Posts Tagged With: potato

We’re French and You’re Not – Chapter One – Chardonnay Man – Part 1

Posted on May 31, 2022 by pauldelancey

CHAPTER 1–CHARDONNAY MAN

Mom and Dad never talked much about the visit of Robert and his friend Jean, but I still remember how my French heroes smashed into our propane tank, burned down our barn, and tried to drive away with Mom.

Their stay, while arguably bad for Mom, a nondescript, faded beauty of 5’ 5” who now looked like a Russet potato with red hair, and Dad, an incredibly typical Republican farmer, inspired me to court my Frenchwoman.

Her name was Yvette Airelle. She wore dresses instead of overalls, dyed her hair blue to match her eyes, and smelled wonderful on the days that she showered. Her Parisian parents had sent her to Wheaton High to learn English, but she just wouldn’t talk to us brutes from Wisconsin.

But she would, if I learned how to act French like Jean and Robert. But I could do that, for I had Robert’s slightly charred diary. It was a wonderful book.

At first, just picking it up would make me daydream about them. Later, its passages came more and more to resemble my life.

Yes, I remember picturing them at their favorite café sipping their champagne when . . .

* * *

“There he is, the Premier of Belgium! At this very café, at this very table! Monsieur Le Secraisin, I must act.”

“Monsieur le reporter, I too am outraged. He is sitting at our table. But how shall we get rid of him? Ah, he is eating pêche flambé.”

Fwoosh!

“You set the man on fire! The head of Belgium! They are taking him away.”

“Monsieur, have a seat. Our table just became available. Calm yourself. I, Robert Le Secraisin, am a much better interview.

“You, of course, wonder, ‘what makes me so wonderful?’ You notice my dashing good looks and effortless charm. But still you think, ‘But this is not enough. These qualities only make me one in a thousand. What makes me the center of everyone’s attention?’ Well, for the few who do not know me, I race balloons. Yes, I do this with such style for such a worthy cause. I race for wine!

“But yes, I am a splendid 38 year-old, and in just eleven days, I shall take to the skies for the honor of my venerable vineyard, ‘Le Cerveau Malsain,’ and my fellow ‘Lords of Fun.’

“My goal is to bring the first bottle of Chardonnay wine to the British market in the annual Chardonnay balloon race. I am most assuredly the best.

“Ho! ho! I will spend the prize money on the best wine, talk to my many admirers, and say pretty things to all the beautiful women who wish to be seen with me. Yes, my life is one that all people should have.

“Ah! Here is my good friend Jean Bouillonner. Jean, will you join us for some pêche flambé?”

 

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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Crabmeat Stuffed Avocados

Posted on April 16, 2022 by pauldelancey

Chilean Entree

CRABMEAT STUFFED AVOCADOS

INGREDIENTS

2 large avocados
6 ounces crabmeat
2 tablespoons minced bell pepper
2 tablespoons minced celery
2 teaspoons lemon juice
¼ cup mayonnaise
⅛ teaspoon pepper
¼ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon minced shallot or onion
4 leaves lettuce
6 olives

Serves 4. Takes 35 minutes.

PREPARATION

Peel avocados and cut them in half lengthwise. Remove pits. Add crabmeat, bell pepper, celery, lemon juice, mayonnaise, pepper, salt, and shallot to mixing bowl. Mix with fork until crab mix is well blended. Shred lettuce.

Arrange lettuce evenly over 4 plates. Fill avocado hollows with crab mix. Top avocado halves with neat little mounds of remaining crab mix. Cut olives in half. Garnish each avocado half with 3 olive haves. Place filled-and-topped avocado halves on shredded lettuce.

TIDBITS

1) The early peoples of Central America subsisted on avocados. The tribes living along the Pacific coast of South America lived on potatoes. Naturally, no one likes to eat only potatoes or even just avocados. So, soon a lively avocado-potato trade developed. Then culinary ingenuity propelled these peoples into a golden age with the harnessing of corn into tortillas. Before long a brilliant mind, Chef Ozomatli, constructed the first potato taquito with guacamole sauce.

