Canoli Creme

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 C Ricotta cheese
  • 1/4 C powdered sugar
  • zest from one orange
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • Optional: 1/4 C semi-sweet chocolate chips

STEP BY STEP

  1. Mix ingredients
  2. Pipe into canaloni shells or squished flat white bread

 

 

Chicken Salad – COLLECTION

Basic Chicken Salad

Basic Chicken Salad

Sesame Chicken Salad

Sesame Chicken Salad

Oriental Chicken Salad

Oriental Chicken Salad

Asian Chicken Salad

Asian Salad

Seared Chicken Salad

Seared Chicken Salad

Pineapple Chicken Salad

Pineapple Chicken Salad

Chicken Fajita Salad

Chicken Fajita Salad

Mexican Chicken Salad

Mexican Dinner Salads – Two Recipes

Shelling a Lobster

PREPARATION
Get large pot of water to boiling
Look for cross line on back
Pierce quickly with a butcher knife
Down and through to front
Straight into heavily salted boiling water for 2 minutes
SHELLING
Snap off the claws
Break tail at proximal joint . Twist
Press tail shell to crack to release meat till tail pulls free
Claws: snap off knuckle then pull or roll
Keep claws intact
Open up knuckles
. 8 legs- Start at thin end and r.o.l.l out meat
Gently score tail to lay flat
Lay out body, claws, and knuckles
Lay out legs
Sculpt head to lay in place
Brush with EVOO

Berndes 11 inch Skillet

A SAD STORY WITH A GREAT OUTCOME – – – – –

This was a GREAT skillet, but recently (7 years after purchase) it has become unusable.  We will find out if Berndes will stand behind their Lifetime Warranty. I will post their reply below.  I approached them as a consumer, so they did not know that this entire situation was echoed here at Grandpa Cooks.


The First Note from Grandpaberndes-skillet

I am the main cook in our family.  I got my Berndes 11″ skillet about 6-7 years ago.  I loved it.  I treated it well, never used abrasives, never exceeded 450º and oiled it before each use.  The non-stick finish has eroded and the skillet is no longer usable.  I was going to throw it away, but see that it had a lifetime warranty.  How do I take advantage of that warranty?


The First Surprise

I must say that I am truly impressed. Not only did I get a reply, but it came within about 48 hours of my original message. More to come as I have it.


The Reply from Berndes

Robert,

Hello! We are the US distributor for Berndes Cookware. We received your email from the headquarters in Germany. We see that you have a pan that is showing signs of wear. We are happy to inform you that we will go ahead and send you a replacement. If you are able please send a photo of the whole pan and measure the pan from outer rim to rim in inches. Is this a fry pan or a different pan? Please let us know this information so we can see if we have that same pan available. Also please provide your shipping address. We will await your reply.

Thanks and have a good day!

We Really Care!

Amanda Stemen
Receptionist / Client Support
Range Kleen Mfg. Inc
4240 East Rd.
Lima, Ohio USA 45807


My Reply – Berndes wanted More Information

Amanda,

What a pleasure to hear from another person from Ohio.  I moved to Arizona from M2016-09-13-17-06-01arion, Ohio nearly 30 years ago.  I was also pleased to get a reply so promptly.

Attached is a measured top photo.  It is an 11 inch skillet.   My mailing address is …  (Address removed for my privacy)

Sincerest thanks,
Robert Andrews


2016-09-23-12-41-37The Result:  Berndes Just Earned a Lifelong Customer

So Maggie (my dog) started going crazy. She does that whenever a delivery person comes to the door. I had ordered two cookbooks, but nothing that I was expecting in a large box, but this was a VERY large box. I opened the box and there it was… my brand new Berndes pan – exactly like the other one, except new!

For those of you who have gone to the expense of buying quality cookware (especially non-stick) please review the rules about how to treat your precious skillets.  If you are looking to invest in something with which you will be happy, give Berndes a try.  Here is a link to Amazon for a quick and easy review of everything they have to offer.   Thanks Berndes for a job VERY well done.

Robert Andrews
Grandpa Cooks


SEE MY POST Care of your Non-Stick Skillets

Bread Roll

Ingredients
  • Potatoes – 3 medium size
  • Green Peas – ½ cup
  • Sweet Corn – ¼ cup
  • Cheese or any other ingredient you want to add
  • Salt
  • Red Chilly
  • Green Chilly – 2 to 3
  • Bread Slices – 8
  • Green Chutney
  • Tomato Sauce
Instructions
Bread Roll Filling
  1. Boil potatoes and mash finely – DO NOT use food processor
  2. Boil green peas and sweet corns and add to mashed potatoes.
  3. Add salt, red chilly and finely chopped green chilly to the mixture.
  4. You may also toast this mixture a bit in light olive oil to add to the flavors though I usually skip this part.
Bread Roll
  1. Take a big bowl and fill it with water. Take a slice of bread and dip in water for 2 seconds. Take the bread out and press in between your palms to remove the excess water.
  2. Take a spoon full of filling and put it in between the bread and roll it up from the sides to make a round ball.
  3. Deep fry in the oil of your liking.
  4. Serve with green chutney and red sauce. A strong ginger tea will double up the fun :).

This recipe first appeared on senseornosense.

Jesco Lifetime Guarantee

We were preparing for a party, when I found a note that I had written to myself over a year ago.  It stated that I had sent in a knife for replacement, but I realized that the knife had never arrived.  I thought perhaps I had not mailed it in, or it got lost in the mail, but I looked back and found the check we had written, and on the back evidence that you had cashed it.

