Happy Easter to everyone who celebrates the occasion.
I was on my own and threw together a pork roast with fiddleheads, hash brown patties and onion rings for supper. Cream puffs filled with whipping cream for dessert and a glass of Pinot Grigio to wash it down. The latter was a Christmas gift from my nephew.
As close as I can get to an Irish meal to celebrate the occasion.
Corned beef brisket, colcannon and carrots.
I forgot to buy any beer but a nice pint glass of an Irish beer (is Harp beer good?) would be a nice accompaniment, I think. Dessert will be a slice of cran-apple pie though a piece of Irish “Brick” cake with some custard sauce might be more appropriate.
PS: I have some creamy potato-leek soup in the fridge but just wasn’t hungry enough to serve it.
The last post on the theme of easy Japanese dishes features a Japanese version of the classic Western hamburger, hambagu, or hamburger steak patty. I’m including a couple of miso soups, a vegetable side dish and some pudding (or purin, in Japanese) to finish things off.
The recipe for the hamburger comes from TabiEats and the result was meant to be used in a bento box. Instead, I used it as a topping for leftover Japanese mixed rice.
Hamburger Steak Mixed Rice Bowl
Hamburger Steak Patty – for 2 patties
100 gm /~1/4 pound ground beef or chicken
30-40 gm enoki mushroom base, shredded
2 tbsp finely diced onion (or 1 tsp fried onions)
1/4 tsp salt
few grinds of pepper
Ground beef and shredded enoki mushroom base
Mix all the hamburger patty ingredients together well. Shape into patty to get out the air. Divide into 2 and reshape into hamburger steak patty. Make a small depression in the center as the middle puffs up during frying. Pan fry over medium heat in 1 tsp vegetable oil for a few minutes on the first side and then turn and finish.
Since the burger on its own seemed a bit dry, I borrowed a recipe for a wine reduction hamburger steak sauce from Nami’s Just One Cookbook. Halve the ingredient amounts for the sauce, from the recipe below, if you’re only making two patties.
Hamburger Steak (Hambagu) – for 4 hamburger steak patties
1-2 tsp vegetable oil
4 hamburger patties, about 90 gm each
~1 tbsp red wine
1 tbsp unsalted butter
Sauce for the hamburger steak
3 tbsp red wine
3 tbsp water
3 tbsp ketchup
3 tbsp tonkatsu sauce (or Worcestershire sauce)
Heat a cast iron or non-stick frying pan over medium heat. Add the hamburger patties and fry 3-4 minutes on the first side. Flip, and add a couple of teaspoons of red wine into the pan.
After you flip, pour 2-3 tsp red wine into the saucepan and then lower the heat to medium-low. Cover the pan and cook for 5 minute, or until the inside of the patty is no longer pink. Take the lid off and increase the heat to medium-high to let the red wine cook off. When the pan is almost dry, remove the patties to a serving plate and reserve.
Combine the liquid sauce ingredients in a bowl. In the same pan in which you fried the hamburger patties, add the butter and the sauce ingredients and mix well. Lower the heat to medium low and let the sauce simmer for a few minutes to cook off the alcohol. With a slotted spoon, remove any meat bits or scum from the sauce so it’s nice and smooth.
When the sauce has thickened to your liking, pour it over the hamburger steaks.
Serve with vegetable sides and rice.
Shira-ae is a tofu ‘dressing’ made of ground sesame seeds/tahini, miso and tofu and added to shredded vegetables.
I used it to dress some blanched broccoli florettes and served it with one of the hamburger patties and a bowl of miso soup.
Two kinds of white miso soup … egg drop/egg flower and tofu or a clear soup.
To finish up … dessert. Cause you ALWAYS need to finish up with something sweet. (Ok, I like cheese and fruit and nuts too but they weren’t in my budget nor did I know any savoury Japanese afters.)
Dessert was pudding, or purin, in Japanese. Both these desserts were made with the same vanilla bean custard mixture. For the flan/creme caramel, I made a hard caramel and poured it into the bottom of the large ramekins. The smaller ramekins were turned into creme brulee and bruleed under the broiler.
Vanilla Bean Flan/Creme Caramel and Creme Brulee
Leftover leeks in the fridge, potatoes sprouting in the basement and a four day stretch at home recovering from a cold, meant I had the ingredients and all the time needed to try a second knish recipe.
I started with Chef Bryan’s recipe on the Klondike Potato website but had to make some changes. Mostly to reflect the shaping technique I used.
