Crockpot Pulled Pork

This recipe ratio turned out tasting very good. There were a few changes to how I did this. The first being the lack of apple juice (one cup). I substituted one cup of unsweetened apple butter (made from winesap apples) plus one cup of water. Also, I didn't toss the cooking liquid from the crockpot, instead I reserved it to a pot and simmered it until it had the consistency of barbecue sauce again. This yielded 2.5 cups of sauce. The cut of pork that was used is called "country pork rib", and you can get this in a large multipack from Costco. It's the same cut style of pork that I use for my kimchi pork soup. The only onions in this batch is what is in the BBQ sauce.

Total prep/cooking time: 8 hours
Yields: 1 quart pulled pork (for 2 lbs of meat)

TheFoodening Blog - pulled pork

Ingredients

2-3 lbs boneless country pork rib

1 c unsweetened apple juice, or 1 c unsweetened apple butter plus 1 c water

4 garlic cloves, minced

1/4 c brown sugar

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

1 c BBQ sauce (I used Trader Joe's Kansas City BBQ sauce)

Directions

In the crockpot, place pork on the bottom. Cover with cloves, apple butter, brown sugar, salt, pepper, and barbecue sauce. Add the water to the bottom (don't wash off the stuff on top of the pork).

Set the crockpot to high for 2 hours. Then, set the crockpot to low for 4 hours. After the 6 hour mark, drain the crockpot of its liquid to a separate pot, leaving a half inch of liquid at the bottom of the crockpot. Cook pork for an additional hour. Turn off heat and use two forks to shred the pork.

In the separate pot with the cooking liquid, simmer the liquid on low heat until it has more than reduced by half of its liquid volume. It should be somewhat runnier than the barbecue sauce that went into it but thick enough that it isn't watery.

Take a half cup of the reduced sauce and pour it over the shredded pork. Stir to combine. 

If you made the hamburger buns from the previous post, split those in half and place a good amount of pulled pork on the bottom bun and cover it with the top bun. Enjoy!

TheFoodening Blog - pulled pork on a homemade bun

Note: If you don't have a crockpot or slow cooker, you can also use a dutch oven and bake the pork until tender for 4 hours at 325 F. 

Quick Hamburger Buns

Made this to go with the pulled pork. Don't let the dough rise. That's all I have to say. Although, it'll rise somewhat after shaping the buns as the oven heats up to temperature. The first batch, I have no idea what happened. It turned into some lumpy, soupy mess. But the second time around, the dough came together just fine. The order of operations certainly is a factor here. Onto the recipe...

From mixing to kneading to forming into buns to baking, the prep takes less than an hour.

TheFoodening Blog - hamburger buns

Makes: 7 buns (at 4 oz to 4.25 oz raw dough)

Ingredients

1 c warm water
2 tbsp active dry yeast
1 large egg
1/3 c olive oil
1 tsp kosher salt
2 tbsp + 1 tsp organic granulated sugar
3 cups all purpose flour + more for kneading
(optional) 1 egg + 2 tbsp water, for brushing tops of buns

Preheat oven to 425 F.

Directions

In a large mixing bowl, add yeast to warm water plus 1 tsp sugar. If the yeast does nothing within 10 minutes (e.g., does not foam or make bubbles), toss it out and try again with fresher yeast.

Add the oil, sugar, and salt. Let the mixture sit for 5 minutes.

Whisk in the egg.

One cup at a time, whisk in three cups of flour. By now the dough should be a little runny but smooth. Turn dough out onto a floured board and knead until it isn't sticky any more.

At this point between flouring the board and kneading, I may have added up to a cup more flour.

If you don't have a kitchen scale, divide the dough into six equal pieces. If you do have a scale, make 4 oz balls of dough. Place buns a couple inches apart on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Brush tops of buns with egg wash.

Bake for 10 minutes. Cool on a rack.

Note: if you divide the dough into 12 pieces, you'll be making buns large enough for sliders

Note2: It would appear this is the second time I've written this recipe up. Although, the buns came out really good and not small like what happened before.. 

