Whatcha Cooking today?

[bower]

Cooking again tonight. Bulk pack of inside round steaks cut up for stew. I decided that I wanted to go with asian flavors, since I had a beautiful big piece of fresh ginger and a lot of garlic wanting to be used - the big pile of smaller cloves left after planting.
I don't have 5 spice or star anise, so I thought about it and dug through the spices on hand. Cloves, green cardamoms, fennel seed, cumin seed, and I decided on garam masala instead of cinnamon, and cayenne for the heat.
Regretting that I don't have any bok choy or napa or other greens, but there it is. Used up the very last of my garlic scapes from the fridge! It's really true they last months, but it was time for them to go. Carrots are local chantenays, and frozen red shepherd peppers. I added a big onion too.
Result is nice and spicy, maybe not quite as tangy as I like, I may add more sauce (with rice wine vinegar) to the leftovers.
I have a nice tasty soy sauce I used for the sauce/thickener, but it's very light colored. The mushroom soy I used to buy is gone forever, and I haven't found a dark soy sauce that I like as yet. Nearly bought one the other day, but read the ingredients and guess what... caramel color was top of the list! It's really not soy sauce unless soybeans are high on the list of ingredients ie being more of it than less. I am not interested in caramel color as a food, so I'll do without unless I find a good one.

asian-flavors-002.JPG

all-ready-014.JPG

and-served-024.JPG

[worth1]

The completion of the smoked sweet Italian sausage and the shrimp from last weekend.
I used the water I cooked the shrimp and sausage in for the fluid for the rice.
Poblanos included as well.
Stick to your ribs.

IMG_20231109_180635605_HDR.jpg

[karstopography]

FullSizeRender.jpeg

Toasted some pecans in the air fryer. Tossed them with a little sugar, salt, peanut oil and ground cinnamon. Cinnamon, I would omit next time although it wasn’t bad.

Definitely tasty.

[pepperhead212]

Today is the first day of Dawali - the Indian festival of lights. I made this dal, to take to some friends Sunday (besides eat a bowl today!), and an even larger bowl I'll be making with that butternut recipe I used a while back, except with nothing hot - I'll use some sweet paprika, instead of the chili. I made this using some bok choy from the garden, the greens separated from the stalks, and all of the cauliflower plants I had pulled yesterday in the garden - no heads anywhere! Here's the recipe I based it on, using my own greens, instead of spinach, and I simply mixed some cooked brown basmati with it, towards the end.
https://www.kannammacooks.com/palak-pap ... inach-dal/

I also used moong dal, that was split, but not hulled - something I use a lot with these and urad dal, to keep the hulls. I cooked the rice in the IP, then removed it to a bowl, and used the IP to cook the 3/4 c of dal, in about 2½ c water - fairly thin, to add that rice, later. Meanwhile, I got all of the ingredients, mise en place, as this goes fairly fast.

On the stovetop, in a tb of ghee, over medium low heat, the mustard and cumin seeds are cooked until crackling, then the asafoetida and curry leaves are cooked briefly, then onion is added, to lower the temp, along with about 2 tsp garlic/ginger paste, and cooked about 5 min, or until golden, then added a cup of tomato purée. Cooked over medium heat a couple of minutes, then added a couple tsp of sambar masala, and a half tb of coriander/cumin powder, cooked another 2 minutes, then added the greens, and stirred a minute, then covered, and cooked on medium low, about 5 minutes (spinach just needs wilting). This is reduced considerably, then I scraped it into the IP, with the cooked dal, then stirred in about 3 c of the cooked rice. I let that heat up, a couple of minutes, then turned off, and stirred in the bok choy stems, and let it sit for 3 minutes, while chopping up the cilantro.
Seasonings for the dal and greens dish, using the last of my sambar masala - on my list now! by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Brown basmati rice, cooked before the dal. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

About 4 c of greens, a cup of tomato purée, by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Some mustard seeds cumin seeds, and a few Maui Purple peppers, cooking in some ghee. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Some asafoetida and curry leaves, added to the ghee. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Onions, and some of that garlic ginger paste, added to slow down the cooking. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The tomatoes, and the sambar masala and coriander/cumin powder, cooking several minutes. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Greens added to tomatoes, before mixing well, then covering, to cook 5 minutes. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Greens finished cooking with the tomatoes, before adding to the cooked dal, and mixing with about 3 c rice. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Cooked greens, added to the cooked dal, with some rice, to heat through a few minutes. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

The bok choy stems, added to cook with the residual heat the last 3 minutes. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Finished dish, with a little cilantro on top (more stirred into the pot). by pepperhead212, on Flickr

[PlainJane]

Love the step-by-step tutorials you post @pepperhead212!

