French Dip Sandwiches

When I'm not admiring our wee little piggies and adorable lambs, smelling the roses or lilacs, blogging about the bucolic joys of raising a few farm animals, and simply enjoying country life...



...I sometimes have to work, both on the farm and off. I believe in trying to always be prepared (try being the key word here -I don't always succeed!), so when I go anywhere, I always try to remember to take a knitting project (so waiting is a pleasure and not a pain) and food -yesterday a parfait of granola, yogurt and a dollop of Apricot-Pineapple Jam (click here). On days when I know I'll be gone all day and getting home late, and when I have the foresight and forewarning to plan for it, I rely on my slow cooker.



Last night we had French Dips, something I absolutely love but haven't made for quite awhile. These are one of the simplest things in the world to make, and incredibly satisfying in a very lip-smacking, finger-licking, dripping-dipping sort of way. In the past, I made these rather often, and they were always a big hit with the kids at all ages and stages, so I am not sure why it's been such a long time since we've had them. It's probably because there is simply only so much room in my brain and I get distracted by new foods and recipes and FORGET some of our old favorites. Anyway, whatever the reason or lack of, last night's dinner was greeted with cheers from all...and it practically made itself, which was a reason for me to cheer!



Beef Roast in Broth

2-3 lb. rolled beef rump roast (from the lamb for beef swap (click here) we did)
1 quart beef broth
2-3 bay leaves
1 t. - 1 T. Worcestershire Sauce

Place in crock-pot (a shepherdess' best friend) and leave to cook on low 8-10 hours. Remove and slice roast.



Serve on rolls with yellow mustard and additional condiments of choice, along with bowls of beef broth for dipping (Au Jus, if you want to sound fancy, though my offspring have taken French and I haven't, so they were not so much impressed as condescendingly amused with my terrible pronunciation). We had a surprisingly good (for this time of year) honeydew melon with these sandwiches, but a green salad would also be great.

The Ultimate Meatball Experience

What is a burger but a large flattened meatball? In my opinion, a homemade burger is the ultimate meatball experience. Burgers are the quintessentially American food, and like it or not, our all-American beef patty served on a bun is the food poster child for our country. All too frequently there are troubling reports and concerns raised about the over 38 million American hamburgers eaten daily in our country, and as iconic as they are, I simply cannot remember the last time I ate a mega-chain burger. I do have a weakness though, for cheeseburgers served in small town cafes such as The Crow's Nest in Montesano. We stop there often when we're driving through, and of course, the Pioneer Farm beef burgers Judy Pederson cooked up at the Snohomish Farmers Market last summer were an almost weekly treat. I don't think that all burgers are all bad, but I do agree there are a lot of really bad burgers being sold and eaten.

Being a passionate home cook, with a special fondness for a good burger, and having worked in several small cafes that served good all-American burgers, I often make them at home. They are sometimes exotic, like the Banh/Bahn Mi Pork Burgers I made (and misspelled) last summer, or more often than not, I make a straightforward all-American-style burger. Just as a drive-through burger is a quick meal to grab when life is hectic, a burger made at home is one of the quickest and easiest thing in the world to cook. I learned this from my Old Granny (click here), who always kept on hand a stack of beef or elk burger patties in her freezer. As marauding teens we knew we could show up at her doorstep with any number of friends in tow, and she would make burgers for us all. Many adventures (and misadventures) began (or ended) with, "Hey, let's stop at Grandma's house!" At any time of day or night, if her lights were on and she was still up, we could stop by and she would always ask, "Are you kids hungry?" Buns from the freezer were quickly toasted, and frozen meat patties went straight onto the griddle. A patty of good quality ground meat, not too lean or too fat, served on a bun with various condiments pulled from the fridge, all ready to eat at her kitchen table within just a few minutes. Of course, she would invariably make up a salad or something else to have along with the burgers, and she always had ice cream in the freezer and a cake of some sorts under cover on her counter for us to polish off.

