Tag Archives: cookbooks

Corned Beef and Cabbage

Posted on March 18, 2023 by AnnieRie

It’s been a while. I haven’t been inspired to write anything that doesn’t seem repetitive.

But, I’m back to trying to find new material.

Like food. We can always return to food, and cooking. Making something different, maybe. Or digging into the origins of favorites.

Today let’s talk about corned beef and cabbage. I made it for St. Patrick’s Day dinner. I don’t believe I have ever made the New England boiled dinner in my 48 or so years of cooking. I have made corned beef and cabbage in the crockpot but never the boiled version.

This one was definitely an improvisation when it came to the potato, and I liked this method. I thought I had red potatoes in the basket on the counter but nope, none there. I did have baking potatoes so they were made separately and served with the finished dish.

I got my corned beef at Boarman’s last week. They have all sizes and I picked up a smallish 2 1/2 pound one. I used the recipe from an old cookbook, The New Basics, by the authors of The Silver Palate.

Simple. Boil the corned beef for three hours in a pot with carrots, celery and a clove studded onion. Discard all those mushy vegetables and save the broth for step two. Cooking the cabbage in the broth with leek, carrots and potatoes but I didn’t have leeks. I used scallions and shallots. I did the potato in the oven since it was a russet potato for baking.

Added the caraway seeds, salt, pepper and parsley. Voila! An excellent meal, with leftover broth to make a cabbage soup today.

I also bought a freshly baked loaf of Irish Soda Bread at Martin’s the other day. A perfect side for the dinner, served warmed up.

The cookbook called for horseradish cream so I stopped on the way home from Westminster and found this gem at Bullock’s.

This stuff is wonderful. It will be used on roast beef sandwiches, and as a side when I make a London Broil from my meat share. It has a slight kick to it. By the way, Bullock’s meat market on 32 near 97 is one of the best around. I picked up a few goodies to use this week, like short ribs.

Our dessert for St. Patty’s Day? A few Irish potatoes. Cinnamon and coconut. Yum!

They were also at Martin’s. We used to get these often at my MIL’s in Shenandoah PA. They are not that common in our area.

Finished the day with a toast to my Irish relatives. A wee bit of Tullamore Dew. Sláinte!

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Decadent

Posted on February 10, 2021 by AnnieRie

So OK, it is just Wednesday. No holiday. No significant life event.

But we live a fairly reclusive life, with no restaurant visits, no day trips, no outdoor activities because of the weather. We have been doing a weekly “cooking as a couple” dinner, which was a New Year’s resolution.

Tonight we cracked open a new cookbook of mine, I Cook in Color. By Asha Gomez.

Clam chowder, made with fennel and leeks.

We are using small, local businesses in our sourcing of ingredients for our cooking. We are supporting the small grocers, liquor stores, farms and a friend who is a wine broker.

We love Italian wines. Todd Ruby Wines is a wine brokerage owned by an amateur radio friend. He brings in awesome wines like this Greco di Tufo. Procured for us by The Wine Bin in Ellicott City. Perfect with the rich clam chowder.

As for the soup ingredients, Some of them came from Boarman’s. Our local grocery store. Littleneck Clams. Clam juice. Canned clams. Leeks. Fennel. Yukon Gold potatoes. Diced pancetta, which was a substitute for the smoked clams in the recipe.

We made our own seafood stock yesterday from leftover lobster claw shells. Used my CSA veggies in the stock.

The finishing touch, flour mixed with half and half, used CSA flour from a mill in Amish country PA.

How did we make it? Chopped leek, fennel and potato. Sautéed in butter. Added three cups of seafood stock. A bottle of clam juice and a can of baby clams. Browned pancetta. A pound of littlenecks.

Finished with a thickener of 1/3 cup of flour and a pint of half and half.

We have enough left for another night’s dinner. We only used half the clams from the bag. They were Chesapeake Bay clams from Virginia, harvested Monday, bought on Tuesday and cooked today.

This expansion of our cooking hobby is what is keeping us sane. While enjoying the fruits of our labor. Wonder what we will tackle on Valentine’s Day?

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Gingerbread

Posted on December 4, 2020 by AnnieRie

Do you sometimes crave those simple desserts from your childhood? Like real gingerbread. Not the cookies, but the cakey moist flavorful version, made from scratch.

For me, a few minutes spent sifting through my old recipe cards yielded this oldy but goody.

From the McCalls Recipe Box, which was my husband’s. I had the Betty Crocker box. I was cleaning out some stuff in the bookcase back in the bonus room over our garage I was trying to decide whether it was time to let go of the recipe cards. But they were how I learned, and so did my husband, to cook.

I was looking for comfort food, and gingerbread certainly fits the bill. I made a few adjustments. I went a little heavy on the spices. I used Grandma’s molasses, which I believe is dark molasses. I used the last of the self rising flour from one of my curbside pickups, where it was a substitute when flour was scarce. That meant no baking soda. I used a 10 by 15 pan so my gingerbread wasn’t the same height as the recipe showed.

Still, it is a wonderful trip back to the days of homemade goodies baked by my mom.

I really enjoyed doing this. I will have to dig through the cards and find something else to evoke those memories. Baking from scratch. Nothing from a box even comes close.

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Simple Pleasures

Posted on August 22, 2012 by AnnieRie

Like simple lunch recipes. Three items, and seasoning. Not fresh, but things right out of the pantry.

Tuna, cannellini bean and onion salad

Served with a side of my tomatoes. Olives and feta to garnish. I found this recipe years ago in one of my Williams Sonoma cookbooks.

I love the description used as an introduction. If you want an excellent source for Tuscan recipes, this is the book for you.

Description of this recipe – credit to Williams Sonoma Savoring Tuscany

I made it with the canned tuna and the canned beans. Use organic beans if you can find them. Drain and rinse. Use a can of good tuna packed in olive oil. Dice a small sweet onion. I used Vidalia. Salt, pepper, olive oil to taste.

Tuscany on a plate.

hocofood@@@

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