Cabbage and Sausage Bake

January 17, 2015January 17, 2015 / featherheadlady / 1 Comment

We all like one pan dinners with simple, very basic ingredients. This is a hardy meal that makes a great supper on a cold winter night. Easy to prepare and only one pan to wash! Preheat the oven to 375.

Ingredients:

1 head of cabbage

dozen or so new potatoes

6 slices thick bacon

2 cups (one large) yellow onion sliced thin

Polish sausage, kielbasa or bratwurst

salt and pepper to taste

2 cups chicken stock

Dice the bacon and cook over medium heat for about 5 minutes.

I did everything in my roaster. Thin slice the onion. I used a mandolin but I good knife will work fine. Add the onion to the bacon and drippings and cook over medium heat until the onion is tender.

Once the onions are tender set them aside and sear the sausages to brown them up a bit.

While the sausages are browning up wash your potatoes. Cut the cabbage in half, then into quarters. Core the cabbage and cut each quarter in half again.

Remove the browned sausage from the roaster and turn off the flame. Arrange the cabbage wedges in the roaster rounded side down.

Arrange the potatoes around the cabbage.

Add the browned sausage.

Add the onions and bacon as well as the drippings. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

Pour the broth over everything and cover the pan tightly with foil.

Bake for 90 minutes. Let it sit covered for 15 minutes after you remove it from the oven before serving.

Serve with steamed fresh green beans or broccoli and some nice crusty bread. And, of course, some spicy mustard.

Cabbage and sausage bake. It’s what was for supper. My dad would have enjoyed sharing this supper with us.

NOTE: If you prefer a tomato taste substitute a can of diced or fire roasted tomatoes and one cup V-8 juice or tomato juice for the chicken stock.

Bourbon Cherries

January 13, 2015January 13, 2015 / featherheadlady / 3 Comments

When we were visiting our daughter over the Christmas holiday she had made some bourbon cherries that made a great Manhattan. Maybe not a traditional Manhattan, but a pretty good variation. I made a batch of these tasty cherries when I got home and I think the longer they “cure” the better.

Ingredients:

1 fifth of bourbon (I used Evan Williams)

1 pint of grand Grand Marnier

1 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 T vanilla (or 2 vanilla beans slit)

1 T whole allspice

3 cinnamon sticks

a little grated nutmeg

32 ounces of frozen, pitted tart cherries

In a large heavy kettle combine bourbon, grand mariner, sugars and spices. Over low heat whisk until sugars are completely dissolved. DO NOT boil. Turn the heat off and allow it to steep and cool down. Once off the heat stir in the vanilla.

Put the cherries in glass jars and pour the cooled alcohol mix over the cherries. You can leave the spices in the jars but be careful to remove them before serving.

To prepare your faux Manhattan…

In a small glass with a little ice pour “cherry juice” over the ice. Add a couple dashes of orange or Angostura bitters. Spear a few cherries on a cocktail pick and serve. You can add a bit of orange or lemon peel for garnish if you wish. A traditional Manhattan has a little sweet or dry vermouth but the grand mariner is a great substitute.

I think these cherries would be awesome over a scoop of vanilla ice cream or on a dish of homemade rice pudding.

Cheers! Happy New Year.

Ring Bologna Bake – Käyrämakkarahe

January 9, 2015January 9, 2015 / featherheadlady / 7 Comments

Yup. That’s a ring bologna. It’s not my personal ring bologna and I’m not actually going to cook it but I’m going to tell you about ring bologna. It’s the crowning glory of one of my Dad’s favorite dinners. He calls it Finnish tube steak. You take a ring bologna, just like the one in the picture. Make a slit in the top all the way around. You put it in the oven at 350 for about 15-20 minutes and watch for it to begin to split open. Fill the opening with brown sugar and catsup and bake for another 15-20 minutes. Serve with mashed potatoes and a can of green beans or corn. I grew up in a family of 5 kids; me and 4 brothers. We had this quite frequently for dinner along with the potatoes and canned vegetables. I don’t know if my mother made two of them at a time or if all 7 of us shared the one Finnish tube steak. When my dad visited last summer I bought the best quality ring bologna I could find and made this for him. He was a happy man!

