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Reach For The Slow Cooker For A Warm Winter Dinner

Reach For The Slow Cooker For A Warm Winter Dinner

By Lee Svitak Dean, Star Tribune (Minneapolis) (TNS)

When important people who cook are asked what their indispensable kitchen tools are, the answers tend to be similar. It usually boils down to a chef’s knife and a heavy set of cookware, with a few random culinary gadgets, depending on who answers the question.

And, yes, those are the important tools of the trade, the mainstay of all good cooking.

I have them both. I am ready to cook at all times. Kitchen duty would be tough without those basics.

But here’s where some of us veer off along a different culinary path. We may be serious cooks, but we also wear the mantle of “busy,” and the prospect of dinner in process while we are away means we’re efficient cooks (and, I would argue, smart ones).

So I add “slow cooker” to that must-have list. (You may call it a Crock-Pot, which is a trademarked name that reflects the original. I officially have to stick with the generic label.)

But the slow-cooker necessity is more than having dinner ready when I walk in the door. I reach for this simple small appliance (one big enough to hold half a ham) because I have only a single oven and four stovetop burners. How else will I cook for a crowd when there are too many dishes to prepare? I reach for the slow cooker and breathe a sigh of relief.

Which brings me to my favorite dish for this low-heat contraption. Sesame Pork Roast serves as my standby in cold weather, as much for its enticing fragrance as for its tender meat.

This recipe has made the rounds of three generations of Svitak cooks and our extended family, it’s that good. And like all memorable recipes, it has a story.

Forty-plus years ago, my mother’s sister wrote down a recipe she heard on the radio. She was quite the adventurous cook and, with a home in California, always ahead of our Minnesota taste buds. As she often did with recipes, this one was passed along to my mother, who made it for company because it was far too exotic to serve for everyday.

And, yes, it was unusual for its time, with sesame seeds, soy sauce, ground ginger and curry powder all part of the mix (how un-Minnesotan was that in the early 1970s?).

The recipe had staying power, in great part because of its versatility. Need an unexpected (and efficient) dish for entertaining? Check. A reliable family dinner? Check. Different ways to serve it? Check (atop mashed potatoes, rice or noodles, with or without gravy). What about informal sandwiches, stuffed onto buns? Check.

I’ve also discovered that it’s a great recipe to adapt to ingredients I have on hand. Add more or less green onions, as you prefer. Experiment with fresh ginger instead of ground (but make sure you use a lot). I’ve prepared it without curry powder when I discovered, too late, I had none. Left out the sesame seeds on another occasion when I hadn’t planned ahead (oops). Despite my tinkering and occasional inept planning, the recipe works because, at its basic, it’s simply braised meat with seasonings.

For all these reasons, Sesame Pork became part of my repertoire and later for my daughters, who prepare it for guests these days because who serves a roast to company? Once again, it’s exotic.

As for the popularity of slow cookers, chefs Daniel Boulud and Thomas Keller have demonstrated recipes in these not-so-haute appliances, though I have doubts that either of them has one stashed in a cupboard.

But when even they serve up braised meat for their guests, I know we’re in good company.

SESAME PORK ROAST

Serve 6.

Note: Basically a braised piece of meat, this roast is easy to prepare whether in a slow cooker or in the oven. When prepared in the slow cooker, the roast doesn’t need to be marinated in advance because the meat marinates during the all-day cooking time. But for ease of prep in the morning, it’s helpful to make the marinade the night before. From Come One, Come All/ Easy Entertaining With Seasonal Menus by Lee Svitak Dean.

2 tablespoons sesame seeds

3 or 4 green onions, sliced (about 1/4 cup)

1/2 cup ketchup

1/4 cup soy sauce

2 tablespoons ground ginger

2 tablespoons molasses (any type)

2 teaspoons salt

1/2 teaspoons curry powder

1/2 teaspoons black pepper

1 cup water

2 tablespoons red wine vinegar

4 pounds pork shoulder roast

3 tablespoons flour for gravy, if desired

Toast sesame seeds in a dry frying pan over medium heat until fragrant and slightly browned, stirring occasionally.

