Sherry – Page 52 – Rosemary and the Goat

Strawberry Shortcakes

You’re going to say “do what with the egg yolks”.

Summer is slipping away and you will want to try this dessert before those just picked strawberries are no longer available.

My daughter first tried this recipe after seeing it on a blog and I remember her telling me the shortcakes had BOILED EGG YOLKS in them. When I was in culinary school I NEVER heard of using boiled egg yolks in a pastry. According to a La Times article, a trick from chef Larry Forgione is to add a couple of hard boiled egg yolks to his shortcake because the yolks are high in fat and low in moisture and they add richness without toughening the dough. Go figure. Well, I guess he knows what he’s talking about because these are delicious.

I’m sure I have said before that my mother use to make strawberry shortcake by first making homemade pie crust (she always made homemade). She then cut it into strips and baked it until lightly brown and crunchy and then we would crumble it up in our bowls, top with sweetened strawberries and whipped cream. I know, I know, sounds like a lot of trouble but well worth the effort.

Others, I’m sure still buy those little round shortbread cakes that get soggy after you put on your strawberries and get that first bite into your mouth. That’s ok too. But this little shortbread cake seems to be the perfect platform for those strawberries or any other sweetened fruit you may want to try.

August 15, 2012 By Sherry

Fish/Seafood

Crab Cakes with Red Pepper Horseradish Sauce

I can just see those little crabs crawling around.

When I was laying around one day recuperating the knee I was thinking of what I could make for a quick, easy and summery dinner; crab was the first thing I thought of. The second thing that came to mind were my BOYS and the pet hermit crabs they had when we lived in Iowa. We had 100 days of snow cover one year and that was when the poor little crabs met an untimely death and they froze in our basement. When we moved to Iowa, I remember someone telling us that that part of Iowa was considered the “Florida of Iowa” — no way I believed that after that year with 100 days of snow cover staring us in the face morning after morning.

We had woods behind our house where the boys sometimes would go to explore. One particular day the doorbell rang and when I opened the door there stood my two little boys, smiles beaming from ear to ear holding a five gallon bucket screaming “look mom, what we found”‘ and there staring up at me was the biggest nastiest bullfrog I have ever seen in my life. That frog did not make it through the doorway.

For some reason these crab cakes took me back to those times in Iowa with the boys and their soon to be sister, lots of snowy winter nights, good friends from church, dinner club, welcome wagon, summer and fall festivals, and lots of other memories of our time spent in Ft. Madison. I love those memories and I hope to hold on to mine forever.

So, hermit crabs, bull frogs to delicious crab cakes. What a jump. I’ve said before, my mind tends to wander. Hope you like the cakes.

August 10, 2012 By Sherry

Entree/ Side dish/ Vegetables

Aloo Bainsan (Eggplant and Potato)

My first Indian dish.

Normally I have an endless flow of ideas for recipes to blog. This time though, I found myself staring at white and graffiti eggplants (I bought because they were so darn cute), one potato and a Serrano pepper and thinking what could I possibly make with this. So I did what I do best and I googled the ingredients. One of the first recipes that caught my attention was a Eggplant and Potato Curry recipe from Food & Wine magazine and my first thought was that I could do better than that. So I dug a little deeper and found this wonderful video from Manjula’s Kitchen (Indian vegetarian recipes).

Don’t you just love YouTube. I use it for anything I don’t know how to make and watching Manjula do this recipe I just knew it was going to be good. (One of these days I’m going to YouTube knee replacement surgery and see exactly what was done to my knee.)

August 5, 2012 By Sherry

Bread/ Morning Foods/ Scones

Bacon, Cheddar and Chive Scones

I could live on bread alone. Could you?

So today, he gets a treat for breakfast and that’s going to be these bacon and cheddar scones.

Most people think of scones as being sweet, but a savory scone is just as delicious. I saw this recipe awhile back on King Arthur flour’s website and just knew that I would be making these for a very special breakfast; maybe some scrambled eggs, some good stone ground grits and a big bowl of milk gravy to go with them.

BLAST FROM THE PAST: EGGS AND PESTO STUFFED TOMATOES has been one of my favorite new breakfast dishes. Hope you will give it a try.

Such simple ingredients. You probably have these in your refrigerator.

I like to cut my bacon in 1″ pieces to fry then all you have to do is stir and no turning required.

Everything chopped up and ready to go into the dough.

My preferred method of cutting in the butter is to use my fingers.

You can either pat this out to a 7-8″ circle and cut in wedges or use a 2″ ring cutter and cut into circles.

