Month 10 day 7: Turkey arepas and cauliflower

Today I made:
Turkey Arepas, Cooking Light November 2010
Cauliflower filet, Food & Wine November 2010

This arepas recipe specifically says not to use masa harnia or cornmeal for the arepa flour, but we couldn't find either of those. We made arepas once before with just normal corn meal, so we figured it might be ok. But when I mixed the specified amount of water with the specified amount of flour, it was totally soupy. I ended up adding extra corn meal until it was finally a texture that could ever hope to be shaped into a ball. But then, they're supposed to puff up and get a pocket in the middle, but these were pretty solid, so maybe this wasn't the correct thing to do. Instead of making sandwiches, we just piled the turkey-onion-pepper-cheese mix on top. They were pretty good!

The side recipe is an unusual way of eating cauliflower-- instead of florets, you cut it through the center to make "steaks" which are browned and then baked along with a zesty mix of red chile, corn, scallions, and capers. I'm not sure if the intact fillet shape added anything, but this was certainly a more interesting side than some plain steamed cauliflower.

Month 10 day 6: Turkey, stuffing, gravy, and cranberry sauce

Today I made:
Roasted Turkey with Rosemary-Garlic Butter Rub and Pan Gravy, Cooking Light November 2011
Fennel, Sausage, and Caramelized Apple Stuffing, Cooking Light November 2011
Old-Fashioned Cranberry Sauce, Cooking Light November 2011

We expected that today, finally, the turkey would be defrosted. Unfortunately we didn't get home until ~7, so the turkey didn't go into the oven until ~8. And, it wasn't completely defrosted, despite being in the fridge for a week! But, I guess it's not too surprising since our fridge tends to freeze things, so of course it would stop things from unfreezing. I figured that once I bathed it in hot water and it relaxed from its tight, balled-up shape it wouldn't be that bad-- it was mostly defrosted after all.

I rubbed it underneath the skin with herbed/spiced butter and then it went in at 425 for 30 minutes, cooling down to 325 for the rest of the time. After about 2 hours or so the popup timer was up and our meat thermometer agreed that the leg and the breast were done. We cut off some leg to snack on, cut off the breasts to eat, and made the gravy and put the stuffing in the oven while the turkey relaxed and adjusted its juices (is this really a thing, or is it a wive's tale?)

After we ate though, we realized that the other parts of the turkey were most certainly not cooked through. The back, for example, was still squishy-soft. Other parts were a cooked texture, but were pretty pink. Back in the oven it went for another couple of hours until just before we went to sleep! The next day when I was picking off the meat for leftovers, some parts seemed pink still, although now that I take a second glance I think that turkey is just pinkish. Nevertheless, we decided to panfry the leftovers a bit or use them in things like soups just to make sure :-P

The gravy was tasty, and particularly important given that our turkey ended up baking for probably longer than intended when all was said and done, and some parts were quite dry by the end. It never got too thick, though-- I guess the ratios might be off because the recipe doesn't specify a total volume for drippings + broth, just the amount of broth to use. Anyway, it was thin in viscosity but not flavor.

The stuffing... I'll just go ahead and say that I grew up on boxed stuffing and I stand by it! Despite the time and effort, it tasted no better than boxed stuffing, and in my opinion was worse. Normally I'm a big believer in as-much-from-scratch-as-possible, but Stovetop stuffing is just my favorite, especially when you add in some sausage, apple, celery, etc. So we will not keep the stuffing recipe. Good to know though! The first time I ever tried to make stuffing was when I lived in Japan, before I had the internet at my apartment, so I just tried to derive it from first principles. I knew there were some spices, some stale bread, and some broth... but I really didn't know how much broth to add or anything. It turned out a mushy disaster! This was better (especially as leftovers when we let it bake a while longer)

I did get converted to home-made cranberry sauce though. It is so fast to make-- just about 10-15 minutes, and tastes so good. This recipe had orange zest in it. When I was a kid I could just eat cranberry sauce straight from the can I loved it so much! I could imagine just eating this too, or using it like jam or anything.

