Imaginary Lobster Rolls

 

To my taste, this fishy po'boy is as good as or better than a take out lobster roll, and a  fast and tasty way to get your weekly salmon requirement.

We get these wild caught Alaskan sockeye salmon portions, skin on, from Walmart, either fresh (previously frozen? IDK), or frozen, but they are rather bland tasting for some reason, especially since I rarely cook with salt. 

So to increase our gustatory pleasure, I make a salmon salad and throw it on a sandwich. A traditional lobster roll or fish or shrimp po'boy is on a hot dog bun. Here we used a soft French baguette, $1, made in store at Walmart. 

1. Mix a couple scoops of mayonnaise in a bowl with a squirt of tomato ketchup. Add an optional teaspoon of horseradish. Add chopped pickles. We used my sour refrigerator pickles, homemade from fresh cucumbers.
2. Pan fry the salmon portions, in olive oil, skin down, a few minutes, flip, and continue cooking until the interior of the salmon is flaky rather than sushi. Pepper it generously with black pepper. Dill or tarragon are traditional options as well. Roughly chop it in pieces with the spatula flipper. Squirt over it the juice of a lemon.  
3. Toss in the saucy bowl, layer on your choice of sandwich roll.

Omit the pickles if you like, but they are a welcome tart crunchiness. Chopped fresh ripe tomatoes are good too, capers, even grated carrots, onions, or apples.

Job done!

The salmon isn't buttery as genuine lobster meat is, but it does taste rich, and the pink and white of the salmon, mayo and blush of tomato ketchup, with the rough points of the salmon flesh, tricks my mind into feeling just as spoiled. 

Bread Machine Northern Cornbread the Way We Like It

We started with a recipe from Bread Dad who has lots of helpful tips about making a quick sweet bread, like a muffin bread or tea bread or cornbread, in a bread machine.

My research seems to confirm Bread Dad's take, that the sweeter, moister cornbread we like up here is Northern style, and Southern cornbread is savory, dry and crumbly. 

We substituted olive oil for butter, and maple syrup for the sugar, since they are saying that maple syrup doesn't cause glycemic spikes the way other sugars do. Plus we LOVE it!

Probably butter and maple syrup would be what New Englanders had on hand to make cornbread, but we have tested and confirmed, this bread tastes sweeter and moister with the olive oil/maple syrup combo.

We started this as a Thanksgiving side dish but my 10-year-old nephew considers this a genuine sweet treat, so now we make it alot! Perfect for Presidents' Day, too, (those old guys liked cornbread). 

Ingredients

1/3 cup olive oil       (or 6 Tablespoons butter if you prefer)

1 cup maple syrup    (or 1 cup sugar or honey)

1 1/4 cup milk (optional; I know this because I forgot it last time! the cornbread was nice and sweet and moist and delicious, just a little smaller)

2 eggs (lightly beaten) (if vegan, use your choice of egg substitutes) 

1 cup yellow cornmeal

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking power

1 tsp. baking soda

Our method

My bread machine is an Amazon Basics. Like all baking machines I have used, start by putting all liquids at bottom and then dry ingredients.

So put ingredients in the machine in the order listed. 

I add the leavening (baking powder and baking soda) last, sprinkling it over the flour, and then use the measuring spoon to sort of fluff mix just the leavenings and flour part on top. This is how I get around separate bowls for mixing flour, etc. in recipes. 

Settings

I use the "CAKE" setting on my bread machine. I have also been successful when I used the "Quick Bread" setting, when first experimenting. 

The CAKE setting takes 1 hour 50 minutes for the whole process. The quick bread setting is 2 hours 40 minutes. 

I typically bake breads on my DARK crust setting, because I like to make very sure the center is done. However, this one will be slightly overbaked on dark setting, (still good to eat!). I will probably go with Light next time, I used Medium this time.

When I serve my family I sometimes cut off the floury crusts all around so it looks like one giant square serving of cornbread! Plus I get to taste it by eating those yummy crust pieces!

  

Cornmeal Cakes with Antique U.S. Presidents

We celebrated everything, with kids...

On George Washington's Birthday, or on Lincoln's Birthday, or on President's Day, we made cornmeal "hoecakes" or pancakes.