These were delicious and the milk gravy was the best. I bought that cute little skillet in France.

Bacon Cheddar and Chive Scones

Ingredients

2 c. King Arthur all purpose flour
1 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. baking powder
2 tsp. sugar
4 Tbsp. cold butter
1 c. finely grated cheddar cheese
1/3 c. snipped fresh slice or diced scallion tops green part only
1/2 lb. bacon cooked, cooled, and crumbled, about 1 cup
3/4 c. + 2 Tbsp. heavy cream

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 425°. Lightly grease a baking sheet, or line it with parchment.
Whisk together the flour, salt, baking powder, and sugar
Work the butter into the flour until the mixture is unevenly crumbled with some of the butter remaining in large pieces.
Mix in the cheese, chives (onion) and bacon until evenly distributed.
Add 3/4 cup of the cream, stirring to combine. Try squeezing the dough together if it's crumbly and won't hang together or if there are crumbs remaining in the bottom of the bowl, add cream until the dough comes together. Transfer the shaggy dough to a well floured work surface.
Pat the dough into a smooth 7" disk about 3/4" thick. Transfer the disk to the prepared baking sheet.
Use a knife or bench knife to cut the disk into 8 wedges, spreading the wedges apart a bit on the pan.
Brush the scones with a bit of cream; this well help their crust brown.
Bake the scones for 22 to 24 minutes until they are golden brown. Remove them from the oven, and cool right on the pan. Serve warm, or at room temperature.
Yield 8 large scones.
Tip: If you want to make these and freeze, after you cut them, put them on a cookie sheet and freeze. When firm enough to wrap, wrap individually and put in a ziploc bag. When you're ready to bake, remove the scones, place on a baking sheet, brush with cream and let thaw about 10-15 minutes then bake in preheated 425° oven for 35-40 minutes until golden brown.
**Note: I added maybe an extra tablespoon or two of the cream as it was still a bit crumbly and needed the additional cream to come together. I also used the green onion stems instead of the chives. Either one would work great.

July 31, 2012 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood/ Salads

Shrimp Louie Salad

Another summer salad.

(Knee update: I really thought I would be back to cooking up a storm by now but this rehab on the new knee is taking longer than I though and I’m so glad that I cooked like a mad scientist before surgery so I would have some new things to post.)

On any trip to Chicago I’m always going to come back with ideas for a new recipe or two to try.

We recently returned from seeing our son and his family. Piece Brewery & Pizzeria will always be on our list of places to go and we did eat there the first night. Their large pizzas is the size of a full sheet pan if you know what that is and we did our best trying to finish it off. We had dinner one night at Leopold where we had some delicious fried veal sweetbreads served with honey cornbread and mustard gravy, a rabbit and duck rillette with Kriek Jelly (making this soon), and the most wonderful chocolate pave that I will also attempt to make the next time I need a great little dessert.

For brunch on Sunday, we went to Mindy’s Hot Chocolate and as always I’m looking around the menu for something other than eggs. There were a lot of different things on the menu like lamb and scalloped potato bake, brioche French toasts with rhubarb and lime curd whipped cream, and the warm doughnut strips coated with cinnamon sugar and house made raspberry preserves were fantastic. Check out their menu for some ideas of your own. Mindy recently won the James beard award for 2012.

I settled on the Shrimp Louie Salad with baby head lettuce, grilled shrimp, avocado, crumbled farm egg, chopped bacon and Louie dressing. I’ve decided to add some baby cucumbers and some sweet grape tomatoes to the mix. I shredded my head lettuce along with a little shredded romaine for additional contrast of color. All I can say is it turned out scrumptious and why had I never heard of a Shrimp Louis Salad.

July 26, 2012 By Sherry

Appetizers/ ColdApp

Macadamia Nut Encrusted Goat Cheese

You don’t have to be in Hawaii to enjoy these nuts.

I first had this appetizer at Tommy Bahama’s restaurant here in The Woodlands. I knew at first bite, it would be a favorite of mine. Some recipes are so easy to duplicate at home that I sometimes don’t think I even need recipes at all except then I would not have anything to play around with.

Six years ago I had the courage to ask The Moonshine Grill in Austin if I could bring this appetizer for my son and daughter-in-law’s rehearsal dinner we had at their restaurant. They probably thought that girl has “gall” but they agreed and in fact they put it on a tray for me with the bread slices and made it very pretty. Of course, everyone loved it.

