Which Came First, the Pig or the Egg? - Scotch Eggs

"If heaven ain't like EPCOT, I'm not going."  Yep, I used to say things like that.  As you might have guessed that was before I took my first cruise.  Back then, it made me happy just to have Scotch eggs and an Irish coffee for a mid-afternoon snack at the Rose and Crown Pub. These days, if I want a Scotch egg, I'm going to have to make it myself.  My recipe is based on one I found in an old Disney cookbook.  I only changed almost everything (grin).

1 pound hot sausage meat (I use Publix)

1 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

1 teaspoon rubbed sage

1 teaspoon dried thyme

6 hard cooked eggs, peeled and lightly patted dry

1 cup all purpose flour

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper

1 teaspoon poultry seasoning (I use Bell's)

2 eggs, lightly beaten with 2 tablespoons half-and-half

1 cup fine dry breadcrumbs (I mixed half plain with half seasoned because that's what I had available in the pantry)

canola oil for frying

In a medium bowl, combine the sausage with the parsley, sage, and thyme.  Divide the sausage into 6 equal portions.  With your hands, shape each portion of sausage into a patty, place a hard cooked egg in the center, and work the sausage around the egg to cover it completely.  

Set out a breading station.  Add salt, pepper and poultry seasoning to the flour.  Take one of the sausage covered eggs and roll it in the flour,  then the egg, and then the bread crumbs.  Use your hands to gently pat the breading and shape the egg.  Then run each egg through the breading station line one more time.  When all of the eggs are double-breaded, place them in the refrigerator for at least an hour.

In a medium sauce pot, heat 2 inches of canola oil to 375 degrees.  Gently place 3 of the eggs in the oil and fry until brown on one side, then turn to brown the other side, frying a total of 5 minutes. With the tip of a sharp knife, carefully pierce the breading and check to make sure the sausage is completely cooked. Set on a rack to drain; repeat and finish the other 3 eggs.

Let the eggs cool before trying to cut them in half.  These are usually served with a mustard-mayo or remoulade type sauce; having run out of energy, I mixed 1 tablespoon of McCormick's Tartar Sauce with 1/2 tablespoon of Goya's Salsa Rosada and 1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard.  Not bad.  Then I stirred in 4 drops of fresh lemon juice and 2 drops of Tabasco.  Even better!

Just a side note - As you can see, I double-breaded the eggs.  While it kept the sausage from breaking through, I thought the breading was too heavy.  Could just be me.  Both Robert and Cory tasted the eggs and thought the breading was just right.  I googled around and saw that Jamie Oliver also recommended a double breading, but skipped the flour in the second go-around.  He also undercooked his eggs, so that they were done enough to peel, but underdone enough that the frying stage did not make them too hard.  Lovely idea.  Here is the link to Jamie Oliver's version, I am definitely going to try this again, undercooking my eggs as he did.  This article, also from a British chef, expounds on the whole idea of undercooking and gives her recommendation for the best egg (put eggs in a pan with cold water, bring to a boil, reduce to simmer for 5 minutes, then remove the eggs to a bowl filled with ice water and let them stay there a full ten minutes before shelling.)  Oh, and she uses panko crumbs instead of regular bread crumbs!  No recipes with matzo meal, though ...

Marinated Artichoke Tempura

I love fried food.  Proper Southern fried chicken, onions rings in puffy fried batter,  tempura shrimp and vegetables with a sweet soy dipping sauce, corn fritters dripping honey, conch fritters, hush puppies, Nathan's French fries, fried pickles, and the list could go on forever.  Many of these taste best with a mayonnaise-based dipping sauce and I can hear my arteries hardening as I type this.  

I also love artichokes.  Whole globe artichokes, which I stuff with savory flavors and bake or cook in the crockpot.  Frozen or canned artichoke hearts for sauces and soups.  Marinated artichoke hearts for antipasto and cold pasta sauces.  And frying.  Oh yes, you can take canned or marinated artichokes and bread them or batter them.  I first had breaded fried artichoke hearts at BJ's Brewhouse at the Loop in Kissimmee, and I was hooked.  So when I got a craving the other day,  I just had to try making it at home.  Rather than set up a breading station of flour, egg, and bread crumb, I tried this tempura version.  Much easier.  I'll save breading stations and the inevitable "club hand" for my fried eggplant.