2) This golden age didn’t last. Robbers ambushed the potato and avocado traders. To meet this threat, the great Aztec empire arose around Mexico. Its armies threw volley after volley of avocado pits at the heads of the robber gangs until the thieves broke and fled. The Incan warrior, however, was invulnerable in his suit of potatoes. These innovations were enough to maintain the great empires until the arrival of the musket carrying, metal-armor wearing Conquistadors.

3) In desperation, local chieftains attempted to attack the Spanish fleets by making canoes out of gigantic avocados. Unfortunately, crabs ate these vessels as soon as they put out to sea. Resistance collapsed. Spain would rule this corner of the world for 300 years. This dish commemorates the destruction of the avocado fleets by the crabs. So some good came out of all this turmoil.

 

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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Potato Sauerkraut Patties (Tierteg)

Posted on August 13, 2021 by pauldelancey

Luxembourg Breakfast

POTATO SAUERKRAUT PATTIES
(Tierteg)

INGREDIENTS

1½ pounds potatoes
1½ pounds sauerkraut
1 pound smoked turkey or chicken
¼ cup lard or butter

SPECIAL UTENSIL

potato masher

Serves 6. Takes 1 hour 10 minutes.

PREPARATION

Peel potatoes. Cut each potato into 8 pieces. Put potato pieces into large pot. Add enough water to cover potato bits. Bring water to boil on high heat. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about 20 minutes or until potato is tender. Drain potatoes. Mash potatoes with potato masher. Cut smoked turkey into ½” cubes.

Add mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, and chicken cubes to large mixing bowl. Mix thoroughly by hand. Use hands to make patties 4″ wide and 1″ thick. Add two teaspoons lard to pan. Melt lard using medium-high heat. Add patties to pan. (Don’t let them touch each other.) Sauté for 5 minutes or until bottom side turns golden brown. Flip patties carefully with spatula. Add 2 teaspoons lard to pan. (These patties are crumbly. Should they come apart, press separated pieces together with spatula.) Repeat for successive batches. Goes well with a friend who cleans up afterward.

TIDBITS

1) The above photo shows a domesticated potato sauerkraut patty. You may safely leaves these patties alone. It’s even safe to eat them and heavens, they’re yummy.

2) Never put feral sauerkraut patties on a plate. They’ll attack your fingers. And my gosh no, never leave them alone. They know what you have in store for them and they don’t like it one bit. The feral patty, in a whirlwind of activity, will destroy kitchen and then off and hide. At night, they’ll come out and nip your toes before leaving your home, never to be seen again.

3) If you must buy a feral potato sauerkraut patty, for Pete’s sake, buy a plate equipped with electrical force fields. The force field discharges an electric shock strong enough to knock out any patty that gets too close to edge of the plate. It takes but only three or four electric jolts to turn even the wildest patty into a reliably tame one. Get one online at http://www.CulinaryForceFields.com. They’re quite the nifty gizmo.

 

– 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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Llapingachos

Posted on January 27, 2021 by pauldelancey

Ecuadorian Entree

LLAPINGACHOS
(Potato Cheese Patties)

INGREDIENTS – POTATOES

½ small white onion (½ small onion more later)
2½ pounds russet or brown potatoes
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (additional ¼ cup vegetable oil later)
½ tablespoon achiote powder
3 green onions
¼ teaspoon salt (¼ teaspoon more later)
1 cup queso blanco, queso fresco, quesillo, or mozzarella cheese
¼ cup vegetable oil (or ¼ cup per batch)

INGREDIENTS – SALSA DE MANI

1¼ cups milk
½ small white onion (See? I told you it would show up again.)
1 cup smooth peanut butter
¼ teaspoon salt

SPECIAL UTENSIL

potato masher

Serves 4. Takes 2 hours.

PREPARATION – POTATOES

Dice ½ small white onion. Peel potatoes. Cut each potato into eight pieces. Put potato pieces into large pot. Add enough water to cover potato bits. Bring water to boil on high heat. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about 20 minutes or until potato is tender. Remove potatoes and let cool.

While potatoes and then cool, add 2 tablespoons oil, onion, and achiote powder to pan. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion softens. Stir frequently. Drain potatoes Mash potatoes with potato masher. Mince green onions. Add white onion, green onion, and salt to mashed potatoes. Mix with fork until well blended.

