Minimally Invasive

Dad called to ask if there was anything special I wanted to eat during my weekend visit. Hmmm… early June in a bayou town… what could I say but boiled crabs?

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When life gives you rosemary…

make rosemary syrup!

Use it to top your couche-couche…

and start researching cocktail recipes that make use of it for later in the evening.

recipe after the jump

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I don’t mind messing with tradition on New Year’s Eve by staying in and avoiding crowds, but you’ll never catch me shirking my duty on New Year’s Day — for if I don’t have black-eyed peas and some form of greens to ring in the new year, disaster will surely fall upon the Roth household. And so we filled ourselves to the gills with creamy black-eyed peas for luck and spicy collard greens to attract money into our lives. Maybe it doesn’t work, but boy, are they tasty. And since they seemed to be crying out for some kind of plain protein, I added a poached chicken breast topped with a mustard sauce I made by mixing together Dijon, maple syrup, whiskey, a few drops of Worcestershire sauce and cayenne pepper.

As always, I used the black-eyed peas recipe from The Prudhomme Family Cookbook, and this time followed it to the letter by making my own pork stock. I think it added a depth of flavor to the dish that plain chicken broth just can’t, but if you don’t want to go to the trouble of making it yourself, it isn’t necessary. How, pray tell, did I make this stock? Well, I preheated my oven to 350 degrees and roasted one quartered onion, three lightly crushed garlic cloves, some pork short ribs, and a few split pig’s feet until they were golden brown. The smell was heavenly, even if the sight was decidedly less so:

Once the meat and veggies were roasted to perfection, I put the feet and ribs into a stock pot, added four cups of chicken stock, and additional water to cover the meat by an inch or so. After they simmered for about an hour, I added the roasted onion and garlic along with one stalk of celery and continued to simmer it for another hour. I set the ribs aside for later use (still trying to decide what to do with them, in fact), strained the broth, and refrigerated it overnight to more easily dispose of the fat. Because these beans have puh-lenty enough fat in them as it is if you use the full half pound of bacon suggested in the recipe.

They start out so healthy and with such potential, though:

But then you add the bacon, and — oh, yeah! — ANOTHER form of pork. This would be tasso — an intensely spiced, smoked bit of pork used for seasoning:

Did you observe any New Year’s Day culinary traditions, dear reader? Here’s wishing you all the luck, good fortune, and prosperity your life can hold. Cheers to a great 2008!

recipes after the jump

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Aaaand hello again! How was your week? Mine was terrific! An extended vacation was just what I needed, but it’s good to be back in my own bed, and very good to be in control of my caloric intake again, just the same. Let’s just say that if I didn’t gain weight over the holidays, it wasn’t for lack of trying. My dad greeted us everyday with, “Good morning. Y’all want biscuits?” and it just went downhill (calorically speaking) from there.

Oh, there were pork-laden dishes and creamysugary sweets and good ol’ home cooking and then three meals in New Orleans, one of which was among the best of my dining experiences. Whew! My stomach is exhausted and my taste buds need their own vacation, but more than that, I think I’ll be adding copious amounts of vegetables to our diets; we saw very few vegetables that weren’t used as mere seasoning in other dishes.

So, what specifically did we have? Well … my dad started us out with his chicken and sausage gumbo with warm potato salad, one of my favorite meals. My sister and her family joined us for our first lunch of the week, and it was just the way to kick off the holidays.

And then Mom and I started baking for Christmas Eve. Behold, the German Chocolate Pie (completely delicious, btw):

I’ll get the recipe from my mom the next time we talk. You’ll thank me.

And after a hard day of baking and wrapping presents, we all relaxed with my dad’s family and chowed down on some incredible food. Uncle Hubert brought his delicious jambalaya, Aunt Chris made her crock pot meatballs and pineapple-basted smoked sausage, and Aunt Geraldine picked up my favorite Christmas Eve treat on her way to town — spicy boudin. Here you see the Official MI Husband demonstrating his still-developing boudin-eating technique (he leaves a lot in the skin, but he’s getting better):

He just needs more practice. We caught a few episodes of the Bizarre Foods marathon during the week, one of which featured Andrew Zimmern doing a tour of a few gulf states. He started in bayou country and went to the place that made turducken famous — Hebert’s Specialty Meats. They also do a mean stuffed chicken and link their own boudin, so I think we’ll have to pay a visit when we’re back in town next June. All in the name of getting Gil up to speed, of course.

