Category: without a recipe

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Making chicken stock & some ideas for less usual chicken soups

This is a “without a recipe”: I am using what I have in the house (I’m sick, dammit).

I really got serious with chicken stock starting with the Master Recipe for Chicken Stock from Cook’s Illustrated’s The Best Recipe (1999) – that is a 20 minute recipe for when you need stock Right Now. I still work from it, even tweaked when cold poaching chicken meat then making stock.

I’m not making 20 minute stock this time, and I’m not poaching (cold or otherwise) chicken. My goal here is to end up with about 6 cups of rich, gelatinous, chicken stock.

Here’s how this goes.

  1. In a kettle, boil 12 cups of water. (I’m using a couple cups of homemade chicken broth from the freezer – I have it, and it’s not enough to make soup on its own).
  2. In a dutch oven: a tablespoon neutral oil. Warm that up. Add onion, whole or cut up – skin included inhances the golden color of the broth, and sauté (if it’s not sizzling, turn it up. If it’s smoking turn it down. If the oil is brown, discard and start again). Salt generously – this helps the onion soften and sweeten, and you’ll need to season at some point – why not now.
  3. Add chicken (I’m using 7 chicken paws, cuz that’s what I got. Backs and necks are great. Ground is a great way to boost flavor. As are bone-in breasts and wings, or a whole cut up chicken). If there is more than what will cover the bottom of the pan, do it in stages. Sauté a little, then give a stir. Get the chicken pieces to the point that they are no longer pink.
  4. Now, add water (and broth). Add bay leaves, and peppercorns. Bring it to a rolling boil, then bring it to a simmer and cover.

Variants:

  • Garlic, carrot, celery & kombu enhance the flavor and make it more homey (that’s how I’m doing it today).
  • There is absolutely nothing wrong with ginger, garlic, chicken, broth, soy sauce, lemon juice, & chile paste.
  • A Chinese/Thai variant, Khao Man Gai, involves sugar, garlic, pandan leaves, and ginger to the base recipe.

In this case, using chicken paws, I am simmering until I end up with about 6 cups of broth – so about half the fluid of what I started with.

Now you have some options.

  • If you are poaching chicken, you need to bring its interior to 165 degrees. If you are cold poaching, that means bringing the chicken and water together to about 160 degrees and letting them cook until the chicken comes to 160 degrees (about an hour). Pull the chicken from the pot, and let it sit on a plate until the temp rises to 165 (or higher – these things do what they will do). Then remove the chicken from the bone and return the bones & skin to the pot.
  • If you are including (ground or boneless) chicken, it needs to come out of the pot when it is cooked through (for ground and/or boneless chicken pieces, most likely about 20 minutes. Otherwise, check the temp – it needs to be pulled at 160 so it can rise to 165 out of the pot).
  • If you are using chicken parts without a lot of meat on them (read: paws, backs, necks, carcasses) to just make stock, you can either cook for 20 minutes, or put it on the back burner and let it cook for quite a while. I’m aiming on concentrating the broth so that means an hour or two.

If you are back-burnering, the stock needs to be burbling at 150 degrees or more. Below that temp, you are taunting the food safety gods.

When it’s done, remove the bones and large objects from the pot. Strain the broth through a fine mesh strainer. Use or refrigerate covered within 3 hours.

The fat will rise and create a seal once the broth has been in the fridge for a couple hours. The fat adds flavor and body, and allows you to keep the broth in the fridge longer, so don’t remove the fat until you’re about to reheat the broth, and even then, don’t remove it all.

Properly stored, chicken stock will last for 3 to 4 days in the refrigerator. To extend the its shelf life, freeze it in covered airtight containers or heavy-duty freezer bags – or freeze in ice cube trays (covered & airtight, of course).

References

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No recipe pesto

In the Tablespoon category:

  • 1 part nuts to 3 parts oil

In the cup category:

  • 1 part parmesan to 6 parts sturdy, flavorful leaves & tender stems (nasturium, parsley, basil, spinach)

Otherwise

  • at least a garlic clove

Combine everything but a third of the smaller leaves in a food processor and whirr until it is coarse. Salt & pepper to taste.

Garnish with the reserved small or chopped leaves, additional cheese &/or oil, and if you want to be fancy, edible flowers from your leaves & stems.

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The wonderful world of beans

Beans are delicious, cheap, high fiber, high protein, low-acid, limiting blood spikes in glucose after eating, and most are low-glycemic.

