Posts Tagged With: carrots

Curry Chicken Potjiekos From Namibia

Posted on December 4, 2022 by pauldelancey

Namibian Entree

CURRY CHICKEN POTJIEKOS

INGREDIENTS

2 garlic cloves
2 onions
2″ ginger root
3 pounds chicken, breast, thighs, or drumsticks
1 tablespoon butter
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1½ tablespoons curry powder
1 teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoon coriander
½ teaspoon nutmeg
½ teaspoon salt
½ tablespoon turmeric
2½ cups chicken stock
3 carrots
1 pound potatoes
1 bay leaf

SPECIAL UTENSILS (If difficult conditions are met)

potjie: this is a cast-iron pot with three legs and is the authentic for this dish. Order it online.
hot coals: The potjie’s contents are cooked over hot coals and firewood. Will your landlord mind?

ORDINARY UTENSILS (If, as likely, the above conditions aren’t met. )

large pot
stove

Serves 4. Takes 2 hours 20 minutes.

PREPARATION

Dice garlic cloves and onions. Grate ginger. Add butter, vegetable oil and as many chicken pieces as will without touching to pan. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until chicken browns all over. Flip chicken enough to ensure even browning. (You might need to cook in batches.) Remove chicken and set aside. Add garlic and onion to pot. Sauté at medium-high heat for 4 minutes or until garlic and onion soften. Stir frequently. Add curry powder, ground cloves, coriander, ginger, nutmeg, salt, and turmeric. Sauté at medium heat for two minutes. Stir frequently.

Return chicken to pot. Add chicken stock; enough to cover chicken. Cover and simmer at low heat for 1 hour. While pot simmers, dice carrots. Peel and cut potatoes into ½” cubes. Add bay leaf, carrot, and potato or until carrot and potatoes soften. Stir until well blended. Cover and simmer at low heat for another ½ hour. Remove bay leaf. Stir occasionally.

TIDBITS

1) Lots of famous people are named after foods and dishes,

2) And vice versa.

3) Here’s a partial list in alphabetical order of their food names.

Fiona Apple – Famous songwriter and singer. Composed and sang “Extraordinary machine.” When a recording company decided to not release one of her albums, her fans mailed the company apples until they release it after all.

Arnold Palmer – Great golfer. Gave his name to a lemonade-and-iced-tea drink.

Kevin Bacon – in many movies including A Few Good Men.

Shaun Bean – in many movies, including National Treasure and the BBC series Sharpe.

Halle Berry – in many movies including Monster’s Ball.

Brie Larson – in many movies including, Short Term 12. The doctor who delivered was Brita Larson and was a friend of my grandmother. I have visited Dr. Larson’s old farm in Sweden.

Hamilton Burger – D.A. on the show Perry Mason. Fictitious character with a great name.

John Candy – best known for the Canadian TV show, “Second City.”

Cherry Jones- in many movies including The Perfect Storm..

Rosemary Clooney – Chart-topping singer during the 1950s.

Tim Curry – in many movies, plays, etc, including Rocky Horror Picture Show.

Ginger Rogers – Great dance and actress. Starred in many movies with Fred Astaire.

Meatloaf – Born Marvin Lee Aday. Famous singer. Made Bat Out of Hell album.

Barry Pepper – in many movies including Saving Private Ryan.

Condoleezza Rice – Press Secretary of State, the second person to President George W. Bush

Tim Salmon – All Star outfielder for the California Angels.

Shirley Temple – Great actress. Ambassador for the US. Childhood acquaintance of my mother. Gave her name to a drink of grenadine, ginger ale* soda, and maraschino cherry. * = There’s a bit of controversy here. Some people insist that the soda is lemon lime.

Darryl Strawberry – All star right fielder for the New York Mets.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D. (but not with cell phones)

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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Hot Pickled Carrots

Posted on May 29, 2021 by pauldelancey

Mexican Appetizer

HOT PICKLED CARROTS

INGREDIENTS

1 pound carrots
1 small onion
2 jalapeno peppers or 6 ounces sliced
3 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon Mexican oregano or oregano
1 cup white vinegar or cider vinegar
1 cup water
2 bay leaves
½ tablespoon sea salt or salt
1 teaspoon sugar

SPECIAL UTENSILS

mandoline (optional, but so helpful)
2 3-cup Mason jars

Makes 4 cups. Takes 40 minutes preparation, 1 hour 30 minutes cooling to room temperature, and up to 1 day in refrigerator.

