Posts Tagged With: ginger

Omelette Curry

Posted on March 14, 2016 by pauldelancey

Sri Lankan Breakfast

OMELETTE CURRY

INGREDIENTS – OMELETTECurryOmelette-

3 green chiles
1 large onion (1 medium onion later)
3 fresh curry leaves or 3 teaspoons dried leaf fragments or 3 teaspoons dried basil (10 leaves more later)
1½ tablespoons sesame oil (1 tablespoon more later)
6 eggs
1 tomato
½ teaspoon pepper 1/8 teaspoon more later)
1 teaspoon salt (¼ teaspoon more later)

INGREDIENTS – CURRY

½” cinnamon stick
¾ teaspoon grated ginger (½” whole ginger)
½ teaspoon fenugreek seeds
1 garlic clove
1 medium onion
10 fresh curry leaves or 10 teaspoons dried leaf fragments or 10 teaspoons dried basil
1 tablespoon sesame oil
2 teaspoons curry powder (not the same thing as curry leaves)
2 teaspoons chili powder
⅛ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon turmeric
½ cup water
1 cup coconut milk

SPECIAL UTENSIL

spice grinder

Makes 4 bowls. Takes 50 minutes.

PREPARATION – OMELETTE

Mince green chiles and onions. Add green chile, onion, 3 curry leaves, and sesame oil to pan. Sauté on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Remove green chile, onion, and curry leaves from heat. Add eggs to large mixing bowl. Whisk eggs. Dice tomato. Add green chile, onion, tomato, pepper, and salt. Mix with whisk until well blended.

Reduce heat to low. Add all ingredients in mixing bowl to pan. Fry on low heat for 10-to-15 minutes or until omelette is cooked to your desired level of doneness. Remove omelette. Cut omelette into squares. You get quite a bit of latitude in the size of your squares. 1″ perhaps?

(However, there is unanimity on the geometric shape. It has to be a square. What would happen if you cut the omelette into triangles? Would the Omelette Police come after you? Would the Earth’s surface convulse in earthquakes? I don’t know. Play it safe, make squares.)

PREPARATION – CURRY

While omelette cooks, grind cinnamon and ginger. Grind fenugreek seeds just long enough to crack them. Dice garlic clove and onion. Add cinnamon, ginger, onion, 10 curry leaves, curry powder, fenugreek seeds, and sesame oil. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Add chili powder, ⅛ teaspoon pepper, ¼ teaspoon salt, turmeric, and water. Stir with spoon until well blended. Simmer on low heat for 3 minutes. Stir occasionally. Add coconut milk. Simmer for 5 minutes or until curry starts to thicken. Stir occasionally.

Add omelette squares back into curry. Simmer on low heat for 2 minutes. Stir occasionally. Goes well with naan bread or rice.

TIDBITS

1) Omelette Curry is an an anagram for the illustrious Portguese navigator and explorer, Telemeo T. Crucy. Senhor Crucy rounded the Cape of Good Hope in 1486 and discovered the Indian Ocean by way of the Atlantic. Bartolomeo Diaz did the same in 1488. Telemeo also discovered India via this sea route in 1487. Vasco de Gama duplicated this feat twelve years later.

2) But Crucy the Explorer–the inspiration for Dora the ExplorerTM by the way–got no credit at all, no monuments, no cities, no holidays, not even candy bars named after him. What the heck? Why?

3) Because he was the first one to bring the spicy curry leaves back to Portugal. Of course, the King of Portugal, whose name is lost to us as I am typing in WordPerfect and I’d have to get out of WordPerfect and into my internet browser, by which time I would have lost my train of thought here and degenerated into writing long, rambling sentences.

4) It was João II. The king’s name was João II! I looked it up. Who knew?

5) Anyway, Big Joe, as the king was often by his adoring subjects, was the first to be served the curry leaves. Portuguese monarchs, by established right, got to taste every new spice first.

6) Which was a mistake in this case. No chef in the king’s kitchen knew how much curry to put in the king’s chicken noodle soup. So they guessed.

7) One cup was a bad guess. Big Joe fled the banquet hall. He wasn’t seen for days. But his moans were heard all over the castle. They still can. Even his ghost has yet to get over this tummy ache.

8) Things deteriorated rapidly. Big Joe started hating the world. He tripled taxes on the peasantry. The despising people called him João the Moaner. The Moaner stripped Telemeo of his titles and erased all vestiges of his name. Proper spicing is a must. May this cookbook help.

