Cauliflower Soup

This soup is adapted from a recipe on Americas Test Kitchen. We made/served it for a major dinner party. This is a scaled back version, so the water may be slightly out of proportion. It can be adjusted at the end as necessary.
The beauty of this soup is that it has all the richness of a cream based soup - but with no cream. There is some butter in the recipe, but I suspect that it could be made vegan with the use of a neutral oil. I haven't tried that though.
You don't need to be very precise with the cutting, it all goes into the blender at the end, anyway.

Picture Courtesy of Jim Brewer

Ingredients

2T butter (substitute oil perhaps)

1 large leek, white and light green parts only. Sliced finely and thoroughly washed

1/2 yellow onion (NOT Vidalia or 1015) sliced thinly

1/2t kosher salt (there will be more salt later)

1 large head of cauliflower (divided use - 2/3 and 1/3)

4 cups water

Kosher salt to taste

Chipotle in adobo for garnish

Jalapeno corn bread/pepita croutons (or any other crunchy croutons)

Very coarse sea salt for crunch.

Finishing oil for drizzling

Method

Soften the leeks/onions in the butter/oil over medium low heat. Add the first salt as they begin to soften. Do not allow them to brown.

While the leeks and onions are softening, divide the cauliflower, making sure that there are no green leafy bits. Slice the stalks thinly and put them with the 2/3 side. 

When the leeks and onions have softened, add the 2/3 cauliflower and the water. Bring to a simmer and simmer for 15 minutes - until the cauliflower is cooked through.

Then add the remaining cauliflower to the pot and simmer for another 12 minutes (take the time from when the pot reaches simmering temp).

Transfer the contents of the pot to your blender and blend until very smooth. Note, of course that this is hot and will probably attempt to splash out of the blender, so make sure you have a towel around the blender and press the lid on tightly through the towel. If in doubt blend in batches for safety.

Strain the soup through a fine mesh strainer - to remove any lumps that the blender missed.

Adjust the texture using boiling water. Adjust the seasoning, remembering that you will be adding coarse salt later.

Serve in warmed bowls with croutons and chipotle. Add a little  swirl of olive oil and the crunchy, coarse salt.

Take a bow!

We served this with a nice Chardonnay from Nickel and Nickel.

Strange Bread

I recently bought Stella Parks's wonderful dessert cook book, "BraveTart". Of course I had to try some things - so the recipe for a Japanese style bread was attempted.  It didn't turn out as intended, but it was wonderful, nonetheless.
There were several issues.

• I had a timing problem - was due to meet some friends for lunch so didn't quite give it enough time
• The recipe called for malted milk - but I didn't have any
• The coconut oil/fat that I had was very strongly coconut flavored

But apart from that, it was a matter of improvisation.

I did have some dry non fat milk lying around, so I thought it might be cool to add that instead of the malted milk powder. But, of course, I wanted some toasty flavor. So i baked it in a 350 oven for 8 minutes to get it toasted. It worked a treat!

Also, because this was from an American cook book, most of the measurements are in lbs/oz not in metric measurements.

The technique hydrates some of the flour with hot liquid first - a way to get water into the recipe without making everything too sloppy. 

Ingredients (Paste)

1 1/2 oz AP flour

6 oz 2% milk

Ingredients (Bread)

15 oz AP flour

2 oz sugar

2 oz toasted milk powder

1 1/2 oz virgin coconut oil (solid)

2t active dry yeast

5 oz 2% milk

1 oz half and half

1 1/2 t kosher salt

Method (Paste)

Mix the flour and milk together in a saucepan. Heat gently stiffing occasionally until the mixture thickens. Keep it on the heat until the flour mixture comes away from the sides of the pan (while you are stirring with a silicone spatula).

Let the paste cool for about 20 minutes

Method (Dough)

Dissolve the sugar in the milk/half and half. Add the yeast and allow to sit for 15 minutes.

Combine the flour, paste, salt, coconut oil, milk powder together in the stand mixer. Add the salt and the milk/yeast mixture, stir to combine and then knead for 15 minutes (in the mixer). It needs to be kneaded until the dough window -panes.

Cover the dough and leave to rise for about 45 minutes in a warm place. It should be a bit fuffy. 

Set the oven to 350 and preheat for 20 minutes.

Turn out the dough and shape into an 8" square. Fold the dough like you would fold a business envelope.  Pinch the edges together to make a seam. 

Place in a loaf pan, seam side down and leave to rise a second time until the top of the loaf is just above the edge of the pan.

Bake for 45 minutes at 350. Internal temp should reach around 202 degrees.

Turn the loaf out of the pan onto a wire rack. For at least an hour before cutting it.