PREPARATION

Use mandoline to cut carrots into ¼”-to-½” thick diagonal slices. Use julienne blade, if possible. Use mandoline or knife to slice jalapenos into rings ¼”-to-½” thick.. Use mandoline to cut onion into ⅛” thick slices. Cut each garlic clove into 4 pieces.

Add vinegar and water to pot. Bring to boil using high heat. Add all other ingredients to pot. Let boil for 5 minutes. Stir until sugar dissolves, then enough to prevent burning. Remove pot from heat. Let cool for 1 hour 30 minutes or until contents, hot pickled carrots, reach room temperature.
Pour everything into Mason jars. Let sit in refrigerator for 1 day for best taste. They should keep for 1 week.

TIDBITS

1) To be “pickled” is slang for “to be drunk.” So, pickled carrots are drunken carrots. How do we know when carrots are drunk? Culinary patrolmen will tell you weaving while driving is a sure sign of an inebriation. Fortunately, drunk carrot driving remains quite rare as hardly any carrots attain the minimum driving age of 16.. Indeed, most carrots get eaten within days of being plucked from the ground. Another sign of a soused carrot is slurred speech. However, you really do need to listen carefully for this as carrots have tiny voices. Mostly, though, a drunken carrot resorts to giving people the silent treatment, which has proved to be a feeble defense against being eaten. And anyway, surly carrots are annoying. Just eat them. Show them you’re the boss.

 

Paul De Lancey, concerned citizen and Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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: international, observations | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Mulligatawny Soup

Posted on May 15, 2021 by pauldelancey

Irish Soup

MULLIGATAWNY SOUP

 

INGREDIENTS

2 carrots
2 stalks celery
1 pound chicken breasts
2 garlic cloves
1 medium onion
3 tablespoons olive oil
2½ tablespoons curry powder
2½ tablespoons flour
4½ cups chicken broth
1 green apple
⅓ cup rice
¼ teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon salt
⅔ cup cream

SPECIAL UTENSIL

Dutch oven

Serves 6. Takes 1 hour minutes.

PREPARATION

Dice carrots and celery stalks. Cut chicken into ½” cubes. Mince garlic cloves and onion. Add carrot, celery, garlic, onion, and olive oil to Dutch oven. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently.

Add chicken cubes, curry powder and flour. Reduce heat to low-medium and simmer for 3 minutes. Stir frequently. While chicken and veggies simmer, peel and core apple. Chop apple into ½” cubes.

Add chicken broth, apple cubes, rice, pepper, and salt. Bring to boil using high heat. Stir occasionally. Cover and reduce heat to low for 20 minutes or until rice is tender. Stir enough to prevent burning. Add cream. Simmer for 1 minute, stirring occasionally.

TIDBITS

1) When Ireland’s bunny population exploded in 1903, they ate up all the land’s carrots, celery, and apples. It became impossible to make delicious mulligatawny soup. This culinary disaster enraged the Irish. They turned concentrated this simmering anger on their foreign, British rulers. “When Ireland was Irish,” they said, “we always had all the ingredients to make mulligatawny soup.” Other resentments were brought up and from that year on, the Irish actively planned for independence.

 

Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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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Saudi Al Kabsa – chicken and rice

Posted on April 8, 2014 by pauldelancey

Saudi Entree

AL KABSA
(Chicken and rice)

INGREDIENTSAlKabsa-

3 pounds chicken breasts (or other parts)
2 carrots
5 garlic cloves
2 medium onions
3 Roma tomatoes
4 tablespoons butter
1/2 cup tomato puree
2 ½ cups water
1 ½ cups chicken stock
2 whole cloves
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons kabsa spice mix (See Kabsa Spice Mix recipe if you can’t find the mix.)
2 cups basmati rice (Do not precook.)
1/4 cup raisins
1/4 cup slivered almonds

Serves 6

SPECIAL UTENSIL

Dutch oven

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Chop chicken into 12 pieces. Grate or dice carrots. Mince garlic cloves and onions. Dice Roma tomatoes. Add garlic, onion, and butter to Dutch oven. Sauté garlic and onion on medium-high heat or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add chicken, tomato puree, and chopped tomatoes, Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Add water, chicken stock, carrot, cloves, nutmeg, salt and kabsa spice mix. Bring to boil using high heat. Cover, reduce heat to low and simmer for 30 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink inside. Remove chicken and bake for 25-to-30 minutes at 350 degrees or until it starts to brown.

Bring to boil. Stir in rice. Simmer for 30 minutes or until rice is tender and liquid is absorbed. Stir occasionally. Add raisins. Simmer for 5 minutes. Stir occasionally. Place rice on plate and top with 2 chicken pieces. Garnish with an equal amount of almonds.
TIDBITS

1) The Temple of Eve is supposedly located in the Saudi city of Jeddah. Cool.

