November's Theme - The Other Red Meat(s)

Welcome to November - a new month & a new theme. I hope you enjoyed last month's Pumpkins & Other Hard/Winter Squash, and remember, you're ALWAYS welcome to post a recipe whether it fits the current month's theme or not.

This month we're focusing on The Other Red Meat(s). That may very well be because Mr. Kluges and I bought a lamb through our neighbor (story here at House of 42 Doors) & now have a fair amount of lamb chops, lamb roasts, lamb ribs, ground lamb, and one remaining leg of lamb in our basement freezer. Maybe. I'm not telling.

Sure, it's pretty young, mild lamb, so I could probably sub it in for a lot of recipes that call for beef, but I'd rather hear/find/read/create some recipes that actually call for and highlight the tastiness of lamb. So far we've made leg of lamb studded with garlic and wrapped in rosemary and sage, threw a lamb roast in the crockpot along with a beef roast, and used some ground lamb mixed with ground beef for some delicious shepherd's pie.

But I got a lot of lamb left!

So, if you've got any good recipes for red meats besides beef, say lamb or goat or venison or moose or bear or squirrel or elk or buffalo or ?, please share them here or point us to them. I'd link to ones that are already posted, like usual, but we don't have any... yet!

Wednesday Fun: Pumpkin Art

What is Halloween around these parts without some creative pumpkin carving? Wander around your neighborhood or do a search on the web & you can find TONS of interesting (or gory or silly or elaborate...) ideas.

You might be a devotee of the classic jack-o-lantern face with its triangle eyes & nose & simple mouth with a couple of teeth. Or maybe a simple variation on that theme.

• Like mine this year! :)
• Mr. Kluges's drooling pumpkin

Maybe you are keen on making a set of pumpkins in a theme or using props to create a scene with pumpkins.

• The KISS Army
• How about some Wizard of Oz? (More links to his stuff below.)
• Fire-breathing pumpkin dragon
  

Using well-known art as inspiration?

• The Scream by Jason Green
• American Gothic, anyone?
• Of course, Mona Lisa's smile's a little creepy anyway.
  

How about designing a pumpkin based on the light inside of it?

• The Sunburst by David LaRochelle via This Old House
• Jack O'Lantern Hell by Plutor/Logan Ingalls on Flickr

Or you get out the wood-carving tools and go for the three-dimensional approach. (Man, are some of these impressive!)

• Zipperface by Ray Villafane, via This Old House (Yes, really.)
  
• Scott Cummings, PumpkinGutter.com - Wow. Just wow. He's got dinosaurs, Einstein, an evil rabbit, Wallace and Grommit and a Davy Jones you have to see to believe! Amazing stuff here!

Whatever sort of pumpkin art you enjoy (or toward which you aspire), I hope you enjoy seeing and/or carving some this October! If you've got links to some great pumpkin art, leave them in the comments because we'd love to see them!


Addendum: Want to make your pumpkin last? Check out this science experiment where 5 methods of pumpkin preservation (plus a control pumpkin) are put to the test!

Frost Pumpkin Pie

For Pumpkin & Other Hard/Winter Squash month, I'm pleased to share with you another one of my mother's recipes. It's refreshing and unusual and a great way to have "pumpkin pie" on Thanksgiving if your oven is just too dang full, but your freezer's got some room. Or maybe if you're living in a warmer climate than Wisconsin and Minnesota! Basically, it's pumpkin pie filling swirled with softened vanilla ice cream, refrozen into a graham-cracker pie crust. Yum!!!! Thanks, Mom, for a delicious recipe!

Frost Pumpkin Pie

1 cup canned pumpkin

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp nutmeg

Beat the above together until smooth, then stir in
1 quart softened vanilla ice cream.

Pour into a 9-inch graham cracker crust.*

Freeze 8 hrs or more.

Remove from freezer 15 min before serving.

Optional: sweetened whipped cream, walnut halves or candy corn for garnish.

* To make your own graham cracker crust:

1 and 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs

3 Tbsp sugar

1/3 cup melted butter or margarine

Combine and press into 9-inch pie pan.

Optional: bake for 10 min at 350, then cool before filling.

Wednesday Fun: Tidbits about Pumpkins

Did you know...


At one time, pumpkins were believed to heal snake bites as well as to remove freckles.

Many people think the pumpkin is a vegetable but in actuality it is a squash fruit. Pumpkins consist of 90% water and if you fill a pumpkin with milk and then bake it, you will have a pudding.*

Pumpkin flowers are edible.

Pumpkin takes its name from the medieval French word 'pompom', meaning 'cooked by the sun.' (Ultimately, probably from the Greek 'pepon.')

