Spicy Sofrito and Black Bean Soup

Thinking back on my childhood, I think I pinpoint my now sister-in-law's entry into our family as the moment where our culinary world expanded. I refer to both an exposure to new foods and flavors and to the culture around sharing food. Growing up, my mother and my sister-in-law's parents made almost every meal from scratch. My guess it was both family tradition and economically driven. It's much cheaper to feed your family home cooked meals than pre-made ones (well, it was. Now I'm not sure if that is still the case). During college my sister-in-law would get a craving for something my Mom would make and tell my brother that they needed to buy celery so that they could make "white people food." It was and still is funny because so many of our meals growing up really did start with a base of onions, celery, ground beef, and salt and pepper. My sister-in-law's family, being Puerto Rican, started most dishes with sofrito, adobo, oregano, cumin, and a smattering of other seasonings. Despite eating a lot of Puerto Rican food over the years and watching both my sister-in-law and her parents cook, I still haven't been able to capture the flavors properly in my own house.

When it came to dinner time, we always sat down as a family to eat, as I believe my sister-in-law's family did as well. In our home, someone would serve up food for each person, giving them the amount they wanted. If we wanted seconds, we served ourselves. In my sister-in-law's family, someone serves the food, but typically gives you more than you ask for. When your plate nears empty, someone offers you more. My sister-in-law told me that one of the first times she ate dinner at our home, she left hungry because while she wanted more food, she was never offered any more and she didn't feel comfortable serving herself more even while the rest of us grabbed seconds. Over the years, we have shared many meals and while our tendencies in how we gather and share food may not have changed much, we have become more accustomed to our differences, small as they may be.

As we all grow and explore the world around us, we have been exposed to more styles of cooking and have incorporated those into our lives. My brother and sister-in-law lived in Japan for a couple years and brought back a passion for the Japanese style of cooking. Growing up, we almost never ate fish because we lived in Wisconsin and nobody in my family went fishing. After they returned from Japan, the family started eating fish with more regularity and occasionally we will make miso soup, ginger chicken, or tonkatsu. I lived in China, where a friend and her mother taught myself and a couple other foreigners how to make baozi. For the last couple years, my family has made baozi for our Christmas Eve dinner. This time intensive meal goes quickly when everyone is chipping in to help roll the dough and form the buns. My other sister-in-law, wife of my younger brother, is a vegetarian which has introduced more non-meat options to our family gatherings. When you grow up with every meal being based on a meat and starch, learning to cook delicious vegetarian meals definitely has a learning curve.

As I drove to the grocery store tonight pondering what to cook for this week, I had a craving for Puerto Rican beans. But, me being me and me not really having mastered Puerto Rican food, I made up my own style of sofrito. Below is the recipe for the sofrito and the black bean soup.

Spicy Sofrito

2 medium tomatoes, cored and quartered
1 bell pepper, cored and quartered
1 head of garlic, peeled
8 small shallots, peeled
1 can chipotle peppers in adobo
2 cherry peppers, stems removed and halved
2 tbsp olive oil
1 bunch cilantro

Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth. Place in jars and either refrigerate or freeze.

Black Bean Soup

1 c spicy sofrito
1 1/2 tbsp tomato sauce
1 small jar pimentos with juice
2 tbsp slices green olives with juice
2-4 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp cumin
adobo to taste
3 28 oz cans of low sodium black beans
2 cans of water
2 tsp chicken better than bullion

Place spicy sofrito, tomato sauce, pimentos with juice, green olives with juice, oregano, cumin, and adobo (sprinkle back and forth across the bottom of the pan twice) in the bottom of a large stock pot. Turn heat to medium-high and cook until fragrant. Add the black beans, water, and chicken bullion. Turn heat to high and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-high and cook at a low boil for 15 minutes. Remove from heat and carefully use an immersion blender to blend smooth. Serve hot.