– 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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Ajam Roedjak (Sweet and Spicy Chicken)

Posted on February 22, 2016 by pauldelancey

Indonesian Entree

AJAM ROEDJAK
(Sweet and Spicy Chicken)

INGREDIENTS*AjamRoedjak-

2 pounds chicken breasts
2 garlic cloves
7 kemirie or macadamian nuts
3½ tablespoons peanut oil
½ tablespoon grated ginger
2 teaspoons grated galangal or grated ginger
½ teaspoon salt
1 15-ounce can coconut milk
1 bay leaf (Indian bay leaf, if you can find it.)
1 teaspoon sambal badjak, sambal oelek, or sriracha sauce
1½ tablespoons ketjap manis or soy sauce
1teaspoon palm sugar or sugar

* = I’m not being indecisive. Some of these ingredients can be hard to find.

Makes 4 bowls. Takes 1 hour.

PREPARATION

Cut chicken into 1″ cubes. Add garlic cloves and kemirie nuts to food processor. Blend the cloves and nuts into a paste. Add oil and chicken cubes to pan. Sauté for 5 minutes at medium heat or until chicken is no longer pink.. Stir occasionally. Remove chicken.

Add garlic/kemirie paste, galangal, ginger, salt to pan. Sauté for 2 minutes at medium heat or until paste begins to dry. Stir constantly. Add sautéed chicken cubes, coconut milk, bay leaf, sambal badjak, ketjap manis, and sugar. Bring to boil using high heat. Stir frequently. Cover, reduce heat to low and simmer for 35 minutes or until sauce thickens. Stir occasionally. Goes well with rice.

TIDBITS

1) Ajam roedjak is served in the U.S. Senate’s cafeteria and is, of course, an anagram for Jajk* Adam – redo. Jack Adam works for the federal government and is the one person who types the recently enacted laws onto the official form which is then transmitted throughout the land.

3) Unfortunately, Mr. Adam is often tipsy when typing in the new laws. This results in many mistakes, such as “Thou shall commit adultery.” Digusted lawmakers sent back the typo-riddled law form with the note, “Jack Adam – redo.” If Jack is still drunk, the laws get mistyped again and he gets another note. This continues until he is sober. This is why it takes congress so long to pass laws.

* = Jajk is a deliberate typo for Jack. Who says senators don’t have a sense of humor?

– 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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Speculaas (Dutch cookie)

Posted on March 26, 2015 by pauldelancey

Dutch Dessert

SPECULAAS
(Dutch cookie)

INGREDIENTSSpeculaas-

1¼ cups butter (2½) sticks
1⅓ cups brown sugar
1 medium egg
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoons ginger
1 teaspoon nutmeg
3 cups flour plus some to dust cookie mold

SPECIAL UTENSILS

speculaas mold, other cookie mold, or cookie cutters
electric beater
sewing thread
1-to-2 cookie sheets
1-to-4 glasses of mulled red wine
wine bottle for bopping oafs

Makes 18 cookies. Takes 15 minutes to make dough, to sit overnight in refrigerator, and maybe 1 hour to make the cookies, plus 15-to-20 minutes each time you put cookie sheets in the oven. You will get better and faster at putting the dough in the speculaas mold, trimming the dough with the sewing thread, and getting the dough out of the mold and onto the cookie sheet in one piece. While getting the hang of things, I say chill out and have some wine to calm yourself down. Note, the upper limit of drinks is for those who use speculaas or other embossed cookie molds. If you just plop down some dough, you only get one glass. There you go.

PREPARATION

Add butter and sugar to first, large mixing bowl. Mix using electric beater set on CREAM until butter/sugar mix becomes creamy. Add egg. Mix with electric beater set on CAKE until well blended. Add baking powder, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, and nutmeg to second, small mixing bowl. Mix together with whisk. Add spice mix from second, small mixing bowl and flour to first, large mixing bowl. Knead mixture until it forms a firm dough ball. Refrigerate dough ball overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Dust speculaas mold for each cookie. Press dough into mold. Gently trim all dough above the line of mold with sewing thread. The top of the dough should be flush with the top of the mold.

Turn mold over and rap it against the cookie sheet. The dough should come out easily and intact if the mold was sufficiently dusted with flour. If not, gently, slowly pull dough out of the mold. If it the shaped dough comes apart in only one or two spots, gently smoosh the pieces together with your fingertip. If someone happens to see this and makes a snarky remark, hit the oaf on its head with the wine bottle. Bake cookies at 350 degrees for 15-to-25 minutes or until cookies turn golden brown.