Form mashed-potato mix into 16 balls. Insert 1 tablespoon queso blanco into center of each potato ball. Close hole in potato ball and flatten slightly to make llapingachos. Add ¼ cup oil and llapingachos to pan. Heat oil using low-medium heat. Do not let llapingachos touch. Sauté for 7 minutes or until golden brown. Gently turn over once. Repeat for each batch.

PREPARATION – SALSA DE MANI

While potatoes cook and then cool, slice ½ small white onion into 4 pieces. Add this white onion and milk to pan. Simmer on low for 10 minutes. Stir frequently to keep milk from burning. Remove onion and discard. Add peanut butter and salt. Bring to boil using high heat. Stir frequently. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes or until peanut-butter sauce, salsa de mani thickens. Spread warm salsa de mani over llapingachos.

TIDBITS

1) Ever get deja vu? Like you read this recipe some twenty years ago? Or maybe you knew tonight’s dinner would be pot roast? Okay, maybe you knew that because today is Tuesday and you always have pot roast on Tuesday. But what about the time you saw Spiffy the Squirrel win the Boston Marathon and only you had known he’d win because you somehow had seen it happen a week ago?

2) Anagram scientists know now that deja vu is not merely a feeling but instead that alga, the stuff that grows on the surface on ponds, are trying to communicate to us from the future. It’s true! Fishermen, golfers, and politicians will tell you the same. Look at the name of this dish, Llapingachos” That word is an anagram for “alga phonics.”

3) In 2032, internet providers, locked in ever increasing competition search looked frantically for faster and faster ways of data transmission. On April 2nd , Timothy “Timothy” Harris, Ph.D and CEO. of Harris Labs dropped his cell phone in an alga-ridden pond. To his surprise, it still dried out instantly! It still worked! It even worked 38% faster than before! Timmy’s brain swirled with exclamations marks. He’d win a Nobel Prize! Then his phone stopped transmitting. The screen stayed on, but the wallpaper switched to pond scum. Dr. Harris slapped his forehead. But, of course, the alga now in his phone had dissolved and replaced its the precious metals. The phone would now only send forth images and concepts the alga understood.

4) Indeed the alga, relatively dim witted due to their single-cell existence and, to be frank, lack of any secondary education to speak of, couldn’t comprehend even the simplest text messages such, “lol” or “smh.” Clearly, alga needed to up their linguistic skills. But how to do this?

5) Timothy had another “aha” moment. Didn’t there, wasn’t there, a program called “Hooked on PhonicsTM? Did they ever make a version for alga? They had! It was still out there on EBayTM. Would this program work on specific single-celled organisms? It would! Harris Labs’ revolutionary cell phones took the communication world by storm. However, Dr. Harris feared industrial espionage and never wrote down the specifics of his invention. But how would he remember to process to make his phones? After all, he was scatter-brained after all.

6) Simple. For in 2033, he had a flash of insight. Could phonics-enabled alga send messages back in time to people’s brains if they were first coded in anagrams? Yes, yes, it proved to be so! Who knew? All you had to receive this message was to walk by a stagnant pond. So yes, whenever you experience deja vu, it is really coming from alga way into the future.

7) “Remember, alga phonics,” thought Dr. Harris. What was an anagram for “alga phonics?” Why no other than the Ecuadorian dish, llapingachos! The great scientist fed this word to his alga who keep forwarding the recipe back in time to us. This is why we keep hankering for this recipe.

– 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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Draniki (Potato Pancakes from Belarus)

Posted on June 3, 2015 by pauldelancey

Belarus Entree

DRANIKI
(potato pancakes)

INGREDIENTSDraniki-

1 small onion
6 medium brown potatoes
1 egg
¼ teaspoon pepper
½ teaspoon salt
up to 6 tablespoon vegetable oil
6 tablespoons sour cream (optional)
6 teaspoons dill (optional)

SPECIAL UTENSIL

Food processor

Makes 12 draniki. Takes 30 minutes.