Place seeds in a bowl with the green onions, ketchup, soy sauce, ginger, molasses, salt, curry powder, black pepper, 1 cup water and wine vinegar; stir to mix thoroughly. Place meat in a large bowl and pour the marinade over the meat. If you are not using a slow cooker, marinate the roast, covered and in the refrigerator, for 2 to 3 hours or overnight.

To prepare in a slow cooker: Place meat and marinade in the slow cooker, cover, and cook on low for 8 to 9 hours or on high for about 3 hours. When done, the meat should be falling apart tender, easy to pull apart with a fork.

To prepare in the oven: Place the meat and marinade in a covered casserole dish, and let it cook at 300 degrees for about 3 hours, or until the meat is very tender.

To serve: Place meat over noodles, rice or mashed potatoes, along with pan juices or with gravy made from the juices. Or pull the meat apart and serve on buns for a variation on pulled pork sandwiches.

To make gravy: Pour pan juices into a 2-cup measure. Skim off fat, returning 2 tablespoons of the fat to a pan. If the pan juices do not equal 2 cups, add enough water to reach the 2-cup measure.

Whisk 3 tablespoons flour into the fat in the pan and cook over medium heat on the stovetop until bubbly. Slowly stir in pan juices and cook until gravy thickens, stirring constantly.

©2016 Star Tribune (Minneapolis). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: Every home should have a slow cooker. (Ron Sumners/Fotolia)

9 Cardinal Rules For Someone Learning To Cook

9 Cardinal Rules For Someone Learning To Cook

By Judy Hevrdejs, Chicago Tribune (TNS)

No one is really “born” a cook or a baker or a candymaker. Not even the world’s culinary stars.

The road to becoming comfortable in the kitchen, a cook will tell you, is rarely straight or smooth. It is riddled with scorched pans, oversalted soups, scars, underseasoned stews, burns and flops.

Trust me. I have scars and scorched pans to prove it.

Along the way, though, family, friends and colleagues have shared kitchen wisdom with me. So have many chefs, cookbook authors, farmers and home cooks. Some of that wisdom I’ve passed on to readers in thousands of stories I’ve written for this newspaper. It’s made me a better cook and baker.

So promise yourself, perhaps as a New Year’s resolution, to get into the kitchen and cook or bake or make candy or pickles or … you get the idea. Maybe it will be a solo creative pursuit, and the steady chop of a knife against a cutting board will become a focused meditation. Or maybe it will be a weekend shared-cooking feast with friends. Or a family affair with children helping prepare a meal.

No matter what, let the power of cooking work its magic. Flops and all.

And when flops happen, quote Ray Bradbury: “Life is trying things to see if they work.” With a little help from some friends, of course:

Fix the flops: “Anyone who does a lot of cooking has flops, and each one teaches you something. … If you’ve had a great flop, take a ‘what-the-hell’ attitude, and pull the dish through with flair,” the late Julia Child told us 30-plus years ago. Recalling a deflated chocolate souffle she decorated with whipped cream, dubbed “chocolate torte” and served to guests, she added, “Keep in mind that your audience doesn’t know what you’re aiming for, so don’t let on.”

Know where you went wrong: Chef Jacquy Pfeiffer, co-founder of the French Pastry School in Chicago, tells students, “It’s very possible that a recipe will not work out right away. Sometimes very simple things, like you don’t let your ingredients come to room temperature, might make the recipe fail. … It’s more important to know how a screwed-up recipe looks, and it’s even more crucial to know how to fix it, than to make the perfect pastry.”

Don’t overdepend on gadgets: “My favorite kitchen tool is my hands,” said Connecticut cookbook author Pam Anderson. “When you go in the kitchen, wash your hands and touch, smell, taste, look — freely. … There’s nothing like pulling pizza dough or bread dough out of the food processor, pouring it onto the countertop and giving it that final 30 seconds to a minute kneading to pull it into that baby’s-butt smooth texture.”

