Croissant Avec Beurre!

nutella, spinach/mozz/romano, eek!

Well, rumor has it the original croissant was forged in Budapest, somewhere near the end of the 17th century, following a siege attempt and local bakers celebrating their intact city by fashioning a roll to reflect the crescent on the Ottoman flag or something.  Nobody cares anymore.  But this shit is delicious.  This is Papa Ritter’s recipe.  And we heart him.

INGREDIENTS

4 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup sugar

1 1/2 tsp salt

1 cup milk

1 cup warm water

3/4 oz active dry yeast (proofed for a few minutes in a bit of the warm water)

1/2 lb (2 sticks) butter, at room temp

-have ready 1 egg plus 1 tbsp water, beaten 

TOOLS

rolling pin (wash the blood off first)

countertop electric mixer (or not, hands work too if you’re not a pussy)

clean countertop

a couple baking sheets

parchment paper

pastry brush or brand new medium-sized paintbrush

METHOD

rest.

Combine all the ingredients (except butter and egg) in the bowl of your electric mixer fitted with a dough hook, or in a medium bowl and combine by hand, old-timey like, until everything sticks together in a good chunk.  Mix with dough hook or knead by hand for about 6 minutes, until your dough wad is smooth and elastic, like your thighs but smoother.  

Spread loosely on a floured baking sheet, cover with plastic wrap or a couple towels and let it rest for at least 3 hrs in the fridge (other cold places: basement, arctic entry), or as long as overnight.  

Now, when you’re ready to commit to playtime, roll out the dough on a floured surface in a long rectangle, approximately 18”x 10”-ish.

dot.

roll.

Dot your dough with thin pats of 1/3 of the butter, fold in thirds, and set aside and cover to rest for about 1/2 hour.  Repeat this two more times, rolling it out first and resting after each butter addition.

Now to shape your little snacks.  Roll out the dough on your floured countertop to about 1/4” thickness.  Croissant dough can be used and shaped liberally, much like puff pastry, in a variety of applications.  It can be cut and molded and stretched and pinched, and will usually give you just a puffier version of what you had in mind.  So you are free to experiment!  Turnovers with goop inside are always a hit.  We put Nutella in some and a savory spinach and cheese concoction (respectively) in some others.  What great ideas!  

But if you want a classic little croissant, cut triangles of dough by first cutting squares (maybe about 6” x 6”, but smaller is always cuuuuuute) and then halving those diagonally.  Roll from one of the sides up to it’s opposite point and plop it on your parchment-lined sheet pan.  Gently curl the ends inward to create a crescent shape.  

Ta daaaaaaaaaa!  Repeat as necessary, dummy.

shape.

Preheat your oven to 425; meanwhile let your pans of goodies rise for 30-45 minutes in a warm place.  Brush tops lightly with egg/water mixture and cram those suckers in  the hotbox for about 10-12 minutes, but keep an eye on them!  Look for rich, deep golden brown tops.  There!  You’re fancy!  Nice job, dickhead.

TASTING NOTES

mmmmmbuulbbhbhhbllluuuurrrghgghluuurghgg. The love handles are worth it.  Bllluuuugghrghyeahtotally.

cram.

Fresh Bing Cherry Pie. Oh, my.

Does anyone out there really NOT love pie?  Assholes who are too chicken-shit to indulge a little, I guess.  Agent Dale Cooper loves pie, and he’s the dreamiest.  We also share his love of coffee.  But on this particular evening, we paired our pie with a lamb roast and fresh ravioli, among other snacks.  Hello!  Now, we’re big fans of “alternative” ingredients and the like, but with things like cherry pie, good old white flour really does the trick.

INGREDIENTS

The Cherry Chomper 

Crust:

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup butter (that’s 1 1/2 sticks), at room temp

a pinch or two of salt, if your butter wasn’t salted

cold water 

Filling:

about 5 cups Bing cherries (2-2 1/2 lbs), pitted and halved

3/4 cup sugar

3 1/2 tbsp cornstarch

2 tbsp water

juice and zest from 1 lemon

the elusive Mike B, chomping cherries

METHOD

Preheat your oven to 400.

Mix all the filling junk together in a bowl and combine thoroughly.  Set aside.  If you’d like to substitute tart cherries, increase the sugar by another 1/2 cup.  Normally I turn to flour for thickening things, mainly because it’s less processed and I like that idea, but Mike B insisted on cornstarch.  What a bossy little bitch.

