Mid Week Philosophy: MISE EN PLACE
Mise en place, a French term referring to having all the ingredients necessary for a dish prepared and ready to combine up to the point of cooking (© Copyright Barron’s Educational Services, Inc. 1995 based on THE FOOD LOVER’S COMPANION, 2nd edition, by Sharon Tyler Herbst).
I try to use this technique whenever I bake or cook. For baking, I separate each ingredient into a smaller bowl and then check each ingredient against the recipe before I start putting them into the mixing bowl. I find it particularly useful when I am baking, because baking tends to be more precise. I just saved myself the other day: sometimes I don’t put on my reading glasses when I am going through the recipe (shame on me) and instead of reading 1-3/4 cups of flour, I read 1-1/2 cups. Once I went through all the ingredients again, checking them with the recipe, I realized my mistake. Instead of throwing out all the ingredients, I just had to deal with the flour and make an adjustment.
It’s also useful in cooking, especially with a new recipe. If you don’t have all the ingredients laid out, you are rushing to add them and sometimes will miss something or put too much in! (guilty as charged: I just did it the other night. Forgot to measure out the heavy cream which was to be added at the end and thus forgot to put it in !!) It’s definitely more relaxing if you are prepared. And it’s essential when making a stir-fry!
I have these cute little glass dishes, that are just perfect for one egg, 1 teaspoon of salt, 2 tablespoons of flour, 1 tablespoon of chopped green onions, etc. And then I have these glass and ceramic bowls (some from my Mom) that are great for putting: 1-1/2 cups of coconut, 8 ounces of chocolate chips, 1 cup of chopped onions, 1/2 cup of seeded and chopped tomato, haha, I could go on!! You need to set yourself up with these, so that it will be easy to lay out your ingredients and then it will start to become a habit!!
Check out these bowls from Amazon, maybe they will give you some inspiration: Prep Bowls or these bowls from Sur La Table: Prep Bowls !!
TOMATO SAUCE
I know there are a lot of jarred and canned tomato sauces out there that you can buy (believe me, I have tried them), but if you would like to make your own, maybe this one will be a good start.
This recipe is originally from my mother. I have modified it over the years to suit my own taste and you can certainly do that too. What makes this sauce unique, though, is the addition of beef bouillon. There is a debate out there in the culinary world, on whether it should be tomato sauce or gravy! In college I met a young woman whose mother made tomato gravy. It was a tomato sauce but it was simmered with a beef bone. Very delicious. I am sure my mother was trying to get that deeper flavor with the addition of the beef bouillon.
Below is my well worn recipe card. When I was making sauce one day, I told my son I could hardly read my recipe anymore! He volunteered to write it again for me in pen (not with a red Sharpie, as I had done). He was probably 10 at the time. The 3x 5 card to the right is his contribution.
Since I have made this recipe many times, I of course have an opinion on brands of tomatoes! For many years I used ‘Progresso Crushed Tomatoes with Added Puree’. But about a year ago, I had a very difficult time finding them. Finally I called Progresso and asked them, Where was their product? I was told that they had discontinued their entire tomato line. Wow! Now what….
So I went on-line and searched for a highly rated crushed tomato and finally settled on ‘Muir Glen Organic Crushed Tomato with Basil’. It’s very similar to the Progresso. But experiment, you might find one that you like better.
Also, if it is summer (or you don’t mind paying the price for fresh in the supermarket during the winter) use fresh Basil instead of dried.
Mom’s Tomato Sauce
1/3 cup of olive oil
2 large onions, diced
4 cloves of garlic, crushed
5 – 28 ounce cans of Muir Glen Organic Crushed Tomato with Basil (preferably)
1 – 6 ounce can of tomato paste ( I use Contadina but any will do, as long as there are no added spices)
4 beef bouillon packets( 4 grams per packet, preferably Herb Ox, Sodium Free, Instant Broth and Seasoning)
4 teaspoons salt
2/3 cup sugar
2 tablespoons of dried basil, or 2 large sprigs of fresh basil
7 cups of water
In a large (at least 8 quarts) saucepan over medium heat, simmer onions and garlic in olive oil until translucent. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, beef bouillon, salt, sugar and basil and stir with a wooden spoon until thoroughly combined. Add water and stir again thoroughly. Cover pan, turn up heat to about medium high and bring to a simmer, stirring every 5 minutes, putting cover back on after stirring. Make sure to stir the bottom very well. This will take approximately 20 minutes. Below is the beginning simmer.
