Preserving Roasted Hatch Chiles

It seems that either canning roasted hot peppers is so commonplace, like making bread, that everyone knows how to do it or doing so without a pressure cooker isn't safe to do so. At any rate, I couldn't find a canning process on the net that actually tell you how to preserve the summer's bounty of hatch chiles. I can't possibly be the only Pacific Northwesterner who enjoys seasonal fruits and vegetables outside of growing seasons. These are great with nachos and cheese.

Wikipedia suggests that the Scoville scale of these peppers ranges from 0 (unlikely!) to 70,000 (more likely). I de-skinned and de-seeded the roasted chiles without gloves and so far no problems. Not like that one time I rubbed my eyes after handling cayenne peppers. Oh the agony!

2015-09 Roasted Hatch Chiles

Prepare the Hatch Chiles (or Anahein, Jalapeno, or whatever hot chile pepper you have)

Five Spice Powder Roasted Chicken

This came out decent and a tad undercooked in the thigh area; more or less edible straight from the oven. This is adapted from my dad's roast duck recipe. If I do this recipe again (the first time I never wrote it up), I'll have to try the slower roasting method. Most poultry roasting recipes call for 50-60 minutes of unadulterated time in a very hot oven, with temps ranging from 400 degrees F to 450 degrees F. A slow roast would involve dropping the oven temp to 275 degrees F but increasing the time to roast to 3-4 hours. That would definitely not be a weekday meal unless I started it on a weekend.

Ingredients

1 whole fryer chicken, cleaned and giblets removed

2 1/2 tsp Chinese five spice powder
4 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp red Chinese rice wine
2 tbsp organic granulated sugar
3/4 tsp kosher sea salt
1 c filtered water

Directions

Place chicken breast-side up into a 9" x 13" baking dish (or roasting pan, if you have one).

In a bowl, combine five spice powder, sugar, salt, soy sauce, rice wine, and water.

Use a spoon or basting brush to cover the chicken (all sides) with the five-spice sauce.

Roast for an hour in a pre-heated oven at 400 degrees F.

Remove from oven and let rest for 10 minutes before carving.

Spicy Tomato Salsa

This batch came out a lot spicier than last year's and it is likely that I wasn't paying attention to actually reading last year's recipe write-up. Because I also picked up some hatch chiles from the produce market at the same time as the tomatoes, I thought I might reserve some of the tomatoes for another salsa recipe using the hatch chiles as I was already mid-recipe. I ran out of pint jars so I only made 6 pints.

What's different between last year and this year's salsa? I left the seeds in the jalapenos, and there's half as many tomatoes in this batch.

Yield: 6 pints (canned) + 1 quart (refrigerated)

Ingredients

12 green jalapenos, stemmed but not seeded
8 tomatilllos, husk removed and quartered
5-6 lbs ripe Roma tomatoes, quartered, not peeled/seeded
2 green bell peppers, stemmed and seeded, diced
2 heads of garlic, cloves removed and roughly chopped
1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
juice of 2 limes (4-5 tbsp)
2 tbsp kosher salt (without anti-caking additive)

Directions

Process in batches, a few pulses at a time with a food processor machine, all the ingredients except for the cilantro, lime juice and salt. Last year's salsa was processed into a sauce-like consistency. This time, it's a bit more chunky.

Empty roughly chopped batches into a large stockpot. Add lime juice, salt, and cilantro.

Cook for 1.5 hrs, or until the desired consistency is achieved.

I used a slotted spoon when filling the pint jars for canning. The quart or so of salsa leftover had a lot of water.

I processed the jars in a boiling water bath for 20 minutes.

