I'm not sure along the way why the last few posts have turned into food sessions, but since it is fall, and fall involves produce, canning, and putting up for the winter... I suppose you'll understand why all the press is about food these days.
Recently, I embarked on a new adventure altogether for me. I was given a free starter of sourdough, and I just had to pay for shipping costs to me. I received this free starter from a company called Cultured For Health, and you can go to their website if you would like to know more about them. http://www.culturesforhealth.com
Upon receiving my sourdough starter, I had no idea what an adventure/challenge this would turn into!
I ordered the whole wheat sourdough culture because I always use whole wheat to cook with, and thought this would be best for our family.
The culture came in a little packet and all I had to do was add a small amount of water and flour to the culture every 12 hours.
They advised that the culture be kept in a warm place, so I placed it in a south facing window. One thing that I did not count upon was just how much flour it would take to get the culture going, and how much WASTE there would be as well. Because every 12 hours 1/2 cup water and 1 cup of flour needed to be added to 1/2 cup starter, and the rest of the mix discarded. As you can see... I just couldn't throw the extra starter away, and thought I would save it too in another jar. I had done some research, and found some recipes for the discarded starter portions, so I began to save the discarded starter for a big batch of pancakes.
You may be wondering why the jars are covered with coffee filters. Because sourdough produces gases that need to escape as the yeast are activated by the water and begin to eat the flour, with gas being produced, the lid covering the starter must allow gas to escape, hence the coffee filters.
Here is the sourdough starter after about 4-5 days of adding 1/2 cup water and 1 cup flour morning and night. It has finally begun to bubble, and when you take the lid off the jar, a wonderful yeasty aroma floats out.
So my first project with the sourdough starter was to make Banana Chocolate Chip Sourdough Muffins. These turned out really yummy!
My sourdough starter continued to grow, and I continued to wonder... WHAT am I going to do with all this starter? I mean... how much bread can a family of four consume?
That is when I went back and read the directions again, and realized that once the starter had bubbled, it could now safely be stored in the refrigerator without the need to "feed" it twice daily, but when stored in the refrigerator, needs to only be fed once a week. Well, that was a relief to finally get my starter to the point where I wasn't having to "throw" most of it away, plus add another 1 cup of flour to the mix! (I began to keep the discarded portions to make pancakes with...)
So my next project to make with the sourdough starter was to make some bread. The directions on the recipe I was using mentioned nothing about not using a metal bowl... but later on I have read that metal and sourdough don't do well together, and a metal bowl or spoon should never been used when making sourdough - oops! But... even though I used a metal bowl, spatula, and a spoon several times, I didn't have disastrous results with the bread - thankfully!
The directions in the recipe I used said to knead the sourdough until a piece of dough held in your hands, and stretched would hold together and allow light to shine through when it was ready to be put into the pan to rise.
Because I was taking the picture, I could not hold the dough with both hands, but the dough had thickened to a consistency where it would hold together and allow light to shine through.
So the next step was to form the dough into a loaf, and let the dough rise in the greased pan for a few hours.
Meanwhile... I had another project in the works as the bread was rising. I had decided the night before to make sourdough noodles and use them in chicken and dumplings, which is one of our family's favorite comfort dishes. To make these noodles, you added the ingredients the night before, and let the bowl sit covered overnight to "proof" and then the next morning, they were to be rolled out and dried.
The recipe for these noodles was called Rustic Sourdough Noodles. The "rustic" should have been my first clue...
But, I persisted on in the sourdough adventures, and proceeded to roll out the dough as directed in the recipe.
You can see in this picture several hours after the noodles had been rolled and cut, and covered with a linen towel, that they had begun to dry and shrivel.
Meanwhile, my bread had risen to a beautiful shape, and it was ready to cook.
And this is the result of my first loaf of homemade wheat sourdough bread -ooh - it looked soo good!
In the oven as it is cooking, along with the pan of chicken for the chicken and dumplings.
The finished loaf of bread as soon as it had popped out of the oven.
After letting it cool for an hour or so, I sliced up the bread into thick hearty slices.
I couldn't help myself, and ate a full slice right away - it smelled soo good, and tasted even better!
