Corn Fritter Recipe only

Kitchen, Craft and Home: Recipe Only

Corn Fritter Pancakes *

combine dry ingredients

 in a batter bowl or large (8 cup) measuring cup

• 1 cup unbleached flour just stir to add a little air before measuring--sifting is not required
• 1 TB sugar
• 1 TB baking powder (look for a product without aluminum in it)
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt (OPTIONAL--I chose to omit this)

using a whisk (or a fork ) mix thoroughly to distribute the ingredients well.

combine liquid ingredients 

• 1  cup (plus maybe a little more) buttermilk or sour milk** (see info below)
• 1 egg well beaten
• 2 TB cooking oil (like olive, corn, canola, etc.)
• 1 small can of creamed corn

blend the liquids until well mixed

 

Add the dry ingredients all at once, stirring lightly to combine.  You are just trying to combine and wet the ingredients--over mixing is not a good idea.  If you find that there is NOT enough moisture, you may need to add a bit more milk.  How can you tell?  If the batter does not spread on it's own--it is too thick.  If it runs all over the place, there is not enough flour...it not as easy to fix that...so better to be too thick, than too thin!

**to make "soured milk" place 1 TB apple cider vinegar (you might substitute lemon juice) in the measuring cup and then fill with milk to the measure.

Sealed to keep the health benefits intact!

Flax seeds have many health benefits (like Omega 3 and lignans)...and here is a product that I found that I liked because the seeds are already ground.  They are sealed to protect the health benefits...if you purchase it already ground, it may become rancid and cause more health problems. 

Chickens that eat the seed lay eggs that contain more Omega 3.

You can purchase the seeds whole, but if you eat them that way, they will pass through you whole and you will not benefit nearly as much from them.  

Grind them in a coffee mill...or if you don't use it that often, you can try these little packets.  They are sealed to help keep them safe.  

Here is a link from WebMD flax seed that has quite a bit to say about the health benefits...

Here is a link to Carrington Farms.

Kitchen: Farro, Orzo, Rice side dish

Farro Wheat, Orzo, Japonica Rice, and Garbanzo

I really like the taste and texture of farro wheat, though it can be a little bland--which makes it a perfect canvas for absorbing whatever flavors and seasoning you desire.  I couldn't decide whether I wanted rice or farro or orzo...so I opted to go for all of them!

Cooking times and amount of water or broth needed to cook each grain varied, so I did have to cook each one separately, but the pans were not hard to clean, so it wasn't a problem.  My thought was that each time I make one of the grains, I can either cook extra to freeze or just save the leftovers, so I could eliminate that step...at least for the rice and farro wheat, the orzo should be cooked at the time.

Since the rest of our meal was a little spicy, I opted this time out anyway, for very little seasoning.  I used a well seasoned chicken stock (not broth) to (separately) cook the rice and wheat according to package directions.

• 2/3 cup cooked Farro Wheat (using chicken stock)

• 2/3 cup cooked  Black Japonica Rice (using chicken stock)

• 2/3 cup cooked orzo (using plain water)

• lightly season with celery seed and onion powder (optional: if you used a good stock)

Combine the three starches, add a little more stock if it seems a little sticky.  Combine well.  Top with

• shredded cheese (I used a 5 cheese Italian Blend cheese)

• warmed garbanzo beans (chick peas)--or substitute your favorite bean or pea.

So, as is, a nice side, which you can see could be enhanced in many ways...begin with onions and slivered greens (kale or mustard or collard), stir in shredded carrots, use a wonderful olive (black or green)...whatever you have on hand, and whatever will complement the meal.  Mushrooms would be nice..............

Home: Mayor Bans Soda?

I am incredulous that so many people are allowing this insidious (perhaps even perfidious) idea that Mayor Bloomberg has about limiting the size of "sugary" drinks, i.e. soda mostly, but others too.
I am definitely on the side of making healthy CHOICES--I personally do not drink soda on a regular basis--maybe 4 or 5 in a whole year--if you make me.  I would NEVER drink diet soda filled with artificial sweeteners.  I have NEVER smoked...not a cigarette, and not anything else.  So, I am not here to defend those products.  I am here to insist that "we the people" refuse to allow elected and appointed officials--people who WORK for us--to continue to tell us (and businesses) what to do and how to do it. 
They keep saying "Look how well bans worked on smoking!!"  Does anyone see a link here?  Smoking was made so INTOLERABLE and SO EXPENSIVE that people have found their way off of cigarettes...but have they just switched to over-eating as their new addiction?  

Everyone is now on the "green" bandwagon...again...I have been on the side fighting (through education--not necessarily legislation) for ORGANIC--NATURAL--NON-GMO--PROTECT THE TREES, BEES, AND THE PLANET SIDE since I was a little girl!  

