Warming Trends

After ten days of snow and ice things started thawing out ever so slightly on Christmas Eve. The day after Christmas I went/made it to work for the first time in a week and a day. Barely made it off my street Friday morning, but the main roads were okay. I stopped on the way home to get bread, milk and a bottle of Bourbon. Three stops to keep on a short route home with clear roads. I didn't have any problems until I turned on to my street and made it about 10 yards and got stuck in the slush. I managed to make it another hundred yards and got stuck across the street from my driveway. Ten minutes of digging got me into the driveway, parked and I soon had a glass of bourbon in my hand.

The snow was soft and melting slowly on Saturday morning, helped along more by the rain than by the temperature. I shoveled off the walkways and cleared off the porches and made getting in and out of the house less of a hazard.

Things didn't start to thaw out seriously until Saturday Evening. I'd seen a couple of recipes for Tom & Jerry Batter that looked like they'd be fairly simple to make. It took about 15 minutes from start to finish to make the batter. I made myself a mug full and was soon glowing from the inside out. A couple of those and I was relaxed and ready for bed. I went to let the dogs out one last time and as I opened the door the outside air was positively balmy. The predicted warm front had come in over the last couple of hours and the temperature had gone from 36F at 7pm to 50F at 10pm.

Tom and Jerry Batter

* 3 eggs, separated
* 1/4 pound sugar - superfine if you've got it.
* 1/4 tsp ground cloves
* 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
* 1/4 tsp ground allspice
* 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon

Beat the egg yolks until thin, and gradually whisk in the sugar. Add the rum & spices. In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff and fold into the yolk mixture until well mixed.

For each drink, put 2 ounces of batter into a toddy mug (you may want to scale that back if using a smaller mug or coffee cup). Add 1 ounce each of brandy and rum and fill mug with equal parts hot milk and boiling water. Top with grated nutmeg.

Anchovies

Anchovies, Blue Cheese, Fish Sauce, Shiitake Mushrooms and Worcestershire Sauce; these are a few of my favorite things. Besides being among my favorite things they are all fine examples of that elusive fifth taste Umami, the others being Sweet, Sour, Salty and Bitter. Practitioners of the Ayurveda recognize six flavors, but we can leave that discussion for another day

Most of us add umami to our dishes when we're cooking without giving it a much of a thought. Topping a plate of pasta with grated Parmesan or adding a splash of soy sauce or tamari to a stir fry becomes second nature as we became more skilled as cooks.

But what happens if we start thinking more critically as we cook? Most chefs taste as they cook and adjust seasonings to maximize the flavors of the finished dish. Do you taste as you cook or do you just follow the recipe? When you've followed the recipe and the dish isn't what you expected do you say "that would have been better if I'd added this or that" or does the recipe just hit the scrap heap? Enough with the damn questions!

Many times when I'm cooking and tasting, I find the dish is lacking. There's something missing; salt, pepper or perhaps an herb or spice. Often a dish has all the flavors, but it lacks a certain pop or wow factor. When a savory dish doesn't sing I find it's often lacking or missing the umami element.

I love virtually all things Umami. Often the Umami is a subtle ingredient; enhancing rather than dominating the dish other times they can be the focus. Anchovies are often the ingredient in a red sauce, like Puttanesca, that gives it the wow factor.

Ask most folks and they'll tell you that they hate anchovies and who can blame them. Most anchovies we're exposed to in the US are the ones that come in the small oval tins packed in soybean oil. Instead of smelling briny and of the sea, they smell fishy and tinny on their own. They might be fine or even essential cooked in a sauce or dressing, but they lack the subtlety of a good salt or olive oil packed anchovy. The tinned anchovies certainly can't or shouldn't stand front and center in a dishes like Caesar Salad or an Anchovy topped pizza where they're not cooked or just quickly cooked. But those folks that claim to not like anchovies will eat them up when they're the umami in a dish.

The problem with salt packed anchovies the that they usually come packed in a commercial sized 700 gram tin or about one and a half pounds of salty goodness. Unfortunately that's more than I can comfortably use in six months or a year, so most of the time I use the ubiquitous 2 ounce oval tins are always present in my pantry for sauces and the like. I like the Roland or Star brands of tinned anchovies. If you're lucky enough to have a good upscale market in your area they may sell salt packed anchovies in repackaged in smaller amounts.

Most of my friends will tell you that I'm anything but subtle. So it shouldn't surprise you that when it comes to using anchovies I also often lack subtlety. Once or twice a year I get a craving for this dish that was first served to me by a former neighbor. Over the years I've adapted it to my own tastes. It's basically Bagna Càuda, a sort of Italian fondue for vegetables, painted on bread and topped with cheese.