[pepperhead212]

Thanks @PlainJane. This one isn't a step-by-step guide, but it's similar to a previous dish I made, not long ago.

I made that second dish today, to take to my friend's house tomorrow - like that dal a while ago, with butternut squash, except this one with moth dal, because they are her favorite legumes, and I added some chicken, about 2 c of cooked chicken (no vegetarian friends visiting them, otherwise I would have left this out). I had a small bowl, to make sure there was no heat, and there is no heat - I used sweet paprika, in place of the Kashmiri chili powder, which is usually mild enough for most people, but not her! And the baby can even try it now.

[JRinPA]

Trying to cook quesadillas with fresh pheasant but too much distraction...so I had a small bowl of pear syrup that got left out overnight from deer scrapple last night. Couple of fruit flies or something in it and I don't want to put it back in the fridge now. And I'm looking at these jalapenos that are slowly dying. I made over 160 poppers one night this past week, and helped make over 200 before that. So lots of jalapenos this year and I'm almost glad for them to be gone...except I just can't throw good food away. I take a nice green one cut the top off and deseed like for a popper, but just dip it in pear syrup and CRUNCH. Oh boy, that is good, it was a hot green one yet the pear syrup totally tamed it and gave it great flavor. BANG BANG two more down in two more minutes. But now, writing this, I'm starting to sweat...and still haven't started the quesadillas.

I wonder how much pear syrup would tame habs...

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

Metro Market Reduced section (which The Gotch can't walk past!) yielded these Boneless NY Strip Steaks...Half Off!:

thumbnail_IMG_2399.jpg

Grilled with a little char:

thumbnail_IMG_2400.jpg

The Gotch

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

Rhetorical Question Of The Day: Anyone have extra Kale...?

The lovely and long suffering Mr.s Gotch's Kale Krisp, laden with fresh Garlic:

thumbnail_IMG_2402.jpg

And Cheesed Up:

thumbnail_IMG_2404.jpg

The Gotch

[worth1]

I've got some scrap beans cooking on the stove.
A combination of Romano and mayocoba beans I had looking for something to do.
Not enough of each to make enough for anything.
But enough together.
Using lots of water because I'm adding mini penne pasta to it later.
The water has a large amount of chicken bullion powder in it.

[karstopography]

Redfish on the half shell, sautéed filet green beans, arugula dressed with a lemon and dijon mustard vinaigrette.

[worth1]

Since minestrone is more or less another peasant food and the rules are use what you have to fill a hungry family, I used what I had on hand.
The beans.
Knorr chicken bullion powder.
Knorr tomato chicken bullion powder.
A couple of dried up peppers.
Fresh garlic.
Chopped onion.
Swiss Chard from the garden.
A Yukon Gold potato.
Mexican oregano.
Teaspoon of bacon drippings.
Mini penne pasta.
That's all I had so that's all the stuff that went in.
I also made a small batch of handmade biscuits from scratch.

IMG_20231112_141908627_HDR.jpg

IMG_20231112_141930003_HDR.jpg

[Sue_CT]

Franks and beans for me tonight. I was too tired to cook.

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

Franks and beans for me tonight. I was too tired to cook.

The only (IMO) thing wrong with that there?

No picture...

The Gotch

[Sue_CT]

I didn't think franks and beans required a picture. Plus, I was freaking HUNGRY.

[karstopography]

FullSizeRender.jpeg

Baked redfish, arugula salad, and filet beans.

[Cornelius_Gotchberg]

Rhetorical Question Of The Day: Anyone have extra Kale...?

The lovely and long suffering Mr.s Gotch's Kale Krisp, laden with fresh minced Garlic:

thumbnail_IMG_2402.jpg

And Cheesed Up:
[/quote]

thumbnail_IMG_2404.jpg

The Gotch

[MissS]

@Cornelius_Gotchberg and it's on the perfect sized cooling rack too.

[rxkeith]

tonight it was a couple chuck eye steaks in the cast iron skillet
accompanied by some garden potatoes, and scarchuks supreme, and thelma sanders sweet potato squash
also from the garden.
we are pleasantly full.


keith

[worth1]

Three days in a row except for a salami sandwich for lunch I've had no meat.
Yesterday I had the beans with cheese on top of tostadas.
Tonight I'll finish them off with basmati rice.
The rice is being cooked with a little Knorr chicken bullion powder for salt and flavor.
Nothing to write home about but filling and healthy.