If it weren’t enough that I brought one of our own appetizers for that night, I actually had the nerve to copy one of their recipes right off their menu — Corn Dog Shrimp with Honey Mustard and Blueberry Swirl. It’s actually still on their menu so it must be very popular. I’ve always heard that Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.

On our recent trip to Chicago I actually emailed Leopold restaurant when we returned and told them how much we enjoyed our evening and asked for their recipe of chocolate pave. I didn’t actually say “give it to me” or anything like that. I smoozed and told them the food was wonderful and the dessert was the best and did they share recipes. A very nice person emailed me back and told me how they made it. So, it never hurts to ask.

July 21, 2012 By Sherry

Beef/Veal/ Entree/ Sandwiches

The Humble Sloppy Joes

Not your ordinary sloppy joe.

I found myself this morning making biscuits just the way my mother did — make them from scratch, pat them out about 1″ thick, cut with a biscuit cutter and THEN melt some bacon fat on the pan that I’m going to bake the biscuits on; and then if all that bacon fat isn’t enough, you put a biscuit on top of the fat and then flip it over so both surfaces (bottom and top) of the biscuit is coated with the delicious salty fat. Then, and only then, do you bake them in the oven. Now, that is a biscuit.

I think we all have recipes that were family favorites whether it is a simple biscuit, sandwich or something that takes hours or even days to prepare.

Who hasn’t had a Sloppy Joe at some time in their life. No one, I don’t think. I was never a fan of the canned Sloppy Joe mixes that one can buy and mix with some cooked hamburger meat and call it a sandwich or the ones that were served to us in our school cafeterias that were nothing more than cooked hamburger and ketchup.

A while back, we were at my sister’s house and she made a huge pot of OUR favorite cooked sandwich filling and that brought back memories of this little overlooked sandwich that I have not made in years and made the same way our mother and grandmother use to make them. Serve on a soft hamburger bun, a pile of potato chips and some pickles and you will have the best Sloppy Joe you have put in your mouth.

So, here it is in all it’s glory. A pretty simple sandwich with a surprise ingredient which is Chicken Gumbo Soup. I have no idea where this recipe came from as we have been making it this way since the 50’s and with the same Campbell’s Chicken Gumbo Soup. I think the soup adds more texture and taste with the little bits of rice and okra that’s part of the soup.

July 16, 2012 By Sherry

Appetizers/ ColdApp

Baba Ganoush

Baba Ganoush. What a funny sounding name.

I can’t say that I have always known what Baba ganoush was. In fact, I am sure, at one time or other, I probably thought it was something some sheik in the Sahara dessert was yelling from his tent — “hey, bring me my baba ghnoush”. As far as I knew that could have meant his slippers, his camel, or his wife. I never really gave much thought to what it was or what you did with it.

Then one time I remember seeing this dip and thinking it was hummus and was told it was Baba Ganoush and it was made from eggplant.

So today I found myself with an eggplant (I was going to grill) that had been sitting out on my counter for a couple of days, and my husband doesn’t liked grilled eggplant anyway; so instead of making something he probably wasn’t going to eat, I decided to try this Baba Ganoush recipe. I had the tahani, lemon, garlic, olive oil and even some very nice pita I had bought down in Houston. So, why not make a little appetizer we can enjoy out by the pool at the end of the day while hub’s grilling our pork chops. Oh, how I like summer and nice weather here in Texas (when it isn’t scorching hot) and the main reason is that my husband does most of the cooking outside and he still LOVES his Kamoto Joe ceramic smoker.

Sometimes this dip is called Caviar d’aubergine and is a very tasty and easy to make spread that can be made several days in advance as it only improves with age. Hope you will try this.

Do you have your favorite dip/spread that guests drool over? If so, leave a comment on what they are.

July 11, 2012 By Sherry

Entree/ Fish/Seafood

Grown-Up Parmesan Fish Sticks

Any fish is a hit in this house.

When I was growing up (I keep asking myself, am I there yet?) seems like our family ate a lot of fish. My dad was the best fisherman around and whether it was catfish, crappie, an occasional turtle (not fish of course) or a big platter of frog legs (again not fish but came out of the water), we had plenty of it and my mother knew just how to make it finger licking good. Her catfish was always in cornmeal and the crappie were always dipped in egg then flour and fried until it was “fluffy” as my daughter still calls it today and of course the other things like frog and turtle were done to perfection as well. One day I will do a frog leg post because I have a hilarious story to tell.

