karstopography wrote: ↑Thu Sep 22, 2022 9:28 am Buffalo Wings tonight. Ranch dressing, carrots, celery, and oven kohlrabi chips, again3CFD0542-9869-4C56-BE72-BF5A74F02719.jpeg. Made kohlrabi for the first time ever last night, wow, why I hadn’t had this before I’ll never know, but delicious these were.

Figured out I can put them closer together. This was the before photo, these shrink up quite a bit. Simply tossed with a bit of EVOO and sea salt and baked at 275° until browned a touch. The flavor is outstanding. I ordered kohlrabi seeds this morning, I will be growing kohlrabi this fall and winter.

I can search for some Superschmelz seeds here, if you'd like.

Kohlrabi chips sound interesting, likely intensifying the flavor. Raw, I like broccoli stems better, having much more flavor. I once thought about crossing broccoli with kohlrabi, but never got around to it.

Tormato wrote: ↑Thu Sep 22, 2022 10:05 am

karstopography wrote: ↑Thu Sep 22, 2022 9:28 am Buffalo Wings tonight. Ranch dressing, carrots, celery, and oven kohlrabi chips, again3CFD0542-9869-4C56-BE72-BF5A74F02719.jpeg. Made kohlrabi for the first time ever last night, wow, why I hadn’t had this before I’ll never know, but delicious these were.

Figured out I can put them closer together. This was the before photo, these shrink up quite a bit. Simply tossed with a bit of EVOO and sea salt and baked at 275° until browned a touch. The flavor is outstanding. I ordered kohlrabi seeds this morning, I will be growing kohlrabi this fall and winter.

I can search for some Superschmelz seeds here, if you'd like.

Kohlrabi chips sound interesting, likely intensifying the flavor. Raw, I like broccoli stems better, having much more flavor. I once thought about crossing broccoli with kohlrabi, but never got around to it.

I looked up that Superschmelz, wow, those are big! I ordered early vienna white and early vienna purple from Baker Creek, but saw that they carry the Superschmelz also. I think for now I’ll stick with the earlier, beginner’s type.

Kohlrabi did seem kind of bland when we tasted it raw, but the thinly sliced oven baked chips are bursting with flavor. We were shocked how good they were. My son at the college food bank brought home a few as kohlrabi apparently is unknown to most all of their patrons. One guy from Wales knew what they were and took home several, but the rest of the customers have ignored the vegetable. The pallet or several crates of kohlrabi the college food bank received were incorrectly marked “Jicama”. My son sent me a photo of the “jicama”. No, that’s kohlrabi. I had to figure out what we could do with it. Martha Stewart to the rescue.

Another large OP variety is Granlibakken. It grows in sort of a bowling pin shape, for me. I would describe its horrible texture as like one eating a neoprene diver's suit.

While I get brassica eating insects up here, the fairly openness of kohlrabi plants makes it easy to spot them.

Even the best of us totally screw up from time to time.
Here is an example and I'm not too proud to admit it.
The colander slipped out of my left hand.
The cussing was at a minimum.
No worries just start over.

worth1 wrote: ↑Thu Sep 22, 2022 6:30 pm Even the best of us totally screw up from time to time.
Here is an example and I'm not too proud to admit it.
The colander slipped out of my left hand.
The cussing was at a minimum.
No worries just start over.
20220922_181932.jpg

That should have been pasta no. 13 (unlucky?). It looks like no. 9, thin spaghetti.

I'm making my own version of steak au poivre tonight to continue my birthday celebration into the weekend.

Well, from a couple days ago, we decided to have some ravioli with Orange Banana sauce. I wanted to make a test batch of sauce, adjusting my methods from last year. Last year I left too much juice in. Took forever to reduce, and in my haste I cooked on too high of a heat. Ended up with too powerful a flavor, and over caramelized flavor (burnt could almost describe :/). Cut off the tops, split lengthwise and strip out gel and seeds. Cut up w/ kitchen scissors, and mash. Not that time consuming cause I do the latest batch once every day or so. Sauce took about 4-5 hours at a low simmer and was perfection, if I do say so, and I do. Heres a daily batch to cut up. And the finished product. A little water running out. I sometimes will stir in just a sprinkle of wondra the last few minutes and it will thicken enuff to not be runny. But we were hungry, so I didnt bother. I have about 20 one gal. bags (not full) of OB in the freezer to sauce and can this winter.

