Bigos: The Dish of Polish Royalty

No, that title is not supposed to be a joke.

Poland was, for centuries, ruled by monarchs, thankyouverymuch (Hello? Boleslav the Bashful? Vladislav Spindleshanks? What do they teach in public schools these days?)

Ahem. Anyhoodle.

Bigos is a perfect food: Hearty, soul-warming, immensely tasty, easy to prepare and cheap if you have leftover pork in the fridge.

Personally, I use a fresh, lean pork roast because I like what cooking it in the kraut does for the texture of the meat.

Totally de-lish and 100% authentically Polish. This is my recipe, culled and cobbled from a dozen other recipes over the years.

Bigos Dziewczynka z Miasta (City Girl Bigos)
2 lbs Pork Loin, Pork Roast or other whole cut of pork
2 Bags Sauerkraut (Boarshead is good)
1 Kielbasa, sliced into 1" thick pieces
1 Large Onion, sliced
1 oz Dried Mushrooms
4 Cups Hot Water
4 Bay Leaves
1 tbsp Juniper Berries (about 12)
Kosher salt

Salt pork and let rest for 1/2 hour.
Preheat oven to 350.
Reconstitute mushrooms in water.
Line bottom of small roasting pan with kraut, top with half the sliced onion.
Lay roast on top of onions.
Arrange two bay leaves on top of roast, top with additional onions and remaining kraut.
Nestle sausage slices, remaining two bay leaves and juniper berries into kraut.
Pour mushroom broth - with 'shrooms - into roaster. Cover tightly.
Cook for one hour, turn pork, stir kielbasa and kraut.
Cook for another hour.

Serve with buttered rye bread or - better - potato pancakes.

Smacznego!

Note: If using pre-cooked pork, reduce the number of bay leaves to 2 and cook the whole thing in a Dutch oven on stovetop for one hour, or simmer all day.

Chicken and Dressing...sort of

It's homecoming at church Sunday and since I don't GO to church (my mom takes my kids and I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT IT since I spent a large portion of my younger life in that church and it wasn't good) I'm sort of obligated to go to homecoming. Which means taking a LOT of food because...there's that thing about my kids. And how much they eat.

There used to be a tearoom in the town we lived in 20 years ago, and the house specialty was Poulet de Normandy. Now, I'm guessing if you had ASKED, they'd have told you Normandy was a big car manufactured by Ford, but the point is this worked. Really well with a cranberry salad and homemade yeast rolls. (And something else...but I'm blank.) So I think I'll make a grocery run tomorrow and bake up a dish of this. And then we can eat it all ourselves when we get to the dinner.

Poulet de Normandy

1 16 oz package stuffing mix...your preference, we use cornbread
1-1/2 cups chicken broth (or hot water with bouillon)
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2-1/2 cups chopped cooked chicken
2 eggs
1-1/2 cups milk
1 can cream of mushroom soup
Grated cheddar cheese

Combine the stuffing mix, butter and broth and set aside. Mix the onions, celery and mayonnaise well, then add it to the stuffing mix and mix well. Spread half the stuffing in a lightly greased 13x9 baking dish. Sprinkle with the chopped chicken, then layer with the remaining stuffing mix. Beat the eggs in the milk and pour over the casserole; refrigerate overnight. The next day, take the casserole out of the refrigerator at least two hours before cooking. Spread the top with the mushroom soup. Bake in a 325 degree oven for 45 minutes; sprinkle with the cheese and bake an additional 10 minutes.

White Beans and Potato Cakes

Sometimes when I write stuff in here I wonder if people who aren't from...the South...look at my food like I look at Andrew Zimmerman.


Weird stuff. But if you're from here, this just makes sense.

Last night we had pork chops, greens, mashed potatoes and cornbread. The leftovers include (barely, The Nice Kid is all ABOUT some mashed potatoes) mashed potatoes and greens. The greens would be half collard and half mustard, since that's what caught my eye in the grocery store yesterday. So we're cleaning up the kitchen last night and I scrape the potatoes into a container and announce, "Tomorrow night we'll have potato cakes." And TNK asks what potato cakes are and I tell her...it's what poor people do with leftover mashed potatoes.

Needless to say, this set off an uproar. After I calmed everyone down and explained that no, we're not poor (but truthfully, poorer than we would be if George W had never been elected) and that some of the best food on the planet is traditionally the food of poor people...we moved on to supper for tonight.

