Recipe: Cream of Potato Soup

This is not Vichyssoise. This is a peasant soup - often my favorite kind of almost any dish. Vichyssoise is White (maybe even WHITE); this one is mottled gold with cracklin’s. Vichyssoise is a smooth texture (usually too smooth having had all its textural character processed out of it); this one is definitely lumpy, and you can choose the size of your lumps. Vichyssoise can be served hot or chilled; this one wants to be steaming hot on a cold winter’s day. Serve it with a sandwich for lunch or with a salad for dinner. To the leftovers, add broccoli or green beans or asparagus to create a whole new meal; add seafood - shrimp, crab, lobster, any whitefish - and call it a chowder. Add, well, you think of something, and let us all know how it works!

Here’s what you’ll need.

Potatoes, 2 or more depending on the size of your pot
onion, ½ large
carrot, 1 small
celery, 1 rib
garlic, 2 small cloves
lean salt pork
chicken stock, home made if you’ve got it, from a ‘chicken base’ if you don’t, canned if you have no ‘base,’ or if worst comes to worst, a couple of bullion cubes
milk
cream or Half & Half
crushed red pepper flakes
Tellicherry
coarse Kosher salt, but only if you are using home made (unsalted) chicken stock; the others all have plenty of salt for this entire dish
fresh ground nutmeg
crumbled tarragon leaf
patience

Here’s how you do it . . .

Pay special attention to that last ingredient. It’s the secret to all the best soups in the world. Yes, there are a lot of ways to make ‘quick soup.’ You can boil water, add spoon of Miso and make ‘soup’ in 5 minutes. You can heat a pot of chicken stock, toss in cooked leftover rice and chicken, and make ‘soup’ in 10 minutes. But if you really want Soup, you’ll need a goodly portion of patience.



You’ll need patience right from the beginning of this preparation, and that’s because you can’t rush salt pork cracklin’s. Oh, sure, you can crank the heat, add a little oil and fry your salt pork, but that ain’t cracklin’s. Cracklin’s come from slowly rendering the fat out of the lean salt pork and then slowly crisping the pork in its own fat. Allow at least 45 minutes. An hour is more likely.



So take a slice or two of your salt pork (you do always keep a hunk in the freezer, don’t you?) and cut it up into little cubelets. These are about ¼” cubes, which works well for this particular salt pork. Others may want to be a little larger, or a little smaller, depending on how they cook up. You want them to be crispy and crunchy, but not tooth-breaking boulders or BBs.



Toss the pork into a skillet, and set it over very low heat. Add patience. After 15 minutes, toss the pork around a bit. After 10 more minutes, toss some more. And every 5 minutes from now until your patience runs out, toss them some more. When they’re ‘done’ to your satisfaction, carefully scoop them onto a paper towel to drain, making sure to keep all the rendered fat in the skillet.



Now, while the pork renders, you can prep everything else, short of actually cutting the potatoes - you don’t want to have to keep them wet for an hour or two; that would make them end up mushy in the soup. So get your stock out. In this case, I used about enough chicken base to make two cups of rich stock.



Then, get your veggies out. You’ll use a little bit of each for the soup’s base and then the rest will go in after the base has developed for a while.



Here we have a classic mirepoix for the soup’s base - onion, carrot and celery, plus one of the garlic cloves chopped finely. The other veggies will go in later.



Before you start cooking the mirepoix, toss about ¼ tsp. of crushed red pepper flakes into the rendered pork fat and let them start to cook.



Then cook the mirepoix - hold the garlic. Crank the heat a bit when you first toss the mirepoix in so that it starts to cook immediately - not a hectic sauté, but maybe a jumpin’ simmer. Stir everything around from time to time and after about 5 minutes, toss in the garlic. Continue cooking for another 5 minutes or so.



When the mirepoix is soft and tender, carefully spatulate it into your soup pot, once again being careful to leave as much of the fat as possible in the skillet.



