I am not the greatest recipe pre-reader. Today I was all set to make Grilled Chicken with Cucumber, Radish, and Cherry Tomato Relish (from the bounty of summer-y recipes in August’s Martha Stewart Living) and reread “grilled.” Realistically, grilling was not happening. How to quickly cook the boneless skinless to make it moist and yummy? How To Cook Like Your Grandmother’s Pan Fried Chicken in Butter was a revelation: pound the chicken thin, lightly flour it, and pan fry it in butter.
The result was perfect. Moist and chicken-y all the way through paired perfectly with the fresh summer-y flavors and crunch of the cucumber, radish, cherry tomato “relish” (Martha-Stewart-ese for a salad on top of your chicken). If you crave a summer salad atop chicken, this is what you are looking for.
Recipe and notes after the jump. Read the rest of this entry »
After an exhausting trip to Boston (a pre-moving there whirlwind), I just want to relax and eat big summer salads and baked fruit desserts. Here’s what I’m thinking…
(Also – most recipes below have amazing food photography through the link.)
Big summer salads
Baked fruit desserts (aka, fruit desserts which go well with vanilla ice cream)
Recipes in August’s Martha Stewart Living were a big factor in creating these cravings as well but they aren’t online yet. (Do not read the issue on an empty stomach – you will find yourself starving and cranky in the produce department or farmer’s market.)
Chuao’s Firecracker bar is an exploding dance party in your mouth. I love how over the top the idea is: Someone thought, well, dark chocolate/chipotle/salt would be a great combination, but it’s missing something, hmm…, popping candy. And that someone is genius. The dark chocolate/chipotle/salt is spot on and as you let the chocolate bar melt in your mouth, the little explosions make each taste seem a bit more salty or chipotle-y or chocolate-y.
Mullet wearers everywhere take note, if pop rocks can gain class without losing the party, there’s hope for you too.
Bonus question after the jump: What makes pop rocks pop? Read the rest of this entry »
Question: Why are English cucumbers plastic-wrapped?
Answer: To keep the moisture in. Most (supermarket) cucumbers are waxed to keep the moisture in, because of the larger surface area of English cucumbers’ wrinkly skin, it’s easier to wrap than wax.
Other interesting facts about cucumbers:
Read the rest of this entry »
During my senior year of high school I used to have pad thai and Reed’s Ginger Brew at Saffron once a week. I was craving the combo on Tuesday and disappointed to see that at some point Ginger Brew was replaced with a homemade Ginger Ale. The Ginger Ale was refreshing (a tiny bit flat to be honest), but just didn’t pack the same gingery punch. So when later that day I saw a recipe for homemade Ginger Ale in Dan’s away message, I was off to 99 Ranch Market for the ingredients.
Like the Amateur Gourmet, I am now sure I’ll be drinking this all summer. The recipe below makes a nearly a syrup which you add to sparkling water. I used the lemongrass and one deseeded Serrano, which gives it a great kick. Half a Serrano is probably plenty though. And sounds like some yeast derived carbonation would only make this better…
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Yesterday my coordination and brain were ridiculously clumsy in the kitchen. I was making Paprika-Braised Chicken with Salt Pork and Spinach, with ad hoc tripling, this involved: Raw chicken liquid all over the floor twice. Chopping skills not quite as shaky as carrying, but close, “rustic chop” would have been a compliment for the carrots and onions. Tongs + chicken slipping and sliding about. Hot oil splatter. Staring at the braising liquid unsure why it wouldn’t thicken. Cleaning up (another sloshy mess), I realize, oh yeah, the cornstarch. Other recipe steps forgotten: drying the chicken, heating the chickpea mush. Read the rest of this entry »
SarahR made Beet Cupcakes!
Camera phone pictures clearly demonstrate that though beet cake batter is pepto-bismol purple/pink (!) and beet cake is not red.
Batter is purple/pink:
Baked cakes are brown:
All iced up:
Recipe review, via Gchat:
5:59 PM me: were the muffins yummy?
6:16 PM Sarah: fine–i prefer carrot cake, though.
I was eating the leftovers of raw beet slaw along with carrot cake for lunch and thought, if beet cake exists, it must have an awesome color.
Unfortunately, when I turned to the internet, I learned that’s not the case. According to this recipe from Cooking Light, beet cake can indeed be made just like carrot cake and the batter is bright red but the cake bakes up to a golden brown:
From Cooking Light
This is really disappointing. Shredding that many beets would be way too messy to justify a golden brown cake.
Question: Can you deep fry with butter?
Ignore for a moment whether you’d personally want to. It just seems like something that would be trendy if possible. Maybe pre-recession trendy, cause that much butter isn’t cheap, but trendy along high meets low comfort food lines. Or something up Paula Deen’s alley.
Answer:
Whether you can deep fry with a fat is dependent on the smoke point – above which an fat/oil becomes unusable. According to Wikipedia and Google books version of What Einstein told his cook, deep frying requires fat at a temperature of 345–375 °F. Without a lot of care, the temperature may reach 400 °F.
Regular butter, smoke point = 350 °F – no, too low
Your average clarified butter (butter w/ milk solids removed), smoke point = around 400 °F – tempting fate
Ghee (Indian clarified butter w/o any water), smoke point = 485 °F – deep fryable!
Other than cost, my best guess for why deep frying with ghee isn’t the rage is that a lot of the buttery taste is in the butter fat. Ghee has a unique taste of its own though, would be interesting…
Also, in my research found the fantastic Cooking for Engineers website. Worth checking out.
This book looks pretty interesting too:
