“B” Dinner: Buffalo Wings, Blue Cheese Dip, Broccoli Soup

I recently purchased

Modernist Cuisine at Home: Nathan Myhrvold,Maxime Bilet: 9780982761014: Books

and finally gave in and bought a pressure cooker.

Fagor Duo Combi 5-Piece Pressure Cooker Set: Kitchen & Dining ASIN: B00023D9S0

I love this set since I couldn’t decide which size to buy. This comes with a 4 and 8 quart pot, trivet and steamer basket, a glass lid in addition to the pressure lid so it’s not a single purpose item, two pressure settings, and it works on my induction burner.

 

Tried the much lauded (from Modernist Cuisine) @ Home version of the Caramelized Carrot Soup and brown chicken stock last weekend to christen the pressure cooker.

I strained the stock first through a colander, and then through a 100 micron mesh bag.

 

Very tasty and wonderful body. I used it 50:50 with water in the carrot soup because I didn’t want to search for carrot juice.

 

I see what all the fuss is about. The soup was wonderful.  And I wish I’d bought that pressure cooker set last year when I got MC.

 

Yesterday I was indulging in my usual Saturday morning food blog surfing and followed a link on egullet.org to a Food Lab article on Korean Fried Chicken by Kenji. I had been tempted by the crispy wings in MC@H, but I don’t have the sous vide capacity to make very many at once, and if I make wings (and have to share with my husband), I want a lot.

The Korean Wings post lead me to Kenji’s Food Lab article on The Ultimate Extra-Crispy Double Fried Confit Buffalo Wings. This recipe uses four pounds of wings – now that’s more like it.

 

I used the oven method to confit the wings; I like the unattended cooking aspect of it. Even though it’s not from MC@H, it does have the same spirit.

 

With all this impromptu cooking, conceived that morning, I didn’t want to burden my husband who was shopping for me on his way home by adding all the ingredients needed for the MC@H Buffalo sauce. I went with my standard sauce of half butter and half Crystal Hot Sauce.

 

I did feel I could impose on him enough to find some blue cheese and milk so I could make the Blue Cheese Sauce. He brought home some lovely Stilton.

 

The Caramelized Carrot Soup was so good, I was anxious to try the Broccoli-Gruyere Soup (especially since I had broccoli, gruyere, and the MC@H brown chicken stock  in the fridge already).

I didn’t have hazelnuts for the garnish, so I used roasted-salted pumpkin seeds with the thyme. My husband and I loved it. It’s more olive toned than Gordon Ramsey’s bright green broccoli soup. I may cut down on the pressure cooking time next try to see if I can keep a better color.

 

Since the MC@H Blue Cheese Sauce is heat stable with the sodium citrate, I warmed a portion of the sauce to use in my whipper and try it in addition to the chilled sauce. I think I prefer the contrast of the cold sauce with the hot wings.

(Sorry about the messy plating, by this time my husband and I were so hungry, we just put the food on the plate and I took one quick photo.)

Either way, the Blue Cheese Sauce is great. Well worth making rather than using store-bought or standard home-made dressing. Intense blue cheese flavor. The wings were as Kenji promised; ultra-crispy and kept their crispiness even with standard Buffalo sauce.

I will be making all of these again, and hopefully frequently.

Modernist Cuisine | Tomato Spheres with Basil Oil

For my first shot at spherification, I thought I'd try the summery take on familiar Insalata Caprese with Tomato Water with Basil Oil served in mozzarella cups. I originally wanted to try to make balsamic caviar, but decided that would be too ambitious for a first attempt.
No centrifuge at my house. Luckily found a pointer to McMaster-Carr 100 micron filter bags somewhere in the egullet forums a few weeks ago. The output is not clear as in the centrifuged version, but at least I get to try it.


