Because Sod Off, that’s why!
Sometimes I’m too lazy to make beer batter. So I just take some chicken skin and wrap it around sliced zucchini straight from the garden. Oh, and then I fry it. ‘Cuz that’s Punk Rock Kitchen style. Don’t forget to hit it with Sriracha Salt.
Because Sod Off, that's why! (Punk Rock Zucchini)
Author: Unca Mo
Recipe type: Appetizer, Bar Food
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Serves: 4
If you have a garden, you will understand this. Squash just starts hurling itself at you. Your only defense is to cook it in as many different ways as you can find. Sometimes I get lazy.
Ingredients
- 1 big-ass zucchini (Fresh from the garden. Do not go out and buy squash for this)
- A bunch of chicken skins, cooked (You can get these by cooking a shitload of chicken to make into stock and other goodies) I promise to give you a recipe for that later.
- Oil for frying. I "like Canola. (Fuck the Agricorps and their corn oil! Plus the best way to refer to Canola oil is its proper name. Rapeseed Oil! That's pretty rude stuff right there!)
- Toothpicks
- Sriracha Salt. (Fine, I'll give you the recipe for that, too)
Instructions
- Cut the zuke in half. Cut it in half the other way. Cut long wedges.
- Wrap the zuke pieces in chicken skin and secure with wooden toothpicks.
- Fry them bastards!
- Drain on a plate lined with paper towels.
- Season with Sriracha Salt.
- Eat without putting your eye out on the toothpicks.
Oh, and the sauce, you ask.
Saffron Cream Sauce
Author: UncaMo
Recipe type: Sauce
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This is the final (yeah, right!) tweak on a sauce I have been making for quite a while. I love saffron. I love cream. There ya go. I invented this to put on Sea Scallops, but it is nice on just about anything. The color is dramatic; it is a rich buttery yellow. Just looking at it makes stuff it's served with seem better. I love to garnish it with just a tiny sprinkle of Sriracha Salt (See recipe soon)
Ingredients
- 2 cups half and half (or third and third and third, if you can find it)
- 10- 15 strands saffron
- Pinch salt
- 1 egg yolk
- 1 T lemon juice
Instructions
- Pour cream into a small sauce pot and add saffron
- Bring to a simmer and turn off heat
- Beat egg yolk, salt and lemon juice very thoroughly and refrigerate
- Reduce cream by about a third
- Temper the egg mix by adding the hot cream to it very slowly, whisking the whole time.
- When about a third of the dairy has been whisked into the egg mix, pour the egg mix into the sauce pot and return to a simmer, whisking constantly.
- The mix will go from thin to thick abruptly. Don't miss it, otherwise you wasted food. Shame on you.
- Test for seasoning and put the sauce on just about anything.
The promised Crepe filling
The promised Crepe Filling
Author: UncaMo
Recipe type: Filling
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Serves: 4 large crepes
Well, I'm sure you are all now experts at making crepes. Fill them bastards! This is a good savory filling.
Ingredients
- 8 ounces Brie, sliced in long strips
- 2 ounces sweet butter
- 8 ounces mushrooms, cleaned and sliced
- 1 tsp. salt
- ½ tsp. pepper
- 4 ounces diced ham
Instructions
- Cut Brie into 4 1-1/2 ounce slices and one 2 ounce slice.
- Heat saute pan.
- Melt butter.
- Saute mushrooms. Sprinkle with salt to release the liquid and continue sauteing until tender and browned.
- Set mushrooms aside.
- Bring pan back up to heat and add ham.
- Add pepper and heat ham just until it starts to brown.
- Put the 2 ounces of Brie in with the ham to melt.
- Mix in the mushrooms.
- Place a 1-1/2 ounce strip of Brie in each crepe and top with a quarter of the filling mix.
- Roll the crepe and top with sauce of your choosing. (or you can use my sauce, which is spectacular)
Crepes. Happy Bastille Day!
Savory Crepes
Author: UncaMo
Recipe type: Appetizer or Entree
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Serves: 4 big ass crepes
Well, my Dad was at Taste of Chicago and posted a pic of the ham and cheese crepes he had. My honey decided that since it was Bastille Day, I had to make her crepes. Plus my buddy John Romero has been bugging me to teach him how to make crepes. I haven't made crepes in years! Now I think I'll make them at least every other week. They are so easy and delicious. Fill 'em with whatever the hell you want to get out of the fridge!
