Cooking special interest

[AdamG]

I was wondering if anyone else had a special interest in cooking. For me, if I go a week without cooking fresh food, I get irritable and stop eating, and then it gets worse. No matter what kind of mood I'm in, the planning and chopping soothe me, and the execution exhilarates and gratifies me. I usually can't eat something I just cooked for a couple hours, because even if I'm hungry, it is boring at this point.

So, on to specifics. I use recipes only for inspiration. One recipe won't do it, I have to see at least 3-4 to get the commonalities and range of ideas. At this point, for many dishes I don't do that any more. I already know.

I have an innate sense of flavor combinations and balance. My simple dishes would be complicated for others, and my complex ones are layered with flavors - it changes as you chew and swallow and savor. I like all sorts of dishes, and love trying new dishes and new culinary traditions/ethnicities.

Anyone else like this with cooking?

 

[Magna]

Yes. I've been cooking since I was around 8 years old when I brought home a children's cookbook from the library and my mom let me make a mess of the kitchen.

It is a "special interest" of mine because I cook and prepare food in ways and with such detail that most people simply wouldn't do. I like to build, create and experiment with food at every stage as much as possible. Examples:

> Grinding my own flours from whole grain and then making my own seitan.

> Fermenting foods such as sauerkraut, kimchi, hot peppers, but then taking it a step further. Taking the used pepper mash after making hot sauce, dehydrating that mash and then powdering it to make a seasoning, etc.

>Raising and processing my own chickens for the meat but also for making and pressure canning my own broth.

>Growing a lot of my own produce as much as possible then freezing, dehydrating or canning it. Tomatoes for example. In addition to making my own tomato paste, I also dehydrate some of it to make "tomato leather" that I can then store in the pantry and rehydrate it as needed.

I almost never follow a new recipe exactly.

 

[AdamG]

That is very cool. I'm hoping to buy property with my wife, right now we are in a trailer park. So we have a small garden plot, but that's it. We want to raise chickens for eggs and culling meat. Possibly meat rabbits as well.

I've fermented, kim chi and kraut and yogurt and kefir. Live foods do me well Never tried my own flour, do pasta and breads and some sweets (muffins, cakes, cookies).

My true love is savory cooking. I guess I was around the same age as you, 7-8, when I started. Didn't like my mom's cooking, my dad barely cooked, so I took it on. And yes, I never have an actual plan, other than "it should be like this". And I just do it. Don't get in my way if I'm cooking, I know exactly how long I have to do something, and if I have to dodge, that wastes 5 seconds. My wife and I dance in our small kitchen.

When we do move, the kitchen is the priority. We'll probably move our trailer onto the land (cheaper that way) and then add on to it. So we have plans to basically double the size of the kitchen by taking out a room. Hopefully we'll get a half-basement foundation to make up for the lost room.

An old shower will be turned into a wet prep area. The stove will be in an island spaced logically (our kitchen right now makes no sense at all, but I got used to it). Etc.

What fun just thinking about it

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

I love cooking and when I travel I will take cooking lessons. Yesterday I found 2 lb of oyster mushrooms on a trail, so today am planning a beef stir fry with them. For the past month I've been harvesting asparagus daily from the garden. In our woods we get wild ramps that my spouse harvests to make a wild ramp vinagrete for the asparagus.

 

[AdamG]

I love cooking and when I travel I will take cooking lessons. Yesterday I found 2 lb of oyster mushrooms on a trail, so today am planning a beef stir fry with them. For the past month I've been harvesting asparagus daily from the garden. In our woods we get wild ramps that my spouse harvests to make a wild ramp vinagrete for the asparagus.

That is awesome. I've hunted mushrooms with people I trusted, I just don't trust myself to identify mushrooms correctly. Also no ramps around me, I've always wanted to try them. I understand they are only available for cooking a short time each season.

My goals include a nice perennial garden, so asparagus will be a must.

 

[AdamG]

.
I love to cook. It really doesn't matter what.
.
Sometimes I like to cook new things.
.
Sometimes I like to cook familiar things.
.
I'm best with sauces and marinades. I've gotten the non-wok way to make restaurant Cantonese - the reason I don't have a wok is that electric stoves, and flame is needed.
.
I do tomato sauces, mostly for pasta.
.
I do gumbo, homegrown okra and never-frozen shrimp (but the sausage can be frozen unless I make that myself too, which is rare).
.
I can do fancy. But mostly it is the week's 2 dinners and 2 lunches per meal for me and my wife.

 

[Gerontius]

I think this is a fine idea for a thread. Okra is delicious. Do you usually cook Southern food?

In India, okra is called bindi, and so a pot of bindi masala is basically spicy okra. I'm thinking about trying that sometime.