Since I’m not actually cooking one right now I had to get on line to find pictures and I discovered that ring bologna actually has it’s own Facebook page!

I’m not sure what the relationship is between the Green Bay Packers and ring bologna but this is ring bologna’s Facebook picture. I apologize to all the Lion fans in my family for this picture.

The other day I was reading through a Finnish cookbook by Beatrice Ojakangas and came across a couple paragraphs about ring bologna. She says, “Ring bologna is as popular in Finland as wienies are in the United States. The Finns have many ways to cook it. They cut it into pieces and cook it over a campfire as we cook wienies. A crowning touch to a sauna party in Finland is to roast ring bologna pieces over the hot sauna stove and eat the pieces with hot mustard. With these, one drinks kalja or olut (beer). Finns do not put the meat into bread as we do with weenies.”

Apparently the brown sugar and catsup bake is the Americanization of Finnish ring bologna.

In July of 1969 I traveled to Finland with my mummu (grandmother) and aunt and uncle. It was my grandmothers first visit back to her homeland in nearly 40 years. We spent a couple of weeks traveling the country and visiting family and friends. I had a vague recollection of the sauna/ring bologna experience so I got my “Air Travel Diary” out and read through the “places and events visited”.

July 13, 1969 we were in Kauhajoki visiting my grandfather’s relatives where I wrote, “He has a real nice home where we went to the sauna. The sauna had four rooms. First room was for undressing. Then you walked through the shower room and then into the hot sauna room. You suds up good and then back to the shower room to rinse off. Then you go into the sitting room before you dress and cook sauna bologna over a fire place.” There was no mention in my journal about beer but the adults may have imbibed. For non-Finnish readers unfamiliar with Finnish sauna practices I’ll elaborate on that another day.

I’ve been having long morning conversations with my dad and we get on these off the wall topics like ring bologna. While looking for suitable pictures I came across a Ring Bologna in the Crockpot recipe. Dad asked me to write it down and send it to him. He wants me to write it twice so he can mail a copy to a fellow Finn who loves ring bologna as much as my Dad does. If I ever make it I promise to blog about it. In the meantime get on line and check it out…there is a whole ring bologna culture out there!

Kaalipiirakka (Cabbage Pasty)

January 8, 2015January 8, 2015 / featherheadlady / Leave a comment

If you’re Spanish you might have empanadas, if you’re Polish pierogis, Italian raviolis, and if you’re Finnish kaalipiirakka (cabbage pasty). I was reading a Finnish cookbook today and came across this recipe. I didn’t grow up eating these but I might have. These would be served as an accompaniment to soup or as a bread side with a meal. I think they would be great with tomato soup! Bread is a mainstay of the Finnish diet…and true to his heritage my grandfather could not eat a meal without bread. I remember both of my grandparents eating bread slathered with butter and sprinkled with salt.

These little cabbage pasties are fairly easy to make. The slightly sweet pastry dough and the savory cabbage are a nice combination. They might be tasty with a dip of some kind…I’ll have to work on that. Suggestions??

Yeast Pastry ingredients:

2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast

1/4 cup warm water

1 cup whole milk, scalded and cooled to lukewarm

1 tsp salt

1 egg, well beaten

1/2 cup sugar

4-4 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup melted butter

Dissolve the yeast in the water. Beat the egg well with a whisk.

Combine the milk, salt, egg, and sugar in a large bowl.

Add the yeast and 2 cups of flour and stir with a wooden spoon until smooth and elastic.

Stir in the butter until blended. Add the remaining flour and mix until you have a stiff dough. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth. About 5 minutes.

Place dough in a lightly buttered bowl, cover with a towel and allow to rise in a draft free place until doubled in size. Punch down and let rise again for about 30 minutes. While dough is rising make your filling.