I'm not sure this will last until next summer. I have already polished off a quart of salsa and gave away one jar. Looks like I may have to procure more of everything. :) :)

Kitchen Notes: Everything Pumpkin

Last year's T-day desserts featuring pumpkin were clearly winners: pumpkin pound cake and the pumpkin roll with candied ginger in the cream cheese filling. Here's a listing of all the pumpkin recipes-to-date on this blog:

pumpkin pie spice
pumpkin spice scones
pumpkin fried rice
pumpkin bread with yogurt
pumpkin bread with tofu
pumpkin soup
pumpkin pound cake
pumpkin roll with candied ginger
pumpkin spice latte
pumpkin muffins
pumpkin cranberry biscotti

Should kabocha squash be included in the pumpkin recipes? After all, it is pumpkin-like in shape, cooking methods, and color. If so, here are those recipe links:

Spicy Sweet Roasted Kabocha Squash
pumpkin potage

With the autumn season close by, pumpkins will soon be available at local farms and the produce market. Here are some recipe ideas that I'll be toying with for this year's T-day:

Southern Living's Pumpkin Chips (deep fried)
Pumpkin Butter
Pumpkin Cornbread
Pumpkin Bread Pudding
Serious Eats' Pumpkin Liqueur

Gluten-Free Zucchini Muffins

I feel like I am contributing to California's water shortage by encouraging the use of almonds in recipes, or the desolation of coconut groves in the Philippines by using coconut flour. Nonetheless, here is another egg-heavy coconut flour recipe. The coconut oil and vanilla are not in this recipe. I simply forgot to add it. Let this be a lesson to you.. don't bake when tired, really! Things get missed.

Makes: 12

Ingredients

1/2 c organic coconut flour
1/4 c almond flour
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
4 large eggs
1/3 c raw honey
1 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp coconut oil
1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 ripe banana
1 c shredded zucchini
1 shredded organic carrot (optional)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

1. In the bowl of a food processor, combine almond flour, coconut flour, nutmeg, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt. Add eggs, honey, vanilla, and coconut oil. Pulse until combined.

2. If you happen to be using a frozen banana, thaw it then lop off the stem and squeeze the banana out into the bowl. Add apple cider vinegar, banana, and zucchini. Pulse to mix thoroughly.

3. Line a muffin tin with silicone or paper muffin liners. Fill each liner with 1-2 tbsp of mixture.

Bake for 20-25 minutes. Cool and enjoy.

These came out looking really dark and not smooth on top.

Blackberry Basil Seltzer

This version of the seltzer is more colorful than the strawberry one and can be served in short glass. Refreshing and light on the palate, this is another drink for a summertime dinner party.

For each serving:

1/4 c blackberries
2-3 basil leaves
1 tbsp syrup sweetener (agave, honey, or simple syrup)
seltzer or sparkling water
crushed ice

Directions

In a glass, add ingredients and squish together with the back of a spoon. Add ice and fill glass with seltzer water. Enjoy.

Strawberry Basil Spritzer

This summer, the sun has been awfully harsh with wanting to be in the sky for 16 hours at a stretch. At least the solstice has passed and the days are starting to get shorter. This beverage can be kicked up a couple notches with the addition of vodka, but is good enough on its own without alcohol.

Ingredients

4-5 organic strawberries, washed, stemmed and halved
8 basil leaves, coarsely chopped
1 oz simple syrup (equal parts sugar and water, boiled and reduced by half)
juice from 1 lime
club soda or sparkling water
3 oz vodka (optional)

Directions

In a pint jar, combine strawberries, basil leaves, simple syrup, and lime juice. Let chill until ready to use. Scoop out 1-2 tablespoons of the mixture per serving, into a tall glass with ice. Add enough club soda or sparkling water. Stir briskly then serve.

Watermelon Coconut Ice Cream

I'm not sure this even qualifies to be an ice cream since it lacks dairy as a main ingredient. This is something else to do with the watermelon that is ultra-low in calories and high in awesome. I could easily polish off a watermelon by myself. Watermelon granita is how I enjoyed it last year. This summer, I think I can start to experiment a little more.

Makes: 1 quart

4 c seedless watermelon, cubed
1 can full-fat coconut milk (at least 70%), shaken, not stirred
1/4 c raw honey
juice of 1 lemon

Blend everything together in a food processor. Pour into a 9" x 13" baking dish. Place in freezer until set. Scrape everything out and place frozen bits into the food processor. Purée until smooth. Scoop into a freezer-safe container and chill until set, about 3-4 hours.

