I love Candy

I know I owe a post on canning & smoking but I'm tired from chasing after kids and such so I'll move on to a shorter and more fun topic... CANDY!!!  My favorite homemade candies include caramel why?  The flavor complexity is amazing and it's easy with no temperature measurements to remember and I love melting things.  If you watch cooking shows they will melt sugar with a bit of water in a pan and have you brush down the sides with water to prevent crystallization  (too much work).

If you can mess with the mix a bit you can prevent re-crystallization by adding a different type of sugar and by damaging the bond between the sucrose and fructose that make up table sugar.  If you take your sugar and add some corn syrup and a couple of pinches of cream of tartar you won't get any unwanted sugar crystals forming as you have prevented (by adding sugar molecules of different types) the ability of the sugar molecules of snapping into place.

So what is caramel?  Its really abused sugar.  We abuse it through heat and this breaks down the sugar into dozens of different compounds which take a one act flavor uptown to Broadway and sweets heaven.

WARNING:  There is not much in the kitchen that is more dangerous to someone half paying attention to what they are doing than melted sugar.  It will stick to skin and burn you horribly so be safe, careful slow and deliberate.  This is NOT a family activity the only things kids should do with this stuff is eat the end product. Also have a bowl of ice water handy.  If ANY molten sugar at all contacts your skin IMMEDIATELY plunge that part of your body in the ice water (so not joking here).

Daddy's nut brittle

2 cups of sugar
1lb of nuts plus some spices  The combos I enjoy are:
peanuts and cinnimon
cashews and cinnimon
and macadamia and nutmeg
1 tsp of vanilla (your homemade version previously posted of course)
2 cups of sugar
1/4 cup of corn syrup
2 pinches of cream of tartar
1/2 cup of water
Optional 1 tbsp baking soda.

Toss the nuts, vanilla and spices together and set aside.
Take your cast iron pan and put on medium high heat and place your sauce pan on top of the cast iron pan (this will give you an even heat and minimize hot spots giving you a better caramel.
Dump in the pan the sugar, corn syrup, cram of tartar and water and stir (should have a wet sand consistency).  This mix will eventually melt and begin to boil.  As the water evaporates you will see the bubbles slow then it will trun barely yellow then to a light amber, dark amber almost brown then black.  If you see black then you have gone too far.  A color between light and dark amber is a good place to be.  How long does it take for the mix to turn back?  It happens the instant you don't pay attention so be sure that you have nothing going on during this operation.

Once you have reached the right color and smell dump in the nuts and optional baking powder and stir (it will bubble a lot so be careful).  Once the bubbling has subsided pour onto a prepared surface (parchment paper, well greased pan or silicone pan/mat)  when cooled break into pieces and enjoy.

Adding in the baking soda will make the brittle opaque as well as easier to bite so it can be a good thing.  If you add enough nuts though you will not need the powder to make it biteable.  Final tip?  Use salted nuts.  A little salt makes sweets soo much better.  Also create your own combination of flavors, like honey in with the sugar mix, pistachios and anise seeds.  Whatever flavor combination you think might work, try and have fun, but please be safe.

Preservation or How not to spoil your food.

Cold is food's best friend.  It slows (refrigerated) or stops (frozen) the biological actions that will destroy the food you have worked so hard to hunt and gather (enzymes that naturally break down the food and microbial and fungal invasions).  Constant cold is a recent invention though and there are other ways to preserve your food (and add flavor) that our ancestors used that are all but lost in the modern kitchen.  The goal is to make the food inhospitable to microorganisms that we share our world with that will destroy what you prize.

What do these wee little buggers need to thrive?  Oxygen, moisture and an environment conducive to growth.  We can destroy this growth friendly environment in many ways.

Dehydration: fruits and meats.  Using low heat and a lot of air we can rapidly remove most of the moisture from these products making it harder for bacteria & molds to thrive.  We can also pre-season to add huge amounts of flavor.  Jerky and dried fruits and veggies are in this category.  You can buy a dehydrator or use your oven but beware of methods that use heat as they congeal the protiens and actually lock water in the subject food.  So forced air is the best.  The cheapest way to accomplish this is to use paper furnace filters (NEVER use the fiberglass) and a big box fan.  The box fan will run you about 20-30$ and the filters are dirt cheap at any hardware or grocery store.  You can stack them 5-6 high on the box fan and the corrugations are begging to hold some food.  The fan will force air over all the food in a standard manner and in 24-48 hours all of it will be bone dry.  If you do want to dry meat you must also cure it (we'll talk about that later).  Store in an airtight container and enjoy until it is done.

