Christmas Duck l'Orange

As told to me by my Dad:

Pork/Duck L’Orange

You want a cup of orange juice concentrate. That’s real orange juice of course from the oranges. You don’t want a juice that is in a bottle unless it’s genuine orange juice with the pulp and everything in it.

¼ cup of red wine

2 tbsp lemon juice. You can also substitute lime juice if you want, it might be a little better for duck, give it a shot.

1 tbsp sugar

¼ tsp ginger

½ to 1 tsp curry powder

3 garlic cloves, very fine chopped

½ tsp dry mustard

½ tsp basil

Sprinkle duck with pepper to taste, but first of all rub it a little bit with a couple teaspoons of season salt, whatever you want to use, again to taste.

Now with pork, of course, pork chops, a pork roast really, you plug in about 12 whole cloves on the top of the roast. I don’t know what that would be like with duck. I guess it would be fine actually, I’ll leave that up to you to poke the breasts with cloves.

And then follow whatever the cooking instructions are for duck. I’ve never made it, you’d have to have it well done of course. With a pork roast just stick it in a pot with your foil there at 250 degrees in the oven for 4 hours, and there you go.

(Duck cooked well at 450 F in a roaster covered in foil and then the lid (keeps moisture in). Flip the duck after 45 minutes, cook for another 45 minutes. Fanny Farmer says that a meat thermometer in the thigh should go above 180 F.)

Easy perogie casserole

This recipe would give 4 to 5 single servings - adjust quantity and cook time based on how many people you need to feed. Leftovers will freeze well.

In an oven-safe crock or casserole dish, mix the following:
1 small bag perogies
1 medium can crushed tomatoes
1 large can sliced black olives (drained)
1/4 cup no alcohol red wine
1 chopped onion (not red onion)
1 each chopped red, yellow, orange pepper
6 large mushrooms, quartered
Mix well.
Cover with a layer of sliced cheddar cheese (do not use processed cheese!)

Bake covered at 400 F for about an hour. If you are cooking more food, decrease temperature to about 375 F and leave it in the oven until it smells really good and is turning a nice dark brown around the edges.

Jen's wicked crock pot chicken

*Note: This recipe needs to be started around 6 a.m. to be ready for awesomeness by supper time.

You will need:

1 chicken that actually fits into your crock pot. Check it to make sure its innards aren't inside, and cut off the ginormous gobs of disgusting fat often found around either opening into its body cavity. This is not heart attack chicken. Line the bottom of the crock with about 12 ounces of water and turn crock on low.

Stuff inside of chicken  with a Very Large Carrot. I've never seen carrots this big before. In fact, I think it's probably equivalent to 3 normally large carrots. And the reason for putting them inside the chicken is because there probably isn't room outside the chicken.

Put the chicken in the crock. Squish it in. You might have lots of room or you might have not much at all, depends on the crock and the chicken. Today I had hardly any room at all.

In a teacup, prepare the spice mix: 3/4 tsp dry mustard, 1 tsp Lawry's season salt, 1/8 tsp garlic powder, about 1/4 tsp fresh ground 3 colour pepper. Mix it together to break up the dry mustard lumps and sprinkle evenly over the chicken.

Add 1 onion (not red) cut into 6 equal pieces. Just wedge it in around the chicken wherever it fits. Then fill the remaining available spaces with cut potatoes. Top up the crock with more water, gently rinsing the spice from on top of the chicken into the crock. Leave an inch of room between the water and the top of the crock. Somehow this space always fills with more liquid, I've no idea how or why.

Turn the crock onto low. Chicken et al should be ready by 6 pm.

To make the gravy, remove chicken and veggies from crock. This may be difficult as meat will be falling off the bones it will be so tender.

Taste the broth and make any necessary adjustments with regard to salt. In a teacup mix 1 tbsp flour with water. You probably want 1 tbsp flour for every 16 ounces of broth and enough water to dissolve it into a paste with a whisk. Make sure all lumps of flour are completely dissolved before adding flour-water mix to the gravy!

Turn the crock pot onto high and whisk the flour-water mix into the stock. Mix it well. Let it sit for 10 minutes or so and whisk again. Keep checking it about every 10 minutes and whisk it well. Continue until it has thickened sufficiently, remembering that it will be considerably thicker after chilling in the fridge overnight.

This dish is particularly good with a large variety of vegetables - if you have a large crock and can fit more root vegetables in to cook with the chicken that is best. Otherwise, steamed veggies are also a lovely accompaniment.

