~~~ day nineteen ~~~
Most seafood can be prepared in an instant.
In fact, it will take you no longer to cook fresh fish than to warm a prepared entree from the sea. The only exception to this would be if you use a microwave oven. Even then, the time difference is minimal. Shrimp is especially delectable and quick to cook. Don’t overcook it, as it will turn out rubbery. Here is my recipe for scampi. It is loaded with garlic.
shrimp scampi
serves 4
2 lbs of medium shrimp
3 tbsp olive oil
6 cloves garlic, minced
2 tbsp butter
Peel shrimp and wash thoroughly. Sauté garlic in olive oil and butter in a heavy iron skillet over medium heat for 5 minutes. The garlic should change color but do not burn it. Add shrimp and cook until it turns pink, about 2 minutes. Remove and serve over rice pilaf.
One of the best vegetables for you is the onion. As you can tell, I use it in all types of recipes. You can use onions to make tasty bread.
The fragrance of the vegetable from this recipe will overwhelm your home.
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onion rye bread
makes 2 loaves
2 large onions, sliced thin and chopped olive oil
3 tbsp caraway seed
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp dried dill weed
2 packages dry yeast
2 cups rye flour
2 cups lukewarm water
3 cups white flour
In a heavy iron skillet, sauté the onions in 2
tablespoons of olive oil for 10 minutes, over moderate heat. Raise the heat, add 1 teaspoon of sugar and continue cooking onions until they are golden brown. Cool. Meanwhile proof yeast in water with the remaining sugar. Pour mixture into a large mixing bowl and add caraway seed, dill weed and cooked onions. Make sure the onions have cooled down. Add rye flour and stir. Add white flour gradually, stirring vigorously to blend in ingredients. Add enough flour to make a stiff dough. Roll dough onto a floured board and knead for about 2 minutes. Wash and dry the mixing bowl and grease with olive oil. Put dough into bowl and cover with a damp towel. Put bowl into a warm oven and let dough rise until double in bulk, about 1
hour. Remove dough, divide in half and form into 2
loaves. Put loaves into 2 greased bread pans, cover with damp towel and let rise for about 45 minutes or until doubled. Remove towel and bake at 375° until loaves are golden brown, about 45 minutes.
Remove from the pans, cool and serve.
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menu for day nineteen
shrimp scampi
onion rye bread
rice pilaf
tossed salad
dry white wine
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~~~ day twenty ~~~
One meal that stands out in my mind from numerous occasions is a roast of pork. A boneless pork roast is quite expensive, but a cheaper roast such as a loin is also good. I don’t cook pork that often, but when I do, it becomes a feast. Pork must be cooked thoroughly, and it takes about thirty minutes per pound to cook at 375°. Use a meat thermometer to determine when the roast is done.
Insert the thermometer into the fleshiest part of roast and make sure it doesn’t touch the bone. The pork will be done when the thermometer registers 175°.
The good thing about cooking a pork roast is that you can use the oven to cook vegetables such as carrots and potatoes simultaneously. One of the first pork roasts I cooked was when friends visited me in Binghamton. The meal included carrots and potatoes cooked with the roast, as well as salad and wine. I even captured the complete spread on film.
It was quite a meal, even while a record snowstorm was burying the city outside.
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roast loin of pork
serves 6
2 tbsp dried rosemary
6 large carrots, peeled
1 tsp dried thyme
4 large potatoes, washed
4 lbs loin of pork
and quartered
1 tsp garlic powder
4 medium onions, peeled
fresh ground pepper
Preheat oven to 375°. Crush rosemary and thyme in a mortar and pestle and rub the roast with it, along with garlic powder and ground pepper. Insert a meat thermometer into roast without touching the bone and place in the oven. Cook until thermometer registers 175°, about 2 ½ hours. While the roast is cooking, cut carrots in half and then cut them in half lengthwise. Add potatoes, carrots and onions to the roast during the last hour of cooking. Remove roast and vegetables from the oven and let stand a few minutes before carving. The pork drippings can be used to make gravy, if you desire. Serve the pork and vegetables with applesauce.