The knife in question is your “cut nails then cut a tomato” knife with the two points on the end.

The quality of the knife was outstanding.  I actually used it for yard work, cutting small branches, then brought it in and used it to slice paper thin tomatoes.  It really does what you claim.  I absolutely loved it.

I had forgotten about the guarantee, and bought an entire set, with which I am very happy, but then I saw that the first knife was actually guaranteed.  I sent it in with high hopes, but the replacement knife never arrived.  I would still like the replacement knife promised to me.

I am enclosing bank images of the checks; Front and back.  The check had actually been cashed.  Please send a replacement knife to Robert Andrews, 903 W Glendale Ave, Unit 3, Phoenix, AZ 85021


So far I have not been able to contact Jesco.  My eMails have come back as undeliverable.  More info to come as I have it.

Our Garden – July 2016

2016-07-03 11.45.54


This has changed a bit, so I will make notes here.  Starting from the COLOR pot to the left and working my way around.

  • I didn’t put any peppers in the pot with the color spots in them.
  • The Basil has been replaced with Hatch Chilies
  • Nothing additional in the Fig Tree basin
  • Mosquito bush (citronella) is also unchanged.
  • We are waiting for August to plant Eggplant starts.  Meanwhile there are sunflowers there.
  • The cilantro will be replaced with an Acorn Squash start.    Meanwhile there are sunflowers there.
  • The Armenian Cuke will be replaced with a Canary Melon, if we can find one.    Meanwhile there are sunflowers there.
  • Wandering Jew is just as it remains
  • The next three pots will be Scallion starts, Cilantro start and a Daikon radish start.
  • The pot with the corn will now be some type of cucumber, but meanwhile has sunflowers there.
  • Of the two pots out front, the basil has three plants in it, and the “herbs” has a Chiltipen ( Americans erroneously call this a Chili Tepin )

 

Asian Dumplings

xiao long bao

These are not the dumplings that are most commonly served in tomato soup here in the US.  These are kind of like miniature sealed burritos or calzones… although that comparison is made VERY loosely.  They are commonly called Pot Stickers.

There are too many dumplings to list here, so I have taken the liberty of including a post from Culinary One which is a great reference site.  Only slight modifications have been made, although links have been removed.  If you want to explore this page in more detail, complete with photos, use the link in this paragraph.

21 Different Types of Dumplings

Every country on earth has its own glorious regional cuisines that have developed over centuries, if not millennia, and when you travel, you have the opportunity to try all the different morsels of delight that each has to offer. One type of food that seems to be ubiquitous is the stuffed pocket, or dumpling: it’s a comfort food that can be made with either the simplest, or fanciest ingredients, and every culture has its own style and flavour for you to experience.


1.  Banh bot loc

These delicious Vietnamese dumplings are made with tapioca flour, and filled with a mixture of shrimp and pork that’s been seasoned with fish sauce and green onion, and then the dumplings are cooked in banana leaves. The tapioca wrapper becomes translucent, and has a unique chewy texture that contrasts beautifully with the savoury filling.

2.  Buuz

Mongolian steamed dumplings, these are most often filled with mutton, onion, and garlic. The flour used for the dough can be either wheat, or a mixture of wheat, barley, and buckwheat.

3.  Daifuku

Made with glutinous rice flour, daifuku are dessert dumplings with sweet fillings such as red (adzuki) bean paste, lotus seed paste, sweetened plum, and pureed chestnuts. The flour can be tinted with green tea, and can also have sesame seeds added to it for texture.

4.  Empanadas

Common foods not only in South and Central America, but also in Spain and Portugal (from whence they originated), these can be filled with anything you can imagine: Argentine empanadas are filled with a mixture of ground beef, olives, onions, and raisins, while in Portugal, you may find them filled with sardines or pork loin. Vegetarian versions are common as well.

5.  Gyoza

Made with very thin wrappers and usually filled with a mixture of finely-chopped pork and vegetables, these fried Japanese dumplings are staples at just about any restaurant you visit. They’re also ridiculously easy to make at home, and can be stuffed with your filling of choice.

6.  Ha Gao (or Har Gow)

Chinese shrimp and pea shoot dumplings wrapped in rice paper: the wrapper goes translucent when steamed, making these morsels into tiny bite-sized jewels. The flavours within complement each other gorgeously.

7.  Khinkali

If you think you’d enjoy a mixture of pork, beef, cilantro, chili pepper, and fenugreek, you’d likely love these Georgian dumplings. Some people make them with caraway seeds instead of Fenugreek, but both add a very subtle bitter note to the filling.

8.  Kreplach

An Eastern European Ashkenazi Jewish specialty, kreplach are filled with a mixture of minced meat and mashed potato, and are usually served in soup.

9.  Kroppkaka (Plural: Kroppkakor)

Don’t let the name put you off: these Swedish stuffed dumplings filled with smoked pork, onions, and cracked pepper, and can be served with either cream, or lingonberry jam.

10.  Mandu

These Korean dumplings can be made with store-bought gyoza wrappers, and are most often filled with minced kimchi, or kimchi and tofu. These base fillings are mixed with bean sprouts, shredded carrots, garlic, leeks, and green onion, and seasoned with ginger, garlic, and brown sugar. These are then either steamed, fried in sesame oil, or boiled in soups.

11.  Manti

A different kind of Turkish delight altogether, these are filled with a mixture of minced lamb, onion, pine nuts, and garlic, doused liberally with smoked paprika, and served with yoghurt.

