Cookin again

[Dannyalcatraz]

I’m involved in a cooking marathon right now. A few hours ago, I started beer-braising the first 2 of several corned beefs for us, friends, family & neighbors.

I do 2 at a time, for 9 hours in a 220degF oven. At the end, they’ll be cut-with-a-feather tender. And occasionally, I’ll thicken the braising liquid into a gravy of sorts.

But I have to do at least 6 this year! At least they’re pretty much fire & forget. Not a lot of fussing with them while they’re cooking.

But compounding the fun, I have shrimp to cook today, AND a MEGApot of chicken & sausage gumbo that’s destined to be split between a couple of locations this week.*

Now, by pro standards, that’s not really a lot. But flying solo in a home kitchen? I’ll be busy, busy, busy, and catching sleep where & when I can. (Fortunately, there’s a super comfy recliner in the den, which is adjacent to the kitchen.)


* Mom promised some to a particular priest in our parish as well as to my Dad’s coworkers. I’ve been procrastinating on the promise, but one of the ladies in my Dad’s office just gave her 2 week notice- she’s enrolled in the police academy to become a CSI.

 

[prabe]

I do 2 at a time, for 9 hours in a 220degF oven. At the end, they’ll be cut with a feather tender. And occasionally, I’ll thicken the braising liquid into a gravy of sorts.

Cut with a feather tender? (Sorry, this might be a typo, I'm not intending to snark or be a pest.)

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Cut with a feather tender? (Sorry, this might be a typo, I'm not intending to snark or be a pest.)

No typo. These things are so tender, they almost melt like ice cream.

 

[prabe]

No typo. These things are so tender, they almost melt like ice cream.

Right. I was parsing "feather tender" as a tool you were using to cut them with, not "cut with a feather" as modifying "tender." I hate it when my brain does me that kind of dirt.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Right. I was parsing "feather tender" as a tool you were using to cut them with, not "cut with a feather" as modifying "tender." I hate it when my brain does me that kind of dirt.

Edited for clarity, now!

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

I’m in the home stretch of CB braising- the last 2 are in the oven, and should be out at 3AM. So tonight’s dinner is sandwiches because the kitchen is a wreck.

I was GOING to have some chips & salsa with mine, but with my (VERY mild) corn allergy, I just didn’t feel like poking that particular bear. But I noticed we still had some bagel crisps from one of our local (Korean-owned) NY/Jewish delis…

So I had my sandwich with bagel crisps and salsa…

Bagel crisps- for the uninitiated- are thin slices of bagel, toasted to a crouton-like level of crispiness. And with all their little holes, they REALLY hold onto whatever you dip them into.

And with their assorted flavors?

Now I’m thinking about things like bagel chip nachos.

 

[Artamo]

-

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

And now for something completely different: GUMBO!

Mom & Dad had some people they wanted to treat…so they asked me to make gumbo for them. Since they were at 2 different places, I decided to get my 30qt pot out and make 1 giant batch, and then divide it 3 ways. (Had to keep some for us!) The giant batch contained something like 20lbs of meat, comprised of chicken thighs, smoked turkey breast, smoked beef sausage, and Louisiana hot sausage.

To accommodate the requirements of several people, there were some necessary changes to my standard recipe:

1) several people in each group didn’t eat seafood, so that was out.
2) one person is Muslim, so I had to make sure I only used beef sausages. Usually, beef sausages only isn’t an issue- that’s my default. But MOST of them use pork casings. So I had to find one that had beef casings, hence the Hillshire Farms. But since it’s new to me, I didn’t know how smoky the sausage was.
3) to add some extra smoky flavor, I usually use Diestel Smoked Turkey thighs. But there weren’t any available nearby. So I went to one of my favorite BBQ joints and got some of their smoked turkey breast.
4) veteran gumbo makers may gasp, but I used Anaheim peppers instead of Bell peppers. That’s because Mom reacts poorly to Bell peppers- we never use them. But we recently discovered Mom has NO problems with Anaheims, Poblanos or Hatch peppers. This was my first time adding Anaheims to gumbo, and it worked out fine.