Don’t Confuse Cream with Cream

When reading a recipe especially one for pastries you will now and then eventually come across the term “cream”. mostly this will refer to “Creaming Butter and Sugar” Don’t confuse it with Heavy Cream.

(to) Cream- To mix two ingredients together until smooth and creamy, such as butter and sugar. When using a mixer use your Paddle attachment, let  butter come to room temperature before creaming this will help speed up the process and it will produce a more smooth texture.

The following is a recipe that uses the creaming method!

Chocolate Cake

 

9 oz butter

6 oz sugar, superfine

 9 oz bitter sweet chocolate, melted, cool slightly

 6 eggs

 3 oz cake flour

2 tsp cocoa powder

1/16 tsp salt

 

Procedure:

 

1. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy.
2. Add chocolate to butter and scrape down sides.
3. Add eggs one by one.
4. Sift flour, cocoa powder and salt and add to butter mixture.
5. Combine thoroughly.

 bake in 350 degree oven. makes for a great liquid center chocolate cake.

 

No Share Recipes

I know it’s hard for some to come to terms with the fact that sometimes no matter how much you like a dish the chef isn’t going to give up the recipe. I’ve been know to change ingredients and ratios just a tad so that the dish doesn’t turn out quite the same as when I make it. Why?  Well if you can make what use am I? I won’t post those “changes” here because I won’t be posting no share recipes. But, it is more than all of that. Have you ever been to a potluck and there is 4 of the same dish? It’s frustrating you don’t want to have something repeated over and over. We call them “no share recipes” in our family, it even says it on the note card somewhere. My mom grew up in Virginia near Washington D.C. and her mother had  lot of friends whose husbands were in the Military. I don’t know how common it is now but in the 50′s and 60′s all the wives would get together and have potlucks, brunches, and cocktail parties. Everyone would bring their favorite dish and under no circumstances would you EVER share the recipe. You don’t want to show up at your next gathering to find that the very person you shared with made the exact same dish. I think that would be grounds for war!

I would almost stake my life on the fact that the recipes from these wives are the best kept military secrets of the cold war!

I will share a recipe that at one time was a “no share” and my great-grandmother tried to get it and when she was denied she just recreated it based on the flavors she could pin point. This won’t be showing up on wikileaks any time soon but it was discovered later that she was dead on accurate so if you have discernible palate like her any time you run across a dish you can’t get the recipe for, try to creat it your self. You can now find this recipe on half a dozen web sites, but they don’t give you tips on how to make it even better!

King Ranch Casserole (their way)

1 can of cream of mushroom soup

1 can of cream of chicken soup

1 can of Rotel

1 cup of chicken broth

2 cups of shredded cheddar cheese

1 dozen corn tortillas

2-4 chicken breasts

 

Procedure

Combine soups, rotel 3/4 of the chicken broth in a bowl. Mix well boil or sauté chicken breast until done in a casserole dish (any size depending on how much you want). Dip tortillas in remaining chicken broth and layer in bottom of dish. Take soup and pour in enough to cover tortillas. Sprinkle cooked chicken on the top. Repeat steps until mixture and chicken are gone. Sprinkle cheese on top of casserole.

Bake uncovered on 350°F for 45 minutes. Let cool and thicken for 10 minutes.

King Ranch Casserole (My way)

1 Can cream of mushroom soup (don’t like mushrooms so I sometimes use cream of celery soup)

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 can of Rotel OR (4 fresh roasted Hatch anaheim green chilies diced and 1 fresh tomato diced)

1 cup chicken broth

1 yellow onion diced

2 cups of shredded cheddar cheese

1 dozen corn tortillas (cooked in corn oil until just crispy)

1 small roasted chicken (cut meat from bone and shred)

Procedure

Mix first five ingredients together along with the chicken a pinch of salt and some pepper let sit for about half an hour or so to let all the flavors mingle. Shred the cooked  corn tortillas (I am a bit OCD so I cut them in to triangles).

Layer the ingredients starting with half the Soup mixture then half of the tortillas and half the cheese. Repeat the layers with the remaining ingredients and place in the 350 degree oven covered for 30 minutes and uncover for another 15 minutes.

 

Let me know which one you prefer! You can also save the bones from the roasted chicken and make a stock. Reduce and freeze to use for chicken noodle soup or use for the next time you make this casserole!

Behind You

There are few things that a chef is likely to take home with them and use in everyday life that wouldn’t be understood by the rest of the general public. One is the constant unconscious act of always letting people know where you are and where are going in relation to them. There is danger lurking around every corner of a kitchen, Knives, boiling pots of liquid, fire, and hot grease the most important thing is to always let your fellow danger junkies know when you are one the move. So yelling “Behind you” or “Corner” is a common chorus to be heard in a kitchen. However when you do this in the supermarket people tend to look at you like you have lost your marbles! Which in my personal opinion you probably have but how is it a bad thing to let people know that your walking behind them and don’t want to get stepped on. Ultimatley in a kitchen it’s a safety precaution, out in public your just crazy.

So if you are ever in a public place and you hear some one say “behind you” or “coming around the corner” Most likely they have worked in a restaurant.

Cooking Obsession

Most everyone in my family cooks in some way or another, there are a few exceptions an Aunt who doesn’t like it. A cousin that would just rather go out than deal with it, but most of my family does. My maternal great-grandmother was a great cook and taught home economics when it was still okay to have such classes in schools. My grandmother picked up the skill and tried to pass it on to my mom who didn’t have an interest in it didn’t really learn to cook until my dad taught her. Food in some way was always a center of family gatherings and breakfast and dinner were a big deal in our house. We rarely went out to eat and when we did it wasn’t fast food we always put on our Sunday best and went and sat in a restaurant with actual tables and real utensils and cloth napkins. I am grateful for this  because I have managed to escape the addiction to the fast food industry!

I don’t really remember if there was a moment where I decided I loved to cook, I just remember a moment where the one thing I couldn’t stand any more about my mom’s cooking was the jar of spaghetti sauce. I found an old italian cook book on her shelf in the kitchen and rifled through it look for a recipe that sounded like it would taste good and BEGGED her to let me make it. I think I was 11 or 12. She happily took me to the grocery store showed me how to pick out the best fresh produce and we went home and I made my first ever meal. That was just the beginning.

20 years and a culinary degree with 12 years in restaurant kitchens later, I still try to make my own Bolognese sauce.