Braided Lemon Danish

Lemon.....oh yes. I love lemon desserts. Dont you? Well maybe you dont. I know my husband doesnt like lemon stuff often. But then give me a lemon poppyseed muffin and I am in heaven. I even made a lemon cream pie a couple of weeks ago. But this recipe comes from the King Arthur Flour magazine. Mostly it is a catalog to buy their products but they do have some recipes in there and this may even be the first one I have tried. I am sure you could find the recipe on their website if you looked.

First thing is if you do not have store bought lemon curd you will need to buy some or make your own. I opted to make my own with some lemons I had in the fridge. I did this the night before so it could firm up and chill before using in the danish. I got my lemon curd recipe from Martha Stewart. To use this recipe click here.

Sponge:
3/4c warm water
2t sugar
1T instant yeast
1/2c all-purpose flour

Combine the sponge ingredients and loosely cover with plastic wrap. Set aside to proof for 15 minutes.

Dough:
all of the sponge (above)
3/4c plain yogurt (i used sour cream....I didnt have yogurt)
1/2c unsalted butter, softened
2 large egg,s beaten
1/2c sugar
2t salt
2t vanilla extract ( i used my homemade bourbon vanilla)
5c all-purpose flour

With your hands, stand mixer, or bread machine on the dough cycle, mix together the sponge with the dough ingredients to form a smooth shiny dough. Allow the dough to rise for 60-90 minutes, until quite puffy and nearly doubled.

Filling: (my modified version)
1 tub of fat free cream cheese, softened
1/2c confectioners sugar (more as needed until desired sweetness)
1/2c prepared lemon curd

Mix together the cream cheese and the sugar until smooth. Reserve until ready to spread on dough.

Now you are ready for the braiding process. The King Arthur site may have pictures like they did in the book but you are just going to have to follow along with my explanation and pictures or find the recipe yourself.

Take your dough and divide into 2 portions. Working one piece roll it out into a rectangle large enough to fit your cookie sheet.

They recommend rolling it on parchment paper to help with the transition to the sheet easier. But I find if you roll the dough lightly around your rolling pin it will transfer just as easily. Now lightly draw two line on the dough that will divide the dough into 3 equal strips.

Spread your cream cheese mixture down the center third of the dough leaving the ends free of filling. Then layer your lemon curd on top of your cream cheese mixture.

Using a small knife or a ravioli cutter make diagonal strips every 3/4in. If you prefer you can fold the bottom inside and keep the look more professional or not worry about it and keep it more rustic looking. Start folding over your strips of dough to form a mock braid.  Set the braid aside and let it rise for 45-60 minutes until slightly risen and puffy.

At the end of the rising process brush with an egg wash and sprinkle coarse sugar over the top. I actually took this from the hotel room we stayed at last weekend. It is not hard to find in stores, but I rarely use it and they had this sitting with the coffee accessories in the room. So we took it home!

 Bake at 375 degrees for 25-30 minutes or until golden brown.

It is important to note here that I only made one loaf of bread. They make the cream cheese mixture spread out for both loaves but they never  give me enough cream cheese to make me happy. So if you like as much cream cheese as I do then this will only make one loaf. So take your other half of dough and place in a freezer bag and keep frozen until you are ready to make this again. And who knows maybe you want to try another flavor. Strawberry, raspberry, blackberry, blueberry...or even fig! Have fun!!

Boeuf Bourguignon

Nothing says I love you quite like French comfort food from none other than Mrs. Julia Child. I mean she is a classic. How could you go wrong with her food? It may not be up to modern standards of haute cuisine but it is still pretty tasty food. And one of Alexs favorites is boeuf bourguignon. This dish does take some time to prepare.....shocker huh?.....but it is well worth it. I mean have I steered you astray yet? I didnt think so!