Next, the crust.  It seems that I’m a renegade when it comes to pie crust.  I don’t use cold butter, I don’t measure the water I throw in, and I don’t let it rest and chill before rolling.  This way it’s quick and easy, even more so than I was in the summer of 2004.  But that’s a different blog post altogether.  But I swear it’s flaky and tender EVERY TIME!!!  “Flaky” and “tender” are what everyone wants in a pie crust, no?

Dump the flour into a medium bowl, and the salt if your butter is unsalted.  Dice up your butter and throw it in there, too.  Now wash those paws of yours and crumble the butter into the flour with said paws.  Do not use a pastry blender, do not use a food processor.  Not if you want to be a renegade.  Squish and crumble until you have a generally mealy texture with a good helping of pea or bean-sized chunks as well.  These little butter wads equal flaky crust once baked.

Now get some cold water in a cup.  Start out by dumping about 1/3 cup into your butter/flour mix.  Squish it around a little, and add more as necessary, a tablespoon at a time, until the dough just holds together.  Make sure to do this step quickly, within a minute or so, with as little mixing as possible.  Wet dough doesn’t like to be fussed with too much.  

Cut your dough ball in half, one slightly larger than the other.  Roll out the larger half on a floured surface and lay it gently in a 9-inch pie plate.  No need to grease it.  Remember all that butter in the dough?  Yeah.

Plop the filling in there.  Roll out the other half of your dough.  If you want to make a solid top crust, remember to poke some vent holes in it with a tiny knife or something, maybe in a fancy pattern or a picture of something you like.  This time, we chose to go with a lattice top.  Seems complicated.  It’s not.  Figure it out, dummy.  

Seal your top and bottom crusts with a fork or your fingers.  

Bake at 400 on a middle rack for 10-15 minutes, then turn the oven down to 350 and bake for an additional 40-50 minutes, rotating 1/4 turn every once in a while.  You may want to put a sheet pan under it to catch the escaping cherry goo before it burns to the bottom of your oven FOREVER.  You’re looking for a nice deep golden crust and bubbling goop from inside trying to crawl out of the pan.  

Let it cool at room temp for at least 1-2 hours, if not more.  Hot pie is delicious, I know, but it’s also runny.  If your fat face can manage to hold off for a bit, it’ll be pleasantly rewarded with heavenly sweet-tart fruit snot enveloped by that “tender, flaky crust”.  Agent Cooper would be more than happy to bury his face in your pie.  Yes, please!

TEAM VELMA LOVES PIE.

  

Ma Chisholm's Apple Nut Cake

I love my Mom. She's basically one of the coolest, funniest, and most surprising people I know. This holiday I made it down to see the whole Chisholm crew, and I managed to sneak in some boozey cooking and baking with the lady who taught me everything I know.

Within the first 3 hours of walking through my parents' front door, I found myself  sweatpants clad, wearing a Santa hat, and holding a bloody mary. My mom popped up from around the corner clutching her favorite cookbook, and flipped to the dirtiest, gunkiest page with an excited grin.
Soups and Samplers a 1962 tome which to the naked eye looks like any 10 cent garage sale cookbook. Really it's a turdy looking gem--chock full of rock-solid no-fail recipes.
The apple nut cake in question sounds like nothing special, but this version yields extremely moist and flavorful chunks that melt in your mouth and warm the cockles of your bitter frost-bitten heart!
...and let's face it, who hates the smell of appley spicy goodness filling your house!? On Christmas fer crying out loud!?

 

METHOD

First you need some fuckin' apples. Personally, I prefer the tart variety,  as does my family. The damn granny smiths needed skinnin', and since peeling apples by hand is for losers, my Ma pulled out our handy-dandy apple peeling machine. It takes about 7 seconds per apple and it's a pretty good investment (BONUS! you can use them for any fruit of veg that needs to be skinned). 
Once bald, hack up the apples, roughly chop up the delightfully greasy walnuts, and combine both in a large mixing bowl. I added a generous drizzle of lemon juice, threw in the sugar, oil, and water to keep the apple chunks from drying out or getting oxidized.

It's so easy to make this cake as I was pretty buzzed, and I still managed to not mess it up!

You finish up by dumping the rest of the sifted dry ingredients into the mixing bowl, give her a good stir, and pour into your desired (greased) cake pans.

