Post Easter Au Gratin

Nothing like potatoes au gratin to go with leftover Easter ham.  I don’t think I have ever made an au gratin before, so I approached it as usual, searched online for common recipe themes and stuff that sounded good then synthesized something.  Below is the result, which actually came out quite tasty.  I don’t think I would change a thing.

• 2 large russet potatoes
• 1 yellow onion
• 1.25 cups milk
• 2 TB butter
• 2 TB flour
• about 3 – 4 ounces of grated or shredded parmesan.  The real stuff if possible, this makes a big difference in flavor.  Results in about 2/3 cup +/- of shredded.
• Panko bread crumbs
• salt and pepper

Start by peeling and thinly slice the russets.  Let soak in a bowl of fairly heavily salted water while doing everything else.  Thinly slice the onion and sauté until soft in olive oil or butter.  Prepare a medium sized covered casserole with cooking spray.

Make a white sauce with the butter, flour and milk *.  Add the grated cheese and stir until smooth and melted.  Pepper to taste.

Drain and remove excess water from potato slices.  Layer potatoes, onions, sauce, overlapping the potato slices by about half a slice.  Lightly pepper each layer.  Should come out to about 4 layers.  End with sauce on top of last layer of potatoes.

Bake covered in a preheated 425 degree oven for about 45 – 50 minutes until potatoes are done when checked with a meat fork.  Sprinkle top with Panko and put back in oven uncovered for a few minutes until brown.  (If you have finely grated parmesan, you can add this to the Panko too).  Remove from oven and let rest for at least 5 minutes.

* I make my white sauce by making a white roux then adding hot milk to the roux while stirring constantly.  Microwaving the milk in a Pyrex measuring cup saves another pot and burner.

Below is a bad picture of finished au gratin resting before being devoured.

Cheap and Tasty

Blogging takes a lot of time.  And there are so many other really good blogs out there that have nice pictures where you can tell the blogger has invested a lot of quality time into.  So I haven’t made an entry in a long time being busy and feeling inadequate.  In the interval, there has been grilled halibut, burgers, rib roasts, salmon and asparagus risotto, basmati rice with various accoutrements, plus good wines, bad wines, familiar wines, etc.

What to do with a package of 5 fresh sweet pork sausages from Trader Joes (grand total of $3.97).  I took 2 of them, pan steamed them in a little olive oil and about 1/4 cup chicken broth, then took the lid off to brown them a bit.  Added a peeled and cubed gala apple and some grape tomatoes, put the lid back on for awhile.

During the ever present, “meanwhile” you find in most recipes, I cooked some penne pasta and steamed some broccoli. Added the al dente pasta to the sausage pan with the cover off and cooked down the remaining liquid while the broccoli finished its “broccolizing”.  Salt and pepper to taste, and voila, a colorful, cheap and tasty dish for two.  All for probably about $2 per serving.  

Swiss Steak

This recipe came from the Food Network’s, Alton Brown, here:  Swiss Steak

Swiss steak that I have had in the past has kind of been a modified stroganoff on either noodles or rice or mashed potatoes.  This recipe didn’t specify “how” to eat it, but the family had it on mountains of mashed potatoes, which was delicious since you end up with lots of wonderful thick sauce.

I made a couple of modifications to the recipe of course, mostly in the meat department.  My version is below.

Ingredients

~3 pounds (before trimming) of chuck steak or roast
salt 
black pepper 
all-purpose flour
vegetable oil
1 large onion, thinly sliced
2 cloves garlic, minced (or equivalent pre-minced)
2 stalks celery, chopped about 1/4” thick
1- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 (14.5-ounce) can diced tomatoes
1 teaspoon paprika
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 cups beef broth
1/4 cup red wine

Directions

Trim the meat fairly meticulously of fat and connective tissue and cut into roughly 1/2” thick by 1”x1.5” pieces.  (This takes awhile with chuck, but the resulting flavor and tenderness using this meat is amazing.)  Season meat liberally with salt and pepper.  Dredge in flour.  The original recipe calls for using a “needling” tenderizer at this step.  (I used a Jaccard meat tenderizer  which we happen to have, but I think you could probably pound the meat with a tenderizer or maybe even skip this step since the chuck comes out so tender.)  After tenderizing, dredge again in flour.

Select a dutch oven like Le Crueset that is large enough to hold all the finished ingredients in about half it’s volume.  This will cook covered in the oven for a couple hours as the final step.

In the dutch oven you selected, over medium to medium-high heat cook the meat in small batches in a thin layer of oil, turning once, to brown.  Meat will not be cooked all the way through.  Remove batches to a plate with paper towel to absorb excess oil.  You may need to add more oil in the process, make sure it is shimmering up to heat before adding meat.  Make sure not to burn the bits on the bottom of the pan.