Marinade for Mushroom Kabobs

Originally I thought about using this marinade for both the brown (cremini) and white mushrooms, but ended up just using the brown mushrooms with red and green bell peppers. I only have aged balsamic vinegar and it seemed a waste to use a tasting vinegar for a marinade so I used half balsamic and half rice vinegar for the vinegar part.

The Foodening Blog - grilled mushroom and vegetable kabobs

Makes: 9 skewers (using 10" bamboo skewers)

Ingredients

8 oz brown cremini mushrooms, stems trimmed
8 oz grape or cherry tomatoes
1 large red bell pepper, sliced into 1" pieces
1 large green bell pepper, sliced into 1" pieces
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, pressed
2 tbsp fresh parsley leaves, chopped
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried basil
Kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper, to taste

Directions

Combine all items in a resealable container. Shake to coat everything with the marinade. Refrigerate for an hour or until ready to use.

To grill:

Stab vegetables and mushrooms in an alternating order (for variety!). Grill vegetables for 10-15 minutes, rotating at the half way mark until the mushrooms are done. The bell peppers can be slightly charred.

Asian BBQ Pork Spare Ribs

This recipe tasted OK. How the pork gets cooked probably needs some work and/or tweaking as they came out a little tough to eat. Overall, from an aesthetic perspective, they looked great and social media post-worthy. I was looking to do something different than how pork spare ribs are traditionally served up, e.g., as dim sum small plate (steamed with black beans) or as grilled ribs with an Asian-flavored sauce slathered onto it.

The Foodening Blog: Asian BBQ Short Ribs

While I had a jar of hoisin sauce in the pantry, for once, I made hoisin sauce from scratch for this dish. You can get these short ribs at any Asian grocery store butcher counter. These were already cut to 1" - 1.5" size, and if you were going to make the dim sum short ribs recipe, you'd need these cut to the 1" size. Onward.

Ingredients

2-3 lbs pork short ribs

1/4 c white vinegar

2 tsp sea salt

Marinade Ingredients
1 tbsp hoisin sauce
1/2 c light soy sauce
1/2 c unbleached cane sugar
1/2 c ketchup
1/4 c lemon juice, or fresh juice from 1 lemon plus its zest
3 tbsp raw honey
1 tbsp fresh ginger, minced
1 tbsp fresh garlic, finely chopped

Garnish

2 tbsp white sesame seeds, toasted
green onion, white part (optional)

Directions

Start by bringing a large pot of water to boil with salt and vinegar. Add pork ribs, bring to a boil and cook for 20 minutes. Drain and set aside.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine hoisin sauce, soy sauce, sugar, ketchup, lemon juice, honey, ginger, and garlic. Whisk to combine.

Place cooked ribs in a large ziplock bag (or food storage container with a lid). Pour on the marinade and marinate for up to 6 hours or overnight.

Grill ribs until the ribs are slightly charred. -or- if using an oven broiler, broil meat until slightly charred

Hoisin Sauce (gluten free)

The secret to a good hoisin sauce is to use fermented black beans as one of the main flavor ingredients. Simply using peanut butter and other savory ingredients isn't going to cut it. While you can use a starch (potato starch, cornstarch, or wheat flour) to thicken it up, substituting the starch with peanut butter and using a tamari-based soy sauce makes this sauce gluten free. Also, you should probably use a smooth peanut butter, but alas, all I had on hand was chunky. I've read that if you have a peanut butter allergy, you can also substitute dried prunes (2 prunes per 1 tbsp peanut butter). If you do end up using peanut butter as a thickener, your sauce won't be pasty black at all. It'll be a brown-ish color, like peanut butter.

Hoisin sauce is a sweet and savory sauce, with neither element overpowering the other. And, it certainly does not use Chinese five spice powder. But, you could add it if you like that flavor in your sauce and the accompaniment is a meat-based dish.

At some point I reverse engineered Trader Joe's light soy sauce by experimenting with tamari soy sauce, rice vinegar and water until I got a sodium content that was close to Trader Joe's. You can also find that recipe here.