Learn how foods feel: “You can’t just follow a recipe and have it turn out,” said Paula Haney of Hoosier Mama Pie Co. in Chicago. “The recipe for a pie crust is going to be variable depending on the weather and humidity, so you kind of have to have a feel for it. … You only have flour, butter and cold water. So I think it takes on this sort of magical thing.”

Plan but be flexible: When chef Stephanie Izard (Girl & the Goat, Little Goat) plans a multicourse meal, “You want to have a little acidity; you want a little sweetness, a little spice or a little salty,” she told us. “With each dish, I’m always trying to make the whole mouth happy.” How do you start? “Pick the proteins first, (then) be flexible because you definitely want to base it on what’s looking good at the market.”

Don’t overdo it: “People try to do too much,” said legendary chef and cookbook author Jacques Pepin. “They take a cooking class, learn seven desserts and try to do all of them. It’s better to do one well.”

Simplify: “Almost everybody who is cooking dinner on a weeknight is doing a (‘Top Chef’) Quickfire Challenge,” said chef and cookbook author Rick Bayless (Frontera Grill, Topolobampo, Xoco, etc. “You don’t have very much time. You just have to get dinner on the table, but you want it to be delicious.” Understand how a recipe works, then “go into the kitchen and make something that’s just exactly right for you.” Improvise, he said, balancing flavors and textures.

Memorize these secret ingredients: Lauren Braun Costello, in Notes on Cooking: A Short Guide to an Essential Craft, explained that sweetness (a touch of sugar, agave syrup or balsamic vinegar) can boost a dull tomato sauce. Vinegars and lemon can “add brightness” to nearly everything. And a pinch of salt? “It makes everything brighter and stronger, (but) that doesn’t mean that things should taste salty,” she said. Foods such as Parmesan, capers and anchovies can add saltiness to dishes.

Rethink recipes: When chef Art Smith had to lose weight for health reasons, he worked on his favorite recipes. “Roasting is probably the healthiest way to cook,” he said. “I don’t think anything blanched or boiled has any flavor. Roasting intensifies the color and the flavor of food.”

This is Judy Hevrdejs’ final story as a Tribune reporter.

©2015 Chicago Tribune. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Photo: The best advice when learning how to cook? Practice. (Michael Tercha/Chicago Tribune/TNS)

 

4 Cool Coleslaws That Don’t Use Cabbage

4 Cool Coleslaws That Don’t Use Cabbage

By Judy Hevrdejs, Chicago Tribune (TNS)

Bored with the usual slaws? The mayo-doused number at the deli or your aunt’s vinegared version?

Don’t fret. We’ve dug up recipes that get to the root of your problem–which is that cabbage is so 245 years ago. The koolsla recipes the Dutch brought to this country circa 1770 used cabbage. And that’s been pretty much the base for coleslaws ever since.

But chefs and culinary pros like to tinker with classic recipes, so they’re using beets, kohlrabi, carrots, fennel, celery root. All are sturdy, colorful, flavorful. All have slaw potential.

The fennel slaw served with a roasted fish sandwich at Found Kitchen and Social House in Evanston, Ill., began with a rethinking of classic coleslaw, explained Nicole Pederson, the restaurant’s executive chef and partner.
“We call it a slaw because it’s raw vegetables all sliced very thinly,” she said. Shaved fennel is mixed with ribbons shaved from different colors of baby carrots. A bit of napa cabbage is added along with pickled onions, and it’s finished with lemon juice and olive oil.

What sets these new slaws apart from their salad siblings is the shredded or thinly sliced ingredients, said cookbook author Rick Rodgers, whose recent “The Big Book of Sides” (Ballantine Books), features several slaw recipes, including one that teams kohlrabi with almonds and apples.

He suggests cutting raw vegetables 1/4-inch or sometimes an 1/6-inch thick. “Slices have to be small enough to be tender without cooking.”

That thin slicing and crunch from raw vegetables make these updated slaws a perfect accompaniment to so many dishes, summer’s grilled meats and fish among them. It’s a good way to add a fun texture to a meal, said Pederson: “When they’re shredded, they seem so much lighter.”

