Recipes for the restive

I got nothing except a recipe from a friend of mine, Gus. I inspired him with my talk of good ol' Southern food on Friday and he went home this weekend and whipped up some tasty goodness. I got his in my email this morning. Enjoy.

Gus’ Super-Duper Crab Cakes with Crawfish Tails Instead of Crab

Degredients

1 lb crab meat, but instead of crab meat use crawfish tails

1 rib of celery (Wait, is a rib the whole thing or just one piece you pull off the clump? Just use

 one piece.), cut into itty-bitty pieces about this big

1 carrot, peeled and cut into itty-bitty pieces about this big

½ of a small onion, peeled and cut into itty-bitty pieces about this big

1 clove of garlic, minced

1 cup of toasted breadcrumbs (optional)

3 large eggs

½ tsp or so of lime zest (optional) (Ha! Yeah, no, this isn’t optional.)

To taste:  Salt, pepper, Old Bay seasoning, Worcestercestershire sauce

Destructions

Roughly chop the crab crawfish tails and set aside in a small bowl. Sauté celery, carrots, onion and garlic in some olive oil for a minute or two until soft.  Add to the shrimp crawfish. (Unless your cat ate it all out of the bowl when you weren’t paying attention; if so, go back to Wally World, buy some more, and start over again. Not that this happened to me or anything.)

Separate the eggs (by removing the yolks from the whites, not by placing the eggs in different locations around your house).  Stir the yolks in with the salmon crawfish mixture.  Beat the egg whites to soft peaks and then fold into the moose crawfish. [Editor’s note:  I’m not sure what the point of this step was.  As soon as you start folding, the egg whites begin to deflate.  When I make this recipe again I may omit this step and just stir the whole eggs into the crawfish mixture.  Use your best judgment.]  Season with salt, pepper, Worcestercestershire, lime zest and Old Bay. 

Decide whether you want to add breadcrumbs.  Without the breadcrumbs, the cakes taste great but they don’t hold together well during frying.  With the breadcrumbs, the cakes hold together better but they taste like, you know, they have breadcrumbs in them.  You have the power – you decide.

Form the whale crawfish cakes into patties and refrigerate for about half an hour to firm them up.  Heat some more olive oil in a pan and fry the patties until golden brown on both sides.  Sprinkle with lime juice, if desired.  These would probably also taste good with Hollandaise sauce except 1) I don’t know what Hollandaise sauce is, and 2) I didn’t have any.

Its worse than you think

So, the economy is already starting to tank so bad that even in a middle class suburb such as my neighborhood, where I am on a first name basis with the majority of folks living within ten houses of me, I get all my tomatoes, squash and zucchini stolen. My extra propane tank for my grill is also missing. I know animals didn't get the veggies, b/c of the fence and netting I have in place around my garden, the lack of animal footprints and the set of human shoe prints in the garden that don't match any shoes I own and are too big to be my wife's.

Someone went in my yard, stole from my garden and stole a 20lb tank of propane. This really makes me mad, sad and scared all at the same time. I seriously doubt it was any of my next door neighbors, I have a suspicion it was someone from the crew that came and cut down my neighbors backyard tree on Saturday. Although we do have curb side pickers/scrap guys who roll through the neighborhood daily, but they don't ever seem to take anything not on the curb, at least I haven't heard of anything going missing that wasn't out for the taking.

I was looking forward to eating those veggies. If I have to start protecting my garden 24/7 from two legged predators, which I can't, things are worse than I think.

Michelle Obama doesn't like Jelly

So my mother-in-law comes home from working a shift at the church food pantry and she says that they can no longer get .gov assistance in receiving jelly to pass out with the peanut butter and loaves of bread. Apparently Michelle O' feels that Jelly is nothing but hollow calories.
Great, so the poor kids should eat nothing at all if they can't eat "healthy"? Somehow this is the opposite of "let them eat cake" and it rings just as false in my ears.
I was raised on PB&J, hell I ate two of them for dinner one night this week, and I'm not obese, I don't have diabetes and I don't have unhealthy eating habits. I would wager in fact that Michelle has the same BMI that I do.
Maybe the Nanny-In-Chief can just stick to campaigning for bigger nutrition labels on food and stop branding staple food items as 'trash'.
I will be buying jelly for the food pantry from now on, instead of my normal cans of tuna fish.

