Tormented Kitchen

Since my dear hubby went hunting and brought home a lovely deer, we've been busy butchering it up.  Justin usually does the most basic cleaning out in the field.  He guts and skins it before it comes home.  Sometimes, he keeps the animal whole. If the weather is too warm, he quarters it and brings it home in coolers with ice. We usually cut it all down into steaks, stew, and jerky meat right away. I asked him to make some big roasts this year. I have some plans that involve making some pretty fancy British venison dishes. They mostly call for venison stock or demiglaze to complete the sauces. Here was my chance to make some stock, too. I made sure he saved me a bunch of good bones. I used the leg bones and part of the pelvis. We sawed them into pieces with the reciprocating saw, and I got busy cooking before the marrow had a chance to get weird. Now I have some beautiful stock ready for action! PS. This recipe will also work for other red meat animals if you don't...

Doesn't everyone love banana bread?  I will occasionally make it without nuts because sometimes I feel like a nut, sometimes I don't. Ba dum dum! (cymbal crash!) Ok, that was cheesy of me. Sorry. Anyhoo. I like banana bread, pumpkin bread, zucchini bread, all sorts of quick breads.  This is one of my favorites. This batch, I made using chopped Brazil nuts and it was fantastic. Rose usually makes hers with walnuts, but my dear hubby (her grandson) is allergic to them. I typically choose pecans as my general go-to nut for baking. Ingredients 1/2 cup shortening 1 cup sugar 2 eggs 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 cups AP flour 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/4 cup sour milk (add about 1 teaspoon lemon juice to regular milk, let set until it's curdled) 3 large ripe bananas, mashed about 1 1/2 cups 1/2 cup chopped Brazil nuts, walnuts, or pecans Method 1. Cream the shortening and sugar until mixed well.  Add the eggs and vanilla. 2. Sift to...

Oh my goodness. I forgot to post about rib cook off!  Yes, we went. We went more than one day, mind you. We are connoisseurs of ribs. It seemed like they spaced out the rib booths further from each other than in years past. That made walking around much easier.  We also took advantage of the free bus rides from the Legends mall to the downtown Sparks bus station. We got ribs from the vendors directly and then also one night we went into the Rib Village for the smorgasbord. The kids now love ribs and devoured them faster than me! We noted that few of the rib-smokers had whole suckling pigs roasting away. They were about $175 a pig. We wandered through the vendor booths and the food providers. The kids played in the water fountain in front of the theater and enjoyed a few carnival rides, day and night. We ate a little of everything. Fried zucchini, onion rings, fried peaches, funnel cake, cream puffs, ice cream bars, ribs, ribs, ribs, and washed it down w...

It's starting to cool down where I live. It's fall. That means it's comfort food season. One of my favorite comfort foods is clam chowder.  Dear hubby Justin is off hunting. My folks came up to help with the kids while he's away. I made this for dinner since they are very fond of chowder. The kids are still in their weird food phases, so they wouldn't touch it. Silly kids! I wonder how long it will be until they figure out what they've been missing.   Ingredients 1 white onion, minced 4 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled 1 tablespoon butter 4 large potatoes, peeled and diced 2 cans clams in juice, (1 can chopped, 1 can minced) 1/8 teaspoon ground thyme 1/8 teaspoon white pepper 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce 1 teaspoon chicken bouillon granules 2 cups milk 1 cup heavy cream 2 Tablespoons flour 1 tablespoon minced parsley Method 1 Saute butter and onion until onion has softened. Add the bacon, potatoes, and juice from the canned clams t...

Way back when I was a kid, my mom used to make bread pudding. She also had two different sauces and you never knew which one she felt like making until it was on the table.Sometimes it was a glossy lemon sauce. Sometimes it was whiskey sauce. I've had tons of bread pudding over the years and I keep changing what goes on top.  That depends on what ingredients I've added to the bread pudding itself.  Chocolate chips baked into the bread pudding with Chantilly creme on top is really good. I also happen to love the recipe below with pecan praline sauce on top. This example has a simple homemade vanilla caramel sauce drizzle.  Not to shabby for a weeknight, don't you think? Ingredients 1 small loaf (1lb or so) of cinnamon bread or white bread, cubed, I keep the crust on 6 eggs 3 cups milk, I used whole milk 1 1/2 cups heavy cream 2 teaspooons vanilla extract 1/2 cup white sugar 1/2 cup vanilla sugar dash of salt 3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon Method 1. Sprea...

Last week, two of the ingredients in my mystery box that didn't get used for mystery dinner, got used on another night.  Hey, I was not letting this good stuff go to waste! A while back a saw a recipe from Giada de Laurentiis. So I made it. It was good. The kids wouldn't touch it because, ack! Green veggies! They're weird kids. They might eat broccoli and green beans, but forget anything else green. Oh well. Kids go through phases. I hope it won't last too long. Anyhow, I eye'd Giada's recipe and cooked it up. It sounded perfect. I had the pancetta and sprouts left from the mystery box. And you know pancetta is the Italian version of bacon so it has to be good. Anything with bacon is delicious. Yum, fresh sprouts! I trimmed off the stem end and washed them. Aren't they cute? Like miniature cabbages. Diced up pancetta frying away.  The addition of garlic was so tantalizing. Mix it all up, hot and juicy. Add a splash of chicken broth and s...

Recently, Mom brought me a couple bags of potatoes from her garden. I was quite pleased to get her potatoes since my potatoes failed thanks to bugs.  Darn it for trying to figure out organic gardening. So what do you make with lots of potatoes? A while ago, I was looking up French potato casserole recipes, like potatoes dauphinoise and potatoes a la boulangere. They are very similar in technique. Both require peeled, thinly sliced potatoes baked in a dish with some liquid.  Dauphinoise uses cream or milk, while boulangere uses stock or broth. Now let me remind you, food does not turn out perfectly for me every time. I wish it did! This was tasty, but a bit soupier than I wanted. I managed to use onions from my garden and they were so good! I added bacon because everyone loves bacon and it really compliments potatoes in general. Ingredients about 4 pounds of potatoes, I used Mom's red potatoes 4 slices of thick bacon, sliced into lardons 1 large onion, sliced 1...