The whole gas/farting issue

I know lots of people who don’t eat beans (often) because of gas. Here’s the deal – if you don’t eat them often, your body never fully adapts to the extra work required to digest their complex sugars. Gradually increase the frequency – your body will adjust.

Dried versus canned

My opinion: home-cooked fresh dried beans are cheaper and taste better than their canned cousins. But there is no shame in using canned beans.

Cost

Given that a pound of bulk bin dried beans (83 cents to $6 a pound for good, fresh beans) costs about what a can of beans (cheapest national brand is 79 cents; the really delicious beans hover around $2) costs…well, if you eat a lot of beans, it’s generally significantly cheaper to cook beans from scratch – and you can control the taste, nutrition, fat and salt that goes into each serving. And even if you compare very high quality fresh heirloom dried beans (something like Rancho Gordo, North Bay Trading and Zürsun Idaho Heirloom Beans who have an astounding variety for around $6 a pound) to Cento, Goya, or Ducal (all hovering around $2) – well, you’re still saving some cash – just not hand over fist.

Buying

If you’re buying bulk bin or bagged low-end dried beans, you want to be sure to be sure they are fresh. Fresh is less than 2 years old. Older than that, you’ll find that beans cook unevenly (crispy beans are never good) and don’t taste as good. Bagged beans should have a sell-by date.

If you are frequenting a store with a significant Latinx clientele, you’ll probably be safe getting black, turtle and peruano/flor de mayo beans from the bulk-bin.

Bulk-binning other beans – there lie dragons. With white, navy, and cannellini beans, I’ve had fails buying at the discount grocery where I get fabulous Latinx beans. It’s all about turn-over. Talk to the bulk manager – if they know what fresh beans are, that theirs are, and that they will make it worth your while if that isn’t the case, your chances of success are much better.

Cooking, or here’s how I do it

Picking over & rinsing – yes, always, in all cases. Remove all beans that are split, broken or otherwise not normal. Rinse well.

Soaking or not – I don’t.  It doesn’t substantially reduce cooking time, it doesn’t reduce gas, it can diminish the color and flavor.

Basic cooking – In the cooking pot – cover with 2 (or more) inches of water (clearly, if you’re making soup(y) beans, more). A heavy pot (like a dutch oven) is a good idea. If there are obvious floaters – remove them – they won’t cook evenly. Season the water generously (but not as much as pasta) with salt. Bring to a boil. If you are baking the beans, preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. Reduce to a simmer, (partially) put a lid on it (and put in the oven if that’s how you’re doing it). Start checking the beans after 45 minutes. If they are not (still) covered with water, add some so they are (well) covered. Remove any scum, if any. Cooked beans should be tender but not falling apart. Depending on their freshness, cooking time can range from 45 minutes to 2 hours. More than 2 hours, your beans were definitely not fresh. In most cases, don’t be afraid of overcooking.

Pressure cooking, obviously, is much faster. I can’t speak to that.

Seasoning while cooking – I like to season after the beans are cooked so I have more options in how I will eat them, but you can do anything you like.

Salt, obviously. Alliums are always good. Celery or fennel, carrot, bay leaf are classic. Be cautious with stock or broth – concentrating the flavors of processed, canned, boxed, or bouillon isn’t always a good idea. Kombu can add umami. Fresh or dried epazote, hoja/hierba santa or avocado leaves as well as fresh or dried chiles are traditional in central america. And salted pork, chorizo, ‎longaniza, ham hocks – you get the idea – to use as a condiment. Acidic things, like tomato, are fine to add once the beans are just about cooked.

Seasoning & garnishes after the fact – just about anything. Beans are a tabla rasa, like tofu. Salt (if needed) & pepper. Cheese. Sour cream or crema. Mexican oregano, epazote, hierba santa. Sage leaves. Tomatoes. Salsa. Crushed red chilies (or dried chile in strips). Fresh chile. Bell pepper. Chicharrónes. Fried plantains. Fried (or poached, steamed or boiled) egg. Condiment pork. Cumin and/or chili powder. Olive (or other flavorful) oil. Lime. Lemon. Any number of latin american or southwestern seasonings. Fresh cilantro. Avocado. Onion (green, red). Tortilla (strips, chips or tostadas). Soy sauce, ginger & sesame oil (oh, yes!).

Storage – Let cool in their liquor. Refrigerate cooked beans in their liquor in a covered container for up to 5 days. They can be frozen for up to 6 months in an airtight freezer container.

