Kitchen and Cooking Thread

[redforever]

Originally Posted by fotze

Thats the real old school way, like those highly specialized noodle makers in Japan. Just saw some pics of spaetzle on google, looks like many put pieces of bacon in it. Never thought of that, that would just make it awesome.

A much better dish is Krautkrapfen, wholy crap, have a buddy who makes it, takes forever. Home made wide noodle rolled in kraut that has been de-vinegarized and browned and speck/bacon, fried up to make it crispy then simmered in gravy. I'd say its the best tasting meal I have ever had.

Yup, that is exactly how she cooked. She immigrated to Canada, her native country being Hungary.

She made all her own pasta, with a hand rolling pasta machine. But of course, she made her own dough first. She started with a mess of flour on an arborite table, making a well, adding 12 eggs!!! and slowly incorporating the eggs into the flour.

She made her own rolling pins because she could not find the type she was used to in Canada. She liked them with quite a thin diameter and quite long so in the end, what she found was a piece of dowelling that she hand sanded to make the shape she was used to. Once she rolled the pasta dough, she put it through the pasta machine, usually make 3 shapes. Little squares and angel hair which she used in her soups and then a medium sized broad noodle.

And she never just made one batch of pasta dough with 12 eggs, she made enough to last about 3 to 4 months. She had pasta drying all over the house.

Now the recipe you mentioned with kraut and noodles reminded me of another dish my MIL made. She made sauerkraut strudel as well as fresh cabbage strudel and cottage cheese strudel. She would make sweet strudel for dessert, but she was better known for savory types of strudel. In Hungary, their diet was not as heavy with meat, eating more chicken than anything. So she made made savory type dishes with cheeses etc that were quite filling and healthy on their own.

And of course, then there were the tortes she made, a walnut torte was her specialty. Then there were all the pastries with home made prune fillings, ground walnut fillings, poppy seed fillings and she grew her own poppies and used those seeds, puff type pastries, I just don't know how she did it all.

[metallicat]

Anyone have a good, simple steak marinade recipe? I don't have a ton of elaborate ingredients laying around my place, so the simpler the better.

[Kipper is King]

Originally Posted by oilers_fan

Anyone have a good, simple steam marinade recipe? I don't have a ton of elaborate ingredients laying around my place, so the simpler the better.

You want to marinade steam?

I consider myself a pretty good cook, but that would be tough!

[redforever]

Originally Posted by oilers_fan

Anyone have a good, simple steam marinade recipe? I don't have a ton of elaborate ingredients laying around my place, so the simpler the better.

Did you mean steak?

For a simple teriyaki style marinade, put 1/4 cup oil, 1/2 cup soy sauce, 1/2 tsp each of powdered ginger, pepper and dry mustard, 1/2 tsp garlic powder or 1 large clove garlic finely minced, and 3 Tbsp blackstrap molasses in a bowl.

Stir to combine. Put your steak in a pan or dish that has a cover. Pour marinade over the steak. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, turning steak frequently. When done marinating, cook your steak as you normally would.

This is particularily nice with a flank steak. If using a flank steak, it should never be cooked well done.

EDIT: I amended the recipe to show powdered ginger, just in case some of you thought it meant raw ginger you would find in the produce department.

[Jordan!]

Salt+Pepper+Garlic powder is the best steak rub of all time. none of this fancy crap

[metallicat]

Whoops, meant steak. Sorry.

That sounds really good red, but I unfortunately only have about half of those ingredients. I'll keep it in mind for when I'm at the grocery store next.

[Kipper is King]

I made chocolate souffles last night! (Bernard Callebaut chocolate souffles, might I add!)








Here is the recipe I used. They turned out really well, but I found they needed a couple more minutes baking time than what the recipe says: http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/fo...ouffles-107102

[Biff]

Nice work! I have Souffle on my list of next things to try making.

[troutman]

City Palate (available free around town) always has great recipes from local chefs.

http://www.citypalate.ca/

http://www.citypalate.ca/index.php?p=Recipes

I made Tomato Tarte Tartin, and Kashmir Ribs recently. Yummy.

Tomato Tarte Tatin with Goat Cheese

Jul/Aug 2009
This savoury take on a classic apple tarte tatin is reminiscent of pizza, only it’s more refined. Slivered, it makes a great appetizer (tear fresh arugula overtop), or serve wedges of it with a side of peppery greens.

8 - 10 Roma tomatoes, halved lengthwise, or 2 baskets cherry or grape tomatoes
Olive or canola oil
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 sheet frozen puff pastry, thawed
10 oz pkg. soft goat cheese or Boursin (plain, peppered or herbed)

In a large cast-iron or ovenproof skillet, arrange the tomatoes cut-side up and drizzle with oil; toss gently with your hands to coat them well, rearrange them in a single layer, and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Preheat the oven to 400°F, then roast for an hour. Remove from the oven.

Roll the puff pastry out to approximately the same size as the tomato pan. Crumble the goat cheese over the roasted tomatoes and top the pan with the puff pastry, crimping the edges with your fingers in a “sloppy/rustic” style or trimming the corners off with a paring knife to make a circle.