White Bean Soup

I have a cousin who married a German, and the first time he ever served White Bean Soup we all looked at each other because...it's just white beans. He uses a different meat. But this recipe came from about three recipes...adapted and adjusted to fit what we eat and what's in the refrigerator.

1 bag white beans
Bacon grease...or olive oil if you must
1 onion, chopped
16 ounces smoked sausage
Chicken broth or water
Salt, pepper and red pepper flakes to taste
Bay leaves
1 bag or two cans (drained) turnip greens

Pour the white beans into a large stockpot, cover with water and bring to a boil. Turn off the heat and let the beans soak in the water for at least one hour. Drain them (this removes a lot of the gas-forming things), return them to the stockpot and cover with water/broth. Bring to a boil again, reduce heat and leave them to simmer. (I can't seem to keep chicken broth on hand, so bouillon cubes are my friends.)

In another pan melt the bacon grease or heat the olive oil, and saute the onion until tender. Add the sliced sausage (this can be smoked, polska keilbasa or...because this is what was in the freezer last night...andouille) and saute until the flavors make friends.

Add the sausage, onions, and greens to the white beans. Add everything else, stir and cover. Here's where you can get creative...per the following recipe fresh thyme is nice. Sage would work. Simmer, stirring occasionally, until the beans are tender. Serve with cornbread and...

Potato Cakes
For every cup of leftover mashed potatoes, add 1/4 cup self-rising flour, one egg and 1 tablespoon diced onion. Stir to combine and season to taste...salt and pepper, Emeril's, Zatarains, whatever cranks your tractor. Fresh thyme is good, especially if you throw some into the soup. Heat some oil in a skillet...here it's bacon grease and cast iron...and drop the batter into the hot grease by heaping tablespoon fulls. Tablespoons full. Tablespoons-full. Don't mash the cakes down yet...when the first side browns turn the cakes over and THEN pat them down with a spatula.

This is so feel-good it's probably a sin. Damn good thing I'm Methodist.

Feta & Olive Meatballs

One of our great pleasures in life, before all this soccer and basketball and chicken living in the garage stuff, was going to one of the two exquisite steak houses in this neck of the woods and having...the Greek tray. Given that the founder was born in Greece and his son still runs the place, we can be forgiven for forgoing the house specialty...which happens to be steak...and gorging on an appetizer. Although I kinda think we had both.

Feta & Oive Meatballs

1 pound ground lamb
1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley
2 tablespoons finely chopped onion
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
1/2 cup chopped green olives
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning

Preheat the oven broiler. Mix all ingredients together (yep, you gotta use your hands) and shape into 16 meatballs. Place them two inches apart on a baking sheet. Broil about three inches from the heat until browned on top, then turn them over and brown the other side.

This is NOT the recipe from our local eatery, but it works well for home cooking because the olives give it a little extra punch. To serve, cover a big round platter with lettuce leaves. Place a small bowl of your favorite dressing in the center...we stick with blue cheese. Scatter the meatballs around the dressing then arrange, in clusters around the platter:

*cucumber spears
*pepperoncini
*chunks of feta cheese
*Greek olives
*wedges of fresh tomato
*anchovies

Good warm bread with good butter. A fun wine. Include the anchovies even if you're not a fan...my kids eat them and once you've tasted them with the other items you might convert!

Comfort in a Crockpot

It may be true that "nothin says lovin like something from the oven," but nothing says comfort like something from the slow cooker.

Last week we got a request (from a male reader, who is not exactly Gordon Ramsay in the kitchen, bless his heart) for an easy recipe.

"I don't know the difference between chop and mince."

Fair enough. We love the newbies as much as the cooks who are serious enough to be in jeopardy of losing their amature status.

So I give you: The Best Baked Mac and Cheese.

Only not baked.

There used to be a soul food restaurant in Florence, Alabama that was iconic. It actually was featured in the Travel section of the New York Times. The meatloaf, baked chicken, sweet potatoes and mac and cheese at this place were IT. Man, if something ailed you, all you needed was a plate from The Hollywood to set you right.

I found this recipe a few years ago in a great little just-for-crockpots cookbook, "Fix-It and Forget-It." It tastes exactly like Sonja's Hollywood mac and cheese.

As an old boss of mine would say, "So good it'll make you slap your Momma."

