Maple Ice Cream

I had some maple syrup sitting around from the last time I was in Vermont- Fancy grade, naturally. I don't use it all that often, but it is just so lovely to have. So I figured, I'm goign to be going back soon enough, time to use some. How? Maple Ice Cream.

There is NO cooking involved here.

Ingredients:

2 large eggs

1 1/4 cup maple syrup

2 1/2 cups heavy cream

1/4 cup milk 9full fat. You try this with skim? Fuck you)

Whisk the eggs until fluffy, then whisk in the maple syrup. It's a lot, because the maple is both a flavor as well as a sweetener, replacing the sugar which would normally be used. Once the maple is incorporated, add the heavy cream and then the milk. Place into the ice cream maker of your choice. Feel free to add chopped walnuts for maple walnut ice cream.

Note that because of the amount of maple, you get a strong maple flavor but a very sweet ice cream. The result is an ice cream that you will want 1-2 scoops and no more. But that scoop or two is just maple goodness.

General Goldberg's Chicken

So I came home tonight a little after 10. I had an exhausted hour to cook dinner +lunch for tomorrow for my wife and myself, four boneless, skinless chicken breasts and little else in the cupboards. All this coupled with a growing loathing of chicken breasts in all the ways I normally make it.

I decided to explore my fridge and cabinets for ingredients, and made a sort-of General Tso's Chicken from things laying around.

Put up a pot of rice to serve the food over while you cook.

Cut the breasts into cubes and saute them with some olive oil.

Meanwhile in a small sauce pan, heat a small amount of water- 1/3-1/2 cup. If you are like me, your brown sugar is a solid lump. Break off a few pieces and drop them into the water, stir to dissolve.

Add the following to the sauce pan:

ketchup

red pepper flakes

rice wine vinegar (don't be scared- rice wine vinegar is extremely mild)

some lemon juice

juice of that one naval orange sitting in the fruit drawer in the fridge.

Bring back to a boil. Add a cup and a half or so of water and bring to a boil again. Taste it. Even with that water added, it should be fairly thin but flavorful. Don't worry about the thinness, we'll get to that.

Drain the chicken and put back into the pan. Pour the sauce over it. separately mix some flour and water and add it to thicken the sauce, stirring it in. Add a jigger or two of some cheap scotch (I had White Horse) and let simmer for a minute or two. Add a can of peas and some corn. Bring back to simmer, still stirring. It should be thick, tasty, and smell awesome. Serve over rice.

Wienerpunsch

Some years ago, my extended family invited me to go with them on a trip to Vienna. Why? Just to be nice. We were there for Thanksgiving, and the Weinachtmarkts (Christmas Markets- like at Union Square, but EVERYWHERE) were open in full swing. Everywhere were hanging meats, chestnuts roasting in big kettles, small chachkas and gewgaws. It was cold, unbelievably cold for mid-November. It felt more like February. One thing I noticed to my surprise was the frequncy of men wearing hats- real hats, not baseball caps. That and furs. Women everywhere wore furs, real ones. But naturally, nothing quite warms like real fur, but here in the states, people either wear fake fur coats, or very rarely wear real ones because of the stigma against real fur. Which is stupid, in my opinion. I eat the meat, why not wear the skin? In fact, it seems a bit of a waste, but whatever.

Of course, I've always wanted to club my own baby seal, but that's just me.

In any case, one of my favorite things to do was wander the streets of Vienna, gradually growing colder. When I got cold enough, I would just stop at a nearby Punsch stand and buy a mug of Punsch, then be warmed up and walk on a little further. Punsch is punch, of course, but they had dozens of flavors and varieties, all of it hot, refreshing, and nicely alcoholic. I finally asked what went into making them, and I was told that they used a nice red wine, some tea, and fruit juice. Hunh, thought I. Not what I expected.

I miss Punsch, so I decided that tonight I'm going to make some. My recipe will be as follows, although possibly halved. When you drink it, think of the beautiful city of Vienna, where I smoked in the Natural History Museum.

12 cups red wine
4 cups of black tea
2/3 cup of Austrian rum (80vol% alcohol), if you have to use carribean rum, take 1 1/3 cup
6 cups fresh orange juice
1/2 cup sugar
2 sticks of cinnamon, a few cloves
some orange peel

Put everything into a big pot and gently heat but do not boil. Remember that alcohol boils at 79 degrees C, so if you heat it too much, you'll drive off all the lovely alcohol.