I had some concerns about the amount of salt called for in the dough, as well as the filling, and it turned out that my fears were warranted, as the filling was saltier than I would have liked. When cooking potatoes for mashing, I usually throw two generous teaspoons (using a disposable plastic spoon not a measuring one) of salt into the boiling water, which may have contributed to the excess salt taste. And, rather than sauteeing the leeks and the onions in butter (unsalted, though the recipe didn’t say), I used margarine. If I had been thinking, I would have added more mashed potato to the filling I was making to dilute the salt but, obviously, I was NOT thinking. In my defense, I was also trying a new meatloaf recipe at the same time so I was distracted.
Rather than making individual square knishes, I tried to replicate the beef filled version my mom used to bring home from the deli where she worked for twenty years. They made two/two and a half inch wide meat filled logs which were baked and then cut to size for serving. It turned out that I had too much dough (or conversely, not enough filling) as a result of changing the shaping method. In the recipe below, I’ve doubled the filling ingredients to accommodate this.
Aside: About half an hour after my knish roll came out of the oven, I had the curious thought that I may not have measured out three cups of flour for the dough, but only TWO.
Potato and Leek Knish
Chef Bryan’s Potato Knish – makes 16-20 pieces, serves 8-10
Dough
Dry Ingredients
3 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
Wet Ingredients
1 cup mashed or riced potatoes
1 tsp salt (reduce to 1/2 tsp next time)
1/2 tsp pepper (reduce to 1/8 tsp next time)
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup cold water
Filling
2 tbsp unsalted butter or olive oil, divided in half
2 medium onions (2 cups), finely diced and sauteed in half the butter above
1 stalk of leeks (3 cups cleaned leeks), chopped into 1/2 inch squares and sauteed in half the butter above
2 cups mashed or riced potatoes
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
Egg Wash
1 egg and 1 tsp cold water, whisked together
Prepare a half baking sheet by lining with a sheet of parchment paper.
Making the dough:
Whisk together the flour and baking powder in a small bowl and set aside.
Combine 1 cup of mashed potatoes, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Whisk in the olive oil and mix well until nice and creamy and the potatoes come together.
Add the dry ingredients to the wet. Mash together. It won’t come together yet. Add the water to pull it into a dough by creating a well in the middle and adding the water. Mix together until it comes together into a soft dough.
Cover the bowl with a cloth or sheet of plastic wrap and let the dough rest for about 30 minutes.
Make the filling during this resting period.
Making the filling:
In a large saute pan, fry the onions with some (1 tbsp) of the unsalted butter until softened, but not caramelized. Transfer to a medium sized bowl and set aside. In the same saute pan, fry the leeks with the rest (1 tbsp) of the unsalted butter, until just softened. Add the leeks to the onions sauteed previously.
Add one cup of mashed potatoes to the onions and leeks, as well as the salt and pepper. Stir well to combine and set aside.
Preheat the oven to 375 deg Fahrenheit.
Lightly flour a clean work area. Take your dough ball and cut it in two equal halves. Roll out each portion into a rectangle that’s 1/4 inch thick and about 4 inches wide x 14 inches long.
Spoon half the filling into the center of one of the rectangles.
Brush some of the egg wash along one of the long edges of the dough and fold other end of the dough over the filling onto the egg washed edge. Press the dough down to seal the filling into the roll. Turn the roll over, so the seam is on the bottom and transfer the knish log onto the parchment paper lined baking sheet. Brush some of the egg wash over the top. Repeat the assembly process with the rest of the dough and filling.
Place the half sheet into the preheated oven and bake for 45-50 minutes or until the top is golden brown.
Let the knish cool until it’s barely warm, then cut the knish rolls into 2 inch bars.
Serve warm or room temperature with ketchup or spicy mustard.
I served my knishes with a couple of slices of meat loaf and found that the sweet, tang of the ketchup-mustard glaze paired well with the heaviness of the knish.
I recently found a recipe for boursin, a soft and creamy cheese, posted on “The Frugal Hausfrau” website and knew that I had to give it a try. It makes an amazing spread but it also works as part of a creamy pasta sauce. I made a change to the original recipe … I substituted purchased crispy fried onions for the dried chives since I didn’t have any.
Roasted chicken and creamy boursin and mushroom fettuccine
Creamy Boursin and Mushroom Pasta – serves 2 or 3
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp butter or margarine
1 1/2 – 2 cups (~227 gm) mushrooms, halved and sliced (white and cremini)
1/2 cup whipping cream
1/2 cup boursin cheese spread (purchased or home made*)
salt and pepper, to taste
200-210 dry pasta, cooked according to package directions, reserve about half a cup of the pasta cooking water to add to the sauce in case it tightens up before serving.