2) Saudi Arabia is one of the driest countries in the world.

3) British humor is one of the driest in the world.

4) These tidbits are getting shorter, aren’t they?

5) Yes, they are. You can measure them.

6) Soon nothingness.

7)

8) And rebirth.

9) And so new, longer, vibrant tidbits come into being.

10) I feel like writing a haiku to tidbits.

11) Tidbits, o, tidbits.
Life was so sad when you were gone.
I’m glad you are back

12) Haikus are composed of three lines of five, seven, and five syllables respectively. They can evoke complex imagery within this restrictive space or they can display the elegant simplicity of the following effort:

Word, word, word, word, word
Word, word, word, word, word, word, word
Word, word, word, word, word

13) Speaking of using words to communicate information; all shops in Saudi Arabia are forbidden on Valentine’s day from selling anything red or with hearts on it. You may not wear anything red.

14) Movie theaters and beer are banned in Saudi Arabia. You must drive to Bahrain for these things, which depending on where you live could be anywhere from twenty minutes to twenty hours away. That movie had better be good.

15) And what if the beer you had made you sleepy and you fell asleep during the movie? That movie that took you twenty hours to get to? And twenty hours to get back?

16) If had to drive forty total hours for a beer, I would get the best, most expensive beer I could buy and really, really, really savor it.

17) And I would get gourmet popcorn for the movie. A giant tub of it.

– 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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Chicken Pot Pie

Posted on March 6, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Entree

CHICKEN POT PIE

INGREDIENTS – FILLINGChickenPotPie-

3 chicken breasts
3 medium carrots
2 stalks celery
1 onion
1 white potato
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup flour (6 more cups later)
1/4 teaspoon celery seed
1/4 teaspoon marjoram
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt (3/4 more teaspoons later)
1/2 teaspoon thyme
2 cups chicken broth
1 cup milk (1 tablespoon more later)

INGREDIENTS – PASTRY

6 cups flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup butter (softened)
1 pint water

1 tablespoon milk
1 egg

SPECIAL UTENSILS

Dutch oven
6 meat-pie pans (5″ diameter is best)

PREPARATION – FILLING

Cut chicken into ½” cubes. Dice carrots, celery, onion, and potato. Add onion and butter to Dutch oven. Sauté onion on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add 1/3 cup flour, celery seed, marjoram, pepper, salt, and thyme. Stir until well blended. Add broth and 1 cup milk. Bring to boil on high heat. Stir frequently. Add chicken, carrot, celery, and potato. Reduce heat to lower and simmer for 40 minutes or until carrots are soft. Stir occasionally. Remove.

PREPARATION – PASTRY

While filling is simmering, add 6 cups flour, salt, and butter to a second mixing bowl. Blend ingredients with whisk. Add water. Remove dough and knead on surface dusted with flour.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Let dough sit for 20 minutes. Divide dough into 12 balls. Use rolling pin on dough balls–A large can of soup will do. A stick of dynamite is way too risky–to make 6 circles with 8″ inch diameters. Flatten the remaining dough balls to make 6″ wide circles.

PREPARATION – PIE

Line each pie pan with an 8″ dough circle. Add filling to each pan. Moisten rims of pies with 1 tablespoon milk. (This helps to tops stick with the bottom pastry.) Place a 6″ dough circle on top of each pie. Trim away the excess puff pastry. Press edges of puff pastry onto rims of bottom pastry with fork. Beat egg with whisk or fork. Glaze tops evenly with egg.

Put pies in over. Bake at 425 degrees for 15-to-20 minutes or until golden brown. Spread ketchup over each pie. Have a nice cooling refreshment and enjoy. Press gang the least appreciative guest into cleaning up.

TIDBITS

1) H. G. Wells wrote the culinary-sci fi novel, The Thyme Machine, in 1903. It fared poorly, selling only three copies. Two of those copies were used to keep open windows during London’s August heat weaves. Some historians believe the third copy was placed under the short leg of an otherwise unstable table at a pub called The Copper Penny. The pub’s owner allowed customers to read The Thyme Machine with the understanding they replaced it before leaving the establishment.

2) The distraught novelist chucked his writing career and went to culinary school. He thrived there. He became a spice-using genius. In 1905, he opened up an upscale restaurant in one of London’s ritzy districts. It specialized in French cuisine and was called, Food of the Gods.

