The Lucky Get the Juice

We're lucky enough to have access to a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program, something I've written about before. We're also lucky enough to get to go to one of the farms during the "Farm Welcomes You!" days they hold every month. The first time we went we were able to pick oranges and avocados.

This time it was only oranges, btu we still made out pretty well. Actually, we made out soi well, that we were able to do things like this post: making some juice.

Here's the start. I grabbed fifteen oranges and halved them. That I could just grab fifteen oranges is another story, one about the vast ubiquity of the oranges on trees, but here, really have been used to only going with six or so, this represented a lot.

Here were my tools: the stainless bowl; a fine mesh sieve; the Pyrex measuring cup used to collect filtered juice; and the strangely scary-looking wooden butt-plug-like hand juicer.

Here's the juicer at work. Arm crampingly and everything-sticky-making work.

Now, with all those oranges juiced, and nearly a gallon of juice collected, the need to filter is here, and you can see the setup of the sieve and measuring cup.

Here's all the juice next to a pile of orange husks halves. This is almost too much juice.

Pretty lucky, but you work for this.

Saturday Afternoon Indian Inspirations

This past Saturday I used my knowledge of Indian sub-continent fare to make a little something, actually a big something considering I used some of our farm delivery vegetables. I think I can explain about how to make it in every home. The food is delicious and healthy.

Here's a little list of the things needed, nothing that should be too exotic:
1onion, diced;
1 tbsp cumin seed;
1/4 cup diced jalapeno;
1/4 cup sliced cilantro stems;
1/8 cup minced garlic;
1/8 cup minced ginger;
tiny pinch of tumeric;
tomato sauce (I'll explain a little about this in a second).

That's all you need if you want a really good base for meats or vegetable. Tumeric might be the only truly exotic thing there. You only need a tiny amount for any dish it asks for; it's the spice the turns everything neon yellow/orange/heading to green.

Don't be too concerned about the volumes of jalapeno and cilantro, and garlic and ginger, just that they are in a 1:1 ratio with each other and a 2:1 ratio of green to white.

The tomato sauce I speak about originally, in true Indian food, would be a healthy sized can of stewed whole tomatoes that you need to grate over a grater. I done that; I've also used cans of tomato sauce, cans of crushed tomatoes, and on this day, I used the remnants of a bottle of bloody-mary mix that a bar owner down the street had given to me.

Here's how the steps work:

Heat the oil and drop in the cumin seeds. They'll start to sizzle, and you should let them toast. Don't burn them. Add the onions, and you're kitchen will smell awesome.

Let that go until the onion becomes translucent, then add the diced jalapeno and cilantro stems.

Once those soften up, add the garlic and ginger. Now everything really starts to smell great.

After that starts to get aromatic, about a few minutes of letting it go, add the tumeric and other curry powders, if you have them. We still have some really hot powder that was given to us as a gift.

Then the tomato sauce goes in. Now you have a really good base for meat or vegetables, or both. On this day I went with both.

Here is the diced chicken I added. This smelled so good at this point...

Then I added the vegetables. I started to get nervous because it didn't look like there was enough vegetables. I used a little of everything from the farm stuff, and it proved more voluminous than I would have thought.

All was fine in the end, of course, as the vegetables release their water. Here's the finished product, after about fifteen or twenty minutes of simmering.

Serve it over rice and you have a nice balanced meal. It, like a casserole, gets better as the days go on, and it's just as good the next day.

That base--the cumin, onion, pepper/cilantro, garlic/ginger, tumeric and tomato--is so delicious and easy and healthy, that it can make nearly anything into a tasty exotic alternative.

Didn't stop cooking...

Still cooking most nights, I haven't been taking too many pictures. I do, though, have a few from a few days ago. It was a night I was trying to be creative with what we have--Gonzo Cuisine at its base, baby--and finished off the fennel bulb.

The starch was rice, which is easy and agrees with the missus and myself. I diced up some beef and seasoned it with salt, pepper, and some cayenne. I needed to spice it up a touch because of the other ingredients.

I didn't have any onion or celery--my mirepoix reserves were down to nil. I did have the fennel, which I diced to the same size as the meat, and carrots, which got diced the same (keeping it "nice"). I smashed and minced some garlic, and got ready.

I heated some vegetable oil in a pan and tossed in the carrots and fennel and seasoned. I let them soften a bit, then put in the garlic and red pepper flakes. Garlic turns bitter is you burn it, as do the red pepper flakes. I let it get about three-quarters done and then removed it from the pan, putting it in a bowl to rest.

