Oxtail bourguignon.

Not a fan of ox tails but they do look good, the sauce looks very rich and concentrated.

That's an interesting cooking technique.  I'd normally think to always stir fry a dish like that.  Baking in the oven seems really easy and convenient.  I'd never have thought to bake it.

Saturday night we made Gamjatang (Korean Pork Neck Bone Soup).  Sunday morning my wife used the leftover rice to make a fried rice with XO sauce.

Quote from: Cheese on December 10, 2018, 12:03 PM

Hoisin Shrimp ...healthy too.

Only when you skip the shrimp.
In case you want to stay blissful as you want to continue to eat them: don't research how they are farmed.

Yea, ain’t that the truth...

This reminds me of my first year in college when I needed to get a “good paying part time job” to help pay for the expenses. I hired on as a butcher and a smoker for a local sausage maker. One of the perks of the job was that every day I worked, I could go into the coolers and pick any meat product to cook for my dinner/lunch.

Unfortunately, after seeing how these ground meat products in casings were produced, I lost any interest in eating any of them.

It took 4-5 years after I quit before I mustered up the courage to actually, once again, eat a brat or a wiener.  Sometimes it’s just “too much information”.

50+ years later the single mention of “head cheese” still gives me the willy’s.

This meal is totally out of my expertise, but I’d think @six-point socket II will weigh in and make some sense out of the mayhem.

Last Sunday we had a bit of a fail with what was supposed to be Hungarian Goulash with Spatzle and Braised Red Cabbage.  The braised red cabbage didn't make it as the cabbage got scourged somehow, the goulash was salty, and the spatzle didn't come out that nicely using a ricer (last time I squeezed it out of a ziploc and cut it with a knife).  It's a shame since the same meal was a real success back in April.

When we first married, my wife had not previously done a lot of cooking. But shows game to learn. The first few dishes she tried were German meals. She first tried making Goulash with Spatzle. I liked her result. We have  had variations of the meal over the years.

Next, she included kartuffleclaisse (sp?) with a meal. Those came out teriffic as far as I was concerned. She was not satisfied. "They didn't hold together" was her complaint. She has since learned how to get them to "hang together" as she wanted.  However, whatever she uses to get them to stay solid, as she expects, has  not anything towards improving flavor. They are still good, but not as great to my taste as her very first attempt.

She is still a good cook, but with just the two of us rattling around, she does not have the energy to prepare as she used to do. When we have company, that is her time to shine.
Tinker

The little bundles make for easy removal.

Yup, you can squirt the sriracha directly into the broth.  Some people also like to squirt in Hoisin Sauce.  Others will have a small bowl and squirt in a mix of sriracha and hoisin to dip the meat into it.  I used to put sriracha into the pho broth, that is until I discovered the joy of sate (the chili and oil in the tall jar).  I still squirt sriracha into canned vegetable soup to kick it up a notch.

It's possible that I used a different computer to get the recipe.  We usually print of a hard copy of the recipe for easy reference when cooking.  I'll hand write notes and cross out anything that we omitted or changed.  Sometimes that paper gets wet or splattered and ends up getting trashed without permanently recording the edits that we made to the original recipe.

I do often think about the Paprika app, but the price kinda kills me especially since I think I need to pay for my phone, iPad, and computer separately?  I have started to put some stuff into Evernote, but I don't think it works that well for recipes (better for me for just general lists of things).

This morning we had more pho with some frozen spring rolls, vietnamese iced coffee and my wife had Banh Mi Op La (Vietnamese bread with a fried egg).

Hi!

@Cheese not sure I can help, but I'll try. Thanks for "paging" me.

@GoingMyWay

Can you tell me what you mean by scourged in regard to the red cabbage? Maybe using another word? I haven't heard that word before, I looked it up in a dictionary and I can't get "whipping" / "plague" and red cabbage together 

Or was that just an auto-correct/typo and you meant scorched? That would make sense.

I can translate and post the recipe for red cabbage (with onions and apples) we use, if you like.

