elizabeth_mn

The weather the past week has been wonderfully cool. I put the fluffy goose-down comforters out and got the urge to turn on the oven and bake stuff. And since the historical food fortnightly has fizzled out, I have missed doing cooking posts! So here you are. These are three things I make all the time (though usually not all in one day!).

First I made cookies. I decided to be smart and mix up a double batch so I could freeze half my dough for later.



These are my favorite cookies ever. They give me serious Frog and Toad moments.



( Cookie recipe )
Then while those were in the oven I mixed up a batch of granola. This is a breakfast staple at my house, to eat either with milk or with plain yogurt and fruit. If you eat sweetened yogurt, this might be a little too sweet to go with.



( Granola recipe )

That was enough sweets so finally I made vegetable pasties.



( Pasty recipe, sort of )

Yeah, yeah, I'll get to my coco photos eventually (not many anyway). But first, a recipe! Particularly for girliegirl32786, but any other non-eaters of the flesh may enjoy also. I adapted this recipe years ago from one I found online, and I've been tweaking it ever since.

Nut Loaf

2 Tbsp butter
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 large yellow onion
3 cloves garlic (or more to taste)
2 cups raw cashews
1 cup raw whole unblanched almonds
1 ¼ cups whole wheat bread or matzo crumbs
½ cup vegetable broth or water
¼ tsp salt
½ tsp pepper
2 eggs, well beaten

Preheat oven to 400° F.

Mince the onion and garlic finely in a food processor. Cook in the oil and butter until translucent, then remove from the heat.

Grind the almonds and cashews in the food processor until fine. (Yes, you really need a processor for this. It's impossible to get them fine enough with a knife.) Put the ground nuts and crumbs into a large mixing bowl, then add the cooked onion, salt, pepper, beaten eggs, and ½ cup of vegetable broth. Mix well, adding broth as necessary for the right consistency: mixture should feel more solid than a batter, but wetter than bread dough. Put mixture into a small parchment-lined loaf pan.

Bake at 400° F for 40-45 minutes or until loaf feels set and top is browned. Let the loaf cool for a few minutes before removing from pan.

More notes: Usually I serve with mustard, and a side of plain steamed vegetables.

The leftovers from this are amazing. The loaf really gets more solid overnight; you can slice it more easily and reheat the slices in a pan with butter.

A "large" onion to me is softball-sized. if yours are smaller you can use more.

I am not a very fussy cook and when needs must I throw in all kinds of other things. If I don't have enough crumbs I have thrown in chickpea flour and gluten flour, and other kinds of nuts get mixed in when I run out of cashews. A friend has also reported successfully making this with an egg replacement product.

Or Nun's Puffs, if you prefer. But I would never miss a chance to say fart. Because I never grew up.



The Challenge: 15. Sacred or Profane December 14 - December 27
In this challenge, be as divine or as devious as you like! It could be a food with connections to a religion, a dish served for sacred celebrations, or a concoction with a not-so-polite name. Whatever your choice, show us how naughty and/or nice you can be! Ok so I am late, oh well.

I first heard of Nun's Farts, or pets de nonne, in the Green & Blacks Chocolate cookbook. Their version is baked and includes chocolate. The recipe I chose is fried and filled with whipped cream.

The Recipe: Nun's Puffs from A Text-Book of Cookery.



( more! )

The Challenge: 14. Fear Factor November 30 - December 13
What foods have you always wanted to attempt, but were afraid to attempt to make - or afraid to eat? Choose a dish that is either tricky to create or nerve-wracking to eat, and get adventurous! It’s historical Fear Factor!



I honestly couldn't think of any food more terrifying to make or to eat than live lobsters. I am a most-of-the-time vegetarian; fish occasionally and poultry maybe once or twice a year. Usually no shellfish. They creep me out. Shellfish are weird, and icky, and are basically giant bugs that live in the ocean. Plus with lobsters you have to cook them alive, so yeah. But my HB loves lobster so I knew it wouldn't go to waste if I made it.

The Recipe(s): I read Mrs. Beeton's general notes on boiling lobsters, and I also used a recipe from National Cookery, below. This was a 2-day process.



The Date/Year and Region: English/American, 1860s-70s.