Tomato water made from my BIL's homegrown tomatoes


Basil Oil

The day before  I used Algin and Calcic from the

Experimental Kit Texturas, 150 Grams (Limited Time Offer- While Supplies Last 15% Off): Grocery & Gourmet Food

for the tomato water and bath, and made the basil oil. I planned to use a 2 1/4 tsp. yeast measuring spoon for the spheres (wanted a bit smaller bite than 1 tablespoon), and molded Ciliegine mozzarella cut in half and softened in hot water on the back of it to hold the spheres for service.

Mise   Tomato water, measuring spoon, small syringe for trial with 18g needle containing basil oil, Calcic bath is out of photo to left, and water rinses to right. Slotted spoon is in my hand as I forgot to put it down to take the photo.
I made 4 miserable looking blobs – none decent enough to even try to inject the basil oil -  then quietly gave up and quickly put everything away in the refrigerator. Time to step back and relax. Company expected soon for the 4th, don’t push it.

On vacation this week, quiet day at home, time to try again.
 
Not very spherical but the basil inclusion is fairly nice and round.


Much better, though the basil oil is wonky. I almost like it better this way, doesn't look so much like an eyeball.
I'll practice a bit more when my husband gets home this evening so he can try one.

McDonald’s type French Fries and Fresh Ground Beef Burgers

I’ve been looking forward to trying this method for making McDonald’s type French Fries at home ever since I read this post, How to Make Perfect Thin and Crisp French Fries, by J. Kenji Lopez-Alt. My husband just completed 3 months of exercise and dieting, and wanted to have an over-the-top nasty (in a good way) dinner to celebrate. I decided I wanted to try frying the potatoes in beef fat for old-style McDonald’s fries.

 

My husband persuaded a local butcher to save us some beef fat to render for frying. This is 12 lbs. trimmed beef fat ready to go in a slow oven to render over several hours.

 

After straining and cooling overnight; I got lovely, creamy-white beef tallow.

 

The fries must be exactly 1/4 inch for the process to work. My Oxo mandoline worked very well with the French Fry insert.

 

The cut potatoes must be parboiled in acidulated, salted water until tender. Unfortunately, I made a slightly larger batch than called for in the recipe and since the water took longer to come to a boil, the potatoes were overdone. It finally occurred to me to check them before the time specified, but I was a bit too late. They didn’t crumble into mashed potatoes, but most of the long ones broke in half when I drained them. I’ll start checking them much earlier next time.

After drying on a paper towel-lined baking sheet, I fried the potatoes in the beef fat for 50 seconds, then spread them on another paper towel-lined sheet and froze them for several hours. They are supposed to be even closer to McD’s fries if frozen overnight, but I didn’t have the time.

 

I wanted a great burger to serve with the fries, so I adapted another of Kenji’s recipes:  The World's Best Burger for a Single Man (or Woman). I ground a well-marbled chuck roast and some boneless beef short ribs with my KitchenAid meat grinder attachment.

 

Very minimal handling is key to preserve the ground beef “noodles” for a greater surface area for crisping and catching melted cheese, and to prevent a dense interior. I ground the meat directly onto the lined sheet pan and gently coaxed the burgers into shape.

 

A close-up of the desired loose structure of the patty.

 

The burger recipe called for frying one burger at a time (hence the “Single” modifier) in a small skillet so the fat from the burgers would get about 1/8” deep to get the edges as crispy as the bottom. To get all the burgers to finish as the fries were getting their final 3.5 minute fry (by my husband outside on the grill side-burner), I just added a bit of the beef tallow I had made to reproduce the effect.

 

My goodness! Everything came out so delicious. The burgers were crispy outside – tender and juicy inside with lots of crags for the cheese to melt into. The fries (though shorter than they could have been) were light-golden bits of heaven. They were fluffy inside, not greasy (really), and stayed crispy to the last fry. I hope to get the gumption to make some batches up to the freezing stage (they are supposed to keep frozen for 2 months). How nice to be able to serve fresh fries like this in just a few minutes. But, I’ll think I’ll just buy the tallow next time…

 

Can I get a little extra credit for difficulty - cooking in the American Mastiff Obstacle Course?