12.  Maultaschen

Literally translated as “a sack for your maw”, these large Schwabian dumplings are filled with spiced meat, spinach, breadcrumbs, and herbs. They can either be pan-fried with onions, or simmered in a broth.

13.  Momo

Popular in both Tibet and Nepal, the Nepalese momo has more vegetables than its Tibetan cousin. Most commonly made with ground buffalo or yak meat, you can substitute beef or pork if those aren’t readily available. Vegetarian versions can be made with cabbage, onions, and herbs. Mixed with spices and fresh herbs, the filling is stuffed into flour wrappers, pleated, and then the dumplings are steamed.

14.  Pasties

Hailing from Cornwall, these are large dough pockets stuffed with chopped beef, potatoes, carrots or parsnips, and peas, and then baked until golden brown. They were traditionally made as lunch for miners, and one corner may have been created as a “dessert”, with the filling at that end consisting of jam, or cream cheese and fruit.

15.  Pelmeni

Like a cross between an Italian tortellini and Turkish manti, these are little folded and wrapped savoury dumplings that are easily recognized by the thickness of the dough. They can be filled with meat (goat, mutton, poultry), mushrooms, vegetables, or cheeses, but never have sweet fillings. These are boiled, and then served with melted butter, sour cream, and chopped green onion or chives.

16.  Pierogi

Known as varenyky in Ukranian cuisine, Pierogis are made of wheat dough, and filled with a variety of stuffings such as mashed potato with onion and cheese; sauerkraut; wild mushrooms and buckwheat; spiced ground beef; even sweet fillings like blueberries, gooseberries, or plums.

17.  Ravioli

Anyone who’s a lover of Italian cuisine will be well-acquainted with these pillows of glee. Dough squares are filled with anything from ground meat or cheese to squash, nuts, herbs, and even fruit, sealed well, and then boiled. They can be served with any kind of sauce, or even lightly pan-fried and topped with browned butter.

18.  Samosa

These Indian delicacies are usually stuffed with a mixture of spicy potatoes, onions, and peas, and can be either baked or fried. They go wonderfully with tamarind or mango chutney, or any other sweet/sour dipping sauce.

19.  Svestkove knedily

Sweet and adorable, these Czech dumplings are as delicious as they are simple to make. A small, whole fruit (like a plum or apricot) is wrapped in a dough made of flour, egg, milk, and butter, and then dropped into a pot of boiling water. They’re considered “done” once they’ve risen to the surface and bobbed around for a couple of minutes, and are then immediately rolled in a mixture of melted butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

20.  Uszka

Translated as “little ears”, these tiny Polish dumplings are usually filled with assorted wild mushrooms and onion, or minced meat. They can be boiled and served with melted butter and chives, or in borscht-style beet soup.

21.  Xiao Long Bao

If you’ve never tried these steamed “soup dumplings”, you must. The filling is made of seasoned ground pork, but the magic of these little beauties is the gelatin: cubes of gelatinized chicken or pork broth are mixed in with the rest of the filling, so that when the dumpling is sealed and steamed, the gelatin melts and creates a “soup” inside.


Lana Winter-Hébert ( shown to the left ) fell in love with cooking while still in primary school. The various dietary needs of her extended family (i.e. gluten-free, dairy-free, vegan, vegetarian, and paleo diets) have helped her to learn a fair bit about substitutions and meal plan modifications, and though her first love will always be the Scandinavian/Eastern European cuisine she grew up with, she has a penchant for Mexican food and can be bribed heartily with the offer of good huevos rancheros. Lana currently resides in rural Quebec with her husband and family, where she divides her time between writing, editing, design, and tending her permaculture garden. She cans and preserves whatever’s in season, and is having some fantastic adventures with home cheese-making and mead-brewing.

Tips: Gardening

  • Store your seed packets in a photo album for easy review and retrieval.
  • Bake crushed egg shells at 350º for 20 minute to kill bacteria, then spread across your soil to slice the underbelly of snails.
  • For those that you like, put a canning jar lid full of beer.  They will drink themselves to death.
  • Use Acrylic or Oil paints to create informal arts plant ID rocks
  • Not the artsy type, use plastic forks and a Sharpie to create plant markers
  • Coffee grounds in your soil helps repel pests AND fertilizes your garden.
  • Soak your seeds for 24 hours to give them a germination jump start
  • Put colored bottles around your garden for a bit of whimsey
  • Use a shipping palate to create a vertical garden
  • A rain gutter makes a garden trough along the top of your fence.  Use spaghetti tubing for irrigation
  • A gauze strip will wick water into your house plants while you are on an extended vacation
  • Use a toilet paper roll as a seedling pot
  • Create a water bottle sprinkler using duct tape and your garden hose
  • Use cinnamon as a rooting compound to repel fungus.

Semifreddo

Ice cream without an ice cream maker.

Translates as “Semi Frozen”

INGREDIENTS

  • 1/2 C sugar
  • 3 whole eggs
  • Hot water bath
  • 1/2 C whipped cream

STEP BY STEP

  1. Cream together sugar and eggs
  2. Heat over hot water bath in double boiler
  3. It will turn color and increase in size
  4. Whip cold cream until it thickens
  5. Fold together whipped cream and eggs
  6. Crumble in crushed amaretti cookies ( or vanilla wafers )
  7. Pour into plastic lined mold
  8. Tap out air bubbles, then freeze overnight

Amaretti cookies

  • Almond paste, sugar and egg whites

 

Simple Crostini

CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE
CLICK IMAGE TO ENLARGE

INGREDIENTS

  • Baguette, bagel, or French bread
  • Cloves of garlic
  • EVOO
  • Very ripe tomato

See optional ingredients below.