Marinated Artichoke Tempura

2-12 oz. jars marinated artichoke hearts, drained and patted dry
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup cornstarch
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
dash of salt
dash of granulated garlic (optional)
1 cup very cold water

canola oil for frying
additional salt 

Heat 1/2 inch of oil in a frying pan, over medium high heat.

Whisk together the flour, cornstarch, and seasonings.  Gradually add the water and whisk until the batter is smooth.  Make sure that the artichoke hearts are as dry as you can get them; be prepared for some oil splatter.  Dip the artichoke in the batter, letting the excess drip off, and then, while you are standing arm's length from the pan, gently place the battered artichoke into the hot oil.  Repeat, working in several batches so that there is space between the pieces while they cook.  Turn one time, and when they are light golden brown, remove to a rack set over a baking sheet or aluminum foil to catch the excess oil drips.   Immediately season the hot artichoke hearts with salt.

Pretty, aren't they?

I tried a couple of my go-to dipping sauces - honey mustard, horseradish, even salsa rosada, but they all overwhelmed the delicate artichoke flavor.  I then took a couple of tablespoons of Hellman's mayonnaise, thinned it with  a little fresh lemon juice, and dipped into that.  Perfect - it enhanced the artichoke flavor.  Just add lemon juice and taste as you go. 

Stuffed Breast of Veal for the Crockpot with Potato Gratin

This is kind of dish that Jewish mothers from Brooklyn prepared back in the middle of the last century.  Veal was always a treat, and our taste ran to chops and the the breast, stuffed with potato or bread.  Back then, you could find a nice big piece, 5 or more rib bones, a full half-breast, with a pocket already cut into it.  Veal is eaten a lot less these days.  It is now prohibitively priced, and for some people, there is the ethical issue of how the calves are raised and slaughtered.  Maybe once or twice a year, I see a small package of veal stew or a nice piece of veal breast on sale, and I allow myself to indulge.

2 pieces of breast of veal, 2 rib bones each piece
Cajun-style seasoning blend*
olive oil

Stuffing:
1 1/2 cups crumbled saltine-type crackers
1/2 cup chopped leftover cooked vegetables - I had some cooked mushrooms and onions
1 extra large egg
1 generous teaspoon each dried thyme and rosemary
1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped
kosher salt and black pepper, to taste
1 teaspoon oil
Water

1 jar of Gia Russa Marsala Simmer Sauce
1/2 cup marsala or dry sherry

Potato Gratin:
1 large russet baking potato, sliced very thin
Butter
Kosher salt, ground black pepper, and sweet paprika (preferably Hungarian)
5 oz. bag shredded Swiss cheese
up to a cup of French's French Fried Onions

Prepare the veal: Cut a pocket by sliding a sharp boning knife between the meat and the bone.  Slide the knife upwards from the bottom of the breast (you will see the bones protruding) without cutting open either side.  Rub the veal breast all over with a little olive oil, and sprinkle generously with Cajun seasoning.  Set aside.

Prepare the stuffing:  Combine all of the ingredients, adding just enough water to hold the stuffing together.

Using a wooden spoon, divide the stuffing in half and slide into each pocket.  Pat gently with your hand to evenly distribute the stuffing in each pocket, stopping about an inch before the opening.  It will look like a skimpy layer of stuffing, but will puff up nicely while cooking.

Heat a large deep skillet over medium high, add about 3 tablespoons of the oil, and brown each piece of veal on all sides, including the back of the bones.

Use about a half tablespoon of butter to grease the bottom of a 6 quart crockpot.  Place a single layer of the sliced potatoes to cover the bottom.  Lightly season with salt, pepper, and paprika, and dot with a little more butter.  Repeat with the remaining potatoes. Put the stuffed, browned breast pieces on top of the potatoes, placing the curved sides against the sides of the crockpot.  Pour the sauce and marsala or sherry over the meat, cover and cook on Low for 4 to 6 hours until the veal is tender and the potatoes can be easily pierced with the tip of a knife.  If you are around the house, turn the veal about halfway through the cooking time.

