I was in the mood for something crispy, so it ended up being panko fried turkey tenders. Served with a spicy miso cocktail sauce, hmm. The roasted broccoli is strictly for easing my health conscience.
Not Carbonara
The pecorino is traditional, but using chorizo is not, fusion cooking?
Savory Pain Perdu
Who said that stuff has to be sweet? Blend some eggs with onion, parmesan cheese, herbs and melted butter, dunk the bread and fry ’em up. It’s kinda like Knödel in rectangular form when you think about it.
Panem et Circenses
(ignore the magic oven humming)
In all the boredom Alduhir decided to gather the group together to play a game or something, I dunno, it sounded like you pick roles and roll dice or something, and since he mentioned that it might go long I wanted to make sure people are well fed. Playing games while hangry is a mortal sin.
Huh, I’ve never baked two loaves of bread in one day before, and it’s pretty challenging to juggle the timing. Because once you throw the yeast in it’s on, and only a matter of time until that fungus has consumed all the flour. Sounds kinda weird when you spell it out like that but the end result is some nice and airy bread. Well, after you do the preferment, autolyse, mix in the salt, bulk proof, do stretch & folds to develop gluten, preshape, bench rest, shape, final proof, score and bake in a blazingly hot oven (lovely on a warm late summer day like this), and THEN, you hopfully get some nice, airy bread with a bubbly, crispy crust. Timing is everything, the first loaf went harf an hour *glug* over, and it didn’t rise as nicely as the second one.
So wait, what are the game rules again?
Crispy Duck Breast Chow Mein
The prep for this is more low and slow than one would think. Start duck breast in a cold pan to render the fat and get a crispy skin, cook noodles, drain, spread out to dry, fry slowly until crisp as well, time everything right with the veggies and make a nice sauce with the pan drippings until you can finally combine everything to a layered dish. Whew.
More Dessert Experiments
I’m sure there’s a part of the dwarven community that will curse me for doing this, but I wanted to mix some whisky into the sauce and felt like the taste was too sharp, so I cooked off some alcohol off. And you know what? It’s kinda nice, but still somewhat overbearing. But the textural mix of streusel, cake, nuts and ice cream was good, so that’s that.
Chocolate Cake with Miso Ganache
Soo, idiot me forgot to grease the baking form, so rather than nice rectangular cakes I ended up with what looks like a modern art piece, or one of them odd rock formations you find in the Southeast of Niflheim. Nevermind, that caramelized white chocolate miso stuff is tasty!
Guacamole
In its most simple form mostly avocado, onions and salt, season with lemon and sugar to taste. The thing is, preparation matters and if you mush the onions in a mortar it gets a more distinct onion flavor, something about broken cell walls and enzymes, so I dug out my trusty granite mortar and pestle. Served the guacamole in a cheeseburger. I have a fondness for cheeseburgers, can you tell? Shoutout to Quiz for the original inspiration.
Caramelized White Chocolate Miso Ganache
Another one of those ideas that sound all sorts of weird on paper, but end up really intriguing in practice. Roast white chocolate in an oven until it caramelizes, briefly do the same with some miso, and mix it all together with some water and sugar to balance the saltiness until you get a smooth sauce that packs all sorts of complex flavors. Like a more adventurous version of salted caramel. I honestly have no idea what to do with it, but I’m already wondering how it combines with whisky or dark chocolate. Mixing it with my afternoon coffee to clean out the bowl was already pretty interesting.
Homemade Ketchup
Not exactly stuff you’d usually cook yourself, but I had some tomatoes left and felt curious. It’s actually an interesting challenge to balance out sweet, sour and savory with the risk of dumping more sugar into it than Einarr could carry.