Mashed or refried – Any bean is great mashed or refried. You can blend or mash the beans with their liquid and then reduce them in a skillet with or without herbs, spices, alliums, and fat. Olive oil tastes great here – so does bacon grease, lard or schmaltz. Though seasoned mashed beans without fat are pretty damn good too.

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White bean stew/soup

This guide is inspired by Jacques Pépin (Essential Pépin video, ~3:12; recipe) and Milk Street (March/April 2018). This can be on the stove or in the oven.

You want some cooked white beans or cannellini. If cooking from dried, Pépin doesn’t soak, and does cook the beans with a generous amount of salt. Dried beans will take anywhere from an hour to two, depending on how fresh they are (less than 2 years old – I’ve written about fresh beans elsewhere) – otherwise, just used canned)  You can stop here, or…

Dice panchetta or bacon and fry until it takes on a little color. Add cubed or chopped onion & tomato (if canned, add with the beans), or onion with fennel bulb and garlic and let them soften. Maybe add fennel seeds, or sage with crushed red pepper. Then add to the beans with their liquor along with some thyme or rosemary (rosemary is especially nice with fennel. But use what you have). Taste & season. Let simmer for more than 15 minutes or up to 45 minutes or so. If you used fresh, hard-stemmed herbs, it’s time to pull them out – but you knew that. Give a portion a little (immersion) blending (or mashing) to give some body to the broth. Season to taste. You can stop here, or…

Before serving, garnish or serve with fresh herbs &/or lemon wedges &/or sage/sage oil &/or parmesan.

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Potato leek soup

I made the Sunset version with 2 very large Yukon golds & 1 average russet – about 2.5#, and without the half-n-half.  I was a little underwhelmed by the lack of seasoning, so, working from the Simply Recipes version, I added a half tablespoon of dried French thyme (as well as more sea salt than I’d expect because potatoes) and a quarter cup of chopped fresh Italian parsley, which was just perfect. Also, blending the parsley made the soup be the most beautiful faintly green soup. Bacon makes an extravagant garnish.

not potato leek soup

Seamus Mullen on Simply Ming – lamb meatballs & lamb pilaf with tzatki

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Avgolemono soup

This is based on recipes from Cooks Illustrated, Saveur, Diane Kochilas, and Whisk. Flip. Stir.

This feeds 2 though I make it just for me and greedily slurp it all down. Really, I should just halve this, because 2 cups should be plenty.  It does not reheat well.

On today’s version, I used some homemade chicken stock, some home-cooked white beans & their liquor (cooked in homemade chicken stock), and some tiny Mexican star-shaped soup pasta. I love any excuse to use that soup pasta! Saffron is nice, even if it’s very old, or very imaginary.

  • 4 cups stock. Or broth. Add bouillon if it needs it.
  • 2 handfuls of a small, quick-cooking starch
  • A tiny bay leaf
  • 2 cardamom pods, crushed
  • Zest and juice of one lemon
  • 2 eggs
  • A pinch saffron
  • 3/4 cup chickpeas or white beans
  1. Heat the stock to boiling. Add your starch, bay leaf, pods, and lemon zest. Reduce to a simmer and cook for however long your starch requires, plus a couple minutes more.
  2. Whisk together eggs & lemon juice in a bowl.
  3. Ladle some hot stock into eggs while whisking. Again.
  4. Add the beans & saffron to the simmering pot. Stir the tempered egg-lemon-broth in. Let everything warm through. Remove the bay leaf & pods. Salt & pepper to taste (white pepper is the fanciest).
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Lagane e Ceci

From Lidia’s Kitchen (5:10)

Note bene : this is not a recipe. This doesn’t claim to be a recipe. If you’d like a recipe, Ms Bastianich has books available for purchase.

Chickpeas:

  1. Soak chickpeas overnight
  2. Olive oil, crushed garlic, pancetta – fry.
  3. Add chickpeas, 2 sprigs of rosemary, 2 bay leaves, and pepperoncino – fry for a couple minutes while stirring,
  4. then add hot water. bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer.
  5. it should be only 45 minutes to an hour if the garbanzos are fresh

Pasta:

  • Salt
  • eggs
  • flour
  1. 1 egg for two people. Combine salt and egg, egg & water, egg & flour. Food process. When it collects to one side, it’s ready. Floured board, knead dough then let rest.
  2. Half the dough. Put half in the fridge & use within a week.
  3. Half again. Roll through the pasta machine 3x. Cut into large fat bite size ribbons – about half the size of glissons.