Ingredients:
6-oz chunk of bacon or just regular slices
1T olive oil
3lbs stew beef cut into 2-in cubes
1-2 sliced carrots
1 sliced onion
1t salt
1/4t pepper
2T flour
3 cups red wine
2-3c beef broth
1T tomato paste
3 cloves garlic, mashed
1/2t dried thyme
2 bay leaves
18-24 small pearl onions
1lb washed, quartered mushrooms

I do things slightly different from Julia but I think it comes together just fine in the end. If you want her recipe then you can google search this and should come back with it or check anybodys cookbook of Mastering the Art of French Cooking. It gives step by step instructions for you. But since this is a blog about my food then I will share my version and modifications. If they do not suit you, then no biggie.

Directions:
Preheat your oven to 450 degrees.

Take your bacon and cut it into lardons (sticks about 1/4in thick and 1 1/2in long). Heat a large dutch oven (must be a dutch oven or something ovenproof as well as work on the stove) on medium heat. Add your bacon lardons and saute until just golden. Do not over cook. Remove bacon and drain on paper towels.

Take your cubes of beef and pat each and every piece dry. They will not brown correctly if they are wet. Turn the heat up to medium high and place the beef cubes a few at a time in the pan to brown. Do not be overly concerned with them being completely cooked. If you add too many to the pan your meat will not brown, Instead it will steam. Once these pieces are browned set them out on a paper towel lined plate. Finish cooking the remaining pieces of meat. My kitchen usually gets really smoky during this phase. I have to turn the fans on and open windows and sometimes even doors. But the point is to get a good sear on your meat and doing it on a lower heat doesnt get you where you want to be.

Once all of your meat is browned reduce the heat back down to medium and add in your carrots and onions. Season lightly with some salt and pepper. Once the onions and carrots are almost tender add back in your beef and bacon and toss together. Add in the flour and toss everything together.

Place the dutch oven in the oven with the top off for 5 minutes. Toss together the meat mixture and let it cook for another 5 minutes. This browns the flour getting the rawness out and puts a light crust on the meat.

Reduce the heat of the oven to 325 degrees. Remove your dutch oven and place back on the stovetop. Turn the heat to medium. Add your wine to the pan and scrape the pan to get the browned bits off the bottom of the pan. Add in the broth and tomato paste. Bring to a simmer. Add in your garlic and herbs. Cover your dutch oven and place in the oven. This will cook very slowly for 2-3 hours. The meat is done when you can pierce it with a fork easily.

It is at this point that me and Mrs Child part ways. My stew doesnt have a whole lot of liquid left in it. and I rather like having the liquid like it is. So I saute my mushrooms and if you like pearl onions (I do not and always leave them out) in butter until they are cooked through. Add the cooked mushrooms and onions to the pan with the meat and stir together. Once everything is evenly coated with sauce and is hot it is time to serve.

Because mine is never stewy but rather light sauce I serve with cooked rice or potatoes. This time we ate brown rice. And it was delightful! I think we finished off the whole pot last night. It is one of those dishes that I do not make often due to the intense cooking and wear on my kitchen. I mean grease splatters EVERYWHERE! Sometimes after making this dish I am still finding grease marks a week later! But oh well. Whats life without a little adventure. And if you havent ever had French food and this it is fussy or not good....then this dish will change your mind. Hope you enjoy. Bon appetit!!

Homemade Grits

You know that Whitesnake song "here I go again"....sometimes I feel like that is me and Alex. Maybe you disagree....maybe you agree but whatever the case here we go again. We made homemade grits. I realize this is another one of those things that may be cheaper or easier to buy from the grocery store but we do things because we can. Or rather as Alex pointed out tonight "you do it for keeping old traditions alive and I do it to make you happy." But whatever the reason we did it.

 So how did this come about? A new local produce market is the start of our story. We have been meaning to go into the City Produce store since seeing it but have just never made it there. So we decided that we were going before Alex deployed. So we went and it was a lovely store! They had all kinds of great local in season produce. If it was not cheaper than a grocery store it was at least equally priced. So I know several grocery stores that are losing my business to this new store. Unfortunately it does not have a website so I cannot give this store due credit. But if you are in the Fort Walton Beach area and do not know where the place is located feel free to contact me. But I digress. While in the store we found some indian corn half priced. Alex suggested that for $1.35 for a bag of 8 mini ears of corn we could feed the birds. So we bought it. When we got home Alex or as I call him the Dreammaker, thought there must be something else we could do with it besides feed the birds. And what did he find? A couple of websites talking about grinding indian corn into grits and cornmeal. And so the dream was born!!

