I can rock a roux — and a stew

As I thought about making dinner this evening, about having too many vegetables in my fridge, and about preparing something for my family while I am away meditating in the beauty of southern Indiana woods this weekend, I realized that I only had one option: head to the cookbookcase for one of my favorite cookbooks. Besides all that, I was just in the mood to do some creative cooking.

One might argue that I have far more cookbooks than one person needs, but I like to read them. My go-to cookbook, though, is Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food. Second in line? Without question, it is Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food. I just love that someone can write a 800 page cookbook about “everything” and then create a sequel that is just as long — and just as good!

So, what did I make? Let’s look at what I had:

Okra gets such a bad rap. Slimy? It can be if it’s old or if it isn’t cooked correctly. It also has a rep for being fibrous. Stringy and slimy? Doesn’t sound very appealing, does it? But, okra is one of those foods that I think most people would like if they had it prepared correctly. And it isn’t difficult to do. Be sure to buy smaller pieces of okra, prepare it when it is fresh, and don’t overcook it.

I started with a recipe for Okra Stew with Roux (How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, page 324). From using Bittman’s cookbooks, I’ve learned about three things: technique, quality ingredients, and flavor profiles. When I was first learning to cook (not all that long ago!), understanding these gave me confidence to experiment with a base recipe. I didn’t have as much okra as the recipe called for, nor did I have enough tomatoes. But, I did have some green beans, having frozen several pounds bought at the farmers’ market earlier this summer. The recipe stated that any green bean was an acceptable substitute. I also had a zucchini that I thought was going to end up in a quick bread. It’s destiny was elsewhere. I needed one large onion, but only had a smallish one. I immediately targeted one of the monster-sized shallots in the bin to accompany the similar-sized onion.

First step was to lightly brown — golden is the actual color you want — the onion and shallot slices. After removing most of them from the pot, I began a roux. Roux used to terrify me. “Can you make a roux?” was something that Emeril used to say on his early Food TV program. That did nothing to convince me that I could. Roux, it turns out, is actually very easy.

For some people though, like me, the patience to make one is the difficult part! It takes time and constant stirring.

For this recipe, 1/4 cup oil and 1/4 cup flour, cooked over low heat with nearly non-stop stirring for about 10 minutes gives you the perfect base for a vegetable stew. Eventually the flour and oil mixture begins to thicken and brown. Bittman advises that you stir until the mixture “darkens to the color of tea and becomes quite fragrant”.

 It is a nutty scent, not a burnt odor.  If you begin to burn the flour, turn down the heat! If you burn it, throw it out and try again; it’s only oil and flour. You could make this stew without it, but you’ll miss the depth of flavor and the thickening you get from the roux.

When the roux was ready, I added the okra to the pot and seared it.

After a few minutes, I added garlic. A few minutes after that, I added some cherry tomatoes and 2 cans of diced tomatoes in their juices (any tomatoes would do) and some oregano.

Then I deviated from Bittman’s recipe, adding the thawed green beans,

the zucchini,

1 cup of Hoosier Momma Bloody Mary mix and about 1/2 cup of water.

Hoosier Momma’s is an Indianapolis company that I first became acquainted with at the local Farmers’ Market. Although they only sell in 7 states right now, they’re quickly expanding. If they aren’t in your area, you can buy online. Not only does this mix make a great Bloody Mary, but both the original and spicy versions are great to cook with. It is vegetarian and gluten-free, if those things are important to you. I certainly recommend this great mix. It’s not your father’s bloody mary mix!

I brought all the ingredients to a boil, then turned the heat to low, covered and let it stew for about 45 minutes.

The result? Delicious!

Ingredients for original recipe:
6 T extra virgin olive oil
1 large onion, thickly sliced
1 pound okra
2 T chopped garlic
4 cups chopped tomato
1 T minced fresh oregano

I added:
1 large zucchini, chopped
1 cup green beans
1 shallot
1 cup Hoosier Momma Bloody Mary Mix

* So you know — and so that I’m following governmental rules — I have received no compensation for use or mention of any products in this post.

By Any Other Name…

My father used to routinely ask my mother what was for dinner. Her favorite name for leftovers was “Clean Out the Fridge”. If she said this to a child likely to turn up her nose, it was “goulash”. Where she got the idea that goulash was throw everything into a pot, I will likely never know.

One day, my father asked: What do you call that?

When he received the usual answer, he chided: Can’t you call it anything more appealing?

That was met by a roll of the eyes. And followed by a wink towards me. From the next several days my mother and I would wait to hear the question: What do you call that? so that we could respond with the most outrageous thing we could think of.

One harried day, when Mom was in no mood to play, my father offered his usual query.

Whatever you want to call it! she said tersely. It’s ham. Cheese. Some leftover veggies. It’s one of a kind. If you want everything to have a name, give it one!

But I’m not creative! my father pleaded.

Ham au gratin, my mother said. It’s not a masterpiece. It’s dinner.

But everything you serve is a masterpiece to me. You’re an artist!, he replied, trying to lighten the mood.