Putting it all together:

  1. Cook pasta, oil, beans. Combine, add parsley and lots of pecorino.
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Pozole Rojo, version 1

Last night, I made a quarter-ish pot of pozole rojo, based on Pati Jinich’s recipe and her 4 minute version.

Broth & chicken: I cold poached 2 chicken bone-in, skin-on thighs (note to self – results were good but this takes FOREVER) with most of a head of garlic. I removed the skin and pulled the cooked chicken off the bone, and then returned the skin and bones to the poaching liquid – with maybe 4 frozen chicken paws. I let simmer for a couple hours, then removed the solids, strained and refrigerated the broth. It looked like about 3 cups total broth, almost two cups chicken.

Hominy: I started with a pound of dried hominy, but lost a quite a bit between floaters and my mishaps with de-hulling. Details are here. Next time I’ll include onion &/or garlic in the cooking liquid. I ended up with about 3 cups of cooked hominy.

Chile paste: working with what I had, I used an ounce of ancho chiles. My bad: I didn’t stem or seed the chiles. After soaking the chiles & blending them with garlic, cumin & salt (I had no cloves or onion), my second bad was not forcing the paste through a sieve. I then fried it. Messy. I made a half-recipe of paste for a quarter-recipe of soup, so, not surprisingly, I only needed about a third of it.

Putting it all together: I combined broth, bite-sized chicken, hominy & about 3 cups of water, brought to a boil, reduced to a simmer. Added a little chile paste, then a little more. Broth was about the right color, and tasted of chile, but was intensely bitter. My dinner guests would be over in just a few minutes – OMG, how do I course-correct? I added some Better than BouillonTM to boost the chicken flavor (the broth wasn’t terribly flavorful to begin with) and suddenly, the broth just worked. Which was good because suddenly, my guests were here.

For the salad plate: 

  • Quartered limes
  • Chopped cilantro
  • Chopped radish
  • Shredded cabbage
  • Tostadas
  • Chunked avocado
  • Mexican oregano
  • Chili powder

Results: not bad. Resulting soup was flavorful but gritty. I was unhappy about the grittiness. I didn’t let the soup with chile paste simmer for the full 25 minutes – I don’t know how much that affected the taste. I think I still would have had to doctor it.

Next time:

  • Season each part separately to build flavor. Broth & hominy were too bland.
  • Pay attention to the details on the chile paste.
  • Halve the chile paste recipe again – use a half ounce of chiles.
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Molletes (or beans on toast with cheese)

Molletes are a very simple, very delicious, Mexican comfort food. There are really only four ingredients, so starting with good ingredients is a good idea.

Bread: I prefer something rustic. I use Italian or French style breads, as those are the bakeries closest to me, but really any crusty bread or roll will work. I just made molletes with an Italian corn bread – amazing!

Butter: don’t sweat this. Salted, unsalted, high-fat, normal – none of these matter. Just make sure it’s room temperature, or otherwise spreadable. (You can also lightly toast your bread-object/s so the butter meltiness is less of an issue, depending on how much you love toast)

Refried Beans: I’ve never seen these made with anything other than black beans, but really, any mexican style (peruvian, pinto) beans will work. They need to be refried in a decent fat – I use olive oil for my veggie friends, and lard or bacon grease for me. They should be well seasoned – I prefer mine garlicky. They can come straight from a can, but they should be good enough to eat on their own.

Cheese: I love some ricotta or queso requesón along with shredded “mexican style” cheese (monterey jack, pepper jack, cheddar, queso chihuahua or queso menonita, and/or queso oaxaca)  and some queso fresco. Okay, and some queso añejo. Really, any one or two of these is fine.

Ready?

Ingredients

  • thick sliced bread or split roll
  • (spreadable) butter
  • cheese
  • refried beans

Garnishes (all optional)

  • fresh or bottled table salsas
  • meat
  • sliced avocado
  1. Preheat oven-like device to 400 degrees F.
  2. Put your bread-like object on the (parchment-ed) pan
  3. Spread bread with butter
  4. Spread buttered bread with a generous layer of refried beans – I like mine thick, you may prefer moderation. All good.
  5. Top with cheese
  6. Turn off the oven & turn on the broiler to high
  7. Put the pan in and keep an eye on it – this goes from almost there to a fire hazard in a blink of an eye.
  8. Pull it out when cheesy is melty and bread edges are golden brown and delicious looking.
  9. Top with garnishes. Or not.