This website turns nineteen today. I just thought I should note that. Still not feeling up for writing much and have only marginally paid attention to guns or politics or much because in March, my house burned to the ground. Complete loss. The cause is undetermined and never will be but I suspect something in the attic.

But this ain’t a post about that, it’s a post about this: One of the things that I lost was years and years of handwritten recipes. Now, I can, generally, recall quite a few of them but not all. For some that require precise measurements, I need those. And some I’ve forgotten completely. I’ve done quite a few things that I had recipes for with success. Others, I’ve had to search the internet for close enough variations of mine. With that said , I’m going to start posting those here from time to time so that I have them and maybe you guys will enjoy them too. No word on when I’ll be up on guns or politics, just not been into that since the passing of my wife and now this.

Also, I will post just the recipes (foreshadowing) not those longwinded, autobiographical pieces that pass as recipes these days because Google likes them that way. You know, just show the recipe. I and the rest of the planet don’t give two shits about that time you were in Tuscany and how this recipe takes you there. And, in an ironic twist, I will end this post with a recipe for creme fraiche:

1 pint heavy cream
2 tablespoons of cultured buttermilk

Combine in a mason jar and give it a stir. Cover the jar with a cheese cloth and leave on the counter for 24 hours. After 24 hours, put it in the refrigerator. Once it’s cold, it’s a creamier and more delicious sour cream. Oh, and if you like

, you can flavor it with herbs before refrigerating.

Cheers.

I make my own stock for cooking. It’s easy. I keep a gallon freezer bag in the freezer. After I trim any veggies, I put the left over bits into the bag. Except for peels, they get gross frozen. But all the root vegetable roots, asparagus tips, onion ends. Etc. I also put any leftover bones in the same bag. Then, when the bag is fool, put it into a large stock pot and cover with water:

Cover and bring to a boil. Boil for a minimum of 45 minutes. I tend to let mine boil for hours. It seems to transfer the flavors more. This batch has guinea fowl bones, asparagus, carrot ends, okra ends and some of the outer leaves of cabbage and artichoke. Then drain (I use this strainer):

Allow to cool then ladle into jars:

No two batches are the same. But they’re always good.

That chow chow I made the other day? Well, that seems to work on salsa too:

Same as last time, salt the bottom of the jar. Stir and add your ingredients. Mine were:

2 large tomatoes diced
3 habeneros minced
1/2 bell pepper diced
1/2 onion diced
4 cloves of garlic minced
2 sprigs of cilantro minced

Mix 1/3 lime juice to 2/3 water and bring to a boil, pour into jar. Let cool and refrigerate.

Been busy with work stuff and kids’ sports. But here’s a recipe for ya for lime chow chow. You need:

6-8 jalapenos (for less heat, remove seeds)
Salt
4 cloves of garlic
1 cup of lime juice
1 cup of water

Line the bottom of a small jar with the salt. Smash the cloves of garlic and place them in the bottom of the jar. Finley dice the jalapenos and add them to the jar leaving a little space at the top. Bring the water and lime juice to low boil. Pour the liquid into the jar. Allow to cool for about 30 minutes. Put the lid on the jar and place it in the fridge. In 3 days, you’ll have the chow chow. Good on beans, chips or, well, anything.

I’ve been remiss in posting the occasional recipe. So, here’s one. You can eat these like fries. In a bowl, toss in a pound or so of okra. Drizzle with olive oil and add salt and pepper:

Toss until it’s fairly evenly coated.

Skewer. I use two skewers so they’re easier to flip but for some reason, I found older photos:

Lightly char them:

You can eat them like fries. The flesh will be crunchy and the seeds will have a satisfying pop. Oh, and since these are like fries, you’ll need a “ketchup” or dipping sauce. I whisk together some of the juice from my aunt Rhonda’s canned sweet hot peppers with sour cream and some Italian seasoning. You likely don’t have any of that but a close substitute is the juice from Korean pickles or the juice from spicy bread and butter pickles:

So good:

A placeholder to remember this excellent recipe. Boil a couple of pounds of new or red potatoes, with a dash of salt, until tender. Remove them from the water and let cool. While cooling, place some spinach and diced onions in a bowl and stir. Once the potatoes are cool, halve them and put them on the grill for about 15 minutes. While they’re still hot from grilling, add them to the spinach and onion mix. The heated potatoes will wilt the spinach just enough.

