Ah yes. You will believe me when I say it was delicious, right? When all you can see is the pitiful bone left after serving a big dinner to guests? And you’ll forgive me for not taking a photo of the finished roast? I hope so!

If it were cooler weather I’d have made some kind of soup with the bone, but alas, it’s too hot in the kitchen or our outdoor patio dining area to make or eat hot soup. So this bone got chucked in the trash. But the meat that came from it was quite good. Good enough that I’d make it again. Easy enough too.

I turned to one of my favorite barbecue cookbooks of late, Steven Raichlen’s The Barbecue! Bible. You don’t find all that many recipes for barbecued lamb anywhere. Raichlen has several in this book (well, the cookbook has 500+ barbecue recipes). Anyway, I had all the ingredients on hand  (always a good sign). All it took was to buy a bone-in leg of lamb and making the relatively simple marinade. And cutting a bunch of slits in the meat to stuff in little slivers of garlic and fresh ginger.

There you can see all the little studs of garlic and ginger. And the Worcestershire and soy marinade. The meat sat in the frig for about 8 hours with the marinade. Once drained, it went onto the barbecue with indirect heat (no searing of any of the meat) with a drip pan below the grates. It stayed there for about 2 hours, until the meat thermometer hit 160°.  This meat wants moderate heat, not high heat. It’s a roast, you know! It sat for about 10 minutes lightly tented with foil before we sliced and served it.

With the pineapple relish stuff Raichlen recommends in the book. Raichlen has traveled the world over for ethnic recipes, and he certainly adheres to the adages in the book, The World Is Flat 3.0: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century. If you haven’t read it, Thomas Friedman dissects how, in our global economy, we can so easily buy (now) a Thai urn, kites from China, saffron from Spain, lentils from Morocco. Or talk to a computer expert in India as if he or she is 20 miles away. And the products are all available at our local stores. In this case Raichlen doesn’t care that the meat preparation is a South African method, and the relish served with it is Vietnamese. And he suggests it be served with Persian-steamed rice. I don’t actually know what that means, Persian rice that’s steamed, or is it a particular cooking method that makes rice steamed in the Persian style. Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I didn’t serve it.

Back to the Achar. It’s a relish composed of fresh, diced pineapple mixed with a bit of Vietnamese fish sauce. Now, I can already see you turning up your noses! Here in Southern California we’re used to fish sauce because we have a sizable Vietnamese community near us. And oodles of Vietnamese restaurants too. We’ve learned to appreciate all the different foods from that country. But almost everything is seasoned with fish sauce. It’s even standard in regular (non-ethnic) grocery stores. It’s like soy sauce to the Japanese, paprika in all forms to the Hungarians (they don’t even put black pepper on the table, just salt and paprika), salsa or pico de gallo to the Mexicans. So, there’s fish sauce for the Vietnamese. It’s a condiment served on every Vietnamese table. And it doesn’t taste like fish. You’d think it would, being called “fish” sauce and all, but it’s a salty liquid that comes from anchovies. In the picture, the bottle of fish sauce is there in the background. In the center of the bottle label is a graphic of three crabs – Anglos call it the “Three Crabs” fish sauce. It’s the premium brand. Below you can see the relish – with the chiles and sugar. This mixture doesn’t require any marinating time – just mix it up and serve it.

It went really well with the lamb, even though it IS a Vietnamese relish served with a South African barbecue lamb dish! The only thing I’d change next time – I think I’d do a butterflied leg of lamb instead. There wasn’t enough meat on the roast I bought. I know that the bone-in is a better way to roast, but the boneless is so much easier.