Pickling: Adding salt and acid to the point that microbes just cannot live there.  Ever hear of ceviche? It is soaking proteins in a marinade that is acidic and congeals the proteins and 'cooks' the food (it's NOT cooked but the proteins are mangled in the same manner).  In addition the acid will also PICKLE the meat (don't be afraid it's yummy).  Fruits and veggies of any type can also be treated in a similar manner.  Since your acid is in liquid form (primarily citrus juice and vinegars) and you are adding salt you can also piggyback any other flavor you want from sugar to to heat to anything in your spice rack.  Unless you want to get into canning (another topic for later) you can store these cold (keep refrigerated) pickles in an airtight container in your fridge for weeks longer than they could survive in their pre-pickled state.

Curing: Adding salt and (maybe) removing moisture:  Gravlocks, salmon and jerky are prime examples of this method.  A dry cure is sugar and/or salt and herbs and spices while a wet cure is a salt/sugary mixture with other flavors that needs to be combined with a dehydration method or smoking (more on this later *again*).  A basic cure is one I like to use for salmon.  One part sugar and one part salt mixed well and piled high over and under a piece of fish and left to cure for 24-48 hours in the refrigerator.  This process will pull moisture from the fish as well as add enough salt to prevent bacteria and mold growth for quite some time.  Wet cures need to combined with other methods such as canning or smoking (next post) to drive out moisture and/or add other preservatives.

I've used all of these methods through the years to provide yummies for the family and I will share with you one of my favorites.... Beef Jerky.

Ingredients
London Broil (usually a flank steak or flat roast from the round (upper half leg of the cow) try for top round if your LB is from the round.
Worcestershire sauce a cup or more and an equal amount of Soy sauce (regular not Lite as we need the salt here).

One gallon size ziplock bag.

Cut the beef against the grain into strips that are 1/4 inch wide put all the slices in the bag.
add 1 cup of Worcestershire sauce and 1 cup of soy sauce.  If the meat is not covered at this point add more of both in 1/4 cup amounts until it is covered.
Add additional flavors such as chopped herbs, hot peppers & dry seasonings of your desire to the bag squeeze out as much air as possible and seal the bag (you can use any container but with a ziplock it is easier to ensure that all the meat is surrounded by the cure without having to make an excess of cure $$ saver).  You want to put this in the refrigerator in a safe place (in a container of some sort in case of leakage) for 24-48 hours.  After your curing remove the beef from the bag and pat dry and then air dry until there is no surface moisture.  Lay the dry to the touch meat on the furnace filters in a single layer stacking up to 4- 5 filters deep covering with a final filter.  Set filters on a large box fan and secure with twine or bungee cords.  Turn the fan on (you can do this on your deck/patio if you don't want your house to smell like beef which I just don't mind).  After 24 hours take a representative piece and check for doneness it should be bendy but not floppy and when cut should have no discernible moisture in the center if not done check in another 8-24 hours.  Packed in an airtight container you can enjoy this treat for months if you don't devour it sooner.

Vanilla for All

It's an ugly thing, a Vanilla pod, but it smells and tastes wonderful.  There are two main types of vanilla Tahitian and Bourbon (the island, not drink).  They say that Tahitian is better for using in cooking and Bourbon is better for extracts.  I cannot really tell the difference myself but there is the info that I have gleaned.  Care of a vanilla bean/pod is simple.  Store in an airtight container in a dark place.  If storage is to be of a long duration freeze in an airtight container in a dark place.

You might not know but I'm value conscious (aka cheap) so it irritates me to see one vanilla bean in a glass jar on sale for more than $5 in the store.  If you look you can find a dozen beans shrink wrapped for sale for that amount on the internet.  Pure vanilla extract also irritates me because of it's cost, but we can fix that later.

If you do buy Vanilla extract in the store NEVER buy anything except for pure vanilla extract. If you do get something that says different it is adulterated with vanillan pulled from pine wood and who knows where else.  Is it vanillin? Yes, but it's not nearly as good in taste & aroma, and who knows what traces of chemicals are in there.

