Archives for December 2008

The Latest Kosher Cooking Carnival

December 24, 2008 · by ·

Hey Everyone,

The latest Kosher Cooking Carnival is up. Thank you to Leora for all your hard work in assembling this. This 37th edition is filled with many different delicious kosher recipes by several loyal kosher foodie bloggers. Enjoy!

Check it out!

Filed Under: recipes · Tagged: , , ,

Sufganiyot

December 22, 2008 · by ·
I don’t usually deep fry anything, so the idea of homemade sufganiyot (jelly doughnuts) is a bit daunting to me. Last year I attempted to make zeppolis on chanukah by using the premade Trader Joes pizza dough. It didn’t quite come out right.

 

Tonight I used the recipe from Claudia Roden’s The Book of Jewish Food. If you ever wanted to buy a Jewish cookbook, this is the cookbook you must buy. More useful than the well-thumbed “purple cookbook,” Spice and Spirit , tastier and better stories than any of Joan Nathan’s treasures.

 

Here is her recipe

 

Soufganioth by Claudia Roden, The Book of Jewish Food: An Odyssey from Samarkand to New York

 

Ingredients:

 

1 tsp. dried yeast
1/4 c. lukewarm milk or water
2 tbsp. sugar
1 whole egg
1 egg yolk
3 tbsp. sour cream or oil
A pinch of salt
2 or 3 drops vailla extract
1 2/3 c. flour, plus more if necessary
Oil for deep-frying – **cringe**
Apricot, red-currant, or raspberry jam
Confectioner’s sugar for sprinkling

 

Dissolve the yeast in warm water or milk with 1 tsp of sugar and leave for 10 minutes or until it froths.

 

Beat the rest of the sugar with the egg and the yolk. Add the sour crem or oil, the salt, vanilla, and the yeast mixture, and beat very well. Fold in the flour gradually, and continue beating until you have a soft, smooth, and elastic dough, adding more flour if necessary. Then knead for 5 minutes, sprinkling with a flour if it is too sticky. Coat the dough with oil by pouring a drop in the bowl and turning the dough in it.

Cover the bowl with and leave in a warm place to rise for about 2 hours, or until doubled in bulk.

 

Knead the dough again for a few minutes, then roll out on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin to 1/4 inch thickness. Cut 2 inch rounds….Put a teaspoon of jam in the center of the dough round. Brush the rim with a little water to make it sticky and cover with another round. Press the edges together to seal. Continue with the rest of the rounds and arrange them on a floured tray. Leave them to rise for about 30 minutes.

Heat 1-1/2 inches of oil in a saucepan to medium hot. Drop in the doughnuts, a few at a time. Fry in the oil for 3-4 minutes with the lid, until brown, then turn and fry the other side 1 minute more. Drain on paper towels. Sprinkle with the confectioners’ sugar.

Eat them while they are still warm.

 

The variation on this, is to fry a thicker round of plain dough – about a 1/2 inch thick – when it is cool enough to handle, cut a small slit and inject the jam into the doughnut.
I tried both methods. I preferred the jam-injected donut to the 2-piece donut. I do need to play around with dough thickness and cooking time. All in all, it was an easy recipe and a good start…
Sufganiyot
 
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Author:
Ingredients
  • 1 tsp. dried yeast
  • ¼ c. lukewarm milk or water
  • 2 tbsp. sugar
  • 1 whole egg
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 3 tbsp. sour cream or oil
  • A pinch of salt
  • 2 or 3 drops vailla extract
  • 1⅔ c. flour, plus more if necessary
  • Oil for deep-frying
  • Apricot, red-currant, raspberry jam or other favorite filling
  • Confectioner's sugar for sprinkling
Instructions
  1. Dissolve the yeast in warm water or milk with 1 tsp of sugar and leave for 10 minutes or until it froths.
  2. Beat the rest of the sugar with the egg and the yolk. Add the sour cream or oil, the salt, vanilla, and the yeast mixture, and beat very well. Fold in the flour gradually, and continue beating until you have a soft, smooth, and elastic dough, adding more flour if necessary. Then knead for 5 minutes, sprinkling with a flour if it is too sticky. Coat the dough with oil by pouring a drop in the bowl and turning the dough in it.
  3. Cover the bowl with a towel and leave in a warm place to rise for about 2 hours, or until doubled in bulk.
  4. Knead the dough again for a few minutes, then roll out on a floured surface with a floured rolling pin to ¼ inch thickness.
  5. Cut in to 2 inch rounds
  6. Put a teaspoon of jam in the center of the dough round. Brush the rim with a little water to make it sticky and cover with another round.
  7. Press the edges together to seal.
  8. Continue with the rest of the rounds and arrange them on a floured tray. L
  9. eave them to rise for about 30 minutes.
  10. Another option is to inject the jam in to the fried donute. Fry a thicker round of plain dough - about a ½ inch thick - when it is cool enough to handle, cut a small slit and inject with a pastry bag.
  11. I like the injecting method.
Filed Under: baked, Chanukah, claudia roden, Dessert, donuts, hanukkah, sufganiyot · Tagged: , , , , ,