Horseradish and applesauce may sound like a strange combination but it is delicious. Over one weekend I fixed it for my friends Thom and Linda, and their sons, Karl and Ben. The latter was not even six years old but he loved the combination and remembers it fondly even today. If you can please a youngster, you must have made something good.
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spicy applesauce
serves 4
6 large apples
1 tsp ground cinnamon
¼ cup water
¼ tsp ground cloves
¼ cup sugar
2 tbsp horseradish
Peel and core apples. Cut into quarters and cut each quarter into ¼-inch pieces or smaller. Put apples into a medium pan with the water, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 10 minutes. Put apples into a serving dish and blend in the horseradish. Serve.
The following bread should go nicely with the roast of pork. For that matter it will probably go well with just about anything. The people I made it for were impressed with its taste.
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cinnamon raisin bread
makes 2 loaves
1½ cups milk
3 tsp cinnamon
4 tbsp margarine
½ cup raisins
¼ cup sugar
8 cups white flour
2 packages dry yeast
2 eggs
1 cup lukewarm water
olive oil
In a small saucepan on medium heat put milk, margarine and all but 1 teaspoon of the sugar. Stir occasionally and remove from heat when the sugar is dissolved and margarine melted. Pour into a large mixing bowl and cool. Proof the yeast in water with the remaining sugar. Add cinnamon and raisins to milk mixture and when the mixture is lukewarm, add the yeast mixture. Add 2 cups of flour and stir vigorously. Add eggs and beat them into the dough.
Add as much more flour as necessary to make a stiff dough. Roll dough onto a floured board and knead for about 2 minutes. Wash and dry the mixing bowl and grease with olive oil. Put dough into the bowl, cover with a damp towel and place in a warm oven to rise until double in bulk, about 1 hour. Turn dough onto a floured board, cut in half and shape each into a loaf. Put each loaf into a greased bread pan, cover with a damp towel and return to the oven to rise until doubled, about 40 minutes. Bake loaves in a 375° oven for about 45 minutes, or until golden brown. Remove and cool on a wire rack. Serve.
Gravy can be made from the drippings of a pork roast, turkey, chicken or roast of beef. You can use flour or cornstarch to thicken the gravy. If gravy 68
is left over, don’t throw it away. Save it to put over egg noodles or plain rice or into soups, casseroles or stews. It is a good addition to any of these.
pork gravy
serves 4
pork drippings
2 tbsp cornstarch
¾ cup of water
fresh ground pepper
Skim fat from the top of the drippings. If you put drippings into the refrigerator overnight, the fat will rise to the top and solidify and be easy to separate.
Put the drippings and ½ cup of water into a small pan. Bring to a boil. Mix cornstarch thoroughly in ¼
cup of water and add to drippings in the pan, while stirring. Bring to a second boil, lower heat and simmer until gravy is thickened. Season with ground pepper. Serve.
The following recipe can be cooked in a wok or in an iron skillet on the stove if you don’t have a wok. You can substitute sweet vermouth if you’re out of sherry.
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Chinese cabbage
serves 4
1 lb of cabbage
2 tbsp brown sugar
3 tbsp olive oil
¼ cup sherry
2 tbsp soy sauce
4 tbsp vinegar
½ tbsp cornstarch
Cut cabbage into inch squares. Heat oil in the wok over high heat. Add cabbage and cook for 2
minutes. Mix remaining ingredients in a measuring cup and add to the cabbage. Cook for 5 more minutes or until the cabbage is tender. Remove and serve.
menu for day twenty
roast loin of pork with gravy
spicy applesauce
roasted vegetables
Chinese cabbage
cinnamon raisin bread
spicy applesauce
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~~~ day twenty-one ~~~
Over the years, I have run across some unusual barbeque sauce recipes. One has pitted prunes in it and another I made myself at a friend’s house. The sauce with the prunes is very good and the sauce I made was improvised. It seems that the ingredients were limited so I used what I could find.