Mushroom Pizza

Sunset from my back window

My friend came over yesterday for an evening of cooking and knitting. The food was good (a Thai curry), but would have been better if I had remember correctly and told her to buy the fish sauce. I guess I didn't have any in the house after all... but the dish didn't suffer too much from the absence of the fish sauce, so all was well. The recipe called for shitake mushrooms, stems removed. Instead of letting those stems go to waste, we saved them and tonight I made a mushroom pizza. I heated my pan and then added my oil and let it heat up as well. That way, the shitake mushroom stems didn't absorb too much oil, but did give the oil a strong mushroom flavor. I added to that garlic and rosemary. Once the garlic was starting to brown, I removed the mushroom stems, garlic and rosemary. I then turned down the heat and once the oil had cooled a bit, I added about one cup of chopped portabella mushroom. This I cooked slowly, allowing the mushrooms to wilt and absorb the flavored oil. Once it had cooked a while, I added some flour and then some milk. I combined the sauce with sharp cheddar cheese to top the pizza. I was very pleased with the results. I hope you enjoy it too.

Mushroom Pizza

pizza crust (see Rockin' Homemade Pizza)
1/4 c olive oil
stems from 5 oz of fresh shitake mushrooms, trimmed and sliced lengthwise
3 large cloves of garlic, peeled and crushed
1/2 tsp dried rosemary
1 large portabella mushroom, chopped fine (yields approximately one cup)
1 tbsp flour
salt and pepper to taste
3 oz milk
1 c shredded sharp cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 500 degrees.
Heat a 2 quart sauce pan over medium high heat.
Once the pan is hot, add the olive oil.
Once oil is bubbling, add the shitake mushrooms and cook, stirring, until slightly browned.
Add garlic and rosemary and cook until the garlic just turns golden brown.
With a slotted spoon, remove the mushroom stems, garlic and rosemary.
Turn down heat to medium low and add the portabella mushrooms.
Allow the mushrooms to cook slowly for 5 to 10 minutes, until wilted and only a little oil is still visible in the pan.
Add the flour, salt and pepper and cook for one minute.
Slowly stir in the milk.
Once the mixture is smooth (except for the mushroom pieces), remove from heat.
Prepare your pizza crust and prebake for 4 to 5 minutes.
Remove the pizza crust from the oven and spread evenly with the mushroom sauce and cheese.
Bake another 8 to 10 minutes, or until bubbly and golden.
Remove from oven, slide from the pan onto a cutting board; cut and serve.


Someone got a haircut...

Rockin' Homemade Pizza

I have come to learn that you can learn good recipes from even the most unexpected sources. Recently I discovered that my younger brother has become quite a good cook. I don’t think he gets into quite as much experimentation as I do, but he cooks everyday. (I think it’s cool that both of my brothers have become the main cooks of their relationships, rather than falling into the gender roles that would put the “burden” of cooking on their significant others). He shared a recipe for Thai Chicken Pizza with the family, and I must say it’s pretty tasty. Our only disappointment in making it was our inability to find a decent crust.

Actually, a decent homemade pizza crust has been the holy grail of my family’s cooking adventures; it was always out of reach and sought for. As it turns out, my younger brother had found a great pizza crust recipe and I have it in my possession now. I will now add the disclaimer that my family likes thin, cracker-like crusts. That way, the toppings take the front seat in the flavor-mobile and the crust doesn’t sit in your stomach like a lump of clay.

With the new crust recipe in hand, I embarked on the adventure of making a great pizza. I winged the sauce recipe, knowing that too much of a good thing (oregano) can make for a bitter sauce, that I like sauce that is just a touch sweet and with a slight sting, and that onions and whole tomatoes were a must. We also decided to slightly cook the pepperoni in a skillet before placing on the pizza. This allowed the pepperoni to release some of its oil and increased the likelihood that it would crisp on the pizza, despite the short baking time. I venture to say that the resulting pizza was practically perfect in every way.

