Broccoli Salad

Ingredients
1 head broccoli
8 to 10 slices cooked bacon, crumbled 
½ to 1 cup chopped red onion or sweet onion 
½ to 1 cup dried Cranberries or cherries 
½ to 1 cup chopped carrot 
½ to 1 cup chopped walnut 

Dressing
1 cup Miracle Whip, see direction 
2 tablespoons vinegar 
1/4 cup sugar 

Directions 
Start with the broccoli. Wash and cut flowerets and stems into bite-size pieces. Place in a large bowl. Add the crumbled bacon, onion, dried cranberries or cherries, and carrot. Dressing, in a measuring cup, combine vinegar and sugar then add Miracle Whip to make up one full cup total. Add to broccoli mixture and toss gently.

Options
If you have extra time I would suggest blanching the broccoli in boiling water for 30 seconds and then rinse in cold water. This brightens the green color and I believe makes it taste better. I blanch before cutting into pieces.
I use walnuts, but you can use sunflower seeds, pecans, cashews, or even peanuts.
You may want to add cheese, small chunks or shredded.
If using mayo in place of Miracle Whip you may need to increase the amount of sugar to a ½ cup.

Blanched Broccoli Ready to be chopped

Chopped Broccoli

Chopped Sweet Onion

Chopped Carrot

Chopped Walnuts

This is the dried cranberries I used

I used this bacon.  No Nitrates.

This is the vinegar, 1/4 cup sugar, and Miracle Whip I used

Sugar and Vinegar Mixed Together

Add Miracle Whip to the Sugar Vinegar until you have a total of one cup as shown.

I hope you enjoy this wonderful salad.

Eric's Homemade Hummus

Eric's Homemade Hummus

For a number of years I’ve made attempts at making hummus with varied results.  Most of my attempts were at best, just ok until today.  The results were so good I felt the need to share.  I will never feel the need to buy premade hummus again as this is as easy as it gets and the flavor is wonderful.

You will need a food processor plus the following ingredients.

29oz Can of Chick Peas, I use La Preferida

4 to 6 cloves of fresh garlic

 juice of one lemon

1.5 tablespoon of Tahini (ground sesame seeds), I use the brand krinos

¼ to ½ teaspoon of sea salt (to taste)

2 tablespoons of olive oil

1/8 cup water or enough to have a smooth consistency

Start by placing the chick peas in a colander and rinsing with cold water and let drain.

Place the whole garlic cloves in a microwaveable container.  Drizzle with olive oil. Cover the container lightly with wax paper.  Place in the microwave for about 2 minutes on high.  Allow the container to cool down some before moving it, about 2 to 4 minutes.  

Place the drained chick peas into the food processor.  Once the garlic cloves are cool enough to touch, squeeze the cloves from the skin and into the food processor.  Add the lemon juice, salt, olive oil, tahini and start to blend.  Blending will take a number of minutes.  Stop and use a spatula to scrape down the side and continue to blend adding water as needed to finish with a light smooth consistency.  Remove from the processor into a sealable container.  You can eat it right away, but the flavor will improve allowing it to set in the refrigerator overnight. 

Hope you enjoy this as much as I do.

Recipe - Very Banana Banana Bread

Banana Bread Makes one 9-inch loaf

Be sure to use very ripe, heavily speckled (or even black) bananas in this recipe. I use a 9 x 5 inch loaf pan. 

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups (9 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon table salt

6 large very ripe bananas (about 2 1/4 pounds), peeled (see note)

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly

2 large eggs

¾ cup (5 1/4 ounces) packed light brown sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

½ cup walnuts, toasted and coarsely chopped (optional)

½ cup raisins (optional)

2 teaspoons granulated sugar

INSTRUCTIONS

1.       Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Spray 8½ by 5 inch loaf pan with nonstick cooking spray. Whisk flour, baking soda, and salt together in large bowl.

2.       Place 5 bananas in microwave-safe bowl; cover with plastic wrap and cut several steam vents in plastic with paring knife. Microwave on high power until bananas are soft and have released liquid, about 5 minutes. Transfer bananas to fine-mesh strainer placed over medium bowl and allow to drain, stirring occasionally, 15 minutes (you should have ½ to ¾ cup liquid).

3.       Transfer liquid to medium saucepan and cook over medium-high heat until reduced to ¼ cup, about 5 minutes. Remove pan from heat, stir reduced liquid into bananas, and mash with potato masher until fairly smooth. Whisk in butter, eggs, brown sugar, and vanilla.

4.       Pour banana mixture into flour mixture and stir until just combined with some streaks of flour remaining. Gently fold in walnuts, raisins, if using. Scrape batter into prepared pan. Slice remaining banana diagonally into ¼-inch-thick slices. Shingle banana slices on top of either side of loaf, leaving 1½-inch-wide space down center to ensure even rise. Sprinkle granulated sugar evenly over loaf.

5.       Bake until toothpick inserted in center of loaf comes out clean, 55 to 75 minutes. Cool bread in pan on wire rack 15 minutes, then remove loaf from pan and continue to cool on wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Sauerkraut! Well, Almost - 10 Days into Fermentation

I decided to make pork chops for dinner and what would go better than a little kraut?  If nothing else it gave me a good excuse to break into the crock for a look-see.  Ok, I opened it for the first time since I sealed it 10 days ago.  I was expecting a sauerkraut smell, but to my pleasant surprise there really wasn't much of any.  I pulled out the weights and scooped out a bowl full.  It looks great!  There is still a slight amount of green color.  Of course I had to sample some right out of the crock.  Well, it wasn't quite what I expected. The salt taste was most dominate followed by a slight tang and a little of the caraway seed flavor, but then again, it's only been 10 days.  What I hope is the salt taste will diminish as it ferments more. It seems strange that it came out salty as I followed the minimum amount for the poundage of cabbage.  The texture is very good.  Nice crunch.  The bottom line, it needs more time, so, the lid is back on and I'll leave it for at least another ten days.