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One year Ago: Peach Cobbler
Two years ago: Barbecued Beans
Three years ago: Crisp Apple Pudding (my all-time favorite, my mother’s recipe)

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Don’t you just want to reach your spoon right into the monitor screen and grab just a little bit of this? Uh, yes, I sure do. Apple and chutney didn’t exactly sound all that intriguing to me, but I was asked to bring a sauce or a go-with dish for the crown roast of pork for Christmas Day. So, I scrounged through all of my cookbooks to see what I could find to go with pork. This one stood out (from online), no question. It’s fun when you find a recipe on epicurious, or any of the other foodie sites where people are allowed to add comments. This particular dish was no exception. Most people adored it. A few people deplored it (mostly because they thought it was too vinegar-y). Some people recommended reducing the amount of vinegar. Several people said their house smelled like vinegar for two days. Most people liked it as it was. But to be on the safe side, I decided to use less vinegar (apple cider type) than the recipe called for.

What this dish is NOT is applesauce, or a great side dish on its own. It’s meant to go with the meat. It’s pungent (from the vinegar), spicy hot (from the red chile flakes), sweet and sour (from the sugar/vinegar/lemon juice it’s cooked in) and utterly succulent. It has golden raisins in it, mustard seeds, a ton of garlic, fresh ginger, salt, and a bunch of tart apples (Granny Smiths).

Here are the ingredients: apples on the bottom with the fluid (vinegar, dissolved sugar, lemon juice) and on top are the three components you add – golden raisins piled up there in the back, mustard seed over on the left, and the garlic, ginger, chili flakes and salt mixture front and center.

You dissolve the sugar in the vinegar, then add everything else. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer and let it slowly bubble away for about 45 minutes. It thickens as it cools, apparently. As I write this I haven’t had it cold yet. The recommendation in the recipe was to make up to a week ahead, and that it ages well as it sits. Several commenters said it was better after it mellowed for several days.

I did reduce the amount of vinegar called for, and like it just fine with 1 1/2 cups, rather than 2. So that will be what I’ll include in the recipe below. I stuck my tasting spoon into the mixture as it began to cool. The apples are translucent (from the sugar, I’d suppose). And the mixture was already thick at that point. Oh my goodness, was it fabulous. I see why so many people raved about it. Just don’t – as I said above – mistake this for applesauce. It definitely isn’t.
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A year ago: Breakfast Eggy Muffin
Two years ago: Gourmet Cheesecake

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Last night we had some friends, Bob & Peggy, over for dinner. Bob is recovering from open heart surgery, but after just two weeks he felt up to coming to our house for dinner. Bless his heart! They have minimal air conditioning at their house, so I was grateful they’d come here, rather than me needing to package up everything  (hot) and take it to their house. Their kitchen is not air conditioned. Peggy said, don’t go to too much work. So instead of finding all kinds of new recipes, I decided to use some old tried-and-true ones.

No special appetizers – just some tortilla chips and a cheese dip. I did make a garbanzo bean salad that I read about yesterday on somebody else’s blog (I’ll write that up as a separate post, though). I had some meatloaf frozen which became the main dish of the meal. But instead of spreading it with my usual sweet and sour sauce, I decided to dig out the recipe for Red Peppers for Cold Meat that I wrote up last year. Perfect for a spoon full on top and along side a baby meatloaf. Then I made a watermelon salad that’s so refreshing in this hot-hot weather. And an old family standby, a chocolate cake from a mix. So here’s what I made:

Meatloaf – last time I made meatloaf, I froze them in individual portions (about 4 inches by 1 1/2 inches by 1 1/2 inches. Not only do they defrost a bit easier, but they take a lot less time to bake too. I used my old favorite, the meatloaf mixture only from my Sweet & Sour Meatloaf.

Red Peppers for Cold Meats – well, I’d used it before as a relish for baked meatloaf, and knew it tasted great. This time I had less red bell peppers, but I had a poblano/pasilla chile, so added that to the mixture. This time I used more onion too. The preparation of it is certainly flexible. It keeps for a long time in the refrigerator.

Minted Watermelon & Feta Salad – this pairing is a match made in heaven. If you haven’t ever tried it, well, you’re missing something special. I was ever-so skeptical before tasting it the first time over a year ago, but now I’m a true convert. Especially when watermelons are in season (now). There is a Tomato & Watermelon Salad too, with red onion, but this one is a Martha Stewart recipe. I made it with watermelon, feta and mint since I had ample tomatoes in the red pepper mixture and in the garbanzo salad too.