Makes: ~1/2 cup

Ingredients

1/4 c light soy sauce
2 tbsp organic peanut butter
1 tbsp raw honey
2 tsp rice vinegar
2 tsp sesame oil
1 garlic clove, minced
fresh ground black pepper, a few grinds
1 tbsp black fermented soybeans, rinsed and prepared
1 tsp chili sauce, or more to taste (e.g., Trader Joe's Sriracha or a sweet chili paste)

Directions

In a small bowl, soak fermented soybeans with hot water for about 5 minutes. Drain and then crush the beans with the tines of a fork. Voila. Now you have prepared fermented soy beans.

Whirl all the ingredients in a food processor until smooth. Put it into a lidded jar and refrigerate until ready to use.

Beef and Bean Burritos

I will probably not be making this as a lunch week batch any time soon, or maybe if I do, I certainly won't be eating them every day for lunch.. again. Filling but boring. My burrito wrapping skills, like most recipes that call for wrapping food in something else (e.g., tamales, zongzhi, dumplings, etc.) needs a lot of work. The biggest difference in taste, besides my inept wrapping skill, is that restaurant-quality burritos are typically served warm. You just can't slap together cold ingredients, wrap it up, and call it a burrito. I suppose you could, but it doesn't taste like effort went into it. Anyhow, I ended up making a week's worth of lunch burritos with this attempt.

The Foodening Blog: behold! a burrito in the making

Ingredients

12" flour tortillas
1 lb ground beef, seasoned and prepared
tomato-based salsa, any style
16 oz can of refried beans or salsa-style refried beans
1 to 1.5 c cheddar cheese, grated
sour cream, to taste
shredded lettuce, optional

Directions

If you're making this for lunch, toast the tortilla before assembling the burrito. If not, skip the toasting step.

Lightly toast a flour tortilla on a griddle, or otherwise flat-enough frying pan surface so that your 12" tortilla can lie flat and be heated up. Flip and toast the other side before it burns.

Preparing the ground beef

There are two ways to do this, the quick way (use a taco seasoning packet) with the ground beef before frying it up and draining out the oil. Or, the more authentic way and mix in spices (minced garlic cloves, chili powder, ground cumin) and taco sauce with the ground beef before frying and draining out the oil. Yes, for this step I cheated and used Trader Joe's taco seasoning packet. Aside from what's in the packet, you'll probably also note that a lot of my adapted Mexican recipes do not contain onions. This is on purpose. If you like onions with your beef, go ahead and use it. You'll need one cup of chopped onion per pound of ground beef.

On a plate, begin your assembly.

In the lower 1/3 of the flour tortilla, add the refried beans. This will be your liquid barrier between the tortilla and the rest of the ingredients. Spread the beans like the paste it is across the bottom third, leaving a 1" space to the edge of the tortilla.

Next, add 1/3 cup of prepared ground beef. Spread it around on top of the beans.

Top the meat with 1/4 c grated cheddar cheese, salsa, and garnish with 1 tbsp of sour cream.

You could add shredded lettuce to this step, but not if you intend to freeze the burritos. Lettuce freezes poorly and it'll be a soggy, terrible mess if you include it for not-eaten-same-day burritos.

Folding the burrito

If only I had read this before both writing and doing the recipe. 

Start rolling from the bottom-up, once you pass the filling part, fold in the right and left sides and continue folding up.

Not eating today? Wrap for later.

For each burrito, wrap it up in a sheet of foil large enough to house it. Use a marker on the foil to label what it is and when it was made. Put it in a resealable plastic bag, and freeze.

To reheat

This was interesting since I don't own a microwave, and it seems like a waste of energy to use the oven for one burrito. Let your burrito(s) thaw in the refrigerator. Pan fry on low heat in a covered pan. Make sure to check your burrito so that the tortilla does not burn. Burnt tortillas taste awful.

Baked Sesame Chicken

I envisioned something different. But alas, this is the best that it gets when it's baked and not deep fried. Visually, not terribly appealing. It tasted okay, but I don't think I'll be making this again any time soon. It does not even come close to the sesame chicken you'd get at a Chinese restaurant.

