The Ultimate Recipe Thread Volume II

Someone had a thread requesting dessert recipes, but I seem to have missed it by the time I dug up this recipe. So I thought I’d post it here instead. It’s one of my favorite dessert recipes, originally made for the birthday of a friend who was sick of cake. It’s my first recipe I’ve ever posted, so I hope I do everything right. :slight_smile:

from Food and Wine magazine, March 2001

Bananas with Caramel and Honey Roasted Nuts

8 just-ripe bananas, peeled and halved lengthwise
1 cup dark brown sugar
6 tbsp unsalted butter (so they say; I use margarine because I’m lazy and it’s in the fridge)
1 tbsp boiling water
vanilla ice cream
1/2 cup honey roasted nuts

  1. Preheat oven to 400 deg. In a large, shallow baking dish, arrange the bananas, cut side up.
  2. In a medium saucepan, combine sugar and butter and cook over medium heat, stirring, until just melted. Raise the heat to medium high, add boiling water, and boil for 3 minutes. Pour the sauce over the bananas.
  3. Bake the bananas for 15 minutes, or until golden and the caramel is bubbling. Serve warm over ice cream and top with nuts.

serves 8

Chinese Chicken Salad
Asian first course

Preparation time: 1 hour
Serves: 6-8 people

Ingredients:

Salad:

2-3 Freshly grilled skinless chicken breasts
2-3 Cups Finely shredded iceberg lettuce
1-2 Cups Finely shredded Napa cabbage
1-2 Bundles deep fried mai fun rice stick noodles
1-2 Chopped green onions
1-2 Peeled carrots
1 Red bell pepper
1 Pint grape or cherry tomatoes
½ Red or green Jalapeño pepper
¼ Cup Chopped cilantro leaves

Toasted sesame seeds for garnish

1 Quart of peanut oil for frying the rice sticks

Optional:

Char siu Chinese barbecued pork
Shoyu ninniku pickled garlic
Hard boiled quail eggs
Peeled prawns
Garlic chives
Blackberries
Pea sprouts
Baby corn
Pineapple
Dressing:

½-¾ Cup Kikkoman soy sauce
¼ Cup pineapple juice
¼ Cup Xao xing Chinese rice wine
¼ Mirin sweet Japanese rice wine vinegar
2-3 Cloves crushed garlic
1-2 Minced shallots
2-3 Tbs Golden brown sugar
1-2 Tbs Roasted sesame oil
1-2 Tbs Thai peanut sauce (or creamy peanut butter)
1-2 Tsp Finely grated ginger root
1-2 Tsp lemon juice
1-2 Tsp white sugar (to taste)
1 Tsp Chinese five spice powder
½ Red or green Jalapeño pepper
Dash of roasted sesame chili oil
Poultry dry rub:

2-4 Tsp Freshly ground colored peppercorns*
1-2 Tsp Onion powder
1 Tsp garlic powder
½-1 Tbs Corn starch
½ Tbs Salt
½ Tsp Sugar

  • Red, white, green and black peppercorns
    Ground semi-coarse in a spice grinder
    Preparation:

Start barbecue or preheat broiler for the chicken. Rub the boneless and skinless chicken breasts with a few teaspoons of peanut oil and then coat them with the dry rub mixture. Allow them to rest for five minutes before grilling. Cook off the chicken using the second or third rack of the barbecue or turn off one side of the grill and reduce the other side to low for the duration. Cook the chicken over the unlit side. The chicken will take 15-25 minutes to cook through. Turn once during the cooking period. Avoid disturbing the peppercorn crust if possible. If necessary, finish the chicken over the lit side of the barbecue to obtain some grill marks.

Heat the peanut oil in a large deep pot. The noodles will need to be fried last, but the oil takes some time to heat up. Keep it at a medium-low setting until the final stages. In another small saucepan, heat some water with the quail eggs in it. Turn them off once the water boils and wait five minutes before draining and submerging under cold water.

Make the dressing by combining all of the liquid ingredients. In a small bowl, gradually mix small amounts of liquid with the Thai peanut sauce or creamy peanut butter until it is very runny and combines easily with the dressing. Dissolve the brown sugar and stir in the five spice powder. Remove all seeds and membranes and then mince the Jalapeño pepper finely. Mince the shallot finely and add with the crushed garlic. Reduce the amount of garlic if you are making the dressing well ahead of time. Peel and grate the ginger then add to the dressing and stir well. Check for salt and sugar balance. If the dressing is too sweet, add more soy sauce. The liquid should have a nice dusky salty-sweet and sour taste to it. If it is still very sharp in flavor from the xao xing rice wine or mirin rice wine vinegar, add more brown sugar. If the dressing is merely too salty, adjust it with some granulated sugar.