We came back home exhausted but too wound up to sleep, so we tuned in to the Christmas Story marathon on TNT (it’s a marathony time of year, I guess) and made our way to bed eventually, once we were sure Ralphie got his Red Rider BB Gun.

And then the smell of baking ham woke us Christmas morning. I’m no joy before my first cup of coffee, but I greeted that day with a smile, believe me.

We spent the day with my mom’s family, where we dined on the above-pictured ham, Uncle Phil’s cornbread dressing, cheesy broccoli casserole, mac & cheese, and lots of desserts. And this was only Tuesday! We still had three full days to go!

Dad refused to let us slow down in any way and cooked an enormous pot of white beans with the ham bone for Wednesday’s lunch. Oh, and because we couldn’t just have white beans (what kind of host would he be?) he fried a bunch of delicious tiny catfish filets for an accompaniment. How could I refuse? I was down a few pounds at the start of the trip, anyway…

Oh! I forgot the crab-stuffed mushrooms Mom made sometime during the week! Silly me.

And after ALL of that, we still had a day and three meals to go in New Orleans. Stay tuned for the details…

(If you want to check out the full flickr set of the week’s food & fun, just click here. I’ll let you know when Gil’s set is posted.)

We wish you a Merry Christmas …
and a happy new year! Take care, everyone, and thanks for stopping by.

For all Advent Calendar posts, click here.

recipe after the jump

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Apples and oranges
Every Christmas Eve as we exit the church, everyone is given an apple and an orange to celebrate the holiday. So you can pretty much count on a fruit salad at our house on Christmas day, is what I’m saying.

For all Advent Calendar posts, click here.

recipe after the jump

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Star of wonder
Not quite a disco Christmas, but close.

We’re off to Louisiana bright and early this morning. Merry Christmas to those of you who celebrate it, and Happy Long Weekend to those of you who don’t!

For all Advent Calendar posts, click here.

recipe after the jump

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There’s no place like home for the holidays
A glimpse of my parents’ tree.

For all Advent Calendar posts, click here.

recipe after the jump

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Peace, Y’all
A French Quarter balcony, spied last year. We’ll be back in just over a week — can’t wait.

For all Advent Calendar posts, click here.

recipe after the jump

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Because of my need to give homemade food gifts for the holidays, this is traditionally the weekend I atone for my lack of baking throughout the year — all at once. But instead of saying two dozen Hail Marys and 10 Our Fathers, my personal penance was making THREE batches of pralines, a few POUNDS of spiced nuts, and TWO types of cookies. Oh, my friends, I’m on a sugar high that would do Beavis proud. (What? You’ve never heard of quality assurance?)

For the pralines, I dug out my dad’s recipe which adulterates the traditional praline with marshmallows, but you’ve never tasted anything like them; they’re really creamy instead of gritty the way straight-sugar pralines can sometimes be. Gil would chime in to agree, only he’s shoving broken praline bits into his mouth and banging his head on the wall in the kitchen. Don’t worry — he’s wearing a bucket for protection. The sugar crash is going to be ugly.

But the real surprise of the weekend were the cookies, primarily surprising for the fact that I baked them and did not burn even one. I normally bring in savory treats for my co-workers (last year — bacon brittle and gougères), but I suspect people appreciate the sweet stuff a little bit more, so I was willing to go that extra mile for them. And we weren’t disappointed; I really hope they won’t be, either.

Here’s the really soft and sticky sugar cookie dough, cut and ready to be moved (CAREFULLY) to the parchment paper-lined baking sheet.

As it turns out, I didn’t really need to be SO careful because these cookies s-p-r-e-a-d in the oven.

But dressed up with chocolate and nut toupées, they turned very suave, indeed.

So I’m really looking forward to a well-deserved break from baking this week. Maybe I’ll be chained to my desk at work, but at least I won’t be in the kitchen, forced to bake and sample delicious sweets!

Are those tiny violins I hear in the distance?

Incidentally, how sad is it that this is the only brandy we have in the house? I had to break into our kitschy Eiffel Tower stash to flavor the cookies.

recipe after the jump

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