My cute Mommy dearest has always made two separate cakes, on in a glass 8x10 pan, and one in a pie pan (Pyrex also). The depth really lends well to get both cakes thoroughly cooked and caramelized on top and bottom.

Bake it up for about 40-45 minutes on 375 and voila...you're feeding 3 drunk 20-somethings and they're friends and putting a shit-eating grin on everyone's face. 

THANKS MOM! (i luv you!)

RECIPE

3-4 Apples (whatever you prefer. Grannies bake better and lend some acid to the sweetness of the batter)

1 1/2 cups of walnuts (the recipe calls for any tree variety, but we liked walnuts because they are awesome)

1 egg

1 cup sugar

1 cup flour

1/4 cup oil

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

nutmeg and cinnamon to taste (nutmeg is hated by our family so we omit it, and it's ok!)

these assholes totally love the apple nut cake!

Recipe provided by "Soups and Samplers" by Suzanna Wheppler and Adele G. Jones 1962

Holiday Time Cocomallows!

Time for a history lesson, kids!

  It seems that a lot of folks don’t know that marshmallow is a plant.  Apparently, the use of marshmallow to make a candy dates back to ancient Egypt, where the recipe called for extracting sap from the plant and mixing it with nuts and honey. Another pre-modern recipe uses the pith of the marshmallow plant, rather than the sap. The stem was peeled back to reveal the soft and spongy pith, which was boiled in sugar syrup and dried to produce a soft, chewy confection.

  Candymakers in early 19th century France may have made the innovation of whipping up the marshmallow sap and sweetening it, to make a confection similar to modern “marshmallows”. They would extract the sap from the mallow plant's root, and whip it themselves. The candy was very popular but its manufacture was labor-intensive. In the late 19th century, French manufacturers devised a way to get around this by using egg whites or gelatin, combined with corn starch, to create the chewy base.  So, I guess even those fancy Frenchies have been known to bastardize a thing or two.  It ain’t just us ‘mericans.

Well, this recipe is adapted from Smitten Kitchen:

INGREDIENTS

about 1 cup powdered sugar

3 1/2 envelopes unflavored gelatin (a disgusting and useful product)

1-2 tablespoons coconut flavor (also pretty gross)

about 1 cup shredded coconut, toasted nice and golden

1 cup cold water

2 cups granulated sugar (cane sugar works fine too)

1/2 cup brown rice syrup (available at your local natural foods store)

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 large egg whites

METHOD

Oil the bottom and sides of a 9x13 metal or glass baking pan and dust it with about 1/3 of the coconut, followed by a bit of the powdered sugar.

In the bowl of a fancy standing electric mixer, or in another large bowl, dump half of your cold water and sprinkle all of the gelatin over it.  Leave it be.

In a heavy saucepan (3-quart or larger) cook the granulated sugar, rice syrup, other half of the water, and salt over medium-low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, until sugar is dissolved.  Now increase the heat just a bit and boil the mixture, WITHOUT STIRRING, until a candy or digital thermometer hits the 240F mark.  It’s gonna take about 12 or 15 minutes.  And be sure it never looks like it’ll boil over.  Burnt sugar on your burner would ruin Christmas, or whatever other silly things you people celebrate.  Remove your pan from the burner promptly at 240F and pour the whole mess straight on top of the gelatin.  

Now with that fancy mixer, or a nice little hand-held version, whip that shit!  But don’t fling hot sugar on your eyeballs.  You’re looking for about a triple in volume, and it’ll be silky-looking and white and fluffy.  Should take 10-15 minutes-ish.

While you’re overseeing that, have a tiny helper or small slave whip the egg whites in a separate bowl until you get peaks.  These peaks can be loose or stiff or somewhere in between; don't really think it makes a huge diff.

Beat your whites into your sugar fluff, followed by the coconut flavoring.

Coax it all into the prepared pan.  Very sticky.  Sprinkle the remaining toasted coconut on top.  Let it chill, uncovered, until firm, for at least 3 hours, or up to a day.

Now time to cut!  So fun!  Pry the marshmallow block away from the sides of the pan to loosen and then grab an end and pull the whole thing outta there, right onto a cutting board, the bigger the better.  Cut into whatever sizes you want.  A lightly oiled pizza wheel works good for this.  Toss your fluff buds in the remaining powdered sugar, shake off excess, and cram that face.  Cram your friends’ faces too.

