jr conlin's ink stained banana

Oct. 31st brings two traditions to my house. Doling out lightsticks and full sized candybars to the children of the neighborhood, and chili.

A few folks have asked for the recipe, which i don't really have written down, so i'll make up for that now:

Ingredients:

• 1 lb lean stew beef
• 1 large can of stewed plum tomatoes
• 1 yellow onion
• 1 can of red beans
• Seasonings (these are mostly to taste, but i tend to use in descending amounts):
  • Chili Powder (about a tablespoon)
  • Oregano
  • Basil
  • Sage
  • Cumin
  • Salt
• Optional stuff:
  • 1/2 can Lager beer
  • Cast iron dutch oven
  • long tongs

About the ingredients:
Like with everything else you get out what you put in. If you just grab what's cheapest at Fresh & Easy, you're not going to be that happy with what you get out. Meat should be fresh (that means it's red all over the cuts), the Chili Powder should be actual dried, ground chilis. On that note:

Stew Beef
You can usually get this from the butcher counter. It's usually cubed chuck. Don't get the ground chili beef since that's full of silver skin, which gets tough. You may have to trim up the meat to get it to the right size. You want some fat, but you don't need that much. If you can't find stew beef, get 1 lb of leaner chuck and cube it yourself. Make sure to remove all the silver skin, otherwise you're going to wind up chewing some meat gum, and that's never pleasant.

Chili Powders
i like a mix of dried poblano and chipotle, but feel free to experiment. You can usually find these in cello packs hanging in good mercados or the "ethnic" food aisle. Don't use the pre-mixed "taco seasoning" McCormic crap. That's mostly salt and MSG. On the plus side, those cello packets usually sell for about a buck each, and you won't use that much of them, so you're saving a lot of money by getting the real stuff.

The Prep
Proper prep will make your life much easier. Cut and clean the meat and set it into a large bowl, Mix the seasonings well and set them into a small dish, dice the onion and set that into a small bowl. Turn on your hood fan and open a window. Open the beer (but don't start drinking yet). Have the tongs handy as well as some paper towels in case you need to clean anything up.

The Cookening
This is best done in stages, and will take time. This isn't something you dump in the crock pot. You will be rewarded.

First thing to do is sear the meat. Put the pot on the burner and turn it to high. Once the bottom of the pan reaches about 400° (way past the 'smoke point' for oil, that's why you're not using any) start placing the meat. It'll stick hard at first, and that's fine. Make sure there's space between the chunks. About when you've placed the last chunk, you should be able to turn the first. You're looking to get a good sear on most of the meat, but not cook it. In cooking terms, you're "blue"ing the meat. Once you've got a good dark sear on the chunks, get them out of the pot and replace them with whatever is not yet cooked.

When you're about half way through the last batch, turn down the heat on the pot to low. There should be a lot of burnt meat at the bottom. That's good. It's also why i recommend a cast iron pot for this. Take the last of the meat out when done. Toss the meat in the spices (or more likely, toss the spices onto the meat) and make sure the meat is coated. You're going to let the meat juices bloom the spices while you're cooking the onions.

Speaking of which toss the onions into the pot. You don't want these to burn (that's why you lowered the heat), if you think the pot is still to hot, use some of the beer to deglaze and cool the bottom. Plus, beer simmered onions are amazing. Onions take time to cook, so don't rush this. Plus the longer the meat blooms the spices, the better. Depending on how much you like raw onion, you can either just sweat them or caramelize them. i go for more caramelized, which takes longer, but really brings out the flavors.

Once the onions are done, turn the heat up to medium and add the meat back to the pot (may want to use a spatula to scrape out the juices from the bowl). If you still have beer left, you may want to deglaze the bottom of the pot now and get up all those delicious burnt bits, don't spend too long doing that you don't want all the liquid to boil away or the meat to cook. If you don't have beer, no worries just pour in some of the liquid from the tomatoes.

When you feel like you've gotten as much up as you'd like, carefully add the tomatoes and beans, and any extra beer. Bring the pot to a medium boil, then drop the temperature to a simmer. Let lightly simmer for about 3-4 hours or until the meat falls apart. If you don't want to leave this thing on the stove that long, you can also park the pot in the oven at 250° for that long.

Serve with cornbread, cheese, hot sauce, more beer, and anything else you'd like.

Recently, the topic of cook books came up. Truth be told, i kind of miss them.

i don't mean recipe books. There are plenty of those, full of lush pictures of carefully crafted cuisine staged under perfect lighting and designed to be the dining equivalent of women's magazine covers. Beautiful, but you know damn well that whatever you try just ain't gonna look like that. We have some of those too, and as reference books, they're useful, but i'd hardly describe them as real cook books.

My mom gave me a set of books fairly early on that had some of her favorite recipes. One of my personal favorites is Beard on Bread, a tome authored by James Beard. Good Mr. Beard was a contemporary of Julia Child, an avid researcher, writer and food critic, and because of that wrote chapters that informed, instructed, and enticed you to try something different. Because of that, his books are still legendary. Think Harold McGee, with examples.

Honestly, the only thing that comes close to that now are the publications from America's Test Kitchen, and to a somewhat lesser extent some books by Alton Brown, although neither of which are the kind you'd want to just pick up and start reading.

About the only books that come close to real cook books as far as i'm concerned are ones by Anthony Bourdain, but even those are less about how to prepare the dish than everything around it.

i guess it comes down to the simple fact that once you master the fact that you don't need to have your stove up to max heat to make tomato sauce and that roasting spices before you use them is actually a pretty good idea, you're less interested in finding yet another variation for fried pork chops with grilled onion dip. (Yeah, i thought it was gross when i heard it too.)