Ingredients
- 1 cup (about 4-1/2 ounces) All Purpose Flour
- ¼ tsp. salt
- ½ cup whole milk
- ½ cup water
- 2 large eggs (3-1/3 ounces)
- 2 T. unsalted butter, melted
- (optional, if you have the kind of friend who just comes to your house with a giant goddam OUNCE of saffron) add 5-10 strands to the milk and stir well
- Butter for cooking crepes
Instructions
- Preheat a nonstick saute pan over medium-low heat.
- Mix flour with salt.
- Beat eggs well and add milk, water and butter.
- Sift flour and salt into liquid.
- Whisk just until blended.
- Melt some butter in pan, just enough to coat bottom of pan when you swirl it.
- Pour batter into pan starting in the center and spiraling out, covering about ⅔ of the pan. (About ⅔ cup for a 9 inch crepe)
- Tilt pan to spread batter to fill bottom.
- Cook for about 2 minutes.
- Flip with a smooth motion. Or you can just fucking throw out the batter, turn off the stove and practice flipping with a piece of bread until you get it. Or you can just suck and use a spatula. (I plan on posting a video lesson on how to saute and flip stuff in a pan)
- Cook for about a minute and a half on the second side.
- The crepe will bubble slightly and brown a bit. This is what you want.
- Place the crepes on a plate and cover with a clean cloth. Or put them in a oven on the lowest setting to keep while you cook the rest.
- You will likely have to discard the first crepe. It happens. No biggie.
- Fill crepes with stuff. I'll post a nice recipe later.
- Top the crepes with a lovely sauce. I'll post something kickass later.
Hey look! I figured how to caption stuff! This is the first crepe I cooked in almost a decade. It came out pretty nice. Don’t be scared.
These are called Mo Rolls. They are the best food in the damn world.
These are called Mo Rolls. They are the best food in the damn world.
Author: Morris. No kidding. These are my invention.
Recipe type: appetizers or entrees
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Serves: everyone (20 appetizers)
When you make as much chicken stock as I do, you end up with a bunch of skin. This is the way to take care of that.
Ingredients
- 24 skins, cooked from chicken thighs (I will tell you how to get these almost for free later)
- 1 Qt. reduced chicken stock. (I guess I have to teach you this too.)
- ½ pound bacon
- 1 T. Sriracha salt
- 1 t. black pepper
- 1 cup basmati rice
- 1 pint water
- 1 Qt. Plum Chicken Sauce (use the stuff I will post or use something else)
Instructions
- Boil chicken stock. Add the rice. Turn the heat down to low.
- Dice bacon into ⅛ inch cubes and cook in a skillet at low heat.
- Preheat oven to 350F. Heat Plum Chicken sauce.
- Lay chicken thigh skins skin side down on foil-lined baking sheet.
- Add the water to the rice. Let it simmer until it is sticky.
- The bacon should be rendered down to tiny crispy bit with a bit of fat in the pan. Mix all of it into the rice.
- Take small spoonfuls of the rice/bacon mix and place them in the middle of the chicken skin. Roll up the skin so they hold the rice mix.
- Put the pans in the oven and bake for about 18-25 minutes.
- The skins will be crispy and wonderful and the rice will be hot.
- Put some of the plum-chicken sauce on each plate. Put two Mo-rolls on each plate.
- Garnish. Or just eat them. Whatever. This shit is SO good you don't really have to garnish it.
OK. This is the secret Mo recipe you have been waiting for.
OK. This is the secret Mo recipe you have been waiting for.
Author: Morris
Recipe type: Topping
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Serves: all the fuckers.
Don't share this. It is a big secret. Kinda. This is the best thing to put on brats in the goddam world.
Ingredients
- 3 Yellow onions, quartered and sliced thin
- 3 Red onions, quartered and sliced thin
- 3 White onions, quartered and sliced thin
- 1 Qt. Reduced beef stock (see recipe)
- 2 T Kosher salt
- 1 T fresh ground black pepper
- ¼ cup vegetable or olive oil
Instructions
- Cut, peel and slice the onions. Heat a big-ass pan or sauce pot. Drizzle some oil in it and dump the onions in.
