Category Archives: I Cook, Too

Some of my favorite recipes.

Saving the Season

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I start canning. Again.

Saving the Season
Saving the Season is just the book I needed to come up with creative ways to store what I harvest.

My garden is neither small nor large. It would probably be just right for a family of four.

I am a family of one.

While it’s wonderful to be able to pull 75% of the food I consume right out of my own garden, it’s horrible to harvest far more food than I can possibly eat or give away. After all, my friends and neighbors have gardens, too. Although mine was a bit earlier than most, they’re all caught up and trying to give me zucchini, tomatoes, etc. Needless to say, my chickens are feasting on soft tomatoes, peppers, zucchini, and other things these days.

Canning Tomatoes

Last year, I had what I thought was a pretty good crop of roma tomatoes. I set about canning them with my boiling water bath setup, which, because I have a glass-top stove, must be done on the burner beside my BBQ grill out on the deck.

Canning tomatoes is not fun. First you have to boil the jars and lids to sterilize them. Then you have to wash the tomatoes, remove the skins by scalding them in boiling water, dropping them into ice water, and sliding the skins off. Then chop them. Then put them in the prepped jars with a tablespoon of lemon juice to add acid. Then boil them for the required time in the canning setup.

It took me two hours to can two pints of tomatoes last year. I swore I’d never do it again. After all, what does a can of tomatoes cost at the supermarket? Why am I wasting my time canning mine?

Trying Again with Carrots

A few years ago, I’d bought a book at a bookstore up in Winthrop called Saving the Season. It’s all about canning and preserving what comes out of your garden. This year, I finally opened it when I was ready to “save” something I was taking out of my garden: carrots.

Yes, I grew carrots this year for the first time. I cannot believe how well they grew — even in my raised beds, which are only one foot deep! And as one batch was getting big, I planted another batch.

Very Large Fresh Carrots
After pulling one or two carrots a week, I finally pulled the rest of the entire first batch. They were huge.

I soon discovered two things:

  • Carrots keep getting bigger if you don’t harvest them.
  • Freshly harvested carrots lose their stiffness quickly after harvesting. (I won’t tell you what they remind me of after just a few days in the fridge.)

I realized that I’d have to harvest them before the next batch was ready and use them as quickly as I could. Harvesting was easy. Just pull them out from their tops. I had a bunch of really large ones to work with. (Although I only want the orange part, my chickens really seem to love the green tops.) Unfortunately, I just didn’t feel like eating carrots.

The answer was to pickle and can them. The recipe I chose was “Picked Carrots, Taquería Style.” This would produce carrots like those that can sometimes be found at a real Mexican restaurant’s salsa bar. The best part of this recipe: not only would it use up all the carrots I’d picked, but it also called for red onions, jalapeño peppers, and garlic, all of which I also harvested from my garden.

Pickled Carrots
One of my four pint-sized jars of Mexican pickled carrots.

So I put aside memories of peeling tomatoes and got to work following the recipe, dragging my canning setup out of storage in the garage, and prepping the four pint jars I’d need for canning. It went remarkably well, even though I never got the canner up to a full rolling boil. (The recipe said 30 minutes at 180° to 185° was fine.) Although my kitchen looked as if I’d just cooked for a party of 10 when I was done, I had four beautiful jars of pickled carrots that I could store in my pantry until I was ready to eat them.

I also had about a half cup of carrots with some liquid leftover. I put those in a jar in the fridge. This morning, I opened it up for a taste — I knew I wouldn’t like them hot so I didn’t taste them while I was making them. They were delicious.

Now I’m looking forward to that second batch of carrots to be ready to pull. I want to make another four jars to take me through the winter.

And beets….do I have a recipe for those? Let’s see….

All Purpose Salt & Pepper Blend

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I discover that a rib rub actually makes an excellent everyday seasoning.

A few weeks ago, I watched a cooking video titled “Salt & Pepper Spare Ribs” by Allrecipes.com‘s Chef John. Although Chef John’s sing-songy narration drives me bonkers, he shares a lot of good recipes and this was definitely one of them. (You can find the recipe without listening to his voice here.) I made the ribs, using baby backs because St. Louis (which I prefer) weren’t available, and they were great.

I did find myself with some extra rub after preparing the ribs. (Baby backs are smaller than St. Louis.) I put it in a jar in my pantry. This morning, on a whim, I sprinkled some on my breakfast scramble. Today, that included bacon; onions, yellow squash, and potatoes from my garden; spinach; and tomatoes with an egg on top. The small amount of “rib rub” I put on my breakfast really made the flavor explode. I regret not putting more on. (Tomorrow is another day.)

The blend is easy. Just mix these five ingredients together:

  • Ingredients
    Just five ingredients. Can’t get any easier than that!

    4 teaspoons kosher salt. I actually used regular iodized salt, which is I had in my pantry and wanted to use up.