What about dressings? Well, there are no rules. “Except for the fact you have to kind of bow to regional or family preferences,” said Rodgers, citing a diner coleslaw popular in New Jersey that marinates all the vegetables in a sweet and sour vinaigrette. “By sweet, I mean they’re almost pickled.”

TIPS FROM THE PROS

Skip the knife: You can use a mandoline or plastic V slicer or a food processor (shredding blade for solid vegetables; slicer for irregular vegetables like cabbage) instead, said Rick Rodgers. But stay away from graters: “The typical box grater will make the shreds too fine, and you end up with vegetable puree.”

Balance flavors: “I use radish a lot because it’s got that heat and brightness to it,” said Nicole Pederson. “Put carrot in, and that sweetens it up, rounds it all out. Beets raw are really sweet and delicious, but they have a backbone of earthiness.” She may use a mix of beet varieties, such as candy stripes and goldens.

Consider colors: Use the same sensibilities you would to make a side dish look nice, Rodgers said.

Add herbs: “We like to add a lot of fresh herbs right at the end,” said Pederson, who’s favoring dill and summer savory at the moment.

Shred an apple: “Apple blends in because its texture is softer,” said Rodgers. “It is a flavor element that’s nondetectable.”

RAW BEET SLAW WITH FENNEL, TART APPLE AND PARSLEY

Prep: 25 minutes

Makes: 4 servings

Diane Morgan, author of “Roots,” (Chronicle Books) suggests serving this at a barbecue, at brunch with cured salmon or alongside country pate. Use a mandoline or a sharp chef’s knife to cut beets into matchsticks. Use disposable surgical gloves, or you’ll end up with red hands.

3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon each: fresh lemon juice, freshly grated orange zest

1/2 teaspoon each: honey, fine sea salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

1 medium red beet, 3 to 5 ounces, peeled, cut into matchsticks

1/2 fennel bulb, trimmed, halved lengthwise, cored, cut into matchsticks

1/2 medium crisp tart apple such as Granny Smith, cored, cut into matchsticks

1/2 cup firmly packed chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

In a small bowl, whisk together oil, lemon juice, orange zest, honey, salt and pepper. In a medium bowl, toss together beet, fennel, apple and parsley. Add dressing. Mix gently to coat ingredients evenly. Serve immediately, or cover and refrigerate until ready to serve. Remove from refrigerator 30 minutes before serving. Slaw can be made up to 8 hours in advance. Presentation note: If you don’t serve immediately and want to prevent the beets from tinting the fennel, keep beets separate (dressed with half the dressing) and mix in right before serving.

Nutrition information per serving: 128 calories, 10 g fat, 1 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 9 g carbohydrates, 1 g protein, 386 mg sodium, 2 g fiber

CARROT SLAW WITH MISO VINAIGRETTE

Prep: 15 minutes

Makes: 4 servings

Rick Rodgers, author of “The Big Book of Sides,” (Ballantine Books) serves this with Asian-style grilled meats, poultry or seafood. He’s a fan of miso and writes that it’s “one of the most flavor-packed ingredients in my kitchen because a little goes a long way.” Miso brings deep umami notes to this.

2 tablespoons rice vinegar

1 tablespoon white miso

1/2 teaspoon soy sauce

1 garlic clove

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 pound carrots, trimmed

1 scallion, white and green parts, finely chopped

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Sesame seeds, for garnish

For vinaigrette, process vinegar, miso, soy sauce and garlic in a blender. With machine running, gradually add oil through hole in the lid. Or crush garlic through a garlic press into a medium bowl. Add vinegar, miso and soy sauce; whisk until combined. Gradually whisk in oil.

In a food processor fitted with the coarse shredding blade, shred carrots. Do not shred carrots too fine. If your food processor only has a fine shredding disk, use a V-slicer to julienne carrots into strips less than [-inch wide. In a medium bowl, toss together carrots, scallion and vinaigrette. Season with salt and pepper. Slaw can be covered and refrigerated up to 8 hours. Serve chilled or at room temperature. Top each serving with a sprinkle of sesame seeds.

