New England Clam Chowder on the Fly

Clam chowder is one of my absolute favorite things in the world. When I was young and set in my ways (as opposed to now when I am slightly older and set in my ways), I would pretty much always order the same thing to eat when I went out with my parents: grilled cheese and clam chowder. And I mean New England clam chowder. If there is one thing that will vamp up my New Englander pride more than anything else, its the superiority of our chowder. Thick, creamy and delicious with big chunks of tasty veggies and clams...that's how a chowder should be.

That being said, it occurs to me that I don't think I have ever made clam chowder before. I know my mother has a recipe for a low-carb chowder (made when we were all on the Atkins diet a million years ago), but I don't think I ever even made that recipe. Despite that, Sunday night my mother mentioned that she had collected the ingredients for clam chowder and Monday night I found myself flying blindly, yet somehow confidently, into my first attempt. Clam chowder is a passion of mine, surely I could just make it by instinct.

I searched the fridge and freezer for bacon but none was to be found. That was really my only setback for the evening and easily solved when my father suggested rendering some salami he was currently slicing up for a pre-dinner snack. Once I had something to sautee my veggies in, I chopped up 3 peeled potatoes, 6 stalks of celery, half an onion, 3 peeled carrots and a partridge in a pear tree. Everything got mixed up with a spoonful of minced garlic. Once all the veggies were nicely mixed up and starting to get their cook on, I poured in water/clam juice that I drained from my large can of clams and set everything to simmer for a while.



In the large soup pot, I started to make my roux. I melted two whole sticks of butter (this chowder sure wasn't going to be healthy but it was going to be rich) and whisked in about a cup and a half of flour until it was thick and smooth. I slowly whisked in Half and Half until I got the consistency I wanted.

It was around this time my mother came into the kitchen and said "Do you know what you're doing?" and I answered honestly, "Nope."



I turned the heat off of my roux and made a little over two cups of clam broth using some clam base, which I kept set aside. I kept checking my veggies while they were simmering away until I could easily slice a large hunk of potato with a spoon. Then, one ladle-full at a time, I added my veggies (including the clam juice), my clam broth and the now-drained can of clams to my roux. I turned the heat back on and kept it on just long enough for everything to mix up and heat through. While I was mixing I added fresh cracked pepper, garlic salt and a little Old Bay seasoning. Right before turning off the heat and serving, I stirred in a bit of red wine vinegar.

Although I can never be 100% pleased with my cooking results, I was pretty excited more than anything else about the consistency. I wanted a nice, thick chowder and that's what I got. It needed a bit more seasoning, but that can always easily be adjusted bowl by bowl, whereas trying to thicken a chowder after its done would probably end disastrously. I've had it for lunch the last two days and is the perfect thing for a dark, rainy Connecticut December.

Honestly, I think the thing I am most disappointed in is my pictures for this entry. Since renewing my blog mojo I have been looking at other blogs and the photos I have been seeing make me understand why people use the term "food porn". Maybe I should stop using my cell phone and break out an actual camera.

I think this post might be the closest entry I have so far to being an actual recipe, since I did try to mention measurements when I could. Question for my reader(s) for the future: would anyone actually use a recipe if I tried to write down what I was doing during one of my "flying by the sea of my pants" cooking adventures?

NaNoBlogMo 28 - How NOT To Make Maple Sugar Candy

I was searching for another blog post topic when I got a message from my mother saying that she had found a huge, unopened bottle of maple syrup at the cabin and when I came up to join them for the long thanksgiving weekend, I should try to make maple sugar candy. I found this recipe and read the reviews and comments (my usual method before choosing whether or not to follow a recipe). It seemed like it would be easy enough, so I packed up the candy thermometer and a good cooking pot. Saturday night my mom pointed out that I still hadn't attempted to make the candy. I poured a good amount of maple syrup in the pot, but a small enough amount that I thought wouldn't boil over (maybe about 4 cups) with a few drops of oil (which according to comments could help keep the boiling down) and clipped the candy thermometer on the side. Slowly I stirred and watched the temperature rise.

