Feb
02
I really like this technique for cooking steaks. I picked it up from the Amateur Gourmet. Nice and browned on the outside edges and barely bloody on the inside. Salt and pepper your meat for a minimum of fifteen minutes before cooking. Heat your pan to the highest setting with about one tablespoon of butter for every eight ounces of steak. Try and use a regular stainless steel pan because Teflon is no good for browning. Place another pad of butter on top of the steak and cook covered for two to four minutes. Flip and cook the other side for the same amount of time and you’ll have a medium rare steak in under ten minutes.
- steak
- salt
- black pepper
- butter
To make it like a Dutch Steak, top with the following, and broil. Leave your steak nice and bloody if you plan on adding this topping. It should only need two minutes on each side.
- Mix together the following:
- 2 tablespoons mayonnaise
- 1 teaspoon sweet hot mustard
- 3 tablespoons Parmesan
Jan
26
Bing goes your kitchen.
Recipe results are pulled from a variety of recipe websites including MyRecipes.com
and Epicurious.com. Each recipe will result will show the source or name of the site, user ratings, and a measure fat and of calories. You can filter recipes by convenience, type of cuisine, occasion, ratings, course and main ingredient. Unfortunately, the recipe feature doesn’t show up for every query. I typed in macaroni and cheese as well as spaghetti and meatballs, I didn’t get the recipe results for either search term.
Techcrunch has an article about a new feature in Bing related to recipes. It looks pretty slick. Originally I wasn’t all that sure about the awesomeness of Bing, but this recent addition is definitely a good reason for me to use Bing other than image, video and travel search. Google hasn’t performed too well when it comes to recipes.
This play on words comes from a recent Microsoft advertising campaign called “Bing goes the internet“.
Jan
26
Microwaves are never my first choice for cooking. That said, I developed this recipe for when I want to cook something fresh at work, in 10 minutes on my break. The only implements in the breakroom are a microwave and a toaster. Why be a slave to reheating leftovers or a frozen dinner when you can impress your coworkers with something fresh? The great part is the ingredients cost about $6 – $8 and makes about a dozen sandwiches — much less than buying 12 McMuffins from McDonald’s.
- 1 English muffin or 2 slices of bread
- 1 egg
- 1 slice bacon
- 1 slice cheese
- 1 tsp butter (optional)
Place the English muffin or bread in the toaster. Line a plate with those napkins you still have from the last time you got take out. Place the bacon on and microwave for 1 minute. Crack the egg in the bottom of a bowl, and beat with a fork. Remove bacon when done and discard the napkins. Put the egg in the microwave for 45 seconds. It should be almost done. Place the cheese slice over the egg and microwave another 10 seconds. When the muffin or toast is done, butter it, and add the egg-cheese and bacon.
Alternate: Sausage breakfast sandwich
For this, skip the bacon part of the above recipe. Add some sausage to the bottom of a bowl, pressing it into the bow’s bottom. Crack the egg over it beat with a fork. Microwave for 1 minute. Add cheese. Continue to microwave until sausage is done. Finish as above.
Jan
22
- 1 1/2 pounds ground meat
- 1/2 cored and peeled apple
- 1/4 diced potato
- 1 cup oats
- 2 eggs
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire
- 1/2 diced onion
- 2 cloves garlic
- salt
- black pepper
- dash of thyme
- 16 oz prepared red cabbage with apple bits
- paprika
Mix everything except the cabbage and paprika in a bowl. Knead until every item is distributed evenly. Place cabbage on bottom of baking dish. Sprinkle paprika. Spread meat mixture on top of cabbage. Cover and cook in oven for one our at 350 degrees. Forty minutes in, feel free to drain. With ten minutes left, cover with sauce.
Sauce for meatloaf
- 4 tablespoons minced onion
- 1/4 cup ketchup
- 4T of brown sugar,
- 4T vinegar,
- 2T Worchestershire Sauce
- 1 teaspoon basil leaves
Simmer everything in a small sauce pan and stir constantly. Serve with meatloaf.
Jan
21
Mashed potatoes without butter (poor man’s mashed taters)
- 3 russet potatoes
- 4 garlic cloves
- bay leaves
- sprig of thyme
- vegetable stock
- salt
- black pepper
I made these because I didn’t have any butter.
Boil some water. Add salt, bay leaves and thyme. Quarter potatoes and place in boiling water. Boil until you can squish a piece of potato between your forefinger and thumb, easily. Make sure to use tongs and cold water before attempting to handle the hot potato. While the potatoes are boiling, cook the garlic in a little bit of oil to soften. Once the potatoes are cooked use either a large fork or a potato masher or a wooden spoon or whatever works best for you. Add the garlic and slowly add stock while mashing. The potatoes will fluff up and absorb the moisture so just add more stock as you mash until you reach the desired consistency. Salt and pepper to taste.