Wash all of the vegetables. Shred the iceberg lettuce and Napa cabbage finely. Peel the carrots and Julienne them into very fine slivers. Julienne the Jalapeño pepper as well and finely cut the green onions. Separate the cilantro leaves from their stems and run a chef’s blade over them a few times to mince them. Cut open the red bell pepper and remove all membranes and seeds. Sliver the bell pepper finely into one inch pieces. Use whole grape tomatoes or cut cherry tomatoes in half. The grape tomatoes will be perfectly matched in size with the hard-boiled quail eggs and shoyu ninniku pickled garlic.

Optional ingredients:

Peel the hard-boiled quail eggs under cold running water. Wash and mince the garlic chives finely. Open and drain the baby corn and pineapple. Reserve the pineapple liquid for the dressing. Rinse off the pea sprouts and blackberries just before adding to the finished salads. Use the shoyu ninniku whole.

Frying the rice sticks:

Once all of the other ingredients have been prepared, increase the oil temperature to high. Periodically drop in small fragments of the noodles to test for the right temperature. The noodles should puff up and flash cook in mere seconds when the oil is hot enough. Be ready with tongs or a slotted spoon to remove the puffed noodles from the oil. Add only a handful at a time to the hot oil. They will swell tremendously and literally try to climb right out of the pot. Drain the fried noodles on paper towels and finish cooking all of them off. You will want at least about four cups of the fried noodles. Once it has cooled, strain the oil through a sieve and save it in the refrigerator for other uses.

Assembling the salads:

Remove the chicken breasts from the grill and allow them to rest for at least three to five minutes before slicing them up. Mix all of the chopped green vegetables together with the pea sprouts. Ensure that they are relatively dry after being rinsed off. Any excess moisture will tend to make the fried noodles get sodden rather quickly. Just before composing the salads, coarsely crumble the fried noodles and toss them with the greens. Make a bed of the noodles and greens in the bottom of each bowl. Decorate the top side with the shoyu ninniku, hard-boiled quail eggs, baby corn, blackberries, pineapple chunks and peeled prawns. Hang prawns over the bowl’s edge for a festive appearance.

Cut the grilled chicken and room temperature char siu barbecued pork into thin slices. Top each salad with a fan of these two meats. Scatter grape or halved cherry tomatoes around the salad’s edge. Sprinkle with toasted sesame seeds and liberally spoon the dressing on top. Serve immediately.

Please contribute a recipe and come back soon!

[sup]THE ACTIVE INDEX IS HERE.[/sup]

Corn Fritters

Ingredients: 1/2 cup flour, 2 tsp. baking powder, 1/2 tsp. salt. One cup cooked rice, one cup whole kernel corn (well drained), 1 egg beaten and 2 T milk.

Sift together dry ingredients. Stir in rice, corn and egg. Add milk to make batter. Cook in hot oil until golden brown (fritters should be no bigger than about 3’’ around).

Enjoy!

A northerner’s questions for Blonde:

  1. How does one “cook in hot oil”? Fill a stovetop pot or pan (cast iron?) with a certain depth of oil? Does the kind of oil matter?
  2. What would you eat corn fritters with? Are they breakfast, dinner, dessert? Toppings?

Sorry to be so dense, but they sound good!

  1. Cooking in “hot oil” is one step short of deep frying. There is typically almost enough oil to submerge the item to be fried but not to have it swimming about. In the case of fritters, you would only want about an inch or less of oil. The fritter should be able to contact the bottom of the pan and gain a flat impression from it.

  2. Corn fritters come in all forms. They can be an appetizer, main course or dessert. Appetizer fritters will usually have a savory flavor imparted by spices, a bit more salt and items like mushrooms or chopped herbs. A dinner fritter might have crumbled bacon or small cubes of smoked ham stirred into it. A dessert fritter could have a bit of cinnamon and be made with half and half or cream instead of milk. You could also serve corn fritters for breakfast topped by a fried egg with sausage or scrapple on the side.