Besides making a delicious snack, pumpkin seeds are full of zinc, iron, potassium, magnesium, and essential fatty acids. I think they're totally worth the yick of pulling them out of all the pumpkin guts. REALLY want to know exactly how healthy they are? Check out the USDA's nutrient listing for 1/2 c. of them.


Take a wild guess as to the size of the 2010 World Record Pumpkin. Then go here and see how close you got. HUGE, isn't it?!



*I have not tried this, but I think somebody should!

Sources: Pumpkin Trivia Tidbits, Food Facts & Trivia: Pumpkin, USDA National Nutrient Database for Standard Reference, Pumpkin Nook.

October's Theme - Pumpkins and Other Hard/Winter Squash

A new month and a new theme! You know I love Halloween, right? And fall? And we're members of a CSA? And (ok, you might not know this one) we have several volunteer squash-y type plants in our garden & yard, one of which appears to be acorn squash? So, yeah, I'm all about this month's theme being Pumpkins & Other Hard/Winter Squash.*

I didn't think we had very many recipes so far, but it turns out you could probably make a meal of all squash dishes.

For starters, there'd be Butternut Squash Soup with Curried Horseradish Cream.

It would be followed by Pasta with Roasted Butternut Squash and Shallots. It's so autumn with the oven, and the smell of the squash, and the comfort food of the noodles... YUM!

For your bread, you've got Nectarine's Pumpkin Bread. Or, make her Pumpkin Spice Muffins! Ooh, choices!

For dessert, don't forget the classic, Pumpkin Pie, as Pusher makes it from a real pumpkin! :) Now that's dedication. Or, if you're not a fan of the crust, try Diplowhat's No-Crust Pumpkin Pie!

Of course, to keep your strength up while you make all that, the day before you should make AllKnowingJen's Pumpkin-Chocolate Chip Squares so that you've got them to snack on while you're all busy creating your squash-y meal! :)


So there you have it! Lots of recipes already. But looking through to find these, I noticed a few request/longings for a good butternut squash ravioli recipe, so if anybody's feeling up for a challenge, maybe you could go searching & recipe-testing for us all! :)



*To paraphrase from my old Joy of Cooking, in general, winter squash have hard-shelled skins and include acorn, Hubbard, and butternut. Summer squashes are all thin-skinned, such as zucchini, pattypan, and yellow summer squash.

Wednesday Fun #140 - Autumn is here!

The seasons have changed. No more is it a millionty degrees outside, in my house, or, most importantly for this blog, in my kitchen. I can imagine cooking something again! Something beyond throwing some brats on the grill, frying up bacon for a BLT (of which I did not have nearly enough this past summer!), or mixing up a salad.

How about you? What's this fall weather got you cooking? Turned on the oven yet? I have! While I would have loved some of that do-nothing artisan bread this summer for tomato bruschetta, I couldn't stand the thought of turning on the oven for that long. That has changed! Hooray!

So let's hear it? What are you now willing to cook, thanks to the change into the cooler weather of autumn?

Apple Waffles

We went to the apple orchard yesterday, so I've got a million apples (ok, "just" 32 pounds...), so for Sunday brunch I was looking for something delicious & different & that preferably used apples! We hadn't done waffles for a while, so I flipped through our copy of Waffles from Morning to Midnight by Dorie Greenspan & found "Apple Waffles!" Perfect! It was yum & so very seasonal that I thought I'd better share. Also, my kids LOVED them. To make them even more apple-y, I'd recommend adding an extra half-an-apple, cut into tiny chunks*.

Dorie Greenspan's Apple Waffles
Makes about 5 waffles

3 Tbl. unsalted butter, melted
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
2 tsp. double-acting baking powder
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground allspice
pinch of grated nutmeg
1/4 c. granulated sugar [You know that's 4 Tbl., right?]
1/4 c. firmly packed, but lump-free light brown sugar [...and again, you've got the measuring spoons out anyway, don't you?]
1 1/2 c. milk
2 large eggs
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
1 medium-sized apple, peeled & grated
[I'd recommend peeling & cutting up another half an apple into tiny chunks and adding that, too.*]

1. Preheat your waffle iron. If you want to hold the finished waffles until serving time, preheat your oven to 200F. [Mine heats so fast, I have to wait until I'm about to mix the dry & wet ingredients, so consider your own waffle iron.]
2. Melt the butter; reserve. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, spices, and sugars. In another bowl, whisk together the milk, eggs, and vanilla until very well blended. Add the liquid ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir with the whisk until just combined. Fold in the grated apple and the melted butter.
3. Whether or not your iron's grids are well seasoned or made of a nonstick material, it's best to light butter or spray the grids of your waffle iron since this batter is very soft and can stick. Brush or spray the grids again only if subsequent waffles stick.
4. Spoon out 1/2 c. of batter (or amount recommended by your waffler's manufacturer) onto the [hot] iron. Spread the batter evenly over the grids & close the lid. When the underside of the waffle is lightly browned, carefully turn over the waffle and brown the other side. [If necessary for your iron. Mine was fine.]
5. Serve the waffles immediately or keep them, in a single layer, on a rack in the preheated oven while you make the rest of the batch.
   