Filling Ingredients:

4 T butter

2 cups sauerkraut drained

2 medium onions sliced thin

2 T brown sugar

1 tsp caraway seeds

In a heavy skillet melt the butter. Add the onion and cook over medium heat until the onion is tender and beginning to caramelize.

Add the sauerkraut, sugar, and caraway seed. Stir until well blended and cook for 2-3 minutes. Remove from the heat. Our filling is ready.

Preheat your oven to 375.

Now you’re ready to roll your dough and fill your kaalipiirakka. Divide the dough into thirds and roll the dough about 1/3 inch thick on a lightly floured surface. Use a glass or cookie/biscuit cutter on the dough. I used a scalloped cutter but round would work just fine.

Brush each circle with half and half to moisten the edges for sealing. Put a tsp of filling in the center of a disc, put a second disc on top and crimp the edges with a fork.

(The amount of filling in each will actually depend on the size of your discs). Brush each filled and crimped kaalipiirakka with half n half and cut a little steam vent in the center. Put on a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Bake for 15 or 20 minutes until golden brown.

You’ll have extra filling. Just get out a fork and finish it off. Tastes great!!

Lemon and Garlic Chicken ala Pressure Cooker

January 6, 2015 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

Can you imagine cooking an entire chicken in 15 minutes that is moist and fall off the bone tender and has a delicious sauce? It’s that easy in my electric pressure cooker. The beauty of this pressure cooker is that you can brown, boil, simmer and keep food warm. One pan to wash and it’s easy to clean. If you don’t have a pressure cooker you can surely prepare this recipe using a roaster in your oven. Use a meat thermometer to make sure your chicken reaches 165F. I used to be a little frightened of pressure cookers…some of you might be as well. Afraid it would start rocking on the stove and the top would blow off leaving dinner on the ceiling. Trust me, the new electric model is easy to use, safe, and not the least bit scary.

Though I love the combination of garlic and lemon I was a little concerned that the flavors might be too strong but they were not. The sauce had a nice citrus tang but was not overpowering. Good balance. I think you’ll like it.

Ingredients:

1 roasting chicken cut into pieces (I saved the back for broth)

kosher salt to taste

3 T canola or olive oil

5-6 cloves of garlic sliced

1 tsp red pepper flakes

1 tsp oregano

1/2 cup vermouth or dry white wine

1/2 cup lemon juice

1/2 cup chicken stock

Fresh parsley chopped

Generously salt chicken pieces and heat oil in the pressure cooker. Add the chicken, a few pieces at a time, and brown on both sides. Remove browned pieces to a platter. While your chicken is browning squeeze your lemons and slice your garlic.

Add the garlic, oregano and red pepper flakes to the hot oil and cook for about 1 minute until garlic becomes fragrant.

Add lemon juice, vermouth and stock to the pot and arrange the chicken in the liquid.

Lock the lid and cook at high pressure for 15 minutes. Allow the pressure to release naturally. Remove the chicken to a serving platter. Bring the sauce to a boil and stir in chopped parsley. If you wish you can thicken the juices with a little flour or corn starch. Pour the sauce over the chicken and serve.

While the chicken was cooking I decided to prepare some smashed cauliflower for a side. An easy, tasty side.

Ingredients:

1 large head cauliflower cleaned and cut up

3-4 garlic cloves (I know, no vampires in our house!)

1-2 cups chicken stock or broth

1/2 cup Romano cheese shredded

1/2 cup Le Gruyere cheese shredded

2-3 green onions thin sliced

salt and pepper (white pepper if you have it) to taste

2 T butter

Cook cauliflower and garlic cloves in the chicken broth until the cauliflower is fork tender. Drain off the broth holding a little back to add in while smashing. Add butter to the cauliflower and begin mashing with an ordinary potato masher until the consistency of mashed potatoes. Add some of the broth if necessary. Add the shredded cheese, salt and pepper to taste and green onions stirring well. This is one of my favorite sides!