We made burgers twice last week -it was one of those weeks. I wasn't thinking 'blog post photos' when I was making them and didn't take any -everyone knows what a burger looks like anyway. I often portion and freeze individual patties, as my Old Granny did, when I'm not using all of a package of ground meat, or when I'm thinking ahead to having an answer for, "What can I make for dinner that can be ready in the next fifteen minutes?" I shape individual patties in a plastic sandwich bag and stack them in the freezer. If I have the time and plan ahead, homemade burger buns are absolutely heaven, but if not, my Old Granny's always-keep-some-buns-in-the-freezer trick is good for RIGHT NOW meals -or we simply use whatever bread is at hand. Burgers from different meats each have their own character and goat and lamb are both very tasty. I made this week's burgers with ground beef that was raised by my sister-in-law. Because I intimately know where the ground meat for our burgers comes from, I don't have to cook the living daylights out of them. Mayonnaise, ketchup, and mustard (or a dollop of special sauce) are the usual requisite condiments, along with some lettuce, tomato and dill pickle slices -cheese and onions are optional- and Zucchini Relish. My cousin, Michelle says Zucchini Relish is the whole point to having a hamburger, which may be going a bit too far, but it is definitely an important part of a good homemade burger like those eaten at my grandmother's kitchen table.

Egyptian Kufta

"The world's most ephemeral art form -even worse than magazine writing. What kind of life would let dinner pass in a tenth the time of its preparation? This kind. The kind we're built for." -Richard Powers, generosity



With the title, My Egyptian Grandmother's Kitchen -Traditional Dishes Sweet and Savory -how could I not be immediately and completely enchanted by this cookbook? It is the traditional home cooking an Egyptian woman learned by watching her grandmother cook, and she dedicates this book to her three daughters "so that it may be an aid in the preparation of all the foods I made that you loved so much." My son bought this for me for a gift last year, and it is absolutely fascinating. While at college, he got to know an Egyptian student he met in one of his classes there, and he told me he'd never met anyone so incredibly proud of their country as this young man was. On Saturday, the Egyptian people held their first free elections after ousting Mubarak last month. Like all politics, the choices they were given to vote on are far from ideal, but it was a free vote and is one more thing for Egyptians to be proud of. Yesterday, I was thinking about this historic vote in Egypt, which led me to looking through this cookbook (with me, it always comes back to food), which led me to making these Egyptian kuftas for my weekly meatball recipe.



I first made this Yogurt-Tahini Sauce to serve with the meatballs. Very tasty and super easy -the most difficult part was that I was opening a new can of tahini, which has to be stirred forever to re-emulsify the oil which separates out as the tahini sits on the shelf. I found my wand blender to work really good for this -in the past I simply arranged to have a long phone conversation while stirring it with a spoon.

Yogurt-Tahini Sauce
Adapted from Flatbreads and Flavors

Mix:
1/3 - 1/2 c. plain yogurt
3 T. tahini
1/4 - 1/3 c. lemon juice
1/2 t. salt
1/8 t. cayenne
Makes 1 cup and stores in the fridge for one week.



Pita bread is now commonly found in most grocery stores these days, but I made homemade pita breads with half whole wheat and half white flour, using the recipe in Flatbreads and Flavors for this meal. I followed their directions for cooking pitas on a griddle on top of the stove, rather than baking them in the oven, as I usually do. They were good enough, but I think they would have been better if I'd rolled them out a little bit thinner.



Egyptian Kufta
Adapted from My Egyptian Grandmother's Kitchen by Magda Mehdawy

Blend in food processor:
1-2 garlic cloves, pressed
1/2 onion, grated
1/2 c. cooked white rice
1/2 T. each minced parsley and mint, dried -or use double the amount of fresh herbs
1/4 - 1/2 t. each salt and black pepper
1/8 - 1/4 t. each ground cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, and cumin, or 1/2 - 1 t. Buharat or 'mixed spice'
1/2 - 3/4 lb. ground beef ("Note: ground camel meat can be used instead of beef.")

Form 20-25 meatballs. Chill. Deep fry in oil, or brown them in 1-2 T. ghee. I then popped them into the oven alongside the egg dish, Shakshuka, I was also making for dinner. I don't know if an Egyptian home cook would serve these two dishes at the same meal, but I thought they were great together.

Shakshuka is eggs poached in a tomato sauce, either on the stove top or baked in the oven. It is one of those easy comfort dishes that seems to be claimed by multiply groups of various nationalities and ethnicity. I followed Magda's recipe and now understand its universal appeal. It is a quick, satisfying comfort food, the sort of thing to whip up for a quick meal, when the cupboards are almost bare, or when you don't want to make a big production out of cooking.