Take cover off, reduce heat to medium and simmer for 1-1/2 hours, stirring every 15 minutes. Make sure to stir the bottom very well, again. Burnt tomato sauce is ruined, I know this first hand. I have thrown out a whole batch because I was not diligent stirring or had the heat up too high. Below is the sauce complete. Notice how much it has reduced, by looking at the side of the pan. It doesn’t reduce a tremendous amount but enough to make it slightly thicker and allow the ingredients to blend together.
Allow the sauce to cool in the pan at room temperature, covered for about 1-2 hours. Do not put in the refrigerator while it’s still in the pan (yuk, 😦 have tried that too!)
Ladle sauce into freezable plastic containers. I use 2.9 cup containers (2.9, couldn’t they make it 3 for pete’s sake!!!) and one batch produces about 8 – 9 containers. Put containers in refrigerator for 24 hours and then freeze. Of course, you can use some sauce before you put it away!! Lasagna, spaghetti and meatballs, chicken cutlet with shredded mozzarella and sauce, yum, yum, yum!!!
Below, containers are all ready to be covered and put into the refrigerator:
I usually make 2 batches at once and then I have tomato sauce for quite awhile. But just try one for now, to see how you like it!
Happy Saucing from my kitchen to yours!
MID WEEK PHILOSOPHY: SCALE
Food scale that is!
I cannot live without mine. I was thinking, they always ask chefs this question in food magazines, “What kitchen tools can you not live without ? or What are your favorite kitchen tools?” Well, one of mine is the food scale. The one I eventually purchased and like very much is small, like a thin book. I can stick it upright in my cupboard and it hardly takes any room.
This was not my first food scale though. I originally had a non-digital 2 piece. I wanted it specifically to weigh meat (?), and for the life of me I cannot remember why that was so important. Anyway, when spring came around one year and I needed to weigh out fertilizer for our dosatron’s continuous feed, 15 gallon tank ! ( hmm, you say, what the frig is that? believe me, it’s not food related, haha!) I brought out my 2 piece scale and vowed to myself that this would be just a one time thing and back in the kitchen it would go! Well spring is super crazy around here and guess what? The scale never made it back, I used it a bunch more times, it got rusty and stained and thus unusable for food! I bought another one and for a long time, I did not use it much until I made chocolate chip cookies one day. My recipe called for a 12 oz. package of chocolate chips and I realized they had downsized the variety that I liked to 11 ounces! So of course, 1 ounce made a difference to me and I whipped out my scale. After that, I started using it more and more!
So I went on Amazon to find my scale so I could share with you what I had but unfortunately mine does not seem available anymore. So I poked around Amazon’s website to see what was, and this is what I found:
They rate this particular food scale very highly: EatSmart Precision Pro – Multifunction Digital Kitchen Scale. It’s not as versatile storage wise but it does take regular batteries, which some people find essential. It has a nice range of colors, so if you needed to keep it out, you could match it to your kitchen’s color scheme. My Salter food scale takes 2 lithium batteries, which are expensive and sometimes annoying to find but I think that’s why it can be so skinny. But maybe the battery issue is not important to you. I believe the lithium batteries last a little longer…..
I also found another scale from Amazon that is very thin, thinner than mine, and has a slightly bigger platform: Ozeri Professional Digital Kitchen Scale. It takes lithium batteries, though.
Many recipes now have weight measurements included, along with volume measurements, which I find invaluable. Weighing is much more accurate. But I also use my food scale for weighing other food stuff besides ingredients in a recipe. Meatballs for uniform cooking, cookie dough for even baking, bread dough for rolls (like the Refrigerator Rolls Deluxe) , freshly ground chuck beef for hamburgers, and even weighing out pasta, so I don’t cook too much!
So, think about it, maybe a food scale is in your future! At least put it on your wish list!
Happy weighing and measuring from my kitchen to yours!
OVEN FRIED HADDOCK FILLETS
Now that we are all on a sugar high…..
I do have other recipes to share besides cakes and cookies though those are my favorite subjects. One does not live on sweets alone!!
This is a very simple recipe from my Mom. I think I wrote it down while we were talking on the phone or at my parent’s house with our children because the paper is pretty sketchy and my hand writing is, well, I’ve seen better.
