Turkey Pot Pie

A traditional pot pie would be at least 8 servings an a lot of cooking time. While cooking other items I made an ingredient pre-prep with 1/2 celery stalk, 1 carrot, 1/2 onion and 1 garlic toe. 

I  cooked 1 Tbs butter with the onion, and later the garlic.  Added 1 Tbsp of flour.  After it'd cooked a while, I added the carrot & celery.  Then Tsp bouillon powder, 1 cup milk and after thickened, 8 oz peas and  8 oz of diced leftover turkey from the freezer. 

I cooked the cheesy biscuit earlier when I had the oven on for a birthday cake.  This recipe is amazing.  I made 1/2 batch.  But because it's hard to add 1/2 egg,I did whole and is was wet.  So I treated it as a giant drop biscuit.  Look at this beauty!!! Here's the recipe. 

 

Pizza Perfection

 

Round 1, Pizza 1

My husband loves pizza and rarely complains about any style crust.   On the other hand, I am a total crust snob.  Inspired by a TV show where they were making Naples style pizza, I started researching. 

Round 1, pizza 2

I read several articles on Cold Fermented Pizza Dough.   Here's the link to the recipe and directions that I mostly followed (I used 4g yeast).  After reading several articles, one secret is the timing.   The dough must be made 3-5 days before use.  I did Round 1 (pictures above) on day 3, round 2 (pictures below) on day 4. 

Secret # 2 is heat.  Pizza ovens are 900 F.  My oven maxes out at 550.  I followed suggestions and bought a pizza stone, bringing it to heat from a cold oven.  Middle rack  (some instructions say top rack).  I tried using the broiler on round 1, but it turned off the oven heat, so didn't do that round 2

Minute 6 of baking pizza 1 of round 2 I heard a bang.  The pizza stone broke. 

Undeterred, here's the hubby's pizza, perfect at 7 minutes.  He added pineapple after the photo.

I probably overloaded the cheese by Neapolitan standards.  Which prevented as much rise in the dough at the center.  

By the 4th pizza, I did get some bubbles in the center.

Amazing bubbles on the edges. 

I also found that it helped to roll out the crusts as much as they would go without bouncing back to a smaller size.   Then I let them sit for 10 minutes and rolled again, which increased the size and thinned out the crust. 

Fortunately, the broken pizza stone was still big enough for the mini pizzas. 

Round 2, Pizza 2 was everything I'd hoped for.  Pesto & fresh basil with ham & fresh mozzarella. 

YUMMY!

Four 9 inch pizzas for under $10.

Discount Tacos

Tacos are a great bargain.  They only take small amounts of ingredients and are a great way to use up leftovers.  One of my goal words for 2022 is Reduce.  Which when it comes to  food means lower cost, but also less food wasted.  With only 2 people too cook for, I never seem to make it through a package of tortillas before we're tired of eating tacos.  Or I put it in the freezer, only to throw them away months later.   

I searched for a corn tortilla recipe on line and made a 1/2 batch with some masa I had on hand.  Total cost was 10 cents and a few minutes at the stove.   I definitely need more practice.  And I prefer flour tortillas.   Maybe next time. 

I bought a tomato just for this but only used 1/2 so a cost of $ .50.    With some leftover precooked burger, and hot sauce and cheese I always have on hand, this meal was all in for $3  to feed 2 people well with 3 street tacos apiece.

Low Carb Sushi

 As a Diabetes Educator,  I frequently have conversations about the frustrations of sushi causing all kinds of blood glucose spikes, even in moderate portions.  So my current challenge is a low carb sushi.

Replacing rice with a cauliflower/bean blend drops the carb total from 30 to 5 per roll.  I started with my standard recipe with head of shredded cauli sauteed with onion and lemon juice.  But was too moist, so I changed to a microwave steamed version to be drier. 

The next debate was a "glue" to hold the cauliflower together.  Canned Navy Beans and Great Northerns worked great for the "glue" to make cauliflower sticky.  In theory, navy beans are somewhat softer for blending, but when I had to shift to Great Northerns, I really didn't see any difference.  Butter Beans should be an equal swap.

My first attempt, I was really focused on the veg, as I always am.  Trying to make a Rainbow Roll with a little crab or lox style salmon.  One of the critiques of the first round from an uber sushi lover was that I had too many flavors.   My personal critique was the flavor and moisture of the cauli/bean substitute for rice. The recipe below has adjusted for some of that problem.

And so did this proportion of cooked shrimp, cauliflower and avocado. 

Each roll = 3 large cooked shrimp, 1/8 cuke, 1/4 avocado. 1 cup cauli-sushi-rice.

I took 3 variations of this to a birthday party and forced people to give feedback.  The group favorite and runner up variations are listed below. 

Cauliflower Rice. 

1 onion finely minced or shredded. 

1 head cauliflower shredded in a food processor or box grater

In a large microwave safe glass container, cook onion for 3 minutes.  Add 1/2 the cauliflower and stir to combine.  Top with the other half and cook in the microwave on high for 4 minutes.  Stir and cook and additional 4 minutes.  ( I have done this on the stove top with a skillet, but you may need to add additional water to steam, and drain after). 

Bean Glue

Drain and rinse 1 can (16 oz) of white beans : Navy, Great Northern, Butter Beans.   

Puree with 3-4 Tbsp of Sushi vinegar:

    4 Tbsp rice vinegar, 3-4 packets of Splenda, 1.5 tsp soy sauce

The formula for rice substitute is 1 cup cooked cauliflower rice to 1/4 cup of bean puree glue.