Remove the veal and let cool slightly.  Cut between the bones to serve.  If you have any difficulty (I did, even with an electric knife) do the best you can and don't fret.  Now the celebrity chefs tell us you eat first with your eyes, but I think you eat first with your nose, and this smells so good no one will care if your ribs are uneven.  Also, my mother always said it all ends up in your stomach anyway, and she never steered me wrong when it came to eating.  

Finishing the gratin: using a little more of the butter, grease an 8 inch square tin.  Carefully move the cooked potatoes from the crockpot to the buttered tin.  First place a single layer of potatoes, then drizzle a little of the sauce, then sprinkle some of the Swiss cheese.  Repeat until the potatoes are used up, and finish with more Swiss cheese.  Cover with foil, and bake for 30 minutes in a preheated 350 degree oven.  Remove the foil, and add the crispy fried onions to the top.  Return the pan to the oven for another 5 minutes or until the cheese bubbles and the onions are browned.  Let the gratin cool slightly before cutting into squares for serving. 

Spoon any remaining sauce over the veal and serve with the gratin.  

*For this I used Lowcountry Gourmet Seasoning from the Lowcountry shop in Savannah, Georgia.  Emeril's Essence is an ideal substitute.

#TBT - You Get No Bread With One Meatball

Columbus Day has come and gone, Monday of this week, and I could not help but notice that it is no longer politically correct to celebrate the birth of the man who is credited with discovering America.  I just hope that doesn't mean an end to all of the Italian food specials that invariably show up at that time.

I love Italian food.  It is as much a part of my culinary heritage as chopped liver and potato kugel.  Growing up in Flatbush in the fifties and sixties, there really was no difference between Italian Catholic families and us Russian Jewish families, and it was the late comedian and actor, Dom DeLuise, who reinforced this point, writing "the Jews had matzo balls, and we had meatballs."  For me, cooking Italian is instinctive.  Maybe I should call these instinctive meatballs.  Never mind.  I also love to make Jewish sweet and sour meatballs, Swedish meatballs, tiny meatballs for Italian wedding soup, and you get the idea.

"You Get No Bread With One Meatball" Meatballs  

The waiter hollered down the hall:
You get no bread with your one meat ball.

Little man felt so very bad,
One meat ball is all he had.
And in his dreams he can still hear that call
You get no bread with your one meat ball.

Oh, but what a meatball!

3 1/2 - 3 3/4 pound ground beef (I use Publix market beef or you can use ground round)
3 eggs
1 1/2 cup whole milk ricotta
1/2 cup panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup Italian bread crumbs
1/2 cup cornflake crumbs
2 tablespoons granulated garlic
2 tablespoons parsley flakes
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon dried oregano
1 1/2 tablespoon dried basil
1 1/2 tablespoon kosher salt
1 tablespoon Hungarian sweet paprika
1 tablespoon coarse black pepper
1 1/2 tablespoon brown sugar
crushed red pepper, to taste
2 teaspoons ground mustard
1/2 cup ketchup
4-26 oz. cans Hunt's garlic and herb pasta sauce

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees, and lightly spray the bottom of two casserole dishes, preferably the aluminum 9x13 size with deep sides.

Loosen up the ricotta by mixing it with the eggs.  Then combine all the ingredients except for the pasta sauce, in a very large bowl, take off your rings, and start mixing.  When everything is well mixed, take a small portion of the meat, form a very small patty and cook it in a pan.  Taste the cooked meat and make any seasoning adjustments to the meat mixture in the bowl.

Using a 3/4 cup measure, divide the meat into 16 portions.  Form the meatballs, and place eight in each of the prepared pans.  Place in the oven, uncovered, for 15 minutes.  Remove, carefully turn the meatballs over, and return to the oven for another 15 minutes.

While the meatballs are baking, heat the pasta sauce.  Ladle half the sauce into each pan of baked meatballs, cover with aluminum foil, lower the oven temperature to 325 degrees, and return the pans to the oven for 45 minutes.  Check for doneness with a thermometer - it should register 165 degrees internal temperature.  Add more time as needed to finish the meatballs.

Then eat your one meatball with as much bread as you like ... garlic bread for me.