STEP BY STEP

  1. Cut your bread into 1/4 – 1/2 inch slices on the bias (at an angle)
  2. Toast for 4 minutes in a toaster oven
  3. Rub with Garlic
  4. Rub with Tomato
  5. Drizzle with EVOO

OTHER TOPPINGS

The toppings are virtually unlimited.  Don’t be afraid to use your imagination.  Here is some guidance.

  • Put a thin slice of aged ham on top
  • Sun-dried tomato with a piece of cheese and a basil leaf
  • Oiled and cooked red pepper
  • Cream cheese and salmon
  • Salmon roe
  • Black olives
  • Radishes
  • Pickled onion
  • Avocado puree
  • Hard-boiled egg medallion with a dollop of mustard
  • Blueberries and raspberries
  • Olive Tapenade:  black, green, Kalamata, anchovy, salt, lime, capers, basil, garlic, and sundried tomato

Easy Pasta Salad

Ingredients

  • Some sort of fancy pasta – twirls, ears, whatever…
  • One egg (separated)
    This means the yolk in one small bowl, and the yolk in another
  • 1 TBL red vinegar
  • 1 TBL honey
  • 1 TBL mayo
  • 1 TBL EVOO
  • 2 basil leaves
  • 1 clove of garlic – crushed
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • Optional: Black olives, feta cheese, cucumber, shredded cheddar, chives, parsley, cilantro

Step by Step

  1. Cook the pasta till soft
  2. Mix red vinegar, one egg yolk, honey, mayo and EVOO
  3. Add in garlic, salt, basil and pepper
  4. Toss everything together in a big mixing bowl.
  5. Add optional chopped black olives, feta, cucumber and shredded cheddar
  6. Top with tarragon, chives, cilantro or parsley

Toasted Mango Oat Desert Bar

  1. Mix flour, butter, sugar and salt.
  2. Baked at 350º for ten minutes
  3. Mix eggs, sugar, lemon peel and juice
  4. Add canned mango puree
  5. Mix with flour until you have a loose batter
  6. Pour over top of your baked bottom crust and spread
  7. Bake 325º for 25 minutes
  8. Sprinkle 1/4 C oats (or granola) over the top and press down
  9. Refrigerate before cutting

Tomato Sauce from Scratch

  1. Bring a pot of water to a boil. Have ready a large bowl of iced water. Plunge whole tomatoes in boiling water until skin starts to peel, 1 minute. …
  2. In a large pot or Dutch oven over medium heat, cook onion, bell pepper, carrot and garlic in oil and butter until onion starts to soften, 5 minutes. Pour in pureed tomatoes.

How To Make Basic Tomato Sauce with Fresh Tomatoes

Makes about 8 pints

What You Need

Ingredients
15 pounds ripe tomatoes
1/4 to 1/2 cup lemon juice or red wine vinegar
2 teaspoons salt (optional)

Optional ingredients:  grated carrot, chopped onion, minced garlic

Equipment
6 1/2-quart or larger Dutch oven or stockpot
Mixing bowls
Slotted spoon
Knife and cutting board
Food processor or blender
Jars for canning or containers for freezing

Instructions

  1. Boil a pot of water and prep the ice bath: Bring a large Dutch oven or stockpot of water to a boil over high heat. Fill a mixing bowl with ice and water and set this next to the stove.
  2. Prepare the tomatoes for blanching: Core out the stems from the tomatoes and slice a shallow “X” in the bottom of each fruit.
  3. Blanch the tomatoes to peel them: Working in batches, drop several tomatoes into the boiling water. Cook until you see the skin starting to wrinkle and split, 45 to 60 seconds, then lift the tomatoes out with the slotted spoon and plunge them into the ice water. Continue with the rest of the tomatoes, transferring the cooled tomatoes from the ice water to another mixing bowl as they cool.
  4. Strip the peels from the tomatoes: When finished blanching, use your hands or a paring knife to strip the skins from the tomatoes. Discard the water used to boil the tomatoes.
  5. Roughly chop the tomatoes: Working in batches, pulse the tomatoes in the food processor. Pulse a few times for chunkier sauce, or process until smooth for a pureed sauce. Transfer each batch into the Dutch oven or stockpot. Alternatively, chop the tomatoes by hand. Process through a food mill for a smoother sauce. For a very chunky sauce, skip this step entirely and let the tomatoes break down into large pieces as they cook.
  6. Simmer the tomatoes: Bring the tomato sauce to a simmer over medium heat. Continue simmering for 30 to 90 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the sauce reaches the taste and consistency you like.
  7. Stir in the lemon juice and salt: When finished cooking, stir in the lemon juice or vinegar and salt. A quarter-cup is necessary to ensure a safe level of acidity for canning. Add more lemon juice or vinegar to taste.
  8. Preserving option 1 — freeze your sauce: Let the sauce cool, then transfer it into freezer containers or freezer bags. Sauce can be kept frozen for at least 3 months before starting to develop freezer burn or off-flavors.
  9. Preserving option 2 — can your sauce: Transfer the hot sauce into sterilized canning jars. Top with new, sterilized lids, and screw on the rings until finger tight. Process in a pot of boiling water for 30 minutes. Let cool completely on the counter — if any lids do not seal completely (the lids will invert and form a vacuum seal), refrigerate that sauce and use it within a week or freeze it for up to 3 months. Canned tomato sauce can be stored in the pantry for at least a year.→ For a more detailed description of the canning process, read this tutorial: A Visual Tour of Hot Water Bath Canning

First, I want to admit something: Making sauce from fresh summer tomatoes has long been an insecurity of mine, despite years of cooking experience, including working as a sous chef in a Tuscan restaurant in New York and living and working on farms in Italy for extended periods, elbows deep in fresh-picked tomatoes and the sauce we made from them.