TheFoodeningBlog - Baked Sesame Chicken

Ingredients

2-3 lbs chicken body parts (drumsticks, thighs, wings, etc.)
1/4 c white sesame seeds, toasted
2 tbsp all purpose flour
1/4 tsp sea salt
pinch of fresh ground black pepper
2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
2 tbsp soy sauce 

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 F.

1. In a 9 x 11 x 3 baking dish, add soy sauce and tilt the dish so that the soy sauce covers the bottom evenly.

2. In a shallow dish, combine sesame seeds, flour, salt, and black pepper together. Dredge each chicken piece in the dry ingredients. Lay chicken in a single layer in the baking dish.

3. Bake for 40 minutes, or until the thickest part of the chicken measures 160 F on a meat thermometer. Remove from oven and serve hot.

Corn Chowder

What started out as a vegan recipe, turned into one not so vegan friendly. I don't usually stock vegetable broth since it's mostly just vegetables laced with onions that have been boiled in salt water for a period of time. Instead, I used beef bouillon as the broth base.

The Foodening Blog: Corn Chowder

Serves: 4-6

Ingredients

2 c vegetable or beef broth
1 lb organic cut corn, frozen or fresh
One 14-oz can of organic coconut milk
3 organic celery ribs, diced
1 yukon gold potato, diced
1 red bell pepper, diced
3 garlic cloves, chopped
1-2 tbsp olive oil or unsalted butter
1/4 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp celery seed

Quick beef broth:

2 tsp Better than Bouillon Organic Beef Base + 2 c hot water

Directions

In a medium stockpot, melt butter or olive oil over medium-high heat. Add garlic, celery, spices, and salt. Stir until the garlic has started to brown. 

Add the bell pepper, corn, potato and broth. Let this cook until the potatoes are fork tender, about 10 minutes.

Last, add the coconut milk. This might take some serious spooning as it is winter and coconut fat is solid at room temperature.

At this point you could reserved a cup of the vegetables. Use an immersion blender to turn the soup into a chunky chowder. And then, put the reserved vegetables back in.

Serve hot.

Garnish: fresh ground black pepper and/or minced chives

Canning 2016

One day I'll figure out an easier way to log this down. At the moment, I'm just copying a list of what got made on the Notes application of my smartphone with the hope that I remember to blog about it.

Here's what got made in 2016:

peach brandy, 1.5 pints refrigerated
strawberry-rhubarb syrup, 2 pints refrigerated

Extracts
lemon extract, 1 pint
chive flower-infused vinegar, 1 pint
blueberry-infused vodka, 1 quart
blueberry-infused bourbon, 1 pint

Salsas
Control batch salsa (jalapeno peppers), 5.5 pints
Hatch chile salsa (hatch chiles), 5 pints
Spicy salsa (Anaheim & jalapeno peppers), ... pints?
Harissa (dried chile negra, ancho chile, Calif chile), 1 pint refrigerated
La jiao jiang (hot chile paste), 0.5 pints refrigerated

Fruit butters/jams/preserves
Winesap apple butter, 6 pints
Peach bourbon jam (burnt)
Peach bourbon jam (normal)
Apricot-pineapple preserves, 1 pint, 3 half pints, 1 four-oz jar
Apricot-rosemary preserves, 3 half pints, 4 four-oz jars
Strawberry basil preserves, 5 half pints plus 8 oz refrigerated
Strawberry port wine jam, 5 half pints plus 8 oz refrigerated

Pickles/Pickled
Bread and butter pickles, 3 pints
Kimchi, 1 quart refrigerated

Slow Cooker: Stewed Pork Hocks

One way to add depth to any soup is to cook meat bones for a long time, say more than 6 hours. My parents would just cook this stove top for a couple hours, but I find that in these modern and subsequently lazier times, I would much rather start this in the morning and have it ready by dinner in the slow cooker.

It's quite a simple recipe and it makes a few things: a hearty meat stock that can be a base for other soups, a bone broth, and the pork itself can be chilled, sliced and served up with hot or cold noodle dishes. But, for me, I just like the meat and marrow part of the pork.