Our mother was a stay at home mom and was always there for us. (I have a twin sister so you will probably always here me refer to myself as “we”, “us”, or “our” — that’s just the way it is.) She cooked lunch for our dad almost everyday and had something on the table just in time for him to walk through the door in the evening and say “What’s for dinner?”. Believe it or not, on occasion, she would pull out a package of Gordon’s Fish sticks for my sister and me and our little brother. Wow, can you believe those little sticks have been around since 1849. Now I never really think of these as “real food” because no telling what goes into a package (any brand) of fish stick; read the label the next time you are in a grocery, you will be surprised at the ingredients. Maybe you were one of those kids that were forced to eat fish sticks in the lunchroom on Fridays during lent and you still have a bad taste in your mouth just thinking about those little sticks all covered with ketchup .

These homemade fish sticks are made from fresh sliced fish (not minced) and all the ingredients can be pronouned. Now it is up to you whether you fry them or bake them.

July 7, 2012 By Sherry

Side dish/ Vegetables

Elote (Spiced Mexican Corn)

Corn for the 4th of July

A squirt of lime makes this even more delicious.

What is it a backyard bbq without some type of corn. Whether it is corn on the cob, corn relish, corn casserole, corn fritters, or corn and black bean salsa…. I could go on and on about the many uses of corn.

Don’t you just love the summer months where so much of your time is spent outside either tending your flowers, gardens or getting ready for a party. I tend to go overboard in the amounts of food I prepare but what the heck, it’s a holiday, a family gathering or a party with of friends coming over for something delicious to eat and that’s what I like to do.

My motto has always been it’s better to have too much food than not enough and if someone doesn’t want to eat EVERYTHING I make, then they can make the decision on which of the foods to pass on.

July 3, 2012 By Sherry

Dessert/ Fruit Dishes

Fruit Salsa with Cinnamon Tortilla Chips

Fruit explosion!

Who doesn’t love chips and salsa at a party? I think it is kind of un-American to turn up your nose at probably one of our first appetizers we ever learned to make whether it is guacamole, onion dip (even the packaged type) or anything you throw together with a sour cream or mayonnaise base. And this little fruit salsa just explodes in your mouth with taste; kind of like the best bite of fruit cobbler you put in your mouth and you don’t even need a recipe.

IT’S THAT TIME OF THE YEAR AGAIN; The time when I drag myself to the blueberry and blackberry patch with the possibility of snake bite, mosquito bites, sunburn, pricked fingers from the throned berries, heat stroke, and dehydration and force myself to pick berries so I can make some preserves and then put the remainder of the berries in the freezer (it better not go out again and spoil my fruit).

I was ready this year and decided to drag myself off the couch and quit complaining about my knees (by this time I should be two days into one new knee) and get out and do something. The first trip was to the blackberry patch. So, I took a tumbler of water (that dumped before I picked a half a pail of berries), hung my iPhone around my neck, put on earphones, set it to play my favorite soundtrack from the movie French Kiss, and donned my big floppy hat and set out down the patch with two buckets in hand. So the first hour I picked 10 lbs and went back for two more buckets which I filled in 45 minutes. $65 later, I have enough berries to last awhile.

My second trip was to the blueberry fields of Moorhead Blueberry Farm. They were the first blueberry farm in Texas according to their website. I did not beat everyone there the day I went even though I was there at 7:00 a.m. By the time I left, there were at least 100 berry picker’s cars along the road and more coming in. This was a fun morning. I was by myself and as I picked berries (there were gazillions) I could hear cries from all over the fields from parents who had taken their children — “watch out for the poison ivy”, “only pick the dark blue ones”, “don’t throw them in the bucket”, “WHERE ARE YOU”, and AWWWWWWW from the ones that were probably too little to take on this outing. I was glad to be in my own little world with my headphones and music.

June 29, 2012 By Sherry

Side dish/ Vegetables

Baby Bok Choy with Brown Butter Garlic Sauce

Bok, Bok, Bok, doesn’t that sounds like some kind of strange bird?

Ok, so it isn’t a bird. I don’t think I have ever eaten this vegetable until back in February when we had our annual dinner of golf husbands and their wives. Our golfers have come to call this “wife appreciation dinner” because we let them play so much golf. Not that they really need our permission to do so, but it’s always nice of them to take us to dinner.

(I’ve been saving a few recipes so while I’m having the knee surgery and the first couple of weeks of rehab I can use some things from my draft folder — so here’s the first, hope I’m up and walking soon.)

I used the bok choy under the mashed potatoes here and then topped the potatoes with a little brown butter. For our dinner that night we had a beef fillet on top of the potatoes. Really nice.

June 25, 2012 By Sherry

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