Even so, the chicken we used this barbeque sauce on came out quite good. Fire must have magical powers for transforming anyone into a good cook.
You can put just about anything you like into your barbeque sauce and it will be good. You will note that I said “just about anything” not anything you want. You still need to use good judgment. The recipe that I have included here is quite simple. One note of caution: just make as much as you will use because the sauce may spoil in the refrigerator since it has no preservatives.
barbequed chicken
serves 4
1 chicken, cut up
barbeque sauce
Start a fire in the grill using charcoal briquettes.
When the coals are ready, place chicken pieces on the grill. Cook chicken on each side for 20 minutes.
Apply sauce to each side and cook 10 minutes more per side. Serve.
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barbeque sauce
for 1 chicken
½ cup catsup
3 tbsp brown mustard
1 tbsp liquid smoke
2 tbsp olive oil
¼ tsp cayenne pepper
1 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
Bring all ingredients to a boil in an iron skillet.
Lower heat and simmer for ½ hour. Remove and use.
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raisin rye bread
makes 2 loaves
½ cup raisins
½ cup lukewarm water
1 bottle dark beer
1 tbsp sugar
½ cup molasses
3 tbsp caraway seeds
olive oil
2 cups rye flour
2 packages dry yeast
4 cups white flour
Soak the raisins in hot water. In a small saucepan on medium heat put 6 oz of the beer, molasses and 2
tbsp of the olive oil. Stir occasionally and remove after 5 minutes. Pour into a large mixing bowl; add the rest of the beer and cool. Proof yeast in water with sugar. Squeeze out excess moisture from raisins. Add the yeast mixture, caraway seeds and raisins to the liquid. Add rye flour and stir vigorously. Add as much white flour as necessary to make a stiff dough. Roll the dough onto a floured board and knead for about 2 minutes. Wash and dry the mixing bowl and grease with olive oil. Put dough into the bowl, cover with a damp towel and place in a warm oven to rise until double in bulk, about 1 hour. Turn dough onto a floured board and cut the dough in half. Form 2 round loaves and put on a greased cookie sheet. Cover with a damp towel and put into oven and let rise for about 40 minutes or until double in size. Bake in a 375° oven for 45
minutes. Remove to a wire rack and cool. Serve.
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menu for day twenty-one
barbequed chicken
raisin rye bread
potato salad
tossed salad
A man was arrested in Washington, D.C. for trying to mail a watermelon using food stamps.
George
Carlin
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4. New England: parties
and dinner parties
I resided in the Hudson Valley and Westchester area for over seven years. That’s why the last chapter was so long. From there, I moved to New England, specifically Derry, New Hampshire.
My job was that of a computer consultant, with contracts in nearby Massachusetts. When you think of New England, the first thing that comes to mind is people who talk funny. They say certain words and leave out the letter “r”, such as chowda (chowder) and pahk the cahh (park the car.) The reason they do that is because they need that letter for other words that don’t have the “r”, such as dater (data to us normal folks.) To say that New England was the first place I had a dinner party would be incorrect. If you consider a dinner party to be any event in which you cook for friends, then my first dinner party was in the first few months after I left home. I have had a dinner party in every place I have lived. As far as parties go, I consider every party that I have thrown to be a dinner party, since each has had plenty of food. The real difference is that one is a sit-down dinner and the other a buffet. Another difference is the number of guests. A party which is not a dinner party is one in which there are plenty of people, drinks, pretzels, potato chips, popcorn and not much else. I’ve been to those parties and I’m sure you have too.
Clearly, you can see that when I use the term party, I mean dinner party. As it turns out, it won’t 75
matter whether there are two or two hundred guests; only the amount of food cooked will vary. The basic rules remain the same and can be summed up as follows:
Try to plan items that can be prepared ahead of time.
Try to plan items that can be frozen.
No more than forty percent of the menu should consist of new recipes.