Then it was time to make the chicken and noodles (or dumplings as my family fondly calls them).
Everything was rolling along right on schedule!
The smell of the chicken and noodles was just heavenly.
And the bowl of chicken and rustic sourdough noodles and sourdough bread looked and smelled like a meal fit for a king. We prayed and thanked the Lord for his blessings, and dug in...
OH MY GOODNESS! WHAT? As I took a taste of this yummilicious chicken and noodles, something awful happened. A terribly, terribly, terribly SOUR taste had totally overwhelmed the dish. It was unmistakably sour to the point that it tasted like pure apple cider vinegar had been poured into the soup, and you could taste nothing else but sour. It was gagging sour! I don't understand or know what went wrong... as I went later to the internet to see if anyone else had any problems with this recipe, and everyone seemed to praise it (even though no one had paired it with chicken, but simply as a plain noodle dish). I even went back to my chicken bones and tasted the meat on them to be sure it wasn't something gone wrong with the meat, but the bit of chicken left on the bone tasted just right... so it had to be the sourdough itself.
It was a rather dejected and deflated meal that we had. My daughter and I were able to eat a few bites of the soup, along with huge gulps of water, but .... in the end we succumbed, and just ate the bread. My son never even bothered, but just went straight to the bread and strawberry jam!
The bread was definitely the highlight of the meal, despite the fact that our highly anticipated meal of chicken and dumplings was a huge horrible sour flop!
Annie volunteered for cleanup duty, and it didn't seem to bother her a bit.
Simba, on the other hand, sniffed at the bowl, and backed off and just sat and watched Annie eat it. It was pretty funny. He had sense enough to know he didn't want any part of that! LOL!
So after my disastrous result with the sourdough noodles, my family asked that I never mess up a good dinner of chicken-n-dumplings again by trying some newfangled recipe, lol.
Still... since the bread turned out so nice, along with the pancakes, and banana muffins, I will probably continue making sourdough bread... but will continue to leave it out of any meat dishes. The two just don't go together. 'Nuff said... LOL!
Recently, I embarked on a new adventure altogether for me. I was given a free starter of sourdough, and I just had to pay for shipping costs to me. I received this free starter from a company called Cultured For Health, and you can go to their website if you would like to know more about them. http://www.culturesforhealth.com
Upon receiving my sourdough starter, I had no idea what an adventure/challenge this would turn into!
I ordered the whole wheat sourdough culture because I always use whole wheat to cook with, and thought this would be best for our family.
The culture came in a little packet and all I had to do was add a small amount of water and flour to the culture every 12 hours.
They advised that the culture be kept in a warm place, so I placed it in a south facing window. One thing that I did not count upon was just how much flour it would take to get the culture going, and how much WASTE there would be as well. Because every 12 hours 1/2 cup water and 1 cup of flour needed to be added to 1/2 cup starter, and the rest of the mix discarded. As you can see... I just couldn't throw the extra starter away, and thought I would save it too in another jar. I had done some research, and found some recipes for the discarded starter portions, so I began to save the discarded starter for a big batch of pancakes.
You may be wondering why the jars are covered with coffee filters. Because sourdough produces gases that need to escape as the yeast are activated by the water and begin to eat the flour, with gas being produced, the lid covering the starter must allow gas to escape, hence the coffee filters.
Here is the sourdough starter after about 4-5 days of adding 1/2 cup water and 1 cup flour morning and night. It has finally begun to bubble, and when you take the lid off the jar, a wonderful yeasty aroma floats out.
So my first project with the sourdough starter was to make Banana Chocolate Chip Sourdough Muffins. These turned out really yummy!
My sourdough starter continued to grow, and I continued to wonder... WHAT am I going to do with all this starter? I mean... how much bread can a family of four consume?
That is when I went back and read the directions again, and realized that once the starter had bubbled, it could now safely be stored in the refrigerator without the need to "feed" it twice daily, but when stored in the refrigerator, needs to only be fed once a week. Well, that was a relief to finally get my starter to the point where I wasn't having to "throw" most of it away, plus add another 1 cup of flour to the mix! (I began to keep the discarded portions to make pancakes with...)