Basic Latkes

December 22, 2008 · by ·
Happy Chanukah/Hanukkah! Make it a happy one, whichever way you choose to spell it.

During the holiday, we usually make latkes twice. Each year we do the basic recipe, and then later in the week, we try and come up with a unique “gourmet” version. Stay tuned for the gourmet flavor.

Tonight, we made and enjoyed our basic, easy latke recipe. I will not say it’s a “no-fail” latke, because anyone can mess up, but it’s pretty good. Even my picky 7-year-old partook in the latke joy tonight.

LatkesIngredients:

4 largeish yukon gold potatoes
1 onion
1/4 cup of flour
2-3 eggs
salt and pepper
vegetable oil

Peel and quarter your onion and potatoes.

In a food processor, grate the onions and potatoes together, using the grating blade. If you are deficient in nice kitchen appliances, use a hand grater.

Pour the grated goodness into a tea towel. Squeeze out the starchy water from the mixture into a sink. This keeps the latkes from getting a starchy brown color. This brown is a greyer color than the fried brown color. If your latke mixture is too starchy and moist, it can fall apart and have a pastey consistency.

Dump the squeezed out potatoes and onions into a mixing bowl. Mix in the eggs, flour, salt, and pepper.

Heat up a fry pan with around an inch of vegetable oil.
Plop the potato mixture using a tablespoon in to the fry pan. Flip over when you see the edges begin to brown.

Drain on a cookie sheet covered in paper towels.

Serve the latkes hot with sour cream and/or applesauce. We prefer sour cream in our house. Never use ketchup or mayonaisse on your latkes.

If you plan to serve them at a later time, reheat on a cookie sheet at 200 degrees.
Filed Under: Appetizers, Chanukah, fried, hanukkah, potato · Tagged: , , , , , ,

Split Pea Soup with Flanken

December 22, 2008 · by ·
I came home from work Thursday night, looked at the weather, looked inside my freezer, and was disturbed. I had no soup left. The school superintendent and the weathermen were both predicting snowstorms. I needed something warm and hearty for a Shabbat soup. The only requirement was that I must be able to make matzah balls with it.
I looked though my pantry and fridge and decided on split pea soup. I normally cook it with a smoked turkey leg to give it that treife split pea soup with ham taste, but I didn’t have any smoked turkey and the kosher store was out of it. I opted for flanken and flanken bones. The soup is very good and there is plenty leftover for a few more dinners.

Split Pea Soup with Flanken

Ingredients:
1 pound of boneless flanken
3/4 pound of flanken bones
3 stalks of celery, diced
1 medium onion, diced
3 carrots, diced
2 cups of split peas
8-10 cups of water
salt
pepper
2 tsp. dried thyme or 3 sprigs fresh
2 bay leaves
Salt and pepper the meat thoroughly. In your soup pot, brown the meaty bits in some olive oil. After 5-10 minutes, add in your mirepoix of chopped celery, carrots, and onions.Let oy saute for 5-10 minutes.
While the meat and veggies are sauteeing, rinse the split peas.

Pour the split peas in to the pot. Stir. Add in the bay leaves and the thyme.
Pour in the water.