2-3 tbsp coarsely chopped fresh parsley, for garnish
* See recipe below
In a large saute pan over high heat, add the oil and butter. When hot, add the mushrooms and saute until lightly browned. Turn the heat down to medium/medium-high and add the whipping cream and cream cheese. Stir gently until the cream cheese melts into the sauce and the cream starts to bubble a bit. Add the cooked pasta and stir through. Serve with some chopped parsley on top, for garnish.
Savoury Boursin Cheese
Savoury Boursin Cheese – makes about 1 1/2 cups
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened to room temperature
2 tbsp unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp white pepper
3/4 tsp garlic powder
1 tbsp dried parsley
1 tbsp crispy fried onion
In a medium sized bowl, cream together the cream cheese, butter, salt, white pepper and garlic powder with a hand mixer. Stir in the parsley and fried onions by hand.
Transfer to a small bowl or ramekin, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate so that the flavours will marry. Remove from the fridge 1 or 2 hrs before serving so that the boursin will be soft enough to spread.
Tater tots, mini bites of grated and deep fried potatoes, are a convenience food that make a tasty and fast side dish. A healthier version may be made with “cauli-rice” … cauliflower florettes briefly pulsed in a food processor. The recipe below is a simplified adaptation of the various techniques and ingredients found on line. Though I DID add a ‘variation’ that seemed more extravagant. I haven’t tried it yet. Mainly because I didn’t have either the bacon or the peppers on hand. However, I have two packages of raw cauli-rice in the freezer. Maybe I’ll make them for Christmas. Or New Years.
Baked Cauliflower Tots
Baked Cauliflower Tots – makes 10-12 ‘tots’, 4-6 per serving
2 cups/250 gm ‘riced’ cauliflower florettes*
1 large egg
1/2 tsp dried parsley
1/4 cup raw onion, finely minced or 2 tbsp crispy fried onions
1/4 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup fine breadcrumbs, plain or Italian seasoned
salt and pepper to taste
cooking spray or vegetable oil
*Break down a whole head of cauliflower into florettes. In a food processor, 1/4 of a head at a time, briefly pulse the florettes until they’ve broken down into roughly rice kernel sized.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
Place the riced cauliflower into a microwave safe bowl, with lid, and cook 1-2 minutes on high. Let cool enough to handle. Place the cooled cauli-rice into a fine weave tea towel and squeeze out the excess water. (NOTE: I managed to extract about 3 tbsp of liquid out of this batch.)
Spray a nonstick cookie sheet with cooking spray or brush lightly with vegetable oil. Set aside.
In a medium sized bowl, combine all of the ingredients and season with salt and pepper to taste.
Spoon about 2 tbsp of the mixture in your hands and roll into small oval shaped tots.
Place on the cookie sheet 1/2 inch apart and bake for about 20 minutes. Turn and bake for another 10-15 minutes. Both sides should be nicely browned and firm but still retain some bounce.
Remove and serve as a side dish. Or, as an appetizer, serve with ketchup, pesto, hummus or your preferred dipping sauce.
For an even more decadent appetizer, stir in the items below.
Twice Baked Potato Variation: 1/2 cup grated cheddar cheese, 1/4 cup finely minced bell pepper and 1/4 cup finely chopped crispy bacon
I went a little overboard this year and bought a pre-cooked 5 kg honey-glazed spiral cut ham for my Thanksgiving meal. It cost me $22 CDN and I figure I’ll get at least ten meals out of it so it was definitely a good purchase, price wise.
I had a wonderful lie in this morning, and hadn’t done the math needed to figure out how long it would take to re-heat this monster, ahead of time. It turned out to be almost THREE HOURS, with the enclosed glaze being brushed on for the last half hour. Next time I’d up the temperature to AT LEAST 300 deg or even 325 deg, from the 275 deg F written on the wrappings, because, even after the maximum roasting time recommended, it was still only lukewarm inside. So I sliced off and reheated the portion I ate in the microwave. By this point, it was 6 pm. And I was VERY hungry.
The ham was tasty and moist, but the potato and onion gratin was the star of the show, in my opinion. I started out with this recipe, and then made some changes. Because I was starved, I served myself about one quarter of the dish and by the time I was finished, I was so full, that I almost didn’t have room for dessert.
ALMOST
Cause this was a great looking dessert.
