Vichyssoise

You may remember that I said I was going to make a chilled soup with the stock from some pork chop bones.  I came across a number of yummy cold soup recipes, but I decided on a recipe for vichyssoise.  I changed only a couple of things about this recipe.  I used pork stock instead of chicken stock - and I had just enough.  And I used sour cream instead of heavy cream at the end, because it was what I had on hand.  My picky five year-old pronounced it her FAVORITE soup.  Much to my surprise.    I know this picture leaves a lot to be desired, but I was half-way through when I remembered I needed to take a picture.  Just the thing for a hot day. My daughters sipped it out of big mugs the next day for lunch - it cooled them right down.

PS - I have run across this soup from time to time, but I still had to look up how to pronounce it - vee - see - schwaz!  Or you could just call it Cold Potato and Leek soup.  :o)

Ham and so on

The whole family loves ham, and there is something about the smell of ham baking in the oven on a cold day that is magical.  Of course, it stays cool in Wisconsin a lot longer than in other places, and I fixed this a month or so ago - sorry again for the delay, it has been a crazy upside-down spring around here.  So, for the first night we had ham, baked potatoes, bread and salad.  I hardly ever take pictures of the salad, but we eat it almost every night.  We buy the big boxes of organic mixed greens at the grocery store when we can't get it locally, and we will start buying it locally again very soon!  Our local grocery stores don't carry it in the big boxes and the small bags are so expensive, but since my husband works in Madison, he stops at a grocery store that is right across from his office, and they carry it.  I have often noticed that I can buy bulk so much cheaper in bigger cities.  So - when you are taking an outing to a larger city - stock up!  I buy rice, olive oil, salad and sometimes cereal there.  Oh - and some really great specialty cheeses.  We have some great cheeses at the cheese house in town here, but they have some really great ones in Madison from all kinds of wonderful cheese makers from Wisconsin.  I highly recommend Crave Brothers (Petit Frere) and any of the Carr Valley cheddars.  Mmmm.  There are not cheese that you just eat.  They are cheeses that you savor in small amounts.  They are too expensive to do otherwise, but make a great (and healthy!) treat. 

I am very lazy about making hams.  I usually stick them in my dutch oven (still frozen if I haven't been organized enough to thaw them out in the fridge first).  Then I turn the oven on to 225 or 250 and let it go for a couple of hours or so.  About an hour and a half before I am ready to serve it,  I turn the oven up to 350 and stick in some potatoes.  I just scrub them, rub them with a bit of butter and stick them in.  Then everything can come out at once.   Easy peasy! This served four adults and two kids and there were still leftovers!

The next day we still had company and so I made fried ham sandwiches for lunch.  This was very easy too.  You slice the ham into 1/4 slices or so and put them into a dry frying pan.  You don't need any additional fat - there is enough on the ham.  Cook at medium heat until warmed through and beginning to brown.  While you are waiting for them to cook, you can slice the bread and toast it (if desired) spread bread with mayo and add some cheese slices - we like muenster or cheddar.  Put the ham slices on top of the cheese, top with some lettuce and you have got a wonderful simple sandwich.

We also fried up some potatoes in another pan.  This was simple too.  I just added some ham fat to the pan, then scooped the leftover baked potatoes out of their skins (and I am sure that you know by now that I made potato skins out of them!) and tossed them in too.  I cooked them until warmed through and starting to get crispy too, on medium-high heat.  This served eight adults and four children for lunch.  And we still had the bone and a little bit of meat left.  So what did I make?  All together now:  SOUP!

I made the U.S. Senate Bean Soup again, with only a couple of modifications.  I just used the ham bone (with attached meat) and trimmings instead of the hock/shank.  I still ended up with about a cup and a half of meat after picking everything apart after simmering it for a couple of hours.  We soon had more company, and this soup served four adults, plus the two kids, and then just the four us for two more meals.  I usually serve it with bread.  Enjoy!

White Bean and Lamb Soup

I found this recipe for White Bean and Lamb Soup that I have been meaning to try.  I have made a barley and lamb soup before that I liked, but I just wanted something a little different this time.   With my leg of lamb leftovers, this is exactly what I did.  (Remember that post?  I have had a super busy spring and this is the first time I have gotten a chance to post in over a month!) It was great and I think that it will probably be my top choice for lamb leftovers from now on.