Jen's snowpocalypse eggnog

In a large stainless steel pot, beat together 3 eggs, 2 tsp. real vanilla, and at least a teaspoon of nutmeg. Add to this 1 can sweetened condensed milk and 2 cans Pacific condensed milk. Beat together well with a whisk.

Place pot over a high heat and whisk constantly until nearly at a boil. It should be making boil noises but not be showing boiling bubbles. Keep it there as long as you can and whisk vigorously, scraping as much of the bottom and corners as possible. You don't want it to boil because that will scald the milk but you do want it to cook because it's made with eggs. You'll know when it's done because the mixture will be just slightly thicker and it will barely start to have a carmelized smell. If you're uncertain about how to not scald milk, get a thermometer and aim to keep the mixture at 167 degrees Farenheit.

Once cooked, remove from heat and keep stirring. Very slowly whisk in 3/4 L of regular milk (you can use any milk you like - I used 0% and it made the right consistency for me). Mix thoroughly. Pour into pitcher and chill in fridge until cold (but taste it warm because it's good like that too). If there was any that got stuck in the corners, scoop it out with a spoon. It will be custard-like and delicious.

If you are the kind of person who likes booze in your eggnog, mix it after it's cooled in the fridge.

If you're feeling brave and would like to try more of a custard eggnog, add a quarter cup of cornstarch to the original mixture before cooking and finish with pre-whipped whipping cream (instead of milk) that's been beaten until it's stiff (I think about 15 minutes on a high speed).

Best homemade pudding ever

This recipe is adapted from what I found on the internet.

1/4 cup cornstarch
1/2 cup sugar
1 tbsp vanila
3 cups milk (any kind)
1 1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Mix cornstarch and sugar together in a pot. Add milk. Whisk vigorously. Add high heat and whisk constantly, scraping the bottom of the pot. The split second it gets thick (it will get thick pretty much instantly when it does), remove it from the heat and whisk in the chocolate chips until melted. Serve hot.

Yum!

Variations would include other kinds of chocolate chips (I don't like milk chocolate but maybe you do) - milk, white, unsweetened, etc., or butterscotch chips, or mint chips, or a combination of butterscotch or mint and chocolate... other extracts for flavour instead of vanilla... etc.

Probably would be extra awesome with fresh homemade whipped cream on top, but if you think I'm going to the store at 8 pm to get cream and whip it, you're crazy!

Bean and rice stuffed peppers

This recipe makes 3 stuffed peppers.

24 hours ahead of time, soak enough mixed beans for 3 stuffed peppers. I'd guess about 1/3 cup beans per pepper as they grow in the water quite a bit...

Cook 1 cup water with 2/3 cup jasmine or aborrio rice. Cut tops off peppers and clean out insides. Line bottom with mozzarella cheese.

Mix spices:
Heaping 1/4 tsp season salt
1/16 tsp dry mustard, garlic powder
1/8 tsp marjoram, oregano
1/4 tsp basil
heaping 1/4 tsp sage
1/4 cup parmesean cheese.

Add just enough V8 juice to make the spice mix into a paste. Mix it into the rice when the rice is cooked. Add the beansa nd about 1/2 cup no alcohol white champagne. Continue to cook on low until liquid is absorbed. Rice should be slightly overcooked.

Stuff peppers with stuffing and more mozzarella in the middle and cover with mozzarella on top. An alternate cheese would be white cheddar.

Cook 1 hour at 350F in a covered container with a scant amount of liquid in the bottom to keep them from going dry.

Might be awesome with guacamole?

Chocolate Dishwasher Vodka

Ingredients:

1 glass bottle of vodka
1 cup of finely chopped or grated chocolate (baker's chocolate, candy bar, flavoured chocolate, whatever you want)
1 dishwasher

Method:
Empty 1 cup of vodka from bottle. Either save for later or consume.

Fill bottle to almost full with the chopped or grated chocolate and return lid to bottle. Invert several times.

Place bottle in top rack of dishwasher and run short wash cycle without soap.

Shake bottle well.

Repeat dishwasher cycle and shaking until all chocolate is melted and fully incorporated into vodka.

Serve neat with adequate adult supervision as it will, at this point, simply taste like candy.

New addition

Hi all,

Just a quick note to tell you that I've invited a fabulous friend to join this blog! Nakita is properly educated about things like nutrition, and she's been spending the last long while in Morocco running Bassma Primary School. I've always wanted this blog to be a bit more of a collaborative effort anyway so... here we go!!!