Tried my first ripe red Jimmy Nardello pepper with some tortilla chips and pine nut hummus. Some of them look pretty crazy , they taste crazy good.

@karstopography , thanks for that tip on making kohlrabi chips. I sure will try them this fall. The first plants are going into the ground tomorrow.

I have a recipe for a kohlrabi salad and will post it if anyone is interested.

To cook the steak au poivre I needed to make a stock first.
I didn't have beef broth so I used a quart of chicken and chicken bone broth instead.
Some vegetables and two whole onions carmalized in bacon fat.
Added a teaspoon of Knorr beef bullion too.
Plus a 15 ounce can of tomato puree.
Letting it reduce down to 50% and will strain off the stock from the vegetables after cooking for hours.

Green peppercorns in brine are nowhere to be found in Bastrop as far as I know.
They used to have them but not now.
Well to heck with it.
If you look on line people say you can't soak or cook a whole black peppercorn and make it soft.
That is total rubbish.
I've done it before and I'm doing it now.
Here's a small jar in salt water with a shot of white vinegar.
They'll be soft in a few hours if not less.
And they'll keep nicely.
They are needed for the sauce that goes on the steak au poivre.

I'm also making a tequila lime shrimp concoction.
But only need a small amount.
I haven't had my favorite mixed drink in about 4 years.
What could possibly go wrong.
By the way this is one of those hidden secrets of the tequila world.
It's good tequila not just cheap tequila.
The Mexican soda pop is a no brainer.

Just literally whipped up a compound butter made with.
Butter obviously.
Chipotle powder.
Lime juice freshly squeezed.
Japanese sake.
Crushed garlic.
Cilantro chopped.
Chopped habanero.

Chakillya lime shrimp.
Made with the compound butter.
Chopped.....
Habanero.
Green jalapeños.
Red jalapeños.
Cilantro.
Green onion tops.
Tequila.
Lime juice.
Cream cheese.
Black pepper.
Fettuccine pasta.
Tequila.
Etc etc.
Frigging awesome.

That sounds/looks delicious, @worth1!

Today I made one of my last tomato salads of the season. A lot of new growth basil to use, with some of that garlic, and some of that Greek kalamata olive paste, from lidl. I started by soaking some kala chana overnight with a little baking soda, rinsed, then pressure cooked 60 min. with a black cardamom, and a little asafoetida. After draining and rinsing the chickpeas, I put 1/2 c of rinsed freekeh in to pressure cook for 8 minutes in about 1 1/2 c water. I cooked a 12 oz box of pasta, to stir into this mix, then salted the mix a little more with fish sauce.
Tomatoes, garlic, basil, olive paste, kala chana, and freekeh, mixed with the olive oil and wine vinegar, ready for the pasta. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Finished pasta salad, with some fish sauce added as another salt and umami flavor. by pepperhead212, on Flickr

Looks awesome, Worth! Is that sausage too I see in there?

Lunch today was creamy mushroom soup from fresh funnel chanterelles topped with diced smoked moose meat.

Sue_CT wrote: ↑Sat Sep 24, 2022 6:46 pm Looks awesome, Worth! Is that sausage too I see in there?

No sausage just shrimp peppers compound butter and tequila.
I did have a wee bit of spaghetti left in a bowl in the refrigerator so I tossed it in too.
You probably saw some meatballs.
Once I did that I decided to add the fettuccine.
A total change in direction while cooking which I often do.

The steak for the steak au poivre I'm going to make today is a huge 1 3/8 thick bone in ribeye that weighs 24 ounces.
Lots of outside fat too.
It's labeled select but I've seen choice with less marbling.
No center fat eye like some have.
The black peppercorns are now soft and salty.
Perfect for adding to the cream sauce with brandy.
They had all manner of brandy in the store including some cognac for around $200.
Not gonna happen.

No way is this a select cut of steak.
Sounds expensive but I only paid $18.24 for it.
USDA prime would have been twice as much.
At Vince Young or other high-end restaurants in Austin one would go for close to $100 if you included everything.
Right now it's in the refrigerator sucking up some flavor with freshly ground black pepper from my pepper mill and kosher salt.