So this uppity, know-it-all MAYOR--(MAYOR--not elected LEGISLATOR) decides that we are too fat...so we should be FORCED to make better decisions.  He defends his plan by stating that basically in certain situations there are ways around the "law".  He says if someone wants 32 oz in stead of 16 oz then they can order TWO drinks.  Or they just might head off to the grocery store and buy a liter bottle on their own!  So, the mayor seems to feel that either generating MORE TRASH or denying the merchant the soda sale in preference to the grocery store where there is NO LIMITATION...that is somehow better.

Empty calories, they say, are at the root of the problem, yet once again ALCOHOL is exempt.  I am a teetotaler, I don't drink...once every 5 years or so I may have a sip of wine...but generally one could say I don't drink alcohol.  Talk about your empty calories!! And honestly, I am not so much worried about an over-eater (even of sugary fluids) driving on the same road with me...but I am very concerned about the same over partakers of alcohol...they don't even have to be in a car to cause problems... 
domestic violence, loud parties which break out into gun battles...this is where my concerns lie.  Driving while under the influence of alcohol, or soda...I'll take the soda drivers.

Your body needs carbs, protein, and even fat...many vitamins and nutrients are FAT SOLUBLE or need fat to manufacture...and fat enables that satiated feeling.  Alcohol on the other hand is 7 cals. per gram!  And you do NOT need it at all.  Certainly we can say that when you go to the ball park--you can get all the beer you want, and all the hot dogs you want...(for NOW, anyway), but that soda...well now, that is the reason that everyone is FAT.  An when you go to the movie theater--it's the SODA'S that are causing you to be fat...the over-sized candies, the extra buttered popcorn...that has nothing to do with it--YET.


Perhaps alcohol was exempted because there are so many government agencies that have their fingers in the pie.  We even have a Federal agency devoted to ALCOHOL (ATF).  What on earth would they have to do if we got government out of the alcohol business.  


Look what New York had up it's sleeves for beer producers--the smaller ones being the most affected--of course.  From RT  http://rt.com/usa/news/new-york-beer-state-063/

" The Brew New York website adds that for smaller breweries that handle distribution on their own, such as Oceanside’s Barrier Brewing, they will now have to pay not just a state tax but an additional New York City excise tax of $3.72 for selling there swill in the Five Boroughs. For them, the new rules will require them to pay more than $8 extra on each barrel. These craft beer producers will be among the hardest hit since producing only a limited supply of brew and keeping the cost-per-bottle higher in order to conduct business on a wider scale are necessary." 

Let's not forget the Federal Excise Taxes collected on beer.
http://www.ttb.gov/beer/tax.shtml 

It's kind of like the crazy reasoning of funding health care for children with special taxes collected from CIGARETTE sales.  Once the sales decline, just as "they" want, then there are no funds for the account that is supposed to cover health care for children...and we can't stop funding that...so we have to take it from someone else's pocket.


So even if it is a "good idea" based on "sound principles"--there is NO JUSTIFICATION for a MAYOR to impose these limitations.  


Where will this end?  I guess if we go to an ice cream parlor--they will have not only limit you to a single scoop, but the size of the scoop.  Maybe we can keep people in their houses if we just force them to spend their money on what we think is right?  If they can pay all their bills on time, then they MUST be able to handle their finances...but if they are having problems making any payments...perhaps the government needs to step in and tell you what to spend and how to spend it.  If you want to be able to keep your Fannie Mae home--you might have to have ALL your expenses and payments channeled and approved through your personal appointed accountant from the IRS.  


Little by little we are being told we are too stupid to figure anything out on our own...because little by little we have allowed our governments from local to state to federal to control everything we say and do...all they have to do is say "it's for the children" in the state of AZ and they will pass the law, whether it really will benefit children or not.


There is another little thing they fail to tell you.  People don't often  CUT things out.  They are more likely to REPLACE them with something else.  I keep hearing that if you just cut that one soda a day you will lose pounds.  Seriously??  Unless you drink only water...you will replace that soda with something else which may have calories.  It may even be something with artificial sweeteners that has NO CALORIES...but studies demonstrate the people who partake of artificial sweeteners are more likely to crave more food...not mentioning the vast medical problems that can arise from them.  (Migraines, jaw pain, weight gain--yes, weight gain)  


Remember when "they" told us how bad fat was for us?  I knew that was a horrible idea.  We do need fat.  I knew several people who drastically cut their fat intake.  They blew up like a balloon!  


