Posts Tagged With: American

Russian Dressing

Posted on January 21, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Appetizer

RUSSIAN DRESSING

INGREDIENTSRussianDressing-

1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

PREPARATION

Add all ingredients to mixing bowl. Stir with whisk until well blended. May be stored in air-tight jars for up to two weeks. Woo hoo! This is so easy. You’ll lots of time after this to do crossword puzzles or plot worldwide domination, whichever you prefer.

TIDBITS

1) Lake Baikal is in Russia. Its depth reaches from the surface to the bottom and contains around 20% of the world’s unfrozen fresh water. You could make a lot of ice from the water in Lake Baikal. That ice could chill a lot of mugs filled with blessed, soothing root beer.

2) The Russians have always known this. This is why America and Russia faced off for decades in the Cold War. The United States in particular, worried then that the Soviets would restrict the supply of ice cubes. Indeed, Brezhnev in 1968, severely curtailed the export of ice from Lake Baikal.

5) It is no coincidence that riots broke out in one American city after another that year. Crime spiked. Did things suddenly worsen from 1967? No, but without ice from Lake Baikal, Americans could not properly ice their root beers. Problems that people shrugged off easily with the aid of ice-cold root beers, suddenly became insurmountable, maddening even.

8) The United States wasn’t the only country to face disintegration in 1968. Russia invaded Czechoslovakia to put an end to the ice riots that ravaged the country. Millions perished in China’s cultural revolution. We now know Mao launched this horrific plan to hide the even more hideous fact from his countrymen; there weren’t enough ice cubes in the country to cool all the root beer.

9) But President Johnson knew the Russia’s Achilles heel. He threatened to ban exports of root beer to Russia. The root-beerless Soviets backed down and ice flowed, not quite the right verb, to all corners of the world. Tensions between nations diminished considerably and people hugged each other everywhere. The New York Mets even won the World Series next year. And bluebirds sang.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Powegian Salad

Posted on January 18, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Entree

POWEGIAN SALAD
(Poway, my fair city)

INGREDIENTSPowegian Salad-

6 eggs
3 medium carrots
3 celery stalks
2 garlic cloves
1 white onion
1 tablespoon olive oil
4 ounces fresh spinach
3 avocados
1 large tomato

PREPARATION

Boil eggs eight-to-twelve minutes, depending on your taste for hard-boiled eggs. Remove eggs. Let eggs cool. While eggs are boiling and then cooling, mince carrots, celery, garlic, and onion. Add carrot, celery, garlic, onion, and olive oil to pan and sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens.

Put carrot, celery, garlic, and onion in large bowl. Peel and cut each hard-boiled egg into 4 slices. Peel and remove pits from avocados. Chop avocados into pieces about 1/2″ wide. Dice tomatoes. Add egg, avocado, and tomato to bowl. Gently mix or toss salad with two large spoons. (Do not interpret tossing salad as an command to fling it against the wall. It will not impress your guests, unless they are wildly, really wildly into modern art.) Goes well with all sorts of salad dressings.

1) Spinach is used in this recipe. Spinach made Popeye the Sailor strong. Popeye would have liked this salad. However, this particular recipe does not, as of press time, come ready made in stores.

2) It’s not as if Popeye could stop a vicious fist fight with his nemesis Bluto to go to the supermarket to buy this salad. Bluto would knocked out the iron-deficient Popeye with the old one-two if Popeye had tried to leave the fight. And even if Popeye had to been able to got to the store, he would have need to eat quite a lot of Powegian Salad to have gotten the same amount of spinach as in a can of spinach.

3) And notice Popeye always eats spinach out of a can. The spinach in the can is already cooked. Maybe Popeye doesn’t like fresh spinach.

4) Oh no, I won’t believe that. I won’t. I won’t.. Fresh spinach is so clearly tastier and healthier for you and Popeye than the canned stuff. Popeye wouldn’t lead the youth of America astray. Indeed, I bet he only ate spinach out of a can, because Powegian spinach in a bag wasn’t sold in any store when his cartoons were being made. Yes, that’s it. I feel much better. Carry on.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Split Pea Soup

Posted on January 15, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Soup

SPLIT PEA SOUP

INGREDIENTSSplitPea-

1 medium carrot
1 celery stalk
1 large onion
2 tablespoons butter.
9 cups water
2 cups (1 pound) dried split peas
1 teaspoon marjoram
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon pepper

SPECIAL UTENSIL

Dutch oven

PREPARATION

Mince carrot, celery, and onion. Add carrot, celery, onion, and butter to Dutch oven. Sauté veggies on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add split peas, water, marjoram, bay leaf, thyme, and pepper. Bring soup to boil on high heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about an hour or until peas are tender.