For those of you (like me) who had to look up what part of the pig the "hock" is, it's the part of the fore or hindquarters above the hoof and below the pig equivalent of the knee/elbow; as illustrated in this Wikipedia stub.

Ingredients

1-2 tbsp olive oil (if cooking by stovetop)
1 lb pork hocks
1 star anise
2-3 slices of fresh ginger, peeled
2-4 tbsp soy sauce
filtered water

To cook this by stovetop:

Brown the hocks in 1-2 tbsp olive oil (or any vegetable oil), add one star anise, a few slices of peeled ginger, 2-4 tbsp of soy sauce (depending on how salty you like it) and an amount of water that covers the hocks. Bring to a boil then simmer covered until the meat is tender, 1-2 hours. Be sure to check on the pot every so often so that the water does not boil all away.

To cook this by slow cooker / crockpot:

Place pork hocks (about a pound) in slow cooker, preferably in a single layer. Add a star anise (one is plenty of flavor per pound of meat), 2-3 slices of peeled ginger, 2-4 tbsp soy sauce, and enough water to cover the hocks. Cook on LOW for 8 hours.

If putting raw meat into a slow cooker is a concern, you can also brown the hocks before putting them in but this is not necessary and it means more stuff to wash.

Chicken and Dumplings

This recipe starts off as though making chicken stock with the addition of both the chicken parts and flour-based dumplings. I have omitted the onion part, but you could always put it back in. This is the second time I've made this recipe; though probably the first time I've taken a photo of the dish. I used 1 lb of chicken thighs (skin-on and bone-in) and 1 lb of chicken drumsticks.

TheFoodeningBlog - Chicken & Dumplings

Ingredients

1 tbsp olive oil
2 lbs chicken parts
sea salt
fresh ground black pepper

2 stalks organic celery stalks, diced
4 organic carrots, sliced
1-2 small onions, diced (optional)
2 tbsp fresh thyme leaves or 2 tsp dried thyme
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 bay leaves

1/2 c all purpose flour + 2 c stock (from the pot)

10 cups filtered water

Dumpling Ingredients

2 c all purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
6 tbsp unsalted butter, melted
3/4 c buttermilk
2 tbsp fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Directions

In a large pot or Dutch oven, heat olive oil and fry chicken parts in batches on medium-high heat, 5-6 minutes on each side. Remove chicken to a plate and reserve pot.

Add to the: celery, carrots, thyme, cloves, bay leaves. Cook over medium heat for 6 minutes until softened. Add chicken, bay leaves, and 10 cups of water.

Simmer for 25 minutes. Discard bay leaves and transfer chicken to a plate. Shred chicken and return to the pot.

Whisk 1/2 c all purpose flour with 2 cups of cooking liquid (stock), pour into pot and simmer for an additional 10 minutes.

To make the dumplings:

In a large bowl, whisk together 2 cups of flour, baking powder, baking soda, 1/4 tsp sea salt and 1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper. Stir in butter, buttermilk and parsley. Form into small balls or divide into 8 large spoonfuls.

Reduce pot to low and drop in the dumplings. Simmer covered for 15 minutes.

Serve hot.

Buttermilk Biscuits

I wish recipe sites would say what size biscuit cutter to use. I used a 2" cutter and these turned out enormous! And, also considering that it is raining today, I'd say that it is very humid and my biscuit dough was very sticky, so sticky in fact that I had a hard time even getting a layer to form. But, dusting the cutter in flour prior to cutting was a great help. With a 2" cutter this recipe ratio made 5 enormous biscuit-textured scone-like objects. I'm sure if I used the smaller cutter, it would have come out to be more like the 10 biscuits the original "grandma's recipe" suggests this yields.

TheFoodening Blog - Buttermilk Biscuits

Ingredients

2 c all purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 organic granulated sugar
6 tbsp cold unsalted butter
1 c buttermilk

Directions

Preheat oven to 450 F

1. In the bowl of a food processor machine, pulse together flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar, salt, and unsalted butter.

