Month: December 2003

Aromatic vegetables include members of the onion family, carrots, garlic and peppers. If the recipe calls for sweating, the aromatics are cooked over low heat. This gets the vegetables to release their flavor so it ultimately ends up in the surrounding liquid. You’ll usually be told to cover the pan so the moisture and aroma from the vegetables are trapped and the vegetables don’t brown.

For some dishes, you cover and cook the veggies gently, then remove the lid and let them slowly caramelize. This caramelization gives soups and sauces a richer, more complex flavor and a deep color.

If the directions say to saute, the aromatics are cooked rapidly over high heat to seal in the flavor. Be sure the vegetables to be sauteed are dry, and do not crowd the pan. If necessary, saute in batches. The fat must be hot to produce good browning and crisping.

When you are prepping the vegetables — washing, peeling if necessary, and cutting — the type of dish and how long it will be cooked will determine the size of the pieces. For quick-cooking dishes, the pieces should be cut into tiny dice. Soups and braises call for aromatic vegetables to be cut into medium-sized pieces. Long-cooking stews and long-simmering stocks are best with large pieces such as onions cut in half, whole celery ribs and carrots in chunks.

Fats to be used include butter, olive oil, peanut oil, lard or even the rendered fat from a prosciutto or pancetta rind.

These sauteed or sweated bases are called different names in different cuisines. The classic French flavor base, known as mirepoix (meer-PWAH), is a combination of finely chopped onions, celery, and carrots sautéed in butter; the Italian soffritto (soh-FREE-toh) varies by region and may be as simple as chopped onion and a little garlic sauteed in olive oil. Mexican cooks often don’t use any fat at all, instead dry-roasting garlic, onions, and chiles on a flat, heavy roasting pan. [Serry]

Serry, Carol Anderson. &ldquo;Aromatic veggies often the start of a great meal.&rdquo; <i>North County Times</i>. 12 October 2000. <a href="http://www.nctimes.com/news/101200/pp.html" title="Aromatic veggies often the start of a great meal - NCTimes.net">&lt;http:// www.nctimes.com/ news/ 101200/ pp.html&gt;</a> (8 December 2001).

<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2003/12/03/dining/03LOST.html?ex=1385787600&amp;en=342343092fcadc4e&amp;ei=5007&amp;partner=USERLAND">At Lunch With Marion Cunningham: A Grande Dame of Home Cooking Is Still at the Stove</a>: &ldquo;Mrs. Cunningham writes for people who shop in supermarkets, where, she said, quality does not match variety.



&ldquo;&lsquo;The food is mass-produced,&rsquo; she said. &lsquo;It comes great distances from where you buy it. Everything is picked to be shipped. You really have to search around to find good beef and chicken. Everything has lost its intrinsic flavor.&rsquo;



&ldquo;Technological changes like speeding up a chicken&rsquo;s growth and speeding up cooking worry her. &lsquo;Organic,&rsquo; she said, &lsquo;is a very authentic concept because it's saving the land,&rsquo; whether or not it tastes better.&rdquo;

Breakfast was a bowl of cereal with a sliced banana. I weighed in at 161 pounds.



<ins datetime="2003-12-03T16:11:00-05:00">I had a granola bar and a four mile walk for lunch.</ins>



<ins datetime="2003-12-03T18:33:00-05:00">Dinner was left over butternut squash and vegetable gratin and roasted potato wedges with balsamic vinegar and a <a href="http://www.sierra-nevada.com/beers/celebrationale.html" title="Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale">Sierra Nevada Celebration Ale</a>.</ins>

<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A16398-2003Nov26.html">Plant a Pot of Ginger (washingtonpost.com)</a>: Ginger should live in gravel for several months (and even longer in dirt). When it starts to wither, just buy a new piece and begin anew. 

1. Gather your supplies. Ginger can be found in most grocery stores for less than $2. The ideal piece will have smooth skin and several eyes, like those on a potato. Shape is also important: Buy a piece three to six inches high, with a nub on the bottom to help it stand upright in the pot. You’ll also need a small clear vase or bowl and two shades of gravel. (Pet shops usually have an array of the colored stones.)
2. Pick your base color of gravel and fill the bowl a third of the way, shaking the container slightly to get an even layer. Pour your second color of gravel on top, leaving enough space for the final layer.
3. Place the ginger in the bowl, steadying it with one hand as you pour your final layer of gravel around it with the other hand. Fill the bowl to the top, making sure that the ginger can stand on its own. Water sparingly once a week, and new growth should soon appear. When the culinary urge hits, hold the plant firm, cut off a piece of ginger with a sharp knife, and prepare for its pleasantly pungent flavor.

Breakfast this morning was a piece of apple pie made by my sister-in-law. I weighed in at 160 pounds. <img src="http://www.personal.psu.edu/staff/m/h/mhl100/images/gasp.png" height="18" width="18" alt="=-O" /> I walked downtown over lunch to drop Gretchen&rsquo;s watch off at the jeweler&rsquo;s to get the band repaired &mdash; about three miles round trip. I discovered that I did not have my wallet with me &mdash; one sure way to keep you on a diet is not being able to buy food <img src="http://www.personal.psu.edu/staff/m/h/mhl100/images/wink.png" height="18" width="18" alt=";-)" /> &mdash; so, lunch was my last bag of popcorn.



<ins datetime="2003-12-02T18:45:00-05:00">We had a <a href="http://www.cooks.com/rec/doc/0,1950,159184-233192,00.html" title="Cooks.com | Recipe | BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND VEGETABLE GRATIN">butternut squash and vegetable gratin</a>. It was quite good, with a very proven&ccedil;al flavor. We also had some more of the left over stuffing.</ins>

Tonight we moved our onions from drying in the attic to storage in the root cellar. We have been using some already but, after picking out the ones that had gone bad, we ended up with a bushel and a half in the root cellar.

<a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/3248822.stm">BBC NEWS | UK | Scientists create &lsquo;perfect&rsquo; toast</a>: &ldquo;Researchers&rsquo; found that people think the perfect piece of toast should have partly melted butter patches on it, improving its taste and texture.



&ldquo;For this to work, the butter should be applied at fridge temperature of five degrees Celsius, the equation shows&hellip;



&ldquo;The equation relates to the critical amount of butter, applied at fridge temperature (approximately five degrees Celsius or 41&deg;F), required to produce this effect.



&ldquo;H represents thickness, Cp the specific heat, P density, T the initial temperature of the toast, w the weight, and subscript a and b toast and butter respectively&hellip;



&ldquo;&lsquo;To produce the patches of butter most people said they preferred, the bread needs to be heated to at least 120&deg;C, and the butter should be used straight from the fridge, applied unevenly within two minutes of the bread coming out of the toaster.



&ldquo;&lsquo;The amount of butter should be about one-seventeenth the thickness of the bread,&rsquo; he said.&rdquo;

Breakfast was a piece of Gretchen&rsquo;s banana bread. Lunch was an <a href="http://www.orville.com/gateway?waf.action=P04ProductDetail&amp;productID=1002&amp;mnav=products" title="Orville Redenbacher — Gourmet Products">Orville Redenbacher&rsquo;s Gourmet&reg; Popping Corn Smart Pop Mini Bag</a> followed by a four mile walk.

Dinner was the <a href="http://www.personal.psu.edu/staff/m/h/mhl100/2003_11_01_journal.html#id106994259932429342" title="Food Log">split pea soup</a> that Gretchen made the other day. We froze three bags of three cups each of what was left. That is enough for two generous servings per bag.