TASTING NOTES

FLLLLLUFFY!!!!  So tender as well.  Those little crunchy coconut bits break up the wondrous monotony of heavenly cloud cubes.  You can squish'em, bounce'em, or even put'em on yer titties like pasties (because they're sticky inside)!!!

Scotch Eggs? Okay.

Exhibit A.  the scotch egg.

Throughout the UK, one can commonly find run-of-the-mill Scotch Eggs cling-filmed in supermarkets, convenience stores, and motorway service stations: a hard-boiled egg surrounded by sausage, rolled in bread crumbs, and deep-fried.  Then slapped in the cool box for a couple months, until those limey blokes waddle along and decide to start muggin’ up.  Bluuuurgh.

  Variations also abound.  A plethora of supermarket brands over there across the pond feature a chopped egg center combined with mayo or bacon.  In Manchester they use a pickled egg and throw in some black pudding, which is some seriously ridiculous pudding (look it up).  Some US “pubs” dip them in ranch.  In case you didn’t know, you can ruin a TURD by dipping it in ranch.  The occasional state fair might serve them on a stick, which is handy and extra fun.  This silly snack nugget has even found it’s way to multiple fast-food chains in Africa.  Yep, Africa has fast-food chains.  

  Well, despite all that could go wrong with such a concoction, we found this classic British picnic fare to have some major potential.  MAJOR.

I beleive the conversation went something like this....

Ritter: Balls?!

Amanda: BALLS!!

Mike B: Balls.

Aiko: ruff!

Fried sausage-y balls?!?! A resounding Yes please!!! 
...But hold the coagulated blood, thanks.

  

We went for a relatively simple equation:

INGREDIENTS

6 hard-boiled eggs, peeled (blanching in cold water after boiling eases the peeling! And it will smell like dog farts in your kitchen for an hour or so)

3/4-1 lb sweet Italian sausage (yeah! pork fat!), or your preferred ground meat mixture

3/4 cup dry bread crumbs, seasoned as you like

heavy saucepan with about 3 inches of peanut or canola oil for frying

 (but we plopped them in the Fry Daddy; love that thing)

some sauces you like, for dipping

METHOD

  Heat your oil on the cooker to about 360 degrees, give or take a few.  If you don’t have a frying thermometer, drop a 1” cube of bread in there, and if it browns nicely in about a minute, you’ve got yourself about 365.  Don’t be afraid to estimate a little.  The shit will still get fried.  A little hotter is better than a little too cool.  But if you’re lucky like some of us, you can have both.

sausage baby

  Divide the sausage into 6 portions.  Take each glob and flatten it like a burger, about 1/4-3/8 inch thick.  Just slap it out into a niiice thin round of meat. Not too thick now, y’hear??? Too much sausage means the outer breading will burn and you'll still have raw pork fat.        

  
Now wrap it around those little bollocks.  Roll them in the bread crumbs, good ‘n crumby.  Really pack those crumbs on there.  It’s imperative for a deliciously crispy coating!

  

cradle and crumb-coat

Fry 2 eggs at a time, but no more, for about 1 1/2-2 minutes.  Keep an eye on the outside.  It should brown up pretty quick.  If you do more simultaneously, the oil temp could drop too drastically and you could have greasy-sponge no-good crap balls instead of nice crispy buddies.  Don’t waste yer pork fat! 

  Drain and serve halved or quartered alongside you favorite saucy bits.  But no ranch allowed, wally.

  
TASTING NOTES

HP=A1, more or less

What do you think it tasted like???  Deep-fried sausage-covered eggs.  And with the pairing of HP sauce and some decent brown mustard, we hit this one basically way out of the park.  If you're unfamiliar with HP, it's fancy British A1.  Thanks, the UK.  


We reveled in a miniature pig-out session spent hovering over the greasy countertop just praying for a reason to stop wolfing them down.  But honestly, one is enough.  Oh, gut rot.  Oooooh bloat.

Inaugural Luncheon

We, the gin(and whiskey and wine)-soaked raisins, needed an extracurricular activity to sustain us through the long, cold, dark, great white northern winter.  Hence the blog, which hopefully we'll be coherent enough to maintain as a throwback to treasured recipes from the mid-20th century.  And maybe tidbits of crafts and ephemera.  Thank you for your time.


