Food

Food 10-1-07

I've mentioned many times that I have enough activities and supplies in my house to keep me happily occupied for years. I've gone in cycles, fixated on one activity or another, and bought kits, supplies and books to keep me interested and inspired. One of those cycles, which actually lasted a few years, involved buying cookbooks. It started with various specific ethnic cookbooks. Then there were specialty cookbooks, like the pancake cookbook. Motivated by the fact I have a cookbook my mother got when my parents got married, I began to look for older cookbooks (i.e. butter-rich recipes) reaching back to the early 1900's. Finally, I focused in on general cookbooks that ran the full gamut of courses and foods.

I have a fantastic plan to cook through all of these cookbooks. It is time I benefitted from this accumulated knowledge. It will take years. I have a friend who was an avid cookbook buyer as well. We cooked a fantastic dinner together once for a couple of friends, bringing together our cookbooks: watermelon soup (surprisingly good), orange chicken (OK, I know there is a French name for this, but it supposedly was a Floridian version), and caesar salad. I don't remember the desert. It might have been ice cream sandwiches, but I'm not sure. We ate in the kitchen and it was a very hot day. The chicken was still cooking, making the kitchen even hotter. Now I don't know why we ate in the kitchen, unless it was to make the chicken monitoring easier. This day also stands out because the two of us had gone shopping, incorrectly estimated our time, and scrambled like crazy once we got home to get it all done. It came out well, in spite of our frantic last minute work.

So, on the links page, I've mentioned that I had a recipe page in the original version of this website. This was to be a motivator to work through my recipes and share some of the best. Truth is that I don't have nearly as much time as I'd like to cook and I have cycled to other activities, so that it doesn't seem quite as important anymore. I'm sure it will cycle back again as it all does.

Nonetheless, after updating the writing page with all the old homepage posts, I decided that the only other information that might be worth carrying forward are the two recipes on the links page (Tomato Beef and Pumpkin Praline Torte) and the two I'll let you in on now.

Peanut Butter and Jelly on Ritz Crackers. That's it. Use a knife to apply the peanut butter and jelly. Use two crackers. That simple. I haven't had Ritz Crackers in a very long time, but may need to pick up a box to make these sandwiches again. I associate these with the Winter Olympics. That's right- and I don't think Ritz is even a sponsor. One year, watching the Winter Olympics, my whole family sat in the den and made PBJ Ritz Sandwiches. That's the kind of memory marketers try to sell you all the time, but it just isn't nearly as effective as random circumstances with positive feelings.

The last recipe is a recipe for Dora Yaki. Once I finally realized I could go back and investigate what search terms were bringing people to my site (thanks to all you German teachers making people read Kleist), I found dora yaki was a big one. This motivated me to bring the recipes back that existed before. At this point, there are much better blogs out there that chronicle the cooking lives of their writers, so my culinary comments will be limited from this point on. With this, I complete all the back inforamtion from this website that you'll get out of me. This recipe for dora yaki is based on a recipe from Asia, the Beautiful Cookbook by Jacki Passamore.

Dora Yaki (Pancakes Filled with Red Beans)

Azuki Paste
1 1/2 cups azuki beans
1 1/4-1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt

3 eggs
2 tablesppons light corn syrup or treacle
1/2-3/4 cup sugar
2 cups self-rising flour
3/4 cup milk or water
salt
vegetable oil or melted butter
1 1/2 cups cooked azuki paste

1. First make the azuki paste. Thoroughly wash the beans and place in a large saucepan. Cover generously with cold water and bring to a boil, then drain. Cover again with water and bring to a boil.

2. Simmer over medium-low heat until the beans are tender and the liquid is almost completely absorbed; at this point drain off any excess water, as the final paste should be quite thick. Stir in the sugar and salt and continue to cook over low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture is thick and the beans are partially crushed. Set aside to cool before using.

3. Beat the eggs and corn syrup together, then add the sugar and continue beating until the mixture is light and the sugar has dissolved. Sift in the flour and add half the milk or water and a large pinch of salt. Mix well, then set aside for 10 minutes before adding the remaining milk or water. If necessary, add extra water to make the batter the consistency of heavy cream.

4. Rub a wide, heavy skillet with a piece of paper towel dipped in vegetable oil or melted butter. (Or use an ungreased, non-stick pan.)

5. Drop in large spoonfuls of the batter and cook until golden brown underneath and bubbles appear across the top surface. Flip over and cook the other side, then remove from the pan and cover with a cloth until all are cooked.

6. When ready, spread half the pancakes thickly with the red bean paste, cover with the reamaining pancakess and pinch the edges together. Wrap in little squares of waxed paper and serve just warm.

Serves 8-10