Pure Vanilla extract contains alcohol and what it pulled from vanilla beans.  Since we've found a source for cheap beans (I usually search eBay myself) vanilla extract is just a step away.  We need alcohol!!!  Cheap vodka is what you want, brand does not matter unless you think it does (I'm not going to argue the merits of what the definition is of a premium  colorless odorless liquid).

Take about a pint of vodka and 5-12 vanilla beans and a mason jar.  Split the beans in half and scrape out the 'seeds' inside the pod (they are not seeds but what else do you call what lives in a pod?).  Put the scrapings in the mason jar, then cut up the remaining pod and drop in mason jar.  Fill the jar with the vodka and seal tight (be very sure that the mason jar is clean and you are using a new lid otherwise flavors will mingle and that is bad).  In 4-6 weeks you will have GREAT vanilla extract for about 10$ (if you bought that much retail it would be about 50-200 depending on where you shop and what you buy).  We're not quite done with the vanilla yet though.  Get a funnel and a coffee filter.  Put the filter in the funnel and the funnel into a container that you can seal airtight and is suitable for long term storage of liquids.  Slowly pour your extract into the funnel and you will filter out the pod bits and all of the specks that you scraped out of the pods earlier.  Now we are done with the Vanilla extract (but not the vanilla).

What else can we do with these used vanilla bean parts?  So glad you asked.  If you let them airdry  for a day you can add them to a bag of sugar (mix well) and they will perfume the entire bag into a great vanilla sugar suitable for whatever you want (vanilla cinnamon sugar toast is awesome).  My choice though is to take that old mason jar and add 1/2-1 cup of sugar all the vanilla bits (no need to let them dry) and fill it up with cheap bourbon or rum.  In another 4-6 weeks you will have an AMAZING sipping liqueur that you just cannot buy for the added cost of a cheap bottle of booze.

Link to vanilla beans on eBay:

Sausage...

OK sausage is flavored chopped meat products.  As such this covers a large swath of products from burgers to mealoaf (not the singer) on to meat balls to cased sausage and back again.  One of my big problems is there's not enough variety in the stores (italian and brats on most days) and who in the heck knows what goes in them?

Let us start with meat.  You know that ground beef has beef in it but you don't know the cut same with pork you can grind up a lot of pieces there.  This is why I have started to grind my own meat (no jokes here please this is a family friendly blog).  I like fatty cuts (most flavor) but trimmed lean.  This way I get the max flavor but with a heathier amount of fat.  Ironically the best steak meat (the loin and tenderloins) make the worst burgers because of lack of fat.  Ideally you want a good chuck (boston butt for pork) roast,  They have the most flavor with also the least cost (and if you catch a sale it's even cheaper than the bargain ground meat.  To grind it to your taste preferences you need to experiment as you have fine grind, chili or coarse grind and double grinded.  I prefer the texture of a single fine grind as it really balances the texture and formability for me.

Seasoning is my downfall as when doing it by the seat of your pants it's tough to get it right... too little and you have a bland-burger too much and it's a nightmare.  The other danger is deyhdration especially with a lean mix.  Fat keeps the meat juicy so you need to add moisture.  For moisture you can add vegetables sauteed until they are soft, olive oil (or other fat) to replace what you removed or moist breadcrumbs.

Any meatgrinder will work well but I prefer motorized.  Since my wife was kind enough to gift me with a KitchenAid stand mixer, I got the grinder attachment (see my amazon store for the gear).  Meatballs are easy and basicallly mini meatloafs so if you have one you have both of them good to go.  As for seasoning since I don't recommend tasting raw meat so use your nose.  If you use aromatic spices you want a gentile aroma of the spice blend in the mix.  A subtle smell will be light flavoring and strong will be too much.  Salt the mix gently as you can add salt to cooked meat but you cannot take it out.

Italian Meatballs
1/2 cup of italian seasoned breadcrumbs mixed with milk to a wet sand consistency.  let it sit until all the milk is absorbed.
1 egg or 2 egg yolks.
1 tablespoon of Italian seasoning
1/2 tsp of Salt
2 lbs of ground pork or beef (if chicken or turkey add more milk & another egg yolk to compensate)

optional
 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
1/2 onion sauteed
cooked garlic or garlic powder to taste

combine in a bowl with your hands until very well mixed.  Form into balls of about 4 tablespoons and bake in a 350 f oven for about 30-35 minutes.  Sacrifice one meatball to ensure doneness.  Now you can enjoy them in whatever manner you choose.
Pepper to taste

Equipment I can't live without.

