Christmas Candies!

Making Christmas cookies is one of my favorite ways to enjoy the holiday season, especially because my goofy, wonderful husband and I have a tendency to be really silly, dancing around the kitchen and turning cookie making into a full-on event. This year, though, we thought we'd also give Christmas candies a try, and we have Food Network to thank for this brilliant idea. On a recently aired episode of Guy Fieri's Diners, Drive-ins and Dives, Guy helped a master candy maker at Disney World make candy canes from scratch. It was amazing to see all the steps that go into hand-crafting those delicious treats, and I was particularly fascinated watching Guy and his mentor pull the dough on the candy hook, stretching it like taffy, and then modeling it so that the strips of red and green could be worked in. I love candy canes but am, like most people, familiar with the really inexpensive, industrially produced kind. It was a revelation to see the craftsmanship that went into making the ones at Disney. My husband and I were inspired to try making some candy at home, but even though we appreciated everything that went into making candy canes, that seemed just a tad too intense to try at home. Plus, we're busy spending all our money buying people presents, so there's not a lot floating around to buy candy-making equipment (not to mention that I have no idea where I'd put a candy hook in my tiny kitchen).

When my December issue of the Food Network magazine came in the mail, I found the perfect solution in their edible gifts section. We modified one of the recipes they included to make our very own delicious and very festive peppermint bark. It was inexpensive to make, especially since I saw a tin of the exact same stuff at Trader Joe's for $9.99. It is also really easy since, unlike cookies, you don't have to work in batches, and the whole process is pretty quick from start to the hardening stage. It's also easy enough that you can make it with kids (or very child-like adults) as your special helpers.

First, finely chop 12 oz. of semi-sweet chocolate. You can also use chocolate chips for this part, in which case you do not need to chop them. I actually used both chips and chopped pieces of chocolate since I had a bit of both in the pantry already. You will need another 4 oz. of chocolate in a little while and should have it handy, so if you're chopping, chop another 4 oz. now and set it aside.

Next, you need 1 c. of broken peppermint pieces. Even after my rhapsodizing about the craftsmanship of candy canes, we bought some of the cheap ones and smashed them...but I'd never do that to the hand-made ones--honest! You can use starlight mints or candy canes. Just put them in a large plastic bag, place on a sturdy flat surface, and roll over them with a rolling pin. This will cause some initial breakage but won't actually get the pieces small enough, so once you've exhausted what you can do with the rolling pin, give them a whack with a hammer. No, I'm not kidding. See?

Once your candy pieces are ready, melt the chocolate. You have three choices here: microwave, double boiler, or in a saucepan. I just did mine in a saucepan, stirring constantly and watching closely, and I'm pleased to say that it didn't scorch. While the chocolate is melting, melt 1 T. vegetable shortening. Once the chocolate is melted, add the 1 t. melted shortening and then stir in the additional 4 oz. of chocolate. If you'd like a mintier bark, you can add some peppermint extract here (I didn't do so but would next time around--I'd go with 1/8-1/4 tsp).

When the mixture has melted and is smooth, use a spatula to spread it on a parchment-paper lined cookie sheet. Sprinkle the candy mixture on top, pressing down to make sure larger pieces adhere.

Allow the candy to harden. I needed to leave mine overnight, so I just covered it with plastic wrap and stuck it in a cold oven...just don't forget it's in there the next day! Once the candy is hard, break it into pieces. Don't worry about it being uniform--that's not the point (and not really possible, either).

Your peppermint bark is now ready to enjoy, or to give as an edible gift.

Allrecipes shout out!

I love, love, love allrecipes.com. Like other sites, it is searchable in a variety of different ways and has a virtual recipe box that allows you to save things that look interesting, and it lets you leave reviews on particular recipes. But I think it's great because it has a couple of features some other sites don't.  Namely, it allows your average users to post recipes and to tweak existing recipes and save those tweaks as custom versions (although I should say this is available to members at the supporting level). I find this enormously helpful for those times when I want a new recipe, but I want something another average person made in their kitchen with regular equipment and ingredients, not something out of Bon Appetit magazine that requires ingredients out of my budget and ok, fine, I'll say it, knowledge beyond my current culinary skill level. I also like that there are a number of affiliated food blogs with interesting and handy dandy information, as well as online groups that have sprung up within the allrecipes framework, such as one that specifically looks for recipes that do not have a photo posted, vote on one they all want to make, and then users all add their photos and reviews to help round out the site (and have some fun, too!).

I'm nursing a repetitive stress injury (from too much typing! blah!), and it has seriously curbed my kitchen experimentation over the last week or so...so what better time to cop out a little and just point you towards awesome things other people are doing online?