Just dug up my old copy of Charleston Receipts and am excited to try some classic recipes. I also have the White House Cook Book of 1887 in a facsimile edition and would like to see how those recipes taste.

 

[AdamG]

oh I love doing Indian. But my wife gets freaked out when I move so fast in the kitchen, because timing on how each spice cooks is everything. Layers.
.
I am in the south now, so more into southern than I used to be. I just grow as a home chef, basically.
.
I always do a brown roux for my gumbo, and the okra is due to climate and general heartiness - the only thing we can grow for a full season without pests or disease. This year it is an African strain, I forget which country it is from, but it is gigantic. We have 4 of them, they are not even 2 feet tall and producing enough for me to say "oh I should cook those now". And these get 12' tall.
.
so my gardening is part of my cooking.
.
I'll be moving soon, so better garden spots. But I'd like to discuss Indian, and other Asian styles of cooking (Thai in particular).

 

[AdamG]

I have a cherry tomato plant, it is the only kind I can reliably grow for a couple months until the moths get it.
.
so I made a sauce out of all the collecteds, the other night.
.
seeding and roasting and peeling cherry tomatoes all day.
.
it made a nice sauce, with capped basil and honey and other stuff who knows what at this point.
.
all day for that. And now the moths ate half of it, but we got the 'pillar, so maybe it'll produce some more?
.
Anyway, garden and cooking are the same for me.
.
we can discuss meats too.

 

[lovely_darlingprettybaby]

.
I love to cook. It really doesn't matter what.
.
Sometimes I like to cook new things.
.
Sometimes I like to cook familiar things.
.
I'm best with sauces and marinades. I've gotten the non-wok way to make restaurant Cantonese - the reason I don't have a wok is that electric stoves, and flame is needed.
.
I do tomato sauces, mostly for pasta.
.
I do gumbo, homegrown okra and never-frozen shrimp (but the sausage can be frozen unless I make that myself too, which is rare).
.
I can do fancy. But mostly it is the week's 2 dinners and 2 lunches per meal for me and my wife.

Me too, I love it and probably too baking more.
I love baking to death but I feel like I have to be careful with sweets and sugars.
I have taught myself and have a natural knack for it and it is one of my most favorite things.

 

[Outdated]

I love to cook too, or I used to. I had a great little gas stove, two burners and a small oven. It was perfect for a single bloke and the oven was so cheap to run that I used it all the time. Housing management made me get rid of it because I'm not allowed to have a gas cylinder.

That broke my heart a bit and now I'm stuck with the electric stove which I hate, so my enthusiasm died but I'll get back in to it again. Naturally I specialise in simple cooking for single people, but I'm also really good with soups and sauces. I'll post a few recipes if anyone's interested.

 

[Outdated]

seeding and roasting and peeling cherry tomatoes all day.

My Mum had a trick for peeling (or not peeling) the tomatoes when making sauce.

Don't peel them, just cut a cross in to the bottom of each tomato and drop it in to the pot. Don't cut too deep, no more than half way through. A few minutes after it has all come back to the boil the tomatoes have peeled themselves and the skins are still in big pieces that can easily be fished out with a fork.

And Mock Raspberry Jam:

Same old recipe as any other jam, just use tomatoes as the fruit. Tastes exactly the same.

8 lb of fruit
6 lb of sugar
2 cups of water

Boil it until you've got jam

 

[Mary Terry]

I have a cherry tomato plant, it is the only kind I can reliably grow for a couple months until the moths get it.
.
so I made a sauce out of all the collecteds, the other night.
.
seeding and roasting and peeling cherry tomatoes all day.
.
it made a nice sauce, with capped basil and honey and other stuff who knows what at this point.
.
all day for that. And now the moths ate half of it, but we got the 'pillar, so maybe it'll produce some more?
.
Anyway, garden and cooking are the same for me.
.
we can discuss meats too.

Our tomato crop is huge this year. I halve or quarter the vine-ripened tomatoes, spread them on a baking sheet, add EVOO, whole garlic cloves with skin on, rosemary and/or thyme sprigs from our garden, and roast at 300 degrees F for about 2 hours. Let it cool and run it through a food mill to remove skins and seeds. Then I measure the amount and bag it for the freezer. I prefer freezing it in 2 cup amounts which is most useful to me for routine home cooking.

 

[Mary Terry]

My Mum had a trick for peeling (or not peeling) the tomatoes when making sauce.

Don't peel them, just cut a cross in to the bottom of each tomato and drop it in to the pot. Don't cut too deep, no more than half way through. A few minutes after it has all come back to the boil the tomatoes have peeled themselves and the skins are still in big pieces that can easily be fished out with a fork.

And Mock Raspberry Jam:

Same old recipe as any other jam, just use tomatoes as the fruit. Tastes exactly the same.