Bagna Càuda Bread

• 2 small baguettes or 1 Italian loaf cut in half lengthwise
• 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 6 plump cloves of garlic finely minced or put through a garlic press
  
• 4 to 6 salted anchovy filets (rinsed and boned) or one 2-ounce tin of anchovies
• 1 cup or more of grated Parmesan or Romano cheese - You can use a good domestic version - please don't use the stuff in the green shaker!
  
• A few sprigs of flat parsley minced

Preheat the oven to 350F

Put a couple of tablespoons of the olive oil in a small skillet and heat up over medium heat. Add the anchovies and cook until they dissolve. Add the garlic and cook until the garlic is fragrant.

Remove from heat and stir in the rest of the olive oil. Paint the olive oil, garlic and anchovy mix on the inside faces of the bread and set on a baking sheet.

Sprinkle the cheese over the top of the bread.

Cook for 10 to 15 minutes until the house smells heavenly or it drives out the whimps!

Garnish the bread with the minced parsley and cut the bread on the diagonal into easily held and eatable slices.

Serve this up with a tossed salad to make a fine lunch while watching a football or basketball game. I like a light red like a Dolcetto with this. It would also go well with a dry rose or a medium bodied un-oaked white like an Oregon Pinot Gris. Tannic reds or oaky white wines will clash with the anchovies.

Snowed In

The north part of the Willamette Valley has been suffering through a ten day bout of snow on the ground. We've received record amounts of accumulation with some area reaching 18". My little residential street in NE Portland is a dead end and is traveled almost exclusively by the residents and doesn't get plowed or sanded. I'd scheduled vacation for the week and most of my neighbors are retired or self employed and so none us have had much reason to venture out of the neighborhood. Consequently we've all just enjoyed being snowed in since last Saturday afternoon.


I was supposed to go out and help cook and serve at a community dinner tonight. I've been clearing the snow off the old Suburban every morning, but it still has inch of ice under last night's 4 inches of snow. I decided to take the bus since the street was not really passable and as a bonus I wouldn't need to dig out the car.

The transit agency's website said the bus that runs through the neighborhood was running a snow route. So I bundled up and slogged a couple of blocks down to the bus stop and waited for the bus. And waited. And waited. After about 45 minutes I decided I was going to get hypothermia before I'd ever see a bus, so I walked back home to figure out plan B. I called up my buddy Tony who was helping cook the dinner and he said they had more volunteers than they needed. I decided I could relax with a clear conscience since they had the situation handled.

Having an open evening, I decided to make a batch of "Housemade Grenadine". I'd bought the ingredients on my last trips to Costco and Trader Joe's. It's a simple project, but very satisfying. This home brewed version is so superior to the usual store bought dreck that it will change your mind about grenadine. Grenadine is an essential ingredient in many of the cocktails that I'll be writing about in future posts.

This project would be good fun to make with the kids and you can serve it to them in the traditional non-alcoholic gateway kiddie cocktail the "Shirley Temple"

Housemade Grenadine

1 quart Pomegranate Juice - I use Trader Joe's "Just Pomegranate"
1 cup of Sugar - I use evaporated cane sugar from Costco that is really superior to C & H
Optional - An ounce or two of high proof vodka

Mix juice and sugar together in a sauce pan and simmer until reduced by about 50%

If you have an instant read or candy thermometer boil until the temperature hits 219 F and you'll have a syrup that's about 66 brix or the consistency of maple syrup when it's cooled down.

Add the high proof vodka if you wish. It's supposed to improve the shelf life. I'm not sure it's really necessary if you store it in the refrigerator, but I rarely pass on an opportunity to get more alcohol in my diet.

Yields about 2 cups or a bit more. Store in the refrigerator.

Shirley Temple

• Fill a highball glass with ice
• Fill with 7-Up or Sprite
• Add a tablespoon or two of Housemade Grenadine - it will sink to the bottom of the glass - let them stir it in or just suck up the syrup.
• Add a straw and garnish with an orange wheel and a toothpick with a couple of bright red maraschino cherries and a chunk of pineapple or orange.

Merry Christmas!

Cooking from the Freezer

Portland is in the midst of a "Winter Event". We've had a week of winter weather and frankly those of us in Western Oregon don't handle it very well. We don't get snow every year and only occasionally do we get more than an inch or two. So anytime we get more than a trace of snow we compulsively watch 24/7 Storm coverage, wring our hands and suffer excessive angst.

