The "pressure" cooker

I wrote a couple of posts ago about running out of family recipes to share (although it subsequently occurred to me to get my Hungarian-Polish sister in law to share her family recipes as well). In a way it's true; the recipe reservoir of the nuclear family is going to be small. If you know how to make as few as 20 different things, assuming you eat out once a week, you're going to go nearly a month before repeating anything. Plus, they're favorites, right? So you want to keep making them.

And of course, I did think of some old family favorites that I haven't blogged yet, and some new things to try out on you, and then there's my sister-in-law. But I also realized what an inspiration just writing about these recipes is. I find myself thinking, what can I make that would have an interesting story, what can I try on my small audience, what can I create?

Here's what I created yesterday:

Ginger chicken with winter squash
bone-in chicken breast, one per diner
1 winter squash (acorn or small butternut)
1 pint shiitake mushrooms
2-4 inches fresh ginger root, peeled and sliced
1 teaspoon green peppercorns
4 cups Ginger-squash broth
1/3 cup rice for each diner

Seed, peel, and cube the squash (you can peel squash and the ginger for that matter with a potato peeler). Put the seeds, peels, ginger bark and peppercorns in a 2-quart saucepan, fill with water, and bring to a boil Simmer for 20 minutes, then strain to create about 4+ cups of broth.

In a large frying pan, saute the chicken in about 3 tablespoons of butter, until skin is browned. Add the ginger root and saute until soft. Add the squash and toss until it is completely coated with butter. Season with salt and pepper. Add the mushrooms and toss, simmering for another couple of minutes. Dredge lightly with flour, toss to distribute flour evenly. Add about 1 cup of the hot broth and bring to simmer. Continue adding up to 2+ cups of broth so that you have a nice gravy.

Use the remaining broth to cook the rice in, which will give the rice a ginger flavor.

Thanks to The Yarden for inspiring the title!

The endless warmth

It's a funny autumn season this year. It's not actually summer-like, and October was perfectly miserable, but the weather feels like it is never going to break. It looks like autumn. The sun is at that autumn angle that makes everything still and golden. Sunset comes at the correct time, and the leaves all turned, and fell.

But the gentle air goes on and on, not really warm, but zephyrous. There hasn't been a day yet where the sun is bright and painful, the winter sun that hits like a shard of glass, or the frozen crystal in your eye that enslaves you to the ice queen.

So for a fall day in this year's endless wait between equinox and solstice, a one-pan autumn meal.

Autumn pan chicken

One cut-up chicken
3-4 pats of butter
2 T flour
one medium onion, sliced
fall vegetables (I used carrots, potatoes, turnips, but you could also do this with squash or pumpkin)
dried sage
2 cups apple cider
salt
black pepper

Melt 2-3 pats of butter in a large saucepan. Heat the cider just short of boiling (about 5 minutes at 80% in the microwave.) Saute the chicken on both sides (to keep the skin from pulling off, wait for it to "release," meaning, when it's properly cooked on the first side, it will be easy to turn. If it resists and sticks to the pan, just wait until it wants to turn). Add the onions and vegetables and saute about 5 minutes. Add the rest of the butter, plus the sage, salt and pepper. When the butter is melted, dredge with flour, turning the chicken a couple of times. Add half the cider and reduce until it barely covers the bottom of the pan, scraping up the brownings. Add the rest of the cider, turn to a light simmer and cover for about 15 minutes, until chicken is cooked through.

Serve with noodles or rice and a fall vegetable like broccoli or brussels sprouts.

Please buy your chicken from a butcher or mercado, not from the chain stores, where it will have been chilled to 33F/1C meaning it will be tough and tasteless.

Equinox

Of the lunar events that mark the calendar, I think the fall equinox is my favorite. There is such a sense of balance as the garden stands poised between summer and winter. There is still food to harvest, and a few 3-season flowers like cleome and black eyed susans won’t give in to the cool nights. The main color has changed from the neons of summer to subtle reds and purples of fall. The canterbury bells, whose blue insistence marks the beginning of July’s peak, have formed hard seed pods and the leaves are turning yellow. The delphiniums and baby’s breath breathe one more bloom into the chilly morning air. The banes are flowering— bugbane, fleabane, wolfsbane, leopardsbane.

The goddess sends her winter scouts in the guise of spiders the size of a finger joint, and the cicadas scream out one more chorus before the chill takes them underground. The morning dew has that heavy cold sparkle that says “I want to be frost”.

I'll be eating leftovers all week, as there's a fridge-full of the pumpkin variations, as well as some pilaf. Towards the end of the week I'll pick the rest of the black beans and make chili; I need to figure out something to do with 9 turnips (the lo bak gau was a dismal failure). In the meantime, here's another family favorite.

Beef stew
I know lots of people like the supposed no-work method of using a slow cooker for beef stew; this recipe can be put together easily in 15 minutes, then simmered for an hour after getting home from work.

1/4 to 1/3 lb. per person, of any beef cut you like. Don't feel like you have to buy "beef for stew" which is the cheap awful tough stuff they can't sell any other way. Get a nice cut and you'll have a better stew. If you get a bone-in cut, you can use the bone and fat trimmings to make a nice stock*

large onion*, sliced
1 large carrot*, sliced
2-3 celery stalks*, sliced
4 large tomatoes or 1 small can of whole peeled tomatoes
2 cups beef or vegetable stock*
dried oregano
salt and pepper

broccoli or green beans
1 large potato for every two diners
additional water or stock as needed

To make stock: Trim the meat and all the vegetables. Put all the trimmed items (bones, fat, carrot ends, onion skins, potato skins, celery leaves) in a 2 quart pot filled with water. Add peppercorns and salt and boil; simmer until it is reduced to half; strain.

Place the onions in about a half cup of water in a large stew pot and saute until all the moisture is gone. Add 3 Tablespoons of olive oil, the oregano, and the meat; brown the beef (meaning, sear it until all pieces are browned on one side at least; okay if there's still a lot of red on the meat when you add the other ingredients). Add the celery and a small amount of water and saute until the celery starts to get translucent. Add the tomatoes and about a cup of water, simmer until the skin comes off easily. (If using canned tomatoes, skip the simmering and move straight to the next ingredient). Add the stock, carrots, and potatoes, then add enough water to cover all the ingredients. Bring to a boil, then cover and reduce to a simmer. Let this simmer for about 30 minutes, adjusting the seasoning. Add water if you like your stew with more sauce. Add the green vegetables 5 minutes (for store bought or frozen) to 10 minutes (for garden fresh) before serving and continue to simmer covered-- you want these to be al dente not mushy.

Serve over rice.