Nutrition information per serving: 300 calories, 29 g fat, 2 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 11 g carbohydrates, 2 g protein, 512 mg sodium, 3 g fiber

KOHLRABI SLAW WITH CREAMY HERB AND AVOCADO DRESSING

Prep: 25 minutes

Makes: 6 servings

Adapted from “Vegetable Literacy” by Deborah Madison (Ten Speed Press), who notes you may not use all the fresh herb dressing. Extra can be used as a dip for vegetables.
4 or 5 small kohlrabies, about 1 pound

1/2 avocado

5 tablespoons olive oil

2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar

1/3 cup sour cream or yogurt

1/2 teaspoon sea salt

1 1/2 tablespoons finely chopped tarragon

2 tablespoons finely chopped parsley or chervil

1 tablespoon slivered chives, plus more for garnish

Freshly ground pepper

If kohlrabies are young and tender, you don’t need to peel them. If older and less than tender, slice off skins. Cut kohlrabies into fine julienne. An effective way to do this is to slice them thinly on a mandoline, then stack slices and cut into matchsticks.

For the dressing, peel and slice avocado. Combine with oil, vinegar, sour cream and 1/2 teaspoon salt in a food processor; puree until smooth. Stir in tarragon, parsley and chives; taste for salt and season with pepper. Toss kohlrabi matchsticks with just enough dressing to coat well. Garnish with chives.

Nutrition information per serving: 87 calories, 8 g fat, 2 g saturated fat, 4 mg cholesterol, 3 g carbohydrates, 1 g protein, 127 mg sodium, 2 g fiber

SHAVED FENNEL WITH ARUGULA CRUNCH SALAD

Prep: 25 minutes

Cook: 18 minutes

Makes: 4 servings

A sweet-sour orange gastrique balances and softens the fennel, writes Roberto Martin in “Roberto’s New Vegan Cooking” (DaCapo Lifelong Books).

1/4 cup each: brown sugar, maple syrup

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

Zest and juice of 2 large oranges

2 whole cloves

1 cinnamon stick or 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 garlic cloves, crushed

4 medium fennel bulbs, cleaned and trimmed to bulbs only, fronds chopped and reserved

1 large Granny Smith apple

1/3 cup chives, cut in 1/4-inch pieces

Kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper to taste

4 cups baby arugula

1/2 cup salted, toasted sunflower seeds

For gastrique, whisk together brown sugar, maple syrup, vinegar, orange zest and juice, cloves, cinnamon and garlic. Bring to simmer over medium heat. Simmer uncovered until liquid is reduced by about half, about 1/2 cup; about 15 minutes. Strain; set aside for immediate use. Or cover and refrigerate.

Cut fennel bulbs in half lengthwise; shave very thin with a mandoline, starting with tops down to the base. If you don’t have a mandoline, do your best with a sharp knife. Peel, halve and core apple; slice thin crosswise. In a medium bowl, toss fennel, apple and chives with gastrique. Season with salt and pepper. Cover; let marinate 30 minutes to one day.

To serve, place about 1/4 cup fennel salad on a plate. Top with a fat pinch of arugula. Sprinkle with sunflower seeds; top arugula with more fennel salad and seeds. Serve immediately. Store any unused arugula separate from fennel salad. Fennel salad is good for 5 days in the refrigerator.

Nutrition information per serving: 272 calories, 11 g fat, 2 g saturated fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 39 g carbohydrates, 8 g protein, 199 mg sodium, 12 g fiber

Photo by Alex Bayley via Flickr

Atlantic Beach Pie: Crunchy And Creamy At Once

Atlantic Beach Pie: Crunchy And Creamy At Once

By Marlene Parrish, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (TNS)

Some pies are easy to bake, and some aren’t.

The Atlantic Beach Pie is an easy-peasy dessert to make. It has a filling similar to those in Key lime and lemon meringue pies, but the dense, crispy, thick, salty saltine crust is the secret weapon because it is such an amazing balance to the tanginess and sweetness of the filling.