8 lb of fruit
6 lb of sugar
2 cups of water

Boil it until you've got jam

I also use that method to peel peaches. Just cut a small X on the bottom, put in a pot of boiling water until the skin starts to peel away from the fruit, drop it in ice water to stop the cooking and peel off the skin.

 

[Mary Terry]

I love to cook too, or I used to. I had a great little gas stove, two burners and a small oven. It was perfect for a single bloke and the oven was so cheap to run that I used it all the time. Housing management made me get rid of it because I'm not allowed to have a gas cylinder.

That broke my heart a bit and now I'm stuck with the electric stove which I hate, so my enthusiasm died but I'll get back in to it again. Naturally I specialise in simple cooking for single people, but I'm also really good with soups and sauces. I'll post a few recipes if anyone's interested.

Can you get a propane gas grill for outdoor use? We have a gas grill with an eye or burner on the side. I usually use it to keep barbeque sauce or melted butter, or whatever I'm basting the meat with, warm while cooking the meat.

Yes, recipes, please!

 

[Mary Terry]

oh I love doing Indian. But my wife gets freaked out when I move so fast in the kitchen, because timing on how each spice cooks is everything. Layers.
.
I am in the south now, so more into southern than I used to be. I just grow as a home chef, basically.
.
I always do a brown roux for my gumbo, and the okra is due to climate and general heartiness - the only thing we can grow for a full season without pests or disease. This year it is an African strain, I forget which country it is from, but it is gigantic. We have 4 of them, they are not even 2 feet tall and producing enough for me to say "oh I should cook those now". And these get 12' tall.
.
so my gardening is part of my cooking.
.
I'll be moving soon, so better garden spots. But I'd like to discuss Indian, and other Asian styles of cooking (Thai in particular).

Okra is native to Africa, brought to America by slaves. The word for okra in one of African languages, Nigerian I think, is close to the word "gumbo".

According to GI doctors, the fiber in okra has been found to be a demulcent, soothing to the intestinal tract, and potentially helpful in cases of gastritis. The mucilage in okra (the slime factor) has been shown to have anti-adhesive properties that block the adhesion and colonization of Heliobacter pylori bacteria to the stomach lining. It can help prevent or heal stomach ulcers.

If you've seen the movie 'Forrest Gump', you'll remember Benjamin "Bubba" Buford shared with Forrest the list of possible shrimp dishes. Here's my partial okra list:

okra boiled in beans or peas,
an ingredient in every type of gumbo - chicken, sausage, venison, seafood, etc.
okra stewed with fresh tomatoes
okra sauteed with bacon and onion
cooked alone on the grill or grilled with any kind of meat, including chicken livers and onions in brown gravy
loose fried or batter fried
pickled
an ingredient in virtually any Creole dish
a garnish for Blood Marys

I like to put whole okra pods on a sheet pan, drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with onion powder, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, Tajin, or whatever flavors you like and roast in hot oven till tender.

Okay, I'll stop now.

Okra freezes really well, too.

 

[AprilR]

I like cooking, especially trying new things. Since i am on a diet, i can't do much however.

 

[Outdated]

Can you get a propane gas grill for outdoor use? We have a gas grill with an eye or burner on the side. I usually use it to keep barbeque sauce or melted butter, or whatever I'm basting the meat with, warm while cooking the meat.

What I was using was one of these. And I live in a small unit, no private outdoors where I could reliably keep any outdoor gear.

 

[Gerald Wilgus]

Hi, Adam. I too enjoy cooking. I especially like Mexican Cucina. I have taken cooking lessons in Oaxaca and really enjoy the various Moles. A couple of weeks ago at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival I had some Oaxacan chicken and cheese Tamales with salsa verde that I will need to make at home. In my garden I grow Tomatillos, Seranno chilis, and German Red Garlic that will go into my homemade Salsa Verde that I can. The hardest items for me to get are biznaga for Chilis en Nogada or Pasilla Oaxaqueña for Moles.

Cooking is fun.

 

[Mary Terry]

Hi, Adam. I too enjoy cooking. I especially like Mexican Cucina. I have taken cooking lessons in Oaxaca and really enjoy the various Moles. A couple of weeks ago at the Smithsonian Folklife Festival I had some Oaxacan chicken and cheese Tamales with salsa verde that I will need to make at home. In my garden I grow Tomatillos, Seranno chilis, and German Red Garlic that will go into my homemade Salsa Verde that I can. The hardest items for me to get are biznaga for Chilis en Nogada or Pasilla Oaxaqueña for Moles.

Cooking is fun.

Gerald - you can order pasilla and virtually every other kind of dried chile online. I usually buy a variety of dried chiles at the local Mexican grocery store but also order some online.

I have taken cooking classes in the Yucatan numerous times and love to host a yearly tamale party at Christmas with everyone a cog in the assembly line to make tamales. I miss Mexico and can't wait to return.