Friday, January 22, 2010

Two things. (aka Inertia is contagious)

One of my favorite places to spend quality time is on a soap making forum called the Soap Dish Forum. Not only do I get inspiration to make new and unique soaps, lotions, bath bombs and the like, I pick up ideas to simplify my life.

Around Christmastime '09 the topic came up about the Great Decrapification of 2010. Everyone has crap. Don't lie. If you say you have no crap you're full of crap. A few dozen "dishers" took the challenge and have been organizing, donating and just plain trashing the stuff that has accumulated in their homes and offices. We each confess every few days. This causes other dishers to catch the tossing bug. It feels really good.

I am no stranger to decrapification - or collecting crap. Last year I spent the first month of my retirement going through every nook and cranny of my home and organizing. I found bags and bags of old paperwork that we didn't need any more. Sorted and filed all of the user guides and tax info in waterproof boxes, junked pens and pencils that no longer worked. You get the drift. I found $241 in loose change and around 50 Euros in the process. It was good. I try to keep up with cleaning, but crap just multiplies on its own.

Doing a major decrapification is a pretty big undertaking. Another Dish thread introduced the notion of keeping things simple. Just toss 2 things a day that you no longer need. Over the course of one year that would be 730 pieces of crap out of your life. It's so doable. Truthfully, you can make the 2 things a day with a pair of holey socks or pens with no ink. What generally happens is you look at things a bit differently. As you explore areas of your home you'll find far more than 2 things. In no time you've emptied a lot of crap that had no meaning to you but took space and time to clean. An added twist is to toss 2 things for every one new thing you bring back into the house. It makes you really think about purchases.

Here's where I'm at:
Day 1: Bathroom Vanity. Junk piled 6 jars of lotion and hair product that I didn't like. Oddly it had been in there so long most things had started to separate. 3 Mascaras that had dried up. Eye shadows that didn't suit my skin tone. Air freshener that made me sick to my stomach. That was more than 12 things in 2 minutes. Open shelves and a clean vanity top. Good start.

Day 2: Kitchen - Baking cabinet. I pulled a chair over to stand on to survey the top shelf and discovered 3 jello instant puddings, 4 jello gelatins, 1 box of gourmet cake mix, evaporated milk, 2 boxes of crackers, Cake decorations, frostings an industrial size container of garlic powder all expired. At least 15 things in 2 minutes. New rule: I am not allowed to use the top shelf for ANYTHING!

Day 3&4: Soap Studio. I've been feeling constricted lately. I shouldn't have to add on to the house to make soap. I'm not so big as to need that room. My studio is 15 x 20 with cabinets and countertops on 2 full walls - plenty big to do whatever I need to do. The problem: the cabinets were full of crap from when we moved in. I pulled out 5 frying pans moved from upstairs when I replaced them with new non-stick and stainless steel. A coffee percolator for parties, cru de te trays, computer parts and keyboards. The worst was my own stockpile of little bottles, cans, containers and such that I kept for temporary molds. Really? Will I ever use 6 pringles cans for soap molds? I love making logs. Out they went. Essential oil and fragrance bottles. That was harder. Sometimes I like to huff from bottles to compare scents between vendors. Some went. Some are honestly still there.

I added four stacking 8 foot wall shelves to line up the curing soap. Moved all of the empty molds to one location and arranged fragrances in wire shelves along the wall. I can now see exactly what i have and how much of it. I added 2 more spice rack type of wire shelf where I mix everything up. Nothing on the counter except the mixing pails. Added cork squares on the cabinet doors to pin up the recipes I'm working on. I made 2 batches of soap with all the space in the world. No more tipping over bottles in a cramped space. I feel so energized! Creative juices are again flowing.

Tomorrow: The storage room. Sweet Jesus I am not looking forward to it. If I just focus on 2 things. Two measly little things, perhaps I'll get the job done. 2 Paperback books. 2 coffee mugs. 2 old dog blankets. I can do that. In about a month that room should be back in ship shape. 2 things.

Saturday, January 9, 2010

Coffee Break


I recently joined a coffee swap with a group of people in my favorite Soap Forum. Initially I planned to venture to downtown Chicago to pick up a few pounds from Intelligentsia. I like their coffee and their story, but not enough to pack up my 5 year old daughter during one of the coldest spells of weather this year and trudge through the Windy City.

So, instead I let Google lead me to a place more local. I struck GOLD in a neighboring town. Conscious Cup is a roaster that makes their magic in the restaurant in front of their giant window. Each week day morning they put on a show of the tastiest kind. I had a cup of their "Nicaragua" yesterday while Teagan munched on an oversized chocolate muffin. The coffee was light and smooth. Even at 4 O'Clock in the afternoon I didn't feel the caffeine jitters. Got a good night's sleep and awoke looking forward to my day.