Garbanzo Bean Salad with Thai Curry Sauce – Ever so easy to do. Couldn’t believe how easy. Uses canned chickpeas and bottled Thai red curry paste/sauce and coconut milk. Yes, this really is a cold salad. And extra delicious. Stay tuned in a few days for that recipe.

German Chocolate Chip Cake – this is an old family standby that normally uses a German chocolate cake mix. I didn’t have one, so used a regular chocolate cake mix instead. It’s so simple – spread the cake batter in a 9×13 pan, sprinkle it with sugar, cinnamon, walnuts and about 2/3 cup of chocolate chips. Bake as usual. Some of the nuts and chips sink down into the cake; some stay on top. And the sugar/cinnamon mixture gives the cake a finished look without making frosting. Especially good with vanilla ice cream. I didn’t have any, so I used whipped cream instead.

A year ago: Feta Tomato Gratin (easy appetizer)

Two years ago: Apple Cherry Walnut Green Salad

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Certainly I’ve admitted here before that pie crusts (at one time) were not my favorite thing. Well, to eat them was fine. To make, well, sometimes was iffy. Not anymore. But therein lies a story:

My mother, a real pie crust expert, only made the old-fashioned kind of Crisco (shortening) type. Even as a child I marveled at her ability to whip up a pie in nothing flat. She would combine the crust ingredients in a bowl, cut in the shortening, then sprinkle in the ice water. She’d mix and form it into a mound, flatten it a bit then start rolling. In about 8 rolls she’d have a perfectly round piecrust which she’d very easily pick up and lay into a pie plate. There were NO cracks. No dry edges. No thin parts either. If there were scraps, she’d put those on a separate baking sheet and spread with a little margarine, sugar and cinnamon and bake those for us to nibble on.

Therefore, I grew up thinking making and rolling pie crusts was easy. So one time, probably when I was about 12-14 I’d guess, I asked my mom if I could make the crust this time. She said “sure.” With her next to me, I did everything she told me to do (use ice water, handle it as little as possible, roll gently, don’t roll all the way to the edges, turn, sprinkle the surface with a bit of flour, but not too much, turn and roll some more).  With the kind of impatience I likely had, I did manage to get it into a ball, flatten it some and started rolling it out. I’m sure I was more interested in the rolling of it than the making of it. But anyway, you can guess from the tenor of this post that all did NOT go well. It stuck to the board, big time. It was lopsided. It was thin in places. It cracked right through the middle. When I tried to transfer it (after my mother had helped me patch it in several places) it completely fell apart. I was nearly in tears.

It’s likely I’d already manhandled it too much. My mother wrapped the dough in a ball and refrigerated it for 15 minutes and I tried again. Same thing happened. I think I walked away from piecrusts at that point, rarely to return. I watched my mother make them after that, but was never willing (or interested) to try it again.

When I first became a bride in 1962, I was a real novice cook. Living in a small cottage in Florida at one point, I decided to tackle another pie crust. You’ll laugh at this scene: I didn’t own a pie plate. With all the lovely wedding gifts I received, nary a pie plate. But I had a thin aluminum cake pan (nonstick didn’t exist back then), so I figured, oh well, I could make the pie in a cake pan. Sure thing. I thought. (Note to any new cooks here: don’t do it.) I managed to make the shortening pie crust somehow, patching it in a dozen places. Had a very hard time getting the crust to hold on the cake pan edge, of course. Pie crusts aren’t meant to hold onto a vertical surface. Anyway, I think it was a cherry pie made from the Joy of Cooking (a wedding gift). The dark and gloomy kitchen had a 2-burner stove and a small oven in it. It was difficult to see anything, but within about 20 minutes I knew something was wrong because I could hear some hissing coming from the oven. I could hardly see into the dark oven interior, but as soon as I opened the oven door smoke was pouring out. The pie had overflowed and was dripping all over the oven floor. Not knowing what to do, I just let it do its thing. The crust obviously wasn’t done. Well, the pie tasted okay, I guess, but it was hardly a pie. It was nary impossible to get the crust out of the pan because some of the filling had leaked through the crust and caramelized on the aluminum surface. Plus all the globs of sugary filling had dripped all over the oven. What a mess to clean. I’d never had to use oven cleaner (this was long before self-cleaning ovens). So can you see why I walked away from pie crusts? Yup. I did. For years and years and years.

My epiphany came probably 20 years later (can you imagine, I didn’t make a pie in all those years unless I could buy the ready-made shell!) I attended a cooking class where the instructor made quiche Lorraine. And she used a pie crust recipe from ‘>’>The Silver Palate Cookbook. As she whizzed up the crust ingredients in the food processor (BUTTER – oh my goodness BUTTER) it came together in a flash. She chilled it briefly and literally rolled it to soft perfection. Into the pie plate it went and any cracks were easily fixed. The butter gave the dough a softness that not only allows easy handling, but simple repairs as well.

My first butter pie crust was a resounding success. It was tender and flaky. It stood up around the edges (in a pie plate, of course!). Nothing leaked through the crust. It looked pretty. It tasted great. My guests thought I knew how to make a pie crust. Since then, I’ve never wavered from making a butter crust. A few have worked better than others, and I’m always open to some new combination, as long as butter is in the mix.

With a new cookbook at hand (a gift from my friend Cherrie, for my birthday), ‘>’>The Art and Soul of Baking (Mushet, 2009), I decided to try their version of a rich pastry crust. It’s very similar to many others (one cube of butter to 1 1/4 cups of flour). This one also had egg yolks (2) in it, which made it even more rich. But it worked like a charm. Probably the flakiest pastry I’ve ever made. It was mixed in the food processor. It was still cool enough from the cold butter and ice water, that I was able to roll it out immediately. I think I needed just a tiny half teaspoon more water in the mix (in the photo above you can see the raw pastry has a few dry edges). But, it went into the pan just fine.

The joy of this kind of pie crust is that it can be pressed, by hand, into the pie plate too, rather than using a rolling pin. So if you are pie crust challenged, or don’t own a rolling pin, by all means, just use your hands and press it in, starting in the middle. Put clumps of dough in the bottom of the pie plate and then start pressing toward the outside edges and up the sides. The recipe had ample quantity, so I didn’t lack for enough dough to put on a nice crimped edge.

When I made the Tomato Pie, it required a partially baked crust. So, I put long strips of waxed paper in the middle of the raw shell and added pie weights. And pushed them as much as possible UP the sides so the top edges would stay in place. I use two sheets of waxed paper in the raw shell. I do trim down the corners that stick up (so they don’t come in contact with the heating elements), but not too much. I also discovered early on, that when you try to remove the pie weights by grabbing the waxed paper, you’ve got to have enough edges to pick up the whole thing.

There’s the raw shell with the pie weights. Carefully move them around so more of the weights are up the sides, as I said. Once the shell is partially baked, you let it cool for a couple of minutes. Have a heatproof bowl nearby, then very gently and very carefully pick up opposite sides of both sheets of waxed paper, lift and pour the pie weights into the bowl. (You may need to wash the pie weights – for sure you will if you only use one thickness of waxed paper – with two thickness, probably not.) Allow the pie weights to completely cool before returning them to a storage container (I use a quart sized freezer bag).

So there’s my pie crust story, and I’m sticking to it – the butter pastry, that is. Below is the finished pie. Isn’t this pretty? If you didn’t already print out the tomato pie recipe, be sure to try it. With the buttery flaky pie shell, it’s sublime. For a PDF of the shell, see bottom of recipe.

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A year ago: White Sangria
Two years ago: Italian Bragiole (a stuffed steak)

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Oh, was this ever delish. I’d bought some fish (lingcod) for dinner, and needed SOMEthing to go on top of it. With cauliflower as a side dish, I definitely required a colorful something to go with it. I have a cookbook I don’t refer to very often – Pike Place Public Market Seafood Cookbook. With recipes and advice regarding everything fish and seafood. I was going to lightly slather the top of the fish with some mayonnaise (gives it moisture), so under the mayo section I found this recipe for the blueberry ginger salsa. It comes from Ray’s Boathouse, a paragon of Seattle cuisine. A trusted name. And, happily, I had all the ingredients!

Once again I grabbed my fabulous little mini-chopper. The white chopper you see pictured at left is about 6 inches long, and the grid in the middle is tiny – itty-bitty tiny – blades. It makes SUCH quick work of mince. Luv this thing. Although I will tell you, it’s a bit tedious to clean. It has an insert that helps pull out the stuck-in pieces in the bottom of it, but it doesn’t get the tiny residual miniscule things that get stuck in the blades. But it’s oh-so worth it if you need to finely mince something to a uniform size. I don’t use it for onion because it just doesn’t cut it all that well.

It took little time to make this salsa. Half the berries are pureed, the other half left whole. It has fresh ginger in it, garlic, balsamic, a little sugar (I used agave nectar), some red bell pepper (that’s what’s red in the pictures), fresh lime juice, MINT and salt and pepper. See, I told you. Easy. Once it sat for about an hour it made some lovely-colored juice, and here’s what it looked like on the fish:

I’d make this again anytime. My friend Donna raved about it. The only thing I might change is to add just a little bit of heat – minced jalapeno, for instance. This salsa would be great on chicken too, I think. And pork. Maybe even lamb. And salmon for sure! With blueberries in season right now, this would be a great way to use some of them!

The next night I baked some fresh Alaskan salmon for dinner, and used up the remains of the salsa. It was great on this fish too – maybe even better than on the white fish. Make this, okay?
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Two years ago: Peppered Pecans (a favorite in salads, as an appetizer)

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Buying the book A HomeMade Life, by Molly Wizenberg (the writer of the blog Orangette) was a given. I’m just so proud to be in the same league (Molly and the others are in the major leagues, I’m in the minors) as the few other bloggers who are published authors – published mostly because of writing a food blog.

The stories in the book are refreshing reflections on her life – her growing up years, with recipes included. Then when she became an adult, she began cooking in earnest on her own and discovered how much she enjoyed it. (And now, she and Brandon, her husband – you read all about him in the book too – are about to open a restaurant in Seattle, called Delancey.) Her chapters are so darned CUTE. She has a sparkly wit and weaves wonderful tales. Even though I’d read some of it over at her blog, in book form it was just as entrancing. And the recipes are not your mainstream potato salad or tomato soup. They’re different, like Meatballs with Pine Nuts, Cilantro and Golden Raisins, Bouchons au Thon (a quiche/pate kind of muffin-style omelet, sort of), Bread Salad with Cherries, Arugula and Goat Cheese, and this, the Pickled Grapes. Why pickled grapes? Because Brandon is a pickle nut, of course.

Possibly I’d never have tried this recipe except that Smitten Kitchen did and raved on and on. So I looked again at the recipe in the book – it’s so EASY. You make a vinegar brine with a cinnamon stick, brown mustard seeds (gee, I even HAD some of those) and whole peppercorns. You cut off the little stems ends (the belly-button ends, Molly tells us) and soak the grapes in the brine.

Serving this on top of some fresh goat cheese was so fun. Once you taste them, you know they’re grapes, but looking at them on the plate (top photo) you might wonder. They’d be equally at home served with pieces of cheese – maybe even some veiny Blue or Cambazola, for instance. Serve with crackers. If serving with a soft cheese, I think the grapes should be chopped up (once brined). That way they’d stick to the cheese a bit easier.  If serving with firmer cheese, leaving them in whole or halves would be better. Molly adds the hot brine to the grapes. Smitten Kitchen cooled the brine first, then marinated them. Your choice. Whichever way, you’ll be glad you tried these. They’re just flat-out delicious.
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A year ago: What is it about Plates?, a post about my obsession with plates, china, etc.

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Since we were invited to our son’s home for Easter, I didn’t have to cook much. We went to an 8 am worship service, then helped setup, serve and cleanup for a brunch to our church’s 120-voice choir. We had a few minutes of respite before going to our son’s home for dinner. I provided a 10-pound bone-in ham, from the 4-H pig we bought last summer. It was fabulous. Everyone there who ate ham ( a few people didn’t like ham) raved about it. I also made the delicious Mustard Sauce I prepared last year when we bought a Kurobuta ham from David Rosengarten from Idaho. The sauce was outstanding (a David Rosengarten recipe; actually from his wife’s grandmother, I believe it was) and very easy to make. I will mention that I took the photo with the chilled sauce (just making it look pretty for all of you), so it was thicker than it is once warmed. So don’t be dismayed if the warmed sauce doesn’t look like the above.

Karen (our daughter-in-law) also made a huge stuffed leg of lamb. She’d made it before, she said, and had marked it as a keeper. Indeed it was. It’s stuffed with Italian sausage, fresh spinach, Pecorino cheese and pine nuts. The recipe came from a Today show episode with the Scotto family.  I forgot to take along my camera, otherwise I’d have a good photo of it. Karen’s mother took some photos, though, so eventually I’ll upload a picture of the actual roast or the slices. The lamb was scrumptious. I’ll make it myself – next time we want lamb.

We also enjoyed some great appetizers, dips, veggies, including several pounds of asparagus, and chocolate cupcakes with a coconut, almond & brown sugar broiled topping, and a sensational white sponge layer cake with glazed fresh fruit on top, provided by Karen’s sister Janice.
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A year ago: Cauliflower Puree (it’s really good)

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Until I decided to write up this recipe, I can’t say that I knew much about Auguste Escoffier, other than he was a famous French chef. And that he wrote a cookbook or two which are considered sacrosanct by lots of chefs and foodies in France and abroad. He lived from 1846 to 1935 and spent his life in the French food arena, beginning when he was apprenticed to his uncle’s restaurant in Nice at the ripe age of 12. He revolutionized (streamlined) the running of top-drawer kitchens, and implemented new techniques of canning when he was the Chef de Cuisine for the French Army during one of France’s wars. So there’s your little food history lesson of the day.

I’ll just comment briefly that as I was growing up (I think I’ve mentioned it here before) both grandmothers always served lots of pickles and relishes with meals. They likely did lots of canning since they grew their own vegetables, so they had lots of cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers to use up every season. But then, pickles and relishes were just de rigueur. My mother served her fair share of them too, and I can’t say that I was all that enamored with them as a child. Actually, salsa is a similar kind of condiment, and I certainly eat plenty of THAT. Once I ventured into making fruit salsas (my mango or pineapple salsa being a particular family favorite), I must have reacquainted my palate to the kind of sweet and sour mingling that goes on with pickles and relishes. I also have that Mexican onion relish that is so good too. And remember my write-up about the piquante peppers from South Africa? They have a very similar taste, although this pepper condiment has many more layers of flavor with the addition of onions, garlic and spices. The South African peppers are just pickled somehow.

My fellow blogger, Luisa, the Wednesday Chef, wrote up this recipe, having read it in the Los Angeles Times (no longer available online). In her post she used many, many superlatives. I usually stand up and notice when bloggers use words like fabulous, fantastic, can’t keep my spoon out of them. That kind of language. Since I had some leftover meatloaf (obviously cold), this recipe seemed like a cinchy combination. I had everything on hand except the red bell peppers, and that was easily rectified.

This recipe is SIMPLE. Really. It took about 20 minutes to chop and cook, then it bubbled away on the stove for an hour or so. I had golden raisins instead of dark, but that was the only substitution I made in this recipe. I didn’t weigh the peppers – I used 4 peppers. The picture above is the combination of ingredients to make the peppers. Nothing all that unusual. And the second photo shows the spices used. They made a very attractive pile on my cutting board, so I decided to photograph them for you. The only thing a bit different here is the freshly grated nutmeg. I almost never use jarred pre-ground nutmeg. The flavor of the fresh is just so much better. Years and years ago I bought a nutmeg grinder (less than $10 then) that has served me well all these years.