I had to add to the conversation: If it’s a masterpiece, name it! It’s abstract. Call it Etude #27. Or Nude Descending the Staircase.  Like something you’d see in a museum.

My father, wisely, retreated without a word as my mother and I burst into laughter.

Always a place on my cookbook shelf for Madame Childs.

My mom was a great home cook, but she rarely did anything fancy. I know I must have some memories mixed up, because it seemed like we had eggs for breakfast nearly every day. Yet, I know that she would only buy three dozen to feed 9 for the week. While Mom did her everyday magic at the stove, I was fascinated by shows like The Galloping Gourmet or Julia Childs. They seemed so far removed from our kitchen table that it didn’t seem like it was even in the same realm.

Today marks the 100th birthday of the inimitable Julia Childs. As I watched this clip from the 1980’s — it’s so Julia; so Letterman — I remembered Etude #27. Just like my Mom, Julia could think on her feet and figure out how to make chicken salad out of something else.

h/t to Open Culture for leading me to the YouTube link! (Open Culture is great. Be warned: you’ll spend time there — and not regret a thing!) Be sure to watch to see what Julia says she does with food that doesn’t turn out right.

By any other name, when faced with malfunctioning equipment, a hamburger can be Steak Tartare Au Gratin. That is if you are a chef like Julia Childs, or you have an ebullient, joyous personality and know that a good part of cooking, like so much in life, is confidence peppered with a great sense of humor.

Adventures in the Culinary Arts I

I have a cookbook collection, that at first glance, to some, seems a least an embarrassing amassment of gastronomic knowledge or, at worst case, the sign of an unchecked obsession. Long before I learned how to cook, I collected cook books, with the hope of some day actually using them. Even without any plans to cook, when not in search of a recipe, I still will peruse a cookbook. But, I must confess, there are several that I have never used.

My very first cookbook was bought in the Spring of 1980, in a Covent Garden junk shop (long since gone, I assume, as this was the tattered Covent Garden of the past, not the gentrified Covent Garden of today) called The Inside Out Shoppe. I had wandered through there one day with a friend and found The Covent Garden Cookbook, an intriguing volume, with illustrations that seem much like today’s graphic novels, that not only discusses the proper treatment, storage and preparation of vegetables, but also discusses the long history of the Covent Garden market.

I don’t remember what else I bought on that trip to England and doubt that I still have anything but photographs and a framed brass rubbing stored somewhere in my basement, but I still have this cookbook. And, I was hooked! Since then, cookbooks are just about the only item that I’m likely to bring home from a trip.

Which is how I acquired, apparently from the note I wrote in the front cover in 2004, The Monticello Cook Book, which claims on the front to contain recipes of great Worth and of the widest Variety. Secrets of the delectable Dishes from Ancient & Modern times by the good Ladies of the City of Charlottesville and the County of Albemarle.

Yesterday, with an abundance of blueberries in my kitchen, I decided to make blueberry jam. Surely one of the simplest things to do, as all you need is a pot, some blueberries and a heat source. You may want a bit of sugar if they are too tart, or a bit of lemon if you need to add some acidity, but blueberries, pot, and heat are all that are needed — and some patience as you slowly reduce the berries to a wonderful, bubbly, thick jam. The kind of jam that you can’t wait to eat. The kind a jam that you don’t care if it isn’t going to last more than a few days — you will eat it before it spoils. The kind of jam that cries out to be put on some kind of bread, fresh out of the oven. Which is how I happened, while scanning my kitchen book case (yes, it is a full book case, in my kitchen!), I came across The Monticello CookBook, which appears to have never been put to use in my kitchen.

It was late in the afternoon, and I had no yeast nor desire to venture out to the store, so a quick bread was the obvious choice and I quickly settled upon the recipe for “Nut Bread”. But, since I’m not a chemist — err, I mean, a baker — I didn’t really think through this recipe before I began. It wasn’t until I added the milk and the egg that I started to wonder. Really? Only 1 egg? Only 1 cup of milk? as I started to mix what I expected to be a batter, but was really a dough. 3.5 cups flour, 1 cup sugar, 3.5 t baking powder, 1 cup nuts, 1 egg, 1 cup milk: that makes a very dry dough!

Putting my concerns behind, and realizing that I had enough time to get rid of the evidence of another baking failure before anyone else was home, I decided to proceed with the recipe. And you know what? It was funny looking. It wasn’t like any nut bread that I’ve ever had, but it was good. The perfect complement to my blueberry jam.

What it was, regardless of what the good ladies of Albemarle thought when they put together this collection in 1950, is a scone. I pulled the King Arthur Flour Cookbook off the shelf this afternoon to read what they have to say about scones. “The oldest quick bread”, the book said, and that if one could master a quick bread dough, one should be able to make easy work of a quick bread batter. As for the basic King Arthur scone recipe, it was amazingly like the one I used, except it called for butter, with the precise measurement of “2 to 8 tablespoons (each end of the spectrum is fine…)”.
(edited: I was corrected by my SO (hereafter to be referred to as Mr. Foodie) that the King Arthur was his cookbook!)
Regardless of what you call it, I think I did an okay job with it and there is yet another cookbook on my shelves that I can say I have used.