Miscellany! With Thunderstorms

1.  The weather lately has been unamusing.  The attentive reader may remember that a couple of weeks ago I was writing exultant posts about the glories of spring time.  No more, it's been cold and grey and dreary.  It snowed in Everett this morning.  This evening we had thunder and lightning.  But no snow, thankfully.

However it's so cold that I shut my window last night.  I  almost never do that.

2.  Lately it seems that I am accursed in the transit department.  I miss buses.  (Once I was standing within five feet of the bus stop, but happened to be looking the wrong way.  I realized the problem when the bus pulled by me.)  Or the bus just fails to show up.  Or, if it shows up, it's the wrong bus, and I end up having unsought adventures.  Today's bus failure fell into the third category.  The upshot of which was that I ended up dashing from half way up Cap Hill to lower Queen Anne, trying to keep an appointment for dinner with a friend before we went to church for Stations of the Cross.  We ended up having to postpone dinner until after the service.

Despite postponing dinner, I managed to traverse the city by foot unexpectedly zippily, however my left hamstring decided that it needed to spazz out just as I was standing up from kneeling.  There is a whole lot of kneeling, standing, and bowing involved in a high Anglo-Catholic Stations of the Cross.  As one is keenly aware when one has a furious left hamstring and five stations left to go. 

3.  Tonight I ate goat for the first time.  It was very tasty in the curry in which it occurred.  Said curry may be the most luridly red thing I have ever eaten, not even excepting Water Melon Jolly Ranchers.

4.  Skadi did indeed visit this weekend and it was wonderful.  Jackie put in an appearence as well. There was beer, cooking, ranting, and laughter.  New Belgium's 1554 is well on its way to being the official beer of my apartment.

In the course of going for a perfectly normal walk, we discovered that one can walk from Capital Hill to Lake Union.  There are a lot of stairs involved in going from sea level to 400 feet in less than a quarter mile.  Because Skadi was around, this seemed like a great adventure, rather than a brilliant way to fall and break your neck.  We also discovered that the oatmeal raisin cookies at Joe Bar are a pretty good way to refuel after climbing all those stairs.

5.  Thanks to those who chimed in on the problem of what to do with a bunch of Kale*.  I made soup.  Lo! It was very good.   Is very good.  I may be eating this soup forever.  Happily. 

Kale Potato Soup

1/2 large chopped onion
8 oz raw bratwurst cut up into bite size pieces
1 lb russet potatoes chunked up
1 1/2 teaspoon caraway seeds
2 Tbsp cider vinegar
5 or 6 cups chicken broth
1/2 bay leaf
1 large pinch smoked paprika or chipotle (optional). I think I used somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 tsp of paprika.  I would have used less of the chipotle. 
1 bunch kale, stems discarded, and leaves sliced up
salt and pepper to taste.

Brown the sausage and onions.  If the sausage is very lean, you may wish to use a bit of vegetable oil as well.

Add the caraway seeds, vinegar, potatoes, chicken broth, bay leaf, and paprika.  Bring to a simmer and allow to simmer for ten minutes or until the potatoes are just growing tender. 

Add the kale and simmer for another ten minutes or so or until all the vegetables are nice and tender.  Salt and pepper the soup to taste.  Serve with a crusty whole grain bread.

*I was trying to learn more about Kale and discovered that all sorts of wild claims are made about its health benefits, but more interestingly I learned that cabbages, kale, cauliflower, brussel sprouts, and broccoli are apparently all cultivars of the same species.  Furthermore in frostless climates, a cabbage can grow on its stalk to a height of 3 meters, providing fresh leaves year round.

White Chili (Sort Of)

I have a perfectly good recipe for white chili that I have been meaning to make for awhile.  I like white chili.  No.  I love white chili.  And when the fit is on me, chili from a can will not do.

I didn't know the fit was on me, until I went to the grocery store for brownie supplies.  I came back with chicken, chilis, and a sweet potato.*  A sweet potato?  Huh?  Yes, the Vast Orange Vegetable Conspiracy has struck again.  Sweet potatoes appear nowhere in my white chili recipe.  Possibly they do now.  I'll know for sure in a couple of hours.