The verdict? Fabulous. This relish would be wonderful with just any kind of meat (roasts, chops) and even chicken. Even some kinds of fish. So often leftover meat from a pork roast, for instance, loses that juiciness once it’s cooled down and chilled, so you need something to moisten every bite. I can see this as a great condiment in sandwiches too. I can’t wait to try this on a turkey or meatloaf sandwich. I don’t know that I’ll be eating it straight out of a bowl because it does have a vinegary sharpness. Muffled by the sugar, though. Overall: delicious. And did I tell you it was EASY?

This little note is being added nearly a month later . . . I still have these peppers in the refrigerator. They’re fine. Just fine. I served it recently as a side with grilled sausages for dinner. All that vinegar in them  must keep them preserved well.
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Files: MasterCook 5+ and MasterCook 14 (click link to open recipe in MC)

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I was chatting with my friend Cherrie the other day (she and I spend some time always talking about food – what she’s making, what I’m making, restaurants, etc.) and she was telling me about how she made one of my lamb stew recipes that I’d posted awhile back. Then she said when she tasted it, it was blah. Blah, I thought? How can that be? The stew I made was absolutely fabulous with flavor. She’d made it exactly as written. The lamb was from Costco, just like mine. I had to contemplate that conundrum for a bit. How could two stews be so different in taste? The recipe wasn’t that complicated. Didn’t require any particularly unusual ingredients. Then a light went off in my head. It’s the broth. I’d put a fair slug of turkey broth concentrate in that stew that was almost like a soup.

Hence I’m posting about something that I had begun to take for granted. No longer.

Years ago, I used to buy those little cubes of chicken bouillon to flavor up things. That’s about all there was out there unless you made your own stock (which I’ve done, but don’t choose to make anymore except the day after Thanksgiving). Eventually you could buy loosely packed dry chicken broth granules (still can, I believe). Of course, you could buy canned broth too. But if you were making soup that needed 2 quarts, for instance, that was a heck of a lot of cans to buy and lug home, open and throw out. That’s why I preferred the granules. Then along came the little jars of hydrolyzed protein with a modicum of flavor. And lastly, the sealed, waxed boxes of broth, which I use regularly too. But the underlying problem – to me anyway – was the amount of sodium in all of these products. Even that stuff Better than Bouillon. Have you even looked at how much salt is in them? Salt is cheap – a whole lot cheaper than chicken meat or buying hydrolyzed protein, so of course, the “superior” minds (read: greedy) of American business, always looking out for our better health (right?) would use salt as the overriding flavor. Hey, if they can fool us into thinking it’s chicken broth, then they’ve made another product the unsuspecting homemaker and cook will buy.

Some years ago I read a story about hydrolyzed protein and wasn’t all that thrilled with the process and what products made with it might do to our bodies. So generally I used the cardboard boxes of broth or the loose granules. For a lot of years that’s what I did. And it was only a few months ago that I read about Wolfgang Puck’s own brand of broth that was noticed by either food magazines, or Cook’s Illustrated, or maybe it was Consumer Reports. I don’t remember now, but whatever I read indicated Wolfgang’s was really good. So I’ve been using that too (it’s expensive, so I don’t use it for just anything).

Meanwhile, I decided to try some of Penzey’s soup bases. They do not contain hydrolyzed protein (yea!). The first ingredient on the chicken base (my most used one) is “cooked chicken meat.” Well, it’s about time somebody decided to give us what we want – the main ingredient is chicken! I’ve come to rely on these jars of concentrated broth. I merely dip my small spoons into the chicken goop and pull out a little dab and add to whatever I’m cooking. I never measure – I just use a clean spoon. I use it anytime I need broth and merely add water. They do require you to store them in the refrigerator once opened. That’s about the only down side to these. (And in all fairness, I will state that the second ingredient is salt. At least it’s not the first one.)

