Do You Even Cook, Bro?

[SCCY Marshal]

Just got back from a late morning constitutional. Laid out two slices of crusty honey sunflower seed bread (storebought but tasty and was on sale). Both got a thin smear of margarine, thicker dab of deli mustard, thinly sliced raw red onion rings, dill pickles sliced lengthwise, and slice of good deli Swiss cheese. One was finished with a couple slices of Polish loaf and the other got three slices of Santa Fe turkey so thin it's just this side of shredded. Accompanied by a bottle of Moosehead lager as I head back out to eat in the sun.

[UNM1136]

The wife didn't care much for my first attempt smoking brisket. Not enough fat rendered and still a little toothsome. So I sliced thin and cooked in a skillet, like bacon, essentially making beef chicharones and crispy beef. Drained. Added mozzarella cheese to the pan and cooked with the beef till crispy around the edges. Spread buns with Umami Mayonaise, and toasted them on a a griddle. Put beef and cheese mixture on bun, slice of tomato, a couple of basil leaves, a sprinkle of Costco Organic CA garlic powder (best garlic powder I have found, BTW). Topped with an over easy egg, diner style (cooked in the beef fat, runny yolk, crispy, lacy edges). Black pepper, top bun. YUM.

pat

[SCCY Marshal]

Have a spatchcocked turkey on the smoker over cherry chips with a small portion of hickory mixed in. Bird had a mustard and roasted thyme compound butter whipped up last night to rub under the skin. Then in the fridge for the skin to dry a bit before smoking.

Making a chunky mash of roughly half and half potatoes and rutabega. Will use butter, milk, cumin, salt, pepper, and sour cream for the final mash.

About to cream some pearl onions with real cream and butter rather than a béchamel.

Wife made a cranberry custard pie, eldest made a fresh from scratch pumpkin pie using a couple tender little sugar pumpkins, youngest is making buttermilk biscuits.

Also about to whip up a gravy with stock pressure cooked from the gobbler's neck, spine, giblets, onion, celery, garlic, and carrot. That same stock went into my custard-based sausage stuffing. The bread for that being half and half sourdough/Italian that has been cubed and drying for a few days. Wife also made a hotdog bun stuffing she and my father prefer.

Wife also made a mashed and unsweetened butternut squash. Roasted last night, mashed this morning. Her cranberry jelly from scratch is sweetened, however. My whole cranberry sauce was sweetened with honey, chopped prunes, orange liqueur, whole raisins, and orange zest plus the juice from.

Cheese and cracker platter of mortadella triangles, truffle-laden gouda, Danish blue cheese from raw milk which I just noticed on the label, soft goat cheese a bit like a camembert, some Basque region sheep's milk cheese, extra sharp local cheddar, and pepperjack. Crackers an assortment of seed-topped water crackers and woven wheats both plain and rosary/olive oil.

Drink menu of sparkling cider, coffee, bourbon (Wild Turkey 101), the apple cider I'm currently mulling with spices that looked promising in the larder plus a halved orange and honey, whole milk, and lemon water.

Oh, wife is also tossing tinned beets with olive oil, vinegar, and salt. Reserving the drained can broth for pickling a fresh batch of eggs once fridge space opens up for the crock.

Father is making a green bean casserole. Mother nothing as she's working until just time enough to get here and meet him.

[SCCY Marshal]

Had friends for supper, oranges needing used, and a bunch of beer, last night.

Pulled pork from a Boston butt in the pressure cooker with a bottle of generic ale, juice of an orange, Goya adobo out of laziness, halved onion, and couple garlic cloves. Stock strained and meat returned to it after shredding.

White rice made with garlic, onion, liquid strained from a can of chili beans, bit of water, and mostly the stock from making the pulled pork. Chili beans folded in when done.

Crusty asiago cheese rolls about 5" in diameter from.the day-old shelf at the grocer. Rejuvinated a few in the oven at 350°F until the kitchen smelled toasty and then sliced to a platter next to some margarine. It's cool how fresh past-its-prime bread can get with a few minutes innthe oven.

Thick Jamaican mustard-based scotch bonnet sauce, sour cream, and a good barbeque sauce for condiments.

Made a serviceable-at-best grzane piwo a few cans of a honey brown lager that was not the correct base. It wasn't stout enough and collapsed under the mulling process into a bland thing rather than rich, creamy treat.

Buddy arrived bearing a sixer of good spiced wheat beer that was much better than my poorly selected hot lager.

Laid out a dish of Beer Nuts branded bar mix. It isn't my favorite but grabbed a jar to try and went quickly.

Wife and her friend mulled half a gallon of cider, using the last orange.