Add more oil if necessary and sauté the onions and celery until soft.  Add the garlic at the end without browning it.  Deglaze pan with a little red wine.  Add the rest of the ingredients and whisk together.  Add meat back in and make sure liquid just covers the meat, if not, add some more beef broth.

Cover the pot and place in a preheated oven at 350 degrees for 2 hours.  Test seasoning for salt and pepper and serve over mashed potatoes.

I served this with green beans butter steamed with onions and bacon:

Trim and cut fresh green beans to serve 6.  Chop about 1/2 of an onion.  Chop up about 2-3 slices of bacon.  Cook the bacon in a little bit of olive oil in a large non-stick fry pan that you can cover.  Add the onions when the bacon is almost cooked.  Sauté onions until soft.  Add beans and about a tablespoon of butter plus a little cayenne pepper to taste (dash or two) and generous salt and pepper.  Saute for a couple minutes to coat beans, add about 1/4 cup + of chicken broth and cover.  Turn down heat to a simmer and cook until beans are done.  Uncover and reduce remaining liquid to almost gone. 

Classic Pot Roast (and stew) Master Recipe

Updated 12/2016 and again 12/2022 with recent refinements and modifications.

This is a "master recipe" that I have worked on using a lot of input from various Cooks Magazine recipes. The smell in the house as it is finishing up is quite intoxicating. I am making some now to eat tomorrow, and at 8:00pm after already having eaten, it smells so good I want to devour it now.

Chuck roast is the king of pot roasts. When braised in liquid for several hours, it comes out falling apart tender with great flavor, and you can sometimes find it on sale for under $4.00 a pound (2016, not so in 2022). There is lots of information out there on what types of roasts to choose for what type of cooking, so I won't go into that here. Just trust the chuck for pot roasts and stew!  (2016 update:  I have found that grass fed quality roasts from retailers like PCC or Whole Foods really do make a difference in taste.)

Buy more meat than you think you need, since leftovers are awesome. Around ½ - 3/4 lb per person. The following general quantities are geared around a 3 lb roast or 2lbs of stew meat.

In a large dutch oven that is big enough for everything to fit in with at least an inch of room below the top brown/sear the roast in some high temp oil like Avacado oil. Roast should be dry and seasoned liberally with salt and pepper before searing. Spray or brush with some oil on the meat first to hold the seasoning on.  Sear on all sides holding upright with tongs if necessary. Adjust heat while searing to keep from burning fond. Remove roast when browned to a plate and cover with foil.

Sauté about 3 cups mirepoix until soft.  Then add at least ½ bottle of decent red wine. Turn up the heat and deglaze the pan and reduce the wine to 1/3 or 1/2.  With heat still up, add a 32 oz box/can of prepared beef broth; half a 6oz small can of tomato paste, and either about 3 inches of anchovy paste out of the tube or about 4-5 minced anchovies (these are optional, but nicely enhances the beefiness of the broth and resulting gravy. This ingredient was from Cooks Mag.) Also optional, add about 2 tablespoons chopped dried porcini mushrooms and a packet or two of Savory Choice beef broth concentrate. Add a couple bay leaves, some juniper berries if you have them and a little bit of thyme if you want.   Blend together and add the meat and any juices back to the pot.  Liquid should just cover the meat.

Cover dutch oven and put in a 285 - 300 degree oven for at least 3 hours. (Tip: foil the bottom side of the lid and you won't have to clean off a layer of thick dark goo later.) Roast should be close to done at this point. Taste test the broth and add salt and pepper if required. Add cut up red potatoes and large chunks of carrots and optionally a small parsnip for about another 90 minutes of cooking until vegetables are nice and soft. Mushrooms and fresh green beans can be used too. Liquid should just cover everything.

When done, remove meat and vegetables and any solids to a warm serving dish and keep warm and covered. Add a little of the cooking liquid so it doesn't dry out while making the gravy.

Strain the cooking liquid into a separate sauce pan and keep on low heat.  Preparing a roux in the Dutch oven. Add the hot simmering liquid to roux slowly whisking into a luxurious gravy. Don't add roux to broth or use cool broth unless you want lumpy gravy. (This gravy, made from a butter roux and the cooking liquid that started out with wine and beef broth, enhanced by the cooking of the roast and vegetables, is like liquid gold. You will want to drink it straight and go to heaven, which you may, since it will probably clog your arteries, but you will die happy.)