Spatzle, well - the dough is basically key, but I think a typical ricer's holes may be to small. We always scrape/shave them when we make them from scratch.

Here's a video (not ours) on how it is done:

(You could do that with Festool's putty knife ...  )

As usual, very great looking meals & dishes! Thanks for sharing!

Kind regards,
Oliver

Hi!

@Cheese not sure I can help, but I'll try. Thanks for "paging" me.

@GoingMyWay

Can you tell me what you mean by scourged in regard to the red cabbage? Maybe using another word? I haven't heard that word before, I looked it up in a dictionary and I can't get "whipping" / "plague" and red cabbage together 

Or was that just an auto-correct/typo and you meant scorched? That would make sense.

I can translate and post the recipe for red cabbage (with onions and apples) we use, if you like.

Spatzle, well - the dough is basically key, but I think a typical ricer's holes may be to small. We always scrape/shave them when we make them from scratch.

Here's a video (not ours) on how it is done:

(You could do that with Festool's putty knife ...  )

As usual, very great looking meals & dishes! Thanks for sharing!

Kind regards,
Oliver

Hi Oliver!

Yes you are correct - I meant to say scorched.  I try to proofread my posts before posting, but I guess I missed that one  .  I think it might have been caused by the combination of factors.   I think I originally cooked in our le crueset dutch oven, whereas this time I used our chicken fryer skillet.  I think last time I also washed the cabbage so there was much more liquid in the pan.  This time I only added sugar and vinegar (along with butter) - I think the sugar is what really caused everything to burn.  Does braised cabbage traditionally have onion and apple in it?  I feel like whenever I've gotten it from a European restaurant it's just cabbage.  I suppose I might not have been able to taste an apple that had cooked down to basically nothing, but I'm pretty sure I would have been able to detect onion.

I think the holes in the ricer are about 1/4".  I think those were the largest holes that I could find in a ricer.  I bought it specifically for trying to press out noodles like this and also to make a Vietnamese rice flour noodle that's similar to udon.  I think the viscosity of the dough/batter really matters if you're going to try to squeeze it out.  Too thin and it just oozes, runs, drips through the holes on its own.  Too thick and it may not be possible to squeeze it through the holes.  The style of the spatzle in your video is interesting.  It's like a thin noodle.  I always thought spatzle was more like orecchiette shaped.  I guess there are different varieties of spatzle - kind like chicken and dumplings, some use a drop biscuit while other versions have more like a rolled and cut noodle.

Lol, are those balls of gluten? 

Quote from: GoingMyWay on December 15, 2018, 09:18 PM

Tonight my wife made Vietnamese Beef Noodle Soup (pho).

Nope those are the pieces of cut up meatball with pieces of tendon in there for added texture.  This particular brand wasn't very good as the overall meatball was rather soft and mushy.  The colors also seems a little lighter than normal.  It's usually a little more firmer and chewy.

I do often think about the Paprika app, but the price kinda kills me especially since I think I need to pay for my phone, iPad, and computer separately?  I have started to put some stuff into Evernote, but I don't think it works that well for recipes (better for me for just general lists of things).

This morning we had more pho with some frozen spring rolls, vietnamese iced coffee and my wife had Banh Mi Op La (Vietnamese bread with a fried egg).

I believe the Paprika app is $5 and the same app can be used on both the iPhone & iPad. That's how I started out. The iPad for cooking meals because it's easier to read and the iPhone for the shopping list. Try it on your iPhone and see how you like it. It's only a $5 hit if it doesn't work for you.

Then after about a year I decided to add the MacBook to the list. That's a $25 hit. The lap top is nice to easily add original home brewed recipes because of the keyboard.

The Vietnamese iced coffee looks delicious...

It didn't seem like a lot of people drink Coors Light, but I thought I'd throw out this PSA anyway.  Evidently there is a known issue with Coors Light cans not opening properly.

This last 24 pack had several cans that failed to pop open.  Sadly I lost these 2 cans as I didn't have anything to open it with.