Chef Bill Smith is head honcho at Crook’s Corner, a restaurant on the North Carolina coast. He doesn’t take credit for inventing the pie, which is often referred to as “lemon pie” in those parts. In Smith’s version, real whipped cream replaces meringue as the topping. But economical home cooks who shudder at the thought of lemon pie without meringue, almost as much as discarding the whites, can add the whipped topping with little effort.

There’s also a bit of lore that surrounds the dessert.

“When we were growing up, everybody believed that if you ate any kind of dessert after having seafood, you would drop dead sick,” Smith says. “The one exception was this lemon pie that all the fish restaurants along the coast served.”

The pie’s simplicity is its appeal. Smith jokes that it takes all of four seconds to make. In reality, it’s 18 minutes to bake the crust and 16 minutes to cook the filling.
“You don’t have to wait for the crust to cool,” he says. “The only thing that takes any time is, the finished pie has to cool enough when you’re done so you can cut it without making a mess. But it couldn’t be faster to put together.”

Some things to remember:

–Crush the saltines with a rolling pin or empty wine bottle. You want tiny flaky pieces. Do not use a food processor or your crackers will turn to dust before you can say, “Fail.”

–Eggs separate easier when they are cold, whip better when they are warm.

–The pie works because each forkful is a luscious combination of sweet, tart and salt flavors, with a texture that’s at once crispy and velvety. If you pair it with a cup of coffee, a bitter note seals the deal.

Now, go make an Atlantic Beach Pie.

Atlantic Beach Pie

The easiest (and least messy) way to make crumbs is to put the crackers in a plastic bag, seal it and whack with a rolling pin. You will have about 2 1/2 to 3 cups of cracker crumbs. Do not use a food processor.

1 1/2 sleeves original saltine crackers (not unsalted, whole wheat, etc.)
1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
3 tablespoons sugar
4 egg yolks
1 (14 ounces) can sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup lemon juice (about 4 juicy lemons)
Whipped cream or meringue (see recipe)
Coarse-grain sea salt

In a large plastic bag, crush crackers with your hands. Then roll and whack with a rolling pin until pieces are pea-sized or smaller (you want a chunky meal, not a fine crumb). Add butter and sugar, and knead with your hands until crumbs begin to stick together. Things will be crumbly, that’s OK.

Press crust on the bottom, up the sides and onto the rim of 9-inch pie plate. Carefully place the crust in the refrigerator and chill for 15 minutes, then immediately bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes. Remove crust from oven, and place on a rack.

Once the crust is out of the oven, make the filling (not sooner as it will begin to set once you mix it up).

To make the filling, combine egg yolks, sweetened condensed milk and lemon juice. Mix until smooth with electric mixer on medium speed or a large whisk.

Spread filling into crust; the crust does not have to be cooled. (If you like meringue, whip it up, top the pie and bake at this point.)

Bake at 350 degrees for 15-17 minutes or until set.

Cool for 30 minutes at room temperature, then refrigerate for 4-6 hours or until pie is completely chilled. Serve with real whipped cream sprinkled with coarse-grain sea salt.

Meringue (optional):

If you’d like to use meringue instead of whipped cream, top filled, but unbaked pie with meringue.
4 egg whites

1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar

Pinch of salt
1/2 cup sugar

Beat egg whites with cream of tartar and salt on medium-high speed with an electric mixer for 1-2 minutes, or until soft peaks form when beaters are raised.

Gradually beat in sugar, { tablespoon at a time, until stiff glossy peaks form, and sugar is dissolved.

Spoon meringue onto filling and spread to edge of crust to seal well and prevent meringue from shrinking.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 18 minutes or until meringue is set and peaks are golden brown.

Cool for 30 minutes at room temperature, then refrigerate for 4-6 hours or until pie is completely cold. Sprinkle with coarse-grain sea salt to serve. Makes one 9-inch pie.

–Adapted from chef Bill Smith of Crook’s Corner in Chapel Hill, N.C.

Photo by Sebastian Bassi via Flickr