Goat Cheese Stuffed Peppadew Peppers

I only recently heard about Peppadew peppers (though they’ve been around for several years), so when I saw them at Martin’s Wine Cellar, I had to give them a try. I thought they would be good stuffed with goat cheese. I’ve made a goat cheese spread before with a bit of butter blended in to make it spreadable, but decided to try a bit of Colatura (a wonderful essence of anchovies I also only recently heard about).

 

I drained the peppadews in a sieve, blended about a tablespoon of the colatura into the softened goat cheese, and stuffed the peppers.

 

I placed them under the broiler until the cheese was warm and bubbly, and the peppers charred just a bit. Wow, it was hard to share half of them with my husband. They are addictive – sweet peppers with just a bit of heat – tangy goat cheese with that extra bit of umami from the colatura. I ordered a case of the peppadew peppers so we can have them often. I may even be able to part with some for guests.

Brown Poultry Stock

I adapted this from Jacques Pépin’s Fast Food My Way, Michael Ruhlman’s Ratio, and Joy of Cooking: 75th Anniversary Edition. It’s a great way to use the bones from a few rotisserie chickens.

 

Celery, carrots, and some leek tops and corn cobs I had saved in the freezer.

 

A few rotisserie chicken carcasses, a duck carcass, some turkey and duck “bits” (neck, gizzards).

 

Part way through roasting at 425 degrees F for about an hour. You don’t even need to peel the onions.

 

Bouquet garni of celery tops, parsley, thyme and bay leaves; plus a few peppercorns thrown in the pot.

 

Extracting the flavors with a bare simmer.

 

I strained it through a chinoise, refrigerated it, skimmed off the fat and froze what was left after reserving 4 1/2 cups to make Chicken & Dumplings.  I was able to freeze two quart jars, four pint jars and two ice cube trays (nice for roughly 2 tablespoons worth to add to sauces) of stock for very little effort. 

Cozy Winter Lunch | Potato – Leek soup and Croques-Monsieur

I found this potato – leek soup on David Lebovitz’s blog. It was wonderful with the sandwich. This may be one of my favorite lunches.

 

Butter, leeks, home-made chicken stock (the recipe calls for water, but I figured a couple of cups of stock substituted for some of the water wouldn’t hurt), bay leaves and thyme, russet potatoes (had some sitting around), white pepper and chili powder.

 

Sweating the leeks in the butter.

 

Simmering until the potatoes are tender.

 

Buzzed with an immersion blender.

 

Gruyere (got it sliced into “sandwich slices” at the charcuterie counter), sourdough bread, honey-baked ham I had vacuum-sealed and frozen from Christmas.

 

Two layers of cheese and ham.

 

Microplaned a bit of cheese on top of the skim of butter.

 

Baked, then broiled a bit to brown the cheese. It’s wonderful that something so simple can be so good.

Spice Pepper Tapenade

Onion, anchovies, garlic, capers, purple basil, Parmigiano-Reggiano, sundried tomatoes, and roasted spice peppers. I finally realized that as the seeds in these spice peppers aren’t hot, I didn’t have to go insane removing them from the tray full of tiny peppers.

 

This tapenade is so tasty (and now that I know I don’t have to deseed them), I’ll grow these peppers again next season. (This was made in October.)

Peppers from Our Garden

My husband has started making a lovely roasted pepper-garlic spread/dip with the peppers from our garden. After roasting in the oven, he processes the garlic and peppers with a bit of nice olive oil. It's a great tapenade to spread on crostini, etc.

 

Peppers and garlic after charring under the broiler. The skins are so thin on these peppers, we didn’t have to peel them; removing the seeds and ribs took plenty long enough. I’m so glad the dip turned out to be worth the tedious bit.

 

Processed with a little salt, pepper, thyme (had some handy), and olive oil to the consistency desired.

 

 

Must, Stop, Photographing peppers. Enough.