it was vegan. That's kind of like the best thing, isn't it? That I didn't even set out to make a vegan/vegetarian dinner, but the food I wanted just turned out to be that?

Sounds nice, Barb. I hope you bought more than one piece, after such a long drive!

I bought some fresh prawns as well! And there is a wonderful produce shop in the same village which I can never go past.

I made a fairly high-hydration sourdough bread using my red-grape starter and a dutch oven. I have a couple of Tramontina dutch ovens--large and small. And I love 'em. How about your dutch ovens?

Earlier this week, I scored some nice bicolor corn and have been having an ear almost every day. I like butter, salt, and cayenne pepper on them. How about you?

[Jenise]

Larry, on Tuesday I cut the corn off six fresh ears I'd purchased but found too old, almost like field corn, for eating off the cob but was fine for turning into creamed corn, New Mexico style, with green chiles and cilantro in the sauce. This made a nice side dish for Mexican rice and chicken thighs that had been marinated all day in Tapatio sauce diluted with dry white vermouth and grilled off. I probably described that meal here already. Lots of leftover corn, which I'll puree into a soup.

You know what, I miss the days of my childhood where corn, even in supermarkets, was a mix of ears both very young, very old, and all places in between. Every ear might be different, and since we quite frequently ate corn as our main course when it was available (with a tomato salad on the side), you would get to have the whole range of experiences in one meal. Nowadays it's like the corn's stamped out on a 3-D printer, every ear alike.

Last night we had fresh swordfish with a simple lemon/butter sauce and brussels sprouts after a salad course of cold, sweet whole cherry tomatoes shared out of a bowl while sipping wine and enjoying the view on the patio. This is why dinner is usually a whole evening. We don't eat and run, we savor, starting with a raw vegetable be it a traditional green salad or something else, after which the main course, like last night, has yet to be cooked.

How many starters do you have?

Sounds nice, Barb. I hope you bought more than one piece, after such a long drive!

I bought some fresh prawns as well! And there is a wonderful produce shop in the same village which I can never go past.

I'm a City Mouse so I think that's a long drive. If it were me, I'd also have gotten a few fillets for bouillabaisse and something frozen, too.

I just picked up 4# of frozen octopus this morning. Running the warm water now....

I made a fairly high-hydration sourdough bread using my red-grape starter and a dutch oven. I have a couple of Tramontina dutch ovens--large and small. And I love 'em. How about your dutch ovens?

Earlier this week, I scored some nice bicolor corn and have been having an ear almost every day. I like butter, salt, and cayenne pepper on them. How about you?

Butter, s+p for sure. A squeeze of lime is good, a sprinkle of parmesan (...just never have cotija at home...).

I'd imagine that cumin or coriander would work well.

How many starters do you have?

I'm the cook but I work. Multiple plates is weekend/celebration fare.

How many starters do you have?

1. My original red-grape starter,
2. 1847 Oregon Trail
3. San Francisco
4. 200-yr old Mormon
5. one from Nebraska
6. one from Tennessee

And I'm willing to share.

Another nice use for cut corn is calabacitas--essentially zucchini with corn and onions (with variations). A tip that I learned: saute the corn kernels first in a little bacon grease (it adds a smokiness).

[Jenise]

How many starters do you have?

I'm the cook but I work. Multiple plates is weekend/celebration fare.

Not starter courses, sourdough starters--to Larry when he mentioned a red grape starter, he obvously has several others.

[Jenise]

Larry, you'll share???? Oh please!!!!

I'm making a new batch of Inner Beauty Hot Sauce today, using scotch bonnet chiles I found at the local supermarket. For some reason I always feel like Harry Potter in Potions class when I make this stuff. Or maybe more like Seamus Finnegan in Potions class, given the incendiary nature of the brew.

Tomorrow's dinner will be Sichuan: Ants Climbing a Tree.

-Paul W.