I wanted to make some sort of seasonal fruit dessert for Thanksgiving, but all I had in the house were three apples (Red Delicious) in the crisper drawer, and some blueberries in the freezer. I decided on an apple crumble (with sliced almonds in the crust because I didn’t have any rolled oats in the pantry) with a couple of tablespoons of the blueberries added for a bit of colour. I’ll post my recipe for an individual apple crumble in a future post. As well as for an individual blueberry pudding cake I made.
Potato and Onion Gratin
Potato and Onion Gratin – serves 6-8
1 medium (~300 gm) sweet potato, peeled, halved and sliced about 1/4 inch thick *
1 medium white/yellow (~100 gm) Russet potato, peeled, halved and sliced about 1/4 inch thick*
1 medium onion, cut in half and thinly sliced (1/8-1/4 inch thick)
~4 oz (125 gm) cream cheese, cubed
2 tbsp all purpose flour
1 tsp dried thyme
1 cup chicken broth
1/2 cup milk
4 strips of cooked bacon, thinly sliced (about 1/4 inch thick)
* Use all sweet potatoes or white potatoes, if preferred, or if that’s all that you have available.
Topping
1/2 cup grated old cheddar cheese
1/4 cup seasoned bread crumbs
1/4 cup fried onions
Combine topping ingredients in a shallow dish.
Pre-heat the oven to 400 deg Fahrenheit.
Lightly oil a medium sized baking dish with a neutral oil like canola. (Spray with a cooking spray if you prefer.)
Cover the base of the baking dish evenly with about 1/3 of your sliced potatoes. Scatter about half of the sliced onions over the potatoes. Make another layer of potatoes, and then scatter the remaining onions over the top. Finish with the last of the potatoes.
Place the cubed cream cheese in a medium sized, microwave safe bowl, and warm just long enough to soften the cheese. Whisk/stir in the flour and the dried thyme. Slowly whisk in the chicken broth, a bit at a time, until it’s smoothly combined with the cheese and flour mixture. Whisk in the milk.
Pour the cream cheese/broth/milk mixture over the layered potatoes and onions. Scatter the bacon over the top. Put the lid on the casserole dish and bake for 45 minutes.
Take the lid off the casserole dish, scatter the topping evenly over the casserole and return to the oven. Bake uncovered for 15-20 minutes, or until the cheese is melted and the bread crumbs are golden brown.
Let rest for 10-15 minutes, then serve.
I bought a box of Arborio rice several years ago, to make risotto, and it ended up in the back top shelf of my pantry until this weekend. There was slightly under half a cup of rice left, just enough for two servings. I decided on a pesto risotto and referred to several recipes on line for ingredient amounts, proportions and technique for assembly. This is what I came up with.
Shrimp Pesto Risotto
Shrimp Pesto Risotto – serves 2
Sauteed Shrimp
12 large shrimp, peeled except for the tail
a pinch or two of salt
a few grinds of black pepper
1/2 tbsp butter, unsalted
1/2 tbsp olive oil
Sprinkle the salt and pepper over the shrimp and set aside in a small bowl.
Add the butter and olive oil to a medium sized saute pan. Place over medium heat and when the butter melts and starts to bubble a bit, add the shrimp. Saute until the shrimp just start to get pink, turn over to the other side until it changes colour as well. Remove the shrimp to a clean small bowl, cover and reserve.
Continue with the recipe for the pesto risotto, using the same saute pan.
Pesto Risotto
1/2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp white part of green onion, thinly sliced
1/2 cup Arborio rice
2-3 cups warm chicken broth
1 tbsp Parmesan cheese
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1/4 cup basil pesto, room temperature **
** I used shiso/mint pesto
Add the oil to a medium skillet. Add the onion and saute over medium heat for a few minutes, until it gets soft and just begins to pick up some colour.
Add the rice and toast until lightly golden brown, another couple of minutes.
Pour in the warm chicken broth, half a cup at a time, stirring occasionally, until the current batch of stock is absorbed, every 5-6 minutes or so. (Keep the chicken stock warm in a covered saucepan on the stove.) Cook for 20-30 minutes or until the rice is just barely tender.
Take the rice off the heat and add the Parmesan cheese, lemon juice, pepper, and pesto. Stir to combine and serve immediately.
Serve each portion of the risotto on a large flat plate and place half of the shrimp on top.
Pork ribs are tasty when they’re hot and fresh off the bbq, especially when slathered with bbq sauce. But, on reheating, they always seem to fall flat taste-wise. So I decided to try to cook them in a way that would get more flavour INTO the meat instead of just on top.