Main Course...
CHAMPAGNE CHICKEN

INGREDIENTS 

2 chicken breasts

1 cup champagne

¾ cup heavy cream

1 lemon

Salt and pepper to taste

Garlic and shallots to taste

2 tbsp butter

Pasta or Rice

(add veggies if you like, fatty)

METHOD

It starts with the booze. There are a wide variety of bubbly sparkling wines available on the market. The obvious choice for us was the lovely Andre’s Blush. You can procure this fine wine from a number of upstanding liquor stores, but be warned it will cost you at least six dollars.

chicken-poking

The champagne chicken gets the majority of its acidity from the lemon juice.  Marinate the poultry for 2 hours after pounding into uniform thickness---use the flat side of a meat tenderizer (or a clenched fist can help with your rage issues). Place the chicken pieces in the juices of a whole freshly squeezed lemon, set a few tablespoons aside for later. Dust generously with freshly ground pepper. Slap it in the fridge, dummy.

The minced shallots join the skillet party with the melted butter, followed by the finely chopped garlic. Pour in the pink champagne, heavy cream, and the additional lemon juice simmering until slightly thick. The chicken tenders didn’t need long to cook in the hot liquid, and we decided it would be a great idea to add some cherry tomatoes and spinach in to soak up the liquid. 

radish roses

The recipe calls for rice or pasta as a base.  Being stuck-up bitches: we opted for fancy angel hair noodles. Be sure to time the cooking right as the angel hair only needs about 3 minutes to cook and can almost be thrown in the boil as you’re plating dinner.

Toss the pasta in with the chicken and sauce and grate some fresh parmagiano reggiano over the top with a sprig of parsley and possibly a classy lemon twist. We liked the radish rose…

Be sure to drink the left over champagne with dinner.   

Prepare to feel really classy; that is if you ain't scared.

TASTING NOTES

the finished product, pink "champagne" chicken,
basking in its own strange glory

At least one of us isn't particularly thrilled with chicken in general, unless it's roasted whole or deep fried.  That being said, this savory mouth-invader was a robust and perfumey treat.  That blush sparkling wine sort of blew our collective mind, its essence doing a fancy jig with the creamy-sauced angel hair, not to mention shallots and garlic.  Mmmm MMM!
And since at least one of us is kind of the aforementioned fatty, we preferred the addition of cherry tomato halves and fresh spinach, to kind of church it up in the nutrient department and provide more textures to wrestle around with. 


---------------------------------------------------------

Dessert...
PRUNE MOUSSE

INGREDIENTS

8 oz (1/2 lb) Dried Prunes
2 cups Black Tea of your choice
Sugar to taste (we used approx. 1/3 cup)
Zest from 1 Lemon
Juice from 1 Lemon
1 cup Prune or Apple Juice (we used unfiltered, not-from-concentrate apple)
1/2 oz Gelatin (2 envelopes)
3 to 4 tbsp Heavy Cream, plus more for garnish

1 Egg White

METHOD

Brew the tea (we used 2 bags for this volume of water), letting it steep for about 10 minutes to get good and strong.  Strong enough for a lady.

While the tea is still hot throw those prunes in, and let them soak for at least 2 hours, or as long as overnight.  Next, pour both the prunes and tea into a saucepan with the sugar & lemon zest and simmer over medium heat until quite tender, verging on mushy; about 30-45 minutes.

Puree the above ingredients in a blender or food processor.  Set aside.

white goop meets brown goop

Pour the prune/apple and lemon juices and gelatin into a small saucepan and dissolve over gentle heat.  Once entirely dissolved, whiz this into your prune goop.  Transfer the whole mess to a medium bowl and let it cool to room temp.

Whip the cream, using whatever tool you prefer, until you have firm peaks.  Firm peaks will make you popular with your guests.  Then do likewise with the egg white.  Fold the whipped cream and egg white into your prune goop you have waiting in the wings.  Pour into a serving dish of your liking and allow to chill and set (In the icebox, this’ll take about 45 minutes).
Serve with a fancy blob of whipped cream or whatever else you may desire in order to make it look less like petrified puppy shit.  A radish rose might even do the trick.


TASTING NOTES

see?  petrified puppy shit

Tangy, fluffy, almost effervescent prune jell-o.  The tea and lemon really shine through.  The most delightfully refreshing Arnold Palmer we've ever had the pleasure of gumming.

Based on the Prune Mousse recipe in:

The Constance Spry Cookery Book
by Constance Spry & Rosemary Hulme (1956).