First Chicken!

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Last night was the first Mr. Big Food had used his new grill for chicken. It was a huge success!

As you can see, as soon as he shut the lid, the temperature went to perfect. He did his standard technique of moving the pieces around as he mopped them with tea. If you’re not familiar with this, every few minutes as it grilling, you use a basting brush and mop the pieces with tea. It keep the chicken moist and tender. At the final move around, you slather on the barbecue sauce.

Strange picture is just that but I thought it was an interesting reflection. It’s getting a bit natty out there in the evenings.

Those were our two sides, coleslaw and some black eye pea thing. I’ll post the recipes tomorrow.

1:08 of Country Mouse Life

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Don’t know why the video is so grainy but it doesn’t matter. It’s the audio I wanted to share. Potential for bad weather again early this weekend so I thought I’d take Missy & Rocky to the Hidden Pasture for a good run.

Have a good one!

Recipe: Across the Garden Soup

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Across the Garden Soup is my variation on my mother’s. As its name implies, the soup changes subtly with the seasons, so go ahead and stroll across the garden to create the soup you like. This is a great soup to have simmering in the background. In my humble opinion, it tastes better after it’s been refrigerated for a day.

ACROSS THE GARDEN SOUP
• Left-over meaty ham bone or ham hock; if you don’t want to make the soup within a few days of having served the ham, freeze the meaty ham bone.
• 2-4 Bay leaves
• 1 Tbsp. or more Peppercorns
• Thyme or other fresh herbs
• 2 (at least) onions
• Carrots cut into chunks
• Potatoes cut into bite-sized chunks; new potatoes are awesome
• Cabbage quartered or whole green/wax beans or both
• Celery cut into chunks
• Parsley
• Salt to taste
• Whipping cream or half-and-half

(Quantities of all ingredients vary with the size of the ham bone and your tastes. When you get all of the veggies into the stock, the pot should be packed full of veggies.)

Cover the ham bone with water. Add bay leaves, peppercorns, and one onion quartered. Cover and simmer slowly until the meat begins to fall off the bone. Add more water if needed to keep the bone covered. Remove bone and any meat that’s fallen into the stock. Also remove bay leaves and as much of the onion and peppercorns as you can. When the bone has cooled, remove meat and set aside.

Bring stock to a slow simmer and add carrots and remaining onions. When the carrots are about half cooked, add potatoes. When potatoes are about half cooked, add celery and cabbage. Simmer slowly for a long time– until the veggies are the texture you prefer.

All of the above can be down early in the day and the soup left on the stove to mellow. About 30 minutes before serving, add ham and parsley to the soup and bring to a slow simmer. Adjust seasonings
Add cream to taste in individual bowls.

First Iris

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It’s all about the irises today. Which explains why I had nothing to say earlier.

My irises, of which I have only two varieties, hale either directly from Aunt Margaret, or from Aunt Margaret via Mom. I like the one that’s booming but the darker one that still in bud is my favorite. That row in front of the apartment– that’s still a work in progress with respect to clean up– is about 50′ long. It should be stunning.

I’ve got about 70′ of the lighter one in a semi-abandoned garden behind the workshop. That’s where the transplants came from. Man that was a chore. It needs to be thinned. Very badly. Who’s up for that this weekend?

Time to tend the soup. It’s Marica Cooks… Wednesday!

Memphis

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Traveled to the formerly charming Southern City of Memphis* today. Only had four near vehicular death experiences, and saw only three wrecks. Took the back way home which had only minor can’t text and stay in my lane problems on the outskirts.

While sitting in the parking lot of a high rise building on Poplar in a decent neighborhood (Whole Foods only blocks away), saw a guy zoom into the lot, pull up in front of a large dumpster, get out, climb on the dumpster’s ledge, and look in. Apparently nothing too interesting as he departed into the neighborhood and proceeded to peep into the dumpsters at the ends of driveways. Musta been trash day.

No offense to those who live in cities but I, for one, do not know how you tolerate this. Give me back roads, farmers’ waves, and hand-painted signs alerting me to the fact that the porch swings, rockers, and picnic tables on display in your front yard are for sale any old day of the week and I’ll be happy.

*I’m glad I knew Memphis when it was such. Before the Tupperware Ladies and Mike Tyson’s pimps and whores invaded the Peabody (correctly pronounced, Pibbidy). It was a long time ago.

Shakshuka Step-by-Step

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The recipe is here. Photo at that link was of our first experience with Shakshuka in Tel-Aviv a few years ago. Last week we decided put it on the menu and give it a try ourselves. It’s not hard or as time consuming if you do all of the chopping (except for tomatoes) before you begin. Mr. Big Food and I worked as a team.

The last photo above is just before we put the lid on the skillet for the final five to eight minutes. Traditionally, you want to whites to set but the yolks to be warm but running. We opted to let the yolks get firmer than tradition.

As we were making it, Mr. Big Food commented that every culture has the equivalent of this dish, varying according to regional spice and herb availability. And let’s not forget that it would not have been until the tomato made its way to The Old World that folk in those cultures would have come up with their variations.

Would be interesting to be a food historian.

Sop up the goodness with Israeli Sabbath Twist.

Recipe: Israeli Sabbath Twist

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It’s poppy seeds, not salt!

This is one of the oddest breads I’ve baked. At every stage I thought it was going to be a complete disaster up until I checked it 20 minutes into baking. What a delightful surprise! The dough is the softest I can remember working with. I let it rise 30 minutes longer the first time, and 15 the second. Punching down was a dud. But man did it turn out good! Served with Traditional Shakshuka.

“This recipe won the grand prize in the 1965 yeast baking contest at the Texas State Fair.”—Mrs. Emily Luck, Dallas, Tex.

ISRAELI SABBATH TWIST

Makes 1 loaf

2 C hot water, plus an additional ¼ C water, warm
2 ½ tsp salt
1 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp vegetable oil
1 package active dry yeast
2 eggs, beaten slightly, plus 1 additional egg yolk, beaten
5 C unsifted flour
Poppy or sesame seeds

Pour 2 C hot water over salt, sugar, and oil. Dissolve yeast in additional warm water. When oil mixture has cooled slightly, add yeast mixture. Mix in 2 eggs and enough flour to make a light dough, and knead until smooth and elastic. Place dough in a greased bowl, turn once to coat entire surface, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour. Punch down, turn out onto a floured board, divide into 3 equal parts, and roll out each part to 18×1 ½ inch thick rolls. Twist rolls into a braid, place on a greased cookie sheet, cover, and let rise again in warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour. Preheat oven to 350o. Brush with additional egg yolk, sprinkle with poppy seeds or sesame seeds, and bake 45 minutes.