We’re big on salmon up here in the northland. Here’s my recipe for salmon cakes:

8 Cups Cooked, flaked red salmon
8 Eggs, beaten
2 Cups Crushed saltine crackers
1 tsp Hot paprika
2-3 Tbsp Dried thyme leaves
2 Bunches green onions, chopped
2 tsp Salt

Mix all ingredients together by hand until well blended. Form into patties by hand or…Spread out on a large cutting board to a depth of about one inch. Cut patties with a biscuit cutter or round cookie cutter. Fry cakes in a little butter until nicely browned and heated through. Serve with a remoulade or a Louis dressing. Freeze unused cakes. Makes about three dozen.

Again with the fish…

Salmon with Orange/Ginger Glaze

Sockeye (red) salmon filets, about one pound, without skin
butter
olive oil
salt

1 cup orange juice
Juice of one lemon (optional)
Dash of cognac (optional)
Small dash of vanilla (optional)
2 TBSP grated fresh ginger
1-2 cloves minced garlic

Saute the salted salmon filets in a few tablespoons of oil and butter until browned and just done (salmon flakes off easily with a fork). Do NOT overcook. Remove fish from the pan. Add orange juice to drippings, and lemon juice, if desired. (Note: the lemon juice changes the flavor of the dish significantly). Reduce the liquid over medium heat. As the glaze begins to thicken, add the cognac and vanilla, if desired. Add the ginger and garlic and cook briefly. Pour glaze over the salmon. I’ve also included shallots in this dish with good results.

bdgr could I use lamb instead of pork in your vindaloo recipe?

masonite I’ve got a friend here in Australia who has expressed a wish for key lime pie but I havn’t seen any key limes for sale in the shop’s. Any suggestions for substitutes?

I’m not a big fan of most pasta salads but this one really flipped my salad bowl. Have you ever heard the question about if you could only have one food to live on for the rest of your life…? I could never answer it. The first time I tasted this dish I said “Oh my god, this is the one”. I have had dreams about this stuff. Really!
CHICKEN PASTA SALAD (Serves 22 generously)

1 - 12 oz. pkg. Bow-Tie Pasta
1 - 12 oz. pkg. Corkscrew or Radiatore pasta
2 - cups chopped celery
1 - 20 oz. can pineapple tidbits, drained
1 - cup chopped green onions
2 - cups green or red grapes cut in half (I prefer red)
1 - 6 oz. pkg Craisins
2 - cans mandarin oranges, drained
4 - chicken breasts cooked and cut up
1 - 9.5 oz. can cashews (whole or pieces)

 Dressing

1 16 oz bottle Hidden Valley cole-slaw dressing
1 cup Mayonnaise
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
Cook pasta. Drain and rinse under cold water. Mix salad ingredients
in large bowl. Add dressing. Add cashews just before serving if you want them crisp.

Well, that’s a hell of a recipe to follow, Zenster - but I fear not, for I have the instructions for Aunt Billie’s Banana Bread:

Cut 1/2 cup shortening into 1 1/2 cups sugar. Add 2 beaten eggs, 1/4 cup buttermilk, 1 tsp. vanilla and 1 cup mashed bananas (very ripe). Sift together 1/2 tsp. baking powder, 3/4 tsp. baking soda, 1/2 tsp. salt and 2 cups of flour. Mix together dry and wet ingredients, bake in floured, greased load pan at 350 degrees for 1 hour, 10 minutes.

Traditionally its with pork, but people make vindaloo with everything so I’m sure you can substitute lamb or kangaroo or whatever you want in it. I remember on Red Dwarf they had Caviar Vindaloo one time.

I’ve been meaning to contribute to this thread for quite a while, but found the task rather daunting for some reason and didn’t know where to begin. Grandmom is a fabulous cook, though, so I figured she was a good place to start. So without further ado:

Grandmom’s Yummiest Central European Jewish Soul Food Sweet-and-Sour Meatballs This Side of Heaven (or at least the turn-of-the-century Austrian partition of Poland, where her family is apparently from):

1 lb ground beef
1/2 cup cooked white rice, preferably sticky short-grain type
1 onion, finely minced
1 raw egg

Mix the above and form into meatballs; saute in oil and set aside.