Don’t worry, the recipe is below!
I just made it last night for dinner and even my son, who is not an enthusiastic fish eater ( though he tries), ate 2 pieces. I served it with rice and sauteed baby spinach with garlic and olive oil.
The temperature might seem excessively high but I’ve made it many times and it works. Just make sure you put the oven fan on! The fish may look slightly burnt on top but don’t worry, believe me it’s delicious!
Happy Cooking from my kitchen to yours!
Oven Fried Haddock Fillets (from my Mom)
1 tablespoon salt
1 cup milk
3 Haddock fillets (or Scrod (my favorite) or Cod), about 1 pound
3/4 cup bread crumbs (these should be homemade, I will discuss further below)
1/4 cup shredded parmesan cheese
1/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 cup butter, melted
Put middle oven rack into top position. Preheat oven to 525 degrees.
Add salt to milk in a shallow dish (like a glass pie dish) and stir until pretty much dissolved. In another shallow dish, put bread crumbs, cheese and thyme. Stir with fork to combine.
Cut fillets into serving pieces.
Dip fillets first into milk and then into bread crumb mixture.
Arrange fish in greased baking dish and pat any remaining bread crumbs onto fish. Pour melted butter over fish.
Bake on top rack of oven for about 12 minutes. May need another minute or two depending on thickness of fish. Test with a sharp knife or carving fork. The fork or knife should easily go into the fish with no resistance.
This is what the filets look like before they go into the oven. This is scrod. I had a very thin piece which I dipped in the milk and dredged in the breadcrumb mixture and then folded in half when I put it into the baking dish. This way it is the same approximate thickness as the other filets.
Out of the oven, it looks slightly burnt but no worries, it’s delicious as you can see below when served!
Yum!
My husband likes his with lemon and a ketchup/horseradish mixture. I like mine as is. Serve the way you like!
As for the breadcrumbs, please try to make your own. It does make a difference. If you have a cuisinart, it’s a cinch! Or if you have a blender, this works too.
White bread, any kind, rolls, sliced bread, whatever you have on hand. Chopped pretty fine, and dried in the oven at 250 degrees, for about 1 hour. I put mine in the freezer for future use.
CHOCOLATE BROWNIES
There must be a zillion recipes for chocolate brownies. And I have tried about 1/2 a zillion!
My original recipe is from my Mom and it’s probably from one of the older versions of a Betty Crocker Cookbook or possibly from the back of a package of Baker’s Chocolate. For many years this is the only chocolate brownie I made ( I was not very adventurous) and it is very good. My father would make it on a regular basis, when he was older and had a bit more time (yes, my Dad baked, one of many talents). When my children were young and (gasp!) it was difficult for me to bake, he would bring me over a batch. It was the only brownie my son would eat, he is not particularly fond of chocolate. I still have a small package of brownies wrapped in aluminum foil in a plastic bag in my silverware drawer, of the last batch my father made. It’s a small reminder of how great my Dad was in many ways and how food to all of us was very important when we were growing up. We were ‘foodies’ before the term was ever popular.
But being a bit adventurous, sometimes results in some fantastic discoveries! Which brings me to the OTHER brownie.
This chocolate brownie is simply decadent. If you like chocolate, this is the one! I have served this to guests as the dessert and have added ice-cream, slightly beaten whipped cream and sometimes chocolate sauce. But you must really LOVE chocolate, it’s intense.
So not to delay you any further, below are the recipes.
Happy baking from my kitchen to yours!
Brownies (adapted from my Mom and possibly Betty Crocker as well)
2 oz. unsweetened chocolate (preferably Ghirardelli or best chocolate you can get)
1/3 cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray 8 x 8 inch baking pan with canola oil.
Put flour, baking powder and salt in small bowl and whisk to combine.
Melt chocolate and butter together over a double boiler (put bowl over pan of simmering water) or very carefully in the microwave (starting with 30 second increments). Let cool for 15 minutes.
Put sugar and eggs in mixer and beat on high for about 1 minute. Reduce speed to low/medium and add cooled chocolate/ butter mixture. Gradually add flour mixture until just combined.
Pour into prepared pan, smooth top and bake for about 20-30 minutes. Let cool completely before cutting.
This recipe can be easily doubled and put into a 13 x 9 inch baking pan.