Edit: The verdict is in- both Kirsten and I think it tastes exactly like what we had in Vienna. I made up the black tea (Lipton's) and set it aside to steep. Once it had, that went into an enamelled cast iron pot. Still ery hot, but nowhere near boiling. Heat was turned on underneath and ~ 2 liters of a red cabernet was added (an inexpensive box wine). I dumped in a fifth of Bacardi silver (200 mL). I was running low on space by that point, so I only added ~2 cups or so of orange juice (poured in without measuring). 1/2 cup sugar was on the money, 2 short but fat cinnamon sticks and 5-6 cloves were added as well as the zest of one orange. Because the tea was so hot, this required very little heating to get it where it was going, and it was greatly enjoyed by all on such a cold night as this. I will definately be making it again in the future!

Mayonnaise - in praise of the Real Hellmans

Oh lord, I'm down to the last 2 tablespoons of Hellman's Mayonnaise - real honest to goodness, New York bought Hellman's mayonnaise.

One of the horrors of "localisation" of brand foods is what is done to Hellman's Mayonnaise in the UK. Obviously it's what the company believes is preferred by British consumers. But as I'm not, I find the UK product completely alien. I've been lucky in recent years to have visiting family and friends haul over jars of Hellman's when they visit. But now I'm running on fumes so I'll have to make homemade American recipe mayo now.

Btw: Commercial mayonnaise sold in jars originated in New York City, in Manhattan's Upper West Side. In 1905, the first ready-made mayonnaise was sold by a family from Vetschau, Germany, at Richard Hellmann's delicatessen on Columbus Avenue, between 83rd and 84th Streets. In 1912, Mrs. Hellmann's mayonnaise was mass marketed and called Hellmann's Blue Ribbon Mayonnaise.

Here's the basic recipe. Details to follow after I make a batch tomorrow with my stick mixer (immersion mixer) and document the process.

2 large egg yolks
1 Tbs. lemon juice
1/4 tsp. salt
pinch of white pepper
1 cup oil - this should be a "tasteless" oil like sunflower, safflower, grapeseed, or canola (rapeseed)

Important: All ingredients must be at room temperature before you start this recipe.

Traditional way to make mayo:

Add first 4 ingredients to a bowl and whisk until combined and light.

Whisking vigorously add the oil 1 drop at a time, whisking after each drop until it disappears into the mixture (about 8 strokes/2 seconds).

After you have added about 1/3 of the cup of oil, and the mixture has thickened a lot, start adding the rest of the oil in a slow very thin stream.

When all the oil has been added and the mix is thickened - taste and add additional lemon juice and seasoning to taste, whisking it in smoothly.

You can add crushed/mashed garlic to the mayo to create aioli or minced tarragon or other hebs. The add-ins are endless.


My way to make mayo (quick and easy)

I use a stick mixer and a narrow cylindrical container to make mayo in under 30 seconds.
I'll add details and photos tomorrow afternoon.

And..in later news...my daughter has generously offered me her last jar of US Hellmans Mayo which I will eagerly collect tomorrow.

Labor Day Limeaide

I know, I know. It's frigging limeaide, how hard is that to do? Well, judging how how terrible some of the stuff I've swilled down over the years, very.

In all seriousness, there is this particular ratio in limeaide and lemonaide that if you get just a little bit off, it tastes wrong. It's too watery, too sweet, too sour, whatever. So, today being Saturday of the Unofficial Last Weekend Of The Summer, I went food shopping, and lemons and limes were on sale. I always promise myself that I'm going to make limeaide, but as tonight is gaming night, I thought it would be a really nice treat to have some icy cold, handmade limeaide on hand.

Oh yea- commercial stuff always sucks. Something about simple syrup tastes weird to my tongue. And commercial stuff always has the taste of the zest. I like candied orange, lemon and lime peels. But not in my lemon/limeaide.

You need a ~ 2 liter pitcher, preferably one with demarkations on the side. I rolled and squeezed 8 limes, which gave me just a hair under 500 mL. Yes, we're doing this metric. Deal with it. Add three tablespoons white sugar, stir with wooden spoon. It should readily dissolve. Add 1.5 L water so it hits the 2L mark. Taste. I thought it was still a bit too sharp, so I added one more tablespoon sugar. I add the last sugar at the end, because I prefer to be wary of how I flavor the end product. But 0.5 L lime juice, 1.5 L water, 4 tablespoons sugar? Fantastic. It's in the fridge chilling right now.

I'm not going to lie, I'm writing this up here more so that I can refer to it in the future than for you folks.