Rockin’ Homemade Pizza

1 pizza crust for a 9x13 inch jellyroll pan
pizza sauce (below)
½ c sliced black olives
1 ½ c shredded mozzarella cheese
enough pepperoni to cover pizza to taste

Sauce:
¼ c olive oil
½ medium onion, finely chopped
1 large clove of garlic, finely chopped
1 rounded teaspoon crushed red pepper
1 rounded tablespoon oregano
1 c portabella mushrooms, finely diced
16 oz canned whole tomatoes, with juice
¼ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar

Heat a large cast iron skillet over medium heat until hot.
Add olive oil.
When oil is hot, add onion and sauté until soft and slightly golden.
Add garlic, red pepper, and oregano and cook until fragrant.
Add portabella mushrooms and cook, stirring, until they have shrunk to half their original size.
Add tomatoes, salt, and sugar and cook, stirring, until reduced to a good sauce consistency.
*You don’t want the sauce to watery, or it will make your crust soggy.

Crust:
1 ¾ c flour
½ tsp salt
¾ c water
¼ tsp sugar
1 tbsp yeast

Mix the flour and salt in a bowl and set aside.
Heat the water in a microwaveable dish for 2 to 3 minutes, until hot but not boiling.
Add sugar to the water and stir until dissolved.
Add yeast to the water mixture, stir, and let sit for 8 minutes.
Pour ½ of the water mixture into the flour and stir.
Add remaining water mixture and stir until just combined (you can use your hands to finish the mixing).

To prepare the pepperoni:
Starting with a cold cast iron pan, add pepperoni in a single layer to the pan.
Turn burner to medium heat.
Once the pepperoni has bubbled up, remove from pan.
If you still have more pepperoni to prep, add another single layer and cook until bubbled up.
Repeat until all pepperoni has been precooked.
Drain pepperoni on paper towel until ready to use.

Pizza assembly:
Preheat the oven to 500 degrees.
Oil a 9x13 inch jellyroll pan and place pizza dough in the center.
Using your fingertips or a small rolling pin, gently press or roll the dough to fit the pan.
Pre-bake the crust for 4 to 5 minutes.
Remove crust from the oven and spread with pizza sauce.
Add olives, cheese, and top with pepperoni slices.
Place bake in the oven and bake for another 10 minutes.
Remove from oven and slide the pizza out of the pan onto a cutting board.
Cut into pieces and serve.

Pancakes with Banana Sauce

I forgot to get syrup at the store last weekend. So I made pancakes and used two ripe bananas to make a sauce for them. If you like banana bread, you'll like this.

Pancakes (enough for 2 to 3 people)

1 1/4 c buttermilk
1 egg
1 c flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp grated nutmeg

In a mixing bowl, whisk together the buttermilk and egg.
Add the remaining ingredients and beat until smooth.
Allow to sit while you make the banana sauce.
Once the banana sauce is started, heat a skillet over medium to medium-high heat.
Once the skillet is hot, lower heat to medium to medium-low.
Use a paper towel to spread some shortening on the skillet before the first pancakes go on.
Using 1/4 c measuring spoon, put three measures of pancake batter on the skillet.
Once pancakes are bubbly and starting to just dry along the edges, flip. Do not press down on the pancakes - that makes them flat.
Allow to cook on other side a few moments, remove and add more pancake batter to the skillet.
I keep the pancakes warm by putting them on a plate covered with aluminum foil.

Banana Sauce

2 ripe bananas that have started getting a lot of brown spots
1/4 c sugar
2 tbsp molasses
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp butter

Put bananas in a sauce pan and mash.
Add sugar and molasses and stir.
Cook over medium-high heat, bring to a boil.
Stir in the salt and butter.
Once butter is melted, turn off the heat and allow to cool a bit before serving.

