Tag Archives: Food

Slow Cooker Revelations

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Well, it’s been quite some time since I last posted. Now my health is good again, I’m off the blood pressure meds after 16 years and I’m starting to feel really well again. Thank goodness. Now I’m ready to explore. Welcome back to my journey…

It started a couple of weeks ago. It was too hot to cook indoors, the humidity was off the scale and dripping into your dinner as you cook is no fun. So, I was trawling the internet for recipes (so that’s what you call it?) and I’d found some slow cooker groups on Facebook. Interesting stuff, mostly. It seemed like a good idea then, even though in my head slow cooked meals were a winter phenomenon. Apparently not. I was  pleasantly surprised to learn I was not utilising this cheap appliance to its full potential. I had acquired a secondhand cooker for all of $6.99 from Goodwill and figured I should give it a try. It works! Baking, braising, roasting, it seems the cooker has a lot to recommend it, and it didn’t fry me in the kitchen in the process! Ok, beef cheeks in Borello can wait till the first frost, but there are many things to attempt in the meantime.

The next few posts will be related to slow cooking, some stuff that is new, and some adaptations of previously stove topped tagine or other recipes. Have fun and enjoy the endeavours (and maybe some epic fails ha ha…)

kind regards,

J

Wacky Wakame Salad with Mussel, Mushroom Miso soup

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The red bean Miso paste that has been sitting quietly in the cupboard minding its own business could no longer be ignored. It kept falling out every time I opened the pantry door (that’s probably a reflection on my tendency of overstocking of the cupboard like we are about to have a famine or something.) I took it as a hint.

So, for the wacky Wakame salad… gather some seaweed.

A packet of dried seaweed.

A packet of dried seaweed.

 

Ingredients

Take out 20 grams of wakame and soak in hot water for about an hour, changing the water a couple of times as you go and stirring to make sure all the seaweed is reconstituting evenly.

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Wakame soaking, wet ingredients mixed, and sesame seeds waiting for toasting.

 

In the meantime mix together:

2 tbsp rice vinegar

2 tbsp light soy sauce

1-2 tsp chilli powder or flakes

1 tsp sesame oil

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Toasting sesame seeds

2 tbsp roasted sesame seeds (place in a dry frying pan and heat until they are just starting to toast and smell nice)

 

 

Method

When the wakame is suitably rehydrated, drain it in a colander and dry it off with paper towels.  Place the wakame in a mixing/serving bowl, you may need to “cut it up” with a pair of scissors, or you could actually chop it into smaller strands with a knife. I liked the scissor option in the bowl… and then add all the other ingredients and stir well to mix the dressing through the seaweed. Cover and let the flavours infuse.

Now for the Miso

This is not a traditional miso recipe per-se. I used what I had in the fridge and improvised a wee bit.

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Home made frozen prawn stock, pretty colour hey?

Heat 3 cups of home-made prawn stock over high heat and add;

1 tsp ikan bilis (dried shrimp, garlic and chilli. Available from most good asian markets)

Heat until hot.

Gather together

1 tsp minced ginger

1 tsp minced garlic

1 tsp rice vinegar

5 drops of Tamari (soy sauce)

2 tablespoons red miso paste (softened with a couple of tablespoons of your prawn stock.)

add all the above to the stock and stir.

Veggies for interest.

1 medium field mushroom cut into 1 cm cubes.

1 small pak choi  (or cabbage or whatever you have on hand) sliced thinly

3 spring onions (scallions?) chopped thinly for garnishing later

Pop the mushrooms and pak choi into the stock and add 300 grams of cleaned raw mussels. Simmer the stock gently until the mussels open.

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Assembled wakame salad.

The Salad

You can serve the wakame salad as a side dish, or if you prefer, you can place a mound of the salad in the bottom of your soup bowls and pour the soup around the side.

 

 

 

Mussel, mushroom miso soup

Ladle the soup into your soup bowls and garnish with the chopped spring onions.

Mussel, mushroom miso soup by J

Mussel, mushroom miso soup by J

Incidentally, prawn stock is easy to make and freeze. Next time you acquire some fresh prawns for cooking in a tapas dish such as garlic chilli prawns for example, shell and de-vein the prawns, throw the heads and shells into a stock pot and fry gently in a little olive oil (or coconut oil as an alternative for say Laksa stock) until they change colour. Then cover the heads with water and simmer very gently for about 15-20 minutes. Strain the stock through a fine sieve and let cool in smaller containers and then freeze for later use.

I hope you enjoy.

Kind regards,

J.

Odd bits that are actually quite unctuous

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I sauntered up to the local butchers shop for a quick perusal for something for dinner the other day and got very excited when I spotted a small portion of lamb sweetbreads! I had been hunting these beauties down for months and here they are on my own doorstep. Awesome. Needless to say, I bought some. Off home I trotted with my spoils, thrilled that I could finally cook up these delicious morsels into crispy, creamy, explosions of flavour and texture. Ohm, nom, nom…

I soaked them for an hour or so in water to make sure they were well cleaned. Then, I placed them in a pan, and covered them with more water, a little salt and some ground black pepper. Then I brought the pan to a simmer, and let them poach for about 4 minutes untill they were firm yet still springy. I popped them into cold water to let them cool just enough so I could handle them. They have a membrane on them that is well worth peeling off. It’s a little fiddly, but well worth the effort when you eat them. I popped a plate on top of them to “press them”, and left them in the fridge overnight. Then I sliced them into small pieces, about the size of a large grape ready for the final cooking.