On Lincoln's birthday we played with, yup, Lincoln logs. We decorated with money, (pennies and dollar bills). Of course we read the books, early readers, Abe Lincoln's Hat, stories about George, about Martha. Age appropriate stories, and got to the meat of the stuff when they were a little older.

Here's a cornmeal pancake recipe. 

Equal parts cornmeal and flour; or all cornmeal (my preference)

An egg or two, or omit and use a little baking powder and a little baking soda (less than a tsp ea.)

a spoonful of sugar or honey, if desired

a pinch of salt, if desired

enough "sour milk" to mix lightly into a lumpy batter:

    use buttermilk if you have it, or add a squeeze of lemon to            milk; or substitute yogurt or sour cream

Fry like pancakes on a hot griddle. When bubbles show on top, it's time to flip. 

Serve with butter and honey. 

These are the all cornmeal version, no leavening other than eggs. The cornmeal is very tender and sweet.

(Or maple syrup: I read that Washington aspired to plant maples at Mt. Vernon, ever the entrepreneur, as people tried to convince him that maple sugar would one day be a successful product, see "founders archives" at this link: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-20-02-0101

But of course maples are New England trees, they don't like Virginia weather. I wonder if John Adams ate them with maple syrup?)

Adding Cocoa Reduces Blood Pressure? Try Co-coatmeal cookies

 

Ok my family loves oatmeal cookies, and we have our own recipe but I also love the one that comes with the oatmeal for Vanishing Oatmeal Cookies, because it doubles the oatmeal (to use it up and make you buy more of course, but who doesn't need more oatmeal?). 

And I have been reading about all the foods you need to eat everyday to reduce blood pressure and prevent cancer and prevent heart disease and prevent dementia, and so now we have a little group of foods we take one of everyday like a vitamin--which pretty much meets our calories for the day by eating them all!

AND now they are telling us that cocoa reduces high blood pressure! but has no ill effect if you already have low blood pressure.

So in advance of our annual checkup we are adding cocoa to everything! And cinnamon. (I usually add cardamom and ginger and any spices I can to oatmeal cookies! but I thought I'd taste the cocoa first...)

These came out great and my family urged me to share with you all. These are nut free, and use no eggs, (because I was out, and can only afford one shopping per paycheck).  I used white chocolate chips, dried blueberries and dried cranberries as mix-ins because I intended to make our white oatmeal cookies red, white and blue for the 4th, but didn't make them...oh well they tasted great with chocolate anyway.

1/2 cup plus 6 T softened butter (Or make it vegan: I also love to substitute olive oil pretty much anywhere! I have also used solid coconut oil here)

1 cup sugar (this is about half the Quaker Oats amount of sugar and these were still super sweet, you can cut this to taste)

Cream it up. Then add:

1/2 cup applesauce (here's where you would add the eggs)

Follow with these:

about a cup and a half flour

about half a cup of cocoa

a teaspoon baking soda

a teaspoon cinnamon

Mix it up. Add 3 cups oatmeal (dry, not cooked).

Add your add-ins, raisins, nuts, or as I did, chocolate or white chocolate chips, dried fruits (blueberries and cranberries were really good!)

Drop tablespoonfuls on a baking sheet, bake about 10 minutes in 350 degree oven. 

Made 4 dozen. 

Enjoy that calming drop in pressure!

Cold Comfort Food

This is a kiddie fave, banana pudding pie, right before baking.  

Avoiding grocery shopping and using up everything available to eat?  Make something cold and tasty and sweet and nutritious.  

This is a marriage of a stove top cooked blanc mange pudding with a baked egg custard, depending more or less on your available milk/eggs, and uses up as many ripe bananas as you like.  

Because it's ant season, I have been hastily using up all of my sugar/molasses/maple syrup/honey, so I finished off the sugar with this one too.  

Not only did I have ripe bananas on hand, because my daughter who does not eat bananas does my shopping, and when I put bananas on the list, she thinks we can stock up for several months....in stocking up on "comfort food" treats to maintain coffee break variety for my adult children working from home, I had purchased FOUR POUNDS of animal crackers.  

This was overly optimistic because the novelty wore off after a handful.  We crumbled them on ice cream or yogurt.  I crunched them up and used them as the "crust" and topping for our banana pudding pie.  

Line the pie tin, bowl or baking dish with a layer of crumbled animal crackers, (or graham crackers, yeah we have four boxes of those too), or vanilla wafers.  