Workday Breakfasts to Go

This year I am trying something new. Every Sunday I make breakfast for work all at once. That's right. 5 days of breakfast stuffs that I trek to work. Between baking and eating, sometimes I'll have four dozen eggs in the fridge.

The basics

Hard-boiled eggs. I try to stay around $0.20-0.25/egg. This can range anywhere from bulk white eggs or brown eggs. I prefer brown eggs, but only because they're not white. And, I hate to break it to you but there is no such thing as "free range" for eggs nor chickens that bear them. Those happy chickens you see in all the farm-to-table marketing ads are just that.. marketing. In fact, a factory farm can still mass produce eggs and still call itself a "free range" farm. Anyhow, that's a topic for another day.

Put your 10 large eggs into a pot, fill it with enough water to cover, and put a lid on the pot. Bring the pot to a boil then let it simmer covered for 8-10 minutes. Once the timer is up, use a slotted spoon to scoop out the eggs into a large bowl filled with cold water. 

Some people like to wait. I do not. Immediately shell all the eggs and put them into a lidded container in the fridge. 70 calories per egg.

Next item.

Oatmeal with dried fruit. The dried fruit can be anything from chopped dried cherries, raisins, dried blueberries, or dried cranberries. This is one of the simplest recipes I have managed to replicate from Pinterest without a fail. About 136 calories.

1/3 c organic old fashioned oats
1 tsp brown sugar
2 tsp nonfat dry milk
5-8 raisins, cranberries, dried blueberries, or whatever (it's less than 1 tbsp)
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon

Put this all into an 8 oz mason jar. Put a lid on it and set it aside. Calories will vary by fruit used but not by much. At work, simply fill the jar with hot water, replace lid and screw the band so that the lid stays in place. After 15 minutes or so, the oatmeal will be done. I just eat it straight from the jar.

Organic yogurt. I am not so savvy that I own a yogurt maker. So, this is one of the many organic varieties that Trader Joe's carries. I am partial to the organic vanilla yogurt; though, the quart will only provide four days of yogurt (at 8 oz a day). 213 calories.

I supplement the fifth day with Trader Joe's mango/apricot Greek yogurt. Sure, it's a whopping 300 calories but it's also protein.

Plus coffee (50 calories). A little jolt of caffeine to start the day.

And there you have it. My weekly breakfast is just under 540 calories per morning. This lasts a lot longer than coffee and a bagel that's for sure.

Red Papaya and Kimchi Salad

Today, my salad has taken on a red theme. With the papaya salad dressing, it is slightly sweet and mildly spicy. I didn't even have to beat up green beans for this salad. That coupled with the inability to find fresh bean sprouts at the grocery store also prompted a different spin on papaya salad. I used a food processor's cheese grating disc (larger holes) to grate the entire papaya. This took about two minutes. Much better than grating it by hand.

Red Papaya and Kimchi Salad

Per serving:

1 c fresh, unripe papaya, peeled and grated
handful of ripe red plum or cherry tomatoes, halved
1/4 c homemade kimchi
1-2 tbsp papaya salad dressing

Toss it all together in a bowl and eat.

Papaya Salad Dressing

I picked up an unripe red papaya from Trader Joe's the other day ($3.29 each large). It's typically used ripened, either as an eating fruit, in fruit cocktail, or sweetened and dried in a tropical trail mix. I thought it might be a good option for a papaya salad. I'm sure it's done. Most papaya salads call for shredded green papaya; I'm assuming that the flesh stays green through the ripening phase. The partially ripened red papaya looks like an evening sunset, mostly yellow on the outer part and that characteristic salmon red color towards the center. The papaya yielded about 4 tablespoons of seeds. 