What was initially a slow and boring case of waiting and watching a pot of maple syrup not boil soon became a maple-splosion. I was incorrect in thinking that the amount I had chosen was small enough to prevent a boil-over. I turned the heat down as soon as it looked like I was in the danger zone, but the damage was done and I ended up with hot syrup all over the stove. Cutting my losses, I moved to another burner and got the syrup to a near boil. I was more concerned about avoiding another mess than hitting the temperature mentioned in the recipe. I turned the heat off and mixed for over 10 minutes, but the syrup never changed color or consistency. I figured the problem was having not reached the right temperature. In order to try again and avoid the boil issues, I split what I had into two batches and started again with just half.

This time I aimed to hit the right temperature. This time it seemed like it was thickening, so I poured it into my pre-greased glass dish and waited. Even after letting it sit for a while, it was only about as thick as honey. Thicker than when it started, but not by much. I took the other half and tried for a third time. This time I made absolutely sure to hit and stay at the target temperature for a little while. After it cooled, I stirred and was relieved to finally see a significant change in color and consistency. I poured it into another container. I reboiled the batch that had reached the "honey" level the same way and poured it on top. The whole time the cabin was filling up with the amazing maple smell that made me think of Sunday morning pancake breakfasts.

After letting everything sit for a while, I was not left with creamy, melt-in-your-mouth, maple sugar candy like I had hoped. What I had poured into the bake tin had instead become something very akin to taffy. Thick, stretchy, tough but oddly pliable and very sticky. Of course it tastes good because all that's in it is maple syrup, but it was about as far from the texture I wanted as physically possible.

I am not 100% sure what went wrong. I searched through the recipe comments but no one else mentioned taffy-like results. My best guess as to why the candy failed was that I didn't stir it fast/hard/long enough. And the only reason that that is my guess is when I was furiously trying to scrape the last bits of syrup out of the pot to pour into the baking tin, the syrup on the spatula turned the color of maple syrup candy. A pale, creamy, opaque color.

These pictures here can best show the consistency of my results. On the left you can see that I pulled and bent a hunk out to taste. As tasty as it was, there was the slight concern of pulling out a tooth. When I came back a few minutes later, the candy had oozed back to fill in the hole I had made by pulling out a piece.

Honestly, I think this might be the kind of thing that my 'rents and I nibble at for a few days before the rest gets thrown away.

Maybe someday after I shake off this failure, I might try again. I do love maple sugar candy and it would be great to be able to make it at home. If anyone has made maple sugar candy successfully before, please share any advice or tips!

NaNoBlogMo 26 - Making Chinese Dumplings

This will be my most cheaterly post for all of NaNoBlogMo, I promise. This post below the line is a word for word and picture for picture copy of a blog post I did in 2009 in my China blog. I have a decent post scheduled for tomorrow. I wanted to post something with a video in it as I have done for every Saturday this whole project, but that kind of limited my options. I had already posted sword fighting and guitar playing videos and I couldn't find any decent improv videos, but I found my dumpling video and figured I would take it easy on myself during the Thanksgiving holiday. So if you haven't already read/watched me talk about making Chinese dumplings, please enjoy!

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Alrighty, here is how you make Chinese Dumplings!
First off you make the dough. Zeno made the dough with just dumpling flour and water. She kneaded it for a long time. According to her, you know when it's ready when it feels "smooth like a young girl's arm". After it's all mixed you set it aside for a bit and work on your filling.
Then you chop a lot. We made shrimp dumplings so the three main ingredients were shrimp, egg and what we called "grass" because I wasn't 100% sure what the English name for what we were using, and it looks like grass. I am pretty sure it's Chinese chives...Chopping up some scrambled up eggs...
Here is the lovely dumpling filling all mixed up. We also add some dried up tiny little prawns and some sesame oil. One of my favorite jobs that I did on Friday night was going through the mixture and picking out with chopsticks any piece of "grass" that was too long. Ha.
Now you start making your wrappings. You roll the dough out like a snake, making sure it's an even thickness.
Then you roll the dough stick back and forth while you cut it into sections so that the pieces look like this:
The pieces will be sticky on both ends. Only rub flour into one side, as the stickiness in the middle will help the filling to stick. Smush each dough piece with your hand.
Using your rolling pin, work from the outside in, turning the dough piece constantly, to get a nice round wrapper. You want it to be a little thicker in the middle so that it doesn't rip and spill out all the delicious filling.Here is the first wrapper I made by myself. I approve.
Then, using chopsticks, scoop up some filling into your wrapper. Don't overfill or it'll explode!Closing/folding it is really hard to describe and I don't have the best pictures. You start by pinching it in the middle and then fold up each side. You want it to be able to stand. The more folds you can fit in, the fancier your dumplings will look.
One of my fancier dumplings...
Once you have a big ole' plateful of dumplings, boil up some water and drop them in. Be sure to keep the water moving when you drop them in or they might sink to the bottom and stick. When the water seems like it's going to boil over, douse it with some cold water and let it get to a boil again. Do this a few times.If you want to fry up the dumplings in oil, you only want to half boil them. We decided to just have them boiled so we boiled them through.
Mmmm...a delicious dinner of boiled shrimp dumplings, jellyfish and Zeno's delicious chicken wings. Yum!