TIDBITS

1) The first weekend of September is the Redhead Festival in Breda, Netherlands. It started as a local photographer’s quest to find a redhead model. It soon got out of hand. Well, sort of. Redheads walk around seeing other redheads. They even celebrate the color red.

2) It could have so exciting. Why not really celebrate the color red by having tomato fights?

3) Or have ketchup wrestling. That would draw a big crowd.

4) Or have professional drivers race around Breda in red fire trucks instead of race cars.

5) Or let tourists do high diving into a pool of tomato soup.

6) Or hold a contest to build the highest pyramid out of red bell peppers.

7) Or have a contest to eat the most habañero peppers.

8) Or even celebrate ginger. Redheads are often called gingers.

9) Who wouldn’t want to enter a contest to see who could eat the most buttered ginger toast?

10) Go bowling with tomatoes. Professional tomato bowlers recommend a perfectly round. The flattish, not entirely round ones do not go as straight as the perfectly round ones. You’ll never knock down any pins with your tomato if it heads straight for the gutter. Oh, it must be said that the typical tomato has no finger holes as opposed to the standard three-hole bowling ball. This makes tomato bowling even more challenging.

11) Play golf with ginger root! Be careful not to hit your ginger in the woods. It blends in with the leaves. You’ll never find it.

12) Even better, play basketball with tomatoes! Given that tomatoes would make a big splat the first time the ball handler batted the tomato to the ground, fears of players getting away with uncalled double dribbles would be thing of the past.

12) Play football with tomatoes! Since tomatoes are so fragile, soft hands for the quarterback and receivers would be a must.

13) Stage your own bullfights. All you need is a red tablecloth and fast feet.

14) What about ten tons of tomatoes and a bulldozer? Revelers get five minutes on the machine, or fewer if they miss the tomatoes and run into a building.

– 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, humor, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Laotian Ginger Chicken

Posted on January 23, 2015 by pauldelancey

Laotian Entree

GINGER CHICKEN

INGREDIENTSGingerChicken-

3 garlic cloves
2 shallots
2½” fresh ginger
5 chicken breasts
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1½ tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons oyster sauce*
3 tablespoons soy sauce
3 tablespoons fresh cilantro

* = There is some debate about allergies and oyster sauce. There is also much discussion over substitutes for oyster sauce. The best substitute seems to be hoisin sauce. Some say to just omit the oyster sauce. The culinary community is a fractious one.

SPECIAL UTENSIL

Dutch oven or wok

Takes about 30 minutes. Makes 4 bowls.

PREPARATION

Mince garlic and shallots. Grate ginger. Slice chicken breasts into ½” strips. Add oil, garlic, ginger, and shallots to Dutch oven. Sauté at medium-high for 5 minutes or until garlic softens. Stir frequently. Add chicken strips. Sauté for 5-to-10 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink. Stir occasionally. Add honey, oyster sauce, and soy sauce. Cover, reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes. Stir occasionally. While chicken simmers, remove stems from cilantro. Garnish chicken with cilantro. This dish goes well with rice.

TIDBITS

1) Laos is the world’s most bombed country. There are entire spots in Laos that are off limits due to numerous unexploded bombs. Laos is also home to the King Cobra, one of the world’s most venomous snakes. Don’t wander off the beaten path!

2) Head instead in May for Laos’ Bun Bang Fai Festival, where villages vie for the best looking and highest soaring bamboo rockets. Can bamboo rockets be dangerous? Well yes, but not as much as King Cobras or 500-pound bombs. Besides the slight chance of bodily harm, the festival also features plenty of wonderful music, dancing, and parades You will have fun. You will come back.

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

Chicken Jalfrezi

Posted on June 6, 2014 by pauldelancey

Pakistani Entree

CHICKEN JALFREZI

INGREDIENTSChickenJalfrezi-

2 green bell peppers
2 green chile peppers
2 garlic cloves
1 onion
2 tomatoes
1.5 pounds boneless chicken
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 chili powder
1 tablespoon ginger
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon turmeric
3 tablespoons ghee (clarified butter)
1 teaspoon coriander
1 teaspoon cumin
½ tablespoon cilantro
basmati rice (optional)
naan bread (optional)

SPECIAL UTENSILS

deep skillet, Dutch oven, or wok
magic wand

PREPARATION – with magic wand

Wave magic wand and say, “Mumbo jumbo bumbo, make me chicken jalfrezi.” Poof! Your chicken jalfrezi will appear instantly.