I was always taught to use contrasting colors on your plate and white and white are a bit off putting. So I added a sizable sprig of parsley (good for getting rid of garlic breath after dinner) and some cranberry relish which I think is a must have for any poultry dish.

And then there was color.

Lemon and garlic chicken with smashed cauliflower. It’s what’s for dinner tonight. And tomorrow night.

NOTE: My lemons were particularly juicy and 2 of them made a little over 3/4 cup of juice. I put the extra juice in a small zip lock snack bag and freeze it for a time when I have no fresh lemons on hand.

And seriously, parsley IS a good breath freshener.

Galette aka Rustic Tart

January 5, 2015January 5, 2015 / featherheadlady / 1 Comment

Pie is one of my favorite desserts and this rustic tart (or galette) is easy and beautiful in its simplicity. My good friend Jane introduced me to this recipe a couple years ago. She made hers with pears. It works with almost any kind of fruit filling….peaches, pears, apples, berries. Today I made it with pears and apples. Awhile back my daughter and I made a galette with apples and raspberries. I keep my cornstarch and baking powder right next to each other in my baking cupboard and I somehow confused the two. We wondered why our fruit was bubbling. Was a fail that we fortunately were not serving to guests. But, we did eat it ourselves. Waste not, want not…or something like that. Pay attention to the ingredients and I promise that you will enjoy this recipe.

Ingredients:

Pie crust (homemade or pillsbury refrigerated crust)

I prefer to make my own crust but in a pinch the refrigerated crust works fine.

5 cups of sliced fruit (I used 2 pears and 3 apples)

1/2 cup golden raisins or dried cherries or cranberries

1/2 cup amaretto

3 T cornstarch

3 T brown sugar

5 T white sugar

Preheat oven to 450

Peel, core and slice the apples. Core and slice the pears. Put them in a shallow dish with the raisins and amaretto and let them marinate for about 30 minutes. Longer is okay. While you’re waiting for the fruit, prepare your pastry. Roll out a disc about the size of a pizza pan.

Line a baking pan with parchment paper. Once your fruit has marinated combine the brown sugar, corn starch, and 3 T of the white sugar. Drain the amaretto from the fruit. (Save it, it’s perfectly fine to sip on while you finish preparing the tart). Toss the fruit in the sugar mixture. Heap the fruit in the center of the prepared pastry. Fold the edges over. Sprinkle with 2 T of granulated sugar.

Bake at 450 for 20 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 and bake for 45 minutes. Remove to a cooling rack.

Serve warm with a scoop of vanilla ice cream or at room temperature with a generous dollop of whipped cream.

Galette is a French word and means “any of various round flat pastries with a sugar glaze or a sweet filling such as fruit.” If you want to impress people serve them a “galette”. If you’re just serving it for dessert tonight call it a rustic tart. Either way, enjoy!

Spiral Veggie Pie

January 4, 2015 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

A few weeks ago a friend posted a recipe for a veggie spiral that looked beautiful and challenging. I love making meatless dishes and decided to try a modified version of the recipe. In the making of this dish I decided I need a new mandolin. Mine didn’t seem to cut the veggies as thin as they should have been and I had to use a wide peeler for the sweet potatoes and carrots.

Preheat oven to 375.

Ingredients:

2-3 yellow squash

2-3 zucchini

2 small eggplants

2 carrots

2 sweet potatoes

4 oz cream cheese at room temperature

1/2 cup sour cream

2 T Dijon mustard

fresh sage leaves

salt and pepper

olive oil

single pie crust

Prepare your pie crust.

Using a mandolin (or wide peeler) thin slice the vegetables. Do not peel the vegetables; the skins add color to the dish.

Using a hand mixer beat cream cheese, sour cream, and Dijon mustard until smooth.

Spread cream cheese mixture in the pie shell. Sprinkle with chiffonaded sage leaves.

Begin rolling the veggies, skin side up, in a spiral alternating the colors. Continue until you reach the ends of the dish.

Drizzle with olive oil and season with kosher salt and fresh ground pepper.

Bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes.

Cool for 5 minutes, slice and enjoy.