Sauce:
1 large can (28 oz.) plain tomato sauce
1/2 of a 15-oz. can of WHOLE BERRY cranberry sauce (or equivalent amount of homemade, if you have it handy; I used up Thanksgiving leftovers this way)
1/2 cup golden raisins

Seasonings, to taste (although you’re going for an overall subtle effect; don’t overdo it!):

Salt and pepper
Mixed Italian seasoning (if desired; not 100% necessary; can include basil, oregano, thyme)
Fresh garlic
Fresh or powdered ginger (required)
Sweet spices: cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg (any or all, but in moderation)
I usually throw in 4-5 pods of cardamom

Simmer the meatballs in the sauce for at least 1 hour, or until cooked through and no longer pink on the inside. I usually serve this over white rice, with some kind of plain green vegetable or salad on the side. Make lots; leftovers freeze well. Sorry for the imprecise directions, but you know how grandmothers are!

You can also use the meat mixture to stuff cabbage leaves, and them simmer or bake them in the sauce. They’re usually bigger than meatballs, so they take a bit longer.

In the ingredients section of the teriyaki recipe, that should read “¼ Cup Ponzu.” This is not going to be a good day.

I have a good one:

Penne with Vodka sauce

I put the sauce on penne, but you could have it with any pasta that holds sauce well.

1 lb penne
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
6 cloves of garlic, crushed (but not minced into bits)
pinch of pepper flakes
16 oz can tomatoes
1/4 cup vodka
2 tbsp heavy wipping cream
good handful freshly grated parmigiano reggiano (you could use the stuff in the green can, but you’ll be sorry about it later)
good handful of shredded basil

Start a huge pot of salted water boiling on the stove and throw in the penne.

Meanwhile, heat olive oil in a large sautee pan and whizz up the can of tomatoes in a blender. Throw garlic and pepper flakes in the hot olive oil and cook until just fragrant. Put the whizzed up tomatoes in the pan. Watch out, because when the tomatoes hit hte olive oil it will splatter. Cook that for about five minutes and add the vodka, keeping the whole mixture on a brisk simmer. Cook for two or three minutes and then pull out the garlic cloves and add the cream.

When penne is al dente, remove from water and add to sautee pan and stir well to incorporate the pasta and sauce. Throw in the handful of grated cheese and shredded basil. Let sit for a couple minutes and scoop out into individual bowls. Add a drizzle of olive oil and maybe a little more parmigiano reggiano, if you’re feeling decadent.

This is so good, I’ve got to eat it at least once a week:)

Thanks bdgr :slight_smile:

Zenster, please explain about Soy sauce. After Silver Swan and another brand whose name escapes me from the Phillipines, Kikkoman tastes very like the stuff from Kroger. Am I a gourmand, or does the less flavorfull Kikkoman have uses?

“And he spake unto them of Soy Sauce, saying…”

Ukranian Borsch

1 1/2 lb. Soup meat
1 lb. lean fresh pork
1/2 lb. smoked pork
10 cups cold water
1 bay leaf
6 pepper corns
1 bunch soup greens
8 medium sized beets
1 cup shredded cabbage
2 large onions
3 large potatoes
6 tomatoes
1 tbsp vinegar
1 tsp. sugar
1 clove garlic
5 frankfurters
1 tbsp. butter
1 tbsp flour
1/2 cup cooked navy beans

Put soup meat and your two kinds of pork in a large heavy pot with the water. Bring to a boil. Skim, then add the bay leaf, peppercorns, garlic and soup greens. The soup greens should include parsley, a carrot, celery, and leek. Cover and simmer 1 1/2 hours.
Cook 7 beets, unpeeled, till tender. Grate 1 raw beet and mix with 3 tablespoons of cold water. When the 7 cooked beets are done peel then cut in 8 pieces.
Take the meat out of the soup pot.
Strain the soup, pour back into the pot; add the cooked beets, cabbage, and the onions and potatoes cut in quarters. Peel and seed tomatoes before putting them in. Add vinegar and sugar.
Put in all the pieces of meat. Boil up. Let simmer for 1 hour. Add cooked navy beans. Cut the frankfurters in think slices. Add them to the soup 20 minutes before serving.
When your ready to eat, skim the excess fat from the soup. Thicken the soup with flour browned in butter. Add the juice of the raw beet mixed in water. Salt if needed
Serve very hot with a bowl of sour cream on the side.

quick borsch

2 cans consomme’
1 can bouillon
1 cup water
1 tsp. vinegar
1/2 tsp worcestershire sauce
1/2 cup juice from canned beets
1/2 cup sour cream

Mix the consomme’ with bouillon and water. Bring to a boil.
Add the vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, and beet juice. Put in a pinch of sugar if the beet juice doesn’t give the soup a slightly sweet taste.Be very careful not to oversweeten!!
Stir the sour cream smooth with 1 tablespoon of water,
then add the consomme’ a little at a time. reheat but do not boil.
The borsch should always be sprinkled with finely chopped parsley.