Transfer as much soup to blender as will fit. Liquefy or puree soup. Repeat for all batches on soup. Serve and enjoy. Soup crackers and ham go well with this soup.

TIDBITS

1) Gregor Mendel, used pea plants to prove his theory of dominant and recessive genes.

2) His published results were quite close to his hypothesis. In fact his results were so near that one can use statistics to show he fudged his outcomes to prove his point. Bad Mendel.

3) If I had a time machine, I could have gone back in time and convinced Mendel to publish the actual results. He still would have been famous for his ground breaking work without becoming a homework problem for students in statistics. I mean what did Mendel’s son think of all of this?

4) Felix Mendelsson, the great composer of his violin concert and incidental music for A Midsummer’s Night Dream, is probably not the son of Gregor Mendel as Felix’s birth occurred in 1809 and Gregor’s didn’t come into the world until 1822. Geneticists and biologists concur with this assessment with near unanimity.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, history | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Hot Chocolate

Posted on January 13, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Appetizer

HOT CHOCOLATE

INGREDIENTSHotChocolate-

4 ounces semisweet chocolate (chips or squares)
4cups milk
1/2 cup sugar

PREPARATION

Add all ingredients to saucepan. Heat with medium heat. (Whoa! Heating with heat. That’s just crazy enough to work.) Cook until chocolate has completely melted and liquid is just ready to boil. Stir frequently.

Use an electric or hand beater on hot chocolate if you wish to make it frothy. Mini marshmallows and whipped cream make excellent toppings.

TIDBITS

1) If it weren’t for chocolate, we probably wouldn’t have microwaves. Decades ago, the chocolate bar in Percy Spencer’s pocket melted when he got close to the microwaves of a magnetron. Instead of saying yuck, Percy got excited. He placed an egg next to the magnetron. The egg cooked so fast that it exploded. The synapses in Percy’s brain fired at a prodigious rate. The research on the kitchen microwave began.

2) The good feelings to your brain and body from eating chocolate last four times longer than from an amorous kiss. Indeed, pollsters in Britain found that 50% of women love chocolate more than sex. This guys, is why you give your dates a box of chocolates rather than a package of lutefisk.

3) Eating chocolate multiple times a week greatly reduces the risk of fatal heart disease.

4) Chocolate is a natural antidepressant.

5) A milk chocolate bar has ten fewer calories than a bag of potato chips.

5) So chocolate gave a boost to the advancement of science, provides for an enhanced love life, protects your health, keeps you from being sad, and is better for your figure than potato chips. What more do you want? Why can’t our government be more like chocolate?

6) It can. It can. The Bacon & Chocolate Party was formed in 2012 and is dedicated to promoting the health giving properties of chocolate and bacon and to ensure ample supplies of these wonderful foods.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Sausage and Lentil Soup

Posted on January 6, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Soup

SAUSAGE AND LENTIL SOUP

INGREDIENTSSausageLentilSoup-

1 pound Italian sausage
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 garlic cloves
3 medium onions
1 1/4 cups brown lentils
2 stalks celery
2 carrots
1 bay leaf
3/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
64 ounces chicken broth
12 leaves spinach

makes 8 bowls

PREPARATION

Sauté sausages in olive oil in pan on medium heat for 10 minutes or until done. Remove sausages. Cut sausages into slices 1/4″ thick. Dice garlic cloves and onions. Add garlic and onion to pan. Sauté garlic and onion on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion is tender. Devein celery. Dice celery, carrots, and spinach. Add all ingredient to large pot. Cover pot and simmer on warm-low heat for 2 hours.

TIDBITS

1) This recipe uses garlic. Garlic wards off vampires.

2) Italy uses a lot of garlic. It has hardly any vampire sightings worth mentioning.

3) Garlic never wards off sausages. Italy has a lot of sausages.

4) So, it could be argued it’s all those Italian sausages that keep vampires away.

5) I’ve looked at garlic and Italian sausage. Neither item looks particularly scary to me. But then again, I’m not a vampire. However, most vampires don’t fear tax auditors as much as we humans do. This is because they don’t have jobs. They just bite necks of teenagers who don’t have the wit to get out of a scary building.

6) The United States, Russia, and China don’t have vampires. It’s safe to say the armies of these mighty nations are well equipped with garlic and Italian sausages.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Key-Lime Pie

Posted on December 25, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Dessert

KEY LIME PIE

INGREDIENTSKeyLimePie-

1 14-ounce can sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup key lime juice
4 egg yolks
1 8″ graham-cracker crust.
1 can whipped cream

SPECIAL UTENSIL

electric blender

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Add condensed milk, key lime juice, and egg yolks to mixing bowl. Blend with electric blender set to “whip” or “cream” until well blended. Pour mixture into graham-cracker crust. Bake pie in oven at 375 degrees for 15 minutes or until toothpick inserted into the pie’s center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack for 2 hours.  Note, key lime pies made with real key lime juice are not green. Add whipped cream if desired. Or even lots and lots of whipped cream.