Honey Mustard Sauce and Excuses

I'm afraid that both parts of this post will be boring. The more boring part: excuses:

For not posting often enough:
I'm preparing to move across the country and have been extremely busy.

For not having photos:
I'm lazy, plus see the note above.

For not having my homework ready to hand in:
I did it, I must have left it on the kitchen table.

The less boring part: my experiment with making a honey mustard sauce:
I suppose the easy thing to do would have been to find a recipe in a cookbook, but after shopping all day Saturday (I hate shopping, except for shoe shopping or when I have a specific item that I NEED to buy. The latter has a maximum time limit of 2 hours to ensure that I don't lose all brain function) and then moving my boxes out of the attic for a good part of Sunday, I didn't even think to look in a cookbook. I just took the pork tenderloin and butterflied it. I dry roasted some yellow mustard seed (about 1 tbsp) in a small cast iron pan, allowed it to cool, and crushed in plastic wrap with a meat mallet. I fried a large white onion in a pan, added the crushed mustard, then added the tenderloin to brown. I figured it was cooking too quickly, so I put two cups of chicken broth and a quarter cup of honey in the pan. It was at this point that I realized that I was near ruining pork tenderloin.

Luckily, mom was there to save the meal. She took the pork out and put it in a dry cast iron pan to brown (and get rid of that porky smell). Then she instructed me to start the sauce separately because the pork had left nasty little balls in the sauce (gross). This time I started with 1/3 cup of prepared Dijon mustard (the other stuff hadn't even smelled like anything), slowly added 2 cups of chicken broth and then whisked in 1/4 c honey. I think I added salt and pepper as well. When it had boiled a bit, mom deglazed the browning pan with a bit of water and added it to the sauce. Then I added a bit of cornstarch/water mixture until it was thick enough to glaze. We put the pork in the sauce and allowed it to sit, covered, but without heat until we were finished preparing the accompanying dishes (corn and mashed potatoes).

Perhaps it was my mood that made me not love this dish, but my dad seemed to really like it. I'll have to try again, perhaps with tenderloin that is grilled (tenderloin tastes best grilled) and using the sauce as an accompaniment rather than the sauce in which it cooks.

Roast Beef

Another of our family's comfort foods is Roast Beef. The last time we went to the butcher (http://www.brandonmeats.com/) it was still a bit cool outside, so I ordered two roasts. Then it became unseasonably warm (80 degrees, 80 degrees in March, that is wrong on so many levels), so I started trying to think of warm weather ways of preparing the arm roasts. But, it got cool again, so last night I made Roast Beef with mashed potatoes and cooked carrots. The cooking time for this one is long, and longer if you do it the way I did yesterday so that I could go to the gym (needed more time), but the results are a tender roast.

Roast Beef

1 beef roast (You can use any size or cut. The size will only affect the cooking time. I believe the one I used last night was around 3 lbs, and it was an arm roast.)
1 large onion, peeled and chopped
1 large bell pepper
1-46oz can of tomato juice
salt and pepper, to taste

Preheat the oven to 275 - 350 degrees (higher temperature will reduce cooking time).
Place the roast in a large ovenproof skillet (we use cast iron).
Salt and generously pepper each side of the roast.
Add the onion and bell pepper.
Pour the tomato juice over everything until the roast is covered.
Place, covered with lid or aluminum foil, in the oven and cook until a fork, inserted into the middle of the roast, comes away without resistance (Yesterday I cooked the roast at 275 degrees for 3 1/2 hours.)

A gravy can be made of the tomato juice after the roast is complete. Simply remove the roast from the skillet and set aside, covered. Place the skillet on a burner set at medium to medium high heat. In a shakable container, put flour (the amount of flour depends on the amount of liquid in the pan, you'll have to experiment as we never measure this part) and enough water to make it runny and shake. Slowly whisk the flour and water mixture into the tomato juice and heat to boiling, stirring constantly. Once it is thick, pour into a gravy boat and serve.