PREPARATION – without magic wand

Seed bell peppers and green chile peppers. Dice bell peppers, chile peppers, garlic cloves, onion, and tomatoes. Cut chicken into 1″ cubes. Add oil, garlic, and onion to skillet. Sauté for 5 minutes at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add chicken, chili powder, ginger, salt, and turmeric. Cook on medium heat for 5-to-10 minutes or until chicken is golden brown. Stir frequently.

Add ghee, bell pepper, chile pepper, tomato, coriander, and cumin to skillet. Bring to boil over high heat, stirring frequently. Cover, reduce heat to low and let simmer for 20 minutes. Stir occasionally. Uncover and let simmer for another 10 minutes or until bell pepper is tender. Garnish with cilantro.

This dish goes well with basmati rice and naan bread.

TIDBITS

1) Magic wands are truly useful. You can make a million dollars, a new house or a fancy sports car appear with them.

2) Or you could use your wand to find your car keys.

3) Nervous people about to make a speech are often told to visually their audience dressed in their underwear. But what if the speaker is too shy to picture the audience so undressed. In this case, the best thing to do, the Good Samaritan thing to do, is to wave your crowd at the crowd and say, “Mumbo jumbo bumbo, let these people wear underwear only.” Poof, the audience will be in its undies. The speaker will gain courage from this and deliver a rip-roaring speech that brings the crowd to its feet and stirs it to action.

4) Since the speech is about recycling, everyone will soon be recycling. Land fills will no longer be needed. The land once set aside for landfills will now be used for farmland, new homes, and root-beer factories.

5) In fact, the audience from the speech will be filled with such fervor that it will make things just so they have more things to recycle.

6) This will be bad. Thank goodness for all those root-beer factories we built in tidbit 4). We will distribute its root beer to the teeming, frothing masses filled with recycling exuberance.

7) One sip of root beer, will calm the frenetic recycling masses. Serenity will be restored. A perfect balance between recycling and over recycling will be achieved. We will live in a new Paradise.

8) So, let these happenings be a cautionary tale to you. Use your magic wand wisely and be prepared for unforeseen consequences.

9) Well as much as you can be prepared for something that can’t be foreseen.

10) Indeed, the motto of the Boy Scouts is “Be Prepared” and they don’t even have magic wands.

11) Always buy new wands. You can never be sure how many spells are left in a used one.

12) After all, wouldn’t you be embarrassed if you tried to impress your dinner guests by summoning a tyrannosaurus rex and found you couldn’t wave it back into non-existence because you had no spells left on your wand.

13) Some of your guests would get eaten. Your surviving friends would leave your home in a huff and would most likely never speak to you again. Your dinner would be a disaster and your homeowner insurance rates would go up.

14) Of course you could have a two-ton bag of T-Rex ChowTM on hand in case this happens. But you’d only be kicking the can down the street. Eventually, the t-rex would just get hungry again. Yep, just stick to new wands or summoning only ice-cold mugs with your used magic stick, for goodness sake.

– 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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Qorma Laward (Afghan chicken stew)

Posted on May 6, 2014 by pauldelancey

Afghan Entree

QORMA LAWAND
(chicken stew)

INGREDIENTSQorbaLawand-

4 chicken breasts or 2 pounds chicken
3 garlic cloves
2 onions
2 teaspoons ginger
1 teaspoon lime juice
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons peanut oil or ghee (clarified butter)
½ teaspoon cardamom
½ teaspoon chili powder
½ teaspoon cinnamon
2 teaspoons coriander
½ teaspoon turmeric
½ cup water
1 ½ cups whole yogurt

PREPARATION

Cut chicken into 1″ cubes. Mince garlic cloves and onions. Put chicken, ginger, lime juice, pepper, and salt into large mixing bowl. Turn the chicken cubes until they are well coated. Place bowl in refrigerator for 1-to-2 hours.

Add 2 tablespoons peanut oil or ghee to large skillet or Dutch oven Add onion and garlic. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Add cardamom, chili powder, cinnamon, coriander, and turmeric (Goodness, there are a lot of spices starting with “c.”) Reduce heat to medium and sauté for 2-to-3 minutes.

Add yogurt, coated chicken cubes, and water. Stir with whisk or spoon until blended. Bring to boil on high heat, stirring constantly. Reduce heat to warm, to avoid curdling the yogurt, and simmer for about 30 minutes. Add water as necessary to keep the qorba lawand from drying out. Stir occasionally. Goes well with naan bread or rice.

TIDBITS

1) Naan is a palindrome. So is Anna. So is Anna’s Naan. A Santa Anna’s naan at NASA is an even more ambitious palindrome.