TIDBITS

1) Contrary to what I would have wished the Key Lime did not come from Key West nor even Key Largo. I researched this by going to Key West and by watching the 1948 movie, Key Largo. Key Largo starred Humphrey Bogart, Lauren Bacall, and Edward G. Robinson. None of these actors ate even a single Key Lime during the entire movie. After the movie? No one knows.

2) Key Limes were first grown in Southern Asia. Historians will tell you that Key Limes made their way to Spain, presumably by hitchhiking as these fruits don’t have legs. Actually, I doubt the whole hitchhiking theory as Key Limes do not have thumbs. You can tell they don’t just by looking at the tiny yellowish-green thingies.

3) Ship crews liked the take Key Limes as the fruit was high in vitamin C and prevented scurvy. Christopher Columbus took Key Limes on his voyages of discovery to the Americas. Indeed, culinary historians praise Spain for the bringing health-enhancing Key Lime to the New World.

4) Do other historians laud the European discoverers? Not so much, pointing to endless wars of conquest by the Spanish conquistadors, Old World diseases that decimated indigenous populations, and wholesale enslavement of the local tribes. Indeed, Europe didn’t balance things with the natives until they brought the hamburger to America in the 19th century. Kinda like a do-over.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Potato Ham Soup

Posted on December 22, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Soup

POTATO HAM SOUP

INGREDIENTSPotatoHamSoup-

6 Russet potatoes
1 pound ham
1 onion
1/2 teaspoon mustard
1/4 teaspoon paprika
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter
1 cup milk
1/2 cup sour cream

PREPARATION

Cut potatoes and ham into 1/2″ cubes. Dice onion. Put potato, ham, and onion into large pot. Add just enough water to pot to cover potato, ham, and onion. Add mustard, paprika, pepper, and salt. Cook on high heat until water boils. Reduce heat to medium and cook for 20 minutes or until potato is tender. Stir occasionally. Reduce heat to warm. Add butter, milk, and sour cream. Cook for 2 minutes or until soup is heated through. Stir frequently.

TIDBITS

1) Dom DeLuise starred in a movie called Silence of the Hams. It parodied the movie Silence of the Lambs. Silence of the Hams did not do well at the box office. So I’ll discuss potatoes instead..

2) The Inca Indians of Peru were the first known cultivators of potatoes. They harvested the first spud somewhere between 8,000 BC and 5,000 BC. That’s quite a wide range of years. It’s the same thing as saying your federal-income-tax check will be in the mail sometime from now until the year 5014. See how well the folks at the IRS accept that statement.

3) In 1536, the Spanish conquered the Incan Empire for its potatoes and gold. There are thousands of varieties of potato. There is only type of gold. Gold is an element. The potato is not; it is a tuber. Sure there are such things as white gold but that comes from mixing gold from something, well um, whitish. But just think of the dozens of herbs and spices that can be added to potatoes. Moreover, the mighty tuber is truly tasty, gold not so much. Potatoes beat gold by a technical knockout.

4) Many people believe the first real French fries were actually made in Belgium. If Belgium had thought of patenting French fries, it could have ruled the world and become fabulously wealthy. However, it’s doubtful Belgium’s powerful and envious neighbors: Germany, Britain, and France would have let tiny Belgium continue with this monopoly. It’s certain a long and bloody European war would have erupted. Thank good Belgians shared the recipe. The Great Global French Fry Peace broke out, marred only the interruptions of World War I and World War II. Yay, spuds.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Chocolate Cream Pie

Posted on December 11, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Dessert

CHOCOLATE CREAM PIE

INGREDIENTSChocolateCreamPie-

2/3 cup semisweet chocolate bits
8 ounces cream cheese
1/3 cup milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 9″ graham-cracker pie crust

whipped cream

SPECIAL UTENSIL

blender

PREPARATION

Use medium heat to melt chocolate bits in pot. Stir constantly. Add chocolate, cream cheese, milk, and sugar to blender Using “mix” setting on blender until thoroughly blended. Pour mixture into pie crust. Add whipped cream as desired.

TIDBITS

1) “How can you govern a country which has 246 varieties of cheese?” – Charles De Gaulle (French president) From the mid 1600s to the mid 1900s, France suffered from repeated uprisings, rebellions, and riots. The country also had a global empire for well over 200 years.