While it rested, I put in the meat. Here's the meat going next to the resting veg, and the rice slowly going on the side. The reason for the cayenne is because of the fennel and carrots. Fennel has a noticeable flavor that veers from weak-licorice to sweetness-touched-with-anise, while carrots are nondescriptly sweet. Together they could turn a nice dinner into something too sweet. The cayenne helped.

Once the meat was almost done, I returned the vegetables finished it all together. The dicing on the meat meant that it would cook too fast to all be put in together. Separating it made for more dirty dishes, but the right consistency on the meal was the prize.

The dish was easy and turned out to be very tasty. Not really enough green for me, but it worked. Gonzo Cuisine for certain.

Some things to do with Fennel Bulbs

Fennel comes in a two varieties (seed and bulb), and of those varieties, one has two varieties of its own (large bulbs and baby bulbs). Fennel is in the licorice family of flavor, and usually is found in the dry spices area of the market, with the seeds looking like cumin, and tend to be used is cookies or baking for people who like a milder form of anise.

Now, I know this post is really about the bulbs, but I couldn't resist an idea that uses some fennel seed, now that summer will quickly be upon us. What you want is an even mix of fennel seed and coriander seed, and grind them together coarsely. Coriander seed has a lemony flavor, and the combo produced by mixing it with the slight anise flavor form the fennel is sweet and uplifting.

This mixture is used to dip one side of a one-inch square sandwich in, so one side of this little finger food is covered in the fennel/coriander powder. The sandwich is made of two 1" x 1" squares 1/4" to 1/2" thick pieces of watermelon on either side of the same sized piece of block feta cheese. Perfect for an appetizer or snack on a hot summer day, these little sandwiches are awesome. (The scrap watermelon is pretty awesome too.)

So, the bulbs are versatile once you have some idea what to do. Starting with the large bulbs, you can cut them in half, core them, since the core is tough and no fun to chew on, and you can roast them. Fennel bulb roasted like this exudes a sweetness (from the caramelization of its sugars) that compliments the light licorice flavor. The outer layer might need to be strafed with a peeler before roasting, as that toughness associated with that outer layer becomes really tough after a roasting.

We've been getting the fennel bulbs in our farm delivery each week for a while now, and they come with the fronds still attached. The fronds are good for stocks, but even better for fumee, the light fish broth. To stocks they add some definite character.

I've been dicing the bulbs like onions and adding them to sauces, and this is one of the great things to do with them: using them diced for a shrimp stock. Not everybody is down for this, but if you have the scraps, like shrimp husks, you can make a broth and then add your vegetables (like mirepoix and fennel) and make either a sauce for pasta or rice, or just a flavorful soup. Maybe I'll do that in a little bit.

If you slice the bulbs thin, they make a great addition to a lettuce salad, and if you shave the fennel, with either a mandolin or a peeler, you get something else entirely. This is what I like to do with them. Thinner than paper shavings of fennel in a bowl, mixed with thinly sliced strawberries and some bitter greens like treviso or arugula, and you've got yourself a winner.

Here it is without the greens yet. I use a peeler instead of a mandolin because I don't have a mandolin. A mandolin in the kitchen is a plastic rectangle with a blade set diagonally in the middle. It is the same tool I sliced the tip of my finer off with back when I was a kid. In the professional kitchens cooks have a love/hate relationship with the little bastards. They're mean, they bite, they have bad attitudes, but they do things it would take you far longer to accomplish without them, and for that, they're indispensable.

Dressed with salt and pepper and some extra virgin, all you need is a fruity vinegar like apple cider or red wine, but champagne vinegar might be best (but who has that just chillin' in their cupboard?). Make sure you cut the acidity of the vinegar with your kosher salt. Get a bowl, put your vinegar into it, and put in a pinch or two of salt. Mix it in until it dissolves, and taste it. It won't be salty, it'll just be flavorful without that biting acidity.

It makes a refreshing little side dish to any meal, full of flavor and fiber and vitamins.

The more expensive bulb, the baby bulbs, are a little more exotic, and I have one recipe for them that, if done properly, is so awesome that you almost can't stop eating them, and they're only a garnish. They'll get their own post in a bit. They deserve it.