Thanks for looking!

The Results of My 2nd Container of Fermented Vegetables

For lunch this afternoon I finally opened the larger container.  This one has convinced me I will continue to make my own pickles.  The first word that came to mind with my first taste is wow!   This is far better than I had hoped for, slight salt taste, nice tang with a little bite of heat as the finish with no after taste. The crispiness of the cauliflower is prefect.

 

When I put this mix of vegetables together in this lager container I wanted to include some cucumber.  Unfortunately the only thing I could find was in the local grocery store.  It was a nice looking cucumber, however, like most grocery store produce it was wax coated. It thought I’d just cut the skin off and take the seed out of the cucumber.  However good my intentions, this was a poor idea.  The cucumber taste good but really lacks any form of crispness.  It has the texture of a wet piece of bread. One more lesson learned.

Both the jalapeño and yellow wax pepper came out great.  Good flavor, color and texture.  I’m sure I’ll be making some batches of just peppers in the near future.

 Take a look at this photo and how the cauliflower took on the pink hew from the cabbage leaf.

Here is a close up of the cauliflower and cucumber. The cauliflower is wonderful while the cucumber didn't have the right texture even though it still taste good.

I'll post more as I make my next batch of fermented pickles.  Thanks for looking and happy pickling!!

Four Days of Fermentation & The Taste Test!

It is four days since I bottled my first batch of fermentation. I wanted to let you see how the contents have changed.  One of the interesting things that has occurred is the red - pink color from the red cabbage leaves I placed on the top to hold the rest of the vegetables under the brine.  I believe I'll be doing a taste test a little later today.  I will report back if they are edible or not.

Ok, this is the look after four days of fermentation.

This again is right after I added the vegetable.

 Four days in to fermentation.

And this was what it looked like right after being capped.

There was a lot of bubbling the second day.  This is the CO² that the fermentation process develops while the lactic acid is being generated.  It is the lactic acid that give the pickled products their tangy taste.  I sure hope these taste as good as they look.

I couldn’t wait any longer.  The jar with the screw top was the first I tasted.  When opening the lid there is a smell of cabbage or sauerkraut.  This is normal from what I have read.  It diminished quickly.  I really could not smell much of anything after that.  The top of the container is clean and clear, none of the scum or mold that some folks get.  Even if there were, this doesn’t mean you have a bad end product from what I read.  If you should have mold or scum they tell you to spoon it off and any dark or discolored products. I’m glad I didn’t have this issue.

The first thing I did was to remove and discard the red cabbage leaves. Below was a red/pink color of the cauliflower.  The cauliflower took on a slight translucent appearance too.

Ok, the moment I’ve been wait for! The taste test! I put a piece of the cauliflower in my mouth.  It has a slight salty flavor followed by a tangy zing.  Interesting!  Not the best pickled cauliflower I’ve ever had, but it is in no way bad.  In fact, on a scale of say 1 to 10, 10 being excellent, 1 being bad, I’d give it a solid 8.  I’m a little surprised, primarily because I had a fairly hot jalapeño in the jar, that didn't flavor the cauliflower at all. I didn’t cut the jalapeño up, I kept it whole.  This may have not been the right thing to do.  The second larger container I sliced the jalapeño up. It will be interesting to see if this one has more heat.  I decided to let it ferment one more day and I’ll give it a taste test sometime tomorrow. More to come tomorrow!  

Thanks for taking a look at my blog!!

The Fermentation Experiment Continues

Here is my latest experiment in fermented vegetables. If this works the way the websites I’ve visited, my book, The Joy of Pickling, by Linda Ziedrich, explains and a dozen or more youtube videos I watched, I should have some good tasting pickled cauliflower in three to seven days.

This is the start of my first jar.  The jars are cleaned and sterilized with boiling water, and the vegetables are rinsed.  You can’t overly clean the vegetables or risk not having them ferment properly.  The good bacteria that are on the vegetables can be damaged if washed too much.  The ingredients included coriander and mustard seed, fresh dill and garlic cloves.  In the middle is one whole jalapeño.  I packed the remainder of the jar with cauliflower.  Wish I would have remembered to put in a few pepper corns.  On the top of the cauliflower I added one whole leaf of red cabbage.  The cabbage leaf has a large amount of the good bacteria to help kick-start the fermentation. With about an inch left from the rim of the jar, I filled the jar with brine made up of one tablespoon of pickling salt to two cups of water.

This is my first jar with the lid on.  The jar is setting in a bowl just in case the fermentation causes it to overflow the jar.  Once in the morning and evening for the next three to seven days I have to loosen the cap to allow any pressure out. At the end of fermentation the jar will keep in the refrigerator for up to 6 months.

This is the second jar. This jar has sliced Hungarian yellow wax peppers, sliced jalapeño, cucumber, cauliflower, coriander and mustard seed, fresh dill and garlic cloves. It is topped with the red cabbage and brine like the first jar.

Here is one other view of the jar.  I think it looks pretty special!! Well, lets hope it taste at least as good!  


Thanks for following my blog.