On the stovetop cook:

About a quarter cup of flour or cornstarch 

About a cup and a half of milk

2 Tablespoons butter

A cup of sugar 

Cook on low, stirring, to cook off the flour taste and thicken the pudding.  This is the blanc mange part.  

While you simmer, whisk up a little of the hot milk mixture into a small bowl of two egg yolks, and then add back to the pot, continuing to stir.  

Add 3-5 ripe bananas, sliced.

Pour the pudding onto your cookies, crumble some more on top to cover, and bake in a 350 degree oven about 15 minutes.  That's the custard part.

Chill and then eat. 

Another way we used up the animal crackers?  In the best granola bars we've made yet!  My family loves these, and they are even better the second or third day as the flavor ripens.  

Mix your choice of (I used all these):

2 cups crumbled animal crackers (or graham crackers, or skip this altogether)

peanuts

walnuts

chopped figs

raisins

dried cranberries 

3 cups of old fashioned or quick cooking oatmeal

ground flax seed (1/4 cup or less)

poppy seeds (a tablespoon)

orange zest

cinnamon

ground cardamom

peanut butter (I had just a quarter cup)

maple syrup (I had about 3/4 cup)

2 eggs

I did not salt, but add if you like

Line a 9x13 pan with parchment paper, spread mixture and bake at 350 for 15-30 minutes, until dry to the appearance and touch, and just beginning to brown.  

Let cool and cut into bars.

Ok, one more cold comfort food with the overstocked survival shopping you completed:  

Swiss Miss Ice 

My daughter does not drink coffee but likes hot chocolate from an instant mix.  She is sensitive to some dairy products but finds the dried nonfat milk in hot chocolate mix works for her.  Because my kids were going to be trapped at home for awhile, and because ingredients including milk were kind of hard to find at the beginning of all this, I sprung for a package of Swiss Miss in the canister, so I could scoop out the cocoa/sugar/milk mixture to use for her, and for....things.  Baked goods, maybe.

Except the delivery of one unit of this Swiss Miss included about five years worth of hot cocoa servings.  I have about 10 lbs. of it.  I have the canisters tucked away everywhere!  

So we made hot cocoa ice last night.  I followed the directions for a cup of cocoa and made a quart of it, with boiling water.  Then freeze!  Mix occasionally while freezing, or use your ice cream maker, we did.  Return to the freezer until hard, then run your spoon over the top and collect the chocolaty ice shavings in a paper cup.  Better than Rita's!

Mother's Day Brunch by the Boy

Our Guest Editor today invented this lovely brunch modeled on a photo he saw but for which he could not find a recipe!  He says:

It's literally just baguette slices with a sunny side up egg on top.  The sauce is balsamic vinegar and blueberry jam mixed together.  Serve with fruit and yogurt.

Happy Day!

My Favorite Food

Lazy Cole Slaw

cabbage, coarsely chopped

grated carrots

lemon juice

mayonnaise

salt

black pepper

caraway seeds

When stocking up, oh it was before St. Patrick's day, I picked up a cabbage because I know how long they last in the refrigerator!  Good old foods from the lands of long winters and short growing seasons, cabbage, potatoes, root vegetables....Anyway a little cabbage goes far, in soups, salads, as a vegetable, so I still had 3/4 of my cabbage and finally got around to making my favorite food, cole slaw!  Cole slaw feels like spring so is perfect for the Easter table, and was terrific on our turkey and rye bread sandwiches.  

I can eat my cole slaw like candy, I can eat the whole bowl, now how else could you enjoy so much cabbage?  I prefer homemade over the classic because I add NO sugar.  The carrots and cabbage are sweet enough.  What is necessary for cole slaw flavor is lemon juice and mayonnaise.  Carrots are optional, though beautiful for color and vitamins, and sometimes I generously add caraway seeds, and coarse salt.  I don't usually salt anything, even soup or pasta, (except in baking bread or cakes, because in there, salt is crucial to the chemistry as well as flavor), but Lazy Cole Slaw is a special treat.  

Classic cole slaw grates the cabbage and carrots very fine, but I often (usually) just do Lazy Cole Slaw, roughly chopping the cabbage across the grain, and tossing the whole thing.

This gets even better over time in the fridge, though it never lasts too long!