The reason why: there are two primary goals when making fresh tomato sauce, and they’re at odds with each other:

  • First, the sauce should taste like it was made from fresh tomatoes, which means it should have the bright, fruity aroma and flavor of uncooked (or barely cooked) fruit. If we don’t have this, we might as well throw in the towel and stick with canned tomatoes 365 days of the year.
  • Second, the sauce should have a good sauce-like consistency and have deep, sweet notes, which means cooking off much of the tomatoes’ natural water content and caramelizing the fruit’s natural sugars. Otherwise it’s going to be too thin and tart.

The trouble is that retaining the tomatoes’ fresh flavor means minimal cooking, while getting rid of the excess water content and caramelizing sugars means extended cooking. Everyone has a different solution to this dilemma. Some discard the watery seed-jelly and cook only the tomato pulp, which I refuse to do because the seed jelly has way too much flavor to waste. Others settle for a minimally cooked sauce that just heats for about 25-30 minutes, but I find this to be a compromise that fails to deliver the deep, sweet flavors we want. Another approach is to divide the sauce into two parts, one long-cooked, one quick-cooked, and then blend them back together.

Of those approaches, the divide-and-conquer concept has always made the most sense to me, but I’d never settled on exactly how to do it. To figure it out, I started with the first obvious question: What kind of tomato should we use?

You Say Tomato, I Say, Which One?

The first rule of making tomato sauce from fresh tomatoes is to do it in the peak of summer, when tomatoes are not only at their absolute best, but also their absolute cheapest. In the winter, when the only tomatoes available are ghostly versions of their in-season selves, it often makes more sense to use canned: canned tomatoes tend to be made with fruit that’s more ripe than anything we can hope to get out of season, and they’re generally cheaper, especially when you account for the amount of water weight that fresh ones have to shed before they become sauce.

But there’s still the question of which fresh tomatoes to use when they’re at their peak. The general wisdom is to use pulpy “paste” tomatoes (i.e. plums), which are less watery. Those guys yield more sauce per pound of fruit and require a shorter cooking time to get rid of the liquid, which helps retain some of that fresh tomato flavor.

But are plum tomatoes really the best way to go? And does it matter which kind of plum tomato you use? I bought four different types of tomato at the farmers market: three different varieties of plum tomato and then common beefsteaks, which are basically never recommended for sauce due to their juiciness. There are far more varieties of tomato than this, but it isn’t practical to test them all, and, frankly, most other varieties, such as most heirlooms, cost a premium—making them a prohibitively expensive option for sauce.


And these are the beefsteaks. Tanta acqua! Clearly, after all this water cooks off, there’s not going to be much sauce left, which is why it doesn’t make a lot of sense to make sauce from these kinds of tomatoes, unless you like paying hard-earned cash to humidify the air in your home with tomato vapor.

But, since I’d already started, I took the beefsteaks to their completion, straining out the skins and seeds and cooking the purée down. I did the same for all four types of the tomatoes, and was surprised at how drastic their flavor differences were.

  • The San Marzanos made a purée that was bright and tart and not too sweet.
  • The Amish Pastes produced a purée that was sweet, mild, slightly tart, and fruity.
  • The Romas were sweet and floral, but not very tart.
  • The beefsteaks had a great balance between sweetness and tartness.

Alone, each had its strengths, one more tart, one more sweet, one fruitier, another more fragrant. But as I tasted them all, what I realized was I didn’t want any one of these tomatoes in my sauce: I wanted all of them. Tasting then one by one, each was good, but combining them into a single spoonful made the whole thing pop.

To be clear, the flavors of my tomatoes are particular to the ones I bought: You may buy San Marzanos that are sweeter and less tart, and Romas that are tart but not sweet. It depends not only on the variety, but also where they were grown and other specific environmental conditions. It’s hard to predict with certainty the exact flavor profile and balance of sweetness and tartness any given tomato will deliver, so the best way to arrive at a balanced sauce is to combine multiple types.


The majority of the tomatoes should be pasty plums—ideally a variety of types if you can find them—because they’re more cost-effective. But I’m willing to add a little extra water from a small portion of beefsteaks or other juicy tomatoes if it means I can get a little bit of their flavor in the mix.


http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/08/how-to-make-the-best-fresh-tomato-sauce-summer-spaghetti-sauce-which-tomatoes-to-use.html

 

Prepping the Tomatoes

Once I’d settled on using a mix of tomatoes, the next step was deciding on how to prep them. Most folks agree that an abundance of skin or seeds in a tomato sauce is not a good thing, but there’s more than one way to remove that stuff from a sauce.

Some recipes call for discarding the seeds altogether, but as I’ve already mentioned, I like the flavor of the jelly the seeds are suspended in too much to do that—in fact, it has a tartness that I think is essential to creating what will ultimately be a sauce that has a good balance of sweet and tart flavors.