2. Add flour mixture to a large mixing bowl and add the buttermilk. Stir to combine but do not over mix.

3. On a silicone mat, use a silicon spatula to press dough down to 1/2" thickness. Use a biscuit cutter to cut the dough into biscuit rounds.

4. Place biscuit rounds onto a parchment paper-lined baking tray.

5. Bake for 10-12 minutes, or until lightly golden brown.

Serve hot and enjoy.

TheFoodening Blog - Buttermilk Biscuit with Peach Bourbon Jam

Small Batch Bread and Butter Pickles

Did you know that if you chopped these up in a food processor, you can make sweet relish?

As far as pickle recipes go, this is really easy. The secret to a crunchy pickle is the salt brine, or letting the cucumber's excess moisture drain out by using salt. This recipe ratio comes from the TasteofSouthern.com blog. I omitted the onion, of course. Also, my pickle slices are thicker because I don't like wafer thin, transparent pickles. It's a blue ribbon recipe so by default it should turn out great. :)

TheFoodening Blog - Bread & Butter Pickles

Ingredients

3  lbs pickling cucumbers, ends trimmed
1/4 c kosher or sea salt
2 c white vinegar
2 c sugar
1/2 c water
1 tbsp mustard seeds
2 tsp celery seeds
2 tsp pickling spice mix
1 tsp turmeric powder

Directions

1. Slice cucumbers and place in a large bowl and toss with salt. Let stand for 1-2 hours or overnight in the refrigerator (I did the latter for this batch).

2. Rinse the cucumbers and let drain in a colander until ready to use. Place as many as will fit into half-pint or pint jars. 

3. In a large saucepan, combine vinegar, water, sugar, mustard seeds, celery seeds, and turmeric. Heat to a boil. 

4. Pour vinegar mixture over cucumbers in jars.

If canning, process in a boiling water bath for 20 minutes.

If using as refrigerator pickles, cover with sterilized lids and bands. Let this cure in the fridge for several days before using.

Quick Buns for Sliders or Burgers

An hour or so before dinner, your friend says that he feels like grilling hamburgers but has neither hamburger buns nor tomatoes. Thanks to GirlVsDough, a beautifully warm day, and the first recipe title I stumbled upon with a quick Google search, I made these in just under an hour.

TheFoodening Blog - Hamburger Buns

I used a digital kitchen scale to divide the dough. The total mass was roughly 2 lbs, and divided by 12 would have yielded 2.67 oz per ball of dough. As laziness would prevail, some balls of dough were 2.5 oz while others were 2 oz 7/8 oz. The smaller balls could pass for slider buns, and the larger balls were just about the right size for a grilled average hamburger patty. I also didn't have any milk on hand so I watered down some heavy cream instead.

Note: if you do a lot of bread baking, I recommend picking up the 2 lb block of yeast from Costco. At roughly $4, it really brings down the cost of making bread. Plus, you can store 8 oz of it in the freezer in a freezer jar and some in a pint jar in the refrigerator. 

Ingredients

3 1/2 c all purpose flour, plus more for dusting/kneading
2 tbsp active dry yeast + 1 cup warm water (115 F)
1/4 c sugar
1/3 c olive oil, or neutral smelling vegetable oil
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp sea salt
1-2 tbsp sesame seeds (optional)

Egg wash (for making buns golden brown):

1 egg yolk
1 tbsp heavy cream
1 tbsp water

-or-

1 egg yolk
2 tbsp whole milk

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 degrees F.

1. In a 2-cup measuring cup, dissolve yeast in warm water, then add the sugar.

2. In a large mixing bowl, egg, salt and oil. Whisk together. Add yeast water. Add flour.

3. With a wooden spoon, stir to combine.

4. Turn dough out onto a floured surface and knead for 2-3 minutes. Weigh dough and divide equally by what you want to make:

3 oz = medium sized hamburger bun
2.5 oz = slider sized bun
If you chose the latter, one batch of dough will make 12 slider buns.