Now we just had to figure out the equipment necessary and if we had the inclination. HA! Who am I kidding? Of course we had the inclination. This is us we are talking about here. So now the fun....labor intensive....part of the process. We rounded up bowls and trashbags and mortle and pestle and food processor and spice grinders and set to work. First up was getting the kernels off the cob. This was suprisingly easy...at least for me, you see I just sat there and watched Alex pluck them all off!

Then we tried the mortle and pestle to crack the corn before grinding. However this was not the best idea. It not only did NOT crack the corn but it dirtied something that did not need to be dirtied.

Next we tried the food processor. I did not place a whole lot of kernels in the processor but this was also a bust. Perhaps is would have worked if I had filled it to the top. But I was nervous that the mini food processor was going to break. So next up was my spice grinder or coffee grinder. And it worked beautifully...for a little while. Unfortunately after doing one bag of mini corn the edge on one of my blades broke off! AHHH!! I was so upset. But the more we thought about it we realized that my coffee grinder was not made to withstand the force of grinding corn and especially on such a large scale. We were disheartened and with Cub Scouts that night we put a hold on everything.

So now it is a new day and a new perspective. Alex realized we were idiots for not pulling out the meat grinder! Oh man what were we thinking yesterday?? So now we were cooking with peanut oil! So lets pull out the corn and get started!

 Alex pulled out the meat grinder and set to work grinding! At first the corn was flying everywhere. Part of it was hitting the plate under the grinder but other parts were hitting the walls behind Alex and in front of him. So he got creative and rubber banded a gallon sized bag around the grinder and collected all the cracked corn. Score one for us!! Now our process is by far not the best or easiest or quickest method to get grits and cornmeal. But it worked and that is why I am sharing with you. If you have a large coffee grinder and I mean a handcranked one that might be easier. But we did not so we used what we had. First we cracked the corn with the meat grinder.

After the first grind I sifted with a mesh strainer to get the cornmeal pieces out. My mesh strainer is plastic and it got the job done. Once the cornmeal was out I dumped the pieces leftover in a collander.

I realized the night before that whatever passed through one of my smaller holed collanders was the perfect grit size. So everything that passed through was considered grits and everything else got another pass through the meat grinder.

And there was quite a bit of large pieces in the collander when I was done. Some pieces were barely cracked while others ran right through the grinder without getting any smaller. But it was a step we felt was necessary to save my coffee grinder. So we did another pass doing the exact same thing. Meat grinder, mesh strainer, collander.

Now it is time for the coffee grinder. We decided to continue using my broken coffee grinder if if would still grind corn. And it did. So we saved our new spice grinder and continued to use the broken bladed one. And you know what? I went through all the corn in the bowls you saw above. So its not that bad huh? This time it gets a little tricky. I placed the setting of the coffee grinder on various speeds and coarseness. Once I got it right I let it run and then do the same straining process. Run it through the mesh strainer to get out the cornmeal.

Then run it through the colander to get out the grit sized pieces.

 

Next dump it into a bowl or run it back through the spice grinder if you have enough to run back through. We did. I ran it through the spice grinder twice. And what was ever leftover became food for the birds. But to be honest between all the  corn we had we only had 1/4c of birdfood. Not too shabby. And what do we have to show for it??

What you are looking at in the back in the measuring cup is our leftovers. On the left we have yellow indian corn grits and cornmeal and on the right we have multi-colored indian corn grits and cornmeal. Although if we are being honest here I have left some out. We ate some purple grits last night for dinner and I placed some in a cannister. So we had a little more purple grits than is shown in the picture. We started with 8 bags of corn. We had 4 bags of large corn with 3 ears each and then 4 bags of mini corn with 6-8 ears each.