Shakshuka
Brown in 1-2 T. ghee:
1/2 diced onion
2 minced garlic cloves
Add:
1-2 minced hot chili peppers
14 oz. can diced tomatoes
1 T. minced dried parsley
salt and pepper
Bring to a simmer and cook a few minutes. Pour sauce into a baking dish, make a hollow, and add 3-4 eggs. Bake 15 minutes. Serve with pitas.



Since there were only three of us for dinner, I simply rounded out our meal by putting jars of pickled beets and dilly beans on the table, but if we'd been more, I would have included some couscous, an eggplant dish, and one or more of the simple Egyptian salads in this cookbook. I loved this egg dish -seasonally appropriate with our egg production in full swing and the equinox making it officially Spring. I like the subtle and unique spicing of the kuftas, and how all this came together to make a simple, yet exotic, home cooked meal made from what we had on hand.

Meatball Mole

My weekly meatball recipe I'm sharing today is for beef meatballs cooked in a mole sauce. I made slightly larger sized ground beef meatball for this easy and authentic Mexican-style family meal.



Mexican-style Beef Meatballs
Mix:
1 beaten egg
1 lb. lean ground beef -ground goat would also be good
1/2 t. Mexican oregano
1/4 c. masa harina
1/3 c. milk
1/3 c. minced onions
Form into plump meatballs using about 1 1/2 T. meat mix each, to make about 22 meatballs. Chill several hours. Brown meatballs in an oiled skillet. Meanwhile, cook 2 c. sorted pinto beans in a pressure cooker with 2 qts. water, 2 T. vegetable oil, and 2 dried chilies for 30 minutes on high pressure, then allow the pressure to drop naturally.



During the three years Marilyn Tausend traveled across the United States and Mexico, talking to hundreds of Mexican and Mexican-American cooks and compiling the more than 200 recipes from their home kitchens found in her cookbook, Cocina de la Familia, she says, "Meatballs in one form or another -tiny meatballs in broth, bite-sized ones in party appetizers, and to my delight, glorious plump balls of ground meat in some sort of enriching sauce -were served to me more often than any other meat or chicken dish." Mexican cooks, Marilyn Tausend, Diana Kennedy, and Rick Bayless all give recipes for richly flavored, complex from-scratch mole sauces -usually used for saucing some type of poultry- and I hope to actually make one of these someday. Instead, this is a much easier version of 'some sort of enriching sauce.' It is probably quite authentic, in that I suspect a majority of busy Mexican-American home cooks make mole this way, rather than the more time consuming from-scratch way.



Mix 1 part commercial Rogelio Bueno Mole Sauce (I have it on good authority that this is the best commercial mole sauce to use) with three parts water or chicken broth in the unwashed skillet that the meatballs were cooked in. Stir until smooth, adding 1/2 - 1 t. to taste of each salt and sugar.



Pour the mole sauce over the cooked meatballs -I transferred mine to my Dutch oven- and simmer 10-20 minutes. Meanwhile in the washed skillet, refry the tender, drained pinto beans in 2 T. vegetable oil or lard, adding salt and cumin to taste. Mash, cook, and mash some more, until desired consistency is achieved. Cook separately 2 c. white rice.

Serve meatballs in mole sauce with plain white rice, refried beans, a garden vegetable -I cooked some of our frozen corn- and a bit of pickled carrots and/or pickled jalepenos.

A Shepherdess' Best Friend

You might think a shepherdess' best friend would be her trusty sheep dog, or the man she's been happily married to for twenty some odd years, but no, a shepherdess' best friend is her crock-pot. I love mine. A crock-pot makes dinner all on its own, while you do whatever stuff you want, or need, to do elsewhere. Having used my crock-pot several times this week, I am reminded of just how wonderful it is. Granted, meals from the crock-pot are not always the most photogenic, but like a true best friend, it is reliable and always there for me, consistently providing delicious and satisfying meals with a minimum of effort.



Last night was lamb stew made in the crock-pot, and biscuits quickly baked in the oven. I firmly believe at the end of the day there are very few things better than an old-fashioned stew.



Mid-week I put pork country-style ribs in the crock-pot with green sauce and a bit of orange juice, left it to cook on high for 6 hours, then shredded the meat and removed the bones.



I added cooked black beans and some leftover rice before serving. Wrapped in a warm flour tortilla with lettuce and cilantro, grated Pepper Jack cheese, diced onions, pickled jalapenos and a hot green taco sauce, this made an amazing burrito filling.