3) The wealthy soon flocked to the Food of the Gods. Everyone had to taste its scrumptious entrees, its divine desserts. It became so renowned that giant lines formed outside the restaurant’s doors. In 1907, Chef H.G. instituted a reservations only policy. This left thousands of aristocratic food lovers out in the culinary cold, to subsist on fish and chips. Just getting a reservation provided immense social prestige. In 1911, Charles Witherham garned a baronetcy from George V when he gave his time to the British monarch.

4) Tragedy struck in June, 1914, when the German nobleman, Hans von Frikadellen, stole the French ambassador’s 8 o’clock reservation at The Food of the Gods. The ambassador said German food was one boring pork dish after another. Frikadellen said the French didn’t know how to spice. Things went downhill after that and by July the two nations were at war.

5) Lots of nations joined in the kerfuffle. Millions perished during World War I . Naturally, H.G. Wells felt bad about that and invented a time machine and went back to 1895 long before his havoc creating restaurant opened.

6) Wells renounced cooking and went back to writing. He excised all culinary references in The Thyme Machine which became the more tighter, page-turning masterpiece, The Time Machine. The world would still go to war in 1914, but it wouldn’t be his fault.

– 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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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.

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

Vegetable Mafe From Senegal

Posted on November 2, 2013 by pauldelancey

Senegalese Entree

VEGETABLE MAFE

INGREDIENTSVegetableMafe-

1 small cooking pumpkin (1 cup)
1 medium onion
1 large tomato
1 turnip
2 brown potatoes
2 large carrots
1/4 head cabbage
1 cup fresh spinach
1/4 cup peanut oil
2 cups tomato sauce
1/2 cup water
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 cup smooth peanut butter

Makes 9 bowls. Takes 2 hours 30 minutes.

PREPARATION

Cut pumpkin shell into large pieces. Remove seeds and those gooey strings that go along with the seeds. Cut off edible pumpkin part from outer skin. Cut edible part of pumpkin into cubes no bigger than 1/2″. Mince onions. Dice tomatoes, turnips, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, and spinach.

Add onion and peanut oil to pot. Sauté onion at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add pumpkin, tomato, turnip, potato, carrot, cabbage, and spinach to pot one at time, sautéing for 1 minute on medium-high heat as each new veggie is added. Stir frequently.

Add tomato sauce, water, black pepper, and cayenne pepper to pot. Simmer on low heat for 1 hour 15 minutes or until veggies are tender. Add peanut butter to pot. Simmer for 10 minutes on warm-to-low heat. Stir occasionally. Goes well with rice.

TIDBITS

1) Pumpkins are a fruit. Who knew? They have been grown for 7,000 years. The first were grown in Central America. I grew a pumpkin when I was a kid, way too late to be the first grower.

3) Linus, of the comic strip “Peanuts,” believed in the Great Pumpkin. The Great Pumpkin would arise out of the sincerest pumpkin batch in the land and distribute gifts to all good children. Clink on the following link to hear Linus explain the Great Pumpkin.

4) You can make a lot of other dishes out of pumpkins, such as pie, cupcakes, bread, scones, French toast, ice cream, waffles, soup, curry, cheesecake, pasta sauce, chowder, muffins, cannelloni, stuffed shells, roasted pumpkin seeds, casserole, cookies, and stuffed pasta shells.

– 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-Beef Flatcakes From Tanzania

Posted on June 8, 2013 by pauldelancey

Tanzanian Entree

POTATO BEEF FLATCAKES

INGREDIENTSPotBeefFlat-

3 large brown potatoes
3 large carrots
1 green bell pepper
1/2 ground beef
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon coriander
1/4 teaspoon cumin
1 teaspoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons sugar

2 or more tablespoons vegetable oil.

makes 12 flatcakes

SPECIALTY UTENSILS

food processor
electric skillet

PREPARATION

Peel and mince potatoes. (A food processor helps immensely. Remember this when your loved one gives you that appliance for your anniversary.) Peel and mince carrots. Remove seeds and mince bell pepper.

Combine all ingredients except vegetable oil in large mixing bowl. The best way to mix this is with your hands. Sorry. (But there is an upside to having messy hands. When your sweetheart asks you to answer the door or the telephone you can say, “Sorry, messy hands.”)

Make patties that are 1/2 cup big. Put 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in the electric skillet. Set the skillet to 350 degrees. Put as many patties as will fit into the skillet. Flatten them slightly with spatula. Cook with lid on for 5 minutes or until the patty browns. Remove lid. (Oil splatters, may I suggest wearing an apron?) Flip patties over and fry for another 5 minutes. Remove batch and start another. Add oil as needed.

And “tasty” in Swahili is “kitamu.”