Easy Asian Soup with Noodles

The other day I made a dinner that really followed these Gonzo tenants--using only what you can find in your cupboards and fridge--but I did have to make a purchase: Maifun noodles. Luckily the pack I bought cost only a buck-fifty.

This dish came together because I checked my pantry and fridge and noticed that I had eggs, an onion, cilantro, some broccoli, and lots of carrots, scallions, and celery from the farmer deliveries. I also noticed hot chili flakes, soy sauce, and some random things that I have but that you wouldn't need, like shrimp paste (a slightly funky concoction that's red and oily) and soy paste (a thick, slightly sweet soy sauce) (both from Ms. Gonzo's appetizer contest at work)(we're trying to get rid of them).

I also had some bones, so I made a stock for a soup, but you don't really need stock. Another take on this recipe would be using Ramen noodles as well as the packets. I've done this before as well. This type of soup works well and is filling. The Ramen style is easy enough: boil water, add flavor packets, add vegetables, add egg (make sure you beat it a little), add noodles. It takes less than twenty minutes, and depending on how many people you have, you can feed them all with the right amount of noodles.

What I made is essentially the same thing, only I used Maifun noodles and no flavor packets, instead generated my own flavoring with the stock and other random shit in my cupboards.

Maifun noodles are rice noodles than you'll usually see as deep fried and crispy, added sparingly to garnish soups and salads. It is quite neat to fry these noodles.Once the get dropped in the oil the just sit there for about four seconds, then, instantly and magically they poof and grow and you have to pull them out or they'll really burn. Seriously, the blocky rectangle of dry rice noodles expands uniformly and takes up the entire fryer basket in an instant. Since they continue to crisp and cook after they're removed, you have to take them out right away after the poof.

When using them in soups, you need to soak them for a while until they soften up, and then toss them into the boiling soup and let them go for about a minute. That's all they'll really need.

The one thing these rice noodles have over instant Ramen noodles is that they won't absorb all the liquid in the pot as you eat your helping.

So, here you can see my noodles, the celery, onion, scallions, garlic, carrots.

I started by putting the noodles in a bowl to soak, then went with the onions, garlic, and cilantro stems in oil and added the flavoring agents (pastes and sauces). Once that got a little tender, I added the celery, carrots, and broccoli and let that saute for a minute or three. Then went in the stock and returned it to a boil. Next, once the boil is achieved, stir in your beaten eggs, I'd say one person. After about two minutes it'll be nicely done, and you can add the noodles, then the scallions and cilantro leaves.

Now you can turn it off and let it rest. In just a few minutes it'll be ready to go. Serve with chopsticks if desired. Quick, easy, fresh, and hits all three of the food balancers: protein, vegetable, and starch.

Kind of a Hippie Move...

So, over here at the Gonzo residence, we, the missus and I, have taken it upon ourselves to try and reduce the amount of shitty additives and animal byproduct that our cat eats, and have started making his wet food.

Dry food for cats does contain the proper amounts of raw protein matter that cats need to survive, but that protein matter comes from soy and other vegetable products, and is hard for kitty systems to process. Apparently it's all in the turds: a cat with the kind of diet they'd get out in the wilderness consisting of a regular stream of raw meats would produce scat in far less volume than one fed a diet of only dry kibble.

Now, we're not there yet, not grinding raw rabbit and chicken into a paste, but some people do. No, we've done our research to find what kind of vitamins, vegetables (if any), and fat levels are necessary for an optimal wet food for our cat.

I started saving rendered bacon, chicken, and beef fat to use as a binder. Cats need calcium, so you can chop up eggshells, which our cat doesn't like, so we mostly go with a crushed calcium pill. We also crush up Vitamin B tablets and use a gelcap of tuarine, which cats need for their heart. Sometimes I'll boil the hell out of broccoli and carrots, but no onion. That's specific. All those chicken carcasses I use for stocks I'll pick dry before they get tossed, giving me a nice little pile of chicken meat. That, mixed with the organ meat, and then all chopped up, make the basis for the food.

Here's the chicken getting pulled, the bottle of tuarine gelcaps, and some stock, where I'll use just the fat skimming from the top (the stock I'm pretty sure I used for quinoa).

Here's the mortar and pestle where I crush up the calcium and Vitamin B, as well as the occasional dried fish in the black rectangular container. We got a large bag of dried fish at an Asian grocer in Austin; they use it for flavoring soup while we use it for cat treats. Sometimes I add it to the powdered what-not. The final resting spot for everything is the old feta cheese container, seen here with untreated chicken.