These ribs were made early in the week and were scrumptious. I added the last spoonfuls of a couple of jams in the fridge to use them up, which were very tasty additions but not necessary. I think this recipe invites improvised additions and substitutions, but this was our only package of beef short ribs from our beef-for-lamb swap we did with The Soup Queen, so I'll have to wait till next year to make it again. Tonight I'm making a roast chicken and baked potatoes in the oven, and Grandma's Baked Beans in the crock-pot.

Sweet and Spicy Soy-glazed Beef Short Ribs
Brown 1-2 lbs. beef short ribs and place in oval shaped crock-pot.
Mix:
1/4 diced onion
1/3 c. soy sauce
1 minced garlic clove
1 T. minced candied ginger
1/4 c. each molasses, Chinese plum sauce, hoisin sauce, and sweet chili garlic sauce
2 T. orange marmalade
1 T. each red pepper jam, sesame oil and balsamic vinegar

Cook on high 4 hours. Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve with rice.

Beef. It's What's for Dinner.

This is our neighbor's cow. She is all by herself, which herd animals hate; She keeps looking towards our sheep flock in a friendly way. Her shelter was built on top of the ridge but she prefers the cozy protection of the cherry tree in the lowest corner of her pasture. The poor, sad cow vocally lamented her situation for over a week. I grew up with cows. My father was a cattle rancher and raising wheat and a herd of Herefords was our livelihood. We also kept a couple Holstein dairy cows for the family's milk. Though Americans are a nation of beef eaters, my family is a bit of an anomaly as we generally eat very little beef. Every year we raise lamb, rabbits, poultry and a pig for our family's meat, and though we raised beef on the ranch during my childhood, we actually ate more deer and elk meat than beef. Beef has always been a treat in my food world except for a period when my mother-in-law raised beef to share with her adult children. We are all excited about the recent MEAT SWAP a few weeks ago, when we traded lamb and goat we'd raised and butchered, for beef that my husband's sister had raised. Since then, we have been eating beef with gusto: Portuguese Steak, which is amazingly delicious; steak, medium-rare, served with mushrooms and garlic browned in olive oil; the quintessential (homemade, NOT McD) All-American, all-beef hamburger; Thai Spicy Ginger Beef, which my husband absolutely loves (the peppers from our garden were actually hot this year); and humble Beef Stroganoff.



Beef Stroganoff is so old-fashioned, so unexotic, so unsexy (and unphotogenic) of a food, that it's easy to pass over. It readily adapts to being made in large quantities and nasty versions by various food services have given it an undeservedly bad reputation. But Beef Stroganoff done well is a deliciously comforting dish of tender beef and soft noodles in a creamy, complex and deeply flavored sauce. It is an honest-tasting casserole of Russian-origin with relatively straightforward ingredients that are easily put together. It is so charmingly 1950's and -unlike the congealed salad recipes of the same era that always illicit an involuntary, "Eww" from me- I can't help loving it. In the beginning, after first discovering Stroganoff (I don't remember my mom ever making it), I made this recipe in an avocado green electric skillet from the 1960's that was my grandmother's, until I reluctantly retired it. This is my recipe I've used for years. I don't recommend eating it once a week throughout the PNW's nine months of NOT summer, but I make it at least once, or even a few times, during the season of dark -when fall has fully descended, during the dark days near the winter solstice, and/or in March before the end of the dreary rainy season- then it is a welcome and comforting indulgence.



Beef Stroganoff
Heat:
4 T. butter
2 T. oil

Add:
1 large onion, diced
1-2 c. mushrooms, chopped
Saute until limp, but not brown. Add:

1-2 lbs beef sirloin tip steak (or boned lamb leg), cut into cubes or strips
1/4 c. flour
Saute a few minutes then add:

3-4 c. stock
3/4 t. salt
2 minced garlic cloves
1 T. Worcestershire sauce
1 t. dry mustard
3-4 T. ketchup
Cook 1 to 1 1/2 hours. Add:

2 T. red wine vinegar
1 T. Dijon mustard

Simmer 2-3 minutes. Add:

3/4 c. sour cream
Do not let sauce boil after adding sour cream. Meanwhile, separately cook 12-16 oz egg noodles al dente and add to Beef Stroganoff. I like to serve this with brussel sprouts, but last week I served a simple salad of tomato slices and minced basil from the garden with the Beef Stroganoff and it was scrumptious.