2) Ancient Romans so loved cheese that they had special kitchens, caerale, just for making cheese. Recurring civil wars convulsed the Empire for over 500 years. Rome also conquered all the lands around the Mediterranean and bit more.

3) The Western Roman Empire collapsed in 476 under the crushing weight of one barbarian invasions, barbarians who wanted Rome’s cheese. The Eastern Roman Empire fell almost a millennium later in 1453. Barbarian cheese lovers just couldn’t work up enough enthusiasm for the Eastern Empire’s limited cheese selection to make a really dedicated invasion.

4) Remembering the unbridled horrors of World War One and World War Two, world leaders got together in Paris, France, June 15, 1947, to form the World Cheese Organization (WCO.) The WCO has worked tirelessly ever since to ensure adequate cheese production and selection in all the nations. They know a country with good and plentiful cheese has no reason to invade its neighbors.

5) Robert Louis Stevenson (crackerjack writer) sums up humanity’s love for cheese when he said,”Many’s the long night I’ve dreamed of cheese – toasted, mostly.” Note, just in case, the WCO is also distributing cheese toasters to the all the people of this globe.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Lime-Chili Popcorn

Posted on December 3, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Appetizer

LIME-CHILI POPCORN

INGREDIENTSLimeChiliPopcorn-

1/4 cup popcorn
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon chili powder

SPECIAL UTENSIL

air popcorn popper

PREPARATION

Put popcorn in popper. Put bowl underneath popper’s opening. Keep bowl in place until all the kernels have popped. Sprinkle lime juice and chili powder into bowl with popcorn. Stir with long spoon or fork.

TIDBITS

1) There is moisture in each kernel. This liquid turns to steam as the popcorn heats up. Water cannot escape the kernel shell. Pressure builds up until the kernel explodes.

2) Popcorn dating from 3000 B.C. has been found in New Mexican caves. People were happy.

3) The first permanent income tax for the United States was established in 1913. Americans became cranky. We fought a bloody war in Germany from 1917 to 1918. We greatly expanded our navy.

4) Charles Manley developed the first good electric popcorn popper in 1925 and sold it to theaters. Americans became happy again. Our economy boomed. It was the Golden Age of Comedy.

5) The Great Depression struck in 1929. Harrowing economic hardships resulted in fascist dictatorships in Germany, Italy, and Spain. America kept its democratic form of government.

6) Why? Popcorn. Popcorn was one of the few treats millions of Americans could afford to eat while watching their beloved movies.

7) The recent and relatively peaceful break up of the Soviet Union occurred because of the easy accessibility of popcorn in contrast to its popcornless Revolution of 1917.

8) The Wampanoag tribe brought popcorn to the colonists for that famous autumnal feast in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The grateful settlers called the meal, “Thanksgiving.” We are still grateful.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Peanut-Butter Ham

Posted on December 2, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Entree

PEANUT-BUTTER HAM

INGREDIENTSPeanutButterHam-

2 cloves garlic
1 small onion
1/4 cup honey
1 cup smooth peanut butter
2 tablespoons brown sugar
3/4 teaspoon ground mustard
3/4 teaspoon orange zest
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon soy sauce
4 1″-thick ham slices (about 1 1/2 pounds)

SPECIAL UTENSIL

2 9″x9″ casserole dishes

PREPARATION

Mince garlic and onion. Add garlic, onion, honey, peanut butter, brown sugar, mustard, orange zest, pepper, and soy sauce to blender. Blend using liquefy or puree setting. Cut each ham slice into 4 pieces. Add peanut butter/honey mixture and ham pieces to casserole dishes. Thoroughly coat ham pieces in peanut butter/honey mixture. Marinate in refrigerator for 4 hours.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Put casserole dish in oven. Bake at 350 for 30-to-40 minutes or until ham is hot all the way through.

TIDBITS

1) Chef Paul gives Jones Soda his coveted “Best Tasting Ham-Flavored Soda Award” for its 2007 Christmas edition of ham-flavored soda. While not needed to win the award, the soda company went the extra mile and made this beverage kosher and caffeine free. Well done.

2) Indeed, 2007 Jones Soda displayed great culinary creativity. Its attention-grabbing Christmas pack included Sugar Plum, Christmas Tree, Egg Nog and Christmas Ham flavors. Its Hanukkah selection gave us Jelly Doughnut, Apple Sauce, Chocolate Coins and Latkes sodas.

3) In 2006, Jones Soda rolled out: Dinner Roll, Green Pea, Sweet Potato, Turkey and Gravy, and Antacid sodas for the holiday season. Clearly, this company can’t be ignored by soda connoisseurs.

4) “I have not yet begun to fight.” – John Paul Jones, September 23, 1779, naval battle of Flamborough Head. It is doubtful that the illustrious commander drank sodas during the battle.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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