I'm sorry I haven't posted for a while.  I've started a "Gena's Kitchen" Facebook page--which has a much wider audience than my sad little blog!  You can actually find it under www.facebook.com/cookwithgena.  (Primarily because /genaskitchen was already taken :(.)

The holidays are right around the corner, starting with Thanksgiving in less than a week.  I am cooking Thanksgiving dinner at home for the first time in something like two decades.  It will just be the four of us.  Maybe five?  Lucas and his girlfriend Sam will likely end up with two meals that day--our house and hers.

I'm debating braising the turkey instead of roasting it.  After brining for a few hours, it simply braises in a slow oven for just under two hours.  According to Cook's Illustrated, it minimizes the risk of dried out white meat.  The downside--no "inside the bird" stuffing.  The upside?  LOTS more gravy.  We'll see.

Mashed potatoes.  Aren't they the epitome of comfort food?  These were done quickly and easily in....wait for it...the microwave!  Cut Yukon Gold potatoes, about 1/2 inch of milk and a heavy, microwave-safe dish.  Cover and zap for 4-5 minutes.  Move the potatoes around a bit and microwave another 4-5 minutes or until tender.  Then add a little more milk if needed, and as much butter as your waistline/conscience will allow and mash.  Added benefit of cooking these in a covered dish?  Make them ahead of time and simply reheat when dinner is ready.  And no need to put them in another serving dish.  (This is a Pampered Chef product--Cranberry Round Covered Baker).

So after 10 days in Europe, which included 3 days in Barcelona and a 7 night Mediterranean cruise, I managed to only gain about 2 pounds.  Must have been all the walking.  Now that I am home, my thoughts on cooking seem to have stayed behind.  I crave olive oil, buffalo milk mozzarella, fresh basil and garlic, seafood, pasta, and good, really good, bread.  Sigh.  Is it the food or the pace at which it is  prepared and consumed?  Maybe a little of both.

Still, I am sad to be gone from there. 

Drunken Bread

First a quick update on the parsley soup--didn't take a pic, but it was delicious.  Think Cream of Spinach and the substitute loads of parsley.

This is something I've concocted from a menu item I had last weekend at a wine bar.  They called it "Drunken Bread."  I had some old garlic-studded sourdough bread in the freezer that I tore roughly into pieces.  To this I added every kind of cheese (shredded) I could find in the refrigerator:  Brie, Jarlsberg, sharp Cheddar, Butterkase.  Here's the "drunken" part:  I beat two eggs, along with some milk, generous grindings of black pepper and a good glug of white Vermouth.  Pour this over the bread/cheese mixture and let it sit for 5 minutes or so to soak in.  The I put the whole mess in a 350 oven until it was set and golden.  It's on warm waiting for my daughter to come home from school for lunch and we are going to dig in.  Smells great.

Parsley Soup

My herb garden is being taken over by a parsley plant that wintered over.  I could open a restaurant with the amount of parsley I have.  So I'll be making parsley soup, parsley salad, parsley mayonnaise, and anything else I can think of.  I'll be reporting results back here shortly!

Meat Glaze

I love the idea of making something from nothing.  Or something from something you normally toss.  Learned that meat glaze can be made from the bones and "stuff" leftover from making stock!  Who knew?   While it is time-consuming, it isn't hands-on.  You just need to be around.  So after you've made stock, put the bones and scraps into ANOTHER pot of cold water.  You can include any mushy vegetables you had in your stock.  I had about 4 lbs of bones, which made 2 qts of strong beef stock. (Actually these were shanks and I removed all the meat and made something else with that).   I put the cooked bones into about the same amount of water.  After bringing to a boil, I let it simmer for about 4 hours.  Strained and discarded the bones.  I put the broth back into a pot and gently boiled (just above a simmer) until reduced to about a cup.  It took 4-5 hours.  You may want to put it in a smaller pot as it reduces.  Once it's reduced, it should have a lovely caramel color and be slightly thickened.  When chilled, it will be very firm and jelled.  Add by the teaspoon to sauces, soups, stews, anything you want to add depth of flavor to.  Note--don't salt it at all.  As it reduces, it will intensify.

Cheap Meat: it's all about cooking method

So cheap meats don't have to be tough, dry, bland (or any other unappetizing adjective).  It's all about how you cook them.   I made an eye of round roast--a very lean, usually tough, inexpensive cut of beef. 

First, I salted it (1/2 tsp per pound or so) with coarse kosher salt, and put it in the refrigerator, covered, for 24 hours (actually about 22....). 

I took it out of the fridge about an hour before putting it in the oven, to bring it up to room temperature.  Always a good idea when roasting meats.

After browning it in a hot skillet with a bit of oil, I placed it, on a rack, set in a baking sheet, in a very slow oven--only 225 degrees for about an hour, until it registered 115 on an instant-read thermometer.  Important thing  here--take the meat out of the oven to take its temp; don't leave the oven door open or you lose too much heat.  Then I turned the oven OFF, but left the roast in the oven for about 30 minutes or so.  This brought the temp up to about 130 degrees--perfect for medium rare. 

I took the roast out of the oven, allowed it rest another 10 minutes under a tent of foil, and then sliced it thinly.  While it didn't have filet mignon texture, it was juicy and tender--and surprisingly flavorful.

All meats are not created equal, and neither are all cooking methods!  This same method would probably ruin a well-marbled filet mignon. 

Croquettes to the leftover rescue--again!

Sorry, no pic to share with this post.  I posted last year, I think, about croquettes, and what a great recipe to keep around for dealing with leftovers.  I had leftover Turducken from Christmas (it was stuffed with dirty rice), plus some leftover ham.  Just pile everything into your food processor and grind it all up until it is quite fine.  Make a thick white sauce (I use 3 tbsp butter, 3 tbsp flour and one cup milk--in fact I make white sauce now in my MICROWAVE...it's awesome...message me if you'd like to know how!), combine the white sauce with the ground up meat mixture, and perhaps throw in some shredded cheese of your choice.  Taste for seasoning--it probably won't need salt.  Now, shape the mixture into croquettes about the size of a large egg.  You might make them a bit more cylindrical.  At this point, I coat the croquettes lightly in very fine bread crumbs (something I make with leftover, stale bread.  Keep frozen).  Refrigerate the croquettes for one to several hours to let them "dry off."  When you're ready to cook them, you have two choices, fry or bake.  Either way, beat an egg or two in a bowl, and put more fine bread crumbs in another bowl.  Dip each croquette in egg and again in bread crumbs.  Toss them lightly back and forth between your hands to remove excess bread crumbs.  Once they're all coated, it's a good idea to chill them again for 30 minutes or so, but not essential. 

You can fry them in 1/2 inch of oil or fat (I've used beef drippings, which gives a wonderful taste but some folks might shy away from the saturated fat content....meh...not something we do often enough to worry about it).  Or you can drizzle lightly (or brush lightly) with melted butter and bake them.  400 degrees for 20-25 minutes should do the trick.  Frying is much faster--just a few minutes per side.  Drain on paper towels and enjoy.  A note on frying--they don't seem to absorb that much oil, so I encourage you to try frying them at least once.  The crisp outside and creamy inside is a real treat--and not one anyone would suspect is made from leftovers!