Great served with a salad and bread. It’s a beautiful dish in its own right that’s fun to prepare. A perfect vegetarian dish or a side for a meat dish.

Beef Short Ribs Asian Style

January 3, 2015 / featherheadlady / Leave a comment

I’ve been on holiday, so to speak, but I’m back to cooking and baking and blogging!

Last year I asked for and received an electric pressure cooker for Christmas. Like a lot of kitchen appliances I used it a lot at first and hadn’t taken it out for awhile. While we were visiting our daughter and her boyfriend over Christmas they reminded me how awesome this electric pressure cooker is and I remembered why I asked for it in the first place. It was late and we hadn’t planned on what was for dinner that night. They took a soup bone out of the freezer…yes, the freezer… put the frozen bone, some vegetables, broth and spices into the pressure cooker and in less than an hour we had truly awesome, tasty soup. Just before serving they added some cooked kale and gnocchi and garnished the soup with Parmesan. How great to be able to prepare great food with complex flavors in no time at all when you’ve worked all day.

Sometimes we can learn things from our kids! When I came home the pressure cooker was put back in service.

Tonight I made beef short ribs Asian style with rice and stir fried vegetables. The pressure cooker is easy to use and makes the meat fall off the bone tender.

Ingredients:

Beef short ribs, approximately 3-4 pounds with bone in

kosher salt and course ground pepper to taste

3 T olive oil

5-6 garlic cloves minced

1 T fresh grated ginger

1/4 cup soy salt

1/4 cup hoisin sauce

1/4 cup catsup (or 2 T tomato paste)

1 1/2 cups beef broth

2 T cornstarch

1/4 cup water or broth

Heat 2 T of the olive oil in the pressure cooker. Generously salt and pepper the ribs, add to the pressure cooker and brown. Transfer them to a plate as they get done.

Heat the remaining 1 T of oil and add the garlic, ginger, soy sauce, hoisin, catsup, and broth to the pot.

Stir to blend. Return the browned meat to the pot. Lock the lid and cook at high pressure for 25 minutes.

Release the pressure naturally. Remove the lid tilting it away from you to avoid escaping steam. Skim off any excess fat from the top of the sauce. Bring the sauce to a boil. Whisk the 2 T of corn starch into the water or broth and add to the sauce stirring until it’s thickened. Cover and keep on the warm setting until ready to serve.

While the ribs are cooking prepare the rice of your choice (jasmine, brown, long grain white).

Choose some of your favorite vegetables and do a quick stir fry. I used carrots, celery, onion, red pepper, pea pods, and broccoli.

Heat 2 T olive or sesame oil in a wok or heavy skillet. Cook your vegetables until tender crisp.

Plate your food. First the rice topped with the vegetables and short ribs. Ladle the sauce over the dish. I garnished with green onion, basil, and sesame seeds.

Short ribs with rice, stir fried veggies, and a rich, tasty sauce. It’s what was for dinner tonight.

NOTE: When I buy ginger I peel it, cut it into several pieces and freeze it in zip lock bags. I always have fresh ginger and it grates easily when frozen.

Pizza

December 19, 2014 / featherheadlady / 3 Comments

Almost everyone loves pizza! Hot pizza or cold pizza, deep dish or thin crust, lots of cheese or lots of sauce, meat lovers or veggie, white or red. There are so many variations, pizza can make almost everyone happy. You can divide the dough into small balls and roll out little individual pizzas. Let everyone choose their own toppings; a particularly fun thing to do with kids. Pizza. It’s what’s for dinner.

Pizza night starts with the crust.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups tepid water

2 1/4 tsp dry yeast

1/2 tsp salt

1 T olive oil

3 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp each dried oregano and basil (optional)

1/2 tsp garlic powder

Place tepid water in a bowl and mix in yeast and salt. Add the olive oil. Add 1 1/2 cups of flour, garlic, and herbs and stir with a wooden spoon. Add remaining flour and knead for five minutes until you have a smooth dough. Grease a bowl and allow the dough to rise until doubled in size, approximately an hour.