Now add about ½ cup of your chicken stock to the mirepoix in the soup pot and bring it to a serious simmer. This is your soup base. And, yes, more patience is required. Cook gently (a few bubbles, no froth) for at least 20 minutes; 30 would be better.



While that’s cooking, cut up a potato. I like little cubes, maybe 3/8” on a side. But whether you want them large or small, always take a thin slice off each side of the potato and mince it up to toss into your burgeoning soup base.



Toss your potato cubes into the skillet and sauté for about 8 - 10 minutes. Now, I used a baby skillet for my small batch of soup, so I did each potato separately. If you’re making a gallon or three, you can cook 2 or 3 potatoes at a time (though extend the cooking time to 15 minutes or so). When the (final) potato is about half done, toss in the minced-up second clove of garlic. You want the garlic to flavor the potato, but not to get browned. At the same time, add a dozen grinds or so of fresh Tellicherry black pepper.



While the potato sautés, cut up the rest of the veggies into soup-size bites. Please note that the ½ onion there did not go into the soup; it was saved for another day. Only the remainder of the ½ onion that was used for the mirepoix went into the soup.



When the potatoes are done, toss them in the soup pot and add the rest of the stock. Then toss the last of the veggies into the skillet and sauté them for 5 - 8 minutes or so, just to the point where they begin to get tender. Then, into the soup pot with ‘em.



Now add another portion of patience. Cook the soup covered for at least 30 minutes. While it’s cooking, you can add some crushed tarragon leaves - no more than 1/3 tsp, and a few grates of fresh nutmeg (8 - 10 scrapes). If all you have is ground nutmeg, I’d say skip it. The flavor the nutmeg adds is very subtle, but with the off-the-shelf ground type, you run the risk of the flavor being bitter rather than nutty sweet.

This is also the time to make a cracklin' choice. I like to add mine in at this point so they add to the overall flavor of the soup. Some prefer to wait until the dairy goes in and add them then. Others will wait until the soup is served and use the cracklin's as a garnish. The choice is yours . . .



Finally, it’s time to add the dairy. Start with 1 cup of milk (your choice as to whole or other, but please, not skim!). When that has warmed up in the pot, add a cup of cream or Half & Half. Stir that in and cook slowly, for another 30 minutes.



Be sure to keep an eye on the pot until the soup gets up to its cooking temperature. You do want it to come just to a boil, but not to boil at all after that - just to simmer, bubbly gentle.



And when those final 30 minutes of patience have expired, well, then it’s soup. Enjoy!

Tip/Technique: Vegetable Stock

Vegetable stock is an incredibly versatile liquid that adds flavor, character and depth to almost anything. If you have to put liquid into something to cook it, consider using some veggie stock. Soups, stews, sauces of every sort, gravies, marinades, basting fluids, braising liquids, poaching liquids, let your imagination flow. Cook your rice in it, your pasta, even your potatoes; how about dumplings, spatzle, good grief, boil your home made bagels in it!

‘Course that means you’ll need gallons of the stuff. No worries. Here’s how you do it.



At least once a month, save up your fresh vegetable scraps for a week (or so). Use those thin little bags you put your produce in at the grocery store to hold the scraps and keep it in the produce drawer in your refrigerator. If you’re careful to squeeze all the air out, then hold it closed and give the bag a spin to twist it tight, you can pull the open end over the sealed end, give it a shake and, voila, airtight sealed storage.

Now a week works for me. The scraps stay ‘fresh,’ the filled bag still fits in the produce drawer (with room for some actual produce, as well), and I end up with just enough scrap to fill my 3qt. saucepan. If you’re cooking for a crowd or just for yourself, you’ll have to figure out whether to save up for a shorter period or to make a smaller quantity of stock. The important part of the equation is: don’t let the scraps spoil.



What to save? Whatever you’ve got. Keep the trimmed ends of carrots, squashes, green beans, celery; the stalks from asparagus, broccoli, leafy greens; trimmings from lettuces, cabbages, Brussels sprouts; the ends and peels from red onions, yellow onions, shallots, cucumbers. . . And so on . . .