PREPARATION

Mince onion. Peel potatoes. Use the side of a grater with the tiny raised holes to grate potatoes as fine and liquidy as possible. Oh gosh, don’t do it this all; it’s hell. Preserve your sanity, use food processor to mince potatoes to teeny, tiny bits.

Add potato, onion, egg, pepper, and salt to large mixing bowl. Blend well with whisk. Add 1 tablespoon oil to pan. Heat oil using medium-high heat. Oil is ready when a tiny potato bit will dance around in the oil. Add 1/12th, about ¼ cup, of potato/onion mixture to pan. Sauté with medium-high heat for 1½ minutes or until bottom of pancake is golden brown. (Lift pancake with spatula to see. X-ray vision works tool.) Flip pancake and sauté for another 1½ minutes or until the new bottom side is golden brown as well.

Repeat for each draniki, potato pancake. Add vegetable oil as needed. If desired, top each draniki with ½ tablespoon sour cream and/or ½ teaspoon dill.

TIDBITS

1) There are probably millions upon millions of people who would go to church more often if its ceremonies were, well, more exciting. If you belong to this group, why not head to Belarus for its Ivan Kupala festival? If your heart races at the sight of fireworks and the opportunity to leap over roaring fires, then this is the ceremony for you. It used to be a pagan festival, but it was taken over by church leaders and converted to a celebration of John the Baptist. It’s on July 6. See you there.

2) By the way, if you’re in line for confession, don’t bother offering to switch sins with the people around you. They will invariably look at you askance and edge away.

– 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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Fish and Chips

Posted on May 18, 2015 by pauldelancey

British Entree

FISH AND CHIPS

INGREDIENTSFishAndChips-

2½ pounds potatoes (King Edward or Maris if you can get them.)
1⅓ cups flour (3 additional tablespoons later)
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon sea salt or salt
1¼ cups (10 ounces) beer
2 cups peanut oil
5 cups (or enough to cover fish) vegetable oil
4 7-ounce cod, pollock, or haddock fillets
3 tablespoons flour
malt vinegar (to be added by guest)

SPECIAL UTENSIL

deep fryer

Makes 4 servings. Takes 1 hour 30 minutes
Note:: Cooking times vary a lot between fryers or with the amount of food you put in them, so you’ll need to check the fryer periodically.

PREPARATION

Peel potatoes. Slice potatoes along their lengths into ½” by ½” strips. Add potato strips to first bowl filled with cold water. Let soak for 1 hour to remove starch. Pat the potato strips with paper towels until the strips are completely dry.

This is important. If you leave moisture on your potato strips, then your chips, if you are British, or your French fries, if you’re American, will not turn out well and the Earth will leave its orbit and spiral into the Sun. Enough said.

While potato strips are soaking, add 1⅓ cups flour, pepper, and salt to large, second mixing bowl. Mix thoroughly with whisk. Add beer. Stir with whisk until there are no lumps and mixture has the consistency of whipping cream.

When the potato strips have only 15 minutes left to soak, pre-heat oven to 200 degrees. (You will be making this entree in batches. Put fried fish and completely done fries warm in oven until everything is ready.) Add peanut oil and vegetable oil to deep fryer. Heat oil to 275 degrees. Carefully add ¼ of potato strips to deep fryer. Fry potato strips for 5 minutes or until any of them start to brown. There are now officially French fries or chips. (Pauses for ceremony.) Remove chips from fryer, drain, and set aside. Repeat for each batch of potato strips.

Add 3 tablespoons flour to third bowl. Add fish fillets, one at a time to bowl. Turn fish fillets around until they are coated with flour. This flour keeps the batter from slipping off later. Add flour-covered fish fillets to mixing bowl with batter. Slowly turn fish fillets until they are thoroughly covered with batter.

Increase heat on deep fryer to 375 degrees. Carefully add fish fillets to deep fryer. Fry for 6-to-10 minutes or until batter is crisp and golden brown. Turn fillets two or three times with wooden spoon to ensure even frying. Remove fish fillets with slotted spoon and place on wire rack above plate and let drain.

Add partially cooked French fries to deep fryer for second time. Keep heat at 375 degrees. Fry French fries for 10-to-20 minutes or until they are golden brown and crispy. Remove French fries with slotted spoon and dry with paper towels.