Loose leaf English breakfast tea brewed samovar-style with honey, milk, and sugar cubes available. I won a debate for once. Was the sole voice in dissent when selecting the leaf. Others wanted to ruin my lovely ceylon with the concentrated, over-steeped style. Threats of caning won the day. Ignorant grumbling that the ceylon would have worked fine continued, however. Think I'll properly brew myself a pot for elevenses.

[RoyGBiv]

Breakfast Musubi. Rice (with seasoned rice vinegar), Spam, pan fried egg whites (market was out of Tamago, too lazy to make), avocado, nori.

Sincere apologies to any Hawaiians reading this, for using turkey Spam instead of the real stuff. I couldn't commit to the extra miles on the bicycle today.

WifeGBiv made a great drizzle out of some hoisin sauce, soy, seasoned vinegar and Sriracha.

[SCCY Marshal]

Eldest has an old-style Henry 22LR levergun that shot high from factory. A Skinner dovetail rear peep didn't help. A current-style, often a bit taller than the original plastic,steel front sight/barrel band did not help. A Skinmer drill and tap rear peep did not help. Cleansing the front sight in hellfire helped.

Brazing an eighty-thou bit of sheet brass in place with an oxy/propane torch and solder bearing much more silver than necessary went quickly. Surface prep, jigging, filing the overhang flush with the steel, and profiling took a bit of time. But now, with the peep still bottomed out, the rifle shoots exactly POA with a dead center hold at 25 yards with Aguila Super Extra.

Took the yoot out to a log yard to try it out on some empty cans. Beer, small Pringle tube, and 28 ounce tomato tins to be precise. As both pahtridge and grey nutters are in season, took along my roughly 19" H&R Topper. Sixteen gauge, forearm held on with duct tape, fossilized recoil pad, chopped with a pipe cutter after marking the position for a new bead, and fat brass bead drilled and tapped in place after cleaning the crown. Handful of Remington 1 1/8oz number sixes which needed rotated out of the hunting stock were pocketed.

When the yoot was done with his musketry, I scooped some snow into the Pringle cans and the tomato tin and went two-for-three on hand thrown arials. Someday, I'll use this beater to learn choke threading and go to one ounce loads like my 37 and Acme but, in the increasingly permanent meantime, continue to make up for the cylinder bore with the extra eighth ounce of shot. It's a handier thing in the briers and bogs than my unmolested sixteens.

Got home and made a traditional cup of soup and sandwich. Roseamary ham, olive loaf, American cheese, and pickles on wheat with mustard and margarine. Soup was yesterday's minestrone. Soaked dried cranberry beans, homemade turkey stock, water, kale, celery, carrots, tin of diced tomato, salt, Italian seasoning, pepper, Thai chiles, onion, roughly chopped garlic, medium shells, finished with olive oil once off the heat. Warmed that up and doused with vinegary hotsauce. Pickle spear on the side.

It's a real rough day.

[t1tan]

6yo son has been obsessed with hot sauce since finding a mini Tabasco bottle at a Disney World restaurant, and well I think Tabasco is one of the worst hot sauces around, so he suggested we make our own. Researched some recipes, applied it to whatever peppers I can find locally and we're happy with the results. Decided to bottle a bit for xmas gifts, I just need to order some of those dripper insert things for later batches, this batch is thicker than I wanted so it's fine without and easily pourable. I wanted it to stay totally liquid without splitting, so I used xanthan gum to emulsify but the original percentage suggested to me was was off for my goal, but I narrowed it down in my last attempt. .0005% by weight after straining liquids from solids. So yielding about 600g of liquid per batch, about .3g xanthan got it where I wanted.

Scotch Bonnet, White Distilled Vinegar, White Onion, Garlic, White Sugar, Salt, Brown Sugar, Black Pepper, Xanthan Gum

[SCCY Marshal]

A dry-ish potato salad, today. I'm very rarely in the mood for mayo gloop, this afternoon doubly so.

Diced yellow potatoes boiled to done, bit of mayonnaise, Jamaican habanero mustard sauce, halved kalamata olives, minced capers, diced extra sharp white cheddar, crumbled cotija, dash smoked paprika, minced yellow onion, sliced hardboiled eggs, and splash of Louisiana hot sauce. Believing in a well balanced diet, a cheap but decent hotdog skillet browned all over and sliced on the bias to accompany.

[donlapalma]

Did beef wellington for the first time last night. Pretty pleased with the results but would like to get my pastry wrap done better next time. Followed a chefsteps recipe and cooked the beef sous vide at 131 degrees for 90 minutes. Made horseradish sauce and demi-Glace from scratch which was probably the most labor intensive part of the whole meal. Overall, my diners were thrilled and cleaned their plates!

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[RoyGBiv]

^^^ That looks awesome! /drool