Eat with mashed avocado - or just with butter and jam.

Delicious

Spicy Pecan Brittle

This was to be part of the dessert for a formal dinner - if it lasted that long.  Fortunately it did. It turned out a most tasty, more-ish candy with a perfect texture. Definitely will be made again. It does have a little butter so it is not vegan.

Ingredients

2t kosher salt

2t ground cinnamon

2t smoked paprika

pinch of cumin (fine ground)

pinch of cayenne (more to taste depending on heat of cayenne pepper and desire to store

2t baking soda

2 cups granulated sugar

1cup corn syrup (I used 2/3rds plain, and 1/3rd from Rockwall.)

1/2 cup water

8T (1 stick) unsalted butter

2 cups pecans (raw, roughly chopped)

1T Vanilla essence

Method

Warm a rimmed baking sheet in a 250 oven for about 30 minutes ahead of time.

Whisk together the salt, cinnamon, paprika and cayenne until well combined

In a sauce pan whisk together the sugar, water, corn syrup and vanilla and bring to the boil (medium low). and heat to 300 degrees as measured by a candy thermometer (after about 15 minutes)..

Stir and remove from heat. Add the water and stir again.Add the butter and allow to dissolve. 

Put the pan back on heat with the thermometer visible. 

Add the chopped pecans and stir thoroughly.

Pour the brittle onto the warmed baking sheet and allow to cool (about 6 hours).

Break into small pieces and garnish appropriately.

Rotkohl - Allow lots of time

This sweet/sour red cabbage dish was part of a formal dinner party that we had last Saturday. It made enough for about 16 people as a side. The proportions are not exact (sadly) because there was some improvisation needed. But here it is approximately. You can tell by the color if you have enough vinegar.  The dish needs to stay bright red looking. If it goes too dark or faintly purple, there isn't enough acid.

Ingredients

1 head red cabbage (about 4lbs, shredded)

1 1/2 yellow onions (about 1lb) sliced thinly

2 Granny Smith Apples, peeled, cored and sliced

8 cloves inside a spice bag to make them easy to find in the finished dish

3/4 cup rice wine vinegar (Ideally you would use apple cider vinegar and a bit less, but we were out!)

10 T sherry vinegar (optional n- unnecessary if using apple cider vinegar)

1/4 cup of sugar (to taste)

3 t kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Method

Combine all the ingredients in a large pot (these fit into a 7 quart dutch oven). Bring to a simmer gently. Cover and simmer for at least 90 minutes. By all means crack the lid and taste to make sure the balance is how you want it.

After 90 minutes, uncover and allow some of the liquid to evaporate (another 30 minutes). By this time the cabbage should have softened but should still be slightly firm.

Remove the spice bag and serve hot as a side dish with your main course.

Sharpening Knives

I admit it, I am a klutz - with lousy eye sight and worse eye/hand coordination. So the perennial problem that a cook has, "How to sharpen knives and keep them sharp?"

I have tried a variety of methods:
Pay someone to do it ($5.00 per blade gets expensive)
Use an electric (e.g. Chef's Choice) sharpener
Use a hand / pull through sharpener
Use a whetstone
Something else?

For various reasons, none of the methods were particularly satisfactory. The best was to have a pro (e.g. Rolling Stone in the DFW area) do it, but at $5.00 per blade the prices was getting crazy - 8 knives, 2 x year. You do the math!
Most electric sharpeners are too "greedy" for my liking - i.e. they take too much metal off the blade. The hand/pull through sharpener didn't deliver great results.
I can't manage a consistent angle on the whetstone, so I went hunting for something easy to use and that did a great job..
On the Serious Eats web page, there was an advertisement for a home belt sharpener. Belt sharpeners are what most of the pros use, so I figured there was a sporting chance that I could make one of these work. The sharpener in question is the E5 from Work Sharp .
So, on a whim I bought one.
It's very effective (at least for my western angle blades). I didn't buy the Asian guides (yet...). Also only have one grade of grit for the sanding belts. But I dare say I will experiment with different grits as well.
The knives came out incredibly sharp. The tool was foolproof (well Chris Proof which requires an even higher degree of ease). I have a carbon steel Sabatier knife which is dark gray in color. So it is easy to see how much metal the sharpener has taken off. Very little! So it meets my don't be greedy criterion.
A nice (but rather short) ceramic honing rod came with it. I alternate between that and my conventional steel. The ceramic rod does a nice job, however.
All in all I am very happy with the sharpener. Finally found one that suits me.

Full disclosure: After I had bought it and used it, I was contacted by the company for a review. For the review, the company did give me an Amazon gift card. That card will be used for more belts