Sadly, i'm betting those just don't sell that well.

i must be weird.

Tonight, Anne Marie and i went to Andy's Barbecue. Long hailed as "the best barbecue in the South Bay". i'm a good deal more depressed about finding good barbecue now.

Understand that i grew up on Carolina barbecue, which is mostly pork, and mostly consists of taking said pig and spit cooking it for anywhere from eight hours to several days. It's served with a vinegar sauce and slaw with peanuts.

Thing is, there's not a lot of fat.

i hate fat.

If you watch all the cooking shows or other foodie kinda things, they always go on and on about their love of "rich marbled meat". Sorry, no thanks. You can keep your super fatty Kobe, for me the best cuts are from an Angus flank, grilled, with a good char on the outside. Gimme thin cut, bone in pork chops seared on the stove, then finished in a 350° oven 'til they're the consistency of lean bacon. Extra points if you trim the outside fat off. Sausage just ain't right 'til it cracks and is crunchy on the outside, tender on the inside.

To me, fat waters down the taste of what you're eating. Get rid of the grease and you really taste the flavors and seasonings.

That's kinda why i wasn't that into Andy's. i ordered the brisket and got through maybe two slices of the small mountain of meat in front of me. The rest? Well, i'm thinking that if i fire up the grill and cook it at 300° for another 3 hours, it'll be worth dabbing with a bit of sauce, but for now? i think there was less fat in the golfball sized wad of butter they dumped on the baked potato.

Oh well, next time i want barbecue, i guess i'll have to do it myself.

Recently, Anne Marie signed up for the Cook's Country magazine. For those that are curious, that's one of the publications from the folks that do America's Test Kitchens (a show like Alton Brown's, but with less sock puppets).

It's got a lot of good recipes and guidelines in it, but there's also a column that i swear is there for pure comedy reasons. In it, there are folks looking for their lost bits of heritage.

That or they're hoping that you lose your lunch.

Believe it or not, i know of tomato butter. Interested in trying some? Go get yerself an 8 oz. jar of unsweetened apple sauce and four cans of tomato paste. Blend. Serve on toast. Know, just as you begin your second chew, exactly why kids don't clamor for big helpin' spoonfuls of the stuff every fall with their pork chops. Also realize that i didn't even mention that a good many recipes also include cinnamon in this delightful pool of purplish acid.

As a side note, you can use the rest for Purple Slime Molds for your next LARP. Trust me, nothing will go near them.


But wait, there's more!
i feel a little bad for this one. i'm betting her grandfather was a really nice guy. i'm also betting that when he concocted this recipe he was probably thinking "Hey, Corn and pimentos isn't bad. You dress deviled eggs with pimentos. Let's mix them together and we'll be in business forever!" See, now, i'd never go near a dish like this, nor would i go near someone who ate it because i know that the sort of reaction the flora living in one's lower digestive track would have to the combination of the sugars from the corn plus the proteins and sulfates from the egg whites. Perhaps this individual is hoping to harness this new source of a nearly unlimited supply of methane.

Possibly by fitting a hose from the drivers seat straight into the engine intake.


And finally…

Green Walnuts (for those not familiar with Germanic Cuisine) are immature walnuts that are usually pickled. They have a tart/sour taste to them rather than the creamy/nutty flavor you normally get. Not a huge fan of them myself, but i can see where some folks could well be.

Now imagine a sweet green sauce with the distinct flavor of, well, crunchy floor varnish mixed in with your eggs and you can see why this assuredly mild mannered 90+ year old woman might have a slightly different taste in mind.

Yeah, look, there's a darn good reason that many of these recipes are hard to find.

Still makes me want to join the fun and see if anyone can help me chase down a childhood favorite of mine, pickled herring sorbet with chocolate sprinkles.

We're going to be updating our 1950's era kitchen to something slightly post Donna Reed. Perhaps even something early Zee. To achieve that end, we've hired a designer who has informed us that we're abnormal.

Apparently, unlike the vast majority of humanity, we don't rely on the microwave.

In fact, i'll employ the nuclear option maybe twice a month at most. i get that the microwave is basically a steamer, it just works on the water inside stuff instead of bringing it from the outside. That's ok, but i like things that are crunchy on the outside, tender on the inside and you just don't get that from exposing stuff to a magnetron. (Honestly, next time you want to heat up some leftover Chinese, grab your skillet, get it to medium-high heat, toss in the Kung Pao and keep it moving. It'll be done in about the same amount of time. The only real trick is to get the food out of the skillet and get water in the skillet before those sugary sauces solidify on the sides. Use the nuke for the rice if you want, since that needs steam.)

This, of course, leaves me with a question. Should i install a microwave (mostly for resale), or go with something else, say, an Advantium oven. At nearly six times the price of a microwave, it ain't cheap, but it's not a uni-tasker. i don't believe that i'd be cooking steaks in it (Sorry, Alton. We disagree again. That fillet looked like crap.), but i could lose the toaster oven (oddly, i may have to keep the original toaster)

Of course, something like that is complicated. That means more stuff can and will break, and it kinda goes against my "KISS" mentality.

The other option is just get a damn microwave, and keep the toaster oven for small jobs like i do now. Less crap to have to repair in the future. Less reading required before making dinner. Less slightly seared gray steaks.

Hell, if i really need a second oven to keep things warm, i can put a few $2 unglazed tiles on the gas grill, light a single burner and use that, like i've done before.

i dunno. While the idea of cooking with light appeals to my geekly nature, i'm havin' a hard time justifying it.

Any thoughts?