I got a bowl of flour very well seasoned with salt and pepper ready. I tossed the small pieces of sweetbread in the flour, coating all the surfaces lightly and then cooked small batches of them in a shallow pan of duck fat untill they turned golden and crisp on the outside. A green salad, served as a base to support the sweetbreads, which I drizzled with good extra virgin olive oil and a nice sharp balsamic vinegar over the top with lots of salt and freshly ground black pepper, set the dish off perfectly. They were crisp and crunchy on the outside and creamy and mild flavoured on the inside but with a richness that means you only need a small amount to satisfy the most discerning of appetites. This makes for a very economical dish.

Sadly, I didn’t take a picture of these morsels of goodness, I was too busy enjoying them. You will have to supply the details in your head, but trust me, the taste sensation is worth the effort.

Now that I have the basic technique right, next time I’ll dress them up a little more like the ones I had at Rockpool in Perth.

Enjoy,

kind regards,

J

 

Leftover roast duck equals noodle soup the day after…

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I love leftovers. I usually make enough dinner to take some to work for lunch the day after but sometimes, the leftovers cry out for a transformation. There is nothing better than reconstructing and revamping one dish into another and making something fabulous and indeed economical with what someone else may just throw out…

Roast a duck in the oven the usual way with potatoes and root veggies and enjoy it with lashings of gravy. Save the carcass and the meat still on the bone after carving and jointing and you can get another meal out of it.

Prepped veggies

Take some veggies that you have lying around in the fridge, preferably chinese style stuff. I used bok choy and spring onions with some snow peas for the greens, some mushrooms and I added carrots too.

Shredded duck.

Shred the meat off the remaining duck carcass and throw the bones into the stock pot.

Stock ready to go.

I use a pressure cooker and just almost cover the bones with water and then cook on high pressure for about 20 mins. Strain the stock to get rid of the bones and voila! Very basic roast duck flavoured stock. It isn’t clear, I like it that way, it has body.

Garlic, ginger and carrot heating through

When the stock is ready, find a pan and add some duck fat to the bottom and fry off an onion for a minute or two until translucent. Add a generous tablespoon of garlic and minced ginger and sweat it for a minute or so until is smells good. Add a sliced carrot and sweat that off for a couple of minutes.

Throw in the non leafy veggies and stalks of bok choy and stir for a minute and then add the duck stock. Bring to a gentle simmer and adjust the seasoning, but go easy on the salt if you’re adding the sauces below. Have your bowls ready with some dried asian noodles in the bottom (dried egg noodles or rice noodles are good, but ramen or any other that you fancy works well) When the soup is hot, drop in the bok choy leaves to wilt, and ladle off the soup into the bowls over the noodles. Garnish with sliced spring onions, bean sprouts and some chilli paste. Serve the soup accompanied with small bowls of :-

2 tablespoons of fish sauce with one green chilli sliced and/or

2 tablespoons of light soy sauce with one red chilli sliced and/or

1 tablespoon Lime juice, one tablespoon fish sauce, one tablespoon fresh chopped coriander leaves.

Enjoy!

Leftover roast duck noodle soup.

Kind regards,

J

And so onto spring…

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The beauty of the southern hemisphere, and particularly here in Australia, is our inclination to set the date for the change of the seasons. Here in Oz, spring is due to start in 5 days time ie: the first of September.

Mornings are still cold at 4-5’c up here in the hills, but the days are starting to warm up. Tomorrow is heading for 24’c, yippee!

I was reminded of the temperature this morning as I was sipping my first humongous mug of english breakfast tea. I heard this “blip” sound. Then, a little while later, another. It then dawned on me, the sauerkraut I lovingly put in the crock and set by the fireplace yesterday is fermenting! Excellent. The crock can sit there in the warmth for a week and then I will move it into the laundry where it’s cooler to continue cool fermentation for another week or so before I remove the “kraut” and pack it into smaller jars to live in the fridge.

This stuff is alive. Unlike the pasteurized product you get in the supermarket, this one has all those lovely lactobacillus happily multiplying and otherwise having a rollicking good time turning ordinary cabbage into a culinary thing of great beauty.

Take two heads of fresh cabbage, shred finely or not as you choose, pack into a 7 litre crock and pound the shredded cabbage with a  pestle. Strew with sea salt as you go using about 4 tablespoons to 5kg of cabbage. Weight the top of the cabbage down with a plate or flat stones if you are lucky enough to have purpose-built ones and add a little of the liquid from the previous batch to speed things along (not essential, but nice). I like to add a little cooled boiled water to just cover the stones and protect the cabbage from the air. (my Harsch crock also has an airlock lid) Ferment at about 20’c for a week and then drop the temperature by moving it to a cooler place at 15-18’c for a week or so longer, until you are ready to start eating. Don’t be tempted to peek! Because the climate here tends to be hot, when I’m satisfied that it’s ready, mine ends up in the fridge in smaller jars. Goes great with everything, but particularly smoked meats and fish (smoking more meat and fish is this weekends job). Don’t forget the mustard.

The other item of a somewhat more robust nature doing its own thing on the kitchen bench is the kimchi. Now this stuff smells vicious. It could be used as smelling salts with all that ginger, garlic, sambal oelek and fish sauce, not to mention the Daikon radish in there. But boy, am I looking forward to the first taste of it, even if it will make my eyes water. I can fully understand why the Koreans are addicted to the stuff. Just make sure you don’t take the lid off the pot unless you know your friends like it. It’s the fastest way to clear a room…

kind regards,

J