Modifications for Stew:

• For stew meat, unless your butcher has high quality, well trimmed chuck stew meat, the best approach is to buy a chuck roast and trim it meticulously and cut it up yourself.  This takes probably an extra 30 minutes but the quality of the stew meat is so much better and your guests won't get that "chewy piece".  I tend to make my stew meat pieces 1/2 to 1/3 the size of what comes typically in the store.
• When browning the meat, brown in batches so you are just barely covering the bottom of the pan or it will stew instead of brown.  (I know this is supposed to be stew...)
• Cut the vegetables a little smaller more appropriate for a stew and soup spoon.
• Eliminate the gravy step and serve straight from pot.

A Test Run at Feta Dressing

Brier Pizza (formerly Neapolis) has always had a house feta salad dressing that is the dressing of choice when dining there, both for salads and dipping your pizza crust in (a culinary habit the kids introduced us to). The recipe isn't given out, but a former cook told me there were "5 ingredients". A bottle costs $6 which we have indulged in more than a couple times, but I wanted to be able to replicate it at home. The following is attempt number 1, which came out pretty close I think. With some further testing and the tweaking, I think it would be "close enough". This recipe I can't take full credit for, as it was the one that looked closest from a variety of web recipes. The original recipe called for garlic powder which I substituted, and oregano which I eliminated.

[I am also with this post experimenting with a different posting method, using MS Word's Publish function. The last post was very painful to format, and the addition of the pictures dufured everything up, eliciting more than a couple of choice words.]

Ingredients:

• 1 cup mayonnaise
  
• ½ cup sour cream
  
• 4 teaspoon white vinegar
  
• ¼ teaspoon black pepper
  
• 1 minced garlic clove
  
• 2 oz. crumbled feta cheese
  
• 1 to 2 tablespoons milk
  

Directions

Combine mayonnaise, sour cream and feta cheese in food processor. Process while adding vinegar. Add garlic and process, then add seasonings to taste. Add milk last until desired thickness is achieved. Best to let sit for a few hours before serving.

*** February 16, 2010 Update

I made a full batch today with the blender (for the above post I made a test ½ batch and blended it by hand). I wouldn't modify the ingredients but the directions I would. I used the blender to first thoroughly crumble the feta to a fine bread crumb like consistency. Then I added the mayo and sour cream. This worked well at eliminating some of the lumpiness I had in my test batch, but more feta than I wanted stayed at the bottom of blender after everything was done. I think next time I will crumble the feta fine in a dry blender, then take it out into a ramekin or small bowl. Then blend the mayo, sour cream and some milk before adding in the feta.

The other thing I will note is that the dressing got much thicker after a day in the refrigerator, so adding a bit of extra milk up front and letting it sit seems to be called for.

On quantity, the above recipe will make a little bit more than will fit in the typical 12oz salad dressing bottle.

Home Made Taco Seasoning Mix

Another web recipe mash-up. Taco mix not in the pouch. I have never been a big fan of the taco seasoning packets. The taste ends up too processed and the taco meat too runny. This recipe you can play with to taste how you like it, and in its native form, tastes pretty good. In the 2 times I have made it so far, I have not been precise with the measurements, and skipped the onion powder since I didn't have any on hand. Sautéed onions with the ground beef seems like a better way.

Beer and tacos are natural buddies, and 1554 Enlightened Black Ale by New Belgium (of Fat Tire fame) went down good.

Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/4 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper
• 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cumin
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper

Directions

1. In a small bowl, mix together chili powder, garlic powder, onion powder, red pepper flakes, oregano, paprika, cumin, salt and pepper. Add 2 -3 TBS of mix to 1lb of cooked ground beef. (Extra seasoning can be stored in an airtight container. )
2. After meat is seasoned, add 2 tsp cornstarch to 2/3 cup of water and add to meat and seasoning mixture.

Nicole's Birthday Dinner

Per Nicole's request, for her Birthday dinner, we had steak risotto and individual chocolate souffles with mint infused custard sauce. The chocolate souffles were ones that I had made a number of years ago after attending a Jerry Traunfeld cooking class (of Herbfarm fame). They are really quite amazing but require an organized approach and result in a lot of dirty dishes. If made at the same time as the accompanying custard sauce (which you pour into them when you eat them) it is a lot going on. Michelle did the souffles tonight (and did a outstanding job) while I did the custard sauce which made things much more manageable, though we were at times competing for stove top and dishes. You can make the custard sauce 1-5 days ahead which might be a good idea.

 

The risotto I have made numerous times and used Julia Child's "no stir" technique, which I always use now. This is outlined in her The Way to Cook book, but really is just the classic method, but with no stirring and the lid on.

 

Beef Risotto with Steak

 

Serve risotto on hot plates when done, don't let it sit and get gluey. If timing is off, add more broth before it sticks.