At the moment I own three of them (chicken, turkey and seafood). In my next order to Penzey’s, I’m ordering beef and vegetable too. So, if you have come to trust me – may I recommend to you that you click over to PENZEY’S and place an order for these SOUP BASES. DO IT NOW! And while you’re at it, try some of their Korintje or Vietnamese cinnamon too. And cumin. And garlic  (the most recent catalog had a write-up about how the Penzey’s folks finally found a garlic grower willing to do what Penzey’s has wanted forever – somebody to cut OFF the little brown stem part). I use fresh garlic almost all the time, but I may order some of this dry garlic just to try it. And just in case you don’t know me very well – no, I’m not getting paid by Penzey’s to tout their stuff. I simply believe in their products and have been nothing but happy with everything I’ve ordered from them. You likely will be too. And whenever you make anything that requires broth, I think you’ll be amazed at the flavor! In a recent Cook’s Illustrated or Cook’s Country, Penzey’s chili powder did not fare well. Number one winner there was Spice Islands.

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My DH went to a football game a week ago Sunday. The Chargers, in San Diego. He had a great time with the guys, all family. Initially, though, the group met in the parking lot for a lunchtime tailgate party. Dave didn’t have to bring a thing. There was food galore, of course. And early-on he spotted a big container of pickled carrots. His heart raced a little bit. Hmmm. Maybe carrots like the recipe we’ve been coveting but can’t get. It looked like them – with onions, garlic and jalapeno chiles swimming in the pickling liquid. We’ve wanted the recipe for the home made pickled carrots at our neighborhood Mexican restaurant, Jalapeno’s. They won’t tell anybody anything about the prized family recipe. Even the local paper asked and was refused.

So, Dave tasted. Wow. They were great. He started asking around – who made these carrots? Finally found him – Doug – he’s made them himself for over 30 years. Didn’t remember where he got the recipe. But he gladly shared it with Dave.

The second thing Dave told me when he got home was, “I think I’ve got the recipe for Jalapeno’s carrots!” (The first thing was the abysmal score.) He knew I’d be delighted to hear about the carrots. Indeed. As Dave rattled off the brief recipe, I quickly jotted it down. Dave went out and got the ingredients earlier in the week, but I wanted him to help me make them – just in case he had forgotten anything about the recipe. Sure enough, he forgot the sugar, so that was added. And, salt wasn’t mentioned, so I added that in myself.

Are they good? Absolutely they are. I’m going to tweak the recipe a little bit next time we make them – less of the jalapeno pickling liquid (I like heat, but these were too hot for my taste) – probably more sugar. But the method will be identical. We did learn that slicing the carrots a consistent depth is important (we used the mandoline for most of them) – I’m only guessing at the ¼ inch thickness. Doug sliced them lengthwise in planks. Jalapeno’s slices them in coins. Take your pick!

Here’s how they’re made: you parboil the carrots and onions. Don’t overcook them, though. Then you combine them with some of the juice from a can of pickled jalapenos. Just the juice. And maybe one or two of the pickled jalapenos themselves. And garlic. And Mexican oregano. Now Doug told Dave that buying Mexican oregano was the secret to the brine. Nothing else will do. And not to EVER be tempted to try Greek or Italian or any other type of oregano. Mexican oregano has a different aroma, and it usually includes lots of the flower pods too. Dave had to try two or three stores to find it the other day. Nearly a quart of white vinegar is added, and some water. You refrigerate it overnight, then serve. Whoopee! You’ll find notes in the recipe below about the changes I’ll make the next time I make these. Doug’s recipe was rather loosely verbalized, so we’ll tweak it as we go. And yes, we’ll make them again! Doug did remind us that the jalapenos vary (just as they do when fresh) – sometimes they’re hotter than others – so naturally the pickling liquid can be hotter one time than another. So unless you really love heat, use less rather than more until you test your tongue!
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