Let the soup come to a boil. Simmer for 1-2 hours, until reduced to your desired thickness.
Enjoy!
Filed Under: Soups · Tagged: , , , , ,

Chocolate Raspberry Rugelach

December 17, 2008 · by ·

I own a rolling pin, but never use it. It’s not that I am afraid of it, I just don’t really like using recipes that seem to have way too many process transitions. I use my rolling pin maybe twice a year. As you have seen by my carrot muffins, I am in some sort of wierd baking mood. I decided to get all brave and try to make some rugelach. I don’t like most bakery pastry, and I wanted to see if I could “have it my way.”

I used Ina Garten’s recipe for the rugelach dough and then came up with my own filling. The rugelach came out super tasty and they were suprisingly easy to make. My fear of baking is slowly fading.

Is rugel the singular of rugelach? I’ll go with it…
Chocolate Raspberry Rugelach (Dairy)
Dough Recipe – from The Barefoot Contessa by Ina Garten
8 ounces of cream cheese at room temperature
2 sticks of butter – softened
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups flour
1 egg mixed beaten, mixed with 1 tsp of milk for brushing later on
2 tbsp sugar and one tsp. cinnamon, mixed for dusting
In your mixer, using the paddle attachment, mix up the cream cheese and the butter until well mixed.

Add the sugar, salt, and vanilla. Continue to mix on low speed. Slowly add the flour with the mixer running. Do not over mix the dough. The dough will be sticky.

Turn the dough out on to a well floured board and roll it into a ball. Cut the ball into quarters. Wrap each quarter in plastic wrap and chill in the refridgerator for at least an or…or you could freeze the dough for future use. The dough works best the colder it is.

While the dough is chilling, get your filling ready.

My chocolate/raspberry filling ingredients are as follows:

1 cup of walnut pieces
3/4 cup of chocolate chips – semisweet
1/4 cup of light brown sugar
Raspberry Jam – I used seedless
In a food processor, chop the walnuts and chocolate until ground well. Mix in the brown sugar.

I love my mini cuisinart. It’s petite,adorable, and cute. It was sitting lost and lonely in a cabinet behind my giant cuisinart. It should have a permanent place on my counter, but I dislike the clutter.

Once the dough is chilled, we are ready to roll up some rugelach.

On a well floured board, roll each ball into a circle, around 9 inches. Spread a very light layer of jam on to the dough circle. Do not add too much jam, as there will be too much oozing when baking. Sprinkle the nut/choc filling onto the jam. Cut the dough circle into wedges, around 12-16 equal wedges. I find it cuts best with a pizza slicer.


Starting with the wide edge, roll up each wedge. Put the rolled up rugelach on to a baking sheet lined with parchement paper or a silpat.
Chill for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350.

Remove the dough from the fridge. Brush each rugel with the egg wash. Dust with the cinnamon/sugar mixture.

Bake for 15-20 minutes until lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack.

Be thankful that I am not including any nutritional information on this one.

Filed Under: baked, chocolate, cookie, Dessert, jewish, raspberry, rugelach · Tagged: , , , , , , ,

Carrot Cake Muffins

December 16, 2008 · by ·

“Carrots have vitamins that are good for your eyes,” says the kid to her friend. The friend nasally asked “why” and stomped off. She didn’t care about an answer. Lucky me, she came back to the house with an apron built for a kid. My daughter was shocked. I don’t think she has seen me wear an apron…ever. I do have an apron somewhere in some closet that has an ice cream cone from my days working at Perkins.

I decided a week or so ago in some gooey state of crohn’s induced steroid hunger that I needed to make carrot cake muffins/cupcakes…even if I couldn’t actually eat them. I trudged out to buy the ingredients. I promised my daughter some hallmark cooking moments. It was either that or Hannah Montana blasted into the kitchen. I don’t think I can handle more of “It’s the beeeessst of both worlds!” So we went to work after the mad dinner rush. Cooking with your kids can be fun. I am not sharing picture of the cleanup.

I even made the cream cheese frosting to go with…I have never made frosting before.

After much eyeballing recipes on the web, I came up with a recipe that seemed to please all tastes…not too sweet, not too “cimanimony,” and moist.

Carrot Cake
Ingredients:
3 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup oil
2 cups sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2 cups grated carrots (raw)
3/4 cup applesauce
1.5 cups chopped pecans or walnuts (I can’t eat nuts, but prefer pecans – tradition is walnuts – I think)
3 eggs

Preheat oven to 350.

