Cooking and food thread

[Insidious Rex]

Help!! I need a little help with something here. Anyone have a truly good recipe for pasta sauce? Im supposed to be making one and I want to do something really home made tasting (I usually go from a jar). Any Italian grammas out there?

Anyway we can use this thread to discuss recipes or ask other cooking questions and give suggestions and such....

[Hasty Ent]

Here's a simple tomato sauce, but it's absolutely crucial you use the best quality tomato you can get your hands on, or it won't work. If you can't get organically grown vine ripened tomatoes IN SEASON, then buy imported canned Italian plum tomatoes. I think that San Marzano are superior to all others.

If you're using fresh, peel and seed them first. Quickest way to peel is score an 'x' on them and drop them in boiling water for a few minutes. The skin will easily slide off.

Lightly crush the tomatoes -- I use my hands -- and place them in a skillet that has both butter and olive oil filming the pan, with the butter lightly foaming. Set the flame low. Get a glass of wine, or a beer if that's your fancy, and a wooden spoon, and prepare to spend some time watching the tomatoes slowly break down. This will take a while, but it's worth it! You'll see them change consistency after about 20 minutes or so. Once they're 'melted' so to speak, throw in some crushed garlic, some finely chopped basil, salt and pepper to taste. Cook for another 5-10 minutes. Sometime I throw in a dash of balsamic vinegar towards the end. By now the smell should have your neighbors at the door.

I like this sauce on any kind of pasta. Sometimes I throw in sliced crimini mushrooms, or dried woodland shrooms that I've reconstituted in water. Capers are nice, too, or chopped olives. You can pretty much use this as a base for all kinds of pasta sauces, in my opinion.

What time's dinner?

[Lizra]

I start with a jar, usually Ragu or Prego, a traditional smooth style, no weird chunks of stuff, and add a small can of tomato paste, about a fourth to third cup of sugar, and some of the wine I'm drinking when I make it. You can add some spices (basil, oregano, garlic, whatever) if you like, but the jar stuff is pretty good. This makes a thick, sweet sauce that goes good with Italian sausage, thin pasta and french bread. Start with one of those packaged herb salads in the organic dept. yum and groan!

[Elven Archer]

Ragu makes some stuff that has meat in it. It's real good and home-made tasting.

i have a cooking question if anybody wants to answer it. I've been wanting to make a cookie cake but i'm not sure how to. Is it just cookie dough in a pan or is there a different recipe? i tried searching on google but i only found actually cakes recipes.

[gimli7410]

im hungry....

[Elvellyn]

Originally posted by Elven Archer
Ragu makes some stuff that has meat in it. It's real good and home-made tasting.

i have a cooking question if anybody wants to answer it. I've been wanting to make a cookie cake but i'm not sure how to. Is it just cookie dough in a pan or is there a different recipe? i tried searching on google but i only found actually cakes recipes.

I accidentally made a cookie cake once.

[azalea]

I love this thread!

Here's a good pasta sauce recipe that I've adapted from The Vegetarian Epicure:
Simmer sliced or chopped mushrooms (you'll have to eyeball this, but I think I use about a cup) in a cup of water for about 20 min. (you may not need to do it for this long -- as you can see, I kind of do my own thing sometimes). Saute a chopped onion and a chopped clove of garlic (or two, depending on how big they are and how much you like garlic) in oil, and while it's sauteing, shake on basil, oregano and parsley to your tastes. Combine the sauteed onion mixture and the mushroom and broth in a large skillet, and add 2 1/2 cups tomato paste (I use the low sodium kind). Throw in a twist of lemon peel, a bay leaf, and season w/ salt and pepper to your taste. Here's where I differ a lot from the recipe: it calls for the addition of a cup of red wine, but I don't keep red wine on hand because we don't drink it, so I use another cup of water OR I use canned plain tomato sauce (again low sodium) IN PLACE OF the tomato paste and second cup of liquid (water or wine), but if you aren't really experimenting or aren't an experienced cook, you may not want to try to guess the amount. Finally, add in a few drops of Worcestershire sauce, and simmer on very low heat for 15 to 20 minutes if it is to be used in a baked recipe, or a full hour if it is going over pasta. Remove the bay leaf and lemon peel after simmering is over. MMM, this is good.

Big Cookie:
You can use Pillsbury packaged dough (20 oz.) and press it onto a 12 inch pizza pan or 13x9 in. baking pan, bake for 12 to 18 min., and cool before cutting. You can also just use your own cookie recipe the same way, but you'll need to really watch the time on it, to make sure it gets done and doesn't burn.

[Elvellyn]

Originally posted by azalea
Big Cookie:
You can use Pillsbury packaged dough (20 oz.) and press it onto a 12 inch pizza pan or 13x9 in. baking pan, bake for 12 to 18 min., and cool before cutting. You can also just use your own cookie recipe the same way, but you'll need to really watch the time on it, to make sure it gets done and doesn't burn. [/B]

What I did was accidentally put all the cookies too close together and they sort of meshed into one big cookie. And the dough was from scratch too! It tasted good, looked bad.