Divide dough in half or in smaller portions if making small, individual pizzas. Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface.

Preheat the oven to 450.

Once you roll the dough out place on a lightly greased pizza pan. Fold the edges over, lightly rub down with olive oil and pre-bake for approximately ten minutes. This helps to keep the crust from getting soggy.

Now we are ready to top the pizza. There are many prepared sauces that you might like or you can use fire roasted tomatoes, a little olive oil, and some herbs.

Blend the tomatoes, 1 T of olive oil and herbs to taste. Spread the sauce on your pre-baked crust.

Choose your favorite toppings. Tonight I’m using onions, peppers, artichoke hearts, portabella mushrooms, tomatoes and some organic pepperoni.

Spread the toppings.

I used romano cheese and fresh mozzarella. Grate the hard cheese over the toppings and distribute slices of mozzarella.

Bake for approximately 25 minutes until cheese is golden brown and bubbly. Enjoy this thing of beauty with a cold beer, soda, a nice wine or a glass of milk.

Like I mentioned earlier there are countless pizza toppings for every taste. Sausage, bacon, ham, pepperoni. Spinach, fresh basil leaves, arugula. Sweet peppers, banana peppers, peppadews, green olives, kalamata olives, black olives. Mushrooms, fresh tomatoes, roasted garlic, artichokes, asparagus, zucchini. And pineapple…my least favorite topping. Love it in an upside down cake but leave it off my pizza.

Mozzarella is the most common of pizza cheeses but provolone, feta, Parmesan, Romano, asiago, goat cheese, even Gorgonzola are great options. Different cheeses pair well with different veggies and meats. Most grocery deli sections and frozen food aisles have countless types and brands of pizzas. If you don’t have time to make a pizza from scratch doctor a grocery pizza up with fresh toppings and extra cheese to make it your own.

Note: The crust recipe makes enough for 2 large pizzas. If you only plan to make one, freeze half the dough BEFORE you let it rise. Divide the dough and place half in a zip lock freezer bag. When you’re ready to make a second pizza let it thaw/rise and your ready for pizza #2.

Boiled Dinner

December 15, 2014 / featherheadlady / 2 Comments

Boiled dinner is comfort food. It’s not glamorous or gourmet dining. It’s a dinner my grandmother used to make with pork chops or pork steaks. She probably didn’t put any vegetables or tomatoes in because my grandfather was a meat and potatoes kind of guy. I’m going to make our boiled dinner with Polish sausage. This dish is one of my dad’s favorites and I’m wishing he was here with us to enjoy it. A very simple dish to prepare in one pot. It’s a dish that is flexible and can accommodate to what’s in your fridge or what’s not in your fridge. I’ll give you the basics.

Ingredients:

2 T olive oil

1 medium head of cabbage

1 large onion

3 carrots

2 stalks of celery

5-6 redskin potatoes

3-4 cloves of garlic minced

2 tsp caraway seeds

salt and pepper to taste

1 pound Polish sausage

1 pint stewed tomatoes

4 cups chicken broth

Rough chop the onion, celery and carrots. Heat olive oil in a heavy kettle and sweat the vegetables for 3 minutes or so. Mince the garlic cloves and add to the kettle.

Rough chop the potatoes and rinse them. Add to the other vegetables in the kettle.

Core and rough chop the cabbage and add to the kettle.

Cut the sausage into 1 inch pieces and add to the kettle. Add the caraway seed and salt and pepper to taste. Add tomatoes and chicken broth. Cover the kettle and bring to a gentle boil over medium heat. Reduce heat. Simmer over low heat for 2 hours or so. Occasionally give it a stir.

Ladle into soup dishes, add a small pat of butter and enjoy with some good bread.

So that’s a boiled dinner. You could substitute pork chops or pork steaks. Cube them and let them cook in the broth. If you prefer andouille or a mild Italian sausage that will work. If you want more vegetables add green beans, parsnips, rutabaga, or turnips.

It’s what’s for dinner.