Jan
14
I was chatting online a couple weeks back and one of my friends stated that he was eating shapes. I blinked my eyes several times and asked him to repeat himself and he confirmed that he was eating pizza flavored shapes. I told him that I thought this was a very silly thing, indeed, and that he should stop pulling my leg when he continued on to inform me that each shape has a different flavor.
This went on for several minutes with links to images of “biscuits” and wikipedia articles about Arnott’s Shapes when he decided that I must try them.
Because they are baked, the texture resembles that of cardboard. However, the fact that you can actually see the “flavour” attracts me. This doesn’t taste anything like that nasty MSG-hotness laden BBQ flavor we have on potato chips here in the states. Once you get past the cardboard texture, they are actually quite delicious.
I’ll try and save some if anybody local would like to try them.
Jan
13
This is a quick meal that involves using one can of condensed soup and getting two full servings out of it. Enough to fill two tummies for a couple hours or so. This is another example of why it is totally awesome to keep cooked rice available at all times. Who needs to fill up on bread and cheese? There’s no need.
- 1 can condensed chicken noodle soup
- 2 cans of water (this is more than the recommended)
- 1/2 cup cooked rice
- several pinches of canned fancy cut spinach (refrigerate the rest)
- black pepper
- tarragon
- marjoram
- paprika
The spices and the spinach are what really makes this dish stand out from a boring can of reheated soup. This type of recipe is great for people who aren’t used to stocking their pantries with fresh food. As much as I loathe microwaves, you could even prepare this meal with the microwave.
Reheat the condensed soup following the instructions on the label but use twice the recommended amount of water. Don’t be afraid to leave the heat on for too long with this one because the technique I used involved placing cold rice and cold spinach into the soup right before serving. This means that you can add a dash of paprika and a pinch each of the marjoram and tarragon while bringing the soup to a simmer. Sprinkle with black pepper to taste.
After several minutes of simmering, add the rice and spinach straight from the refrigerator. The reason I use this technique is that the heat transfers from the hot soup to the cold rice and the cold spinach warming the latter while cooling the former, allowing you to serve the soup almost immediately.
Jan
08
Made this from leftover turkey. I know that this is more of an after-Thanksgiving type of recipe, but I had an extra turkey in the freezer that I cooked. Soup is a great way to use up leftovers and thing you would usually throw away. Also works well with a couple of picked-over chickens.
For the broth:
- 1 turkey carcass with some meat still attached, quartered
- 2-3 quarts water
- Vegetable trimmings (carrot and potato peels, celery bottoms and leaves, onion ends and peels, etc.) or:
- 1 onion chopped roughly
- 2 celery stalks, broken in half or thirds
- 2 carrots, chopped roughly
- 4-5 whole black peppercorns
- salt to taste
Add the turkey carcass, trimming (or vegetables), peppercorns and salt to the pot of water. You may also add any fat or gelatinous material to the pot and bring it to a boil. Boil for 1-2 hours until you have a rich, flavorful broth. Drain the broth through a fine-meshed strainer or a colander lined with cheesecloth or, if nothing else, just a colander. Pick all the meat from the bones and save them for the next part of the recipe. Make sure to let the bones cool first, though.
For the soup:
- 1 tbsp butter
- 1 medium onion, diced
- 2-3 carrots, chopped
- 2-3 ribs of celery, chopped
- 1/4 c flour
- 2-3 medium potatoes, chopped
- 1 can of diced tomatoes, drained (or 1-2 medium tomatoes, diced)
- 1 can corn, drained (or 1 c fresh or frozen)
- 1 can peas, drained (or 1 c fresh or frozen)
- turkey broth (see above)
- 1 pint heavy cream
- 1 c milk
- turkey meat, picked from the bones, chopped
- 1 tbsp fresh or 1/2 tbsp dried rosemary
- salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
In the same pan you made the broth in, melt the butter. When the foaming subsides, add the onions, celery and carrots, and saute them until translucent. Add the flour and continue to saute until the flour turns brown, about 1 minute. Add the rest of the vegetables and broth and simmer until the potatoes are tender. Add the remaining ingredients and let it simmer a few minutes until it is thick.
Tags: black pepper, broth, butter, carrots, celery, corn, flour, heavy cream, milk, onion, peas, pepper, peppercorns, salt, turkey, water
Jan
07
I will be experimenting throughout the week with different google ad placements on this site. Please let me know if you experience any problems as a result or if you have any feedback for ad placement.
I have room on the front page for one banner ad under the first post that I am willing to dedicate to local websites, businesses or food sites. If you have any information about local ad networks that could help me facilitate this, please let me know.
Thanks.
p.s. looking for assistance implementing google adsense for search results, i.e. editing http://keldscookin.com/search.php and http://keldscookin.com/tabbedBox.php