Yesterday was blizzard like with steady blowing winds and several inches of accumulated snow. Since I wasn't going anywhere it seemed like a good day to clean out and defrost the freezer.

As always there are hidden treasures to be discovered when I start unloading the contents. The last packages of Polish and Bratwurst Sausage from last Spring's sausage making marathon. A package with a couple of smoked pork chops and another with a few chunks of bacon ends were hiding among the frozen vegetables on one shelf. I had most of the ingredients for Choucroute Alsacienne which seemed like a perfect meal for a snowy winter evening.

Choucroute Alsacienne - Inspired by the recipe in Anne Willan's French Regional Cooking

Ingredients
3 or 4 pounds of Sauerkraut well rinsed and drained
2 lbs of Assorted Sausages (if you're using fresh sausages brown them briefly to render off some of the fat)
1 lb of smoked pork chops (I had three)
1/4 lb or so of smoked bacon diced into
2 medium onions - peeled, halved and thinly sliced
2 T minced garlic
1 bottle of dry white wine
12 medium Yukon Gold potatoes.
For the spice bag, tie the following in a small square of cheesecloth:
1 bay leaf
8 juniper berries
6 coriander seeds
4 black peppercorns
2 cloves

Cooking:
This can be cooked in a stockpot on top of the stove or in a roasting pan or enameled dutch oven in the oven

• Saute the bacon until crisp. Set the bacon aside, but keep the bacon grease in the pot
  
• Saute the onions in the bacon grease until lightly brown
• Add the garlic and cook until the air smells of garlic - a couple of minutes
• Put half the sauerkraut on top of the onions
• Layer the sausages and chops on top of the sauerkraut
• Put the remainder of the sauerkraut on top of the meat
• Pour in enough of the wine to not quite cover the sauerkraut
• Tuck the spice bag in deep enough to be submerged
• Bring to a boil and simmer if using a stockpot or put into a 300F oven if you've got an oven proof pot.
  

Cook for 3 hours if you like your sauerkraut with some crunch. If you like your sauerkraut tender like I do, pull out the meats after 3 hours and cook another 2 hours. Put the meats back in the pot and cook another 30 minutes to reheat.

Boil the potatoes in salted water

Serve on a large platter with the sausages and chops on top of the sauerkraut and the potatoes on the side. Sprinkle the reserved crisp bacon over the top of the platter. Have some Dijon and or grainy mustard available to slather on.

I opened a really nice bottle of 2006 Hugel Gewurztraminer and it was perfect with this meal.

Riesling, Gewurztraminer or the German beer of your choice would go well with this dish.

House of Bourbon's take on the Imbibers One Hundred or Make Mine a Manhattan

Darcy O'Neil at Art of the Drink started this last month. It's showed up on many other blogs since then. Art of the Drink is definitely one of my Top Ten Cocktail Blogs. Darcy posts recipes for cocktails and ingredients. He's putting up quality content and he's been doing it for several years.

The drinks I've had are in Bold. I've hyperlinked to descriptions of the beverages I haven't had. So I'm 86/100. Some of the beverages could probably be had locally without too much effort. Fermented Mongolian Mare's Milk (Airag) is probably beyond my reach.

Some of the drinks on the list defy belief. Budweiser? White Zin? Two Buck Chuck? I'd rather see more obscure beverages or ingredients like a Bourbon barrel aged beer, Rose Champagne, Falernum, Pimento Dram, Dr. Brown's Cel-Ray Soda and the like.

List of Drinks You Must Try Before You Expire

1. Manhattan Cocktail
2. Kopi Luwak (Weasle Coffee) actually it's Civet Coffee
   
3. French / Swiss Absinthe
4. Rootbeer
5. Gin Martini
6. Sauternes
7. Whole Milk
8. Tequila (100% Agave)
9. XO Cognac
10. Espresso
11. Spring Water (directly from the spring)
12. Gin & Tonic
13. Mead
14. Westvleteren 12 (Yellow Cap) Trappist Ale
15. Chateau d’Yquem
16. Budweiser
17. Maraschino Liqueur
18. Mojito
    
