Pesto, Pizza, Pasta, And Eliza BD

We had a couple of big basil plants at the end of the season so before they got frost bit, we opted to turn them into pesto just as we did last year.  After stripping the leaves from the plants, I packed them into large measuring cups and ended up with 12 cups.  Then I adjusted Ina Garten’s recipe for the other ingredients to match them. 

Homemade Basil Pesto And Leftover Meatloaf

We had a good crop of basil in our herb garden and with frost predicted, we decided to turn some of it into pesto to freeze.  We used Ina Garten’s recipe for the pesto and I amended it for the amount of basil we had to get the recipe below.

Basil Pesto – Adapted from Ina Garten

Ingredients:

3/8 cup English walnuts

3/8 cup pine nuts, lightly toasted

5 tablespoons chopped garlic

7½ cups fresh basil leaves, packed tight

1½ teaspoon kosher salt

3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2¼ cups good olive oil

1½ cup freshly grated Parmesan

Directions:

Place the walnuts, pine nuts, and garlic in the bowl of a food processor fitted with a steel blade. Process for 30 seconds.

Add the basil leaves, salt, and pepper. With the processor running, slowly pour the olive oil into the bowl through the feed tube and process until the pesto is thoroughly pureed.

Add the Parmesan and puree for a minute. Serve, or freeze in half cup containers.  

Random Food And More Bionic Me

We interrupt our trip to the Midwest for some other stuff.

We made some old-fashioned salmon cakes recently for supper using canned salmon and we had a leftover that I turned into a breakfast omelet.  I chopped it up and reheated it in butter and when it was hot, I moved it to one side of the pan and poured two beaten eggs over it and the rest of the pan.  I added shredded cheddar to the non-salmon side of the pan, covered, and cooked until the eggs were set.  I slid it out of the pan folding it into omelet shape as I did and topped with a dollop of dill aioli to get this delicious breakfast.

My Home Made Corned Beef

We’d been buying corned beef lately but I’m usually disappointed with the small size and the last one we cooked was about one third fat and the whole thing only made four Reubens.  So, I decided to get back into making my own using the 13.64 lb. choice brisket I had in the freezer and that was bought on sale for $1.99/lb. 

Our First Homemade Kraut In Several Years & Chicken Salad Breakfast

It’s hard to believe it’s been 10 years since we made a big batch of kraut and since then we’ve been buying it from the Mennonite market.  While theirs is very good, it has still been processed (cooked a little) which takes away from the flavor somewhat and while you can buy theirs raw, you have to order it in advance which we haven’t done.  When I mentioned to Bev that we should order some she insisted we make our own so we bought some of their cabbage instead and after trimming, we had 10 pounds.

A New Smoking Machine & Tomato Canning

I’ve been using my gas grill with a smoke box to BBQ with only mediocre results and after having my little hobby/business for several years, I got used to the good stuff.  The big Stumps smoker that I used then is too much for what I cook now and I have been thinking about something else.

A few weeks ago, a couple from our RV club invited us to their place for BBQ and I was looking forward to checking out his cooker in addition to eating the food.  He has a Masterbuilt Electric Smoker that uses wood chips for the smoke and an electric element for the heat.

So after watching the cook and eating the meat, I decided I couldn’t go wrong at only $375 for the smoker and stand plus I bought a cover. I got the next size larger than our friends so I could easily cook for a crowd when I wanted.  

Stewed Okra and Tomatoes

Believing I wasn’t much of a fan, it’s been years since I’ve eaten stewed okra and tomatoes, much preferring my okra to be fried but Bev decided it would be a good way to use our extra tomatoes and the okra we were given so I reluctantly agreed.  It was delicious and while the plan was to put some in the freezer, we ate it all over a couple of days so we had to wait a few days to gather more tomatoes and okra before making the freezer batch using the recipe below which was modified from the one from Spicy Southern Kitchen.  The original recipe and more pics like this one can be found by clicking on the link.

Homemade Dill Pickles

We don’t eat a lot of dill pickles but we prefer the garlic dills we make ourselves using a particular variety of cucumbers (name unknown) that we get from the Englewood Amish Market.  

Home Made Corned Beef

For St Paddy’s day, we had a store bought corned beef and Bev just loved it with the only problem being they are usually so small we don’t have enough leftovers for the things I really like – hash and Reubens.

So I decided to take matters into my own hands and bought two nice, big, top choice whole briskets from Food City (except part of the deckle was removed) to turn into corned beef then smoke one into pastrami (more about this later).

I trimmed them up and since the deckle was just a thin slab, I removed it to get rid of the big layer of fat between the deckle and the flat muscles.  Here they are in the pan. 

Bread and Butter Pickles

As is usually the case with squash, this year were having difficulty finding a home for all of our cucumbers – I over planted and they are doing great.  We still have dill pickles from last year and I asked Bev if she’d like some bread and butter pickles to which she gave a half-hearted okay.

When I was a kid, I was fed them a lot, but always preferred the onions to the cucumbers and rather than love them, they are definitely not my favorite – I’m a garlicky dill kinda man.  I went looking for recipes and settled on one from food.com in part because it was described as “... grandmothers recipe” by the recipe writer but mostly because it had the lowest sugar to vinegar ratio I found.  I’m thinking if they are less sweet, I might enjoy them.

The recipe was from cuisinebymae on September 12, 2003 and I followed the it as written.

Ingredients:

15 cups sliced pickling cucumbers

3 onions, thinly sliced

1/4 cup coarse salt

4 cups cracked ice

2 1/2 cups cider vinegar

2 1/2 cups sugar

3/4 teaspoon turmeric

1/2 teaspoon celery seed

1 tablespoon mustard seeds

Directions:

1. Combine cucumbers, onions, salt and ice in a large bowl and mix well.

2. Put a weight on and allow to stand 3 hours. (For a weight, I use a plate with a gallon bottle of vinegar or water on top of it).

3. Drain thoroughly.

4. Combine vinegar, sugar, turmeric, celery seed, and mustard seed in a large pot.

5. Add drained cucumbers and place pot on medium low heat.

6. Bring almost to a boil, but DO NOT ALLOW TO BOIL.

7. Remove from heat.

8. Seal in sterilized jars, 10 minutes in a hot water bath. (I put mine in a 3 quart jar and did not process them but will keep them in the fridge instead)

Bev tried some when they'd cooled to room temperature and said she absolutely loved them - unlike the days required for dills, these begin to taste pickled after just a few hours.  Then, rather than the half-hearted okay, she enthusiastically wanted to make some more as soon as we had enough cukes.  We both liked the yellow color given to the white skinned cukes by the turmeric and mustard seeds.

Photos best if enlarged by clicking on them.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

7/5/2013 eventl date