Posts Tagged With: recipes

Salsa!

Posted on October 17, 2012 by pauldelancey

Mexican Appetizer

SALSA!

INGREDIENTS

1 large red tomato
1/2 onion
1/2 green chile
1 jalapeño chile
2 tablespoons fresh cilantro
3 avocados
1/2 garlic clove or one small one
1/2 teaspoon olive oil
1/2 tablespoon lime juice
2 tablespoons lemon juice
2 1/4 teaspoons cider vinegar
1/2 teaspoon oregano
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper

Makes 1 quart of delicious salsa.

PREPARATION

Dice tomatoes, onion, green chile, jalapeño, cilantro and avocados. Mince garlic clove. Mix these ingredients in large bowl with whisk. Add olive oil, lime juice, vinegar, oregano, salt, and black pepper. Mix again with fork or whisk.

Serve with tortilla chips, rolled corn tortillas with beans, or by itself.

This is a forgiving dish. It is easy to add more of any ingredient at any time to improve the taste. (No, don’t add lutefisk, noooooo!)

TIDBITS

1) Authentic salsa is always fresh.

2) Salsa is a type of music. Ketchup is not.

3) Salsa, the movie, was made in 1988 and directed by Boaz Davidson. Leonard Maltin gives it two out of four stars.

4) The Old Testament’s Book of Ruth has Boaz marrying Ruth after some cloak spreading. The movie, Story of Ruth, was made in 1960 and starred Stuart Whitman. Leonard Maltin gives it 2.5 stars.

5) Stuart Whitman was more well known for his movie roles as a cowboy such as in the 1961 movie, The Comancheros.

6) It’s unclear even after on-line search if Stuart Whitman liked salsa.

– 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-Stick Fajitas

Posted on October 14, 2012 by pauldelancey

Mexican Entree

FISH-STICK FAJITAS

INGREDIENTS

12 fish frozen sticks
2 garlic cloves
1 medium white onion
1 green bell pepper
1 yellow bell pepper
1 red bell pepper
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 teaspoons lime juice
1/4 teaspoon TabascoTM sauce
1 teaspoon red chili powder
1 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon coriander
3/4 teaspoon Seafood MagicTM spice
6 small flour tortillas
1/2 cup shredded Four Mexican cheeses

UTENSILS

No-stick frying pan
A lazy Susan, about 24 inches across, if you can find one.

PREPARATION

Cook fish sticks according to instructions on package. Use food processor to mince garlic cloves. Use knife to slice the onion and all bell peppers into rings. Then cut rings into fourths.

Pour vegetable oil and lime juice into no-stick frying pan. Cook on medium-high heat. Saute one at a time the following ingredients: onion, green bell pepper, yellow bell pepper, and red bell pepper. (Saute means to leap in French. You will leap too if the oil gets on you. Always be careful.) Put each ingredient in its own bowl. Put bowls on lazy Susan, again if you have one. Add more vegetable oil and lime juice if you run out while sauteing all the ingredients.

Whisk together in small bowl: chili powder, cumin, coriander, and Seafood spice. Apportion equally over the onion and bell-pepper bowls. Put an equal amount of TabascoTM sauce, about two drops in each bowl.

Heat each tortilla in microwave for 12 seconds. Put a tortilla with 2 fish sticks on each plate. Let the guests take as much of the onions and bell peppers as desired.

TIDBITS

1) Many believe Sonny Falcon operated the first fajita stand in Texas in 1969.

2) The word “fajita” entered the Oxford English Dictionary in 1971. Way to go, Falcon.

3) So, fajitas are not technically Mexican, but Tex-Mex.

4) TabascoTM sauce is not Mexican either. It comes from Avery Island in Louisiana and is used extensively in Cajun food.

5) The TabascoTM company was formed by the McIlhenny family, presumably not Mexicans, in 1868.

6) Mr. McIlhenny’s first instinct was to name it “Petite Anse Sauce,” but everyone else objected. Good for them.

7) Before 1863, the family made its fortune from the salt mines on Avery Island. However, in that year, Union soldiers destroyed the mines, leaving only a crop of hot peppers. Those peppers became the genesis of the TabascoTM company.

8) So, a lot of culinary good came out of the Civil War.

9) You should visit the TabascoTM factory on Avery Island. Don’t leave without going through the island’s Jungle Gardens, which boasts of a wonderful collection of flowers, birds, and alligators which can scoot as fast as 25 mph.