19. Orgeat
20. Grand Marnier
    
21. Mai Tai
22. Ice Wine (Canadian)
23. Red Bull
24. Fresh Squeezed Orange Juice
25. Bubble Tea
    
26. Tokaji
27. Chicory
28. Islay Scotch
29. Pusser’s Navy Rum
30. Fernet Branca
31. Fresh Pressed Apple Cider
32. Bourbon
33. Australian Shiraz
34. Buckley’s Cough Syrup
35. Orange Bitters
36. Margarita (classic recipe)
37. Molasses & Milk
38. Chimay Blue
39. Wine of Pines (Tepache)
40. Green Tea
41. Daiginjo Sake
42. Chai Tea
43. Vodka (chilled, straight)
44. Coca-Cola
45. Zombie (Beachcomber recipe)
46. Barley Wine
47. Brewed Chocolate (Xocolatl)
48. Pisco Sour
49. Lemonade
50. Speyside Single Malt
51. Jamaican Blue Mountain Coffee
52. Champagne (Vintage)
53. Rosé (French)
54. Bellini
55. Caipirinha
56. White Zinfandel (Blush)
57. Coconut Water
58. Cerveza
59. Cafe au Lait
60. Ice Tea
61. Pedro Ximenez Sherry
62. Vintage Port
63. Hot Chocolate
64. German Riesling
65. Pina Colada
66. El Dorado 15 Year Rum
67. Chartreuse
68. Greek Wine
69. Negroni
70. Jägermeister
71. Chicha
72. Guiness
73. Rhum Agricole
74. Palm Wine
75. Soju
76. Ceylon Tea (High Grown)
77. Belgian Lambic
78. Mongolian Airag also know as Kumis
79. Doogh, Lassi or Ayran
80. Sugarcane Juice
81. Ramos Gin Fizz
    
82. Singapore Sling
83. Mint Julep
84. Old Fashioned
85. Perique
    
86. Jenever (Holland Gin)
87. Chocolate Milkshake
88. Traditional Italian Barolo
89. Pulque
90. Natural Sparkling Water
91. Cuban Rum - I've had Matusalem "Cuba Style" Rum - Damn Embargo
92. Asti Spumante
93. Irish Whiskey
94. Château Margaux
95. Two Buck Chuck
96. Screech
97. Akvavit
98. Rye Whisky
99. German Weissbier
100. Daiquiri (classic)

The Cocktail of choice at my house is often a Manhattan, so I thought it was appropriate that it was number one on the Imbiber's 100 list. I even gave some thought to calling this blog "The Manhattan Project" but thought it would be too limiting.

One of the things that is so appealing about Manhattans are the possibilities: What kind of Rye or Bourbon? Which vermouth? Martini & Rossi, Noilly Prat or perhaps the one of the higher end choices like Punt E Mas or Vya? If that's not enough variables the serious Cocktailian is faced with and ever increasing selection of bitters, both commercial or housemade.

Here's the version of the Manhattan that I'm currently drinking.

2 oz Wild Turkey Rye 101
3/4 oz Noilly Prat Sweet Vermouth
2 Dashes of Angostura Bitters or Angostura Orange Bitters
1 Housemade Marashino Cherry and a few drops of the juice

Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

Edited to add on January 2, 2009: Several folks who responded to Darcy O'Neil's original Post had suggestions of items that are missing.

101. Clamato Juice
102. Original Nyquil
103. Malzbier
104. Sanbitter
105. Ting
106. J. Wray & Nephew Overproof Rum
107. Poteen or Moonshine or White Dog
108. Batavia Arrack
109. Elderflower Liqueur

Day One at the "House of Bourbon"

I've resisted the urge to start blogging because frankly, I'm not sure the world needs another damn blog. My goal is to provide a timely, interesting and occasionally humorous blog reflecting my somewhat tilted view of the world. I’ll strive to provide content that’s worth your time.

The image above, from Despair, Inc, pretty much captures my feelings. My friend Judy gives me a Despair Calendar every year for Christmas and it's one of the things I enjoy most thoughout the year.

My off hour interests right now are Cocktails, Cooking and annoying my cats and dogs.

The Holidays are a time for sharing with friends and family. One of the things that I'm expected to share with friends and family this time of year is a patch of my "Lip Numbing Eggnog". So my new friends, here is my gift to you...the "Secret Recipe"

Calamityville's Lip Numbing Eggnog

Ingredients:

12 egg whites

1/2 cup sugar

12 egg yolks

1 cup sugar

1/4 tsp salt

2 Quarts half and half

3 cups Bourbon

2 cups dark rum

1 cup Brandy

Procedure:

(1) Beat whites very stiff with 1/2 cup sugar.

(2) In a separate bowl Beat yolks until very light with 1 cup sugar and salt.

(3) Add Half and Half and beat well

(4) Then add booze slowly beating constantly

(5) Beat well.

(6) Float beaten Egg whites on top

(7) It's best to let it age for a couple of days before serving.

(8) Serve it with a sprinkle of nutmeg of course.

The guy I got the recipe from used to keep it his garage without any ill effect. The booze seems to preserve it - I keep it in the fridge.