The winning combination added 1/4 tsp ground ginger and 1/4 tsp wasabi powder for  each cup of cauliflower.  

About a third of the tasters preferred my wild card combination which used my home made hummus in place of the white bean / sushi vinegar blend.   I was only able to add 1 tsp of sushi vinegar to the mix without it being too wet. 

My thought was that being able to  buy frozen cauliflower rice and pre-made hummus could make this a more likely recipe for people to try.  

I cooked frozen shrimp in crab boil, but pre-cooked frozen shrimp could also speed this recipe up.

Unlike rice, the cauliflower/bean blend stores well and can be used for days to make a quick, on demand sushi roll with all kinds of leftovers.  

Eat well.  Be happy.

Perfect Sour Dough Muffin Recipe

I have spent a month trying to figure out the perfect English Muffin.  This is the 10th or 11th version.  I actually have another variation plan in mind.

Sourdoughs have different peak and actions, so you'll have to adjust your recipe to how your sourdough behaves.  I used a Bahrain starter, which is a slow acting starter with an amazing sour flavor.

325g Sourdough starter
24 g sugar
25 g dried milk
12 g salt
35 g melted butter or oil
140g water
465 g flour.

I do my bread by hand, so I add about 1/2 the flour and mix like mad with either a  whisk or rubber spatula to develop gluten in the mix.  This saves tons of time in kneading later.

Knead to a smooth texture and proof.  My technique is to turn the oven on for 5 min at 350, then turn it off and use it to proof the dough.  I keep the dough in the mixing bowl and cover it with a shower cap to retain the moisture.  First proof is 2 hours. (adjust for your sourdough)

Pinch off sections 75-80g in size.  Create balls using the fold and squeeze method my mom taught me for making rolls.

 Pull the edges into the center of the ball, until the outsides have a smooth texture.

 Squeeze the base and tuck it under for the rest.

 After a 10 minute rest, roll the balls into 3-4" circles.

 Directions here vary in other recipes with flour or cornmeal.  I used Masa  sprinkled from a high distance.  I used flour for early batches, but it tended to clump up and be too thick.  I don't like cornmeal so none in the house.

 12 to a pan. Covered with foil (which I reuse from batch to batch) with space above to be sure it doesn't touch the cover while it rises. Proof for an additional 2 hours.

 They touched each other more that I would have liked.  Use a sharp knife to divide them, hoping to limit how much they deflate.

Cooked in an electric skillet at 250 for 6 minutes per side with the lid on. The steam helps with the cooking heat while limiting the browning.  My early attempts were nearly burnt.  I find that by going on  a lower heat, it needs and additional  minute per side. I also stacked them 2-3 high after pulling them from the skillet instead of cooling rackto get some residual cooking.

So there are my secrets for Fluffy Muffins.

Fluffy Muffins History

5 weeks ago, I started out on a quest for fabulous, fluffy English Muffins.  Sounds simple, right?

 I asked for recipes from friends, and reviewed internet versions.  Here's the first round with some wonky shaped versions on the re-roll of extras.

 Cooked in an electric skillet.  Had trouble getting them off the proofing pan without making weird shapes.

Reasonable texture.   Fairly small.

 Next batches were wonky

And too dark on the cooking.  But still delicious.

 Texture improved.  Tried multiple techniques, resulting in weird shapes.

 Then this super-model version.  This is what I was imagining.

Even prettier when toasted.

Last week's version shows how much closer I'm getting to the solution.  The upper version from the freezer are the same size (65g) as the lower ones.  I am 9 batches into this at this point.

Posting the finale in another post.

1 Month Vegetarian Eating

My month of vegetarian eating has been a mixed bag.
   

Eating Out:
On the "good" side, I have needed to look at menus differently.  Overlooking things that I would normally order, I found grilled cheddar with blueberries on sourdough to be amazing.  Boise Fry company has a great black bean burger.  Made even better with blue curly fries with blueberry ketchup.

The hospital across the street from where I work serves a Bistro Bowl where you get to pick the ingredients.  I veg mine up and use both the tofu and peanuts as protein, topped with chimichurri sauce.  It's pretty yummy.


Everything else eaten out has been horrible.  It probably doesn't help that our usual haunts are biker bars and small town cafes.  This was a black bean and quinoa burger with texture and flavor of saw dust.  Twice in 1 week I was served "stir fry veggies" with so much teriaki sauce that my tongue was numb for the rest of the day. 

So mostly if I'm eating out, I've found soup and salad to be one of my few reasonable options (besides 1000 calorie bowl of mac & cheese or alfredo pasta).

Postitive:
On the bright side, I am eating a lot more variety of vegetables and more whole grains than before. And probably more calcium too since complicated grilled cheese has become my norm at home.
 
Grilled Havarti on Multigrain with tomato, cuke, spinach & basil.
Grilled Provalone & Gouda with mushrooms on dill rye.


This was my favorite experiment: Papparedelle pasta mixed 50/50 with shaved carrots the same shape.  Tossed in a little bit of cream sauce and enoki mushrooms and topped with basil & green onions.


I've tried tofu a couple times.  Squished and highly seasoned, it's edible but not exciting.


Unfortunately, the carnivore at my house is NOT on board with this plan.  Subsequently, I pre-prep a lot of ingredients that can go together to order.  Oh, and he is using it as an excuse to eat Fruit Loops.

So in conclusion, I will continue on.  Mainly because I am seeing results in the 2 areas I started this for initially.  My weight is down about 4# and my BP down 5 points.