10) Only the alligators there scurry up to 25 mph. Don’t infer from the last sentence of 9) that flowers in Avery, Louisiana can move that fast. Flowers there and indeed everywhere else in that state are rather sedentary.

– 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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Tomato Drop Soup

Posted on October 11, 2012 by pauldelancey

American Soup

TOMATO DROP SOUP

INGREDIENTS

1 10.75 ounce can condensed tomato soup
10.75 ounces of any water from tap to bottles from Norwegian glaciers
1/2 teaspoon Vegetable MagicTM spice
1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cups Monterey Jack cheese

PREPARATION

Pour condensed soup in pot. (This is easy on a planet with gravity.) Fill empty tomato can with water. Pour water into pot. Sprinkle in vegetable spice and garlic salt. Stir and heat at medium-to-high temperature. Add the eggs as soon as the soup looks like it’s fixing to boil. For consistency’s sake, make sure you break the yolks after you put them in. Stir in the cheese.

Soup is ready to serve when egg yolks are done and cheese is melted. This is so easy. Try it.

TIDBITS

1) This dish is called “Tomato Drop Soup” because you could drop everything into the tomato soup base. I do not, however, recommend dropping the raw eggs into the soup at any great height. Hot soup does nasty things to your skin when it splatters onto you.

2) The cans listed at 10.75 used to be 11 ounces. They might have been 12 ounces at one point. Soup companies and canners in general often prefer to shrink their products rather than raise prices. Fine, but we recipe writers and readers hate this practice.

3) Now that I’m in a slightly foul mood, let me rant about the chickens’ complete inability to lay even the simplest of fractional eggs such as 1/2. I might have made this recipe with 1 1/2 eggs, but the lazy chickens pig-headedly lay entire eggs.

4) When my mother was a young girl, her mother raised chickens. Often Grandma would let the chickens peck for their own food in the backyard lawn. Since the grass was normally too high for the chickens, Grandpa would cut half the lawn one week, as that was all the lawn the chickens needed to inspect, and half the next week. Mom grew up thinking that’s how everyone mowed their lawns.

5) Once rain water got into the chicken feed. The feed fermented. The chickens ate the fermented feed. The chickens got drunk and staggered around, often falling. That would have been something to see.

6) I wonder if that counts as marinating the chickens.

– 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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Machaca Burrito

Posted on October 10, 2012 by pauldelancey

Mexican Entree

MACHACA BURRITO
(Allow 2 to 8 hours to prepare.)

INGREDIENTS

MARINADE

1/2 tablespoon soy sauce
1/2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoons water
2 tablespoons lime juice
2 garlic cloves
1/2 serrano chile
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon coriander
1/8 teaspoon Meat MagicTM spice
2 teaspoons peanut oil
2 teaspoons vegetable oil

COOKING THE MEAT

1 1/2 pounds skirt steak (Use flap steak if your butcher doesn’t have skirt steak. Don’t let your sweetheart catch you chasing skirt around town.)

1/2 onion
1/2 green bell pepper
1/2 red bell pepper
1 serrano chiles
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1/2 cup beef broth
1 7 ounce can diced tomatoes
1/4 teaspoon oregano
1/8 teaspoon cumin
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper

ASSEMBLY

5 large flour tortillas
5 tablespoons sour cream
2 1/2 tablespoons salsa
5 lime wedges
1 1/2 teaspoons fresh cilantro

PREPARATION

This is a dish that proves your dedication as a chef. Lots of ingredients and preparation, but lots of prestige as well. Go for it! Excelsior.

MARINATING STAGE (to be done up to 8 hours before cooking, if you have the time. This will improve the taste.)

Cut the skirt steak into 3 1-pound pieces; this is the traditional way. (The Powegian way is to immediately cut the steak into strips 1/2-inch wide by about 2-inches long. We Powegians have always been culinary rebels.) Mince the garlic cloves. Remove the stem and seeds, and insides of the serrano chiles. Mince the remaining outside of the chiles.

Combine the soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, water, lime juice, garlic, serrano chile, salt, coriander, meat spice, peanut oil, and vegetable oil in big mixing bowl. Put the steak strips in the bowl of marinade. Be sure to thoroughly coat each strip. If you can, completely seal the mixing bowl with a plastic wrap cover and refrigerate for at least 8 hours. (Omigosh, are you late for work? Run!)