Since you would like to have time with your guests, any work that you can do ahead of time will be to your advantage. For example, you can make meatballs and certain soups weeks ahead of time and freeze. Just don’t forget to thaw the item on time. You can also prepare ingredients beforehand.
For example, the cabbage in the Chinese cabbage recipe in the last chapter could be chopped and its corresponding sauce could be prepared ahead of time. This would minimize your time in the kitchen since all you have to do is sauté the cabbage, add the sauce and simmer. Many dishes taste better the next day anyway, so why not make the entree the day before. All that is left is to warm the dish. A salad and its dressing can be made ahead of time, so that all you must do is add the dressing and toss.
You get the idea. From a psychological point of view, if you use this approach you won’t be inundated with work. There is still plenty to do but you have control of everything.
If you are expecting a good crowd of people (you may not even have the foggiest idea of how many), plan some items that can be frozen in case there are plenty of leftovers. It is only common 76
sense. For one New Year’s Eve party in the Triple Cities, I cooked and cooked, expecting a large number of people. As it turned out, less than ten people made the scene. Fortunately, I was living with two college students and I froze some of the items, so leftovers weren’t a problem. In addition, the advantage to using this method is peace of mind.
Last but not least, do not be afraid to try new recipes on your guests. Just don’t try too many new things at one time. My friend Jesse was commenting on my bouillabaisse disaster not long ago. He mentioned that I had so many different items on that occasion that the failure was hardly noticed. There’s nothing like a good cover-up. If sixty percent of your items are ones that you have cooked before, you can’t go wrong.
If you follow these three bits of advice, you’ll have a good party. All you are really doing is planning in advance. That is the secret to eliminating worry and concern.
When I invite a few people for dinner, say six or less, I start with some kind of appetizer and homemade bread and butter. Some of the new butter substitutes are quite good and may be better for you than the real thing, so I use them as well. The appetizer may be some kind of chicken wing recipe, shrimp if I have a little extra money that week, stuffed mushrooms or sausage, which I make from time to time. On occasion, I have had corn chips and store-bought salsa. You can even make your own salsa. There are quite a few good appetizer recipes around which are easy to make.
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The next course is soup of some kind, which I probably made the day before. Then comes the main course with salad, some vegetable and rice pilaf, potatoes or noodles. The finishing touch is dessert and coffee. This will be a very nice dinner party for a small number of people.
If you increase the number of people, you have a buffet dinner party. What I do is add an appetizer or two and make another type of bread and another type of soup. If it’s relatively warm outside, I may have one cold soup as well as one hot one. I add another main dish or two, plus a few more vegetable dishes, such as baked beans and salads. I really don’t make that many desserts, but sometimes people bring them so I am not lacking in that area. As far as running out of food, don’t worry about it. If one dish is gone quickly, the others will take up the slack. No one will starve. I have yet to have a party where all the food was consumed.
Throughout the next few chapters, I have included some menu ideas for parties. Bottoms up!
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~~~ day twenty-two ~~~
One of the best parties I gave was an impromptu event between Christmas and New Years Eve. I didn’t really plan it. I just asked around if people were interested in a party and enough said yes. I quickly planned some food that would be good, but easy. The result was about fifteen people with plenty of good food, drink and music.
Precisely what the full menu was is unclear to me now, but I do remember cooking a roast of beef. Someone even took a picture of me carving the roast. You can do an eye of round, but it is expensive. A simple bottom round is just as good.
The most difficult part is carving the beef, but you can even get around that by having someone else do it for you. People feel important if you ask them to carve. Another possibility is to carve some of the roast and leave the knife around for others to do their own hacking. This is not a good idea if you have people from the Bates Motel at your party.