The best part is the dressing. Combine the following ingredients in a salad dressing shaker:

1/2 cup of balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
Teaspoon of garlic powder
Teaspoon of lemon juice
Tablespoon of mustard

Shake it up and drizzle onto the salad until it’s all lightly coated. Goes well with a flank:

The wife started some hippie diet and it said she should drink some sort of carrot juice smoothie concoction. This concoction apparently tasted like warmed over donkey butt.

So, I have about 2 gallons of carrot juice I need to use.

Suggestions?

Someone was nice enough to give me some venison. One of the bits was the neck, with bone and all. And if you’re like me, you said thanks and then wondered what you’d do with a neck. After a bit of googling, I discovered that it’s a pretty tough cut of meat and should be cooked at low temperature for a long time. So, I browned the outside of the neck and put it in a crock pot with 4 cups of red wine, orange peel, a clove of garlic, fresh ginger root, and some bay leaves. I added some parsnips, carrots, cabbage, onion, and mushrooms. Turned out pretty good:

I love cucumbers and make cucumber water, cucumber Popsicles, pickles, grilled cucumbers and on and on. Based on a friend’s suggestion, I made a cucumber gin and tonic. Easy to do. Just cut up half a cucumber and place it in a pitcher. Cover with gin and let soak in the fridge for a few hours. Then, pour the gin into a glass and add some tonic. Garnish with a cucumber.

delicious

Delicious.

One of the things that cracks me up in it’s sheer pointlessness is how devotees of certain food types get upset if someone else makes a similar dish and calls it the same thing. The classic is how chili doesn’t have beans in Texas but in 49 other states it does. So, those 49 states are clearly wrong. Or if you don’t boil it, it’s not a bagel! And here in the south, all soft drinks are cokes. Doesn’t matter if it’s a Coca Cola product or Pepsi. It’s still a coke.

Now, PawPaw is upset that I referred to some Cajun boiled peanuts. Having just got back from South Carolina, let me tell you Cajun boiled peanuts are everywhere. In this case, I don’t think Cajun refers to the group or ethnicity that came up with the food. But the style of spices that go in the pot. For instance, when I get in a Korean barbecue mode and, for an appetizer, toss some cucumbers on the grill before the meat, they’re not Korean barbecued cucumbers in that I think Koreans actually made them. But they are in the style I used to cook them.

But we can all agree this is not chili.

An easy garlic peeler. I never knew these existed. I did know about the two bowl method.

Also, peeling ginger made easy.

Making mustard

A bit back, I posted the recipe for my barbecue sauce. That was the mango version. I’ve also done a peach. But this weekend, I did something new. Strawberries:

Not sure how the sauce tastes yet but I will say that cooking strawberries have the most amazing smell.

After my various GI issues, the docs found nothing. So, I made some dietary changes. First, I started having only two cups of coffee a day instead of my usual pot. The other thing is I started drinking kefir. A dear friend told me of its health benefits, I read up on it and gave it a shot. You can get this brand in the hippie tree-hugging section at Kroger. It’s delicious and, actually, pretty filling.

After a bit of research, I discovered I could make my own. However, I wasn’t too keen on keeping a culture in my house and fermenting milk. But someone much braver than me gave it a shot and approved. So, I hopped on the internet where you can have the grains shipped right to your door. Simple process to make consists of putting the grains in milk and waiting. I leave mine out for 48 hours instead of 24 because it thickens it up. Then, in the morning, I add some kefir and frozen fruit to a blender for a nice breakfast smoothie.

I’m not sure at exactly what point I become a hippie. But it’s odd, though, keeping cultures in your house that you eat. It’s like a pet that you eat.