COOKING STAGE (Takes at least 2 hours. Did you call in sick so you could make this dish?)

Meanwhile back at the range things are heating up. (Once again employment makes the marinating stage pass quickly. That’s why we go to work.) Dice the onion, red pepper, green pepper, and outsides of two serrano peppers.

Coat the bottom of a large pot with 4 tablespoons vegetable oil. Cook it at medium-heat until hot. Gradually add and sear strips of steak. (Searing means to quickly cook the surfaces of a piece of meat so that it will retain juices in later, slower cooking.) Put seared steak strips aside on a platter. Leave the liquid and any tiny bits of steak in pot for next stage. Don’t throw away flavor!

Add onion, red pepper, green pepper, and serrano peppers to same pan. Saute for 5 minutes. Add beef broth, tomatoes, oregano, cumin, salt, and pepper. Mix thoroughly. Add the marinated meat strips and juice to the pot. Heat at medium-high heat until it boils. (Kick out of the kitchen anyone who disagrees with your definition of boiling. You are the chef. You know.) Cover the pot and simmer for 2 hours.

If your skirt steak is still in three pieces, let it cool down on a cutting board. Now, using two forks or your fingers, shred the meat. Put the shredded steak back in the pot. Stir thoroughly and cook until most of the liquid has evaporated. (Unless, you prefer the Powegian style where the excess juice makes an excellent soup. Ah, Poway!)

ASSEMBLY STAGE

Warm the tortillas in a microwave. Put about 4 tablespoons steak mixture in the center top of the tortilla. Add, if desired, a tablespoon sour cream, a 1/2 tablespoon salsa, and a 1/2 teaspoon of diced cilantro. Take a lime wedge and squirt lime juice on top of the meat.

Fold in the tortilla’s two sides until they touch. Roll from the top of the tortilla down. Repeat this process 10 times and you will have 10 machaca burritos. And if you did recipe the Powegian way, you will have machaca soup as well. Olé.

TIDBITS

1) All recipes demand fresh ingredients such as fresh cilantro. But let’s face it, there WILL be times when you find your blood pressure soaring as you need to go back to the store for the 32nd time for another missing, fresh ingredient. Or worse, your sweetheart has gone shopping for those 31 times and is muttering about going to Home Depot to buy a stainless steel Lizzie BordenTM ax. In moments such as these, it is best to take a more relaxed view of cooking and reach for that small bottle of dried parsley.

2) Just remember one amount of a dried spice usually equals three amounts of fresh spice. This one bit of culinary knowledge has saved countless marriages and lives.

3) It’s also a good idea to scan each recipe all the way through for key words such as “marinade for 8 hours” or “simmer for 2 hours” and allot at least 10 hours for cooking. Do not, do not, try to butter your boss up for a raise with this dish and expect to start cooking an hour before dinner time.

– 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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Berbere Stew

Posted on October 9, 2012 by pauldelancey

Ethiopian Entree

BERBERE STEW

INGREDIENTS

1/2 medium yellow onion
1 garlic clove
1/2 russet potato
3 baby carrots
1 1/4 cups water
3/4 cup orange lentils
2 1/4 teaspoons Berbere spice mix (See recipe for BERBERE SPICE MIX INGREDIENTS, if you can’t find the     mix)
1 14.5 can diced tomatoes

PREPARATION

You will make your culinary life easy for yourself and everyone else within cussing distance if you soak your lentil beans before starting to cook. (It is a little known fiction that 37% of all aggressive dictators since 1738 ate unsoaked beans at one time or another.)

Anyway, there are two ways to soak your beans. The first way is the “quick soak” method. Soak lentils in 6-to-8 cups of water. Heat on high until water boils. Boil for 2 minutes. Turn off heat and cover for 1 hour. Drain and rinse. The second way is the “slow method.” Soak lentils in 6-to-8 cups of water for at least 6 hours. (This give you time to run marathons in record times with about an hour break in between.) Drain and rinse.

Peel and dice onion, garlic cloves, and potato. Dice baby carrots. Put water, lentils, onion, garlic, potatoes, baby carrots, bebere spice mix in soup pot. Cook over medium-low heat for about 20 minutes or until lentils soften. Stir periodically with increasing frequency as you reach the 20-minute mark.