Serve fish and chips and malt vinegar to adoring, appreciative guests. Dredge unappreciative guests through any remaining batter. You were cooking with hot oil, for goodness sake.

TIDBITS

1) Gratuitous Capitalizing of Words has not been allowed in English speaking countries since 1945. Indeed, World War II was fought to preserve our minimalist capitalization approach.

2) You see, Germany capitalizes all nouns. Germany wants the whole world to capitalize nouns. Why does Germany want all this capitalization? Who would benefit from this?

3) The German ink makers. Capitalized letters take more ink than small letters. More capitalized letters means more ink. More ink means more income for the ink makers. No German government from 1814 to 1945 was strong enough to resist the dictates of the German Ink Makers’ League, GIML. So, when GIML told their leaders to invade one country after another to open up new market for ink, their governments obliged.

4) Things looked bad for the minimal-capitalizing countries in mid1940. The British Expeditionary Force was trapped against the beaches of Dunkirk. If this force had surrendered, Britain, the last hold out against German Capitalizing aggression, would have had to give up all resistance.

5) Fortunately in 1940, a young physicist named Peter Sakes, was in a London pub waiting for his fish and chips. Boom! A gigantic explosion blew apart the kitchen walls. Hot cod and hot potato strips flew into the eating and drinking areas. Patrons ran screaming from the establishment. A light clicked in Sakes’ head. Perhaps the same process used to explode fish and chips could be employed to make nuclear fission. A nuclear bomb would surely stop the invincible German armies.

7) Prime Minister Churchill agreed and gathered all British scientists to develop the atomic bomb. Well, the whole thing took longer than expected; the heat from cooking oil proved insufficient to trigger a nuclear chain reaction. So the Americans came on board with their Manhattan Project and by August, 1945, had an atomic bomb to use on Japan.

8) The atomic bomb came too late to use on Germany which had already surrendered. However, the mere hope the bomb had brought to Churchill had given him to will to resist. We owe our freedom and our small-lettered nouns to Mr. Sakes and his idea. Here’s to him and fish and chips!

– 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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Iraqi Potato Beef Casserole (kibbe batata)

Posted on December 5, 2014 by pauldelancey

Iraqi Entree

POTATO BEEF CASSEROLE
(kibbe batata)

INGREDIENTSKibbeBatata-

6 medium brown potatoes
½ teaspoon turmeric

2 garlic cloves
1 onion
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 pound ground beef or lamb
3 tablespoons parsley
¼ teaspoon pepper
½ teaspoon salt

no-stick spray
2½ tablespoons butter
½ tablespoon cinnamon

SPECIAL UTENSIL

9″ x 13″ casserole dish
Serves 117 square inches

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Peel potatoes. Cut each potato into eight pieces. Put potato pieces into large pot. Add enough water to cover potato bits. Bring water to boil on high heat. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about 20 minutes or until potato is tender. Drain potatoes. Mash potatoes with potato masher. Add turmeric to pot. Use whisk to blend mashed potatoes and turmeric together.

While potato is cooking, mince garlic cloves and onion. Put garlic, onion, and vegetable oil in pan. Sauté at medium-high for 5 minutes. Stir frequently. Add ground beef, parsley, pepper, and salt. Cook on medium heat for 5 minutes or until beef is no longer pink.

Spray casserole dish with no stick spray. Cut butter into tiny cubes. Add ½ of mashed potatoes to casserole dish. Smooth mashed potatoes with spoon or spatula. Add ground-beef mix. Smooth ground beef. Add remaining ½ of mashed potatoes to casserole dish. Smooth mashed potatoes. Sprinkle tiny butter cubes and cinnamon over top layer of mashed potatoes.

Bake casserole at 350 degrees for 30-to-40 minutes or until top of casserole turns golden brown. Cut casseroles into squares, diamonds, or rectangles and serve to lovers of good food and friends of geometric shapes everywhere.

TIDBITS

1) This entree is Iraqi.

2) Iraqi food is great, however Iraqi is poor word for making anagrams.

3) You can use the word Iraqi to form the anagram “Qi air.”