Apple Strudel

I give up on bakeries in London. They claim to sell Apple Strudel but the product you get is not Apple Strudel as we know it. Certainly not as New Yorkers know it.

So, I finally gave up and decided to make it myself. I've made apple strudel for many years when I couldn't buy the real stuff at a good Jewish/German bakery but never tried in London as the apples in the UK are nothing to write home about. They're great for cider and make very tasty apple sauce but they just aren't pie apples being the wrong texture and generally insipid. However, yesterday a neighbour stopped by with a bag of apples she had just picked from an old tree on her allotment garden. They looked gorgeous and the flavour - wow, spicy and  sweetly tart, yum! Strudel and pie - here we come!

So, here's the recipe. If you are in the US, try using Winesap apples or similar spicy, strongly flavoured firm apples.

Ingredients for the filling:
800g/1lb 12oz cooking apples, peeled, cored, cut into small chunks
50g/2oz unsalted butter
100ml/3 fl oz water
100g/3½ oz caster sugar (granulated sugar in the US) - cane sugar, please!
1/2 to 1 tsp ground cinnamon - to taste
large handful of fresh breadcrumbs (you must use fresh, not bought dried stuff)
Optional: 3 Tbsp raisins soaked in rum or OJ to plump them (I'm a purist and omit these.)

For the pastry:
50g/2oz unsalted butter, melted
5 sheets filo pastry
fresh breadcrumbs
icing/confectioners sugar, for dusting
Greaseproof/baking parchment paper

Preparation method
1. If you are going to use raisins, soak them in a bit of rum or OJ before starting.
2. Peel, core, and cut apples into small chunks.
3. Cook the apples in a pan with the butter, water and sugar for 5
minutes, or until the apples have softened slightly, but still retain their
shape and are al dente.
4. Remove the pan from the heat, add the cinnamon, raisins (if you're using them)
and the breadcrumbs and stir to combine (the breadcrumbs will bind
everything together). Set aside to cool.
5. Preheat the oven to 180C/350F
6. For the pastry, cut a piece of greaseproof paper a little larger than your
baking sheet to assemble the strudel on. This will also help you to roll it into
the assembled shape. Unroll the filo dough sheets and cover with a dish
towel to prevent it drying out. Spread out one sheet of filo on the paper,
and brush with the melted butter. Lightly scatter with a bit of the breadcrumbs
and a bit of sugar.  Repeat the process with all four sheets, placing
them on top of each other, brushing with melted butter each time and
scattering a bit of bread crumbs and sugar on each.
7. Spoon the apple mixture along the long side of the pastry about an inch from
the edge and roll up, longest side first, into a parcel, seam-side down. If you
have too much apple mix, just hold that aside. You can either roll the finished parcel
onto the baking sheet and discard the paper or trim the paper a bit and use that to
lift the parcel onto the baking sheet and let it bake on the paper.
Press down the ends of the parcel gently to seal in the filling.
8. Brush all over with the remaining butter and bake in the oven for 25 -30 minutes,
or until the top is crisp and golden-brown. (Check the strudel after 15 minutes;
if it is browning too quickly, reduce the heat a little. )
9. Remove from oven and allow to cool on the baking sheet. When cooled, carefully
slide the strudel onto a platter or cutting board and dust with icing/confectioners sugar.

Ribsticker

I came home tonight with defrosted chicken breasts and very little else to craft a dinner from. So, I made a Ribsticker, which is what I call my throwing shit together to make something healthy, tasty, and filling.

Prep certain ingredients first. I had three enormous chicken breasts which I sliced into cubes, as well as one very large onion that I gave a rough chop to.

In a large, high-walled pan, add some olive oil. This recipe makes a fair amount of food, so don't be too scared to add a few tablespoons. Crush ~8 cloves of garlic and allow to simmer in the oil. Once they start to brown, immediately add the onions and allow those to simmer for a few minutes. Add the chicken and stir it around for another 4 minutes or so. Add some frozen corn and frozen peas, leave for a few more minutes. While doing do, add salt, pepper, and some paprika. Add one can of (low sodium) chicken stock, and another can worth of water. Stir in roughly a cup of breadcrumbs. Myself, I had Italian style, but decided to use some panko I had laying around. It would thicken the liquid without adding any kind of a flowery flavor or anything. Turn heat to high until the mixture reaches boiling, then turn heat down to a simmer. Cover and leave for ten minutes.

No, it's nothing fancy. But it's cheap, tasty, easy to make, and stick to your ribs. I'm getting to the point where I have very little food in the house (need to do shopping soon) so it's at this time in the month when I start making things like this.