Almost Hollywood Inn Macaroni and Cheese
8 oz. package elbow macaroni, cooked but not mushy (al dente)

13 oz. can evaporated milk

1 cup whole milk

1/4 cup butter, melted

2 large eggs, beaten

4 cups grated/shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1/2 tsp. salt

pinch pepper

In the bowl of the crock pot, combine (mix up) cooked macaroni, evaporated milk, whole milk, melted butter, eggs, salt, pepper and 3 cups of the cheese.

Top with remaining 1 cup cheese. Cover.

Cook on low for 3 hours.

Serves approximately 8.

Image Credit: NYTimes

When in Pittsburgh

Our Super Bowl fete went very well, thank you.

Loads of hot appetizers provided by everyone, and ham sandwiches with good, hot soup at halftime provided by yours truly. Lordamercy we were full by the end of that boring-ass game.

The good, hot soup in question was my famous Pittsburgh Soup.

Pittsburgh Soup?

The recipe is based on "Dan's Vegetable Soup" in the Three Rivers Cookbook Volume II. The book was presented to me by my near-miss in-laws (who were lovely, lovely people - wayhay lovelier than their son) and is still inscribed, "To: (Me) From: Mom and Dad R."

The relationship died but the soup lives on. If you've ever been to Pittsburgh, this actually sounds like the city:

Pittsburgh Soup

1 lb lean ground beef

1 large onion, chopped

3 big stalks celery, chopped

1/4 cup olive oil

1 very large or three smallish russet potatoes, peeled and diced

1 large bag (I think it's about two pounds) of frozen soup veggies*

1/2 a head of cabbage, shredded

1 46 oz. can or bottle of V8 (NOT low sodium)

2 cups chicken stock

Several good dashes of Maggi seasoning (or Worcestershire)

1 tsp celery salt (DO NOT overdo the celery salt - you'll regret it)

2 tsps kosher salt, divided

50 cranks ground pepper

OPTIONAL - Small-diced polish sausage

Heat the oil in a heavy-bottomed stock pot. Add the onion and celery and cook until it begins to fade, stirring occasionally, about 4 minutes. Add beef, 1 tsp of salt and half the pepper. Break up the beef and brown it thoroughly (10-15 minutes).

While the beef browns, prepare your potatoes if you haven't already.

When meat is browned, drain off the fat. Add the remainder of the ingredients, bring to a boil, lower to a simmer and cook for at least 30 minutes.

This soup, as with so many dishes, is MUCH better the next day although it's pretty damn good right off the stove.

Serves 8-10 alone or more than a dozen with sandwiches.

*If you insist on cutting your own (out-of-season) corn from the cob, dicing your own carrots, shelling your own peas and snapping your own green beans, knock yourself out. I applaud you. However, I can't begin to tell you how much of each to add to the pot. Experiment and let me know how it turns out!

PS - Why the hell won't the Blogger Spell Check button work? HELP!

It's Fat Tuesday! Let's have a drink.

A couple of years ago The Big Boy REALLY pissed me off. (The feeling was mutual, but I wasn't worried about his side of the story.) So I called my college roomate and we got on a plane and went to New Orleans for the weekend. So there.

Breakfast at Brennan's is an international stock phrase for a reason...it DOES NOT get any better than this. We had the whole nine yards: Grillades and Grits, champagne, Bananas Foster. But the quirkiest thing was how much I enjoyed the Ramos Gin Fizz. I don't do sweets, but the richness and smoothness of this drink just made me happy. (The champagne didn't hurt.) In fact, I was sooo happy when I left that I bought their cookbook.

So, happy Fat Tuesday. Tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, when my little Methodist children come home from their little Catholic school with black smudges on their foreheads. And hopefully, forgiven. (Reckon that extends to the sins of the fathers?)

Ramos Gin Fizz
1-1/2 ounces gin
1/4 teaspoon orange flower water
1/8 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon lemon juice
2 teaspoons simple syrup
1 egg white
1/2 cup half and half
1/4 cup crushed ice

Combine all the ingredients in a blender and blend for 15 seconds. Pour into a chilled old-fashioned glass to serve.

For my parent's fiftieth wedding anniversary we had a celebration planned, but the morning of the actual date my sister and I cooked the Brennan's breakfast for our parents and the couple who were the attendants at their wedding. I could NOT find orange flower water (if you don't live in Rural Heaven like I do, it's not a problem), and tried this first with orange extract. Wrong. We ended up using about 1/2 teaspoon fresh orange juice. Not the same, but it didn't overwhelm like the extract did.

(Simple Syrup: Combine one cup water and one-half cup sugar in a small saucepan, and boil for five minutes. Store in a glass jar in the refrigerator.)