TheFoodening Blog - A classic hamburger with grilled bacon

5. Form balls of dough. To make a smooth surface on one side of the ball, bring all the odd edges of the dough to the center and pinch it together. Place folded side down onto parchment paper or a silicone mat. Let rest for 10 minutes. I didn't cover these and it didn't seem to matter. Also, my oven takes 10 minutes to heat up to 425 F.

5.1. If you are using an egg wash to make the buns a nice golden brown color, brush the egg wash onto the buns using a pastry brush.

6. Bake for 12 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool on a rack.

7. To use, simply slice each bun in half with a serrated knife (e.g., a bread knife).

Strawberry Shortcake

One of my favorite places to get dessert recipes is Southern Living magazine. Those southerners really know desserts. If only I could read and bake at the same time. The shortcakes would have tasted like little airy cakes if I had remembered to mix in the baking powder. Alas, these little pucks are a bit dense but still edible and presentable.

TheFoodening Blog - Strawberry Shortcake

Strawberry Layer Ingredients

a pint of strawberries, de-stemmed and quartered

1 tsp almond extract

up to 1/2 c organic granulated sugar

Shortcake Ingredients

2 3/4 c all purpose flour

4 tsp baking powder

1/4 c organic granulated sugar

3/4 c cold butter, diced

2 eggs

8 oz sour cream

1 tsp vanilla extract 

a batch of whipped cream

Directions

Preheat oven to 425 F

1. Combine strawberries, almond extract, and sugar (depending on sweetness of the berries) in a container. Shake covered until mixed and set aside for at least an hour.

2. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, sour cream, and vanilla extract. 

3. In a food processor, pulse flour, baking powder, sugar, and butter together until the mixture resembles crumbs with bits of butter.

4. Gradually stir dry ingredients into wet ingredients. Dough will be sticky.

5. Use a 1/3 cup measure to form little cakes. Place cakes 2" apart on a baking sheet.

6. Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until tops are light golden brown.

7. Remove from oven and let cool on a rack.

8. To make the shortcakes:

Cut the shortcake in half. On the bottom half, spoon 2 tablespoons of the strawberry mixture, followed by a dollop of whipped cream, and cover with the top half of the shortcake.

You can also make these shortcakes more adult by adding a tablespoon of a sweet wine or hard alcohol to the bottom half before you add the strawberries. I used the peach wine that I made earlier in the summer; though other alcohols that would be nice are muscat wine, bourbon, sake, gin, or rum.

Oven Broiled Chicken Thighs

Fire + Meat = Good

I would like to believe that adding fire to the cooking of meat somehow brings us back to our more primal nature of being apex predators with intelligence. Plus, I love a meat that bastes in its own fat.

The Foodening Blog - Broiled Chicken Thighs

A woman's alternative to not having a grill is using the oven broiler to achieve a similar effect. Charred meat (and peppers). Some nutritionists out there would have you believe that a single serving of meat is less than 4 ounces, without the skin. I suppose I should save the bones from this in the freezer to make broth later.

My simple gas stove/oven allows you to set the temperature of the broiler. Since I already roast chicken at 425 F it seemed like a good temperature to broil chicken at which is how I got to using that temperature for broiled chicken parts.

The most basic preparation is as follows:

sea salt and black pepper on both sides
squeeze of fresh lemon or lime (optional)

Broil bone side up for 10 minutes. Flip chicken over. Broil skin side up for 15 minutes. Let rest 5 minutes. Internal temp should be at least 160 F.

Kimchi Fried Rice

At least this time around I took a photo of the dish before devouring it. You could call it a two-ingredient recipe, even though it is really three if you count the butter I used to fry the rice with; or more if you include all the vegetables that make up kimchi. If you have made everything beforehand, this recipe comes together in less than 10 minutes.

The rice blend I use is of my own making. It's a 1:1 ratio of Trader Joe's Wild Rice (though, I suppose any wild rice will do) and Trader Joe's Brown Jasmine Rice; both of which apparently have naturally occurring inorganic arsenic in it. Who knew? Apparently, Consumer Reports did a study on the amount of arsenic in rice and it doesn't matter if it is organic rice or conventionally grown rice. I don't eat a lot of rice, but when I do eat it, I usually only cook a cup of rice at a time.

