Repeated attacks of disabling giddiness

-UK driver's license application-

check out #9: "Repeated attacks of disabling giddiness".

Is that a thing? Really?

it's just been one of those days...

I tweet more than you on Facebook

Tonight's dinner: Roast pheasant over carrots-mushrooms-onions, and baked potatoes.

Jed asked a lot of questions about the pheasant - "Is that a mouth?" (no) "where is its mouth?" (with the head, which has been cut off) "Is that blood?" (yes, a bit) "Does it need a bandaid?" (not at this point, no)

barbecue time

Note: this is actually from summer, I meant to write more, never got around to it, so here you go.

I recently picked up a Weber kettle grill, and have been obsessively researching and planning barbecue-related stuff. I'm amazed how easy it is to use, especially controlling temps with the vents. Here's a couple photos of the pulled pork I made for my neighbor's birthday:

Pork shoulder, covered in dry rub and wrapped in cellophane

On the grill, about 4 hours in

The pork shoulder was from The Ginger Pig. Not only were they nice to deal with, but the sausage rolls there are incrrrrrrrrrrredible.

Chicken and matzoh ball soup

Fall is soup-time. Having the stove on for longer periods of time is much more enjoyable with the chilly weather, and the warm broth is great for getting the core body temperature up. 

matzoh ball soup: I tried making this using the recipe from Gourmet, and all I have to say is this: Muriel, that recipe is meshugge. (No, not the band.)

It says simmer the matzoh balls for 40 mins - i think these were ready in 10. Perhaps Muriel has much larger balls, but I dunno how she's making them any larger and still getting 25. I had to add more matzoh flour to even get the consistency of the dough right, given the amount of liquids, and I held back on the stock added to the dough.

Recipe modifications: I added chopped celery to the simmering water, and garnished with the leaves. Interesting note: picked up a bunch of "fenland celery" at the farmers' market, which is a darker green, stronger-tasting variety. Good stuff. I'm drying some of the leaves in the window now, and am considering trying to make celery salt.



Speaking of salts: I just figured out how to make garlic salt. For some reason, I had this idea that garlic salt was artificial in some way. Created in vats in New Jersey or something. Then while mashing up garlic in the mortar and pestle, i realized that I could probably just add salt to the garlic paste, and then when the salt had absorbed the garlic flavour, pull out the garlic bits, and voila. In retrospect it seems incredibly obvious and yet I'd never really thought about it before. So I made up a test batch and it seems to be working pretty well. 2 parts salt to one part garlic, seal up in a jar, shake occasionally.

Faversham Hop Festival

Apologies for the lack of posting. We've been enjoying the summer weather while it's here. For your enjoyment and edification - the Faversham Hop Festival and surrounding area.

 

 

Pasta machine

I've been wanting a pasta machine for a while; made a couple batches of filled pasta with a rolling pin, and, while that actually wasn't too difficult, I was told that a pasta machine could get much thinner sheets in less time than by hand. So I knocked the idea around for a bit, then saw a pasta maker on sale in a local kitchen shop and impulsively got it. I was surprised; the bit with the rollers seemed really light... Then I got home and decided to look up the make and model. Uhoh. Some reviews were okay, but there were enough people complaining about the build quality that I decided to take it back and get a more expensive but hopefully more durable one. I ended up ordering the Imperia SP150  from Amazon, and so far it's been pretty great. It feels really solid, comes with a pasta-cutter attachment for tagliatelle and spaghetti, and there's a bunch of other add-ons available - ravioli, gnocci, etc.

Flat-dough items created thus far: egg rolls, 2 kilos of veggie dumplings (yes, i weighed them), two versions of chorizo potstickers, broccoli and cheese agnolotti, red pepper tagliattle, whole wheat tagliatelle, egg noodles for a teriyaki stir-fry, and sweet potato ravioli.


Here's some of the veggie dumplings.

contents: radish, celery, parsnip, carrot, leek

Basically, you want to make a dough that is around 50% hydration and let that set for 20 mins to an hour. I do this by weighing out the dry ingredients, stirring them and making a well in the centre, resetting my scale, then adding the wet ingredients to the well, cutting them in with a bench scraper. when they're pretty well incorporated, i turn the mass out onto the counter, kneading it as little as possible, until they're in a ball. I then roll this out into a log shape, return it to the mixing bowl and let it sit.

For the red pepper pasta, i used a 50/50 mix of pureed red pepper and water. Even though the pepper was pureed, there were still bits in it that limited how thin i could roll the dough. With that in mind, i cut the noodles into tagliatelle instead of spaghetti, as i was worried about tiny bits of pepper clogging the cutter.

Best results would probably be obtained by using a juice instead of a puree. I'm looking forward to trying a squid-ink version.

• 240 g flour
• dash of salt (mix dry ingredients, reset scale)
• two eggs
• add water to the eggs until scale reads 120 g.
• stir together with pastry cutter, fork, or similar.
• let rest for at least 20 mins.

For the dumplings, I started by rolling out sheets of dough to the second-thinnest setting, cutting rounds out of them with a juice glass, putting a small spoonful of filling in the middle, and folding them over. Advantage: same shape every time. Disadvantage: cutting the rounds is an extra step, and if you wait too long, your dough can dry out. Then I switched to cutting the sheet of dough into squares, filling them, and folding them over into a triangle. This is a bit quicker, but I had a little difficulty cutting the squares all the same size, so there was slight variation in the finished product.

The fastest method is to roll out one long sheet, cut it in the middle, and put spoonfuls of filling at equally-spaced intervals across one segment. Then place the second segment over the first, sealing one side at the top, and work your way across and down, pressing around each spoonful of filling. Make sure to get all the bubbles out as you go; as you work around the filling, leave room for the air to escape.

This is much quicker. However, it works better when the filling is of a consistency that sticks together well, like with the sweet potato ravioli, than one that has more bits (like the dumplings), or has a lot of fluid, juice or oil (the chorizo potstickers). For those two, I find pre-cutting the squares or rounds works better.

Veggie Dumpling:

• carrots, leeks, onions, celery, radish, or whatever veggies you like
• rice wine vinegar
• soy sauce
• sesame oil
• red pepper
• dash sugar (optional)

The proportions are all going to depend on what you would like to put in the dumpling; i would suggest chopping the carrots and radishes into small bits, mincing the leeks or onions, and pureeing the celery, but that's just personal preference. With a juice glass that's around 3" in diameter, you're not going to fit more than a spoonful of filling in each dumpling, so the consistency will need to be fine enough to get a good mixture of all vegetables in there.

heat a saucepan, add sesame oil and a dash of red pepper. Add vegetables. Cook very briefly, stirring well. You don't want these cooked much at all, just enough to soften them slightly. They'll finish cooking when you boil/steam/fry the dumplings. Add equal parts soy sauce and vinegar; you don't need a whole lot, and remember that you don't want this mix too wet.

Transfer this to a plate, spreading it out to cool. Pop it in the freezer if necessary; you don't want to be scorching yourself and juggling dumplings if the filling is too hot.

Fill a few rounds at a time, pinching the sides together with your fingers. Carefully transfer them to gently boiling water. If you're going to pan-fry them, I suggest putting a splash of sesame oil and water in a saucepan, adding dumplings, then covering the pan before turning on the heat. as the pan heats, the water evaporates, and then the dumplings fry a little. Credit to Jen for coming up with this method.

If you're not eating these right away, transfer dumplings to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and put them in the freezer - 15-20 minutes, so that they're firm and no longer sticky, before moving them to a ziploc bag or plastic container.

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