I did, of course, make several changes to the recipe, mainly eliminating things because I didn't have them.  I first used the bone (with any meat that didn't come right off) for a stock.  I simmered it for a few hours.  You could do this in a crock pot and just leave it overnight, then take out the bone and throw in the rest of the ingredients in the morning - leave it to simmer all day and ta-da!

So - instead of chicken broth - I just used the lamb stock.  And I used the leftover meat from the leg of lamb rather than ground lamb.  I also replaced the vegetable that they suggest with the leftover vegetables that I had cooked with the leg.  I didn't have any spinach, feta cheese or tomatoes, so I skipped those, but I did add some celery and some more carrots.  All in all - yummy!  Soups are so forgiving.  I improvise with them all of the time.  If you don't like an ingredient - replace it with one you do like.  Just try and replace veggies with veggies etc. at first until you get the hang of substitutions and additions.  Happy cooking!

Leftover Stuffing and Friends

Apple Pork Chops with Stuffing is a recipe that I have been meaning to try for a while.  I have lots of leftover stuffing from my Christmas turkey, and I looked at a lot of recipes for using up stuffing.  We like it just plain, but that gets old after a little while.

I love pork chops and I am always able to get a couple more meals out of them, so here we go!

First night - Apple Pork Chops with Stuffing.  These were fantastic!  I was a little skeptical about the apple pie filling - I used some that my mother in law had canned last fall- but it was really good.  Also, instead of the stuffing from a box (I avoid boxes if at all possible), I of course used leftover stuffing from the freezer.  If I can get my in-laws to agree, I will post the super-secret stuffing recipe sometime.  Please guys?  Anyway - it turned out wonderfully. 

Second night:  Pork Fried Rice.  This is my go-to recipe for leftover pork.  It is a family favorite.  I usually omit the scallions and use a chopped medium onion and a couple of chopped carrots instead.  I saute the carrots, onions and pork until the vegetables are soft (you probably don't need to add any oil for this - the pork fat just from the pork will be enough), then I remove them and cook the rice and eggs according to the directions.  Remember to heat the oil BEFORE adding your rice.  Otherwise the rice soaks up the oil and tastes greasy. 

The third night:  Soup.  What else?  It seems to be the inevitable end of most of my meals.  For this one I took all of the leftover bones from the pork chops, placed them in a stockpot and barely covered them with water.  I brought the whole thing to a boil and then reduced the heat to a simmer for a few hours.  This could be done in your crockpot too - just put them in the morning and let them simmer away all day.  I then strained the stock into a bowl, put it back into the stock pot and added all of the leftover stuffing and sauce from night #1.  I then picked all of the meat off of the bones and added it back to the stockpot too.  This was a pretty good soup, but it was a little sweet for me - probably because of the apple pie filling.  I think that next time I will add some extra celery and maybe some bread to damp the sweetness.  Or maybe I will just cook the pork chops over regular sliced apples.  Hmmm.  We'll see.  Sorry I forgot to take a picture!  Maybe next time.  :o)

Happy cooking!

Mmmm. Soup.

This is the first time I have made this particular soup and it is wicked good.  Seriously.  I got 'yums' from my picky eaters (and don't tell them this, but it has lots of veggies in it).  It is called 'U.S. Senate Bean Soup' and I got it from "Joy of Cooking".  It said something about how it has been on the menu at the Senate since dinosaurs roamed the earth.  There is a reason for that.  Gooooooood.  It called for a small ham hock, but there was nothing small about our pig and I have shanks which include the hock.  Another good reason to have an inventory - I was convinced that I had a hock in the freezer and without an inventory I would have been out in the freezing garage cursing and searching through the freezer.

So, I used the pork shank that I had, and after boiling it for a couple of hours I picked off the meat and only added a cup and a half of shredded meat back again.  This left me plenty of meat to work with for future recipes, one of the bones went to my dog with the rest in the freezer for to distract him when we really don't want him around.  Yay!  I also saved the fat off the shank.  I will use it instead of butter (cheaper too!) when I need to saute something and want the ham flavor - potatoes for example.  Keep tuned!

Here is the recipe for the U.S. Senate Bean Soup (slightly adapted from "Joy of Cooking"):

Bring the following to a boil and then reduce to a simmer.  Simmer together for a couple of hours or until meat is very tender and falling off the bone:

7 cups water (I needed 14 cups of water to cover my pork shank -so when the meat and bones were ready to come out I just took out 7 cups of water and then froze it to use when I want to make this soup again - without the hock/shank)

1 small ham hock 

1 1/4 cup white beans (I used navy beans - and they were too pretty not to take a picture of)

Remove ham hock and pick off the meat.  Add back to the pot. Add:

1 large baking potato, peeled and finely diced (I actually used the inside of a baked potato leftover from last night - reserving the skins for potato skins of course!) 