Bake 20 minutes, until the puff pastry is golden. Let sit for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a serving dish; retrieve any goat cheese that has stuck to the bottom of the pan and put it back onto the tart. Cut into wedges to serve. Serves 4 to 6.

[wooohooo]

You guys are amazing. I made a pizza pop last night!

[yads]

Originally Posted by BlackEleven

When I was in Krakow I tried white borsch (sometimes they called it Zur or Zurek). It was the best soup I've ever had, bar none.

Here how it's made:
http://www.soupsong.com/rbarscz.html

Sounds rather disgusting from the ingredients, but damn it is good.

Interesting. The soup base they use sounds awfully similar to kvass
the unsweetened version of which is used in some cold soups in Russia.

[yads]

Also in regards to Polcan. I went there recently and some of their meats were good, but their rouladen was terrible. There's a deli I go to called Old Fashioned Meat and Deli in the middle of the industrial park that I find much better.

[sadora]

Originally Posted by oilers_fan

Anyone have a good, simple steak marinade recipe? I don't have a ton of elaborate ingredients laying around my place, so the simpler the better.

Here's a few restaurant tips when it comes to marinating. First, if you plan to marinade any type of meat for a period longer than 6-8 hours DO NOT use any type of sodium product. Using salt/sodium in your marinade will have the affect of curing or drying out your meats. You should seriously only salt your meat right before you cook it. When it comes to pepper, use it at the end because pepper can easily burn and give your meat a bit of a bitter taste.

Since any type of meat is something better enjoyed when it's moist use marinades that promote that, and really the simpler the better. For chicken, you can simply use olive oil and any type of herb you like...maybe even add a bit of garlic to that. (btw, try olive oil and fresh tarragon...amazing together) For a steak, use oil and italian parsley or fresh thyme. Plain yogurt is another one of those things that's basic but also acts as a tenderizer (though I would only recommend you use this with chicken or pork...ie, butter chicken is simply chicken marinated in yogurt with some spices, with a spiced based tomato sauce added in the end)

With beef, my suggestion would be to be mindful of what you are buying. Buy a better quality beef, such as AA, AAA or Prime cut such as top sirloin and you wont need to marinade because there is enough marbling in the meat to give it great taste and moisture. All you want to do is enhance that aspect of the beef which you can do by using salt right before you cook it. Also with beef, concentrate more on your sauce if you want to get a bit more creative. You want something simple, use butter, shallots, fresh thyme, port wine, beef stock and a bit of butter at the end to thicken your sauce.

If you want to get a bit more adventourous, try a game meat. Moose for example is great if marinated with olive oil and fresh thyme over night. Cook it from rare to no more than medium rare (because there is not enough fat in the meat to keep it moist after that point) and for a sauce, use butter, shallots and port wine (reduce), beef broth (no sodium added) and reduce, dark chocolate, and finish with a little bit of butter to thicken. I know that for most the sound of using chocolate is weird but trust me, dark and somewhat bitter chocolate mixed with port or a pinot noir tastes delicious and helps to cut some of the gamey taste.

I know that I just threw a bunch of information there but if you have any questions, feel free to pm me.

[metallicat]

No that is excellent. Thanks for the info!

[missdpuck]

Anyone ever try making seitan?

[Methanolic]

I saw this in the Bay flyer last week. Lagostina 17 pc. cookware set.

I'm thinking of buying this as it's 70% off ($199 reg. $699)

just curious if anyone here at CP sees any glaring difficiencies in these pots.

http://www.lagostina.ca/html/product...26&idsubcat=20

[BlackArcher101]

Originally Posted by Methanolic

I saw this in the Bay flyer last week. Lagostina 17 pc. cookware set.

I'm thinking of buying this as it's 70% off ($199 reg. $699)

just curious if anyone here at CP sees any glaring difficiencies in these pots.

http://www.lagostina.ca/html/product...26&idsubcat=20

No, that's a pretty good price for what you get there.

[Methanolic]

Originally Posted by BlackArcher101

No, that's a pretty good price for what you get there.

Thanks,

I was concerned why so cheap? I'm just not to savvy when it comes to stainlees steel gauges, this one says it's 18/10.

As far as I know, Lagostina has a pretty good rep. So I guess I'll bite the bullet and get them.

Thanks again BA.

[Kipper is King]

^^^with a price like that, I'd say it's worth the gamble.

[onetwo_threefour]

I made a double rack of lamb with accordianed roasted baby yukon golds for my wife's birthday last night. The lamb was beautiful, marinaded with a lemon juice, olive oil, dijon mustard and fresh rosemary mix for a couple of hours, then scraped off the marinade and pan-seared the racks, stood them up in the pan and coated them with a patted on mizxture of the marinade plus toasted bread crumbs. Baked in the oven at 350 for 20 minutes. It was one of the nicest lamb dishes I've ever had.

(The potatoes went in about an hour before the lamb hit the oven (50 min before searing)