Let me stress that the time necessary to soften lentils varies with the time it soaked beforehand and the temperature at which they are cooked. So it is quite a good idea and periodically monitor the softness of the lentils. (Too many business mergers have been stopped because one CEO made another CEO wait too long for unsoaked lentils to soften.)

Add diced tomatoes and heat at low-medium heat for another 15 minutes.

Serve in a bowl or over rice on a plate.

1) Cardamom, used to make the Berbere spice mix, costs about $60 a pound.

2) Many of today’s cars weigh about a ton and cost about $25,000.

3) The same car made from cardamom would run you about $120,000.

4) That’s before labor costs. Who knows how much it would cost to hire workers skilled enough to fashion cardamom into an internal combustion engine, tires, windows, steering wheels and all the fixin’s.

5) Saffron costs about $170 an ounce or about one-tenth the price of gold or four times the cost of silver.

6) Thank goodness, keeping up with the Joneses doesn’t mean owning a $5,600,000 saffron car.

– 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-Stick Tacos

Posted on October 7, 2012 by pauldelancey

Mexican Entree

FISH-STICK TACOS

INGREDIENTS

9 small fish sticks
1/2 medium onion
1 garlic clove
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon Seafood MagicTM spice
2 tablespoons butter
grated four Mexican cheeses
3 taco shells
1/2 cup lettuce
salsa is optional

PREPARATION

Mince the onion and garlic in a food processor. Melt butter in sauce pan. Add onion, garlic, cumin and fish spice. Cook on medium until tender. Be sure to throughly blend in the spices. Stir frequently enough to avoid burning.

Cook the fish sticks as directed on its package. Note that many large ovens take a longer time to cook than directed while smoke billowing out of your toaster oven will forcefully suggest that it cooks food somewhat faster than you expect. Fish sticks can go past your desired level of crispiness to cinders faster than kids unwrap presents on Christmas, so check on them often. In fact, it’s always a good idea to cook in an oven with a window. (Ugh. It sounds as if I want to you cook yourself in an oven. Or cook with a window. I meant to say, “… to cook your food in an oven that has a window.” For heavens sake.)

Put three fish sticks in taco shell. Top with desired amount of onion/garlic/spices mix, grated cheeses, and lettuce. Add salsa.

TIDBITS

1) My grandmother came from Sonora, Mexico, an inland province. I never even heard of fish tacos until a few decades ago. I suspect my grandparents and parents were trying to shelter me from something.

2) Don’t be tempted to pick those fish sticks off the searing-hot cooking tray with your fingers. You’ll only make that mistake once.

3) Fish sticks were supposed to have been made out of herring, but people preferred the blander cod.

4) Fish sticks are a popular item on children’s menus.

5) So are macaroni and corn. Fish sticks, macaroni, and corn comprise Kid CuisinesTM Deep Sea Adventure Fish Stick MealTM. Give your kids this when you and your spouse wish to go out on a dinner date. You’ll feel good about yourself knowing that you gave them a restaurant kids’ meal at a fraction of the cost.

6) Fish sticks were first called, “fish fingers.” “Fish sticks” makes more sense. But then again, “chicken sticks” makes more sense than “chicken tenders.”

7) According to the Codex Standard For Frozen Fish Sticks (Fish Fingers), Fish Portions and Fish Fillets – Breaded or in Batter,

“Codex Stan 166 – 1989

“2.1.1 A fish stick (fish finger) is the product including the coating weighing not less than 20g and not more than 50g shaped so the length is not less than three times the greatest width. Each stick shall be not less than 10mm thick.”

Whew! Thank goodness some governmental agency is looking out after somebody. I was worried that the fish stick industry was the Wild West.

8) However, the amount of mercury that may be eaten in fish is subject only to a federal advisory.

9) Mercury is no longer used in thermometers due the danger it presented to small kids who might break the fragile instrument.

10) Indeed, it is impossible to find a thermometer containing any type of mercury-carrying fish. This shows the fear the thermometer industry has toward even trace amounts of mercury.

Years of gainful employment may be no more for America’s big bird if Romney wins the election in November.