 

Use a heavy pot like Le Creuset

• Mince 1 large shallot and saute in butter and/or olive oil until translucent
• Add 1 cup of risotto (arborio) rice and saute with onion for a few minutes
• Add 1/4 cup dry white wine or vermouth until cooked down
• Add a little less than 1 quart hot (simmering) beef broth and stir well, cover pot and low simmer for about 20-30 minutes. Reserve remaining broth to finish at end
• When almost done to proper risotto consistency (spreads when spooned on a plate) add the mushrooms, beef, seasoning (salt, pepper, and rosemary if you want), plus about 1/2 cup grated parmeson and the reserved broth. Stir, and simmer until correct consistency.

Beef

• About 3/4 lb steak or more cubed into 1" cubes (they will shrink to bite size). Tender steak that will stand up to the risotto process. I use tri-tip or new york or rib eye.
• Spread on a foil covered baking pan with separation between pieces.
• Season well with salt and pepper
• Place under hot broiler until browned
• Let stand until ready to be added to risotto above, use juices in mushrooms below

Mushrooms

• Saute sliced cremini mushrooms in medium hot pan with butter and/or olive oil. Do in batches if your pan is not big enough for all mushrooms to fit in single layer with a little space. Pan should be hot so shrooms brown and not stew.
• When lightly browned, add about 1/4 cup or more red wine and let reduce for about 5 minutes.
• Add beef juices from above and a little of the reserved beef broth and reduce for another about 5 minutes. Time so that the mushrooms and resulting sauce are just done when it is time to add them to the risotto.

Green Beans

 

I was out of burners tonight when making the risotto since I had mushrooms, broth and the risotto all going. So I decided to bake the green beans. They took longer than I had figured, and probably would have been better prepared in a butter saute/steam frying pan.

• Fresh cut and trimmed green beans
• Half to 3/4 onion, chopped, sauted in butter and/or olive oil
• 1/4 cup chicken broth +/-
• Seasoning (salt and pepper, italian or other seasoning of choice

I put everything in a covered casserole and baked at 350 for about 30 minutes until beans are done. Could have used some butter, or bacon, or something but were pretty good. If had been done in a pan, I would have reduced the broth at the end.

 

Chocolate Souffle (from the Herbfarm Cookbook by Jerry Traunfeld c 2000)

• Prepare 6 (6 oz) straight sided ramekins with soft butter bottom and insides completely. Use fine sugar then to coat buttered interiors.
• Melt 10oz of high quality bittersweet chocolate (like sharfenberger) that has been broken or chopped coarsly with 4 tablespoons of unsalted buter in a bowl or small pot over boiling water.
• Beat 6 egg whites (yolks get used in custard sauce below) until they begin to rise then add 1/2 cup fine or superfine sugar until you get sagging peaks. Don't overbeat.
• Fold 1/3 of the beaten egg whites into the chocolate in a bowl until smooth and completely incorporated. Then gently fold in the rest until just no streaks of white remain.
• Pour the resulting stiff mixture into the prepared ramekins making sure to not get any drips on the sides of the dishes until about 1/4 from the top. (If the souffle bakes onto any unbuttered surface at the top of the dish it will stick and prevent it from rising straight up)
• Bake souffles in a preheated 400 degree oven in a water bath (like creme broule) for about 20 - 25 minutes, or until the souffles have risen about an inch. In the space of 1 minute you can go from perfect to a bit burned on top so watch them carefully at the end.

Serve immediately with the custard sauce below. To eat, poke a hole in the top, pour in the sauce and enjoy!

 

Infused Custard Sauce (from the Herbfarm Cookbook by Jerry Traunfeld c 2000)

 

Infuse 2 cups of whole milk with fresh herb of choice like mint, fresh bay, rosemary, etc. by bringing milk just to a boil, adding the fresh herbs (about 3-4 tablespoons of mint leaves for example), pushing them down and covering the pot and removing from heat. Let stand covered for 30 minutes.

• Heat 6 lightly beaten egg yolks in a bowl over boiling water until about 90 - 100 degrees.
• Meanwhile, strain infused milk, mix in 1/2 cup sugar, and reheat on medium until just boiling.
• When just boiling, remove from heat and whisk into the heated egg yolks by pouring the milk mixture into the yolks slowly while whisking constantly but gently.
• Continue to stir the sauce for about 30 seconds. Sauce should come up to 175 - 180 degrees. (If for some reason the sauce doesn't thicken and come up temp, heat over boiling water. Don't heat sauce above 180 degrees unless you want scrambled eggs.)

Souffle mix

going into the oven before adding water to the pan

 

 

 

a little overdone

Prepare to eat!