M's White Chili, Now with Sweet Potato

1-2 Tbsp veg. oil
1 cup chopped onion
2 boneless skinless chicken thighs, likewise chopped
1 large sweet potato chopped (If you're not a victim of sinister orange vegetables throw in a couple more chicken thighs.  Or several, the original recipe I have calls for 2 pounds of chicken, I use considerably less.)
1 Tbsp minced garlic
1 chopped up Anaheim chili

2 cans white kidney beans
1 can green chilis
1 cup apple cider
3 cup chicken stock (or four cups chicken stock and skip the cider)
1 1/2 tsp cumin
3/4 tsp coriander
1 tsp oregano (if you're not a nitwit and forgot to buy it)
salt and pepper to taste

Pour the oil in the bottom of a heavy bottomed soup kettle.  Heat to medium high and toss in the onions and the chicken.  Cook until the onions are translucent.  Add the garlic and the fresh chili.  Cook, stirring often, a bit longer.  Add everything but the salt and pepper.  Cook over low heat for a couple of hours at least.  Really, the best way to do this is in a crock pot.  I do not currently own a crock pot.  This is sometimes a problem.

Before you serve, check the seasonings and salt and pepper to taste.  Serve with grated jack or cheddar, lime wedges, and sour cream. 


*Notably forgetting the sour cream and the oregano.  Savory cooking of any sort without oregano is outrageously difficult.  I may have to make another trip to the grocery store to fix that one.

They're Alive

It was a nasty rainy cold miserable day outside today.  I think I've mentioned that already.  Since I could not face the amount of soaked to the bone a long walk with a camera would involve, I puttered.  I made another batch of ginger ale, invented (mediocre) cookies, cleaned out the fridge, did laundry went grocery shopping, and then I made soup.  I had planned on a bean soup. (Having had enough of pureed soups made from orange vegetables for a while.) I had bacon that needed using.  I had quick cooking dried beans.  I had onions.  I had shallots.  I had carrots (I'm in the bad habit of buying baby carrots sticks when they're on sale and then forgetting them).  It was going to be great.

I fried the bacon.  I chopped the onions and shallots. I opened the recently discovered pack of baby carrots intending on using a handful.  They had roots.  They had bulbous orange excrescences that were the beginning of roots.  They had foliage.  Clearly they all needed to be cooked now.

So I made carrot soup instead.  A quick online search turned up all sorts of exotic carrot soups, all calling for ingredients I didn't have.  I surveyed the ingredients I did have.  So it's carrot soup with bacon, cumin, coriander, and new mexican green chili.  It's really good.  But it's also pureed.

The orange vegetables win again.

Soup! Glorious Soup!

I started making a variant of this soup years ago when I decided that I needed to confront my life long aversion to winter squash. It was too sweet, and the texture... fibrous and slimy at the same time. The Joy of Cooking recipe for squash soup seemed like a nonthreatening place to begin: it had leeks and ginger. I adore leeks and ginger. Actually my relationship with the entire genus Allium verges on the unnervingly enthusiastic. Anyway, the soup turned me into a raving squash nut. So I guess I succeeded in my initial goal.

Recently I've been tinkering with my basic squash soup to make it a bit more substantial. As a result the soup has drifted in a fashionably Asian fusion direction. The coconut adds a rich nuttiness, the rice gives the soup a nice body. As a nice plus this can easily be a vegan friendly recipe.

Squash Coconut (and sometimes Shrimp) Soup

Ingredients

4-5 pounds of winter squash, butternut is best

1.5 Tablespoons vegetable oil or butter

3 large leeks, just the white parts chopped; or an assortment of alliums equal to the volume of 3 large leeks chopped up. I suggest either staying away from, or being very light handed with the garlic -- it's a bit too aggressive.

1 tsp ground ginger or 1 tablespoon, peeled and chopped fresh ginger. (Fresh ginger is to be preferred -- the flavor is more complex, however ground ginger is more concentrated.

5 cups chicken or vegetable stock and a can of coconut milk

1/4 cup of rice

Optional: 1/2 pound U-50 peeled shrimp (preferrably raw)

salt, pepper, and fish sauce to taste. (I only use the fish sauce if I'm adding shrimp)

Procedure

Preheat the oven to 350. Halve the squashes, and place cut side down on an oiled pan with sides. Jelly roll pans are a favorite for this operation. Using cookie sheets will result in squash juice running off the sides, burning on the bottom of your oven, and filling your kitchen with smoke. Why on earth would you think this was the voice of experience?

Sauté the leeks in the bottom of a large soup kettle until they are translucent. Add the ginger, chicken stock and the flesh of the roasted squash.

Simmer covered for thirty minutes or an hour, if you are using brown rice. Anyway, until the rice isn't crunchy. Stir occasionally.

Puree the soup. I prefer using an immersion blender for this operation (I've also used a regular blender and a food mill -- both are much messier). If you are putting shrimp in, add them after you puree and return to heat until the shrimp are cooked. Correct the seasonings.

Serve with a dry-ish white wine, buttered toast, and a spinach salad.