2) Sha Na Na is a famous American rock and roll band. It is also an anagram for Has Naan. Coincidence, perhaps?

3) A big maze stands between you and naan. Oh no, can you find the way?

You

maze

naan

– 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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Kabsa Spice Mix

Posted on April 3, 2014 by pauldelancey

Saudi Appetizer

KABSA SPICE MIX

INGREDIENTSKabsaSpice-

2 1/4 teaspoons allspice
2 1/4 teaspoons cardamom
3/4 teaspoon cloves, ground
½ tablespoon coriander
½ tablespoon cinnamon
½ tablespoon fennel
3/4 teaspoon ginger
½ teaspoon lime or orange zest
½ tablespoon pepper
½ tablespoon turmeric

Makes 4 2/3 tablespoons

Note: The above list of ingredient assumes the spices to be already ground. However, spice mixes taste better when using grinding your own spices. However, if you think the effort in tracking down ginger root, cardamom pods, cinnamon stick, cloves, and peppercorns might turn you into an axe-wielding murderer, please consider using already ground spices.

PREPARATION

Mix ingredients together with fork.

TIDBITS

1) Isn’t that the shortest preparation instruction you’ve ever seen?

2) William Shakespeare could have had the shortest resume ever. All he would have needed to write was, “I am available.”

3) The smallest country in the world is Vatican City with an area of 0.2 square miles and 770 permanent residents. This tiny nation is the spiritual center for over one billion Roman Catholics.

4) Monaco gets the silver medal in the small-countries event with an area 0.7 squares miles and 32,000 people. It’s ruled by Prince Albert II. This nation maintains its independence from France only as long as the princely line produces heirs. Last time I checked the good prince had not produced kids, much less get married. Get cracking, Albert.

– 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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Almond Pork Stir Fry

Posted on March 27, 2014 by pauldelancey

Chinese Entree

ALMOND PORK STIR FRY

INGREDIENTSAlmondChicken-

1 pound pork loins
½ red onion
2 scallions
½ cup blanched, silvered almonds
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 ½ tablespoons chicken stock
1 tablespoon sherry
1 teaspoon sugar
1 pound bean sprouts
1 teaspoon Chinese five spices
1/2 tablespoon freshly grated ginger

PREPARATION

Cut pork into ½” cubes. Dice red onion and scallions. Rinse bean sprouts. Add almond, red onion, scallion, and soy sauce to wok or pan. Sauté on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently.

Add pork, chicken stock, sherry, sugar, bean sprouts, Chinese five spices, and ginger to pan. Cook for 5 minutes on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until pork is no longer pink inside. (X-ray vision would be useful here. If you aren’t a super hero, it’s okay to slice open a pork cube and look.)

TIDBITS

1) In 1764, Spain worried about Russian encroachment on the west coast of America planted almond trees along El Camino Real (The Royal Road) from San Diego to San Francisco.

2) These trees did not significantly deter the Russian military which was generally equipped with ships, horses, cannon, and muskets.

3) The Spanish then tried planting all manner of cacti in Arizona. This failed as well. The Russians weren’t interested in Arizona and the cacti proved remarkably vulnerable to flanking maneuvers.

4) In 1769, the governor of California, Don Antonio Pico de Gallo, came up with the happy idea of building missions along El Camino and staffing them with priests and soldiers. The Russians saw that the price of conquering the Golden State would be too high and left.

5) President Clinton ate almonds at both his inaugurations. Some say he did this to send a message to the Russians, but it is more likely he just like to eat them.

6) Eat the almonds, not the Russians, for goodness sake.

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

Pumpkin Pie

Posted on November 28, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Dessert

PUMPKIN PIE

INGREDIENTSPumpkinPie-

2 eggs
1/4 teaspoon cardamom, ground
1/2 tablespoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon cloves, ground
3/4 teaspoon ginger, ground
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sugar
1 15 ounce can pumpkin mashed or puree
1 12 ounce can evaporated milk
2 8″-to-9″graham-cracker pie shell or 1 9″ deep dish graham-cracker pie shell
whipped cream for topping

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Add eggs, cardamom, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, salt, and sugar to large bowl. Beat eggs with whisk. Add pumpkin. Mix with whisk. Add evaporated milk. Mix again with whisk. Pour mixture into pie shell. Put filled pie shell in oven and bake at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Reduce temperature to 350 degrees. Bake an additional 40-to-50 minutes or until toothpick inserted into the pie’s center comes out clean. Cool on wire rack for 2 hours. Serve with whipped cream. Yum.

