Nori’s Stuff

I’ve been buying ten pound bags of chicken hindquarters and packaging them individually to freeze. I use them for chicken enchiladas, gravy and soup. I’ve developed a couple of recipes I really like; chicken gravy with stuffed baked potatoes for two and two generous servings of an easy and delicious chicken soup.

Stuffed baked potatoes with chicken gravy

Thaw two chicken hindquarters, separate legs from thighs, and brine for an hour. Easy brining is kosher salt in a gallon ziplock bag. Add water, dissolve the salt, add chicken and zip it shut while expressing the air. I set it in the sink if it’s not going to be brining long or set it in a bowl in the fridge if it’s going to sit longer than that.

In the instant pot add 1 tsp italian seasoning, 1 tsp of poultry seasoning, 1/4 tsp hing (or a garlic clove and a quarter of an onion) and 4 cardamom pods. Place the chicken skin side up in the bottom and add enough water to come halfway to the top of the chicken. DO NOT cover the chicken in water. The goal is a beautiful flavorful broth and more water isn’t the answer. Put the lid on, set to pressure cook for 24 minutes. When the chicken is done separate out the meat and roughly chop it. Strain the broth into a container.

Put 2/3 of the chicken in a pan with butter and onion/garlic oil. Once the chicken is warmed up nicely add enough of the broth to do gravy justice. When the broth in the pan starts to simmer mix cornstarch with a bit of broth and thicken the gravy.

Bake a russet potato. Once it’s cooked, cut the baker in half lengthwise and scoop out the potato.

In the bowl with the baked potato guts add sour cream and butter and mix well. You don’t want completely smooth and you don’t want big lumps. You can use the skin to present the potato. Wadly likes the skin, I give it a skip. If you’re using the skin, mound half the potato mix into one of the potato skin halves. Place the potato in a soup bowl (with or without skin). Keep the potato to one side of the bowl. Add gravy to the other side of the bowl. Serve with a slice of buttered sourdough or a biscuit and a bowl of steamed veges.

Put the left over gravy in with the same container as the chicken and left over broth and refridgerate for later use.

This has become one of our favorite meals. In addition to being easy, it’s really easy on the budget.

Easy and delicious chicken soup

Dice broccoli stems and quarter florets. Dice carrots. Sautee in butter and onion/garlic oil. While they’re cooking cut up mushrooms, green onion, peppers (I use green and something else, red or yellow or orange). Once the carrots have started to soften add the remaining vegetables and more butter. Cook for 3-5 minutes. Add the left over chicken/broth/gravy. If the soup is too thick add 1/2-1 cup broth (bone, vegetable or chicken – be aware commercial broth is loaded with salt). Simmer until all the veges are done.

I did say easy didn’t I? And really delicious! All the flavoring has already been added, it’s just a matter of cooking the veges and adding the left over chicken/broth/gravy.

If you’re like most folks you’re eating more chicken and pork and less beef. Inflation sucks. Until the government stops printing money and agrees to live within a budget, this up and down cycle is our life. So, for now, chicken and pork is on the menu!

I bought a new chili sauce and it was crying to be used. It’s got a bit of heat but it’s also got flavor, really nice flavor! So, pork stir fry for lunch!

This was REALLY good. The marinade recipe is for a generous single servering. Wadly doesn’t do stir fry if he can avoid it. He’s like really plain unspicy food and this is not in that category.

Marinate cubed pork in red wine (2 tbsp), worcestershire (1 tsp), fish sauce (1/2 tsp), balsamic vinegar (1 tbsp), honey (2 tsp) and the onion/garlic oil I make (1 tbsp). The pork sat in the marinade for about an hour before I managed to get to cooking. I fried the pork really quick in butter and my onion/garlic oil, dumped the contents out of the pan into a bowl, added more butter and onion/garlic oil to the now empty pan, sauteed halved broccoli florets and carrot (sliced thin on the diagonal). Once they started to be something other than dead raw I added sliced mushrooms and sliced green onion. I pushed that around the pan for a little bit before adding the meat and meat juices back into the pan and gave it a stir. I added two teaspoons of my new chili sauce and some bone broth to the marinade and added most of that mix to the pan. While it was coming up to temp I mixed a bit of corn starch into the remaining bit of marinade. Once the sauce started to reduce I added the corn starch mix, got it thickened and served it up. DELICIOUS.