It may be easier to list what not to keep. No potato parts. No tomato parts. No seeds or membranes from bell peppers parts (or other peppers, either). No peels from waxed vegetables such as rutabagas or cucumbers. No fruits, nuts or garlic parts. I’m sure I’m forgetting (or have never thought of) dozens of others, but hopefully, you get the idea.



When your bag is full, dump it all into your saucepan. Push it down if need be to make it all fit and then fill the pot with water. No salt. No pepper. No nothing. Just pure plain water. And, as mentioned in other posts from time to time, if you live in a ‘water challenged’ area where you can taste the ‘water treatments,’ consider using bottled water for your stock.



Then simply put it on to heat. Start on high, but keep an eye on the pot (if you don’t already know how long it takes your pot that size, full of water, to come to a boil, now’s a good time to learn; watch the clock!)



As the pot nears a boil, take the cover off. You want the pot to reach a pretty full boil, but don’t want to let it boil over.



After it’s reached as much of a boil as you can manage without spilling over, put the cover back on, but leave it ajar, and turn the heat down to a serious simmer. Come back and check in 5 – 10 minutes. Still simmering? Not spitting over? Then you can leave it alone for 30 – 45 minutes. When you check back then, add some more water to bring the level back up near the top of the pot. And let it cook for another hour. More water; another hour.



Now you’ve got a good stock going. So pull the pot lid back a ways and leave it to simmer for a while more. Let the volume of liquid reduce to at least ¾ of the pot, maybe a little more. You want the vegetable scraps to give up all their value, but don’t want to let them start to dry out. When the liquid is down to near the top of the veggies, it’s time to strain.

You can use a fairly coarse strainer here; the idea is to remove (most of) the solid matter. The strained liquid will be reduced further and then strained again before storage. So just dump it into a colander or such and collect the liquid. The solids can be thrown out (or onto your compost heap).

Now, back to the pot and onto the stove for the hardest part of this whole thing. Reduce the liquid over medium heat (a bubbly simmer) to about 2 cups or the amount it takes to fill one of your ice cube trays. Most of mine hold about 14 ounces.



When you’re ready, strain the stock through your finest strainer into a container from which you can pour easily. Then pour the liquid into your ice cube tray. If the tray will sit atop other ice cube trays, be sure to avoid spills and drips – then again, maybe vegiie flavored ice cubes will start a whole new trend . . . And into the freezer.



In the morning (or afternoon or evening or. . .), remove the veggie stock cubes from the tray and store them in a ziplock in your freezer. At the concentrations described here, one cube in one cup of water makes one cup of delicious vegetable stock.

Recipe: Chicken with Mustard Sauce

Here’s a wonderful marriage of chicken and mustard. When I’m in a fancy mood, I call it Poulet de Moutarde en Croute, though the ‘in crust’ part is an exaggeration. But if you’re patient enough, you can certainly get a good crunch going! Sadly, this is one of those recipes that I can only cook while Cathy is away. Though I’ve managed to sneak mustard into loads of food that she’s eaten with delight, this one is still a little too up front mustardy for her tastes. But I’ll keep tryin’ . . .

The hardest part of this recipe is realizing at least 3 hours before dinner that this is what you want!

Here’s what you’ll need (per serving):

1 boneless, skinless breast of chicken
¼ - 1/3 tsp. sesame oil
1/3 – ½ tsp. liquid smoke
5 – 10 drops Tabasco Sauce
1/3 – ½ tsp. turmeric
1/3 – ½ tsp. cilantro
2 tsp. prepared mustard (brown or Dijon – not yellow, please . . .)
¼ - 1/3 cup White wine
2 – 3 Tbsp. flour
Tellicherry (fresh ground black pepper)
(veggie medley, whole ‘boiled’ potatoes, or other accompaniments of your choice)

Here’s how you do it:

Gather your ingredients, and start by building your chicken coating, which will also become your sauce.