TIDBITS

1) Pumpkins are grown on every continent except Antarctica.

2) Morton, Illinois is the Pumpkin Capital. Go visit its Pumpkin Festival in mid September.

3) Pumpkin seeds have been used to remove freckles.

4) Linus from the comic strip Peanuts believed in the Great Pumpkin. See the lyrics for “I’m dreaming of the Great Pumpkin” and other pumpkin songs.

6) In 2009, motorcyclists in Nigeria wore dried pumpkin shells on their heads to circumvent laws making them wear helmets.

7) Irish lore says Stingy Jack was too miserly to get into Heaven. But Jack had tricked the devil so he wasn’t welcome there either. Jack roamed the darkness between Heaven and Hell with a lit, carved pumpkin. This is probably the basis for pumpkin carving on Halloween. That and freckle fear.

– 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

Simple Loempias (Indonesian egg rolls)

Posted on September 14, 2013 by pauldelancey

Indonesian Entree

SIMPLE LOEMPIAS
(Indonesian egg rolls)

INGREDIENTSLoempias-

1 inch ginger root (or 1 tablespoon ginger powder)
2 chicken breasts
1 large carrot
1/2 pound white cabbage or cabbage
1/2 onion
1 8 ounce can bamboo shoots
2 tablespoons peanut oil (3-to-6 tablespoons later)
1/2 pound bean sprouts
1 1/2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 egg
24 egg-roll wraps
3-to-6 tablespoons peanut oil

SPECIAL UTENSIL

spice grinder
electric skillet

PREPARATION

Grind ginger root in powder with spice grinder. Dice chicken, carrot, cabbage, and onion. Add ginger. chicken, carrot, cabbage, onion, bamboo shoots, and 2 tablespoons peanut oil to pan. Sauté for 5 minutes on medium-high heat or until onions soften. Stir frequently.

Add bean sprouts, and soy sauce to pan. Cook for 5 minutes on medium heat or until chicken is done. Stir frequently. Remove from heat.

Scramble egg in small bowl. Place one corner of an egg roll wrap toward you. Put 2 tablespoons of the chicken/veggie mix about 1/3 of the way up from the bottom corner. Fold bottom corner up until it covers the mix. Fold sides in until they touch the mix. Roll up wrap from the bottom. Spread some of the scrambled egg under and on top of the flap of the egg-roll wrap.. (This keeps it from unraveling.)

Put 3 tablespoons peanut oil in electric skillet. Heat oil to 350 degrees. Be careful putting eggs rolls into hot oil. (It’s a good idea to wear an apron, long sleeves, and hold the skillet top in your other hand while doing this.) Fry for 5 minutes or until spring rolls turn golden brown. Turn occasionally to ensure even cooking. You will probably need to fry in patches. Add up to 3 tablespoons peanut oil as necessary.
TIDBITS

1) Cabbage is an essential ingredient in this recipe. Cabbage also has a rich history in literature and culture as can be seen by the following quotes.

“Cauliflower is nothing but cabbage with a college education.”
– Mark Twain

3) “’Good worts! Good cabbage. Slender, I broke your head: what matter have you against me?’

– Shakespeare, The Merry Wives of Windsor

3) “Cabbage: a familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and wise as a man’s head.”
– Ambrose Bierce, A Devil’s Dictionary

4) “I want death to find me planting my cabbage”
Michel de Montaigne

5) “Idealist: One who, on noticing that a rose smells better than a cabbage, concludes that it will also make better soup”
– H. L. Mencken

6) “At middle age the soul should be opening up like a rose, not closing up like a cabbage”
– John Andrew Holmes

7) “Cabbaged” is the longest word that can be played on a musical instrument. It probably sounds awful.

8) Cabbage has been used by many for decades to ridicule America’s government. It goes like this:
Lord’s Prayer – 66 words
Ten Commandments – 297 words
Declaration of Independence – 1,335 words
Gettysburg Address – 271 words
Federal directive to regulate the price of cabbage – 26,911 words

Unfortunately  the bit about the federal directive isn’t true. There is no source for it. Sorry.

9) “ A good wife, rich cabbage soup, what more do you need?”
– Russian Proverb

10) “At middle age the soul should be opening up like a rose, not closing up like a cabbage”
– John Andrew Holmes

11) “Like warmed-up cabbage served at each repast, repetition kills the wretch at last.”
– Juvenal

11) “Cabbage, eww!”
– Little kids everywhere

– 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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