How many servings? That all depends on how you cut them and how you will be serving them. Ditto for the next brownie recipe. Small squares are great for nibbling buffet guests and large squares make a great platform for other stuff ( ice creams, whipped cream, etc.) after a sit down dinner.
The Ultimate Brownie (Chocolate Brownie) or the Other Brownie ( adapted from 2 recipes from Martha Stewart Living Magazine)
1 cup butter
1-2/3 cup flour
8 ounces unsweetened chocolate (preferably Ghirardelli or any good quality chocolate)
5 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla
3-1/3 cups sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
8 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips (preferably Ghirardelli or any good quality chocolate)
Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Spray a 9 x 13 inch baking pan with canola oil.
Melt chocolate and butter together over a double boiler (put bowl over pan of simmering water) or very carefully in the microwave (starting with 1 minute and then going to 30 second increments. Be very careful, chocolate can burn easily. Stir thoroughly each time). Let cool for 15 minutes.
In the bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with the whisk attachment (if you don’t have a whisk, regular beaters will do) combine eggs, vanilla and sugar and beat on high for 10 minutes. (Beating the eggs and sugar for 10 minutes may seem excessive but the recipe does not have any leavening included (baking soda or baking powder), so it’s dependent on this aeration to give it a rise. Not much though, which gives it a very dense texture. (YUM!)
Reduce speed to low and add chocolate mixture until combined.
Gradually add flour and salt, beating just until combined.
Fold in semi-sweet chocolate chips.
Pour the batter (it will be thick) into prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes at 300 degrees. Increase temperature to 350 degrees, and bake 10 – 13 minutes more until toothpick inserted comes out with slight crumbs attached. It should still be moist in the center.
Let cool completely and cut into bars of desired size.
Mid Week Philosophy: MUSHROOMS
I’ve been cleaning my mushrooms with water for a long time. I tried brushing off the dirt, like it tells you in every single cookbook but realized early on that these guys are grown in composted manure or ‘sh##’, to be perfectly honest. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that brushing alone was not going to do it!
I clean them right before I use them and pat them dry with paper towels. Mushrooms and water, sitting around in the refrigerator, is not a pretty site.
But I did not divulge this secret to anyone, thinking that people would think I was crazy, UNTIL I watched Alton Brown on the Food Network. There in front of my eyes was Alton cleaning mushrooms with water! I was vindicated!! So enjoy this video and have a laugh with Alton, as he competes with a ‘French Chef”: Good Eats S2E5P1: The Fungal Gourmet – YouTube
Unfortunately, as I was checking back on this post the video is no longer available. But I did find the transcript, not as fun as the video but informative none the less: Mushroom Cleaning
Happy Cooking and WASH those mushrooms!!
Mid Week Philosophy: BUTTER
I have a confession to make. I never wait for my butter to come to room temperature nor do I do anything to speed that process up: like putting it into the microwave (that almost always fails because it starts to melt, that is NOT what you want) or cutting it up into tablespoon chunks. I don’t have the patience. I just put the butter into my KitchenAid 6 quart mixer and beat it until it’s soft or “room temperature”. (Granted, if you only have a hand mixer, this will not work for you and you will have to wait until the butter comes to room temperature. Cutting it into tablespoon chunks does decrease the time.)
While the butter is being whipped , I use that time to measure out all my other ingredients, get my pan(s) ready and pre-heat the oven. And by the time I’m done with that, my butter is soft and ready for the other ingredients. You can certainly wait until the butter is room temperature, like all the recipes say. But one day, try it this way (maybe you do this already) and see if it works for you!
Try to use the best butter available. Land O Lakes has been rated, on several sites as the best flavored butter. Buy it when it’s on sale and freeze the extra for when you have a baking day.
Another confession: I never use unsalted butter, even when it requests it in a recipe. I taste no difference in my baking. Why have 2 different butters in your refrigerator and/or freezer? Seems a bit over the top to me…..
Happy baking from my kitchen to yours!
Sour Cream Pound Cake
This is another recipe that I included in my mini-cookbook when I was in between colleges. I have made it so many time it’s frightening!! No clue where it came from. I make no reference to a cookbook or person on the recipe card. I assume it was my Mom’s. She went to a cooking school when she was very young (18-19) in New York City, (before WWII and during the depression) called the Ballard School of Cooking (where she met my father on the train, hmm another story). I have a slight suspicion that this is where it came from.