I included quantities in the ingredients list, but as you may know if you’ve explored this blog, I seldom actually measure anything. So, it’s a pinch of this, a sploosh of that, a shake of the other, and there you go. I start this with the oil, liquid smoke and Tabasco. Give them a whirl with a fork or a whisk, and then add the turmeric and cilantro, and whisk them in, too.



Now add your mustard and whisk that in.



Now let this mixture rest for 30 minutes to allow all the flavors to blend and meld completely.

After the half hour rest, rinse your chicken and pat it dry.



Give it a goodly grind or five of Tellicherry.



And slather first one side and then the other with your mustard coating. Depending on how aggressive you like your mustard, you could lightly pierce the chicken with a fork before (or even after) coating, to allow the flavors to reach deeply into the meat. Me, I prefer the physical layers of flavor, with the mustard coat on the outside of the chicken, but hey, you do it your way, please . . .



Now, rest period again. At least another 30 minutes; an hour, if possible. No, you don’t have to put it in the refrigerator; there’s enough salt and vinegar in the mustard and Tabasco to at least inhibit, if not kill, any Salmonella lingering in your chicken. And since you rinsed it and patted it dry before coating, you got rid of any surface bacteria before you even started. But if you’re truly paranoid about food bugs, go ahead and put it in the fridge; just be sure to leave it for at least an hour; the cold really slows down the uptake of the flavors.

While your chicken rests (this time – there’s another rest hour coming later!), scrape any big piles of extra coating from the chicken plate back into the mixing bowl, and add the white wine. Whisk it all up and set it aside. This will become the base for the final mustard sauce.



Now is also the time to prep your veggies and starch for the meal. Tonight, I did up a medley of cauliflower, broccoli, carrots and onions, which I steamed in a little white wine. (I also put a tiny drizzle of olive oil in the bottom of the pan before I added the veggies.) Add a pinch of Kosher (or other coarse) salt and a few goodly grinds of Tellicherry, and then pour the splash of white wine on top. These will go on the heat about 30 minutes before serve time.



And when I can, I prefer to ‘boil’ my potatoes with the skin on (give them a good scrub under running water, first). Of course, as I think I’ve mentioned elsewhere, boiled potatoes, in my book, should actually be intimidated potatoes. Put them in the pot of water; put the pot over high heat until you just begin to hear some ‘action’; turn the heat to low (salt if you must), and let the tubers evolve into perfectly tender, creamy textured spuds over the next hour or so.



But before you put heat to potatoes, you’ll need to ‘en croute’ the chicken. And let it rest again.

I always use a strainer to sift my flour onto the chicken for a dish like this. You don’t have to, but if you just shake the unsifted flour, the texture of the final cooked coating will be much ‘thicker’ and lumpier – not necessarily bad things, but not what I prefer for this dish.



So, strainer in one hand, flour in the other, dump a little flour into the strainer and shake (gently, gently) the strainer across the surface of the chicken until you’ve completely coated the surface of the mustard.



Then, gently (hmm, lotsa gentlies in here!), turn the chicken over and coat the other side the same way. Turn the chicken back over, and put another light coat of flour on the top.



Now let it rest for an hour. Over the hour, the flour will absorb moisture from the mustard coating and create a kind of delicate crust on the surface of the chicken. There will still be loose flour on the outer surface, but the interior will develop some ‘character’, which you’ll find when you eat the chicken.

When you’ve got your chicken resting, put some heat under those potatoes. You’ll be serving dinner in about 70-90 minutes.

So when the final chicken rest period is about done, get your skillet warmed up and put a Tbsp. or two of olive oil in the bottom. Swirl, twirl, shake and, when you’ve got heat, toss in the chicken. Oh, and put your veggies over medium high heat, too.



As soon as the chicken starts sizzling, turn down the heat and cook for about 10 – 12 minutes. You want the outside to turn a rich dark brown but stop well before burn or blacken. On my stove, that means the 8 o’clock spot on the heat dial; your mileage will be different.