So my next project to make with the sourdough starter was to make some bread. The directions on the recipe I was using mentioned nothing about not using a metal bowl... but later on I have read that metal and sourdough don't do well together, and a metal bowl or spoon should never been used when making sourdough - oops! But... even though I used a metal bowl, spatula, and a spoon several times, I didn't have disastrous results with the bread - thankfully!
The directions in the recipe I used said to knead the sourdough until a piece of dough held in your hands, and stretched would hold together and allow light to shine through when it was ready to be put into the pan to rise.
Because I was taking the picture, I could not hold the dough with both hands, but the dough had thickened to a consistency where it would hold together and allow light to shine through.
So the next step was to form the dough into a loaf, and let the dough rise in the greased pan for a few hours.
Meanwhile... I had another project in the works as the bread was rising. I had decided the night before to make sourdough noodles and use them in chicken and dumplings, which is one of our family's favorite comfort dishes. To make these noodles, you added the ingredients the night before, and let the bowl sit covered overnight to "proof" and then the next morning, they were to be rolled out and dried.
The recipe for these noodles was called Rustic Sourdough Noodles. The "rustic" should have been my first clue...
But, I persisted on in the sourdough adventures, and proceeded to roll out the dough as directed in the recipe.
You can see in this picture several hours after the noodles had been rolled and cut, and covered with a linen towel, that they had begun to dry and shrivel.
Meanwhile, my bread had risen to a beautiful shape, and it was ready to cook.
And this is the result of my first loaf of homemade wheat sourdough bread -ooh - it looked soo good!
In the oven as it is cooking, along with the pan of chicken for the chicken and dumplings.
The finished loaf of bread as soon as it had popped out of the oven.
After letting it cool for an hour or so, I sliced up the bread into thick hearty slices.
I couldn't help myself, and ate a full slice right away - it smelled soo good, and tasted even better!
Then it was time to make the chicken and noodles (or dumplings as my family fondly calls them).
Everything was rolling along right on schedule!
The smell of the chicken and noodles was just heavenly.
And the bowl of chicken and rustic sourdough noodles and sourdough bread looked and smelled like a meal fit for a king. We prayed and thanked the Lord for his blessings, and dug in...
OH MY GOODNESS! WHAT? As I took a taste of this yummilicious chicken and noodles, something awful happened. A terribly, terribly, terribly SOUR taste had totally overwhelmed the dish. It was unmistakably sour to the point that it tasted like pure apple cider vinegar had been poured into the soup, and you could taste nothing else but sour. It was gagging sour! I don't understand or know what went wrong... as I went later to the internet to see if anyone else had any problems with this recipe, and everyone seemed to praise it (even though no one had paired it with chicken, but simply as a plain noodle dish). I even went back to my chicken bones and tasted the meat on them to be sure it wasn't something gone wrong with the meat, but the bit of chicken left on the bone tasted just right... so it had to be the sourdough itself.
It was a rather dejected and deflated meal that we had. My daughter and I were able to eat a few bites of the soup, along with huge gulps of water, but .... in the end we succumbed, and just ate the bread. My son never even bothered, but just went straight to the bread and strawberry jam!
The bread was definitely the highlight of the meal, despite the fact that our highly anticipated meal of chicken and dumplings was a huge horrible sour flop!
Annie volunteered for cleanup duty, and it didn't seem to bother her a bit.
Simba, on the other hand, sniffed at the bowl, and backed off and just sat and watched Annie eat it. It was pretty funny. He had sense enough to know he didn't want any part of that! LOL!
So after my disastrous result with the sourdough noodles, my family asked that I never mess up a good dinner of chicken-n-dumplings again by trying some newfangled recipe, lol.
Still... since the bread turned out so nice, along with the pancakes, and banana muffins, I will probably continue making sourdough bread... but will continue to leave it out of any meat dishes. The two just don't go together. 'Nuff said... LOL!
Yes. Green tomato spaghetti was on the menu at our house last week!
And guess what? NO ONE KNOWS! (but me!) LOL! (and now you, heehee!)
No, I did not say a single word about the main ingredient of this spaghetti... but I just served it up!