No such thing as "too much" of a good thing, if the "good thing" is BUTTER!

Several years ago I was looking for...something. Can't remember what it was but in the looking, I stumbled across The Gumbo Pages and I've been an avid fan ever since. Found this recipe there and it has been a keeper...often requested and always enjoyed! I'm thinking I'll do this as my contribution for this year's Super Bowl feast.

This is one of those dishes for the friends you really love. We do it with tubs of beer setting around the table, and we eat on vinyl tablecloths so you can just pile up the shells. I add red pepper flakes in the cooking, and then have bottles of Tabasco out on the table. NAPKINS. The key word here is LOTS of napkins, although we put out rolls of paper towels last time. Butter is good.

New Orleans Barbecued Shrimp

2 pounds butter
2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary
6 ounces beer
1 medium onion, minced
4 tablespoons chopped parsley
5 pounds shrimp
2 tablespoons creole seasoning
1/2 cup Worcestershire sauce
10 cloves garlic, minced
3 ribs celery, minced
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Melt a stick of butter in a skillet. Saute the garlic, onions, celery, parsley, rosemary and seasoning blend for 2-3 minutes. Add the rest of the butter and melt it, then add the beer (drinking the rest of the bottle to get you in the mood). Add the worcestershire and lemon juice.

Drown the shrimp in the seasoned butter, using as many baking dishes as you need. Make sure the shrimp are more or less submerged...if they're not, melt more butter and add to the sauce. (What the hell? What's another stick or two when you're already up these butterfat levels?) Bake in a 350 degree oven until the shrimp turn pink, about 15 minutes.

Serve in big bowls...I have a gorgeous Italian pottery platter that measures about 24 inches across and I just dump the entire concoction out on that platter. Roll up your sleeves and if you're kin to this family, wear a bib. Serve with plenty of French bread to sop up da sauce!

"This dish has nothing to do with a barbecue pit or barbecuing. Why is it called "barbecued" shrimp? Beats the hell out of me. If you're really curious, ask someone at Pascal's Manale Restaurant on Napoleon Avenue in New Orleans; it's where the dish was created. Me, I don't care. This dish is so good you can call it whatever you want. Just, um, don't have it every day. You'll know why immediately when you see the first ingredient listed."

This is one of the ten best things I ever tasted in my life. I like it with extra rosemary but then, that's me.

Cafe Iguana Margaritas

We found this recipe on the computer and I'm not sure how far from the original we've strayed. There's an annual music festival here and every year I pack up a picnic, mix this up and pour it into a red plastic gas can, and we CELEBRATE!

3 cups water

2 cups sugar

2 cups fresh lemon juice

2 cups fresh lime juice

1 cup tequila

1/2 cup triple sec

Make margarita base: Mix sugar and water in a saucepan and stir over medium heat until sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil, set aside and cool. Mix syrup, lemon and lime juices and chill until cold. Can be made one week ahead. When you're ready to serve, add the tequila and triple sec.

The first time we made this no one had a juicer. BIG mistake. Even WITH a juicer it's still a lot of trouble but ohhhh....it's a LOT of fun!

(And yes. I know that's not enough tequila. Handle it.)

Let's talk Texas for a bit...

I haven't checked with City Girl on this but I don't think I have to. She'll have a trick up her sleeve. Or five.

We accidentally lived in Fort Worth for five years. Texas is not a place so much as it's a state of mind, and my mind wasn't born there. But we had a GREAT time and met some wonderful people and...ate our way throughout the Southwest. Honey, it doesn't matter WHAT you crave, you live in Fort Worth and your heart's desire is no more than 30 minutes away. Doesn't matter what it is.

I moved out there with a premature baby and a 15-year-old. And somehow or another God got me to Willow Springs Road. A dead-end street 20 miles from ANYTHING, and it was the answer to a prayer. There were only about ten houses on the street. Originally the neighborhood and the golf course it bordered had been a family farm, and four of the ten houses belonged to various and sundry family members...none of whom were speaking to each other.

Enter my clueless ass. Let's have a block party! Great idea! And you know, it was? Because all of the feuders were afraid not to come because we all know...you don't show, you're the one everyone talks about. And over the course of the years, we had some GREAT parties. And I got some GREAT recipes.

THIS recipe is a gem. Kirk and Paula lived at the end of the street, and their son was the same age as my baby. Kirk is the first person to ever tell me, "People who drink light beer just like to pee a lot." He was SERIOUS about his beer. (I drink Milwaukee's Best Light. By choice. Sue me.) Paula grew a great garden every year...I never could get that Oklahoma wind under control...and I ate out of her bounty every summer. I miss them often.