Ingredients

1 c extra virgin olive oil
1/4 c rice vinegar
2 tbsp fresh papaya seeds
1 tbsp raw honey
2 scallions, white part only, minced
1 tsp dry mustard -or- 1 tsp Dijon mustard
pinch of sea salt

Directions

In the bowl of a food processor, add all ingredients except for the oil. Turn the food prep on and slowly drizzle in the olive oil until the dressing emulsifies.

Kitchen Notes: Cost to Make One Quart Almond Milk

People buy commercially available alternative milks because they believe it is healthier and as a convenience food. Here's the cost breakdown for the previous almond milk post:

• One 16 oz bottle of vanilla extract (from Costco, $6/bottle) = 96 teaspoons = $0.06/tsp
• 1 lb almond meal (from Trader Joe's, $6/lb) = 4.72 cups = $1.27/cup
• 2 Medjool dates (from Trader Joe's, $4.49/lb) = 1.25 oz = $0.35
• Assume cost of water is negligible

1 c almond meal = $1.27
1 tsp vanilla extract = $0.06
2 Medjool dates = $0.35

Total base cost: $1.33 per quart, unsweetened -or- $1.68 per quart, sweetened

About the same price as Trader Joe's private label unsweetened almond milk but without the fillers and vegetable-based thickeners.

Almond Milk Chia Beverage

I got tired of buying cans of 60% coconut cream. There are a few still in the pantry, but I thought I should try to make my afternoon chia beverage out of something other than coconut milk. This is what I did with the quart of almond milk I just made.

Per half-pint mason jar:

1 tbsp organic chia seeds
1 tsp raw honey
1 c fresh almond milk

Stir it together, then lid and band the jar. Put in fridge until later. Give it another stir or shake the jar before drinking.

If you want to make "pudding" out of this, simply double the amount of chia seeds.

How to Make Vanilla Almond Milk from Scratch

My biggest gripe about the rising trend in alternative "milk" beverages are all the fillers that are in an 8 oz glass of it. Take a look at the fillers in these almond milk brands:

Silk: Natural Flavor, Locust Bean Gum, Sunflower Lecithin, Gellan Gum. Calcium Carbonate, Vitamin E Acetate, Zinc Gluconate, Vitamin A Palmitate, Riboflavin (B2), Vitamin B12, Vitamin D2

What the hell is "natural flavor" as its own ingredient??

Blue Diamond: Evaporated Cane Juice, Calcium Carbonate, Sea Salt, Potassium Citrate, Carrageenan, Sunflower Lecithin, Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D2, D-Alpha-Tocopherol (Natural Vitamin E)

So Delicious: Dried Cane Syrup, Pea Protein, Rice Protein, Calcium Phosphate, Magnesium Phosphate, Carrageenan, Natural Flavor, Locust Bean Gum, Kosher Sea Salt, Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D-2, L-Selenomethionine (Selenium), Zinc Oxide, Folic Acid, Vitamin B-12

Protein powder?? WTF!

Pacific Almond: Dried Cane Syrup, Potassium Citrate, Sea Salt, Carrageenan, Riboflavin (B2), Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D2

Trader Joe's: Tricalcium Phosphate, Sea Salt, Gellan Gum, Dipotassium Phosphate, Xanthan Gum, Natural Flavors, Sunflower Lecithin, Vitamin A Palmitate, Vitamin D2, Dl-Alpha Tocopherol Acetate (Vitamin E)

Hands down, if you can handle cow's milk, it is the only way to go for ice cream, milk shakes, pudding, cheese, etc. When you look at the packing for organic milk, it has one ingredient: organic milk. No fillers, nada. Just juice squeezed out of cow udders. Anyhow, I think I'm going to post a homemade almond milk recipe now. 

Vinegar Pie

Happy Pi Day!

This recipe hit my radar when I was reading up on pies that people make for Pi Day (March 14). I really didn't know what I wanted to make; but I did know I wanted to make something I hadn't made before. This recipe originates from the mid-19th century and counts as a pioneer style of baking (think Little House on the Prairie). The recipe ratio comes from Michigan's MLive article on the same topic.