- Stir them for... um... ever. Juice will come out of the onions. When it evaporates, pour in a couple ounces of stock. Let it boil off.
- Repeat this for what seems like too long. The onions will turn brownish. Keep going.
- Use the stock sparingly. You will know that you are done when the onions are falling apart and sweet and mahogany brown. Season with the salt.
- When it is dark brown and sweet and salty, you have succeeded.
- Here's the secret. Cook bratwursts on a grill. Shred or slice Gruyere cheese super thin.
- Top brats with caramelized onions and Gruyere.
- You now have French Onion Euro-dogs.
My Biscuit Recipe adapted from Gisslen
My Biscuit Recipe adapted from Gisslen
Author: Gisslen/Mo
Recipe type: quickbread biscuits
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Serves: 2-1/2 pounds, about 24 3 inch biscuits
These are perfect to go with gravy. I'll post that elsewhere. This recipe works for me at a mile of elevation. If you are at a different elevation, you may want to adjust it. I will post some suggestions to help later. I really recommend egg washing these. That gives them a beautiful golden brown top. But be sure not to drip the egg wash down the sides because that can seal the layers and they won't puff properly. This recipe is for half the amount of the Gisslen recipe and will feed 6 people easily.
Ingredients
- All purpose flour 1#, 4 oz. (Because pastry flour is hard to find)
- Salt ½ oz.
- Sugar 1 oz.
- Baking powder 1 oz. (you will need more at lower altitudes)
- Shortening and/or butter 8 oz.
- Milk 13 oz.
- 1 egg beaten with ¼ cup milk or water for washing the tops
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F.
- Sift the flour, salt, sugar and baking powder into a metal or glass bowl.
- Cut the fat into cubes about ¼ inch. Toss in the flour, then using your fingers, crumble the fat into the flour.
- Add the milk slowly and mix by hand into a sticky mass.
- Mold into a flattish square and turn out onto a lightly floured surface. Roll out into a long rectangle and fold in half. Turn 90 degrees, roll out into a rectangle again and fold again. Repeat this 4 times. You can do this more for more layers, but working the dough will make each layer tough. Roll out to about ½ inch thick and use a round cutter. DO NOT use a glass like your grandma did. This seals the edges and will prevent the biscuits puffing up. You can also make square or triangular biscuits. This will prevent scraps, which become tough as you re-roll them.
- Place the cut biscuits on a dry sheet pan about ½ inch apart. Brush with the egg wash, being careful not to get it on the sides. Bake for 15-20 minutes until puffed and cooked through.
Biscuits from Gisslen.
Simple Biscuits
Folks are scared of biscuits for some reason. They are actually very easy to make. You can have these ready to go into the oven in minutes. I got this from my baking textbook, Professional Baking, 5th edition, by Wayne Gisslen. Go buy it. You can get a used copy for $15-40 from Amazon.
I’ll post the original here, and my adaptation separately.
Biscuits I
Biscuits!
Author: Gisslen
Recipe type: Simple quickbread biscuits
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Serves: 3 to 4 dozen biscuits depending on size
Folks are scared of biscuits for some reason. They are really simple. You can have them ready to go into the oven in just a few minutes. I got this recipe from my baking textbook, Professional Baking, 5th Ed. by Wayne Gisslen. You can pick up a used copy on Amazon.com for $15-40. It's a great book. I'll post the original and then my adaptation.
Ingredients
- Bread flour 1#, 4 oz.
- Pastry flour 1#, 4 oz.
- Salt ¾ oz.
- Sugar 2 oz.
- Baking Powder 2.5 oz.
- Shortening and/or butter 14 oz.
- Milk 14 oz.
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F. Sift together the first 5 ingredients into a large glass or metal bowl. If you don't have an actual sifter, use a colander. It'll work.
- Cut the fat into small cubes and toss in the flour. Using a bowl scraper or a plastic spatula, chop up the fat until is in particles smaller than a pea.
- Slowly add the milk and stir until it forms a sticky mass.
- Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead briefly. Roll out into a long rectangle. Fold in half. Turn 90 degrees and roll out again. Repeat this 4 to six times. Roll out to about half an inch thick and cut out biscuits with a round cutter or just cut into squares. Put the biscuits on a dry baking sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes. If you want a pretty brown top, you can brush with egg wash (1 egg beaten with an equal amount of water or milk)
Badinjan Muhassa
Badinjan Muhassa
This is one of my favorite medieval middle eastern recipes. I make it every time I do a middle eastern feast for the
SCA, and sometimes just because my friends (looking at you, Cham!) love it.
I do a slightly altered version from the recipe below, which I flat out stole from Stefan’s Florilegium http://www.florilegium.org/ Go and check it out if you are at all interested in historical food, arts and sciences or just plain cool stuff.
- 4 # Eggplant (2 large)
- 1 # Walnut pieces (they are cheaper and we’ll just puree them anyway)
- 1/4 cup cider vinegar
- 1 T. kosher salt (for nut dough)
- 1 T. ground caraway seed
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- Salt and Pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 350F. Pierce eggplant about a dozen times with a fork. Roast the eggplants until they become soft, about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, grind the walnuts with the vinegar and salt to form a “dough” in a food processor. If you don’t own one, buy one. I’ll wait…
Form the nut dough into flat patties and cook over medium heat until they brown. Press down with spatula after the first turn. Once the patties are brown on both sides, you can break them up and complete the cooking process. Put aside to cool.
Remove the eggplant from the oven and place in a covered bowl or in a plastic bag. This will loosen the skin. Once they are cool enough to handle, peel them. Use a paring knife to lift the skin and it should come off in strips. Cut the eggplant in rounds about half an inch thick. Put the eggplant in a colander and rinse them under cool running water. Squeeze the bitter liquor out of each slice and let drain. Chop eggplant roughly and put in a food processor, you know, that cool brand new one you just bought. Pulse a few times and add the cooked nut dough, salt and pepper, caraway and the olive oil. Puree until it is smooth. This is not a very attractive dish, but it tastes amazing. Taste and adjust seasonings to taste. I like a bit more vinegar and salt than some folks, but use your judgement. This is now your dish. Own it.
Serve with pitas or corn chips. A nice presentation is to drizzle good olive oil on it and top it with whole caraway seeds and minced fresh parsley. I also like to sprinkle a little Sriracha Salt for color and zing.
Badinjan Muhassa
Ibn al-Mahdi’s cookbook in 10th c. collection, Charles Perry tr.
Cook eggplants until soft by baking, boiling or grilling over the fire, leaving them whole. When they are cool, remove the loose skin, drain the bitter liquor and chop the flesh fine. It should be coarser than a true purée. Grind walnuts fine and make into a dough with vinegar and salt. Form into a patty and fry on both sides until the taste of raw walnut is gone; the vinegar is to delay scorching of the nuts. Mix the cooked walnuts into the chopped eggplant and season to taste with vinegar and ground caraway seed, salt and pepper. Serve with a topping of chopped raw or fried onion.
3/4 lb eggplant
1 c walnuts
2 T vinegar (for nut dough)
1/2 t salt (for nut dough)
1/8 t each pepper and salt
1 t caraway seed
1 1/2 T vinegar (at the end)
1/4 c chopped raw onion
Simmer the eggplant 20 to 30 minutes in salted water (1/2 t salt in a pint of water). Let it cool. Peel it. Slice it and let the slices sit on a colander or a cloth for an hour or so, to let out the bitter juice.
Grind the walnuts, add vinegar and salt to make a dough. Make patties about 1/2″ thick and put them on a frying pan at medium to medium high heat, without oil. In about half a minute, when the bottom side has browned a little, turn the patty over and use your pancake turner to squash it down to about 1/4″ (the cooked side is less likely to stick to your implement than the uncooked side). Continue cooking, turning whenever the patty seems about to scorch. When you are done, the surface of the patty will be crisp, brown to black-and since it is thin, the patty is mostly surface. If the patties start giving up lots of walnut oil (it is obvious-they will quickly be swimming in the stuff) the pan is too hot; throw them out, turn down the heat and make some more.
Chop up the eggplant, mix in the nut patties (they will break up in the process), add pepper, salt, caraway (ground in a spice grinder or mortar and pestle), and vinegar. Top with onion. Eat by itself or on bread.