Here's a look at one example of the finished food on the left and the un-worked chicken on the right.

One day at work many months ago a gentleman came in and gave us all fresh fish he's just caught. I brouhgt it home, took the filets off, cooked them up good, and saved the fish carcass in the freezer, to be used for fumee (a kind of light fish stock) later. That later finally came. Before I threw out the remains from the stock pot, I gathered a pile of the fishy-ness, and, using a special Japanese cleaver, chopped the hell out of everything, bones included. By the end, the mash smelled like regular fish cat food. But I wasn't done. I added the Vitamin B and tuarine, no calcium because of the bones, and a little rendered bacon fat. Here's a picture of the stuff, about to be put into the container. It smells kinda like bacon and fish. The cat loves the shit out of it.

Speaking of which: his weight is where it should be and he's as frisky and spazzy as anyone could ever wish their cat to be.

Cuban Night at the Gonzo's

The other night I had a hankering for a little Cubano flavor, and a look at the cupboard made such a thing possible. I noticed that we had a can of pinto beans and a medium sized tomato. I went to the store and saw that they had corncobs on sale for 5 for a dollar--score--and then picked up thinly sliced bone-in pork chops.

Cuban flavor can be a lot of things, like fried plantains, smoked onion remoulade, cilantro and pickled jalapeno and cabbage...but, since I didn't have many of those things, I went a little more basic: pork chops, rice and beans, and corn, all things undeniably Caribbean, or for lack of a better word, poor.

It is what it is. But with a little creativity, things can get interesting and tasty.

First I husked the corn, then put it on the stove top to char up some of the kernels. This adds a breat complexity to the flavor profile of the corn. Don't burn the kernels to their brittle and chalky black, but you dowant a little blackening. The kernels will pop and hiss. Keep a watchful eye--it'll start to smell like popcorn mixed with grilled vegetables. It's really quite pleasant.

Let it cool, then carefully slice the kernels into a bowl. Go slowly or your counters will be covered in corn. Then I cut some mirepoix, two different batches for two different projects.

I try to make a balanced meal always: a starch, a vegetable, and a protein. So for Cuban Night the protein was easy--the thinly sliced bone-in pork chops; the starch was going to be rice and beans; and the veg was going to be a play on succotash.

Succotash is a corn and bean dish, and this night I was going to make a half succotash--corn and tomato but not beans--and I added some spice and cilantro stems to the mirepoix to make it a little more Cuban.

For the rice and beans I prepped traditional mirepoix (onions, carrots, celery...and I added garlic), toasted the rice with the sauteed mirepoix, then added the beans--drained of their packing liquid--when the rice was at 90% done. It retained a traditional flavor. That's what I was going for, given the cilantro and garlic prepping for the corn.

Above you can see on the left side the rice, traditional mirepoix in a bowl, and the beans. On the right side we have the charred corn, the diced tomato, and the Cuban-style-corn-dish mirepoix. It consisted of onion, garlic, and cilantro stems. Red chili flakes get added later.

Here they both are nearly done. (Damn, my stove top needs to be cleaned.) The tomatoes add needed acidity to the corn dish (and are present in succotash as well), and I finished the it up with chopped cilantro leaves. A touch of water should be added as well, to give it something in which to cook down.

The chops were easy: seasoned well salt and pepper), they just went one at a time on the stove top, about four minutes a side, or until done. When it was all over, the pan, which was screaming hot, had a little bit of pork-ness on the bottom, a bit of stuff I removed with a healthy splash of the beer I'd been drinking. That made a little pan-sauce, which I drizzled over the finished pork chops. It was a nice addition.

Cuban Night Corn Dish


1/2 onion, small dice
2 cloves garlic, crushed and rough chopped
1/4 to 1/2 cup cilantro stems, sliced fine
5 ears of charred corn, kernels removed from cobs
1 tomato, diced medium

Start with hot oil and add onion. Saute until clear, then add garlic and cilantro stems. Season well. Once this becomes aromatic, add corn. Stir in the corn and add red chili flakes, then add around 1/4 cup water, and cover. Let simmer for two or three minutes. Add the tomato and let simmer another three or four minutes.

Don't cook too far; the corn will retain an explosiveness for a little while, but loses it as it overcooks. Check regularly and turn it off when it's to your personal liking. Once the heat's off, stir in the chopped cilantro leaves and enjoy.