Here are a couple of great dishes from allrecipes.com that I've made recently, and that I would highly recommend. Happy browsing, happy cooking, and best of all, happy eating!

Turkey and Yam Tacos

These are fooddude's Turkey and Yam Spicy Tacos, which I've made twice so far and which are definitely going into the normal dinner rotation. It takes a little while to do the chopping, but otherwise is a fairly easy, healthy recipe with absolutely delicious results. You can tweak it, too, adding elements like beans or rice, changing the heat level, and choosing different salsas for a different flavor. I've actually only made it with store-bought tomato salsa, but will try it with a homemade tomatillo salsa as soon as I can get some decent tomatillos at the store. You can find the recipe here.

Slow Cooker Latin Chicken

I'm a sucker for a good slow cooker recipe. The best ones, in my opinion, make healthy meals that have a great fragrance to make your house smell lovely all day long. Crock pots are like magic--even though you might put a lot of prep into dinner earlier in the day, when it comes time to eat I always have that great feeling like dinner made itself. This is a great dish that combines the flavors and textures of beans, dark meat chicken, and sweet potatoes. It's a total winner, and it's even good reheated ( I stuck some peanuts on top of the leftovers for some additional texture--yum). I always make it with kidney beans and have served it on both rice and couscous. You can find the recipe here.

Challah

Lastly, I found a fabulous and very easy recipe for challah on allrecipes.com. There is a version in Claudia Roden's award-winning volume The Book of Jewish Food, but it makes four loaves and while I have mad bread-baking skills, I do not possess mad math skills. I just didn't think I could scale it since I only wanted to make one loaf. I still had to cut the recipe I used in half, but that was much easier for me. This is actually the first loaf of bread I've ever made using a recipe I found online (all the others have come from physical cookbooks), but I found it very clear and was surprised that making challah is really no trouble at all--as long as you're going to be home long enough to let it rise three times. I made the sweet version by adding extra sugar, since that's the kind that I came to love as a child. The bread is tender, has just the right density, is slightly sweet (but still not really a dessert bread), and thanks to the egg wash, has a perfect crust. You can find the recipe here. Oh, and please don't judge my bread-braiding skills. It looked better before I baked it, but presentation isn't everything.

Thanks to all the great allrecipes cooks who have inspired me and who have, more than once, saved me from dinnertime doldrums.

The Best of the Season

Since my husband and I have been traveling a lot lately, we really needed to spend a weekend at home. Last weekend was officially Sit on the Couch weekend, and oh, we watched sooo much football. But in between games I did manage to make up a big pot of Shaker Cider Stew, something my mom used to make when I was a kid and that was always a big hit. I vividly remember coming home one chilly day when I was about 12 to find the house filled with the sweet smell of the stew and that heavy, earthy smell of freshly baked yeast rolls. I had been having a blast out with my friends, but when I got home and saw that mom had been putting so much effort into dinner while I was out made me feel really content and loved. If only this memory had surfaced a few times during those teen years, I might not have been quite as horrible to my mother, or at least I might have thought twice about it.

Shaker Cider Stew is not something my mother concocted herself, but in my mind it is absolutely her recipe, and I think it's sort of funny how that works. I'd never read a great book and be like "it's mine now!," even if it becomes a part of who I am on a deep level. But food, it seems, is different. Make something enough times and it seems to be yours--it becomes the thing you are known for at social gatherings, to the point where your invitation to the event ends with "oh, and can you bring your (insert name of awesome dish you make that everyone loves here)?" This proprietary thing is interesting from a familial standpoint, too, where you can only pass the secret sauce recipe, grandma's fudge recipe, etc. etc. to other members of the family, as if "privileged" kitchen knowledge must be kept secret to assure that no matter what year it is or where you live, your family will always have one thing it can make better than the Joneses. Making a recipe a certain number of times is like adopting it--it becomes part of your repertoire, and you love it and care for it over the years, even though sometimes it isn't as good as you hoped. It's amazing how often I find myself saying something like, "oh, my pumpkin pie recipe calls for...," even though there's no "my" about it. That shit came off the back of the Libby's pumpkin puree can. And it was delicious.

I suspect that my mom's Shaker Cider Stew recipe is from one of the many cookbooks she had in her collection when I was growing up, but we've adopted it and been making it for almost two decades. When my mother made me a scrapbook-style "family recipes" cookbook as a Christmas gift, she included this recipe,  so as far as I'm concerned, she's claimed it. I share it with all of you as a sort of tribute to her. I hope it'll make your home smell lovely and fill your belly well.