1 large onion (or 2 small ones!), diced

3 medium stalks of celery with leaves, chopped

2 (or more!) cloves of garlic, minced (this means cut up really fine)

1 1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp ground pepper

Whenever I have more than one thing that needs to be chopped/minced I use my food chopper (as seen in the picture) or my food processor.  It makes it worth washing if I am going to chop a few things with it and it makes the food prep go so much faster.  I have come to the conclusion that I am never going to be one of those people who can slice and dice and make it look effortless - plus they always seem to be able to do it evenly! I have a relation who can and I am always jealous when I see him smoothly cutting up veggies in the kitchen.  He is pretty handy with teeth too - he just opened up his own dentistry practice in Madison.  I, however, have grown to be content with my food chopper and processor along with my mediocre slicing abilities.   

Cook until potato is soft (about 20-30 minutes), then mash with a potato masher to make soup slightly creamy.   Stir in 2 TBL chopped fresh parsley.  I didn't do this, b/c I didn't have any fresh parsley.  Serve with bread.  Yummy!

This would be an easy one to do in the crock pot too.  I would put the beans and hock/shank in the crock pot all day on low, and then add the other ingredients 20-30 minutes before I wanted to eat.  Happy cooking!
 

Turkey Soup

So, I was faced with a dilemma this week. I had to find something that I could bring for supper for some friends. They live about 45 minutes away and have two small children, one of whom just had heart surgery (at 2!). Anyway, I needed something that would be quick, easy and kids would eat. Of course I called my MIL (mother in law). She is an awesome cook and always has great ideas. She suggested using up the last of our Christmas turkey for soup. Fantastic! I adapted a recipe of hers to the situation and made it the day before - fed 4 adults and two kids and then brought the remainder, fed 4 adults, two kids and still had a lot of leftovers. I forgot to take a picture until after we all ate, but you can still get the idea. (By the way - it was a hit!)



Turkey Soup

1 Turkey carcass (I always pick off pretty much all the meat that I see to use for other things, and still usually have plenty of meat in my soup - this time I added some extra meat because I wanted it plenty meaty)

Place in a stockpot and just cover with water. Add some vegetables - a carrot, a celery stick, an onion. Or, you can save vegetable peelings and use those to flavor your stock. That is what I do. When you peel vegetables for other things, stick them in a bag in the freezer for future use.  I have one bag for onions, one for carrots and one for celery.  Then, whenever I make a stock I just bring out the bags and dump them in. Bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. I usually cook at a simmer for about 4 hours or so. Then strain out the stock, let the carcass cool for a little while then pick the meat off. You may be surprised how much you get off! I always am.

Add the meat back to the stock. Add peeled carrots cut into about 1/2 to 1 inch pieces. Add sliced onions. I usually cut my onions into quarters and then slice them. Add cut up celery, cover and cook at a simmer for about an hour. Then add amish type noodles (you can buy these in the noodle section of your grocery store) or make homemade - recipe following. After noodles are cooked add dumplings.


Dumplings

1 egg
1/2 tsp salt
1/3 cup milk
flour

Mix beaten egg and milk together. Gradually add flour until the consistency of pancake batter, about 1 1/2 cups. Dip the spoon into the liquid before dropping dumplings to prevent dough from sticking Drop teaspoon into boiling broth to form small dumplings. Cook for about 5 minutes.


German Egg Noodles

1 beaten egg
1/2 tsp salt
2 TBL milk
1 cup flour (approx)

Combine egg, salt, and milk. Add enough flour to make stiff dough. Roll very thin on floured surface. Let stand 20 minutes. Roll up the dough and cut into 1/8 inch thick strips. Spread on paper to dry. Drop into boiling soup and cook 10 minutes.

This soup was really good. You can add some seasoning if you want. My MIL uses "Orrington farms chicken flavored ( as directed with water)". I am not really a bullion person, but hers is fantastic too. Sometimes, I taste the soup and then smell some of my spices. If they smell good, I might add some. Trust your senses. You can always take a cup of soup and just flavor that to try it out if you don't want to risk your whole pot of soup. Have fun!

PS - I often freeze my leftover soups and then pull them out for a quick meal when I am super busy.