Spicy relish, tender pork chops and comfort cookies
Welcome to June’s double digits, readers. D.G.S. sat down to a meal of fried chicken takeout from Bea’s Restaurant and wondered, “Does their breading really contain sugar as I have been told? Is that true also for Chick-fil-A chicken tenders? If I make fried chicken at home, how should sugar be used, and how much?”
This one’s anonymous: “Any fish recipes. All I’ve got is tuna salad.”
PORK CHOPS
Linda Morris reported, “I was so happy to hear of a request for juicy tender pork chops. This has been a family favorite for many years, and is so easy and good.”
Juicy Tender Pork Chops
For every pork chop you will need:
1 tablespoon brown sugar 1 tablespoon ketchup or barbecue sauce
1 slice lemon
1 slice onion
On each pork chop, layer in this order the brown sugar, ketchup or barbecue sauce, lemon slice and onion slice. Bake in a preheated 350-degree oven for 45 minutes. Remove foil, and bake for 10 to 15 more minutes. You may find this last step is unnecessary.
RELISH
Tomatoes are the fruit of choice for this canning recipe from the Trion, Georgia, kitchen of Nell Thomas. Ms. Thomas is still canning as she nears her 10th decade. The custom in the Thomas home was to can between 100 and 300 jars of vegetables every year. That definitely qualifies their household for expert status.
Zippie Tomato Relish
12 tomatoes chopped (large pieces)
2 large onions, chopped
2 bell peppers, chopped
2 cups hot pepper, chopped (use less if desired)
2 cups vinegar (I use white vinegar)
2 cups sugar 2 tablespoons canning salt
Blanch tomatoes in really hot water, and remove peelings. Mix all ingredients, bring to a boil and then turn heat down to low. Simmer for 2 hours. This is very spicy hot, so fewer peppers may be used. Take from stove, pack in clean hot jars and seal. You can double or triple recipe in a larger pot.
Note: This is an old recipe my neighbor gave to me 50 years ago. I make 2 or 3 cases in pint jars. My five children love it on beans, peas, put in meatloaf and with collard greens and turnip greens.
CEVICHE
Mr. and Mrs. Sunday report on both restaurant and home cooking, and on fish and soup and bread.
“State of Confusion is now open again for dinein, and ceviche is back on the menu. We tend to alternate between the Peruvian and Mexican version. Last time was Peruvian, and it was as good as ever. Sadly, the Lucuma (a South American fruit) ice cream wasn’t available, but it’s worth ordering when they have it.”
SOURDOUGH
If you are interested in some details on homemade sourdough, starting with homemade starter, email me and I will pass on the Sundays’ reference sheet.
If you’d prefer to let someone else make your authentic sourdough, the Sundays advise on that, too. “Were you aware that most of the breads at Bread & Butter (http:// ButterTheBread.com) in Red Bank are artisanal Chattanooga sourdough (indigenous Chattanooga yeasts and bacteria)? If you like San Francisco sourdough, you’ll like their bread.”
CREAM SOUP
Their final topic is homemade cream soup concentrate. “It looks like most of the recipes you will find are variations on recipes in the ’70s and ’80s Make-a-Mix cookbooks, still available on Amazon at https:// www.amazon.com/Karine-Eliason/e/B000APA4MO/ref=dp_byline_ cont_pop_book_1).
“Mostly they have you create a shelf-stable dry mix and then add water or stock (Better Than Bouillon is often cited as well) and cook to thicken.”
And here is a recipe to quantify it all.
Dry Mix To Make Condensed Cream Soups
This mix makes the equivalent of 9 cans of 10.5ounce condensed cream soups.
2 cups instant nonfat milk
3/4 cup cornstarch
2 to 4 tablespoons dried onion (most often 2)
1/2 teaspoon black pepper Varying amounts of dried garlic, basil, parsley, marjoram and thyme As to the seasonings, add to taste but stay on the bland side. Campbell’s does, after all.
Mix together and store.
Condensed Cream Soups From Dry Mix
1/3 cup mix
1 to 1 1/2 cups cold water
Combine mix and cold water in a saucepan, and cook over low heat to thicken. Some recipes call for doubling the amount of mix when using 1 to 1 1/2 cups water, but the context suggests they aren’t cooking to thicken.
Watch out for burning so stir often.
Mix in additions to match the soup you want:
Cooked mushrooms and mushroom stock for cream of mushroom.
Cooked chicken and chicken stock for cream of chicken.
Cooked celery and celery seed powder (your choice of stock) for cream of celery … and so on.
We’re not sure how to make this mix suitable for a vegan diet — maybe drop the nonfat milk and use coconut cream as the liquid? You’d probably have to alter the cornstarch amount or maybe use a different thickener.
COOKIES
The evidence mounts that this mysterious season has produced not a few fledgling cooks and aspiring gardeners. So it is in our neighborhood, where a college man, Will Parker, sent warm cookies down the street to some not-so-youngish neighbors. He cheerfully shared the recipe as well, which he got from Maya Bhutwala, who found it on a food blog called Crazy for Crust. These cookies call for cinnamon and chocolate chips in irresistible combination.
Maya’s Chocolate Chip Snickerdoodles
3/4 cup butter
3/4 plus 1/3 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups flour
1 cup chocolate chips 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 cookie sheets with parchment paper. Cream butter and 3/4 cup sugar. Mix in egg and vanilla until smooth. Mix in baking soda, cream of tartar, salt and flour just until combined, then stir in chocolate chips.
Place remaining 1/3 cup sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl.
Roll 2-tablespoon-size balls of cookie dough in cinnamon-sugar mix. Bake for 9 to 11 minutes, or until bottoms just start to turn golden brown. Do not overcook; they are better underdone than overdone. Cool at least 5 minutes on cookie sheet before removing. Cookies are comfort food no matter what, and snickerdoodles perhaps especially so. I even heard a recent sermon in which the pastor told of being alone at home and hungry, and deciding to make snickerdoodles. I have forgotten the theological point, but they were probably his best batch ever.
I hope to see you next Wednesday, cooking friends.