I have officially informed my partner that I am taking next week off from cooking. This, of course, does not include feeding my dog but for everything else?
I am off the culinary grid. On hiatus. Away. Gone. Vacationing. You get the idea.
But before that, I have a bunch of summer culinary tasks I need to complete.
First up was making yet another tomato pie or tart, depending on your point of view. I prefer tart over pie but being that I now live in the south, pie it is for most. It just meant defrosting the final bit of my homemade pie dough, par-baking the crust and then smearing the crust with herby cheese, piling tomatoes and more cheese on top and baking. One of my favorite summer dinners in fact. I then processed all the chicken broth I’d made last night in the slow cooker. Once I have two chicken carcasses and random thigh bones crammed in my freezer, I feel compelled to make more stock. Since I already have about a gallon in the freezer, I decided to simmer it down and make chicken broth gummies which simply means when I need some stock, I can defrost a couple of cubes quickly and dissolve them in hot water, using them the same as regular chicken stock. They simply take up less room in the freezer when made into gummies. I used most of the stock for this but also took about two and a half cups and blended it with some of the carrots, celery and onions I had flavored the stock with. That is my frozen base for emergency chicken soup come this winter. The rest of the purred vegetables I am using to make a savory round of bread.
Right now, I have marmalade is bubbling away on the stove. I had a bunch of frozen orange peels and a handful of mini oranges left behind by one of my granddaughters from their recent visit. Sitting on the counter they made me sad so I soaked everything in hot water, boiled it all up with a stray lemon and then blended it up well before sticking it back on the stove and adding a bunch of sugar to taste. I make it the way a grandmother of yore would; stirring and stirring and waiting until it thickens from the natural pectin all on its own. The result is a sweet and tart preserve that I share gladly. I will be sending my daughter a jar. Aside from toast, muffins and scones, marmalade makes a handy glaze for most meats and poultry. Just mix a few tablespoons with a bit of soy sauce and you have the perfect frugal glaze for your roast, baked chicken, pork and more.
As a aside, I always advise frugal friends to schedule making something as time intensive as marmalade for when they are doing a day of kitchen chores because it requires tending at the stove for an extended period of time. When you use boxed pectin for other preserves, however, it takes much less time so plan accordingly.
Speaking of my daughter, I was sending her a package of some fabric for my sewing granddaughter, and she asked me to include a jar of my red pepper jelly which I had served when she visited. There had been a huge sale at the local charity shop wherein for just $20 a customer could fill a large grocery bag full of clothes. I picked the biggest, gaudiest gowns I could find and sent them to my granddaughter who is in need of a variety of fabrics. One of the most environmentally damaging industries in the world is clothes manufacturing so we as a family have made a collective pact to reuse, recycle and repurpose clothing and fabric whenever we can.
Anyway, I sent my daughter my last jar of red pepper jelly, knowing full well I’d have to make more so once I get more pectin tomorrow (because peppers don’t have the amount of pectin that citrus does) I will make her a couple of jars of this treasured family treat.
Taking ten extra minutes to sort through the bones and bay leaves of the chicken caresses normally nets me an extra 3 to 4 additional cups of chicken meat. I took that, mixed it with a couple of eggs and flour and made my dog some chicken pupcakes. They are healthy snacks for her and she loves them. Much better than store bought ‘treats’ which are full of preservatives, fillers and chemicals. No thanks.
The savory bread I make from leftovers when I make chicken stock is a great way to use up the aromatics used in making the stock. I simply blend up the cooked carrots, celery and onions into a fine paste and after using a cup or two for my winter soup stock, I use the rest to make savory round loaves of bread that have a mild flavor and is great for meals, sandwiches and more. The recipe below actually makes two loaves, so I like to place one in a loaf pan and the other in another shaped pan. This time I used a rounded silicon bowl-shaped bread pan. I recently found a gently used one recently at a thrift store, costing just a dollar, and it had cool ridges on the bottom and sides and decided to give it a trial run. The result was a very artisanal looking loaf.
Savory Carrot Bread Recipe
Ingredients:
1 tablespoon dry active yeast
1/4 up warm water
2 tablespoons sugar
1/4 cup softened butter
1/2 cup milk or 2/3 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon salt
freshly grated nutmeg (optional)
1 egg
1 and 1/2 cups purred carrots, celery and onions (you can use beets, potatoes, spinach, all sorts of other cooked veggies but I prefer the carrot base for its mild flavor and beautiful color)
5 to 6 cups flour
Method:
Make sure all your ingredients are at room temperature. Bloom the yeast in the warm water for a couple of minutes before placing in a kitchen mixer. Add everything but the flour and mix well. Slowly add the flour until you have a thick dough that is still sticky to the touch. Knead for five to ten minutes and then let rise in the kitchen mixer bowl with a cloth covering the top for 90 minutes or so. Place the divided dough in two pans and let it rise another 45 minutes. Bake 20-30 minutes in a preheated 350-F deg oven until the loaves tapped sound hallow and the tops are crisp to the touch. Serve warm with butter and honey whenever possible.
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the house behind 