I told the coffee expert behind the counter that I was looking for something smooth with little or no bitterness for my swap. She directed me to an organic free-trade variety from Brazil. I love me a good strong cup of Starbucks, but am trying to reduce the amount of sugar and cream I need to enjoy the cup. I'd like to learn to like coffee 'black' but cannot seem to get used to the taste without the amendments. Sitting here with a tall steaming cup of the Brazil blend I am on my way toward achieving my goal. It took no sugar and only little heavy cream to make my palate happy. It's much lighter than the Winter Blend that was in my coffee grinder before, but I really like it so far.

Thank you Google. Thank you Conscious Cup. Please excuse me while I return to my coffee break.

Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Jambalaya Tuesday

When it's cold outside my family craves comfort food. Tonight I felt like taking a dinner trip away from the icy Midwest to somewhere in the Creole part of the country. I made our version of Jambalaya. Jambalaya Purists may not agree with my ingredient choices or of the methods, but our appetites were satiated for sure.

Ingredients:
12 or so Shrimp - peeled and shelled (the 41-60 per pound size)
2 Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts - cubed roughly 1-1.5 inches
1/2 Kielbasa (or smoked sausage, anduille, chorizo, etc. whatever you have and like)
1 can diced tomatoes (12.5 oz I think it was)
1/2 large sweet onion cut into 1/4-1/2 inch pieces
1/2 chopped green pepper
1 large clove of garlic - minced
a few Bay leaves
1 T or so of Worcestershire sauce
2/3 cup or so of long grain rice
2 cans chicken stock
1-2 teaspoon vinegar (I used Apple Cider Vinegar)
2 Tablespoons or so of Olive Oil

Seasoning for meat:
2 teaspoons paprika
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon white pepper
2 teaspoons ground cayenne pepper
2 teaspoons oregano

Step 1: Veggies
Pour olive oil into a warm-hot pan
add onion and green peppers. cook 1-2 minutes - until they are barely soft
Add garlic - cook 1 minute. Do Not Scorch The Garlic!
Dump in the can of tomatoes with juice, Apple Cider Vinegar and Worcestershire Sauce. Cook another minute or so
Add rice. Cook a minute or 2. Stir
Add chicken stock. Simmer while preparing meats.

Step 2: Chicken
Toss cut up chicken with 1/3 of the seasoning
Lightly brown in an oiled sautee pan
Stir partially cooked chicken to simmering rice mixture

Step 3: Shrimp
Toss thawed peeled shrimp in 1/3 seasoning mix
Cook 1 minute per side in the chicken pan just to being pinkish..
Stir partially cooked shrimp into simmering rice

Step 4: Sausage
Toss sliced sausage in remaining seasoning mix
Fry in the same pan until slightly golden
Stir sausage into the simmering rice.

After about 20 minutes the rice part should be done. Take a taste of the rice for doneness. If your rice takes longer to cook, then allow the mix to simmer until the rice is fully cooked.

Scoop into bowls and enjoy. B says this would go well with an ice cold beer.

This recipe made enough for 2 adults for dinner and a couple of lunches - probably 6-8 servings.

We cleansed our palates tonight with lemon curd and cream crepes.
Ingredients:
2 crepes (made last night. See yesterday's post for details)
2 Tablespoons of Lemon Curd
3/4-1 cup heavy whipping cream
2 Tablespoons confectioners sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Whip cream, sugar and vanilla to soft peaks.
Gently mix lemon curd with 2/3 of the whipped cream mixture
Spread 1/2 of mix onto middle of each crepe. Roll up burrito style. Top with a dollop of whipped cream.
Enjoy

Monday, January 4, 2010

What do you do with Duck eggs and a bunch of lemons?

If you've read early posts, you know that we made a home for a pair of Pekin ducks. The lady Pekin, Ming Ming, had begun laying eggs like a little machine. Not having taken the big leap of faith to eat a duck egg straight up, I use them to bake. Christmas week I made banana bread with them. They are marvelous. Today though, I had a different problem.

I need a vessel to hold some leftover Beef Bourguinon from yesterday. I don't want biscuits again, so I thought why not go all out French tonight? I have Crepe batter chillin' in the fridge right now.

Crepe Batter:
1 cup cold milk
1 cup cold water
1.5 cups flour
4 tablespoons warm/melted butter
4 chicken eggs (I used 2 duck eggs - those things are HUGE)
Mix up the mess in your blender. (Don't tell B that I used the smoothie machine. The blender was liberated to bath fizzies)
Let the mix sit in the fridge for a few hours.

Cook the crepes in a large pan (about the size you want your finished crepe to be)
Fill the crepe with whatever you feel like having
Eat (the best part)

So, we'll be having the beef as the main course. You can add a side of boiled potatoes or mashed potatoes. I think I'll stick to a green salad tonight.

Having more duck eggs to use and spying a bag of lemons when I put the crepe batter into the fridge, I thought of something: Lemon Curd. That would make a nice dessert crepe. Diet, Schmiet.