*That's because when I ran into tiny chunks of too-small-to-grate apple, I really liked the extra texture & apple-i-ness.

Wednesday Fun: The Return is Foretold!

Hello, all! I hope you had a great summer. I was nearly buried under the weight of tomatoes from our garden, but managed to pull through. :) Thanks for bearing with me during the summer hiatus. Life just got too busy & hot to think about cooking much, but now that it's cooling down again, I'm raring to go.

Let me tell you my thoughts...

I like themes. They make it easier for me to come up with ideas instead of sitting down with a blank page every week. So, October's theme is going to be "Pumpkins & Other Hard/Winter Squash." NOT THAT THE THEME SHOULD LIMIT YOU!!! Got a good recipe or link or question? Post away!

The first Wednesday of each month, I'll start with the theme & links to prior recipes, like I've done in the past when we begin a monthly theme. I like seeing and highlighting what treasures we've already got here. Other weeks might have tidbits/trivia about the theme, a recipe related to it, or maybe some links or pictures or something.

Polls, especially theme-related ones, will likely run two weeks long to give folks more of a chance to weigh in their opinions. I might throw in an extra one here and there for fun and curiosity.

Looking forward, November's theme will be "The Other Red Meat(s)." (Yes, it may have something to do with us soon to be getting some lamb for our freezer, as you might have read over at House of 42 Doors. Feel free to start coming up with some good lamb/mutton recipes for me now, ok?) I'm thinking "Traditional Holiday Favorites" for December, but do speak up in the comments if you've got ideas/suggestions for themes, please. For a list of a lot of the previous themes, go here.

Ok, looking forward to seeing you all back here on Wednesdays! Hooray!

Palak Paneer

The second recipe I promised from GAW, finally. :-)

Palak Paneer

4 cups whole milk
3 tablespoons lemon juice
1.5 lbs. fresh spinach
1/4 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 medium onion
4 cloves garlic
2 dried red chili peppers
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup heavy cream

2 cups cooked basmati rice

In a medium, heavy saucepan, bring milk to a boil. Remove from the heat and add lemon juice. (I add a dash of salt at this point.) Stir until milk curdles and separates. Let stand 5 minutes, then pour through fine-meshed sieve lined with at least a double layer of cheesecloth. Let stand until cool enough to handle, then pull the corners of the cloth together and squeeze out as much liquid as possible. Flatten the curd to a thickness of 1/2 to 1 inch. Set on a plate, top with another plate, then top that plate with a weight and let stand for half an hour. Remove from cheesecloth and cut into 1/2-inch cubes.

Wash, stem, drain and coarsely chop spinach. Thinly slice onion and garlic, and either slightly crush or add a couple slits to dried peppers.

Heat canola oil in a nonstick pan and lightly toast cumin (about 15 seconds). At this point I remove half the seeds with a slotted spoon. Sauté the cheese cubes until golden brown. Remove cheese and set aside on a paper towel.

In remaining oil, sauté red peppers and onions with until translucent. Add and sauté garlic. Add spinach by the handful and cook until it's all wilted. Add salt, cook until all liquid is evaporated. Add cream and boil until thickened to desired consistency. Gold in fried cheese, remove red peppers, and serve over rice.

Tandoori Chicken

Here's the first of the two recipes I promised from GAW. (This one is easier, because it's from Emeril on foodnetwork.com. I'll try to get to the palak paneer in the next day or two.)


Four bone-in chicken legs with thighs, or eight thighs, skin removed
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 cup chopped white onion
2 tablespoons chopped garlic
2 tablespoons chopped ginger
1 teaspoon finely chopped serrano or jalapeno pepper, seeded
1 tablespoon paprika
1-1/2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 teaspoon garam masala
1/2 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 cup plain yogurt
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Directions

With a fork, prick holes in the chicken pieces. Using a knife, cut diagonal slices 1-inch apart, and 1/2-inch deep into the larger pieces. Place the chicken in a baking dish.

In a food processor, combine the oil, onion, garlic, ginger and pepper, and process on high speed to a paste. Add the spices and process until well blended. Add the yogurt and lemon juice, and process to a smooth sauce, scraping down the sides to combine all the ingredients. Pour the marinade over the chicken. Turn to coat evenly, rubbing the marinade into the holes and slits. Cover tightly with plastic wrap, refrigerate for at least 4 hours, and up to 24 hours, turning occasionally.

Grill or bake in a preheated 425 degrees F oven on a baking sheet for 35 minutes.