As for the skins, one option is to score the tomatoes, quickly blanch them and then peel off their skins. This is fine for small quantities of sauce, but I felt strongly that I wanted to select a method that would work for large batches—we are doing this in peak tomato season so we might as well make a lot, and peeling each tomato individually isn’t practical.

The method I know best is one I used when working on farms in Italy where we would make vats of sauce each week in the peak of summer: The tomatoes are cut into chunks, cores, skins, stems, seeds, and all (absolutely no need to exclude anything except the odd bad spots you may find), dumped into a pot, and set over high heat until they dump their juices and come to a boil.*

*Yet another method involves baking the tomatoes first at low heat to drive off some of their water, and only then to quickly cook them into a sauce; the reason for this has to do with how temperature affects enzyme activity and flavor, but for large quantities of sauce I also find this method impractical.

Then they’re boiled for about 10 minutes, just long enough to soften the pulp. It’s a quick enough cooking time that the fresh tomato flavor isn’t lost, but long enough that the pulp will pass* through a food mill or vegetable strainer.

In fact, in Italian this watery, fresh tomato purée is called a passata (“passed”).

According to Harold McGee in On Food and Cooking, this quick-boil method allows pectins to thicken the sauce much more effectively, requiring less overall sauce reduction (and therefore a fresher-tasting sauce!).

This does require having either a food mill or some other type of mechanical strainer, but for large quantities of sauce, it’s a minimal investment that will save a lot of time. Plus, it’s one of the easiest ways to remove seeds and skins while keeping all the good stuff in the sauce.

Once we have our tomato purée, the next question is what to do with it.

Cooking the Sauce: The Quick and the Red

One of the goals I outlined above for fresh-tomato sauce is that it should retain some of that fresh-tomato flavor. So I knew I wanted some of my tomato purée to be cooked minimally. But one of the things my initial test batches made me think about is how damned delicious long-cooked tomatoes are. You see, when I was cooking down my beefsteak tomato purée, I had to cook it a long, long time to get rid of all of its excess water, and by the time it was done, it was sooooo delicious: dark red, intensely sweet, and oh-so rich. I just kept going back to it with a spoon.

To get that flavor into my sauce, I consulted several cookbooks, and settled on the idea of turning a portion of the purée into a tomato-paste like extract in the oven, called estratto in Italian. It’s a technique described well by Paul Bertolli in his fantastic Cooking By Hand, and Rosetta Costantino in My Calabria, and while it’s traditionally done in the Southern Italian sun, a low oven is the easy alternative.

Because so much evaporation is required to reach the concentrated stage I was going for here, I used only paste tomatoes for this portion of the recipe—I’d rather let the small portion of beefsteaks in the batch contribute their water elsewhere than have to cook it all off here. Overall, a little less than half of my tomatoes went towards this component (10 pounds out of 25).

The method is simple: pour the purée into rimmed baking sheets or baking dishes (basically anything wide that will maximize surface area and therefore evaporation) and set them in a low oven, stirring from time to time, especially as it begins to thicken, until a rich, sweet extract is formed. Don’t even think of taking a shortcut with store-bought tomato paste here: This stuff is way more flavorful than any canned tomato paste I’ve ever tried.

The low-and-slow reduction allows the tomato sugars to caramelize, creating an intensely sweet, concentrated flavor base for the sauce.

 

Just one tip: Keep an eye on these and stir them frequently. I learned the hard way that the thin layer of tomato paste can burn quickly, even at low oven temperatures, if it’s left unattended for too long.

With most of my remaining tomato purée, about 15 pounds of mixed tomatoes, I used a more classic stovetop method, cooking it down for about 45 minutes to a sauce-like consistency. But before I did that, I set about a quart of the fresh tomato purée aside, thinking I would add it back in at the end for a blast of fresh-tomato flavor. I had gotten the idea while thinking about the common practice of adding a splash of high-quality uncooked olive oil at the end of cooking to get its great taste into the dish. I figured, if it works for olive oil, why shouldn’t it work for tomatoes?

What that meant was I ended up with three sauce components: my rich, delicious tomato paste; my basic cooked sauce; and then my very fresh-tasting tomato purée.

 

Here they are side-by-side, and the color alone speaks volumes about how each is different. In terms of absolute quantities, I had only about a quart’s worth of both the concentrated paste and the fresh purée; the regular sauce seen in the middle here produced about a gallon, and is the backbone of the sauce. The idea is to enrich the bulk of the sauce with the deep, sweet, caramelized notes of the paste, and then finish it with the bright, fresh flavor of the barely-cooked purée, to create layers and layers of flavor that hit every note.

Correcting the Bulk Sauce

So, now that I’ve explained my three-pronged approach to the sauce, we’re basically done, right? Nope!

Just because I have my amazing tomato paste and my fresh-and-fruity purée doesn’t mean I’m just going to accept that the bulk of the sauce is going to taste merely good, especially if there’s anything I can do about it.

The first trick is one we’ve all seen a million times: toss in some basil. It’s no accident that basil is usually included in canned tomatoes: Canning require intense heat and cooking, which kills any trace of fresh tomato flavor. A few sprigs of basil help add a little freshness back in. I added some basil to a portion of my bulk sauce while it was still warm and let it steep.

It worked, adding a fragrant, floral, anise-y scent to the sauce that is totally wonderful. At the very least, it’s worth steeping the basil in the sauce.