Not Vegetarian Chick Pea Chili

I am trying to organize my recipe collection.  Over 40 years of scraps of paper scribbled in someone else's handwriting, recipe cards featuring pictures of cornucopia and matronly chickens, photostats from hundreds of cookbooks, printouts from food websites and blogs like this one.  I had one rather successful organization in 1990, using a very rudimentary program to type up and print out most of my recipes, but I never finished it and then things got out of control.  Still, I have all of those recipes, printed out and slipped into sheet protectors and clipped into a couple of extra-large ring binders, to use as a starting point for my ambitious project.  

Not only that, but I have a serious cookbook collection (and that's after weeding out the books I did not use or want anymore) and I have favorite recipes in most of them.  Okay, the truth is that I really want to leave a culinary legacy for my son.  And that means finding all of those favorite cookbook recipes, copying them, and adding them to the ring binders.  

Which means going through all of these cookbooks.  As well as the ones further to the left that didn't fit into the photo.  And the ones on the kitchen counter.  Also those on my night table, in my car, in my office, and on my Kindle reader.  

Going through those books was like opening up a whole lot of presents on Christmas morning.  In addition to the tried and true favorites, I was finding a new generation of recipes that I wanted to try.  This particular recipe, found in a book I must have purchased a good 15 years ago, caught my eye because of it's unabashed inclusion of garbanzo beans.  That was all it took for me to buy the ingredients and test it on my willing family, after I made some substantive changes to suit their taste. 

I realize that sounds kind of nervy, but have you ever read the reviews of online recipes?  The ones that start out "I love this recipe, and so did my husband!  I just substituted shallots for the red onion, and at the end I added nonfat yogurt instead of creme fraiche and I didn't have pork in the house so I used chicken and it was wonderful and thank you for sharing  your recipe."  Read enough of the reviews and you will realize there is an awful lot of tweaking (not twerking) going on, especially among us old cooking dinosaurs (definitely no twerking!)  For us, someone else's recipe is a framework, a suggestion, an idea that has not yet risen to full fruition.

It's not a great picture of the finished product, but when you see the turmeric in the recipe, you'll understand.  It really is quite delicious, and tastes best without any kind of topping or condiment.  But if you just have to pile on the cheese, sour cream, chopped onions, sliced black olives, and homemade guacamole, don't let me stop you.

Not Vegetarian Chick Pea Chili

2 1/4 pounds beef chuck, cut into very small pieces (carne picada, available in Walmart)

2 tablespoons Emeril's Essence

2 large onions (or 1 very large Vidalia), chopped

2 celery ribs, sliced into 1/4 inch pieces

1 large sweet green pepper, chopped

1 large sweet red pepper, chopped

1 Anaheim chili, seeded, ribs removed, and chopped*

6 garlic cloves, chopped

3 tablespoons olive oil

3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa

2 tablespoons McCormick Dark Chili Powder

2 tablespoons Badia Polvo de Chili Powder

2 tablespoons granulated garlic

2 teaspoons ground cumin

2 teaspoons dried oregano

2 teaspoons paprika (preferably Hungarian)

2 teaspoons ground turmeric

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cardamom

1 teaspoon ground black pepper

2 tablespoons molasses

1/2 cup dry red wine

1-28 oz. can diced tomatoes

1-10 oz. can Ro-Tel Diced Tomatoes and Green Chilis (mild or hot)

1-16 oz. can red kidney beans, drained

1-16 oz. can garbanzo beans (chick peas), drained

1-2 tablespoons sherry vinegar

Season the beef with Emeril's Essence and set aside.   Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a large deep pan.  Add the onion, celery, sweet peppers, Anaheim pepper, and garlic, and sauté just to soften the vegetable.  Add the beef and cook, stirring constantly, until beef is no longer pink.  Drain off any fat and return to the pan.  Stir in all of the remaining ingredients except for the sherry vinegar.  Bring to a boil.  Cover the pan, reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for an hour and a half.

After an hour, taste the chili and reseason to taste.  At the end of another half hour, add the sherry vinegar.  Taste and add more if needed.

*Anaheim chili peppers grown in New Mexico are a lot hotter than those grown in California.  You can also add some heat to the chili by leaving the ribs and seeds intact.