We made a ton of food, so we'll be needing to use turkey in the next few days' worth of recipes!

Month 10 day 5: Japanese-flavored scallops and carrots

Today I made:
Scallops with Green Tea Cream, Cooking Light November 2010
Red-Miso-Glazed Carrots, Food & Wine November 2010

I wanted to roast a turkey today, but it was still partially frozen! So I turned to the only other quick recipe we had the ingredients for. These scallops and carrots both are paired with a traditional Japanese ingredient to make two dishes that don't seem Japanese at all.

The scallops are really supposed to be the large ones, but we didn't think it was worth $6 extra per pound for a larger size. They're sprinkled with ginger and matcha before getting seared in the pan. The sauce was supposed to be creme fraiche, but Shaws didn't have any. I looked online and people said to substitute sour cream, so that's what I did, and I didn't beat it as prescribed. It is mixed with more matcha, lemon juice, salt, and paprika.

The carrots are blanched, coated in a mixture of miso and butter, then roasted. It seemed like there should have been more liquid, because things just got very charred-- not that that's a bad thing for vegetables. But it was hard for G to wash :-/

These were both interesting, but not spectacular. If I'm going to use miso, I'd rather make miso soup or mackerel or something more traditional.

Month 10 day 4: In which I realize that "puff pastry" doesn't mean "phyllo dough" but it turns out it doesn't matter

Today I made:
Mushroom pies with pear salad, Food Network Magazine November 2009
Served with sautéed mung bean sprouts, Satomi Hara-style

These mushroom pies are each a large portobello mushroom cap filled with a copious amount of cheese and breadcrumbs, wrapped in puff pastry-- that's it. (Ok, they're supposed to have a bit of mustard too, but I left it out because G doesn't like mustard.) It's kind of a weird idea. They each have 1/2 cup shredded cheese. Doesn't that seem excessive?? But, it ends up melting down so I guess it doesn't seem like so much in the end. But these do end up being more filling than you might expect (despite the pastry just flaking away everywhere and being impossible to eat)

When I first looked over the recipe, I saw the frozen puff pastry in the ingredient list and passed over it thinking of the phyllo dough we've had leftover from a [delicious] brunch pie a while back. But tonight when I looked again, I realized you're supposed to use one sheet, which is rolled out to get to the right size... whoops. So instead, I just subbed the amount of phyllo dough by weight and cut out the approximately right sized stack of sheets. I didn't layer them with butter or anything because I didn't want to spend that much time, so I just figured it would be an experiment to see what would happen. It ended up being fine. Although the sheets weren't quite large enough to wrap all the way around and seal up, they got crispy and golden-brown as the puff pastry was meant to. I didn't think G would enjoy it, meatless as it is, but actually he really liked it. I thought it was a bit meh, because there was just too much dough. I think if I made it again I would use sliced mushrooms as many of the reviewers suggest, because large portobello caps are just so unreasonably expensive and it doesn't really matter for this dish anyway.

The salad is just a normal vinaigrette over salad with some pear slices. Straightforward, but tasty.

When I studied abroad in Japan, one of the favorite things my host mom made was sautéed bean sprouts. She thought it was funny that I liked them so much, because they were just sautéed with some black pepper and soy sauce. But it's always what I think of when I have leftover sprouts. They were a bit too salty-- I'm used to low-sodium soy sauce but we have the normal kind right now. But it was fun while I was cooking to think of my 4th grade host brother as being a high schooler now! I wonder if he has a JET teacher in his English class.

Month 10 day 3: Pork and roasted vegetables

Today I made:
Crispy Pork Medallions, Cooking Light November 2011
Roasted Root Vegetables, Cooking Light November 2011

This was a straightforward meal, and quicker than you might think given the roasted vegetables. You just cut them up while the oven preheats and toss with some oil and garlic. Then while they are roasting you cut the pork tenderloin and coat in panko, thyme, and parsley, brown in a cast-iron skillet, and pop that in the oven too. Everything finishes around the same time (if you are like me and want your meat definitely well done).