I bought a marinade that I really enjoyed . . . except for the burning stomach it caused. Why? Not sure. Probably coconut aminos, one of those things I should be able to eat but can’t. So the quest is . . . duplicate the taste without upsetting my gut. What I’ve got is really close and delicious.

This is a one-person recipe because I like sauces and spices and Wadly likes simpler stuff.

• 1 medium tomatillo
• 1 tbsp garlic/onion oil (I make it because I love the flavors)
• 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 2 tsp brown sugar
• 2 tbsp bone broth

I process it with an immersion blender. You could do the same thing with a blender, it’s just more things to wash when you’re done.

Cube the pork and dump it in a bowl with the marinade. Stir.

Do your veges . . . broccoli, carrot (saute these two while cutting up the other veges), yellow onion,  bell pepper (I used green and orange), mushrooms (I used shiitake).

Add the remaining veges to the carrots/broccoli. Cook until al dente, transfer to a bowl.

Add the pork and marinade to the pan. Cook until mostly done. Add the veges back to the pan and finish cooking.

It’s simple and really good!

Have you every had egg salad that was actually a salad? It’s really good.

Of course I have to add lots of other things . . .

• 2 hard boiled eggs (crumble the yoke, dice the white)
• diced dill pickle
• diced red pepper
• diced yellow pepper (you don’t really need both but I like ’em)
• sliced green onion
• diced tomato
• spring salad greens
• Sir Kensington Mayo

This is a lovely salad. Stir the mayo into the egg and diced veges, stir in the lettuce . . yum!

For me, a big bowl of this is a lovely dinner. If you don’t want to have it as a stand alone dinner, pair it with pork chops or steak!

I love the taste of garlic. Because I can’t use garlic (high FODMAP) I frequently use garlic oil when cooking. With supply chain issues, it’s currently not available.

I’m occasionally not a very patient person. I’m perfectly happy to improvise when things aren’t going my way. Because the store is out of garlic oil, I decided to make my own.

I’m not a huge fan of olive oil, the base for commercial garlic oil. It’s too hard to get oil that’s truly 100% olive. Usually it’s mixed with something else, often soy which I don’t tolerate at all. This is a significant strike against commercial garlic oil. Is the oil used really 100% olive oil?

So . . . substitution for commercially produced garlic oil . . . I’m using sunflower oil, my preferred oil for everything.

I filled my 10″ cast iron pan with about 3 cups to which I added 2 head of thinly sliced garlic. I cooked it until the kitchen was filled with the heavenly (to me) smell of garlic. I have no clue how long I cooked it. It looked right, it smelled right . . .

I sifted out all the garlic slices and the result is . . . lovely. I’m using more than I would normally but I’m also into it for far far less than the cost of the prepackaged garlic oil.

Win win!

When Wadly brought home my first bottle of chardonnay for cooking, he was working on the advice of the booze guy at the store and all was good. When I find something that works I stick with it and that’s what he got for me each time I needed a new bottle.

Fast forward to supply chain issues . . . and the wine I was used to seasoning around is currently unavailable. A LOT of wine that would be an adequate replacement is also no longer available. Wadly brought home a box of “house chardonnay”. Yup, not kidding. And the seasonings that go with my preferred choice do not work with “house chardonnay.” At all. My wonderful seafood chowder is not stellar with the new wine and the old spice mix.

If you’re trying my chowder and you’re singularly unimpressed, leave out the spices. Try the chowder with just the veges, broth, wine, cod, shrimp . . . and add fish sauce, Worcestershire sauce and a little bit of balsamic vinegar. From that point you can play with other spices if you feel the need. So far . . . I haven’t.

I know I’m going to want the additional spices when I return to my preferred chardonnay, but until the box wine is gone and our store shelves are restocked, this is a perfectly fine solution.

I’ve been making seafood chowder pretty much daily. Over the last couple weeks the recipe hasn’t changed. It is SO good! This will make two servings if you add sides (salad, garlic toast, fresh baked rolls, etc.) and choose to share. Otherwise, be a pig and eat it all yourself without sides. It’s worth it!