This is the picture of my green tomatoes after being put into canning jars.
Getting ready to make the "green tomato spaghetti". My thought was to turn the green into red, so I used a can of organic tomato paste.
I decided to use chicken as the meat for the spaghetti. So I diced a chicken breast into bite-size pieces, and sauteed them in a little olive oil and butter for 5 minutes or so, until browned and cooked through. Towards the end of cooking the chicken, I added 2 cloves of minced garlic. Ohh - did it ever smell good! Then it was time to throw in the green tomato sauce!
Hmm. Sure looks.... well....
Green! Yes, it was very, very green! Yikes! (At this point I was hoping none of my family would walk through the kitchen!)
Fortunately, the tomato paste saved the day! Look at that beautiful red tomato sauce!
I always like to serve salad with spaghetti, and it was nice to have fresh lettuce and tomatoes from our garden! I picked the lettuce before the garden froze, and this was the one tomato that I had picked from our garden that had ripened before the awful freeze!
I have switched our family over to whole wheat spaghetti, which everyone agrees tastes so much better. It really does. My husband never really was a fan of spaghetti until I started serving the whole wheat. I get this from Costco. This whole wheat spaghetti is made in Italy, and is organic to boot.
Since I had purchased a spaghetti squash several days earlier, I decided to serve both the whole wheat spaghetti and spaghetti squash for dinner. My kids are kinda picky, and even though the squash was offered to them, they passed. But not me!
Ooh, it was cooked to perfection, so light, tender, and juicy.
Of course, a spaghetti dinner doesn't seem to be fully rounded unless it is served with bread. I had made some homemade bread earlier that week, and it was a great way to finish it off - as garlic bread. I mixed some mayonnaise, butter, chopped parsley, and a clove of garlic together, and spread it on the bread. Put it in a 400 oven for a few minutes until golden and bubbly.
Garlic bread does something to me... makes me want to just skip the rest of the meal, and just eat garlic bread... it smells so yummy coming out of the oven, fresh, hot, and garlicky!
And this was the final meal served - Green Spaghetti! Actually, the only noticeable green thing on my plate was lettuce, and no one was the wiser!
Except for me, and now you! Shh! Don't tell my kids... or hubby... LOL!
PS: I had extra sauce left over from the spaghetti, and added the sauce to some pasta shells for dinner today - this meal went a long way into round 2. Not too bad for some lovely green spaghetti sauce!
And guess what? NO ONE KNOWS! (but me!) LOL! (and now you, heehee!)
No, I did not say a single word about the main ingredient of this spaghetti... but I just served it up!
This is the picture of my green tomatoes after being put into canning jars.
Getting ready to make the "green tomato spaghetti". My thought was to turn the green into red, so I used a can of organic tomato paste.
I decided to use chicken as the meat for the spaghetti. So I diced a chicken breast into bite-size pieces, and sauteed them in a little olive oil and butter for 5 minutes or so, until browned and cooked through. Towards the end of cooking the chicken, I added 2 cloves of minced garlic. Ohh - did it ever smell good! Then it was time to throw in the green tomato sauce!
Hmm. Sure looks.... well....
Green! Yes, it was very, very green! Yikes! (At this point I was hoping none of my family would walk through the kitchen!)
Fortunately, the tomato paste saved the day! Look at that beautiful red tomato sauce!
Next it was time to add the good stuff! Red cooking wine, a couple of drops of Oreganol, and some basil. (I save and dry my own basil now, and just use recycled containers). I also always add a 1/2 tsp or so of sugar to my spaghetti sauce, as well as salt, and pepper, and a few red pepper flakes. Things began to turn around, and smell yummy. I let the sauce simmer for a while, and then threw in a few handfuls of grated mozzarella cheese for good measure :)
I always like to serve salad with spaghetti, and it was nice to have fresh lettuce and tomatoes from our garden! I picked the lettuce before the garden froze, and this was the one tomato that I had picked from our garden that had ripened before the awful freeze!
Since I had purchased a spaghetti squash several days earlier, I decided to serve both the whole wheat spaghetti and spaghetti squash for dinner. My kids are kinda picky, and even though the squash was offered to them, they passed. But not me!