Love,
Jen

French Onion Soup

It's flu season, and there is absolutely no better way to kill the flu than with French Onion Soup. And it's tasty too!

Here's what you do:

Saute 3 sliced yellow onions and 3 cloves of garlic. When they're cooked, add 2 cans Campbell's beef broth (or your own homemade beef stock if you have it). Add to that 1/2 tsp marjoram, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp pepper, and 1 heaping tsp hot dry mustard mixed into just enough water to make a medium paste.

Next make croutons: break apart old stale bread (best if it's been in the freezer for at least a year) onto a baking sheet. Cover in fresh Parmesan cheese. Bake in a moderate oven until golden brown.

Slice mozzarella cheese - DO NOT use the partially skimmed crap! It tastes like cardboard and will ruin your soup. Go out of your way to find a deli that has real mozzarella.

You have enough soup for 4 onion soup bowls (oven safe, usually with handles). Into each bowl layer some croutons, ladle a scoop of soup, add a layer of mozzarella. Repeat. This should fill the bowl. Top with more fresh Parmesan.

Bake at 350F for about 25 minutes with no lid - you want it heated so that your cheese is gooey and brown on top, but not so long that it is runny .

Om nom nom.

Baklava Cake

Like baklava but hate working with phylo pastry? I can't even spell it so you know I just described myself! This is a modified recipe of a Greek walnut cake that, with syrupy goodness, is baklava in cake form. (If you are averse to syrup you can totally use cream cheese icing...)

Cake:
Beat 7 eggs for something crazy like 5 minutes.
Add 1 tbsp almond extract and 1 tbsp real vanilla extract.
Add a mixture of half oil half milk that comes to 1 1/2 cups liquid.
Beat again. Give it a good thrashing.

Combine in a separate bowl 3 1/2 cups flour, 2 cups white sugar, 1 tsp baking soda, 2 tsp baking powder, 2 tsp cinnamon, 1/8 tsp allspice, 1 tsp ground ginger. Mix evenly.

Add to wet mixture 1 cup of crushed walnuts - crush with rolling pin (releases oil, totally yummy) and measure after crushed, not before.

Beat the wet bowl like mad.
Add the dry stuff a cup at a time and beat it.
Then when pretending you're Michael Jackson no longer works and it's getting too thick, add a splash or sploosh of milk to adjust consistency. And beat it some more.

Pour into a big cake pan lined with parchment paper. What size is big, you ask? Bigger than a square cake pan but not as big as a lasagne pan. I've never measured my cake pan. I inherited it from my grandmother, and her cakes were always awesome.

Bake in a 350F oven for about an hour (at Saskatoon altitude - more in Edmonton and less in Estevan). Cake is done when knife in centre comes out clean.

Syrup:
Combine in a pot approximately 2 cups brown sugar (this is an excellent use for your rock hard brown sugar - it doesn't have to be an exact amount, just close) with 2 1/2 cups of water and 1 short cinnamon stick, and about a tablespoon of lemon juice. Boil until thicker. Refrigerate to cool. Pour over cooled cake. Om nom nom!

Xolostle

First, in a dry, preheated pot, with the stove fan on, toast your chiles. You need 8 chiles - really it seems any chile will do. Jalapenos, guajillo, chipotle, anch, New Mexican, cascabel... red hot peppers, if you're using habeneros maybe only add 3 or 4.... whatever you choose. The chiles need to be toasted until they're almost black. Maybe use tongs to turn them over. Let them cool and then cut them open and take off the stems and seeds and cut or tear into bite sized bits.

Then put some season salt on the roast and brown it. Then take the roast out of the pot and set it aside.

Add a bit more oil and saute 1 white or yellow onion, chopped into bite-sized bits, along with 6 pieces of garlic, sliced lengthwise.

Add to that a "generous pinch" of ground cumin, probably a tsp or so.

When the onions start to look done, add the chiles and 3 tbsp of flour. Mix well. (This actually works, the flour doesn't come out lumpy.)

Add 1 cup of cool stock and a tablespoon of cider vinegar. Mix well and remove from heat.

Bring another 7 or so cups of stock to a boil. Add the meat, the onion mix, 1 tbsp Mexican oregano (regular oregano will work too), and 2 bay leaves. Cook as you would a regular roast or stew. This would also be the time to add the canned tomatoes and whatever else might be good (although I have to admit it's extremely tasty just on its own.)

Serve with boiled or mashed potatoes and fresh cilantro and lime to garnish (or not if you forgot like I did).