The Foodening Blog - Kimchi Fried Rice

Ingredients

1/2 c cooked rice, per serving
1/2 c homemade kimchi, per serving
1/2 tbsp unsalted butter or olive oil, for frying

Directions

Heat frying pan over medium-high heat until butter melts but does not start to turn brown. Add rice and mash around in pan until the grains have separated from each other. Add kimchi. Stir rice and kimchi around in the pan until evenly distributed. Remove from heat after 5 minutes, or until everything is about the same temperature; if your ingredients came from the refrigerator.

Serve hot.

Malted Milk Powder

This post has been brought to you by nostalgia. I grew up drinking malted milk as Olvaltine, and I enjoyed foods with malt in it such as the Whoppers candy and malted milk shakes. As an adult I consume a lot less sugar and as such, needed to figure out how this stuff was made in order to make it from scratch. Why make it from scratch? Because there are so many additives to today's malted milk powders. Just look at the ingredient list for Nestle's Carnation or Olvaltine. King Arthur has a cleaner ingredient list but it costs $10/lb.

I'm not terribly inclined to add wheat flour since it is primarily used as a thickener. This is just malted barley (whole barley berries that have been sprouted, dried, then ground into a powder) and dry milk powder. Also, this is not for making beer.

I got my organic barley grains Whole Foods's bulk aisle; though, you can certainly procure whole grains at any feed store or brewing supply shop.

How to Make Malted Milk Powder

This can be made from whole wheat or barley berries. For this experiment, I am using barley berries. You'll want to find unhulled berries because you want these to sprout. Do not use cracked, pearled, or hulled berries.

Sprout. Take 1 cup of dry grain and rinse it thoroughly in clean pure water. Soak it over night, or about 8 hours, in a 1 quart mason jar with a loose lid. Place a clean mesh lid on the top of the jar and strain out the soak water. Fill the jar again with pure water, stir and strain again. Drain. Rinse your jar of grains once a day. Watch for sprouting hairs after day one, it usually takes between 1-2 days depending on the room temperature.

Ferment. As the barley germinates, it starts to break down the starch into sugars. This is what gives malt powder its natural sweetness. If wild yeast is introduced as the barley is fermenting, the yeast will eat the sugar and convert the liquid to alcohol. You don't want the latter to occur.

Dry. Three possible methods of drying. Air/sun drying (requires 90+ degree temperatures for a few days), food dehydrator, or oven drying. This is to stop the fermenting process.

Air drying - spread moist, freshly sprouted grains on sheet pans in an even layer. Place pans in a dry, well-ventilated area. Dry for 18-48 hours depending on the humidity/temperature. If you are drying this outside, cover your grains with cheesecloth or food-safety screens to keep bugs/birds from eating it.

Food dehydrator - Set dehydrator to 115 F and dehydrate grains for 12-24 hours, or until the grains are dry.

Oven drying - Set oven to its lowest setting, between 150-170 F. Check for dryness in 8-12 hours.

When fully dry, the grains should weigh about the same as what it weighed before sprouting.

Grind. A this point, you are essentially making barley flour from sprouted, dried barley grains. You can grind these in a grain mill, food processor, or blender. You want it to a fine powder, with the granular consistency of say.. cocoa powder.

Storage. Store sprouted flour in an airtight container in the freezer or refrigerator. If using in baking, this can substitute regular flour at a 1:1 ratio.

Now that you have barley malt powder, you can blend it with dry powdered milk!

Here are some sweetened and unsweetened powder ratios.

Depression Era Malted Milk (ratio comes from backtobasicsgal blog):

6 tbsp barley malt powder
1/4 c granulated sugar
2 c powdered milk

Unsweetened Plain:

2 c instant dry milk, whole or nonfat
6 tbsp malt powder

Unsweetened Chocolate:

2 c instant dry milk powder, whole or nonfat
6 tbsp malt powder
6 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

To make one cup: add 1/3 c dry mix to 8 oz cold milk. Blend or whisk together. Sweeten to taste with sugar, honey, or stevia.