I think I've lost 3-4 cans in total that I wasn't able to open.  There have been many many more that required using the end of a butter knife to pop open.  Pretty annoying!

I finally noticed there was a pattern of the cans not opening so I called MolsonCoors this morning to report/complain.  They acknowledged there is a problem with some of their distributors and they are collecting the information off of the cans to help identify batches/distributors that have problems.  I gave them the information (I never realized there were so many different numeric codes on the can before!) off of one of my defective cans and they're going to send me a check for the trouble.

I just thought I'd share this with in case anyone else runs into a similar experience.  You should report it and hopefully get a little money back for the inconvenience.

Hi!

Christmas eve. Traditionally we had oxtail soup and smoked fish with bread. (Eel, salmon (different types), trout)







Christmas.

Traditionally we would have made venison filet, lukewarm pears with cranberries and potato croquettes. The truth: We couldn't stand it anymore. Year after year, and our source for really good venison filet vanished a couple of years ago ... So what else?

We thought of a dish my grandmother loved and made for special occasions: Sole - Norman style. The recipe was found in her old cook book and off we went.

Preparing the duchess potatoes: (We did this in advance and kept them in the freezer until needed)



Sole, Norman style.













Starter: Carpaccio.



Sole, Norman style.



2nd Christmas Day - Main course: Duck filled with apples and oranges, red cabbage (with apples and onions) and bread dumplings. Starter: Scampi with puff pastry and mushroom/shallots cream sauce.

















Starter.



Main course.





We drank mostly white wines: German pinot blanc (Palatinate) Weißburgunder No.1 2017 Dr. Deinhard (steel tank fermentation division of Von Winning Winery)  on Christmas eve, Ravenswood (California) Chardonnay 2016 Vintners Blend on Christmas Day and Georg Mosbacher Riesling (Palatinate) on 2nd Christmas Day.

Kind regards,
Oliver

Hi Oliver,

You had quite a feast for Christmas, looked amazing!

Do you usually eat Goose for New Year's Eve?

Do other people have any New Year's Eve/Day food traditions?  We don't, but we usually try to eat something "fancy" on New Year's Eve.  I reckon you're actually supposed to be eating the "special food" on New Year's Day itself if you expect to have good luck or prosperity for the rest of the year.

Man oh man...you guy's have been busy cooking.

The sole Norman style and the duchess potatoes look great. So does the scampi with the shallot, mushroom cream sauce. I'm familiar with the Ravenswood chard as my wife loves chards of all styles.

And then there's the prime rib with the cherry pie...yum, yum. The last time I cooked prime rib for Christmas, the 13 year old grandson refused to eat it and wanted a peanut butter sandwich instead. 

Better yet, when I directed him to the loaf of French bread and the fresh peanut butter kept in the fridge, he informed me he liked "regular" white bread with Skippy peanut butter.

Hmmmmm, a 13 year old gourmet chef in the offing. 

A New Years eve tradition for us is surf and turf. Something you wouldn't normally eat. Originally it was lobster and tenderloin, then it segued to large U10 sea scallops and tenderloin. Currently we've been at the crab legs and tenderloin stage for the last several years. As far as a vegetable and salad go, it's whatever sounds good at the time.

Thinking ahead, this year maybe just a caesar salad and green beans with lemon & thyme.   
 

So the latest is “Hers” with green beans at the medium level.

And “His” with baked potatoes at the medium rare level.

The interesting thing is that all of these carmelizeing marks are produced with a Le Creuset cast iron grill pan on a gas range.

Looks good...tastes good.

Not the same as being grilled, but better than being boiled. 

I have never had success with pizza on the grill using a stone.  Even when using my Bubba Keg (poor man's version of an egg).  For grilled pizza I use basically this recipe and technique:  https://barbecuebible.com/recipe/grilled-pizza/

For pizza in the oven I use Chef John's Wolfgang Puck recipe that I think was referenced here before.  We don't get as perfect a crust but we prefer more sauce and MORE CHEESE.  And other stuff.

Peter