Lemon Curd:
1 cup sugar
5 egg yolks (I used 2 duck yolks and one chicken yolk)
1/3 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (3-5 lemons depending on size and how old the lemon is)
1 stick butter
lemon zest from juiced lemons (this is simplest before you juice your lemons)

Step 1: Begin the emulsion
Beat the egg yolks, sugar and lemon juice in a large bowl until they seem blended together. I used a whisk. It took about a minute to complete.
Step 2: Gently cook
Place the bowl over a simmering pot of water. The bowl should NOT touch the water. Bad things will happen. Trust me.
Keep whisking while the mixture cools. Some recipes say to heat to 160F. Basically, you'll see the texture lighten up as it nears the right temp. It will coat the back of a wooden spoon. Drag your finger through the coating and your finger path will remain there. This step took me about 5 minutes
Step 3#: add the luscious butter
Add your room temperature butter 1 tablespoon at a time. Whisk it in until you can't see it any more before adding the next bit of butter. Repeat until there's no more butter. This step took about 2 minutes.
Step 4: Add the zest.
Step 5: Enjoy.
Smear it on toast, scones, crepes, ice cream, as a layer in cakes, cookie sandwiches, whatever. This recipe filled a pint sized canning jar with a few good sized spoonfuls for the chef. It's chilling in the fridge now waiting for tonight's dinner to make its entrance. It will thicken A LOT while cooling. Kept in the fridge it will last up to 2 weeks (yeah right this stuff will be gone by tomorrow). You can freeze this stuff too.
To me it tastes like a sour pudding. Work slowly and at a low enough temperature and it will be smooth as silk. Rush it and you'll have lumps. Ick. Take your time, it's worth it.

Happy Food Dreams

Happy New Year!

A kind "Disher" help to remind me that it has been a very long while since the last topic. Once I turned 40 last September, the year just kind of escaped. As you can imagine, the holiday months were busy and simply flew by, leaving me at January in Chicagoland where I have to look forward to cold, cold and more cold. On the bright side, I'm only looking at about 10 more weeks of it before Spring.

Filling time is pretty easy. I have so many hobbies that I run out of time to do them. One of my favorites is cooking. Yesterday I made a traditional Bouf Bourguignon. What a fancy name for a beef stew with red wine. I don't often follow an exact recipe, but rather take bits and pieces from many other recipes and follow instinct on the rest. Here's what I did:

Beef Stew with Red Wine:
2 # Sirloin Roast cut into 1 - 1.5 inch cubes.
A bunch of Carrots peeled and cut in half so they were about 5 inches long. I love carrots, so I used about 8 large. Not traditional, but it's my recipe!
Celery - I love celery in stews - 5-6 large ribs cut in half to make 5 inch long pieces
A small bag of peeled pearl onions. Frozen is OK. (Peeling Tip:boil the whole onions for 2 seconds. The peels fall off with nearly no tears.)
2 cans of stock (I had no fresh available, so I used 1 chicken and 1 beef I had on hand.)
A bottle of Red Wine (Used Menage a Trois today).
A little flour
A couple tablespoons of veg and.or olive oil
A few Bay Leaves

Step 1: Brown the beef
- My beef was partially frozen from the fridge (woops...). If it were thawed I would have dried it with paper towels, but it was dry being frozen. Put a handful of beef in a hot pan with olive oil. Brown all sides, then move cubes to a bowl while the next batch of beef browns.
- When all beef is brown, sprinkle a bit of flour on the cubes and return to pan to form a little crust.
Step 2: Load the crockpot
- Move beautiful brown beef into crock pot set on low.
- Deglaze beef suate pan with 1 cup wine. Reduce to a few delicious tablespoons and get every last bit into the crockpot.
- Add vegetables, bay leaves and stock to the crock pot.
- Wait patiently all day long with tummy rumbling in anticipation
-Had I thought to buy mushrooms I would have cooked them down in butter and oil at this point.
- Make your side(s). Potatoes go well with this!

Step 3: create the sauce
- About 30 minutes before ready to devour, pour crock pot liquid into a wide sautee pan.
- Reduce by 2/3
- Add 2 cups of wine to the reduced liquid.
- Reduce again to equal roughly 2 cups.
-Season with pepper, herbs, etc. as you like.
Step 4: EAT!
-Remove bay leaves (if you can find them easily)
- Spoon crock pot contents into bowls
- Add some sauce
- the rest is history.

We had fresh buttermilk biscuits as a side. They come in very handy to sop up and stray sauce.
Buttermilk biscuits
Ingredients:
2 cups AP flour
2 tablespoons lard
2 tablespoons cold butter
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
Pinch of sugar
1 cup Buttermilk
Step 1: Bowl ingredients
Combine all but buttermilk in a bowl until the mix resembles crumbs or very small peas.
Add 3/4 cup buttermilk and mix around. If the mix seems dry, add the remaining 1/4 cup.
Mix slightly.
Step 2: Knead and Cut
Turn mix onto counter (I use wax paper at this point)
Knead 4-6 times, then flatten the mixture out in a disc roughly 3/4 to 1 inch thick.
Cut into whatever shape suits you. I make 4 inch circles with frilly edges, but that's me.
Ste 3: Bake
Bake in 425F oven for 11-14 minutes - when they just start to turn golden brown and delicious.

Happy winter!