327 posts tagged “western”

I'm not that familiar with these things, but I've got a feeling that these lattice-style pastries might belong in the domain of desserts... Still, I decided to have a go at it, with this savory pie. It is essentially a quiche: eggs. With a few other things of course — some grated cheddar cheese, chopped scallions, even some finely diced lettuce (yeah, lettuce — quiches regularly feature spinach, so why not?), and various other things I came across.

Well this is an extremely artistic and clever picture — I am a very creative and artistic kind of a a guy. And clever. But not clever enough to actually operate this camera. Gah. Heh, it does look kinda good, though...

Salmon fillets, skinned and diced, dipped in seasoned flour, egg and finally seasoned panko bread crumbs. I used an Indian style curry seasoning. 'Twas pretty damn tasty, I must say.

Sautéed, grated onions were mixed into the meat along with salt and pepper. The patties were grilled over high heat on a charcoal grill, and the white potato bread was toasted. Lettuce, pickles, tomatoes and Thousand Island dressing. I've started to appreciate the simplicity a bit more, with bison meat — I want to actually taste the meat, not just the accouterments.

These suckers were stuffed with cilantro and basted with an oil and lime juice mixture, but it had absolutely no flavor impact at all. Grilling things can severely reduce the potency of the flavoring agents you add to your protein, but this really did catch me by surprise. I love grilling whole trouts, and I'll definetely do it again — but I've got to find a better way to infuse flavor into the thing.

The other bit is an improvised idea: Dutch Stamppot (mashed potatoes with root veggies such as carrots, turnips, and swedes) and Irish Colcannon (mashed potatoes with cabbage or kale, and ham). Mashed potatoes and carrots, with spinach, scallions and garlic.

It would have been excellent — except I over salted it. I hate doing that. It's such a damn trivial mistake. You can always add salt at the table. Adding too much salt during the cooking process is a damn stupid thing to do, and I really get upset when I do it. I'm seriously considering putting a label on the stove that just saying "SALT," to help me keep this simple notion in mind when I'm cooking.

Was going to use commercial puff pastry, but ended up with puff pastry cups, rather than sheets... So I had to make my own faux puff pastry. It has been a while since I've done this, and I ended up mixing it too much, grinding the butter down too much. So it wasn't nearly as puffy as it should have been. But it was still fairly decent.

The recipe calls for sliced red onions and garlic to be cooked in a separate pan, and then mixed in with fresh herbs. The suggested herbs were, specifically: basil, thyme and parsley. I can't grow parsley, but basil and thyme, yeah — we've got that. So that's it.

At least I sorta figured out why the camera's flash wasn't going off. Heh.

Well, that'll teach me to wait so long before updating my blog. My memory of this meal has long since faded. Obviously, salmon fillet, baked/broiled, along with a rice mixture with carrots and peas — but I have no idea what the sauce might be. It could be some left-over curry sauce that I froze, but I'm not sure at all. The old camera died, so I'm trying to get used to another one right now, but the damn thing doesn't use the flash, so I get these distorted, warm colors. Ugh.

As much as I've obsessed about making my own burger buns, I guess it's a bit funny that I've become so fond of using toast instead. Yet, the first hamburger ever made, used toast, so I think I'm fine with that. The reason I tried toast was that I wanted to taste the meat itself — not the bun, not the sauce, not the accouterment. And this setup works great.

Bison meat has very little fat content, so you have to take care, to make sure it doesn't dry out. I seasoned the patties with salt and pepper, as well as some grated onion that I sautéed over high heat, while stirring constantly. The onion adds flavor, but it also helps prevent the patty from drying up.

And happy Halloween.

Nothing much to say about this one — except that although making soup can be pretty time consuming, it's well worth it because the frozen leftovers makes for an extremely easy meal...