Frightening thoughts about world resource usage

From Hugh Pickens, via Slashdot
"Pulitzer prize winning writer Thomas Friedman writes that in few years we may be looking back at the first decade of the 21st century — when food prices spiked, energy prices soared, world population surged, tornados plowed through cities, floods and droughts set records, populations were displaced and governments were threatened by the confluence of it all — and ask ourselves: What were we thinking?'We're currently caught in two loops,' writes Friedman. 'One is that more population growth and more global warming together are pushing up food prices; rising food prices cause political instability in the Middle East, which leads to higher oil prices, which leads to higher food prices, which leads to more instability.' According to the Global Footprint Network we are currently growing at a rate that is using up the Earth's resources far faster than they can be sustainably replenished, so we are eating into the future. Right now, global growth is using about 1.5 Earths. 'Having only one planet makes this a rather significant problem,' says Paul Gilding. 'We either allow collapse to overtake us or develop a new sustainable economic model. We will choose the latter. We may be slow, but we're not stupid.'"

Lets hope we do choose a more sustainable model. I hate to go all socialist all of the sudden, but it occurs to me that certain resources, such as oil, are the bedrock of the global economy and might need to be state controlled. The Libertarian in me hates that idea, however, the father of two who enjoys eating and being warm in the winter is largely OK with it really.

Good deal on a good meal. Yum.

Preparedness Pantry/Emergency Essentials (beprepared.com) is having a product giveaway for their new Mexican Food Combo. Emergency Essentials is one of my favorite places to shop online, Give it a look, whether you win or not, its not a bad combo to have around, I'm going to buy one, either way. One question; I wonder how well tortilla's freeze?

Mexican Food Combo:
1 Can of spiced "taco" TVP
1 Can of white rice
1 Can of dehydrated re-fried beans
1 Can of freeze dried super sweet corn
1 Can of black beans
1 Can of dehydrated chopped onions

Mix in some salsa and sour cream with some flour tortilla's, splash a little lime juice in the rice, and you've got my favorite Chipotle burrito (although I always use black beans and leave out the re-fried). I'm going to see if I can figure out how to take this recipe backpacking......

Spring, baseball and hot dogs

For those of you in North America, spring is finally coming in and its time for hot dogs. My favorite way to eat them is slathered in chili sauce, shredded sharp cheddar cheese, onions on a steamed bun.

Sauce Recipe (suspected to be Tony Packo's)
2 lb lean ground beef
1/2 T thyme
2 cloves garlic (finely minced)
1/2 T cumin
Dash cayenne pepper
2 T chili powder
3 c water
1 T black pepper
1 T Hungarian paprika (no substitutes)
1 t salt

Brown ground beef, breaking into very small pieces as it cooks; drain off fat. Add remaining ingredients; simmer 1 hour or until desired consistency.

Serve with chopped sweet onions, relish, shredded cheese and maybe even a pickle. Mustard, no ketchup on a chili dog. Steam your buns people.

Note: Serve over a Nathan's dog, Hebrew national, Bahama mama or any other high quality beef frank, not just any hotdog.

Time to plant your garden (in Ohio anyway)

You really should have started your sprouts by now (I have mine in an indoor greenhouse thingy). As soon as the snow stops falling (we got some yesterday) I'll plant everything outdoors.

Types

• Cool-season and warm-season vegetables can be grown in Ohio. Cool-season crops withstand light frost and include many leaf and root vegetables. Warm-season crops, such as cucumbers, squash, melons and tomatoes must be planted after the threat of frost passes.

Time Frame

• Experienced Ohio gardeners begin planting cool-season vegetables in Mid-March, according to the Ohio State University Extension web site. Ohio is located in USDA plant hardiness zones 5 and 6, with an average last frost date occurring in April-May. Warm-season vegetables can be planted after the last killing frost.

Considerations

• Starting vegetable seeds indoors during late winter can result in transplants by the early spring planting season. Using transplants instead of direct seeding can add a few weeks to your harvest season. Successive planting can also make the most of a season. Plant new crops as soon as the previous ones are harvested.

Chicken With Lemon and Green Onion Sauce

Tried this last night, it was awesome. Still working on side dishes, although obviously chicken goes well with lots of things.

Ingredients:

4 boneless chicken breast halves
1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
2 green onions, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 teaspoon chopped fresh parsley
4 tablespoons butter
dash salt
dash freshly ground black pepper or seasoned pepper

Prep:

Pre-heat broiler; line a broiler pan with foil and oil the rack.
Rinse chicken; pat dry. Put chicken breast between two sheets of plastic wrap and gently pound to thin to an even thickness. Rub with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Arrange on oiled broiler rack.

In a saucepan, combine remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for about 30 seconds.