So whats the verdict? The grits were good. They tasted like....well...grits. And I suppose its a good thing too since they were in fact grits. But it was a lot of work. But if this lasts us for awhile then perhaps it is for the best. If I were to receive free indian corn I would do it all over again. If the economy collapses I will not be short of grits since I have the ability to make my own. But if I run out, I will more than likely go back to buying my cornmeal and grits from the store. But you know what? They will make a nice showy item of food for someone one day. And to be honest thats really why I do these things. Its showy and flashy and fun. Because who has purple grits in their freezer? This girl, thats who!!

Gardening

This week we have officially started our journey into gardening vegetables. We had our herb/onion/garlic box in our front yard but we wanted to experiment with vegetables and fruit. So we got permission from the housing authority on base to raise the ground about a foot and enclose it with wood and fill it in with dirt. They said as long as we leveled off the ground when we left the house, whenever that it, they were okay with it. So we got to work!

We went to Lowe's and bought the wood and the metal braces and got some soil. We ended up making the box 6' long by 4' wide and about 12" high. But after putting the wood into the ground it is probably more like 10-11" but who is really counting?

So after getting the box together we dumped 6 bags of soil in. Turns out that was only about half of what we needed! We also added a half a bag of cow manure to this. Then the next day we went back out and got another 3 larger bags of soil and some mushroom compost. That filled it in just about right.

So now do we wait for spring and plant those vegetables or do we do some late winter vegetables? If you know me at all then you can guess it was the second. I am very impatient and could not wait for Spring to officially get here and plant those crops. So we got some sugar peas, cauliflower, and broccoli. I also had some eyes sprouting on some red potatoes. So we planted three of those and one russet potato.....mostly for Alex.

Now we sit back and wait for the fruits of our labor to produce! I know that this small amount of planting will not keep me from buying vegetables from the grocery store. I know I will only get a couple of servings out of all of this, but it is fun to do it! And that is the most important thing. So get out your gardening tools people.....its time to garden!!

Braised Pork with Cheddar Grits

So what does a foodie do for food on her birthday or birthday party? One might think she would let someone else cook for a change....but not the case in my situation. It gives me the excuse to cook for someone other than my husband. Now I do love cooking for him....even though he can barely taste...but it is much more fun to  cook for people who do not eat my food every day. New people means better expressions and comments. And they may be good or bad. But at least they are new. So this birthday party meal was no different. I cooked for different people. This time I cooked for my dad and step-mom. I had a really hard time deciding on a menu. All I knew for sure was that I was making a lemon pie. So whatever I cooked needed to go with lemon. For days I was stumped until I had an epiphany while watching Top Chef All Stars. One of the guys on the show made a braised pork shoulder on a bed of cheddar cheese/green chili grits with a jicama slaw on top with a Corona Lime sauce drizzled around the plate. (insert angelic sound) I knew instantly this was the dish I was making. I mean it was pork!! I knew that they would love this as much as I would because it is really hard to mess up pork shoulder and grits. And it is universally loved by all people so it would not be a "weird" dish of mine...aka artichoke lasagna.

Well this dish is not for the weak of heart. You need time and patience and more time on your hands. Most of the time is spent cooking in the oven to be honest with you. But there are lots of steps and lots of ingredients. So be forwarned! Also note that I made half a pork shoulder and therefore cut the recipe in half but I will give you the full recipe in case you want a full shoulder.

Pork Recipe:
10lb pork shoulder
2 onions, sliced
2 poblano peppers, sliced
2 jalapenos, sliced
2-4 cloves garlic, sliced
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
2 bay leaves
3 16-oz cans of green chili sauce**
4 qts veal stock
1 bunch cilantro, washed and rough chopped
3T olive oil
1/4c cumin
1/4c chili powder
3T black pepper
2T cayenne
1/4c salt (way too much in my opinion)

** i found a 28oz can of green chili enchilada sauce that I used and added a can of chopped green chilies to it.**

The original recipe calls for using a pressure cooker and mine is not all the way put together so I did it the old fashioned way....dutch oven in the oven for several hours. I will give you the pressure cooker recipe and add in my amendments for doing it without as we go along.