Here are some random clips from when we were making the dumplings if you care to watch...

NaNoBlogMo 14 - Superhero Cupcakes

This weekend I was invited to a super hero themed birthday party, where the guests were encouraged to come in costume (I might do another entry about my costume from this year, but here's a teaser...I won the costume contest!). I went last year where the theme was Disney (I went as Cruella DeVille), and I saw how much effort the birthday girl put into the party. So I volunteered to bring something and the first thing that came to mind was superhero cupcakes; cupcakes decorated with the logos/insignia of various superheros.

I knew I wanted vibrant colors and clear lines, something I probably wouldn't be able to get from icing/piping alone. I looked online for what other people had made before and there were examples of people using things like fondant, modeling chocolate or candy melts. I was still unsure what I was going to use when I went to the store. There my mother noticed Sugar Sheets, something neither of us had heard of before but looked promising. I bought a variety of bold colors (and some icing for details).

I made a batch of vanilla and a batch of chocolate cupcakes the day of the party and then settled down to try and make some logos. The sugar sheets are each about the size of a normal sheet of paper, individually wrapped and resealable so that you can use a bit at a time and keep the rest from drying out. They taste and feel a bit like dried out plain frosting.

The sheets aren't as thin or delicate as I was worried they might be, but I still had to be careful to keep from breaking or tearing them, especially when it came to smaller pieces or bits that came to sharp points. I was able to cut the shapes I wanted with a small knife, but I'm sure an exacto knife would work great. The website for them and the packaging also recommend using their specifically designed punches that cut shapes out for you.

It was a learning process working with this new medium. I learned that you really need to peel the sheets from their plastic backing BEFORE you cut the shape you want or it is going to be much more difficult to get it off in one pieces. I found that the sheets worked slightly like clay in that if I accidentally tore a bit I could press it back together with the heat and pressure of my fingertip for a non-perfect-but-it-will-do quick fix. Also, frosting made a good adhesive to stick sugar sheet on sugar sheet for the more layered designs.
I found out that my Pom glass was pretty much the same diameter as the top of a cupcake, so I used it as a guide to cut my bottom layer for each logo. I made two of each logo (one for the chocolate and one for vanilla) and worked on one logo at a time to prevent having too many sheets out and drying at the same time. That also meant that if I cut out a good symbol (such as the bat for Batman), I could just trace it for my second cupcake. I made all the logos first and kept them on waxed paper before I finally frosted and topped the cupcakes.

I had a few moments of "I can't believe I am actually spending this much time on each cupcake", but all in all I had a fun time. I kept my laptop open to make sure I got each logo right. Some I skipped over because I didn't have the right colors or because I thought they were too difficult, but I think I ended up with a good variety.

I was very happy with the end result. Can you name all of them? There was some slight bubbling with the tops since I forgot that cupcakes aren't really flat (and it didn't occur to me until later that maybe making nice flat sugar cookies would have been a better idea).

They were a hit at the party! I saw a few people taking pictures of them, which made me smile. I had to actually encourage a few people to eat them and that I wouldn't be offended if they ate my "art". Some people also debated over which to eat, although I know at least one cupcake (the Green Lantern) was eaten by a guy dressed as the Green Lantern (or more specifically, Hal Jordan). Personally, I think the Watchmen one is my favorite.