Cooking:

Broil the chicken for about 12 to 15 minutes, turning about halfway through the cooking time. Drizzle each chicken breast with about 1 teaspoon of the lemon mixture 1 minute before it's finished. Serve chicken with the remaining sauce.

Goes well with a side of rice and cornbread.

Serves 4.

Winter Recipe

Yes, I agree this is the tail end of winter, but this recipe sounded so good I couldn't pass up the opportunity to share. I am prepping my grocery list right now and cant wait to have the house smell so wonderful.
Hat tip to Tango Juliet.


"This is about the best cold weather drink ever invented IMHO.

And to think, I put the spotlight on it at the tale end of a fairly moderate winter!

What timing!

The basic recipe:

Into your favorite crock pot, dump 4 parts apple cider to 1 part cranberry juice.

Add two sticks of cinnamon.

Poke 6 whole cloves into a nice sweet orange. Toss it into the mix.

Let it brew for 6 to 8 hours.

This mix is guaranteed to flood your house with the best aromas since fresh baked bread.

Cautions and suggestions: Be sure you get good sweet oranges. Some navel oranges have very bitter rinds. Bad juju! I recommend buying two. Eat one for testing purposes.

Naturally the cider/apple juice to cranberry juice ratio can be varied.

Use caution with the cloves. They are potent little critters. Six is the most I'll use these days. The use of more than six ventures into +P territory very quickly.

This brew is very receptive to alcohol. I prefer cinnamon schnapps but I have seen others use rum with success as well"

Book idea

A first aid/gardening/cooking/parenting/emergency preparedness/fishing/backpacking/joke book. Basically everything you would ever need to deal with untoward situations at home or in the woods with step by step directions, advice, lists of things to have on hand, etc. etc.


Know a good soup recipe that cooks well over an open fire? Know the best way to deal with splinters in the finger of your 5 year old? Not sure which corner of the house to go to in case of a tornado? Need a good joke to tell folks after a scary situation? Know how to remove a kids loose tooth? Have a good recipe for rabbit? Want to know what to do after falling in icy water? Interested in solar energy but don't know where to start? Interested in the best snow shovel? best bicycle? Well, my book will be a compendium of useful knowledge in an easy to read format.
I'm thinking about putting this together, maybe even throwing in a few short stories so people would have something to read during power outages with no TV, and some game ideas for how to entertain your kids during those big summer thunderstorms.

My mouth cant begin to stop watering

Hat tip to Uncle for the Meat Creche Scene.
http://www.saysuncle.com/2010/12/01/so-awesome/

Also, Brigid has a new bacon choc chip cookie recipe.
http://mausersandmuffins.blogspot.com/2010/11/bacon-launch-sequence.html

My winter diet* is going to be tough this year. sigh

*I attempt every winter, with varying levels of success, to maintain my weight between Dec 1 and April 1. Its very easy for me to pack on lbs with comfort food once the snow falls.  Seeing as how I have gained 20 lbs over the last two years snacking with my two year old Boy, my winter diet becomes ever more important. My daughter wants me to lose the 20 lbs before her birthday (April 2011), but losing weight during the winter does not come natural for this mammal. We'll see.

That whooshing sound....

Ross Perot had his "sucking sound" to describe job lass with NAFTA, I hear a "whooshing sound" as every price around me seems to be shooting up, especially food. Hope you've put away some tangibles like canned fruits and veggies for this winter, I have a feeling the prices will get worse before they get better and you cant go too long on vitamin supplements alone.
Giant Eagle has 20 cans of veggies for ten dollars, I'm stocking up myself before I cant afford to eat peas with my dinner and put pineapple on my pizza. Hate to be all doom and gloom, but just read one too many articles about the coming inflation tidal wave.
Well, hold on for the ride and stay warm this winter,

Recipe for Arroz can Pollo???

Anyone have a good recipe for arroz can pollo? I fell in love with it in Yucatan, Mexico, but all the recipes I find come out like a chicken and rice bog. Need a recipe and prep directions for the real thing.

Weeds in the garden

OK, I am controlling the weeds for the most part and the plants look healthy, but damn if these rabitts aren't driving me crazy. Gonna have to set out some snares since I cant watch the thing 24/7. Rabbit stew anyone?
The fence I put up this year has held back the deer better than any previous year, but man the rabbits are tricky lil buggers.

Getting old isn't for sissies

So I've got to take 2 pills a day (blood pressure and cholesterol), I wear bifocals and I eat oatmeal every morning plus my orange juice has sardines in it (for the Omega 3). I usually get bummed staring at this tableau every morning. Fortunately I let myself eat whatever I want the rest of the day.  ;)