• 3-4 large uncooked shrimp split lengthwise and cut into 3/4″ lengths
• 1/4 lb Pacific cod cut into 3/4″ cubes
• 2 tomatillos (3 if they’re small, 1 if they’re large) Don’t leave these out. They add a necessary brightness to the dish
• Green and red pepper diced into 1/4″ pieces
• Green onion split lengthwise and cut into 1/4″ lengths
• Tomato, 1 thick slice cubed
• Broccoli, steamed and sliced fine, 1 cup
• Shiitake mushroom. This is a texture item. Cube or dice
• Bone or vegetable broth, 1 cup
• White wine, 1/4-1/3 cup
• Fish sauce, 2 tsp
• Cilantro, 1 tbsp
• Salt (the dish doesn’t need it but if you like salty stuff, add some!)
• Gochugaru (Korean red pepper), 1 tsp. Use less or more depending on your taste.
• Sour cream, 1/4 cup
• Garlic oil
• Butter

This is a bit fussy to make because things need to be added in the right order but is so awesome it’s totally worth it.

Clean and cut the broccoli into big pieces. Steam until not quite tender. I use my Instant Pot with a steamer basket. I set it for pressure cook, turn off the keep warm function and set the time to zero minutes. When the light goes off I release the pressure and remove the pot. I get the right tenderness every time. I can start the broccoli and prepare all the other veges while it’s coming up to pressure. By the time I’ve got them all chopped or diced and my pan started the broccoli is done.

I’m a huge fan of cast iron frying pans. I have a bunch. I use an 8″ deepish Lodge pan for this recipe. You could use a sauce pan or a bigger shallower pan . . . do what works for you.

Add butter and garlic oil to the pan. Once heated add all the veges except broccoli. Cook until nearly tender. If your pan starts to look a bit dry, add more butter. Add the broccoli. Cook until thoroughly warmed through. Add broth, wine, fish sauce, cilantro, gochugaru, salt to taste.

Once the mixture starts to simmer stir in the fish and shrimp. Adjust the temperature as necessary to keep the mixture at a very light simmer. Once the fish and shrimp is cooked through (be careful not to overcook) add the sour cream to the center of the pan (don’t stir it in yet) and turn the heat down to just below simmer.

Let sit about five minutes so the sour cream can come up to temperature. Stir the sour cream into the mix and serve.

When I make spareribs I marinate the ribs overnight in a rub made of spices and apple cider vinegar. I make the spice mix in bulk and add the vinegar to the spices just before using it as a rub. It’s a five or six to one mix, spice mix to vinegar.

Then the spareribs are cooked at 425º for an hour. This truly messes up my oven. It gets a coating of grease that’s truly unappealing to see or clean.

Yesterday I tried something different. I made a tent out of parchment paper with the edges sitting inside the pan to catch all the splatter. My oven stayed clean and the ribs came out perfect. I couldn’t be more pleased.

I love barbequed spare ribs but they’re a lot of fuss to fix. Clean the ribs, season the ribs, stick ’em in the fridge overnight, bake the ribs, make sauce for the ribs, coat the ribs and bake the sauce in. That’s a lot of steps for a meal that’s eaten and gone in 20 minutes. Add to that, a rack of spare ribs is too much food for the two of us.

By now you’ve figured I’ve got a plan . . . and I do! I don’t want to give up on spare ribs. They are so good and pair so well with so many sides. I’ve figured out a way to enjoy them without having excessive leftover while speeding the process along.

Clean two racks of pork spare ribs. Cut them into two-person sized servings. Prepare the rub, apply it generously and stick the whole mess in the fridge overnight. The next morning bake them according to the instruction. Let cool. Pack each 2-meal sized piece in a separate ziplock bag, stick those in a big ziplock bag and freeze.

Make a double batch of barbeque sauce. Cool and pour into ice cube trays (the silicone ones work awesomely well). Stick the trays in the freezer. When frozen, pop the cubes of barbeque sauce out of the trays and stick them into a ziplock bag and put that bag into the larger ziplock bag holding the seasoned and baked spare ribs.

When you want barbequed spare ribs pull out a meal’s worth, 2-4 cubes of barbeque sauce and thaw. Coat and cook (I use an oven bag to ease cleanup) and you’re done! Meal prep in minutes instead of fussing all day. You’ve fussed just once for 6-10 meals.

I can’t seem to leave recipes alone. I’ve got to tweak and add and change and . . .

I’m fairly sure it’s a chronic thing. A perfectly fine pork stir fry morphs into something else. The seed is never lost as I do my best to document changes. It’s got to be excess creativity or boredom or something else.

I’ve changed my pork rub recipe. I’ve added ground cardamom and . . . and here’s why it’s so important to document. I cannot remember what the second thing I added is. I’ll have to make a trip to the kitchen and go through the spices to refresh my memory.