A bit after you turn the heat down under the chicken, do the same under the veggies. You want to get a head of (wine) steam in the pot, but don’t want to let anything burn. After reducing the heat, the veggies will need about 10 – 15 minutes to reach perfection. Then they can come off the heat (still covered) and sit for up to 10 minutes more.

Turn the chicken after 12 minutes and cook the other side for another 10 or so. Once again, you are seeking dark, not burned.



When the chicken is done, take it out of the pan and let it rest,



while you get your sauce started. Toss the white wine-rinsed left over mustard coating into the hot skillet. Swirl, scrape, and stir to get all the crunchy bits from the pan dissolved into the liquid.



Drain in any lingering liquid from the steamed veggies and maybe a splash of two of water from the potatoes. Bring the pan sauce to a boil and let it reduce, reduce, reduce!







When the sauce is right, put potato and vegetables onto the plate, pour the sauce,



add the chicken, and enjoy!

Catching up . . .

OK. I'm gonna stop making comments about how time flies. Today, I've cleaned up and added a bunch of posts that have been kicking around for almost a year now. They've been published using their original 'first draft' dates. There are more, and I'll get them up here as time permits.

Thanks for all your notes and comments. Please keep them coming, and for sure, keep on cookin!

Tip: Choke That Blade

There are a million and three ‘knife work’ tips that should get written down. I’ll try to mention them as I think of them. The other day, I cut my finger. And that reminded me that I should take my own advice now and then . . .

You see, I had my index finger reaching out there along the top of the knife blade, and lo and behold, there was a new ingredient dribbling out into my onions.

Don’t. You cannot get a good grip on the handle of the knife, and you cannot control the motion or direction of the blade with that finger stuck out there like that.



‘Choke up’ on the blade. Get your thumb pointing toward the knife tip on one side of the steel,



and your index finger down toward the blade edge on the other side, and grip the handle with the rest of your fingers.



If you’re using one of those wimpy ‘little’ knives, where you don’t have room to keep your index finger down the side of the blade, well, then, tuck it under the handle, in that little nook that knife makers conveniently put right there, for just that purpose.



Now, you’re ready to cut. And you won’t be slipping and sliding and adding extra bits of this and that to your dish.

Yeah. I know. It feels really strange at first. But just keep at it. In a year or 12, you’ll only have to think about it when old habits rear their ugly heads and you cut your finger half off . . .

Recipe/Technique: Perfect No-Lump Gravy

A while ago, someone left a comment on the Roast Beef page asking about gravy. I put up a quick 'how to' there, but decided that since good gravy makes a meal and is so simple to do 'right' (once you learn how), gravy should have its own post.

So, for perfect no-lump gravy every time you roast a chicken, duck, turkey, other kind of bird or a hunk of beef or any other kind of meat, just remember one word: roux (pronounced 'roo').

A roux is just flour cooked in the drippings of the roast pan until it is a nice lump of goop or paste. Once flour has been turned into a roux, it can’t cause lumps in the gravy. It’s as simple as that.

For any kind of gravy, the proportions are always the same. 1 Tbsp. of pan drippings (and yes, that means fat!) plus 1 Tbsp. flour makes enough roux for 1 cup of liquid (from potatoes, vegetables, stock, or even plain water). If you don’t have any pan drippings (shame on you!) or if you need to make gravy after the fact (for leftovers, for example), you can use butter or olive oil for the fat.

Let’s use a roast chicken for the example and walk through the whole process of making perfect gravy. The steps are the same for any kind of gravy.

here's what you'll need . . .
meat juices from cooking, or butter, and/or olive oil
flour
cooking water from veggies
(Gravy Master, optional)
fresh ground black pepper, Tellicherry, of course
optional additions include sliced mushrooms, chopped giblets (cooked!), crumbled bacon bits or other cracklin's, additional herbs and/or spices (thyme, oregano, caraway, fennel, . . .), zingy bits like jalapeños, or almost any other thing you can think of that would taste good to you!

Here's how you do it.

When the chicken (or other meat) is done, turn off the oven, remove the bird from the roasting pan, put it on a plate (or platter) and stick it back in the oven to keep warm.