Back in the day when I was painfully thin--so thin that I had a teacher threatening to go to the authorities thinking my parents were denying me food!  She was mistaken.  I happened to have an extremely active metabolism at the time.  I ate a lot of organic and whole foods, but I also ate "junk foods"--just to keep my weight above 100 pounds!  Cheese cake and french fries.  And I was still desperate to keep my weight up.  Not so today...forty years later...I am quite the opposite.  I have a very under-active thyroid and metabolism.  Keeping the weight OFF is the challenge for me at this point.  As I said, I don't drink soda, so that NYC law wouldn't change my situation either way.  

I am a proponent of eating right, but I am NOT a supporter of any government figure or body insisting that they control us by force.  WE are supposed to be a limiting factor on the government!

My issue with Bloomberg is that he has no right to enact or enforce this or the other bans and taxes he has done.  This is interstate commerce!  International commerce!  Who died and made him king?  I guess it is-- WE THE PEOPLE.

 
 

CRAFT: Quick Hair Bow

Less than two dollars and about 5 minutes!

I pull my hair back and secure it with a barrette.  Is it the most attractive that way?  Probably not, but I don't care for hair in my face!  I had purchased two barrettes with similar scarf knots, but the barrettes broke.  I looked everywhere to try to replace them.  Nothing to be had, and anything I could find was priced at $5.00 and up!  I actually gave up looking for replacements for a while, until I happened to come across this scarf at a thrift store for 99 cents.  I really liked it, and decided to buy it.  I tried tying it onto a ponytail, but it was so heavy that it kept pulling out.  (I have extremly fine hair.)  I ended up throwing it into a drawer for about a year.

At one of the dollar stores I found some plastic tortoise barrettes that came 3 on a card.  I decided to purchase them and see if I couldn't fashion my own scarf knot barrette.  

tie a bow, hot glue it to a barrette, DONE

• The scarf had cost 99 cents.
• The barrettes were 3 (on one card) for $1.00
• A little hot glue

The most time comsuming part was trying to charge the camera so I could take pictures, and heating the glue in the glue gun!  I will admit that I tied the bow several times until I was happy with it.  

I will dress this up a little using fancy vintage buttons--using special vintage button pins--so I can easily change them.  Bits of old jewelry and perhaps a sparkly piece from a shoe decoration might dress it up.


You probably have some scarves or pieces of fabric, or something you can readily transform.  

• You can match your clothing.  
• Tie the scarf or fabric in any design.
• I'm even thinking about making some with velcro so I can just switch them out or maybe use multiples on one.

from the back

 



 

KITCHEN: POT PIE "PASTY"

hand held pot pie--pasty version with substitutes in dough

Hand Held Pot Pie--Pasty version

     I am fond of chicken pot pie and beef pot pie.  Those that are currently available in the stores...I am not so fond of.  I decided to try to make my own version of a hand-held pot pie using the Cornish pasty as a model. 

•  "Pasties" are connected to Cornwall England and were eaten by miners...The traditional Cornish pasty would have been filled with uncooked skirt steak, potatoes, "swede" (aka rutabaga) and onion.  Also, the bakers of these hand-held lunches placed sweet "pie" like finish at one end of the pie.  Lunch and dessert being baked into one item.  They were made into a "D" shaped half round, not sealed on the top, as this one pictured above is.  There would be a thick sealed crust that served as a "handle"--and initials of the "eater" were often placed on one end, so the "eater" would know which end to start with...meal or dessert.  
• Historically, though, I believe the pasties began as a venison version...and there seem to be plenty of recipes that include other meats, veggies, and fruit versions, pre-dating the Cornish version.

 I chose the following pasty recipe--only I tweaked it with a few changes and substitutions.  (link to the original recipe)
http://www.food.com/recipe/butte-pasty-dough-278820

• 3 1/3 c. flour
• 1 1/3 c. shortening or butter flavored shortening 

 This I changed to:

• 3 1/3 c. flour 
• 1 packet Flax Paks* (ground flax seed)
• 1 TB wheat germ
• 1/2 tsp Vege-Sal (or a celery salt)
• freshly ground pepper (to taste)

 and fat substitution

• 1 1/3 c. mashed avocado and butter combined (about half and half)

Combine the dry ingredients well. Mash a whole avocado and add butter to make up the difference to 1 1/3 cup of "fat".  The avocado could probably be substituted for all the fat, but in the case of desiring a more flaky crust...I chose the butter.  (Though it didn't really make a very flaky crust.)  Proceed by blending the "fat" into the flour with a pastry cutter until it is fine and crumbly.


The original recipe called for quite a bit of liquid, which I prepared, but didn't use nearly what it specified.

• one egg, whisked
• 1 TB white vinegar
• 1/2 TB sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• cold water--enough to bring the liquid to one cup.

I did make this preparation, but did NOT need nearly that much of it to moisten the flour enough to form a dough.  I don't think I used more than half of this mixture, since the avocado has a measure of moisture to it, besides the fat.  