– 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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Cuban Stuffed Peppers

Posted on October 5, 2012 by pauldelancey

Cuban Entree

CUBAN STUFFED PEPPERS

INGREDIENTS

4 garlic cloves
1/3 medium onion
1 cup cooked rice
2 cups water

1/2 pound ground beef
1/2 pound ground turkey
2 teaspoons olive oil

1 14.5 ounce can diced tomatoes
1 7 ounce can diced green chiles
1/4 cup chicken broth
3 tablespoons tomato sauce
2 tablespoons oregano
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon coriander
1/2 teaspoon pepper

2 green bell peppers (3 total green peppers, 2 here and 1 below)
2 yellow bell pepper
2 red bell pepper (3 total green peppers, 1 here and 2 above)

1 green bell pepper

GUEST APPLIANCE APPEARANCES

microwave
microwavable dishes
sonic obliterator

PREPARATION

Mince onion and garlic cloves. Cook rice according to instructions on package.

Combine garlic, onion, cooked rice, beef, turkey, and oil in frying pan. Cook on medium-high heat until beef is no longer pink. Stir occasionally. Add in diced tomatoes, green chiles, chicken broth, tomato sauce, oregano, salt, coriander, and pepper. Bring to boil while stirring frequently. Reduce heat to low and cook uncovered for 15 to 20 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Meanwhile back at chopping board, cut the tops off 2 green peppers, 2 yellow bell peppers, and 2 red bell peppers. Scoop out seeds and white soft part of peppers. (Get rid of these seeds and all with your sonic obliterator.) Put as many bell-pepper halves in a microwave-safe baking dish. (You might need more than one such dish.) Add water to baking dish until water is level with tops of bell peppers. Fill the insides of the bell-pepper halves with water as well. Microwave for about 8 minutes or until bell-peppers are crisp-tender.

Remove peppers from baking dish and drain the water from them. Put equal amounts of meat mixture into and on top of each pepper half.

If desired, chop remaining green bell pepper into small strips for garnishing the filled bell peppers.

TIDBITS

1) Christopher Columbus brought cattle with him on his epic voyage of discovery in 1492. Cuba probably had cattle by 1493.

2) However, Hernando Cortez was the first to bring cattle to North America in 1519.

3) So, Cuba had a twenty-six year head start over North America in the race to develop the first hamburger.

4) The hamburger patty was developed in the German town of Hamburg in the early 1800s. The culinary world was indeed standing on a mountain gazing into the promised land of the hamburger.

5) German immigrants brought the hamburger patty to America. American can-do spirit applied itself and the first complete was first served at Delmonico’s in New York in 1826 or 1834 or perhaps even 1871 in San Francisco, depending on which historical research you trust. Culinary greatness had been achieved.

6) Oh sure, America has done bad things as well. Slavery, fill-in-the bubble tests, and long lines at the DMV come to mind.

7) Cuba has had its problems as well with slavery and dictatorship and although it didn’t discover the hamburger it can hold its culinary head high with its Cuban sandwich and this recipe’s dish, the Cuban stuffed peppers.

– 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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Garlic Potato Rice Soup

Posted on October 2, 2012 by pauldelancey

French Soup

GARLIC POTATO RICE SOUP

INGREDIENTS

1/3 cup rice
2/3 cup water

2 russet potatoes
1 red potatoes
2 garlic cloves
1/3 large yellow onion
1 2/3 cups chicken broth
1/3 cup water
1/3 tablespoon Poultry MagicTM Spice
1/6 teaspoon lemon pepper spice

UTENSIL

potato masher

PREPARATION

Cook rice separately according to instructions on package. While rice is cooking, peel russet and red potatoes. Cut both types of potatoes into eighths. Peel and mince garlic cloves and onions.

Put potato eighths, garlic, onion, chicken broth, water, Poultry Spice, and lemon pepper into large soup pan. Cook at medium-high for about 50 minutes or until all the potato eighths are completely soft. Mash the potatoes constantly until you feel no resistance. (No, there is no masher for human relationships. No. No! I said no.) Stir frequently. Add cooked rice to potato soup.

Supermarket potatoes cost almost the same whether you buy five pounds, two pounds, or just one microwavable tater. So, we all purchase the economical five-pound bag, leaving us with a lot of potatoes. This tasty recipe reduces your spud surplus wonderfully.

TIDBITS

1) The nutritious potato almost single-handedly kept European peasantry alive during the Thirty Years War in the 17th century.

2) Deadly nightshade is related to the potato. Unlike, its cousin, the tater, this plant is a deadly poison.

3) Which is why my recipes never include deadly nightshade.

4) Nor any other poison for that matter.