Some folks, though, also add some tomato leaves to their sauce. Writes McGee, “tomato leaves have a fresh-tomato aroma thanks to their leaf enzymes and prominent aromatic oil glands.”

I tried it out, and, aside from putting way too much in my sauce, found that it does indeed add a grassy green flavor that can help offset whatever fresh notes are lost from cooking the tomato. The only hard part for most of us is getting our hands on tomato-plant cuttings. If you can’t, rest assured the basil does more than enough on its own—honestly, if I had to choose between the two, I’d take the basil. But if you can do both, each will help in its own way.

The Question of Aromatics

One other major concern for the bulk sauce is whether to add aromatics like onion and garlic, and if so, how to do it. Some recipes call for cooking the aromatics first until soft and sweet (but not browned), while others have the aromatics dumped in raw and simmered in the sauce as it cooks.

I tried it three ways*: with raw aromatics, sautéed aromatics, and none at all. In my tests I just used onion and garlic, which are the most common, though you can opt to also include others like carrot and celery—each will alter the flavor of the sauce somewhat, and whether or not you include them is a matter of personal preference.

*Actually four ways, I also did a batch with crushed red pepper, and loved the subtle warm heat it adds to the sauce.

Raw onion and garlic produced a cleaner-tasting sauce with fresh vegetable notes, but the overall flavor and texture was less integrated. To avoid the texture issue, you can use Marcella Hazan’s method of submerging raw onion halves in the simmering sauce and then fishing them out whole.

When blind-tasting these two sauces on spaghetti, more of my colleagues preferred the sautéed aromatics to the raw ones, but opinion wasn’t unanimous.

My third batch, without any aromatics, was also delicious, and in some ways I preferred its pure tomato flavor, which goes to show that if the sauce is good enough, you really don’t need to enhance it much. On that note, I also preferred my sauce without cheese, which shocked me, because I always put cheese on my pasta with tomato sauce, but this sauce really is that good—too much other stuff just gets in the way.

There are many, many ways to make very good tomato sauce, but if you’re going to take the time to prepare it using fresh tomatoes, the key to creating a balanced, rich, and layered sauce that tastes both fresh yet also deep and complex is to think of it as a blender’s art: make tomato purée and divide it into parts, then slow-cook one portion of it into a thick, sweet, caramelized paste; cook another portion into the bulk of the sauce, flavored with basil, possibly tomato leaves, and aromatics; and save a small portion of the barely-cooked purée to add at the end for a bright, fresh note, similar to how we often finish dishes with a drizzle of uncooked olive oil.

Exactly how you use the sauce will determine final steps: On pasta, for instance, you can finish the pasta in a pan with the sauce and some of the pasta-cooking water, adding a little raw olive oil, pat of butter, or splash of cream at the end, depending on the final flavor you want.

It may be a little fussy, but it’s also the first tomato sauce I’ve made that I haven’t wanted to top with cheese. And really, I don’t even really need the pasta. Just give me a spoon.

 

 

 

Senior Discounts

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Since many senior discounts are not advertised to the public, our advice to men and women over 55 is to ALWAYS ask a sales associate if that store provides a senior discount. That way, you can be sure to get the most bang for you buck. Here is a list that is good to put into your car for quick reference.

113 Stores with Senior Discounts

Restaurants

    1. Applebee’s: 15% off with Golden Apple Card (60+)
    2. Arby’s: 10% off (55+)
    3. Ben & Jerry’s: 10% off (60+)
    4. Bennigan’s: discount varies by location
    5. Bob’s Big Boy: discount varies by location (60+)
    6. Boston Market: 10% off (65+)
    7. Burger King: 10% off (60+)
    8. Captain D’s Seafood: discount varies on location (62+)
    9. Chick-Fil-A: 10% off or free small drink or coffee (55+)
    10. Chili’s: 10% off (55+)
    11. CiCi’s Pizza: 10% off (60+)
    12. Culver’s: 10% off (60+)
    13. Denny’s: 10% off, 20% off for AARP members (55+)
    14. Dunkin’ Donuts: 10% off or free coffee (55+)
    15. Einstein’s Bagels: 10% off baker’s dozen of bagels (60+)
    16. Fuddrucker’s: 10% off any senior platter (55+)
    17. Gatti’s Pizza: 10% off (60+)
    18. Golden Corral: 10% off (60+)
    19. Hardee’s: $0.33 beverages everyday (65+)
    20. IHOP: 10% off (55+)
    21. Jack in the Box: up to 20% off (55+)
    22. KFC: free small drink with any meal (55+)
    23. Krispy Kreme: 10% off (50+)
    24. Long John Silver’s: various discounts at participating locations (55+)
    25. McDonald’s: discounts on coffee everyday (55+)
    26. Mrs. Fields: 10% off at participating locations (60+)
    27. Shoney’s: 10% off
    28. Sonic: 10% off or free beverage (60+)
    29. Steak ‘n Shake: 10% off every Monday & Tuesday (50+)
    30. Subway: 10% off (60+)
    31. Sweet Tomatoes 10% off (62+)
    32. Taco Bell: 5% off; free beverages for seniors (65+)
    33. TCBY: 10% off (55+)
    34. Tea Room Cafe: 10% off (50+)
    35. Village Inn: 10% off (60+)
    36. Waffle House: 10% off every Monday (60+)
    37. Wendy’s: 10% off (55+)
    38. White Castle: 10% off (62+)