How Did You Make It: I got the lobsters live from the local Coastal Seafoods store just down the street. We brought them home and put them in the sink to chill out while I boiled water in the canning kettle, the biggest pot I own. They were definitely alive! I thought one of them was going to flop out of the sink!



By this point I was definitely starting to freak out, so I did what any good historic cook would do to calm her nerves.



And, for your amusement, here's the video of the harrowing ordeal of getting them into the pot.



( The rest of it - not for the faint of heart )

The Challenge: 12. If They’d Had It… November 2 - November 15
Have you ever looked through a cookbook from another era and been surprised at the modern dishes you find? Have you ever been surprised at just how much they differ from their modern counterparts? Recreate a dish which is still around today, even if it may look a little - or a lot - different!



Before I started dabbling in historic cooking, I would definitely have considered mac and cheese to be a very modern dish, something that originated in the kitchens of mid-century Betty Crocker types. But I found this recipe and this one here and realized how popular it was from the 18th century on.

The Recipe: I eventually chose Mrs. Beeton's recipe; without eggs or sherry, it made more sense to me.



( Read more... )

My HB and I celebrated our 8th wedding anniversary this week, so I coordinated this challenge with our day and made a fancy cake!



The Challenge: 10. Let Them Eat Cake! October 5 - October 18
The 16th is the anniversary of the beheading of Marie Antoinette (zut alors!). In honor of Madame Deficit, prepare your best cake from a historic recipe. And then eat it, bien sur.

( Read more... )

Update below: we tasted them!





The Challenge: 8. In a Jam (Or Jelly or Preserve) September 7 - September 20
It’s harvest time in the northern hemisphere, and springtime in the southern hemisphere. Make something either to preserve that produce that you’re harvesting, or replenish your supply after the winter! Fruit and vegetable jams, jellies, and preserves are the focus!

( Read more... )

The Challenge: #6 Seasonal Fruits/Vegetables August 10 - August 23
Concoct a dish based on the fruits and/or vegetables that would have been in season and available to the particular time you wish to interpret. It needn’t be the place you are in at this moment, but it should coincide with the season!



The Recipe: Described in Little Town on The Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder, this is really not a recipe as much as a suggestion. I have always loved the passages dealing with Mary's preparations for college. On p. 110 we find this:

"What would you like for supper, Mary?" It would be Mary's last supper at home.
"Anything you put on the table is good, Ma," Mary answered.
"It is so hot," Ma said. "I believe I will have cottage cheese balls with onions in them, and the cold creamed peas. Suppose you bring some lettuce and tomatoes from the garden, Laura."

Elsewhere in the book she refers to eating the tomatoes in dishes with sugar and cream, and sprinkling the lettuce leaves with vinegar and sugar.

( More! )

I could be sewing, but instead I am making pickles!



Teeny baby pickling cukes from the garden, the first cucumber harvest of any remarkable size so far this year. The dill is from the garden too. I didn't grow the carrots - carrot harvest isn't until October! I could've used garlic from the garden too, but I forgot and just reached for the cupboard.

Phew, came in just in time on this one!



The Challenge: Today in History June 29 - July 12
Make a dish based on or inspired by a momentous occasion that took place on the day you made it. Get creative - you would be surprised by all the interesting things that happened every single day!

Okay. This one was tough for me, which is why I left it until the end. The theme seemed random and I just couldn't find inspiration. In my perfect fantasy world I would have a 19th c book of letters exchanged by sisters detailing recipes, of course with meticulous instructions (and specific dates). Or possibly a newspaper column, dated, with a recipe. But no. While most of the historic sources I could find were dated by year, there were no specific days at all.

A few participants suggested websites like Today in History but mostly I found they just contained lists of battles and deaths. Not terribly useful for recipes!

My one idea was to base something off the Centennial Exhibition in Philadelphia 1876. Although there were many mentions of how great this event was and how much awesome food was served, the details were lacking. That is why this challenge was tough for me. The research was just not happening.

To skip to the good bit, here is what I eventually found:



This is Tufts Arctic Soda Fountain at the Exhibition, from Philadelphia's 1876 Centennial Exhibition on google books. It seems that ice-cream sodas were the hot new thing in 1876 and this Tufts guy had exclusive concession rights at the Exhibition, plus the teetotalers came and ruined everybody's good time so soda was the best drink on the block.

( Read more... )