I would recommend the sugar sheets to people. They were pretty easy and fun to work with and they have a lot of different colors (although keep in mind that each sheet costs almost $4, so if you want a variety of colors it can add up!). I got my at JoAnne's. I plan to at least to come up with an excuse to use what I have leftover...I didn't even end up opening the purple sheet!

I would end this post with saying that I want to do more cake decorating, but since pretty much every post ends with me saying I want to do whatever I talk about more, its starting to get pretty cliche. Oh well!

Magic Peanut Butter Middles

Some friends of mine are moving to a new apartment (in the same building but it still counts) so I thought I would make some cookies to bring as a housewarming snack. I wanted to try something new and I found a recipe for Magic Peanut Butter Middles on Allrecipes.com. Chocolate cookies with a surprise peanut butter center? I had to try it.

I figured it would be easier to work with the middles if I chilled them so after mixing together the peanut butter and confectioner's sugar for the centers I popped them in the freezer to harden a bit while I made the dough for the outside.

One of the reasons I really like websites like allrecipes.com and eatingwell.com is because often on recipes there will comments from other people who have already cooked it. I try to read through a couple before I make something to see what other people suggest. Some people suggested adding mini-chocolate chips to make the outside dough more chocolate-y, as well as some sour cream to make it a bit richer, so I did both. I had to add a lot of extra flour until it got to the right consistency, but it worked.

In order to work with the dough even though it was still a bit sticky, I just floured my hands. That way the dough could stay moist. I patted out a flat circle of the chocolate dough and put a cool peanut butter center in the middle and then rolled it up into a ball. I actually forgot to flatten the first batch before putting it into the oven, but I took them out before they were done and flattened them with no harm done.
I love that you can't see the peanut butter center at all from the outside, but there is a significant amount on the inside. When my mom first bit into one her reaction was "How did you do that??"

There is a good balance between the peanut butter center and the chocolate dough. The mini-chocolate chips melted so they are smooth chewy cookies with no crunch. I just wish they were a tiny bit more chocolately. If I were to make them again I think I might melt some chocolate chips and drizzle them on top of each cookie just to give it a tiny bit of something extra.

I brought a plate to my friends' new apartment and they were eaten quickly and with kind compliments. Relatively easy and delicious cookies with a big reaction. A+!

Five Bean Soup

There is something beautiful about soup. It involves a lot of my favorite things about cooking. I love that you can take a whole bunch of different ingredients and bring them together and have them blend into something new and wonderful. I love that soup can be easy or complicated, thick like stew or a simple broth. This five bean soup was certainly on the easy end of the scale.


All I had to do was saute onions, carrots, celery and garlic in a pan. Then I added that with all the ingredients you see pictured to the right in chicken broth with some barley. Season with a couple bay leaves and some dried basil.


It came out thick and delicious and very filling. If you used a different broth it would be vegetarian in a snap. I'm not one for tomatoes and my mom doesn't like carrots, but with so many other things in this soup it's easy to forget what you don't like and just focus on the tastiness of the whole.

That reminds me of something else I like about soup...I can use it to hide healthy things that I don't normally like under a tasty tasty disguise.

Lemon Coffee Cake

A while ago my mother got a lemon coffee cake from the Shop Rite that was AWESOME. When she realized that we had some lemon curd in the fridge, she asked me to try and recreate the delicious breakfast treat.
















This recipe from Martha Stewart seemed to me the best choice, although I did make some small changes. I followed the streusel recipe, glaze, and basic cake mix almost exactly. The only real difference was that instead of the layer of Meyer's lemons, I spread a layer of the lemon curd. I also supplemented the lemon rind with some fresh lemon juice in the cake batter because I only had one lemon, and used whole wheat flour instead of white.
















The cake ended up giving me quite a bit of trouble when it actually came to baking. It refused to cook all the way through. I think it might have been because of the layer of lemon curd I put in. Perhaps it seeped into the batter and kept it moist and uncooked. I ended up taking it out of the oven before it was done and putting the glaze on top before I realized it needed to be cooked more.