Anyway, now that I told you all that, I had this weird dream the first day I got my kefir. It grew into a blob, a rather large one. And started moving around. Next thing you know, it’s running around the house and it’s apparently intelligent. And it’s freaking the cats out because it chases them and tastes like milk. So, I tell it that it’s freaking people out. Then, the blob assumes the shape of a dog and starts acting like a dog. I had a pet with a wet, squishy bark who I occasionally used to flavor a drink.

Weird.

Some artichoke recipes. Yum.

My Top Ten Food Picks for Super Bowl Sunday

Bonus: Spicy, Crunchy Tailgatin’ Wings

Super Bowl Meat Stadiums!

The super bowl of bacon

My new favorite and, almost, made up adult beverage:

On a recent outing, I had dinner at the Dancing Bear Restaurant. They have a signature drink called the whiskey cask, which seems to be some sort of ginger liquor mixed with Prichards. I tried one and while it was good, I thought it could be better. So, here’s what I came up with.

Take one slice of ginger root and place it in the bottom of a whiskey glass. Add a splash of water and muddle for a bit.

Add about a teaspoon of honey and two shots of bourbon and stir vigorously.

Fill remainder of glass with ice. Then take a spoon and, with an up and down motion, churn the ice.

Enjoy. It’s delicious. I think next time, I may add a sprig of mint with the ginger.

I must try this.

Les is cooking a steak in a cooler. This, I must try.

Clara’s kitchen, 90 year old woman who lived through the depression on cooking frugally. And she has a book.

A placeholder of recipes I need to try:

Asparagus Blue Cheese Soup

Slow Cooker Thai Chicken Soup

Pickled Brussels Sprouts

Sofya rounds up her favorites.

One of my favorite food blogs now has a book out: Food in Jars: Preserving in Small Batches Year-Round.

A round up.

And, hey, 86,000 calories for Christmas. I was into it up until the cheese wiz.

Spicy

Made some last night and someone wanted to know the recipe. Since I typed it up for facebook, may as well post it here:

From Home Life

These are refrigerator pickles and should be made in small batches. I usually do four at at time but the recipe is, roughly, per jar:

4-5 pickling cukes cut how you like
3 cloves garlic
2 dill sprigs
2 peppers of choice (usually jalapenos, but thai chilis here)
1/4 large onion chopped
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1 tablespoon peppercorns
1 tablespoon mustard seed
1 cup white vinegar
1 cup water

Cut the cukes, in this case some spears and some chips. Sprinkle some salt and put in the fridge for a couple of hours. While doing that, boil the garlic for about 30 minutes to soften. You can skip this step but it makes the pickled garlic taste bad if you try to eat it. After two hours, take the cukes out and rinse them thoroughly. Mix 50/50 water vinegar and bring to a rolling boil and add a little salt. In the bottom of the jar add 1 dill sprig, 1 tablespon salt, peppercorns, mustard seed, peppers and onion. Stuff the jar as full of cucumbers as you can, add another dill sprig on top. When the vinegar/water is boiling, ladle it in and fill the jars as full as you can. Let sit on the counter for about an hour, put the lids on them, turn them up to get the brine flowing, then put them in the fridge. Ready to eat the next day and will last about a month in the fridge.

The onions, peppers and garlic at the bottom are the best part.

Or clearing out greader notes.

A placeholder for stuff I need to try:

Everything on this blog, specifically the white barbecue sauce.

Bacon wrapped squash bites

Bacon and bourbon collards

Fig, Caramelized Onion, and Bacon Jam

Muffins.

Pickled grilled vegetables.

Homemade mustard

Boiled peanut hummus.

How To Make Flubber, Glurch and Other Homemade Art Supplies at Home

Dill Pickle Soup

Crock pot blue cheese steak roll ups

One ingredient ice cream

Chimichurri.

101 fast grilling recipes.

And now, google reader is uncluttered.

As you were.

For some bourbon drinks to try.

Grapefruit bourbon sour

Ginger + apple + bourbon

A list of yummy.

I don’t know that I’ve blogged it but my facebook friends know that I have taken to making my own beer and making wine for the wife. I don’t drink wine myself. Anyway, tomorrow, I’ll begin making my first pumpkin beer. It will contain roasted pumpkin, brown sugar, and some molasses. Should be good, in theory.