Put the roasting pan on a burner on the stove. With a spatula, scrape all the browned goodies loose from the bottom of the pan. Guesstimate the quantity of drippings (or, if you’re eternally compulsive, pour them out into a measuring cup to see how much you’ve got. Then pour it all back into the pan).

Turn the stove burner on to a medium heat setting. Sprinkle an equal amount of flour over the surface of the drippings. (You could just dump it all into the middle, but you’ll have to spend much longer mashing it around to make sure all the flour gets coated.)



Stir, chop, mix, scrape, fold and otherwise manipulate the flour, over the heat, until all the fat/liquid has been absorbed coating every last granule of flour. You should end up with a fairly dryish, yet still smooth, lump of roux that holds together in the pan. If the roux seems gooey or wet, sprinkle a little bit more flour on it; if it seems dry and flaky, add a drip more fat (olive oil is the easiest to work with unless you reserved some of the original pan drippings.) Keep chopping, stirring, mixing etc. for a while until the roux cooks for a few minutes and begins to take on the rich brown color of the pan scrapings. (4 or 5 minutes is usually about right; if it takes longer, the stove burner isn’t hot enough.)

And keep in mind, you can always make a roux in a skillet or saucepan using butter or olive oil. Same routine; same proportions; cook it until you like the color.



When the roux is ready, pour in the liquid(s), and always include a good sized slug of white wine (or red wine, or Sherry or beer or . . .) For best results, the liquids should be hot, or at least room temperature, when added - cold water is not a good idea. Start small, adding just enough liquid to cover the bottom of the roasting pan for example. Mix it with the roux using the flat of the spatula to squish the roux into the liquid. When you’ve added enough liquid to make a smooth paste, pour in the rest. Turn the stove up to high (or medium high) and continue stirring, mashing and mixing until the gravy begins to boil gently.



If you have any chopped giblets or shredded neck meat or sliced mushrooms or other accoutrement you wish to add to your gravy, now is the time.



This is also the time to adjust the seasonings for the gravy. For us, that means giving a dozen or so grinds of Tellicherry black pepper to the mixture.

Don’t be concerned if the gravy seems too thin after you’ve added all the liquids. Let it boil gently for a few minutes (10?) and it will thicken up for you. (If it gets too thick, add some more liquid!) After a few minutes of bubbling, add a few drops of Gravy Master, if you wish, to give the gravy a nice color (what’s “nice” is up to you).



While the gravy is bubbling away (remember to stir occasionally), you should have plenty of time to mash the potatoes, serve the veggies, carve the beast and otherwise finish last minute chores before serving the feast with, of course, perfect gravy.

Tip: Paper Towel the Produce

A while ago, we talked about getting the air out of your baggies to help your leftovers and in-progress foods last longer. This idea should probably have been mentioned then.

Certainly air is a crucial ingredient for spoiling food. The air is full of little buggers that love to eat your food and oxygen is a powerful contributor to chemical reactions. But if you really want to speed up the process, toss a little water into the mix. You’ll have slimy garbage to throw out in no time at all.

But lots of foods, particularly vegetables, need their moisture to stay fresh. So what to do, what to do. . . . Yup. Just toss a dry paper towel in the baggie with the half used veggie. It will absorb any loose liquid, but also help whatever air you’ve left in the baggie stay as humid as the veggie needs to keep fresh longer.



And veggies aren’t the only ones to benefit. If you have to keep breads in the refrigerator, that dry paper towel can save the day. Cold things can’t hold as much moisture as warm things. So if your bread is very fresh and ‘light’ – like hot dog and hamburger rolls, for instance, it probably has a lot of moisture in it. Put that in the fridge, and all that moisture gets ‘chilled out’ making a lovely puddle in the bread wrapper. In addition, every time you take the bread out of the fridge and open it in the warm air of your kitchen, moisture will condense on the bread wrapper. When you toss the bread back in the fridge, it sits in all that water and after a day or three, you have a bag of bread soup. So, toss in a dry paper towel and save your bread, too.