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roast round of beef
serves 6
3 lbs bottom round roast
fresh ground pepper
Rub the roast with the ground pepper. Insert a meat thermometer into the roast and place on a wire rack in a baking pan. Heat the oven to 325° and place the pan in the oven. Cook the beef until the roast is done to your liking. Rare will take about 21 minutes per pound, medium rare about 24, medium about 28
and well-done about 33. You can also use the thermometer method: 120° for rare, 130° for medium rare, 140° for medium and 150° for well done. I like beef medium rare, so even if I use a thermometer, I time the meat depending on the weight rather than have the meat reach a certain temperature. You can always cook the roast more if you think it is too pink; if the meat is well done, there’s nothing you can do to recover to medium. If you cook the roast medium, the end pieces will be close to well done anyway, so that you can please everyone.
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garlic cauliflower
serves 6
1 head cauliflower
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 tbsp butter
¼ cup bread crumbs
Wash cauliflower, separate into pieces and place into a medium size pan. Add enough water to cover and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 10 minutes. In a small pan melt butter and sauté garlic over medium heat for 2 minutes. Stir in the bread crumbs and cook for 1 minute. Drain cauliflower and put into a serving dish, add the crumb mixture and toss lightly. Serve.
menu for day twenty-two
roast round of beef
baked potatoes
garlic cauliflower
tossed salad
dry red wine
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~~~ day twenty-three ~~~
A party without chicken in one form or another is no party. Compared to other meats it is quite cheap and there are so many ways to fix it. In addition, it’s hard to mess up chicken. I suppose if you cook it too long or not long enough there will be problems. You can buy it on sale, store it in the freezer and you’ll be ready for your next party. You don’t have to wait for a party to serve this next dish.
Oriental chicken stew serves 4
1 chicken, cut up
2 stalks of celery, chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
¼ cup soy sauce
¼ cup sweet vermouth
¼ cup sherry
¼ cup water
1 large onion, chopped 2 tbsp cornstarch fresh ground pepper
Soak chicken in water for 10 minutes, drain and pat dry. Brown both sides of chicken pieces in the oil in a large Dutch oven on medium heat. Add remaining ingredients, except for water and cornstarch, and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer until chicken is tender, about 40 minutes. Remove chicken to a serving dish and bring sauce to a boil.
Mix cornstarch with water and stir into the stock.
Cook until sauce is thickened. Return chicken to the pot and warm in the sauce. Serve over boiled rice.
In my opinion, the squash with the best flavor is acorn. Because of its shape, about the only thing you can do with acorn squash is to bake it.
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Fortunately, there are various ways to do so and the effort is minimal. Here is one way.
baked acorn squash
serves 2
1 acorn squash
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp butter
Cut the squash in half and remove the seeds and pith. Put 1 tablespoon of butter and 1 tablespoon of brown sugar in each cavity and bake in a preheated 400° oven for 1 hour or until the squash is tender.
Remove from the oven and serve.
menu day twenty-three
Oriental chicken stew
boiled rice
baked acorn squash
tossed salad
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~~~ day twenty-four ~~~
During my stay in New Hampshire, my sister Pat and her husband at the time, Rick, visited from Western New York. We took off for some deep-sea fishing and caught eight fish in all: cod, cusk and haddock. I invited my brother Ken and his wife at the time, Laurie, to join the three of us in a fish feast. They resided nearby just outside Boston.
I cooked some of the fish using the recipe for poached cod from chapter 3, except that I used white wine instead of red. Everyone thought the meal was delicious. Fish doesn’t come any fresher.
I froze the remainder of the fish and my sister took it back home for my parents. I did keep one small cod for myself in the freezer. I remember it was too small to fillet. About a month later, I cooked it in a little butter in a frying pan. I’ll never forget how delicious it tasted; it was almost as good as fresh.
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poached haddock
serves 4
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp Dijon mustard
3 tbsp flour
3 tbsp lemon juice
2 lbs haddock
¼ cup dry white wine
In a heavy iron skillet, heat the oil over moderate heat. Put flour into a paper bag and dredge each piece of haddock in flour. Put haddock into the skillet, skin side up and brown each piece. Turn each piece over and cook for 1 more minute. Mix mustard and lemon juice in a small bowl and add wine. Stir to mix. Pour wine mixture onto had