This recipe came to Kirk in another form and he worked with it for a while. The first time I ever tasted it it nearly KILLED me...he forgot to mention the jar of jalapenos. But the next time, I had the beer already open and I am telling you...this is ADDICTIVE. It's one of my most requested recipes, in this neck of the woods.

Kirk's Jalapeno Cornbread

3 large eggs

1 tablespoons sugar

1 small onion

2 packages corn muffin mix (I use Jiffy)

8 whole jarred jalapeno peppers

2-1/4 cups milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

4-5 ounces cheddar cheese, grated

1 teaspoon baking powder

Following the instructions EXACTLY, mix all ingredients. Pour the mixture, which will appear thin, into a greased 13x9 inch glass baking dish, cover and refrigerate overnight. Let it come to room temperature, then bake 40-45 minutes at 400 degrees. The cooked appearance is a dark, almost burnt-looking, crust with a moist interior.

Combine cornbread mix, sugar and baking powder in a large mixing bowl. Add:

First blender: Eggs, cheese, chopped onion and 1-1/4 cup milk. Blend until smooth and add to dry ingredients.

Second blender: Peppers, oil and one cup milk. Blend until smooth and add to dry ingredients. Stir until all ingredients are well combined...I use a whisk so as not to over mix.

The peppers are to taste...I used fresh peppers once (not a good idea) and they had NO heat, and my friend Robin's dad took the leftovers home with him. For people who don't do heat, four peppers will do. In this house and for my friends, I stem an entire jar of whole jalapenos and blend them right up. The original recipe calls for grated cheese, as well as grated onion. Don't bother. Cube them both and let the blender do the work.

A little factoid: When I was looking for the picture? Something said that one way to gauge the heat in a jalapeno is by the number of little scars it has. I didn't know that.

This is a great take-along recipe...it's just as good room temperature as warm. Perfect with chili, chicken stew or any soup. Also good with...Carpenter's Tacos. Recipe to follow.

P.S...and I posted this as a comment last night and IT'S NOT THERE. Cut this into very small pieces to serve...it's rich. And it is NOT MEXICAN CORNBREAD. Not even close...the recipe creator was always admanent about this. The overnight rest makes it lose the cornmeal texture...this is really smooth.

Got it! Catholic King Cake for Mardi Gras

New Orleans King Cake

2 packages dry yeast
½ cup lukewarm water
½ cup lukewarm milk
½ sugar
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 stick butter or margarine, room temperature
4 ½ cups to 5 cups all purpose flour, divided
Filling (recipe follows)
Glaze (recipe follows)

Dissolve the yeast in warm water. Stir in milk, sugar, eggs, margarine and 2 ½ cups of the flour. Beat until smooth. Mix in enough remaining flour to make dough easy to handle. Turn the dough on to a lightly floured board and knead until smooth and elastic, (about 5 minutes).
Place dough in a greased bowl and turn greased side up. Cover, let rise in a warm place until double in bulk, about 1 ½ hours. Dough is ready if impression remains when touched.
Punch down dough. Turn on to a floured surface and roll into a large rectangle about ¼ inch thick. Sprinkle with filling to about 1 inch of all edges. Moisten the edges with water. Start on the long side; roll dough into a jellyroll. Next arrange the dough into a circle on a greased pizza pan or baking sheet. Pull the dough to stretch into a longer tube. Seal the ends together by dampening fingers with water and pinching.
Let rise 30-45 minutes or double in size. Moisten top and sides with a beaten and mixed with 1 tablespoon milk. Place in 350 degree oven and bake for 30 to 40 minutes. Cake is done when golden brown.
Insert prize into the bottom of the cake. Drizzle on glaze and decorate with colored sugars.

Filling
1 stick butter or margarine, room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 cup broken nuts
Mix all ingredients in a bowl until well blended. Crumble over dough and proceed with recipe.

Glaze
2 cups confectioners sugar
1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
Milk as per directions
Mix the sugar and vanilla in a small bowl. Add small amount of milk and stir. Keep adding small amounts of milk until a smooth, thick glaze is made. Pour over top of cake and let it run down the sides. Immediately sprinkle on stripes of colored sugars, green, purple, and yellow. Serve and enjoy.

The person who gets the prize is the king of the party and tradition says they are to bring the cake for the next get together.