[BeardofPants]

Mine is pretty much the same as everyone elses:

Put a little bit of olive oil in the pot (make sure it's a moderately big pot, as it will reduce faster), set the temperature at medium-low. Crush or chop garlic into oil once it has heated up. Crushed garlic will give you a stronger flavour. I like to use 2 cloves. Move the garlic around so it doesn't burn, and cook on medium-low for about half a minute to a minute. Then pour in a little wine - enough so that it sizzles and burns the alcohol off. I use tinned italian plum tomatoes, but if it's possible you should use fresh ones - make sure they're skinned: to do this blanch them in hot water. Crush the tomatoes in the pot. At this stage, I usually use a little chilli to zest up the sauce. You can also add other things in like bay leaves to flavour the sauce. Make sure you remove the bay leaf at the end. Don't add basil etc until the end, as they won't flavour the sauce, and you'll end up with soggy leaves. The important step is to reduce the sauce - if you don't, its flavours will not intensify, and you will get watery, acidic tomatoes. Yuck. It will take approx half an hour on medium heat - if you don't mind tomato splatters, then feel free to turn up the heat. Make sure you stir often, if on high heat. I usually have it on medium-low: it's pretty low maintenance that way, and I only have to stir it every ten minutes or so. When it's about half reduced, I add more wine to taste. A good red wine to use is a shiraz, or a cabernet, as they both have strong, zesty flavours. When the consistency is such that there is hardly any wine or juice left, and the sauce has thickened, I take it off the heat and add fresh chopped/shredded basil, and season it.

To simplify:

1. Heat oil
2. Add garlic. Cook for 1/2 a minute.
3. Add wine, and evapourate it off
4. Add 1-2 cans of italian plum tomatoes (1 can per person). Add chilli if you want a slightly spicy sauce. I usually use one dried chilli. This is the time to add the bayleaf, and other flavour enhancers, ie olives, capers, mushrooms, etc. Don't forget to remove the bayleaf at the end.
5. Half reduce, then add wine to taste - Usually about a couple of tablespoons.
6. When fully reduced, add fresh herbs, such as basil. Season to taste.

Best served with penne pasta. I usually stir a little through the pasta first, so that when the sauce goes on the pasta, it's not just on top, with plain pasta on the bottom. Season, serve with parmesan, or a parmesan substitue: pecorino is a good one.

Edit: changed to italian plum tomatoes - seems to be an easier reference.

[Insidious Rex]

god.... *drooling*

ok I can see we really need to have an entmoot cook off. whose hosting?

[BeardofPants]

Another easy one is pesto. All you need is a mortar and pestle, or a blender. I prefer to use a mortar, cos the herbs don't get chopped as fine, and I like it lumpy. My favourite one is coriander pesto (I think you yanks call it cilantro.)

For this recipe I'm going to use a mortar/pestle. Crush one-two cloves of garlic into the damned heavy thing. Add a good sized hand full of cashew nuts or pine nuts (if using pinenuts, make sure you lightly brown them first.) For a more tropical taste, cashew nuts are best. Crush with pestle. Add one cup of tightly packed coriander leaves. Add more if you want a stronger taste. Again, crush through with the already crushed cashews. Again: I also like to add in a chopped chilli (in this case a fresh green one) to zest it up. At the end - when the leaves are of store brought pesto texture, I add lots of parmesan, and stir through. Again: I tend to use pecorino for its strong taste. Stir olive oil through until the pesto is of the desired consistency. Season, and serve. This pesto is damned good on snapper, with a light serving of lemon juice.

[Elvellyn]

Originally posted by Insidious Rex
god.... *drooling*

ok I can see we really need to have an entmoot cook off. whose hosting?

As long as I don't have to cook anything that you can't put in the microwave, it soundds like a good idea to me.

[Elven Archer]

Originally posted by azalea
Big Cookie:
You can use Pillsbury packaged dough (20 oz.) and press it onto a 12 inch pizza pan or 13x9 in. baking pan, bake for 12 to 18 min., and cool before cutting. You can also just use your own cookie recipe the same way, but you'll need to really watch the time on it, to make sure it gets done and doesn't burn.

thanks! I'll have to try it when i get home.

[Lady of Rohan]

Originally posted by Elvellyn
As long as I don't have to cook anything that you can't put in the microwave, it soundds like a good idea to me.

Lol. I can't even cook things that go IN the microwave. After an unsucesful attempt to make microwave popcorn (which ended up allmost burning down the house), I have dicided that my cooking career is over (before it even started).

[Elvellyn]

I'm actually a half decent cook, compared to my sister at least. I had to help her boil water once. I'm not kidding. I like baking cookies and cakes and stuff like that. But lately I haven't had much time so I have lapsed into microwaveness.

Does anybody know how to make pie crusts turn out right?

[Baby-K]

Originally posted by Elvellyn
Does anybody know how to make pie crusts turn out right?

Depends - what pies are you making & what type of dough you're using, but I find it generally helps to follow the instructions.......

Anyway we can use this thread to discuss recipes or ask other cooking questions and give suggestions and such....

You're such a girl

[azalea]

Originally posted by Elvellyn


Does anybody know how to make pie crusts turn out right?

Hints:
Use very cold butter.
Use a pastry blender (the thing with a handle that has threee arcs attached) and blend until very fine meal consistency.
Use very cold water.
Try to handle as little as possible. Refrigerate before rolling out.
Roll on wax paper, then carefully place in pan (a good way is to put the pan upside down on top of the rolled dough, and then turn over the pan with the dough still with the wax paper on top. The crust will sink into the pan, and you can adjust it carefully, then peel off the paper) Trim the edges and use the extra dough for a cinnamon roll.
If a two crust pie, carefully place on top and crimp edges together. poke fork holes in top.
If crust browns too quickly, cover the edge with a strip of aluminum foil for the remainder fo the baking time.

[Insidious Rex]

Originally posted by Baby-K
You're such a girl

hey now didnt you notice how many nice females I got to respond to this thread? Its like they say if you want to get with the girls ask for help knitting. *laugh*

And hey cooking can be a manly activity. Now who has a nice recipe for cream puffs.....

[Baby-K]

Originally posted by Insidious Rex
And hey cooking can be a manly activity. Now who has a nice recipe for cream puffs.....

IR sweetheart - you are a cream puff - do you feel the sudden urge to procreate?

[Insidious Rex]

Originally posted by Baby-K
do you feel the sudden urge to procreate?

oh believe me its a constant curse.