Shaker Cider Stew

Ingredients:
2 T. all purpose flour
2 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. pepper
2 lbs. beef stew meat, cut into 1-inch cubes
2 T. oil
2 large onions, sliced
1 c. water
1 c. apple juice or cider
2 medium rutabagas, peeled and chopped (4 cups)
6 medium carrots, chopped (3 cups)
2 T. snipped parsley
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. dried marjoram, crushed
1/2 tsp. thyme
1/3 c. cold water
3 T. flous
6 small potatoes, peeled, cooked and mashed

In a paper bag, combine 2 T. flour, 2 tsp. salt, and the pepper. Add meat cubes, a few at a time, shaking to coat the meat.

In a Dutch oven or large soup pot, brown meat, half at a time in the hot oil. Return all meat to the pot. Add onions, the 1 c. of water, and apple juice or cider. Cover and simmer about 1 1/4 hours or until meat is tender. Add rutabagas, carrots, parsley, the 1 tsp. salt, the marjoram, and thyme. Cover and simmer 30 minutes or until vegetable are cooked. Blend the 1/3 c. of water and 3 T. flour; stir into the stew. Cook and stir till bubbly. Transfer to a serving bowl and spoon mashed potatoes around the edges. (also good without the mashed potatoes, and you can probably substitute turnips for rutabagas if you want, although I've never done so).

A whole lot of failure and sometimes, maybe, a little success

I think the title of this post basically sums up what cooking is for me, but with this addition: that the successes are so rewarding that I'm often willing to overlook the failures. Cooking is about experimentation, at least for me. Sure, I use recipes, but I also tweak them, discard them completely, invent something new, add an ingredient on a whim, completely misread instructions and inadvertently do something that dramatically changes the results...basically, it's a crapshoot, but that's a terrible way to refer to something you're going to put in your mouth, right? I mean, I know what a crapshoot is, but we all know what it sounds like, right?

I decided I'd share with you a few recent kitchen misfires since I'm not exactly your Martha Stewart type and I'm not afraid to say that things went wrong. I don't think any cook should be embarrassed to make a mistake, but then, that's much easier said than done. This is a photo of an apple chicken curry I made using a recipe on allrecipes.com, one of my fave sites. I hold the author of that recipe completely blameless since my first time making the recipe, I decided to incorporate a bunch of suggestions from the comments other people left, and to also add ingredients no one in fact suggested, and, in my final act of madness, decided to use a totally different cooking method. Basically, I made a completely different dish without test-driving the recipe I claimed to be using first. The results were edible, decent even, but a far cry from a true curry. I was disappointed.

Then there was the Sopa de Xim Xim incident. I had bought a cookbook called Hot & Spicy Latin Dishes at a used bookstore for a whopping twenty-five cents. I'm pretty sure it's out of print. Sopa de Xim Xim (Peanut Soup)  sounded awesome and different--it's got beef, onions, bell peppers, peanut butter. I like all of those things when they're together in Thai food, although there we are talking more about peanut sauce than peanut butter. Anyway, I decided to take my chances, except that the soup called for a habanero and I know I can be kind of a wimp about heat. It helpfully suggested that I could substitute three jalapenos, but for a reason I cannot now fathom, I was convinced this was a direct equivalence and would still be too hot. I made a big pot of the soup as directed, but with only 2 jalapenos. I tasted a small spoonful and it seemed ok, so I served it up for dinner, dug in, and tasted what was basically meat and veggies floating in liquidy peanut butter. Determined to fix it, I added some garlic and another jalapeno to try and give it some spice. That helped, but the damage had been done and I never could get past the idea that I was basically eating meat cooked in peanut butter. It turned my stomach, and my poor husband just couldn't win. If he didn't want to eat it, I was bummed. When he took an enthusiastic mouthful, I turned on him and shouted "I can't believe you're eating this!" Did I mention that cooking can kind of play with your emotions, especially when you've worked hard on something that no one--not even you--will eat? There's no photo of this one because it went down the drain, and I went to Taco Bell. That's right, the fruits of over 2 hours of labor were chalupas containing something that is definitely not actual meat.

So what is my point in telling you this? Well, it's because it's weirdly cathartic to share these little mishaps because it allows me to see that that's all they are--little mishaps. I didn't burn down my apartment, or get jalapenos in my eye (again, that is), or give anyone a food-borne illness. I just screwed up, and it happens to everyone, all the time. Actually, in the second instance, I didn't really screw up, I just took a chance that didn't pay off, and everyone does that all the time, too. Well, not everyone, but it's part of leading an exciting life where you actually try new things. So in the end, this post isn't really for you, dear reader, but for me. I accept my kitchen mishaps for what they are, and I vow to soldier on. Next adventure, please!