With food intolerances, it’s difficult to find processed meats that are worthy. Hempler’s meat products are definitely worthy. We eat their bacon, hotdogs, ground pork and more. Nothing they make (that we’ve tried) rates as high FODMAP. Everything we’ve tried has been gluten MSG and GMO free . . . all in all a truly awesome product line.

I love one dish meals. We don’t sit down together to eat unless we have company. We eat on totally different schedules. If Wadly’s eating fried chicken I’m usually having something totally different. Stir fried pork, tuna or egg salad . . . something that’s not fried chicken. When he has two hotdogs heated in the microwave (yeah, me too) I’ll cut up a hotdog and have it with broccoli, bacon, green onion, bone broth, red and green pepper . . . and it’s awesome. I’ve done the same thing with a can of green beans. Hotdog for the win.

I’m test driving a peanut butter custard recipe and it came out quite good. The recipe produces three servings.

• 3 eggs, separated
• 3 tbsp light brown sugar
• 1/3 cup creamy peanut butter
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 cup organic plain yogurt
• 3/4 cup whole milk

Beat the egg whites to aerate them just a bit. Don’t beat them into a meringue, just give them a decent number of bubbles to lighten them a bit.

In a separate bowl mix egg yoke, peanut butter, brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon and yogurt. Mix thoroughly. Add milk a little bit at a time mixing it in thoroughly.

Add egg whites to the egg yoke mixture and mix in without beating heavily.

Distribute equally to three buttered ½ pint canning jars or 1 cup ramekins. Sprinkle mini chocolate chips on the top if desired. Butterscotch chips would also be excellent!

Place on trivet in the Instant Pot with 1½ cups of water beneath. Pressure cook on high for 7 minutes. Immediately release pressure, undo and offset the lid to allow the jars to cool in place. Once the jars can be handled by a bare hand, remove them. Serve warm or cold, top with a drizzle of caramel, chocolate ganache or serve with an ice cream topper.

I’ve been making breakfast hoagies for Wadly and he raves over them. They’re simple to make but a bit fussy as it takes three pans. I like to cook so I don’t see it as a burden.

• sourdough hotdog bun or hoagie roll (hotdog bun is small, hoagie is big – adjust for your hunger level)
• fresh ground pork (I usually buy a 1 or 1½ pound package, mix in the appropriate amount of seasoning, separate it into serving sizes into zippered snack bags and stick it in a larger labeled bag into the freezer.)
• sausage seasoning (1½ tbsp/lb) (seasoning mix recipe is here)
• green onion
• butter
• egg
• 1½ tbsp sour cream

Mix the egg and sour cream.

Dice the green onion, add to egg mix.

Butter a HOT 5″ frying pan and dump the egg mix in. Reduce the heat and turn over when needed. Don’t overcook.

Place one slab of butter in a HOT pan under each side of the bun. Turn the heat down, watch carefully and rotate as needed. You want the hoagie to come out brown and crunchy, not burnt.

Shape the sausage into a size and shape that matches your bun. Cook this in a separate pan. Once it’s turned over, add a slice a cheese to the top. Wadly likes American, your tastes may align with cheddar or mozzarella or . . .

Once everything is done, assemble. While the order of assembly isn’t particularly significant, the taste is.

My awesome brother spun by months ago and gifted me with his breakfast sausage seasoning recipe. I introduced him to white pepper. He doesn’t like anything even remotely hot so white pepper was an awesome addition to his kitchen. I see this as a fairly fair trade.

My sibling’s seasoning recipe got a bit of a tweak to suit my palate (I don’t mind a bit of hot as long as Wadly can handle it) and I’ve been using the adjusted recipe ever since.

Dosing is at 1½ tablespoons per pound of freshly ground pork . . . or more depending on your tastes.

• 3 tbsp rubbed/ground sage
• 2 tsp salt (I’m not a huge fan of salt so try this amount and add as needed)
• 1 tsp white pepper (I agree with my brother on this, black pepper is a bit too bold)
• 1 tsp marjoram
• 3 tbsp brown sugar – I make my own, 1 tsp organic molasses to 1 cup organic cane sugar, store in a jar with a moisture proof lid.

I give this mix a whirl or two in my spice grinder to blend it and get the kosher salt reduced and distributed. Then I stick it in a ½ cup jelly jar for later use. The mouth of the jar is big enough for a tablespoon to fit in easily, the lid is nice and flat for writing the name of the spice combination and they stack neatly.