Mix the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, amd salt in one small bowl. In a separate large bowl, beat the oil, sugar, and vanilla. Slowly mix in half the flour mixture. Add in the carrots, applesauce, nuts, and the eggs. Beat well. Add in the rest of the flour.

Have your muffin tins greased or lined and ready to go. Pour batter into cups. Do not overfill. This recipe gave me 24 cupcakes. Bake for 20 minutes.


My daughter scarfed them down. She didn’t even want to wait for it to cool down or for the frosting.


You do need the cream cheese frosting. It’s not a cupcake without the frosting.

Cream Cheese Frosting
Ingredients:
8 oz. of cream cheese, room temperature
2 cups of confectioners sugar
5 tbsp. butter
Beat the 3 ingredients together for a few minutes. You have some yummy frosting.
You can spread over the cupcakes or you can just eat straight from the bowl…alternating with bites of cupcake of course.

Filed Under: baked, Breakfast, Snacks · Tagged: , , , ,

Pad Thai

December 10, 2008 · by ·

I often find myself watching cooking videos and podcasts on my ipod. Youtube is wonderful for finding every possible how-to video. As of late, I have been especially into Korean and Thai cooking. Today I dug down to the heart of Chinatown and wandered through a couple of Thai markets for ingredients and ideas.

One of my favorite Thai dishes is Pad Thai. It’s truly comfort food, when done right. I finally built up the nerve to cook it. I was amazed that it wasn’t that hard to prepare.


Pad Thai

Ingredients:

Thin Flat Rice Stick Noodles
Eggs – a couple
Tofu – diced small, extra firm
Another protein (optional)
Garlic – chopped
Ground Peanuts – crushed, roasted
Chives –
Beansprouts – I didn’t have any and didn’t see any good ones in the store
Tamarind Concentrate
Sugar – when done right, you should use palm sugar – I didn’t have any
sriracha or chili paste
fish sauce – sometimes available kosher from koshergourmetmart – if vegetarian, use extra soy sauce
soy sauce
Vegetable Oil – non fragrant oil is important, peanut or canola works well
lime wedges – very important player in this dish

The trick is to have everything read to go, before you heat up your wok.

Get your sauce ready. For 2-3 servings, I used 2 tablespoons of tamarind, 2 tablespoons of fish sauce, 2 tablespoons of soy sauce, 2 tablespoons of sugar, 2 teaspoons of chili paste.

Cut up your tofu and let it dry on papertowels.


Chop up veggies and/meat

Cook the rice noodles. Pour boiling water over noodles in a bowl and let sit for 10 minutes. Do not overcook them. Very important.



Ready to get down to business now. Heat up a large wok with 2 tablespoons of oil. Add in your garlic and tofu. Fry a bit. Move the garlic and tofu to the side. If using meat, this is when you would cook it. Crack in your eggs and scramble. Let it set a bit.

Toss in your noodles. Toss in the sauce and mix. Throw in the beansprouts and any other veggies you might be adding. Mix up and stir fry a few minutes.

Serve on to a plate. Sprinkle over some chopped peanuts. Serve with a lime wedge to squeeze over. The lime juice is essential and very yummy in this dish.


This meal turned out to be a hit tonight. Feel free to play with ingredients a bit. Add more or less of sauce ingredients to meet your taste. I will probably add more heat (chili paste) next time as well as more lime juice squeezed on. I was very happy with this meal and will make again. Very easy quick dinner night meal.

Filed Under: Dinner, Lunch, Uncategorized · Tagged: , , , , ,

Beer Braised Brisket

December 9, 2008 · by ·
I had some extra beer. I had bought a couple loosies to experiment with during the beer bread episode. I am not really a beer drinker, even in partylicious social settings. I decided to experiment a little. Wouldn’t want the good Heineken to go to waste.
I opted for a beer braised brisket. The guy at the liquor store claimed that ANYTHING can be cooked better with beer.
Hindy’s Beer Braised Brisket

Ingredients:

1 Brisket – should have some good marbling on it
Salt
Pepper
Thyme
Onion, chopped
Garlic, chopped
2 red potatoes, cubed
3 stalks celery, sliced
3-4 carrots, sliced
Bay Leaves
1 Bottle of Beer
Olive Oil
Preheat the oven to 350.
Rub salt and pepper into the meat. In a Dutch oven, brown your meat on all sides. Takes around 15 minutes.
Put your meat aside. Toss in the onions, garlic, and some of the thyme. Scrape up the meaty bits. Saute for 10 minutes. Remove half of the onions.
Lay the brisket on top of the onions. Cover with the rest of the onion mixture. Surround the meat with chopped veggies. Throw in the rest of the thyme and the bay leaves. Add some more salt and pepper.
Pour over the beer.