Unbaked pie crust, filled pie crust, baked pie, finished pie with cinnamon dusting

Ingredients

1 pre-baked coconut flour pie crust

2 large eggs
1 c organic granulated sugar, divided
1 tbsp tapioca starch
1 c cold filtered water
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
ground cinnamon, for dusting
organic whipped cream, optional

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

1. Whisk together eggs and 1/4 c sugar in a bowl.

2. Attach a candy thermometer to the pot. In a heavy pot, sift together tapioca starch and 3/4 c sugar. Add cold water and vinegar. Whisk together and bring boil until the sugar dissolves. While whisking, add egg mixture in a slow stream. Cook over medium heat until the custard registers 175 degrees F on the cooking thermometer.

3. Remove from heat and pour into pie shell. Cover rim with a pie shield or aluminum foil. The hot pie plate was too much for me and I just let the crust get really dark without either method in play. Bake until the pie filling is set, 15-20 minutes.

4. Let cool completely on a rack. Dust evenly with ground cinnamon.

In this case, mine was still wobbly after cooling on a rack; so I let it chill in the refrigerator and then dusted it with ground cinnamon.

[Update: This one of the worst recipes I have ever made. It's too sweet. The filling is like a runny not-quite-soury meringue that sat out for too long on a hot day. This pie ranks up there with tuna casserole. Don't make it. Well, if you do, don't overbake the coconut crust because that thing gets rock hard!]

Coconut Flour Pie Crust

Coconut oil is solid at room temperature and makes it challenging to work with when a recipe calls for more than a tablespoon. I have 16 oz glass jars of organic coconut oil. I suppose that if I ever buy that humongous container from Costco, I would have to move it all into glass containers. I put the jar in a pot of water over medium heat. After a few minutes, enough of the coconut oil liquefied and to pour out what is needed instead of having to guesstimate the solid to liquid ratio. I have gotten many ideas about raw coconuts (like how to make coconut products from scratch with whole coconuts) from the Coconut Mamma blog. This recipe ratio is hers and I like its simplicity.

Unbaked Coconut Flour Pie Crust

Like an almond flour pie crust, this one is hard to gauge how thick it is when you pat it down into a 9" pie plate. Given how it bakes, this pastry is only good for the bottom of the pie.

Ingredients

1/2 c organic coconut oil, melted
2 eggs
1/4 tsp sea salt
3/4 c organic coconut flour
2 tbsp raw honey

Directions

In a large bowl (or food prep), beat together eggs, coconut oil, honey, and salt. Add coconut flour and stir until the dough holds together. Gather into a ball and pat into a 9" pie plate.

Prick the dough with a fork. (Sadly, this does not stop the pastry from rising from steam.)

Bake 10 minutes, until edges are golden brown. Let cool before using.

Homemade Soft Pretzels, batch #2

I planned to make these yesterday but didn't get around to it. The 1-hour proof for the dough turned into a 24-hour proof on the kitchen counter. This hasn't affected the taste or the rise at all. It made 2 lb 7 oz of dough. I converted the weight to ounces then divided by the number of portions I wanted to make. In this recipe I am making 12 pretzels, so each weighed out to be 3 1/8 to 3 1/4 oz on the digital scale. The biggest difference between batch #1 and batch #2 is the exclusion of milk in the dough recipe and the use of baked baking soda in the boiling stage instead of baking soda.

This NY Times article suggests how baked baking soda affects bread-based recipes like noodles and pretzels. However, the sodium carbonate is not the same as potassium carbonate used in Chinese cooking for ramen noodles and mooncake dough. I store my baked baking soda in a lidded mason jar.

Also, the warm water for the yeast was only 75 degrees F instead of the usual 110-115 degrees F. This also doesn't seem to have any effect on the rise of the dough. The weather has been unusually warm for this time of the year. Yesterday we hit a high of 70 degrees, with humidity; though, today we are back in the mid-50s with rain.