Retail and Apparel

    1. Banana Republic: 10% off (50+)
    2. Bealls: 20% off first Tuesday of each month (50+)
    3. Belk’s: 15% off first Tuesday of every month (55+)
    4. Big Lots: 10% off
    5. Bon-Ton Department Stores: 15% off on senior discount days (55+)
    6. C.J. Banks: 10% off every Wednesday (60+)
    7. Clarks: 10% off (62+)
    8. Dress Barn: 10% off (55+)
    9. Goodwill: 10% off one day a week (date varies by location)
    10. Hallmark: 10% off one day a week (date varies by location)
    11. Kmart: 20% off (50+)
    12. Kohl’s: 15% off (60+)
    13. Modell’s Sporting Goods: 10% off
    14. Rite Aid: 10% off on Tuesdays & 10% off prescriptions
    15. Ross Stores: 10% off every Tuesday (55+)
    16. The Salvation Army Thrift Stores: up to 50% off (55+)
    17. Stein Mart: 20% off red dot/clearance items first Monday of every month (55+)

Grocery

    1. Albertson’s: 10% off first Wednesday of each month (55+)
    2. American Discount Stores: 10% off every Monday (50+)
    3. Compare Foods Supermarket: 10% off every Wednesday (60+)
    4. DeCicco Family Markets: 5% off every Wednesday (60+)
    5. Food Lion: 6% off every Monday (60+)
    6. Fry’s Supermarket: free Fry’s VIP Club Membership & 10% off every Monday (55+)
    7. Great Valu Food Store: 5% off every Tuesday (60+)
    8. Gristedes Supermarket: 10% off every Tuesday (60+)
    9. Harris Teeter: 5% off every Tuesday (60+)
    10. Hy-Vee: 5% off one day a week (date varies by location)
    11. Kroger: 10% off (date varies by location)
    12. Morton Williams Supermarket: 5% off every Tuesday (60+)
    13. The Plant Shed: 10% off every Tuesday (50+)
    14. Publix: 5% off every Wednesday (55+)
    15. Rogers Marketplace: 5% off every Thursday (60+)
    16. Uncle Guiseppe’s Marketplace: 5% off (62+)

Travel

    1. Alaska Airlines: 10% off (65+)
    2. Alamo: up to 25% off for AARP members
    3. American Airlines: various discounts for 65 and up (call before booking for discount)
    4. Amtrak: 15% off (62+)
    5. Avis: up to 25% off for AARP members
    6. Best Western: 10% off (55+)
    7. Budget Rental Cars: 10% off; up to 20% off for AARP members (50+)
    8. Cambria Suites: 20%-30% off (60+)
    9. Clarion: 20%-30% off (60+)
    10. Comfort Inn: 20%-30% off (60+)
    11. Comfort Suites: 20%-30% off (60+)
    12. Continental Airlines: no initiation fee for Continental Presidents Club & special fares for select destinations
    13. Dollar Rent-A-Car: 10% off (50+)
    14. Econo Lodge: 20%-30% off (60+)
    15. Enterprise Rent-A-Car: 5% off for AARP members
    16. Greyhound: 5% off (62+)
    17. Hampton Inns & Suites: 10% off when booked 72 hours in advance
    18. Hertz: up to 25% off for AARP members
    19. Holiday Inn: 10%-30% off depending on location (62+)
    20. Hyatt Hotels: 25%-50% off (62+)
    21. InterContinental Hotels Group: various discounts at all hotels (65+)
    22. Mainstay Suites: 10% off with Mature Traveler’s Discount (50+); 20%-30% off (60+)
    23. Marriott Hotels: 15% off (62+)
    24. Motel 6: 10% off (60+)
    25. Myrtle Beach Resort: 10% off (55+)
    26. National Rent-A-Car: up to 30% off for AARP members
    27. Quality Inn: 20%-30% off (60+)
    28. Rodeway Inn: 20%-30% off (60+)
    29. Sleep Inn: 20%-30% off (60+)
    30. Southwest Airlines: various discounts for ages 65 and up (call before booking for discount)
    31. Trailways Transportation System: various discounts for ages 50 and up
    32. United Airlines: various discounts for ages 65 and up (call before booking for discount)
    33. U.S. Airways: various discounts for ages 65 and up (call before booking for discount)

Activities & Entertainment

  1. AMC Theaters: up to 30% off (55+)
  2. Bally Total Fitness: up to $100 off memberships (62+)
  3. Busch Gardens Tampa: $3 off one-day tickets (50+)
  4. Carmike Cinemas: 35% off (65+)
  5. Cinemark/Century Theaters: up to 35% off
  6. U.S. National Parks: $10 lifetime pass; 50% off additional services including camping (62+)
  7. Regal Cinemas: 30% off
  8. Ripley’s Believe it or Not: @ off one-day ticket (55+)
  9. SeaWorld Orlando: $3 off one-day tickets (50+)

Sloppy Tony

INGREDIENTS

  • 1 LB hamburger
  • 1 LB ground sausage
  • 3 C marinara sauce
  • 1/2 C chicken broth

STEP BY STEP

  1. Brown meat and break it up
  2. Add about 3  C of sauce stir until all sauce is absorbed
  3. Add your chicken broth
  4. Cover and simmer 30 minutes
  5. Cut slices of Italian bread
  6. (optional) Butter your bread pieces and grill them for a few minutes
  7. Spoon your meat sauce
  8. Top with a thin slice of mozzarella or pepper Jack cheese
  9. Broil until cheese starts to brown
  10. Serve open-faced or as a sandich

 

 

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