Cross-posted by request…

Irina Marchenko’s Fabulous Everything-but-the-Kitchen-Sink Ukrainian Borsch

(NOTE: Like all good East European home cooking, but especially like all late Soviet-era perestroika cooking, specific ingredients and proportions are highly approximate, as they frequently depend on what is available. The first time Irina set out to show me this recipe, she and I spent all goddamned day running all over Leningrad and standing in zillions of lines, only to discover that there was nary a can of tomato sauce, or indeed any tomato product at all, to be found anywhere in northern Russia unless one had the foresight to grow and can one’s own tomatoes the previous summer at one’s dacha garden plot. Finally, we gave up, and with her sad puppy-dog eyes she convinced me to go buy some at the hard currency store.)

Anyway:

4 qts. water
2-3 lbs. meat (preferably beef, ideally a couple of nice meaty shank bones, but if all you have is pork, then by all means use it)
2-3 medium cooked beets, diced (I usually bake them in the oven in tinfoil first while the beef is simmering, then peel and dice them, adding them almost at the end since they’re already cooked)
2 carrots, peeled and sliced
2-3 potatoes, peeled
2 onions, diced
3 whole peeled cloves garlic, or more, to taste
2 bay leaves
½ small head shredded cabbage
1 15-oz. can tomato sauce
1 bunch finely chopped fresh dill
Salt, freshly ground black pepper, and vinegar to taste

Simmer meat in water until almost tender with bay leaf. Add garlic onions, carrots, and potatoes. Simmer until almost tender, then add tomato sauce, beets, cabbage, and black pepper. Just before serving, add salt, dill, and adjust level of vinegar to achieve pleasant sweet/sour balance. Serve with a large blob of sour cream in the middle of each bowl (none of this nonfat garbage! My mom always tries to cut calories by using yogurt instead of sour ream, but this is just wrong.), and additional chopped dill as garnish, if desired.

Variations: some people also like their borsch with a few dried mushrooms cooked in it, or even kidney beans. I have no opinion on the kidney beans, but mushrooms are indeed an authentically Ukrainian variation. Never try to separate a Slav from his mushrooms! Also, some people like to use sour salt (powdered citric acid) instead of vinegar, but this is modern cheating. You can make this into a cold vegetarian summer soup by leaving out the meat and tomato sauce, and adding halved hard-boiled eggs and chopped cucumbers at serving.

Alsatian Chicken With Creamy Onion-Riesling Sauce

Special Equipment: One stove-to-oven casserole dish

One 3# chicken, cut into pieces
4 tablespoons butter
2 white onions, roughly chopped
15 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
2 cups Riesling or off-dry white wine
2 long sprigs fresh rosemary
1 cup chicken stock
Kosher Salt & Fresh Ground Black Pepper, to taste

Heat pan on high heat and melt butter. Season all chicken pieces with salt & pepper. Add to hot pan. Brown all sides of chicken (get them good & brown. No light brown in this dish!) then remove from pan.

Add onions and garlic, and cook in butter/chicken fat-juices until translucent. Add wine. Bring to a boil. Add chicken and the two sprigs rosemary, burying in onions. Toss into a 450 degree oven for 20 minutes, when onions begin to caramelize, etc.

Remove from oven, take chicken out of sauce, and remove rosemary sprigs. Puree onion/wine/chicken juices with chicken stock. Return sauce to pan and bring to a boil, reducing slightly. Return chicken to hot sauce and serve.

Best served with potato salad. Yum.

I have seen Kikkoman in the large oriental grocery, but not the “hole in the wall” one…
OK, stir frying snow peas in olive oil with garlic and ginger, at the last moment you splash some soy in to the hot pan…

Kikkoman or Silver Swan?
I don’t remember the brand of Philippine, I’ll check it out at the hole in the wall…I’m out of sesame oil.