Dough Ingredients

1 1/2 c warm water (115 degrees F)
1 tbsp organic granulated sugar
2 tsp kosher salt
2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast (or 1 package)
2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted (I think by mistake I put in 4 oz melted butter)
4 1/2 c unbleached all-purpose flour

Baking Soda Water Ingredients

2/3 c baked baking soda
10 c filtered water

Egg Wash for Pretzels

1 tbsp filtered water
1 egg yolk

Directions

For the dough ingredients, combine sugar, 1 tsp kosher salt and warm water in a 2-cup measuring cup. Stir to dissolve sugar and salt. Add yeast, stir. Let sit for 5 mins, until the yeast foams up.

In a 7-cup food processor, add flour, butter and 1 tsp kosher salt. Pulse together. Next, add the water/yeast slurry and blend until the dough comes together. Pulse or run the processor for 1-2 minutes. It'll be sticky (vs smooth and satiny in a stand mixer) and this is okay. You don't want to burn out the motor mixing a heavy dough like this.

Prepare a 5-quart mixing bowl with 1 tsp olive oil. Just swirl it around on the bottom. Dump the blob of dough into the bowl. You could rotate the blob so that it gets coated with the oil, but this is really not necessary. Cover the bowl with a dinner plate and set in a warm place in the kitchen. Let dough rise for at least an hour.

Bring a pot of water (10 cups) plus the baked baking soda to a boil. This will take some time, so better to start this step before portioning the dough.

Weigh your dough. Then divide it by the number of portions you want to make. This batch made 12 pretzels when rolled out to 18-20 inches. Alton's method makes 8 portions at 24 inches.

Place your dough on baking sheets lined with parchment paper, and cover with a clean kitchen towel. Given the day's humidity, I did not spritz the kitchen towels with water.

Roll each piece into a 18" to 20" log. If you have trouble figuring out how long this really is, either have a 24" cutting board and measure out 4" from the edge and mark it with a post-it note or tape one of those IKEA paper tape measures to your kitchen counter.

I did a variety of shapes to play with the dough. A double twist looked the most fashionable. Place each shaped pretzel back onto the parchment paper and cover with a kitchen towel until you have rolled out and shaped all the portions of dough. At this point, you could let the dough rise again. Mine did not and that is probably because I didn't knead the dough until it was smooth, or because I let it proof so long the yeast was entirely spent from farting all night.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. (This should take about 10 minutes)

By now, the pot of water should have come to a boil. Drop in two pretzels at a time and boil for 30 seconds. I used a slotted metal spatula to get the pretzels. Remove pretzels from the water and place back onto the parchment-lined trays. Repeat until all the pretzels have bathed in the baking soda solution.

Next, make the egg wash by whisking together water and egg yolk with a fork in a small bowl. Lightly brush this on top of each pretzel before baking. You can sprinkle coarse kosher salt on top or herbs or grated cheese or leave it plain. For this batch, I used a sparse amount of kosher salt.

Bake for 14 minutes total. At the 7-minute mark, rotate all the trays.

Let pretzels cool on a rack. Enjoy with or without mustard.

The ingredient ratio and methodology is adapted from Alton Brown.

Spicy Sweet Roasted Kabocha Squash

I thought about roasting the whole squash this way. I ended up roasting the slices 15 minutes on one side, and 10 minutes on the other. A few of the edges of the thinner slices burnt, so a total bake time of 25 minutes is too much. Maybe 10 minutes on each side might suffice. Smashing the whole squash against a concrete step worked really well in opening it.

Prep to make Roasted Squash

Ingredients

1/2 small kabocha squash, washed and seeded
3 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
1 1/2 tsp soy sauce
1 tbsp sesame oil

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Slice the kabocha squash into 1/4" slices.

In a large bowl, sprinkle spices on top of squash. Add sesame oil. Toss squash to coat. Add soy sauce and toss again.

Lay slices out in a single layer on a silicone mat-lined baking tray.

Roast for 10 minutes on each side. Flip slices and rotate the tray at the 10 minute mark.

Roasted Kabocha Squash Slices