A recent purchase of a St. Louis style cut strip of ribs seemed well suited to the experiment. I tasted my current jar of barbecue sauce and although it was ‘just right’ in terms of smokiness, sweetness and tang, it was missing a bit of the spicy back note that I was craving. So, I dressed it up with some chunky chipotle in adobo and ground cumin. I thought the flavour profile would also marry with the leftover Mexican rice (plain long grain rice cooked with a package of Sazon’s Arroz con Azafran) that I was going to serve with the ribs.
Pork Spare Ribs – serves 3-4 portions, 3 bones a piece
1 1/4 kg St. Louis style ribs
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup French’s mustard
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup barbecue sauce*
* Add 1 tbsp pureed chipotle in adobo and 1/8 tsp ground cumin to the barbecue sauce and place in the refrigerator to allow the flavours to marry until the next day.
Peel off the membrane on the underside of the ribs. Combine sugar and mustard and rub over the ribs. Place in bag and let marinade in the fridge for 2-3 hrs or overnight.
Preheat the oven to 350 deg Fahrenheit.
Place the strip of ribs onto a large sheet of aluminum foil, folding it up around the sides to form a shallow tray. Pour the vinegar over the top of the ribs. Cover the ribs with another large sheet of aluminum foil and seal all four sides tightly so the contents don’t leak during baking. Place the foil pouch onto a large baking sheet and bake for 1 hr 45 min to 2 hrs, or until the meat is tender enough to pull off the bone easily.
(If you don’t have time to let the ribs marinate overnight, combine the brown sugar, mustard and vinegar, and brush over the ribs, top and bottom, pouring the remainder over the ribs. Continue with baking instructions above.)
Open the foil, spread the barbecue sauce (reserve 2 tbsp) over the top, return to the oven and continue baking, uncovered, for another 20-25 min.
Cut into 3-4 bone portions and serve with your favourite sides and the reserved barbecue sauce.
As sides for pork ribs, I usually go with the traditional … baked beans and coleslaw.
By chance, I recently watched an episode of the cooking show, “You Gotta Eat Here” which featured a restaurant that topped their waffles in various ways, including one with pulled pork shoulder. And then I remembered that there was a savoury pancake with shredded cabbage in the batter … the Japanese “okonomiyaki’. If I made my pancake in a waffle maker, I would have a very tasty fusion dish.
The idea was brilliant, even if my first attempt was flawed. I was tired, hungry and impatient and when my wonky old waffle maker got hot, I neglected to brush it with oil before pouring in the batter. The waffle STUCK so badly that I needed to chip most of it out of the waffle maker. I shaped the chunks into a rough rectangle, put my ribs on top and dug in.
A chunk of tender rib dipped into some of the reserved bbq sauce, a bit of the waffle, some of the sweet baked beans and I was in heaven. I made a nicer waffle the next day for the post. Cause that’s just the kind of food blogger I am.
Okonomiyaki Waffle
Waffle/Pancake Okonomiyaki Base – makes 1 waffle
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup all purpose flour *
1/8-1/4 tsp salt
3 tbsp water or dashi broth
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp vegetable oil **
3/4 cup cabbage, shredded (or bagged coleslaw mix)
2 stalks of green onion, green part only, slice into 1/4 inch rings
* For a southern/south-western pancake, use 2 tbsp all purpose flour and 2 tbsp finely ground cornmeal
** If sticking is not an issue in your waffle maker, omit the vegetable oil.
In a medium sized bowl, stir together the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder and salt, with a fork. Add the water, egg and vegetable oil and mix just until the flour is moistened. Avoid big lumps of flour but don’t worry about getting it perfectly smooth. Add the shredded cabbage and green onions and fold through.
Add the mixture to a pre-heated waffle maker and cook according to your waffle maker’s instructions. Mine took 5 min to cook through.
I shot a picture of the waffle ‘naked’ but you might want to top it with the barbecue sauce, as in the traditional okonomiyaki.
Inside the shredded cabbage waffle
REVIEW: I’m iffy on how much MORE flavourful the leftover pork ribs were (they were ok) but the waffles were an unqualified success.
Having a bank of fast, easy and economical side dish recipes is a boon to the home cook and this dish is tasty as well.
Asparagus and Mushroom Rice – One cup of raw rice is enough for four servings and, with the addition of 1/2 lb of mushrooms and about 1/4 lb of asparagus, you’ve got your vegetable allotment as well.
If you have leftovers, you can freeze them in single serving portions and thaw and reheat with minimal effect on the texture.
Delicious with BBQ’d pork chops or roasted chicken breast
Cooking is Fun ... Really!! 