The cake ended up extremely dense. Additionally, I thought the lemon flavor was overpowering. The cake from Shop Rite had a perfect hint of lemon, but with this it was too strong for my tastes. My dad ended up eating most of it and seemed to enjoy it, but I was rather disappointed. I think this is definitely a cake that needs to be thinner, at the very least.

Oktoberfest Treats Part 1- Kielbasa in Beer and Onion Pie

So this past Saturday my parents hosted an Oktoberfest/beer tasting party. The idea came about during a wine tasting party they held a month prior, at which I had gone a bit overboard in terms of the food I prepared (including a layered goat cheese spread, mini-artichoke tarts and lava cakes). So of course I had to make some more themed food. I ended up making four dishes, which I'll cover in two entries.

First up is the first dish I made and by far the easiest. What you see below are literally all of the ingredients I used. I chopped up three pounds of kielbasa and put it in the Crock-pot with three pounds of sauerkraut and two bottles of Sam Adam's 'Oktoberfest" (seemed fitting). Done and done!

If you want to make it, just keep in mind how much sauerkraut you want. If you just want it as a bit of flavoring, I would cut it down to half or even less the total amount of kielbasa. Then again, I don't like sauerkraut at all, so I'm biased. The kielbasa came out wonderfully moist and flavorful. The taste of beer was certainly present but not overpowering.

Next up was "traditional" German Onion Pie. I put traditional in quotes only because our neighbor is from Germany and she had never heard of it before. Regardless, the dish was a tasty success. The first order of business was to chop up roughly 5-6 pounds of onions. Even though it was a bit chilly out, I decided to do the chopping outside. Didn't really feel like destroying the kitchen with the noxious fumes from a zillion onions. I had to cook them up in two different batches because I couldn't fit them all in the pan at the same time.

I chopped up and fried some bacon to start the cooking. I used a bit more than the recipe calls for cuz I like bacon, then cooked the first batch of onions in the bacon grease for added flavor. The second batch I cooked up in butter and added some chopped garlic (not in the recipe, but everything is better with garlic!). All the bacon and onions were mixed together with some sour cream, eggs and cheddar cheese (also not in the recipe, but how could I make something like this without at least a little cheese in it??). The whole delicious mixture fit almost perfectly into two frozen pastry crusts.

Allrecipes said to add some caraway seeds on top. I ended up grinding up some caraway seeds with a bit of pepper and some various onion/garlic seasonings in the motor and lightly sprinkling the whole mix on top.

I think The temperature and/or time on the recipe is off quite a bit. I ended up turning down the heat and also cooking the pies for less time than the directions called for and I was still sad to see they came out darker than I wanted. Ah well.

The pies/quiches were very good. It was literally like a big pile of caramelized onions with just enough "stuff" to hold it all together served on top of a crust...with bacon in it. Delicious! I will probably go have a big slice of the leftovers as brunch when I am done with this entry.

Stay tuned for part two where I talk about the pretzels and my black forest cake!

Unemployment Leads to Fancy Pie

So a while back I wrote about an apple pie I
had made with apples from the tree in the yard. I didn't get around to writing about it yet, but shortly afterward I made another apple pie, this time with a mixture of apples from the yard and apples from the store (braeburn I think...) just because. Also just because, I decided to make this the fanciest pie I had ever made. There is a picture of it on the right pre-eggwash and pre-baking. That's right...I made a lattice top pie out of leaves. And I would like to mention that I did not have a cookie cutter or anything of the sort (although I did try to make one out of various materials, but that is another hilariously bad and embarassing story). I hand cut each leaf, which explains the asymmetry and varying sizes. I blame the fact that I am currently unemployed entirely for this far too fancy pie.

Better than being fancy, though, it adhered to my "pie should not be stew" rule. Look how nicely it held it's shape after being cut. Better still, the general opinion was that this pie was better than the last one because the first was a bit on the dry side, whereas this one was moist and tasty without becoming runny.

Mmmm...baking success. Maybe this season I will try making pumpkin or pecan pie.


Tomorrow I am going to be having one heck of a cook-a-thon to make some yummy things for an Oktoberfest style party, and then I have to throw together the rest of my self-made costume for Sea Tea's costumed Halloween Show (which everyone should come to this Sunday), so I should have some interesting posts up soon-ish about those.