Cover and transfer the meat to the oven. Cook for a few hours until done.
Let the meat cool before slicing.

The verdict is that the meat was very good, but the beer taste was not overpowering in the least bit. It’s a good brisket over all. The meat was very tender. Not sure if that was because of the beer or the brisket cut though.
Filed Under: beef, Dinner · Tagged: , , , , , ,

Beer Bread

December 9, 2008 · by ·
I came across this bread recipe on a natural parenting site that I frequent. Everyone was raving about this bread. I am not usually one to follow the cultish trends, but this seemed like a fun experiment to test on a day off. I learned a few lessons along the way. One being that the bread is awesome. Two, is that I didn’t even need a whole day. If I had a toaster oven at work, I could do this during my lunch hour. It’s that quick and easy. Three, is that the bread gets eaten very fast if you have people mulling about your kitchen. It’s really that good. I do plan to make some variations of this again. Maybe adding some herbs, olives and/or some roasted garlic.

Beer Bread

Ingredients:

3 c self-rising flour (poured loosely into measuring cup)
1/2 c sugar (do not decrease or substitute) – I will experiment with less next time
1/4 t baking powder (probably optional)
12oz can/bottle beer – not Corona, I don’t know why…just don’t use the Corona. I used Heineken.
3 T butter, melted – do not use margarine or any other substitute

 

Preheat oven to 375.

Mix together the flour, sugar, and baking powder.

Add the beer. Mix a few strokes until everything is mostly incorporated. Do not overmix. Do not knead. The dough mixture with be sticky, wet, and lumpy.

Pour into a loaf pan. Pour the butter over the top. Please remember that the butter is very essential.

Bake at 375 for 45-55 minutes., until the top is brown and crispy. This bread top is essential. It is the best part of this bread. Let cool, a little. Dig in!

If G-d forbid you don’t finish the bread on the same day, store in a ziplock bag. The bread is pretty good when toasted.

Filed Under: baked, bread · Tagged: , , , ,

Maple Roasted Chicken with Roasted Root Veggies

December 9, 2008 · by ·

Really. it has been way too long. I really have been cooking. I haven’t just been feeding my kids fish sticks and mac and cheese out of a box. Though I have to admit, there have been many days where that is the only thing I feel like cooking. No, it’s not what you are thinking…I am not pregnant. All is ok.

Maple Roasted Chicken with Roasted Root Veggies
Ingredients:
2 medium red potatoes, cubed
2 carrots, sliced
1 large pasrnip, sliced
1 onion, cut up
1 turnip, cut up
1 sweet potato, cut up
2-3 shallots, chopped
6 cloves of garlic, chopped
Maple Syrup – approx. 1/4 cup
Dijon Mustard – 2-3 tbsp.
Olive Oil – 1/4 cup
Ginger Paste – 2-3 tbsp.
Salt
Pepper
Fresh Rosemary and Thyme, chopped
Chicken – either whole or cut up
1 Lemon, juiced if using chicken portions, cut in half, when using a whole chicken

In a roasting pan, lay out your cut veggies. Pour on a couple tablespoons of olive oil, salt, and pepper, and a portion of your chopped herbage . Mix them up a little bit.

Lay the chicken on top of the vegetables. Consider the vegetables a sort of nest for the chicken. If using a whole chicken, fill the chicken cavity with the halved lemon, some herbs, and a few garlic cloves. If using chicken cut in pieces, sprinkle lemon juice, salt, and pepper over the chicken.
Mix up the maple syrup, ginger, mustard, olive oil, garlic, and herbs. Pour over the chicken.

Place in a 375 degree oven covered for an hour. Remove the foil after an hour. Place back in oven for another 45 minutes. Enjoy!
Filed Under: Dinner, Gluten Free, poultry · Tagged: , , , , , , , , ,
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