  • 1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper. Sadly my pepper mill doesn’t properly grind pepper — it cracks it. Not what I wanted in this recipe so I used pre-ground pepper. (Do not use flake pepper. Ever. If you have any, throw it away. It’s garbage.)
  • 1 teaspoon freshly ground white pepper. I wouldn’t even know where to buy white peppercorns in the rural area where I live. I consider myself lucky to find ground white pepper so that’s what I used.
  • 1 teaspoon cayenne pepper. I’ll admit I used a little less than this because I don’t like super spicy food. The ribs were definitely spicy enough for me.
  • 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder. Honestly, I think this is what made it so good on my breakfast.

Put it in a jar that you can seal tightly. I try to save spice jars with sprinkle tops just for this purpose. Then use it on anything you would normally sprinkle with salt and pepper. You won’t be disappointed.

That rib recipe won’t disappoint you, either. It’s especially good if you don’t have a smoker or just want something different. It can’t be any easier to make.

Instant Pot Pork, Cabbage, Apples, & Onions

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Quick and healthy Instant Pot meal.

I made this yesterday. It’s a recipe I dreamed up and it came out great!

Ingredients:

I listed them in the title, but here are the details:

  • 1-2 tablespoons oil. I used light olive oil because I only buy olive oil. I use regular when I want the olive oil taste and light when I just need some oil.
  • Pork loin or tenderloin. I’ve said before that pressure cooking pork tenderloin is a waste of a good cut of meat — it’s much better grilled — but that’s what I had and that’s what I used. I used one of the two tenderloins in the package because I also used my smaller Instant Pot and, let’s face it, I’m feeding a party of one. If I wanted to make more, I could have used both tenderloins.
  • Salt and pepper. I use coarsely fresh ground sea salt and pepper.
  • Onion. I used one large one, cut into narrow wedges. If you cut it too small, it “melts” while pressure cooking.
  • Cabbage. I used half a cabbage because (again) I was cooking for one in a small Instant Pot. I cut it in half, removed the core, and cut that half in half. If you’re cooking for more in a regular sized Instant Pot, use the whole thing, cored and quartered.
  • Apples. I used 2 gala apples. I’d bought them and they were terrible for snacking. Kind of soft and mealy. Not crisp like you’d want an apple. I had two choices: cook with them or give them to my chickens. I peeled and cored these (saving peels and cores for my chickens) and cut them into 1/8 wedges.

Instructions:

  1. Heat the oil in the Instant Pot on Sauté.
  2. Generously salt and pepper all sides of the pork.
  3. Brown all sides of the pork. (Because I used a small Instant Pot, I cut the pork tenderloin in half so it would fit better.) This should take 5-10 minutes.
  4. Remove pork from the Instant Pot and turn it off.
  5. Add onions, apples, pork, and cabbage in that order. (In my case, I could barely get the lid on when it was done.) Do not add any liquid.
  6. Seal the lid and set the Instant Pot on Manual (or Pressure, depending on the model) for 30 minutes. Make sure the steam vent is closed.
  7. Clean up the kitchen. You shouldn’t have much of a mess. Cutting board? Knife? Don’t forget to wash your hands!
  8. When the 30 minutes is up, wait 10 minutes and then carefully release the steam and open the pot.
  9. Remove the pork and slice into 1 to 1-1/2 inch slices. Serve with vegetables and the juice created in the pot by cooking them.

You’re welcome.

This made enough for me for at least 2 meals. I suppose I could eat it with rice, but I’m really trying to minimize carbs and there’s quite enough in the apples and onions.

Yourphotohere
Oh, you want a photo? I didn’t take one. But if you make this and send me a photo of it on Twitter (@mlanger), I’ll put it in this blog post.

Snowbirding 2020 Postcards: Fire Roasted Yams

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My absolute favorite camping food.

One of the things I like best about camping with friends along the Colorado River is the evening campfires. It’s not just sitting around a warm fire with friends on a cool desert evening — it’s the fact that I can roast up some yams or sweet potatoes to snack on the next day.

The trick is to get the fire going early enough in the evening so that we have plenty of hot coals to roast the potatoes on. Then I scrub each potato and wrap it in aluminum foil. I use enough foil so that the potato has at least two layers around it on all sides. Then I lay the potatoes on the coals and turn them occasionally as we sit around the fire chatting about this or that. The hotter the coals are, the more often I turn them and the quicker they get cooked.

Fire Roasted Yam
OMG. How’s this for a fire-roasted yam?

The other night, we burned the bundle of fruitwood I’d brought from home. (Long story there.) It’s a hard wood and very slow burning, but it did make good coals. Trouble is, it took so long to burn down that we were ready to call it a night before the potatoes I’d thrown on — four regular potatoes from my garden and two yams from the supermarket — were done. So I moved the regular potatoes over to the side of the fire pit and left the yams right on top of the fading coals. Then I went to bed.

In the morning, the fire pit was cold (as we expected). I pulled out one of the yams and my fingers immediately smushed it. Uh-oh, I thought. I ruined this one. But when I unwrapped it, I found the potato skin only mildly scorched. I broke the potato open and was thrilled to see a uniformly soft orange center.