4) Qi is a word that is only used in ScrabbleTM games. I don’t know what it means. I don’t play Scrabble anymore.

5) There is a persistent suspicion among culinary wordsmiths that wars and all types of fighting in that country occur to justify the use of the words Iraq, Iraqi, and Iraqis in Scrabble.

6) But what if Iraq were to split into separate countries?

7) Iraq and Iraqi would be taken out of the Scrabble dictionary.

8) And what if you had the tiles IRAQISW in your possession, and you could use the “q” for a triple-letter score and the entire word could be doubled?

9) And what if you were playing the leaders of the superpowers for world domination, the game was about to end because one of the leaders wanted to eat a lutefisk sandwich at the table, and the points from I1R1A1Q10I1S1 are enough to give you the game?

10) Well, you’d lose because Iraq wouldn’t exist anymore in Scrabble. You’d have to go back to your spouse in your tiny apartment who’d ask you where you’d been.

11) You’d say, “Honey, I’ve been playing the nations’ leader Scrabble for world domination.”

12) You’d be told, “Like I haven’t heard that one before. Did you get the milk like I asked you?”

13) A dark mood would envelop you. You’d head to KwikiMart thinking, “If I were the world’s dictator, I could send someone else out to get milk.”

14) On the way home, you’d realize that if Iraq were to split into three nations, the country of Kurdistan would come into existence.

15) What if you had the tiles K5U1R1D2I1S1T1S1 and you could place them in front of AN already on the board for triple K and triple word?

16) Why you’d win the game for sure! You’d be the Earth’s El Supremo. You’d have a milk fetcher on your permanent staff. Chocolate malteds anytime you want! World domination is great!

17) Did you keep the phone numbers of the world’s leaders? Great. Be sure to get those honey-mustard potato chips that Madame President likes.

– 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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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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Blackened Potato Crisps From Ghana

Posted on July 2, 2013 by pauldelancey

Ghanian Entree

BLACKENED POTATO CRISPS

INGREDIENTSBlackPotatoCr-

2 brown potatoes
3 clove garlic
2 tablespoons honey
1 tablespoon cayenne
3 tablespoons fresh ground ginger
1 tablespoon salt
3 cups oil

SPECIAL UTENSIL

electric skillet
food processor with thinnest slicing disk

PREPARATION

Wash potatoes. Use food processor to make thinnest possible potato slices. Dice garlic. Put potato slices, garlic, honey, cayenne, ginger,and salt into mixing bowl. Mix ingredients with hands until spices coat potato slices.

Put oil in skillet. There should be enough to cover potato slices. Heat skillet to 375 degrees. Put one potato slice in skillet. Oil is hot enough when the slice starts to dance around. Carefully put potato slices in hot oil. (Getting splattered by hot oil hurts quite a bit. May I suggest using the skillet lid as a shield between yourself and the oil?) To ensure even and crispy cooking, make sure none of the potato slices touch each other. You will most likely need to cook the potato slices in batches.

Fry each batch at 375 degrees for 7 minutes or until the slices become crispy. Remove slices with spoon with holes in it. Put slices in bowl. Remove remaining oil with paper towel. Repeat for each batch.

Promote world peace with this bit of culinary diplomacy.

TIDBITS

1) Nanotechnology is the latest rage in science.

2) Scientists hope to use nanotechnology to solve all sorts of tiny problems using tiny devices that are maybe a nanometer, one-billionth, meter wide.

3) I am going to make my culinary name with nanocuisine. Entrees, such as, coq au vin, would be made as small as a nanometer wide.

4) Nanocuisine would provide great opportunities for fusion cuisine. I could create a fish taco/cheese-egg salad/ salad Niçoise/paella/sauerkraut/ ham and cheese omelette,suaasat/lasagna,kung pao chicken/doro wat dinner with ease.

5) Indeed with nanocuisine most dishes would be mere molecules wide. I could easily make a dish that combined every appetizer, every soup, every salad, every entree, and every dessert.

6) So, I will cook the first truly global fusion dish.

7) The Nobel Cuisine prize cannot be far behind.

8) I just need to find a food processor that makes nanometer-thick slices.

– 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: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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