5) I do, however, use tomatoes frequently. Tomatoes are related to both the potato and deadly nightshade and were considered poisonous by American settlers in the late 17th century.

6) This fear by early colonials of the mighty tomato completely explains the lack of pizza parlors in early America.

7) Salem, Massachusetts became notorious for its Witch Trials of 1692.

8) In 1905, Lombardi’s in New York became the first restaurant licensed to sell pizza.

9) So, the Witch Trials delayed the licensing of American pizza by 213 years.

10) This explains resistance to capital punishment among many chefs.

 

– 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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Swedish Sliders

Posted on September 30, 2012 by pauldelancey

Swedish Entree

SWEDISH SLIDERS

INGREDIENTS

1 onion
1 parsnip
1 beet
3 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon olive oil

1 pound ground beef
1/2 pound ground pork
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 teaspoon capers
1/2 teaspoon ground mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon white pepper
1/2 teaspoon allspice

1 1/2 tablespoons cider vinegar
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 1/2 tablespoons butter

8 slices potato bread

PREPARATION

(Sweden is at peace with the world, but not with the culinary community as you will see.)

Mince onion, parsnip, and beet in food processor. Melt butter. Add olive oil. Saute onion, parsnip, and beet in frying pan on medium heat for about 5 minutes.

Put sauteed onion, parsnip, and beet in large mixing bowl. Add beef, pork, yolks, heavy cream, capers (diced), mustard, salt, pepper, and allspice. Mix thoroughly with fork.

Make patties about 1 1/2-inch to 2-inches wide. Melt butter in large frying pan. Add olive oil and cider vinegar. Cook on medium heat for 4 to 6 minutes or until done. Turn over every 90- to-120 seconds. (Be sure to use a spatula bigger than the patties as they are more “liquidy” in the first few minutes than a traditional American burger patty.)

Toast 8 slices of potato bread. Put a patty on one side of the bread, fold over the bread, and voilà, you have a Swedish Slider.

TIDBITS
1) How did the Swedes come up with idea of putting beets and heavy cream in hamburgers? I don’t know.

2) As far as I know the first Swede to put a beet in a hamburger patty did so in 1862.

3) Sweden has been at peace since 1862.

4) America’s first known hamburger was served sans beets in 1826 and has been beet free ever since. We’ve also had the Mexican-American War, the Civil War, Spanish-American War, two World Wars, Korean War, Vietnam, and two Gulf Wars. We are currently fighting in Afghanistan.

5) Might we not try making our hamburgers like the Swedes? All I am saying is give beets a chance.

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

Powegian Potato Soup From Fortcoming Cookbook

Posted on September 29, 2012 by pauldelancey

American Soup

POWEGIAN POTATO SOUP

INGREDIENTS

2 russet potatoes
2 red potatoes
2 garlic cloves
2 celery stalks
1 tablespoons olive oil
1 10.5 ounce can condensed cream of chicken soup
1 10.5 can filled with water
1/2 teaspoon Vegetable MagicTM spice
1/2 teaspoon parsley flakes
1/2 teaspoon chives

PREPARATION

Wash and peel all potatoes. (This isn’t all that fun. Do you have a ready source of labor such as a nine-year old boy around?)
Cut potatoes into bits no larger than an inch on any side. Mince potato bits and garlic cloves. Devein celery stalks of those long threads by breaking stalk in half and pulling off exposed silky threads. Minced deveined celery.

Put olive oil in frying pan. Add minced garlic and celery. Saute potato bits, cloves and celery at medium high for about 5 minutes.

Empty condensed cream of chicken into large soup pot. Fill empty cans with water and add to pot. Add minced potato, vegetable spice, parsley, and chives. Cook on medium heat for 5 minutes, then add sauteed garlic and celery. Stir frequently. Cook on warm heat for 55 minutes. Stir every minute or so to prevent burning.

TIDBITS

1) The wild form of celery is smallage.

2) I have trouble visualizing vast open fields filled from horizon to horizon with wild celery.

3) I don’t think settlers who traveled the Oregon Trail during the 1840s came across great vistas of wild celery.

4) Certainly, the Donner Party didn’t.

5) Parties often have celery sticks as appetizers.

6) The modern, party, celery stick was first cultivated in Michigan in 1874.

7) Which means most Americans forgot to celebrate the modern celery stick’s centennial. I know I did.

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

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