I ate it with a spoon.

The regular potatoes came out okay, too, but they’re not nearly as tasty cold as the yams are. I’ll peel the scorched skins off, chop up the flesh, and add it to my breakfast scrambles.

Beyond Meat

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I try some meat substitutes and come away unimpressed.

I first heard of the Impossible Burger on NPR, which I listen to quite regularly. It was mentioned in a piece on one show and then, a few days later, on another. The folks talking about it seemed quite impressed claiming that they’d finally nailed a plant-based burger.

Of course, I wanted to try one. I like trying new foods. So I did some research and learned that the local Red Robin burger joint sold them. As much as I dislike Red Robin — I’m not a fan of chain restaurants and I’d had a very unsatisfactory experience at the local one — I went to give it a try.

Impossible Cheese Burger
From the Red Robin website: the Impossible Burger.

They had different versions on the menu. I ordered some sort of cheeseburger. When it arrived I realized that I’d forgotten to tell them not to fill the bun with sauces and lettuce and tomato and whatever else they stuffed in there. It was a mess. I ate it. It was tasty, but I can’t say I tasted anything resembling beef.

I tried again a few weeks later. This time I told them I wanted it plain: the burger and the cheese on the bun. Nothing else. Now I could actually taste what I’d come to taste. And I was not impressed. If people thought this tasted like beef, I had to wonder what kind of beef they were eating.

Beyond Sausage Package
Beyond Sausage packaging.

Fast forward a few weeks. I was in my local Fred Meyer supermarket shopping the meat department and I saw Beyond Meat burgers. Beyond Meat is an Impossible Foods competitor. On a whim — remember, I like to try new foods — I bought a pack of two burgers. A while later, while chatting with the butcher there, he mentioned that the sausage was really good. I figured, why not? I bought them, too.

I got home and took a closer look at the package. I was interested in calorie count. And that’s when I got my first shock: 190 calories for one sausage.

Beyond Sausage Nutrition Facts
The nutrition facts and cooking instructions for Beyond Sausage. One sausage gives you 25% and 21% of your daily requirements of fat and sodium, respectively.

How could that be? It was made from vegetables. A closer look at the ingredients explained all. The first four ingredients, in order, were water, pea protein, coconut oil, and sunflower oil. Oil. I’d bought a mixture of peas, water, and oil. And this was supposed to replace sausage?

Burned Sausage
I guess when one of your primary ingredients is oil, you’ll burn pretty quickly.

I heated up my propane grill, lowered the flame, and closed the lid. I hadn’t looked at the cooking instructions yet. I figured I’d cook it like I cooked a sausage. I went back outside a few minutes later to turn them. The grill temperature gauge said 350°F and smoke was billowing out. I lifted the lid in time to see the sausage on fire. I pulled it aside with a fork. Shit. Definitely not edible.

One down, three to go.

I decided to look at the cooking instructions. It said to heat the grill to 500°F (!), brush the sausage with oil (!), and grill 6 minutes per side. If I’d followed those instructions, I likely would have set my neighborhood on fire.

I lowered the flame and tried again. It cooked more slowly. Too slowly. I raised it. Now it was cooking too fast. I found myself standing by the grill, watching it cook so I wouldn’t destroy another one.

Penny Says No
Penny can tell the difference between food and nonfood.

Meanwhile, I cut off an unburned piece of the first one and offered it to Penny. She sniffed it and looked up at me as if to say, “Am I supposed to eat this?” I wound up throwing it away.

When the one on the grill was done, I put it on a plate beside the salad I’d prepared for my “healthy” meal. I wanted to pretend it was normal food.

I tasted it. The flavor was good — it tasted like some version of a sausage. It’s amazing what seasonings can do.

But the texture was all wrong. It was spongy with a uniform texture not like any real meat. It was a lot like the frozen chicken meatballs I keep in the freezer for a last minute pot luck contribution — bake them with homemade honey barbecue sauce and they’re tasty. But spongy. Even real meat, when processed enough with additives, ceased to be realistic. These sausages never had a chance.

So no, I wasn’t impressed. I won’t buy them again.

Oddly, I did have two left and was determined to eat them. So one afternoon, for lunch, I cut one up into small pieces and threw it in a frying pan with some chopped onions and broccoli. When it was mostly cooked up, I dropped an egg on top, covered the pan, and let the egg cook until the white was set and white. This is a typical meal for me — I have chickens, after all, and no shortage of eggs — although I usually use bacon, real sausage, or ham as the meat protein. To my surprise, it was actually quite tasty. The sponginess wasn’t that noticeable in such small pieces.

But no, I’m not sold enough to buy it again.

The way I see it is this: there is no flavor, nutrition, or financial benefit to buying Beyond Meat sausage (and likely burgers, although I admit I haven’t tried them yet). They don’t taste any better than real meat alternatives. They’re not, by any stretch of the imagination, a healthy food. And they’re not cheap. I’m not sure why anyone other than a strict vegetarian or vegan would buy these.