This dough recipe was supposed to make TWELVE large pasties...I was only able to manage EIGHT, and I felt that I probably should have rolled the dough out a little thicker than I did.

Another "misjudgement" I made was in the time it would take to bake the pasties.  Silly me, I thought that since I had already pre-cooked the filling, that it would NOT take a full hour for the pastry to bake...WRONG.  I was doing a face palm when I realized how over-done the filling must be!  Though the results were not exactly what I was desiring, I can see that if I continue to tweak the recipe, I may end up with what I am going for.

To make the filling prepare 

• carrots and celery, diced small
• 2 TB olive oil

If you are using onions, then dice and add those together with the carrots and celery into a heavy soup pot, bringing them to a sweat, and beginning the browning process.  Since I used leeks instead, they tend to burn and develop a "bitterness" if you try to brown them too much.  I added the leeks after the carrots and celery were browned.

• boneless, skinless chicken thighs, (raw) diced (small chunks)

Stir in raw chicken meat (breast would work fine too).  Brown it and season with

• salt
• pepper
• poultry seasoning
• garlic

 stirring all the while to make sure it doesn't burn!  
Add

• 4 cups chicken stock or broth

Allow the meat and veggies to cook--although when I do this again, I certainly will not cook them 'til tender, since they will have more cooking time in the oven.


It is important to STRAIN the stock/broth off and allow the chicken and veggies to cool since this type of recipe does NOT call for gravy to be baked into it...you can use the liquid to make a gravy to pour of the top of it.  If you try to put a hot filling into the dough you will have a mess!!    I added a little milk and thickened the stock with a flour and water mixture to make the gravy.

After "resting" your dough for at least 15-20 minutes in the fridge--wrapped in plastic.  Divide your dough into eight balls, and cover in plastic, rolling out one ball at a time.  I used a dessert or salad plate to measure.  (About 8 inches)

I had seen another pasty recipe that sealed the dough at the top, and decided that although it wasn't a traditional finish, it worked best for me.  (You can use a thinner crust if you seal it on top.)

Place the drained and cooled filling on the center of the round and pull up the edges, fold and crimp the edges.  Seal well.  Brush with an egg wash.  Poke a few holes to let out the steam.  Place  four on a baking sheet and set in a moderately hot oven.  I tried 375°, but I think I could have set mine at 400° and cut down the baking time.  Start with the cooler oven, though.  It still took an hour to bake these.

When they come out of the oven, you can smother them in that wonderful gravy!!


These froze very well, the gravy didn't freeze as well.  Taste was fine, just didn't look as nice...a little lumpy!

You can see the little ice crystals from being frozen!

Great to keep these on hand!

*These are handy little packets that keep the milled flax seeds ready for use--and it stays fresh.  Ground flax seeds often go rancid...this way you are good to go!  Sprinkle on cereal or into baked goods--a little goes a LONG WAY!

http://www.carringtonfarms.com/Flax-Products/Flax-Paks.php 

Kitchen: Problems Buying Honey in Bulk!

Transferring to an easier to handle container!

Problems sometimes occur when making purchases in bulk.  Yes, we use a lot of honey...and we purchase our honey in these large jars.  While this one IS NOT raw, usually we buy the raw, unpasteurized, honey that is VERY THICK.  That honey is usually transferred into canning jars because it is not "thin" enough to put into a squeeze bottle.  
This honey is a little more processed than we normally like, but we are waiting for the new collection.  
It is impractical to try to scoop a spoon or two of honey from these large jars.  We save bottles with handles so the size and weight is more manageable.  

• The important thing to remember is NEVER use a jar or bottle that is damp!  There is a danger of contaminating the honey--mold or souring can occur.

In this case, the jar we transferred to had honey in it previously.  It did not need to be washed.  If you do need to make a transfer to a washed container, make absolutely certain that the container is dry--BONE DRY!

While I have some nice stainless steel metal funnels, even some canning funnels...some have too small an opening, while others have too large an opening to fit my container.

• I just took a water jug...
• made sure it was very dry...
• cut the top off...
• inverted it 
• and a makeshift funnel was born!

Honey will take a little while to pour through, so it might take a few transfers to fill the container.  It may be a little messy, but that is the nature of honey! 

makeshift funnel

Now it should be a little easier to make the transfer to a squeeze container--with a cap.  It's always a good idea to have a cover for the squeeze bottle.  It's also a good idea to place extra honey--like that in the large jar in a plastic zip bag...or if it's too large for that...take a plastic bag and place it over the lid and the rim.  

• Use a very tight fitting rubber band around the edge so it sits under the bottom edge of the lid.  Also make sure that there are no honey spills on the jar.  This will help keep ants and other insects from "finding" your stores!!