Food for Thought

Tuesday evening I played with my favorite autumn side dish: apples 'n onions.  I decided to ignore the entire way I'd been taught to make them and instead work with the ingredients as I would with the skills I have now.

Here's the result:

Caramelized Apples 'n Onions:

1 large Videlia onion, French cut
3 medium to large apples, cored and French cut (I used Kikos)
6 Tbls. butter, divided into 1 Tbls. chunks
a good pinch of Kosher salt (to taste)
3 dashes of cinnamon (to taste)
2 dashes of cardamom (to taste)
3 c. apple juice (you will need enough liquid to cover the apples in your skillet)
1 Tbls. dark brown sugar

- Melt 2 Tbls. butter in a large skillet and saute onions until a few of them begin to brown.

- Add 2 Tbls. butter and the apples and cook until a few apples start to brown.

- Sprinkle cinnamon, cardamom, and salt over the apples and onions and pour enough apple juice over them to just cover the piece.  Raise burner heat to high and bring the juice to a boil.  Cover and simmer over low heat until apples are cooked through.

- Either use a slotted spoon and remove the apples and onions from the liquid or use a strainer to separate solids from liquid, returning the liquid to the pan.

- Reduce the liquid until only 1/3 volume remains, stirring in the dark brown sugar.  Remove from heat and stir in the last 2 Tbls. butter to finish the sauce.  Pour sauce over apples 'n onions.  Enjoy!

Sometimes it's worth revisiting old recipes and recreating them using new skills and knowledge.

On Wednesday and Friday I took the apples 'n onions a step further.

I started with store bought pizza crusts... I didn't have the time nor inclination to mess with making my own.  Then I made a béchamel sauce and threw in some mozzarella cheese to make it lovely and gooey, a bit of dried chili flake for a kick, and a bit of salt.

Once the sauce was in place I added some apple and onion slices, carefully removed from their caramel sauce.  Then I added some of the smoked pork butt roast from Sunday's dinner.  I topped it off with a 12-year aged white cheddar cheese.

Wednesday's results showed us the idea was good, but it needed more coverage from the toppings.  For Friday's pizza, FH suggested that I cut the pork finer to give better coverage and spread the flavor around more.  We didn't skimp on the cheddar cheese on Friday either.

That's all for this week.  My store-bought pastry treat on Friday didn't agree with me.  To be blunt, I've been recovering from a suspected case of food poisoning all weekend.  Luckily, FH didn't share my treat and was spared being ill.  I think next time I'll just make my own dessert too.

See you next week!

Experimentation

Since he was feeling better last night, FH tried something completely different for dinner. Here's a rough guestimate of his recipe:

3-4 strips of bacon, minced
1/2 cup water
1/2 olive oil
1 small Black Krim tomato, diced
1/2 small Orange Oxheart tomato, diced
2 dashes dried basil
2 dashes italian seasoning
pinch kosher salt
a couple of grinds of black pepper

enough pasta for two hungry people and water to boil it in

garnish: minced fresh parsley and carrot top

Cook the bacon in the water so that the fat renders and the meat is cooked through. Drain the fat off and add olive oil. Add the tomatoes and spices; cook until the Krim caramelizes.

Stir into the pasta. Garnish with minced parsley and carrot top.

Before you ask, the types of tomato will make a difference in flavor. The first batch only had some Oxheart in it. It was good. We wanted more and he decided to use the rest of the Oxheart and the Krim. It was better. The sweetness of the Krim made a huge difference. Given that we only planted those two heirloom varieties this year, we have no idea what it would taste like with others.

FH is planning on doing more research into heirloom tomato varieties this winter. I want him to plant those same two again but we both want to try another types as well. It will ultimately come down to available space. Until we own a house with some land it will be hard to plant everything that we want.