We had some extra veggies left over from the Asian lettuce cups last week, so I went ahead and used them too in the roasted veggies. I also put in a sweet potato in place of one of the parsnips since G doesn't like them (but he didn't end up eating this, for dinner or lunch leftovers :-P). So I got all the colors! Red pepper, orange sweet potato, yellow parsnips, green daikon (It was the stem end of an aokubi daikon), purple onions, and white/red potatoes. It seems like roasting is such a good way to prepare vegetables! So easy and delicious.

The pork was good too, but not particularly crispy. The bottom layer of breading was pretty soggy from contact with the pan.

Month 10 day 2: Beef potpie and roasted eggplants

Today I made:
Beef-and-Vegetable Potpie with Cheddar Biscuits, Food & Wine November 2010
Roasted Eggplants with Herbs, Cooking Light November 2010

I paired these recipes together because they both needed a 450°F oven.

These are supposed to be small eggplants, but those cost $6/lb instead of $2/lb, and I figured it wasn't worth an extra $5 for the presentation. Instead, I just cut a large eggplant in 4ths and then cut those into the slices that are supposed to be fanned out. This was ok, but not that flavorful or anything. If you like eggplant by itself, this will be good too...  but it really is just eggplant. With some fresh herbs on top. It looks cool, though!

This potpie was pretty coming out of the oven too. It was supposed to be made in a 9x13 (actually two, but I halved the recipe. I'm not sure why they made the recipe for 12 servings in 2 pans...), but I had started cooking in my Dutch oven and figured, if it wasn't going to overflow, why not just keep going with it?
Inside of this potpie is onions, carrots, parsnips, peas, beef, thyme, and rosemary. The rosemary is really nice and flavorful. There's some flour added to the milky broth, but it didn't thicken up much for me. I don't have self-rising flour at home, so I just added some baking powder to the biscuit mix (which is really just flour, butter, milk, and cheddar cheese otherwise). It didn't end up rising too much, but it definitely got crispy on top while staying soft and moist wherever it stayed in the broth. G liked the potpie and had seconds (and maybe thirds!) I liked it too, but it was so filling! Those biscuits are light and fluffy, but they do have a substantial amount of flour :-P

Month 10 day 1: Pepita-crusted pork and squash puree

Month 10! We're almost out of magazines!
This month I have five issues:

• Food Network Magazine, November 2009
• Food & Wine, November 2010
• Cooking Light, November 2010
• Cooking Light, November 2011
• Every Day with Rachael Ray, November 2011

In general, I thought I was getting better at picking out just the perfect amount of recipes that were actually realistic to make in a month, but this month was difficult! Some of these are "double issues" and they're all FULL of turkey, stuffing, green bean, and pie recipes. It was a little tricky to find recipes to make that weren't all just turkey (which I could eat for a whole month, but I don't know if G could).

Today I made:
Pepita-Crusted Pork, Every Day with Rachael Ray, November 2011
Kabocha Acorn Squash Puree, Cooking Light November 2011

G made a squash heart!

We hadn't yet gone grocery shopping, but we wanted to get started on dinner. I looked through the freezer and the pantry and realized that we had an extra squash and some pork in the freezer, so I made these two dishes. They're both simple-- the pork is just dredged in flour, then egg, then chopped [roasted, hulled] pumpkin seeds before being browned in a skillet and then baked. The squash is supposed to be baked for like an hour, but I sped it up by cutting it in half with some water in a pyrex pan and microwaving it for 10 minutes. After getting steamed in this way, you blend it with some brown sugar, butter, and salt and pepper. I was pretty sure G would like this, and he did. It's like candy! He didn't seem to care too much for the pork, though. We like tenderloin, but this was just a normal pork chop or something, so it came out a little tough. The pumpkin seeds don't really have that special of a flavor either. We won't keep that recipe, but I will keep the squash one.