Ooh, it was cooked to perfection, so light, tender, and juicy.
Of course, a spaghetti dinner doesn't seem to be fully rounded unless it is served with bread. I had made some homemade bread earlier that week, and it was a great way to finish it off - as garlic bread. I mixed some mayonnaise, butter, chopped parsley, and a clove of garlic together, and spread it on the bread. Put it in a 400 oven for a few minutes until golden and bubbly.
Garlic bread does something to me... makes me want to just skip the rest of the meal, and just eat garlic bread... it smells so yummy coming out of the oven, fresh, hot, and garlicky!
And this was the final meal served - Green Spaghetti! Actually, the only noticeable green thing on my plate was lettuce, and no one was the wiser!
Except for me, and now you! Shh! Don't tell my kids... or hubby... LOL!
PS: I had extra sauce left over from the spaghetti, and added the sauce to some pasta shells for dinner today - this meal went a long way into round 2. Not too bad for some lovely green spaghetti sauce!
Green tomatoes - oh what shall I do with you? Since the death of my garden a week or so ago, I have been overwhelmed with the green tomatoes, and wondering WHAT to do with them. My hopes of canning bright red juicy sweet homegrown tomatoes were dashed when the Canadian cold front moved in last week and froze my garden.
So I spent some time researching, and trying to find out what one can do with frozen green tomatoes on the vine. I called our local AG extension office to see if they could offer some hope. They advised that I CANNOT can them since they had been frozen on the vine, because the acidity levels would have changed, and therefore making them unsafe for canning. However, they said I could try to see if some of them would ripen, and I could also use them in recipes that involved freezing, or dehydrating.
So, I finally got busy yesterday with the green tomatoes. My daughter and I originally put them in boxes covered with newspaper and put in a dark spot to see if any of them would begin to ripen. What I found was that many of them began to rot, after just a day or two. Below is a picture of the tomatoes that had already begun to rot, and got mushy on me. :(
So, I knew I had to get busy quick before the rest of the tomatoes followed suit. So after carefully washing, and stemming the tomatoes that were still hard, and not soft or squishy (meaning rotten), I chose a few tomatoes to make fried green tomatoes with.
I sliced the green tomatoes and placed them on wax paper, and put them in the freezer to freeze. Once frozen, they can be put into freezer bags, and be taken out and used as needed.
Have you ever fried green tomatoes? I saved some tomatoes last night out for our dinner. I found some great recipes online, but as usual, I modified mine just slightly, according to what I had on hand. The recipe called for a mixture of flour and cornmeal, and spices. I took the easy way out and used Louisiana fish fry - it is so awesome! Perfect blend of ingredients for frying just about anything! So, here is the recipe I used:
Fried Green Tomatoes:
4-6 medium sized green tomatoes, washed, with stems removed, sliced
1 egg
2 tsp water
1/2 cup Louisiana fish fry
1-2 Tbsp fat (I used olive oil, but you could use whatever you have on hand)
Heat oil in frying pain. Beat egg and water together and place in a shallow bowl. Pour Louisiana fish fry into a quart-sized Zip lock bag. Place tomatoes one at a time in the egg wash, and then dip into fish fry and then place into frying pan. Fry 1-2 minutes on each side until crispy. Enjoy!
I served some homemade ranch dressing which we dipped them in, which was the perfect accompaniment for these yummy babies!
Homemade Ranch Dressing:
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp sea salt
1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tsp dill (either fresh or dried)
1-2 tsp chives (fresh or dried)
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp parsley
1/2 tsp paprika
1 dash hot pepper sauce (or more to taste)
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
Add crushed garlic cloves to bowl, and sprinkle salt over garlic. Using fork, mince garlic into a nice pulp with the salt. Add in mayo, sour cream, and buttermilk, mix well. Stir in remaining spices. Cover and place in refrigerator for about an hour before serving.
While I was slicing up the green tomatoes to freeze and fry, I had started the remainder of the green tomatoes to cook outside. The extension office said to cook them for about 45 minutes until soft. So that is what I did.
I didn't have to cook them as long because I was using the propane stove outside, and it was a very hot fire, and the tomatoes were soft and mushy in about 20 minutes or so.