Knives.... very important as you cut a lot of stuff in cooking.  You really only need 3 types for most applications. 
1) chef's knife  6-10" blade European or santoku style.  I like the santoku's my self but whatever you like.  I have three that I use and it's the workhorse knife of the kitchen.
2) paring knife 3-5 inch blade whatever you like.  It's what's needed for small items, sectioning citrus and the like.  Second most used in the kitchen.
3) serrated edge knife 8-12 inches.  Essential for cutting bread (duh) and excellent at tomatos.  Least used but not replaceable.

Not a knife but poultry shears are also VERY useful and not just for cutting open plastic bags.

Keep knives sharp.  I have a draw type sharpener as I find that the easiest to use but use what you are comfortable with.  Always remember that a dull knife is more dangerous than a sharp one.

Get the best quality knife you can afford (Amazon has good sales at most times) and take care of them.  Never toss them in the sink, cut on glass or porcelain or abuse them as you will use them every day and they need to be used safely at all times.

Other types of knives you can use as you see fit.  I personally don't need a boning knife or any of the others that are in the 20 piece sets (i do have an awesome cleaver but it's rarely used).

As a separate item if you can get a sushi knife get one.  These puppies are VERY sharp and are beveled to cut on one side only.  They are also very long as they are designed to cut delicate items in one long draw rather than by using a sawing motion.  Not often used but very handy and it makes a great carving knife.

Recipe of the post:
   Roast Beef Tenderloin
 Use a roasting pan with a rack for a good crust all around the roast.
Pre-heat the oven to 350 f.
Coat the tenderloin with a liberal amount of salt and pepper
Insert a digital meat thermometer (from 15-50 $ online and ESSENTIAL for cooking meat).
Cook to an internal temperature of 140-145 degrees remove from the oven and let rest for at least
15 minutes (the roast will continue to cook to a medium-medium well)  If you cut the roast before it is done resting it will be a bit underdone (nothing wrong with that) but all the juices will run out and it will end up dry.  I like to let it cool and then put it in the fridge for a while and cut very thinly for a very thin sandwich cut.  It will be the tenderest most flavor-full roast beef sandwich ever.  Cut moderately thin for a hot meal.  I know tenderloin can be expensive but at cost-co or sam's club it can actually be a relatively cheap cut when you buy it whole and vacuum packed.

First Post -- Mu Shu (like) Pork

Pork Loin, roast or chops (thin) enough for your family meal.

Veggie Options
Bok Choi (I used this 4-5 stalks from a bunch)
Peppers about 1/2 cup cut in strips
Onions (Spring or regular) if a regular onion long thin slices, if spring thin rounds
julienned Carrots
Bean sprouts
Mushrooms (we used fresh shitake sliced into thin strips)
Napa cabbage sliced thin is good (and is a staple in the restaurant version)
About 1 tablespoon sesame oil (this is strong stuff so be careful)
salt, pepper, puwdered ginger & powdered garlic (use fresh if you have them but I was out)
Sesame seeds
Hoisin sauce
Tortillas or Pitas

First of all just about everything is optional except for the seasonings and something to season.
Cut the pork into about 1/4 inc square strips across the whole length of the chop we want long and skinny here.

I marinated the pork in 1/2 the sesame oil and salt and pepper to taste.  Massage it really well and be sure all the strips are seperated.  If they cling they will stick together when cooking.
Cook the pork until just done (cut one in half to see) in a medium heat skillet or faster in a hot wok (there is never anything but a hot wok).  Remove the meat to a covered dish and start cooking your veggies (add the cabbage last).  You can cook them all seperately or together just make sure they are cooked and have a little bit of crunch left.  Use a little bit of the sesame oil with each veggie and salt each one lightly until they taste good to you.  ALWAYS ALWAYS taste as you are cooking.  Lastly cook the cabbage, we really want the leaves here just wilted.  Much beyond that they are mush.  Quickly add everything back into the pan and combine.  Dust with sesame seeds if you wish at this point.

This is uber yummy as it is but on a warm tortilla lightly daubed with hoisin sauce it will make everyone emit yummy noises.

One pan, one cutting board (if you cut the pork last) one knife (same theory) and a few bowls.  It's good cold too.