TIDBITS

1) The carrot is one happening biennal plant of the umbel family.

2) Eating too many carrots will make your skin turn yellowish orange, especially on the palms or soles of the feet. This is called carotenemia. This goes away completely once you stop eating them.

3) Ancient Greeks and Romans ate carrots. No nation or tribe could stand up to Rome’s scary orange soldiers. That’s the Roman Empire grew so big and lasted so long.

4) Ancient Greeks believed eating carrots made men and women more amorous. “Hey, would like to have dinner at the Carrot Auctioneer?”

5) Seems silly, no? But rabbits love carrots and we all know how fast bunnies reproduce.

6) Hippocrates thought women could prevent pregnancy by eating carrot seeds.

7) Current scientific studies suggest this might be true after all.. Eating carrot seeds after intercourse might prevent the egg from implanting.

8) Whoa.

9) The orange carrot was invented by cross breeding yellow and red carrots. I wonder if you can turn yellow by eating too many yellow carrots. Don’t rob a bank after doing this. The police find  with yellow palms easy to find.

10) Yay, carrots!

– 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 Wonderful Soup Recipe

Posted on April 20, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Soup

POWEGIAN WONDERFUL SOUP

INGREDIENTSWonderS-

2 carrots
2 celery stalks
2 medium onions
2 red bell peppers
1 cup fresh spinach
3 big tomatoes
1/2 cup raw, unsalted peanuts
1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup milk
2 cups vegetable broth
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon Jamaican All Purpose spice
1/2 teaspoon ground mustard
1 teaspoon parsley
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon tarragon
1/2 teaspoon thyme

SPECIAL APPLIANCE

spice grinder

PREPARATION

Mince carrots, celery, onions, red bell peppers, spinach, and tomatoes. Grind peanuts into powder. Add all ingredients to large soup pot. Cook on medium-high heat until soup boils. Stir frequently. Lower temperature to low heat and simmer with lid on for 40 minutes or until onion and carrot is tender. Stir occasionally.

TIDBITS

1) This Powegian soup has a rich tradition.

2) In late 1863, Annabelle and Clayton Morrison left Vicksburg, Mississippi for good. They had lost everything during the Great Siege even though they had resolutely taken no sides during the Civil War. The Confederate Army had requisitioned all their crops, all their livestock. The Yankees burned their home and all their buildings to the ground.

3) After the briefest of cries, Annabelle had told her husband she never wanted to see their accursed land again. But Where would they go?

4) “I’d like to go to California to grow carrots, celery, red bell peppers, spinach, tomatoes, and peanuts,” said Clayton,
“Why, I declare,” said his devoted wife, “when did you come up with this pla?.”
Clayton furrowed his brows for dramatic effect. “I’ve always wanted to grow all that.”
“I never knew,” said Annabelle. “Why did you never say anything about it.”
Clayton shrugged. “There’s a powerful lot of pressure ‘round these parts to grow cotton. Folks would have laughed at me if I had grown anything but cotton. King Cotton, hah!” He gestured to the burnt farms all around. “Annabelle, I need to go to California, where a man can grow whatever produce and herbs he wants and no one will think the less of him for it.
Annabelle nestled against her husband’s shoulder. “And so you shall. I’ve always wanted to catch a peak of the Golden State.”

4) And so, Annabelle and Clayton Morrison made their way west by wagon train. They faced floods, raging rivers, poisoned wells, and Apache attacks. Some of their fellow wagoneers turned back, but not the Morrisons. Fired by their vegetarian dream, they pressed on.

5) Finally, on May 5, 1864, they reached Poway, California. Their hearts soared at the valley’s majestic beauty. So did the flocks of bluebirds that flitted and swirled about them.

6) Months later they harvested a bumper crop of carrots, celery, red bell peppers, spinach, tomatoes, and peanuts. Annabelle wanted to provide a feast right there and then.

“Not yet, dear wife. I need to go to the port of San Diego. I’ll be gone a few weeks.”
“Land sakes, Clayton, two weeks, whatever for?”
Clayton smiled. “A surprise, a wonderful surprise.”

7) Two weeks later Clayton returned bearing fabric for new dresses for his love. She had not had a new dress in years. More importantly though, he had traded for: bay leaves, Jamaican All Purpose spice, ground mustard, parsley, sea salt, tarragon, and thyme.

Annabelle threw up her hands in delight. “Now I can make wonderful. I’ve already made mayonnaise and vegetable broth and I can borrow some milk from the Hendersons.”

8) Thus Annabelle, Poway’s great pioneer lady, made her soup. And it was indeed wonderful.

– 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, humor, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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