In a large pot saute onions, peppers, carrots, garlic, and bay leaves until soft and tender. Deglaze the pan with the chili sauce. Then add in the veal stock and the cilantro and bring to a boil. Simmer gently for 10 minutes or until it reduces slightly.

Mix cumin, chili powder, black pepper, cayenne, and salt in a small bowl. Rub pork shoulder with olive oil and then rub the spice mixture all over the pork shoulder. Heat a grill and grill the pork shoulder over charcoal grill for 2-3 minutes per side. At this point i did not want to fool with the grill so I placed in a large and very hot skillet and seared on all sides. In my opinion the finished product did not need the grill flavor to be really good.

Place the shoulder in the pressure cooker. Take the braising liquid and blend in the blender or using an imersion blender until smooth. Pour liquid into the pressure cooker with the meat. Make sure the meat is covered at least 3/4 of the way. If it is not, add some water.

Cook for 45 minutes in the pressure cooker. Check for tenderness and if done remove. I used the dutch oven and cooked on 325 degrees for about 4 hours. If I had a full 10lb shoulder I would have let it cook at least 7-8 hours. Strain off the liquid. Press the meat for 1-2 hours. I was slightly unsure here what exactly they meant. So I left it in a strainer to get all the excess liquid off the meat. Place in braising liquid and keep warm until ready to serve.

Slaw:
1/2-1 red bell pepper, sliced julienne
1/2-1 yellow pepper, sliced julienne
1/2 jicama, peeled and sliced into matchsticks
3 jalapenos, sliced julienne
1 bunch cilantro, chopped
1/3c lime juice
1/2c canola oil
1T honey
salt to taste

Place sliced vegetables in a large bowl. In a small bowl whisk together lime juice, oil, and honey until combined. Pour over slaw and toss together. Place in the refrigerator until ready to serve.


Grits:
4c stone ground grits
4qt chicken stock
1c milk
1/3c chipotle powder I forgot to use and was glad I did
1 red bell pepper, diced
1 poblano pepper, diced
1/2 yellow pepper, diced
1 jalapeno, diced
1 bunch scallions, thinly sliced
3 roma tomates, diced
1c cheddar cheese
salt and pepper to taste

Combine stock and milk in a large pot and bring to a boil. Whisk in grits and season with chipotle. Make sure you consistently whisk the grits to avoid unsightly clumps.

Meanwhile saute peppers in a small skillet until tender. Once they are done add the the cooked grits. Add in the tomatoes, cheese, and scallions. Season with salt and pepper. Serve immediately.

Here is where I part ways with the recipe. I bought the necessary ingredients for the sauce and tried twice before I gave up and did things my way. I will not post that recipe on my blog. However if you would like to see the sauce and try it for yourself then you can click here. My recipe is super duper easy.

Sauce:
veal stock
prepared braising liquid

Take your prepared and used braising liquid from your pork. Mine was reduced and slightly salty. So add some stock to your liquid and bring to a boil. Let it reduce slightly without getting it too salty. Spoon over your meal.

To assemble, place your grits on the bottom. Take your pork and place it on top of your grits. Spoon on some sauce and then top with your jicama slaw.

Now that wasn't too bad was it? I mean it was a lengthy ingredient list and you do need several hours to let the pork cook...but look at it! Doesn't it scream "LOVE ME!" "EAT ME!" All day long we were smelling the pork and could not wait. I was actually nervous that it would not be any good and we would have to order a pizza for dinner. But with something like this it is hard to screw it up. We all ate lots of it. We did pace ourselves since there was dessert in our future. I even sent the leftovers home with my Dad. He said they reheated very nicely. I did not place the cold, crisp slaw on the pork and grits in the tupperware. I mean do you want to reheat your meal and heat up that lovely crunchy slaw? I really hope that you take the time to try this out because you will be kissing my feet later!!