I removed the tomatoes from the pot and here they are, all soft and well cooked. I took them inside and placed them in the blender to puree them. The extension office said that when you puree them, you don't need to remove the skins, as you keep the extra vitamins. So that saved a huge step there, in not having to remove the skins.
I poured the tomato puree into sterilized jars, and sealed the lids tightly. I let the jars cool down for several hours, and then placed them into the freezer.
So now, I will be curious as to how I will actually USE this green tomato puree. I want to try to make spaghetti sauce with the tomatoes, and add a can of tomato paste, and see how that turns out. (I can't imagine my family enjoying green spaghetti, so hence the can of tomato paste to make it red, lol!) This is all new, and a big experiment for me! I was hoping that these jars would be full of lovely red tomatoes, but it didn't work out that way this year. So... when lemons come, you make lemonade, and that is what I intend to do. I will keep you posted on my efforts to use the green tomatoes. :)
So I spent some time researching, and trying to find out what one can do with frozen green tomatoes on the vine. I called our local AG extension office to see if they could offer some hope. They advised that I CANNOT can them since they had been frozen on the vine, because the acidity levels would have changed, and therefore making them unsafe for canning. However, they said I could try to see if some of them would ripen, and I could also use them in recipes that involved freezing, or dehydrating.
So, I knew I had to get busy quick before the rest of the tomatoes followed suit. So after carefully washing, and stemming the tomatoes that were still hard, and not soft or squishy (meaning rotten), I chose a few tomatoes to make fried green tomatoes with.
I sliced the green tomatoes and placed them on wax paper, and put them in the freezer to freeze. Once frozen, they can be put into freezer bags, and be taken out and used as needed.
Fried Green Tomatoes:
4-6 medium sized green tomatoes, washed, with stems removed, sliced
1 egg
2 tsp water
1/2 cup Louisiana fish fry
1-2 Tbsp fat (I used olive oil, but you could use whatever you have on hand)
Heat oil in frying pain. Beat egg and water together and place in a shallow bowl. Pour Louisiana fish fry into a quart-sized Zip lock bag. Place tomatoes one at a time in the egg wash, and then dip into fish fry and then place into frying pan. Fry 1-2 minutes on each side until crispy. Enjoy!
I served some homemade ranch dressing which we dipped them in, which was the perfect accompaniment for these yummy babies!
Homemade Ranch Dressing:
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 tsp sea salt
1 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tsp dill (either fresh or dried)
1-2 tsp chives (fresh or dried)
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp onion powder
1 tsp parsley
1/2 tsp paprika
1 dash hot pepper sauce (or more to taste)
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
Add crushed garlic cloves to bowl, and sprinkle salt over garlic. Using fork, mince garlic into a nice pulp with the salt. Add in mayo, sour cream, and buttermilk, mix well. Stir in remaining spices. Cover and place in refrigerator for about an hour before serving.
While I was slicing up the green tomatoes to freeze and fry, I had started the remainder of the green tomatoes to cook outside. The extension office said to cook them for about 45 minutes until soft. So that is what I did.
I didn't have to cook them as long because I was using the propane stove outside, and it was a very hot fire, and the tomatoes were soft and mushy in about 20 minutes or so.
I removed the tomatoes from the pot and here they are, all soft and well cooked. I took them inside and placed them in the blender to puree them. The extension office said that when you puree them, you don't need to remove the skins, as you keep the extra vitamins. So that saved a huge step there, in not having to remove the skins.
I poured the tomato puree into sterilized jars, and sealed the lids tightly. I let the jars cool down for several hours, and then placed them into the freezer.
So now, I will be curious as to how I will actually USE this green tomato puree. I want to try to make spaghetti sauce with the tomatoes, and add a can of tomato paste, and see how that turns out. (I can't imagine my family enjoying green spaghetti, so hence the can of tomato paste to make it red, lol!) This is all new, and a big experiment for me! I was hoping that these jars would be full of lovely red tomatoes, but it didn't work out that way this year. So... when lemons come, you make lemonade, and that is what I intend to do. I will keep you posted on my efforts to use the green tomatoes. :)
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