It’s quite delicious. I am always tempted to make some other pound cake and on occasion, I have. But I always come back to this recipe. Very simple ingredients, great flavor and it stays fresh for almost a week. It can also be frozen, if need be for a couple of weeks.
I make this pound cake in mini- bundt pans for Christmas gifts. Quite cute indeed. And it also has staying power like the biscotti. I refrigerate them, packaged and ready to give away. Coating the top in chocolate: bitter-sweet, white or milk is also very delicious. But my favorite is just a slight sprinkling of confectionary sugar.
Happy Baking!
Sour Cream Pound Cake
2-1/4 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup butter, softened
1 cup sour cream
3 eggs
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour (or use the baking flour spray: excellent shortcut) a 12 cup bundt pan or two, 6 cup mini-bundt pans. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking soda and stir together with a whisk. In another medium bowl put the eggs and vanilla. In large mixing bowl combine butter and sugar and mix until thoroughly combined. Add egg/vanilla mixture (1 egg at a time) and beat until light and fluffy, about 3-4 minutes. At low speed, gradually add flour mixture alternately with sour cream, making sure flour is combined first before adding some sour cream. Scrape down bowl and mix slowly for another minute or two.
Put all of batter into large bundt pan or if making little bundts, put a scant 1/2 cup of batter into each mini.
Bake large bundt for 40-45 minutes. Cool in pan for about an hour before turning out.
Mini- bundts, bake for 15-17 minutes. Cool in pans for about 15 minutes before turning out.
To release the cake before turning out, take a kitchen knife and slide it along the side of the pan, releasing any cake that might be stuck. This is a little tricky because of all the fluting on the pans, don’t go too far down with the knife, maybe about an inch for big bundt and 1/2 inch for mini. This will ensure that you will have a completely whole cake.
When cool and ready to serve, dust with confectionary sugar. Serve with ice cream, chocolate sauce, fruit, whipped cream…..the list goes on. This is a very versatile cake, dressed up or down as you see fit for the occasion!
This is the 12 cup bundt pan version.
and this in the mini-bundt cake
WHITE CHOCOLATE: Update
Funny how timing in life works!
I get a little e-mail newsletter from Cooks Illustrated called: Notes from the Test Kitchen – Recipes and Tips that Work. The one I received this a.m. included a taste test on White Chocolate (I want to make that scary sci-fi noise right now! but it’s a little difficult). Below is the link. Unfortunately, Guittard is not available to me but if it is for you, Yippee! Make sure you let me know how it tastes.
Enjoy!
Mid Week Philosophy: WHITE CHOCOLATE
I touched a little bit on white chocolate in my Cranberry White Chocolate Biscotti. But I thought I needed to delve into the subject a little bit more.
I try to put ingredients into my recipes that you can buy locally at your supermarket. I have a few choices: ShopRite, Hannaford , Decicco ( a specialty grocer) and sometimes Mrs. Greens (an organic grocer). I do not like sending away for ingredients, I think the postage alone is ridiculous, anyway…..
I decided to try some true white chocolate (with cocoa butter) that was available locally. I did a little taste test of my own and here are the results.
My first try was Mrs. Greens where I purchased Sunspire White Chocolate Chips. A little on the expensive side but I said, Hey, this is for SCIENCE (baking science that is: haha!) I bought 2 bags (I am continually the optimist when it comes to ingredients) and promptly tried them when I got home. Well, let me just say I hope I can bring the unopened bag back. It tasted flowery, NOT what I was looking for.
Ok, so my next stop was ShopRite for Ghirardelli White Chocolate Baking Bar. This must be good, I keep on tooting my horn about the brand. But no, again flowery, yuk. This is discouraging.
So off I went to Hannafords last night and bought Lindt Classic Recipe White Chocolate. And this morning after my scant breakfast (alot of taste testing these days, have to watch the waistline) I tried a small piece of the bar. Mmmmmm, delicious, rich taste, good feel on my tongue, yummy.
So, when you hit a recipe that has alot of White Chocolate in it, maybe a special cake or a decadent sauce, I highly recommend the Lindt. But if you are making cookies, like the Biscotti, I think you can definitely get away with the white baking chips. The chips are not the main attraction but one of many ingredients.
Enjoy!
Perfecting Deliciousness 