Archive for the ‘Learn to Cook’ Category
Cooking in 10 Minutes. Cover of 1994 US Edition.
Cooking in Ten Minutes by Edouard de Pomaine.
“Do not imagine that ten-minute cooking is going to condemn you to an eternal round of beef-steak without any of the frills of finer cookery.
Your gas stove has two burners, if not three. What is to prevent you cooking slices of ox kidney saute’ in butter on the one, while you make a sauce bearnaise on the other?
During the same ten minutes you can prepare both the kidneys and the sauce. The result is delicious. I have done it time and again. Thanks to the sauce the ordinary ox kidneys, despised by the fastidious, assume an aristocratic manner.
You can always prepare meat and a sauce, but are there many rapidly prepared sauces? That all depends on the liveliness of your imagination. Invent the sauces. The great thing is to prepare them quickly, and for this you must follow the advice which I shall give you for the preparation of some standard sauces.”
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Here’s what Elizabeth David wrote about Pomaine in her book An Omelette and a Glass of Wine. [pp. 175-182]
“In the days when Pomaine was writing, chefs did not dream of braising vegetables – lettuces, leeks, Belgian endives, for example – without a preliminary blanching. That rule was immutable, and woe betide anyone who disregarded it. Dr. de Pomaine bypassed it, and I adopted his method, particularly his recipe for cooling Belgian endives in butter and entirely without a prior water baptism. That sort of unorthodoxy got one into trouble. …
Doctor Edouard de Pomaine’s real name was Edouard Pozerski. He was of purely Polish origin, the son of emigres who had fled Poland and settled in Paris after the Revolution of 1863. …
De Pomaine was the first writer to propound such happenings as the fusion of egg yolks and olive oil in a mayonnaise, the sizzling of a potato chip when plunged into fat for deep-frying, in language so straightforward, so graphic, that even the least scientifically minded could grasp the principles instead of simply learning the rules. In cooking, the possibility of muffing a dish is always with us. Nobody can eliminate that. What de Pomaine did by explaining the cause, was to banish the fear of failure.
Adored by his public and his pupils, feared by the phoney, derided by the reactionary, de Pomaine’s irreverent attitude to established tradition, his independence of mind backed up by scientific training, earned him the reputation of being something of a Candide, a provocative rebel disturbing the grave conclaves of French gastronnomes, questioning the hold rites of the ‘white-vestured officiating priests’ of classical French cookery.
Of a dish from the Swiss mountains, Dr. de Pomaine observes that it is ‘a peasant dish, rustic and vigorous. It is not everybody’s taste. But one can improve upon it. Let us get to work.’ … ”
Resources:
Hot Cherry Pie from a chill cook who runs on a flash red Ducati.
This recipe was created by David George, and published in The Herb Companion, February/March, 1996 p . 21
Vegitative Chili
Marinade:
1/4 cup olive oil
1/3 cup tamari
2 teaspoons chili powder
1 tablespoon cumin
1 teaspoon cardomom
Main Ingredients:
1 lb fresh firm tofu, cubed into bite size chomps
1 large onion diced
1 teaspoon or more minced garlic
4 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon mustard seed
1 large can red kidney beans drained (save juice)
1 large can black beans (save juice)
1 big can crushed tomatoes
2 tablespoons basil
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
Step 1. Put the cubed tofu in the marinade, preferably a glass bowl with plastic sealing lid so that the tofu + marinade can be shaken and evenly coat the tofu. The longer the tofu soaks, the deeper the marinade seeps into the tofu. For a fresh taste, add a cup of cranberry or orange juice to the marinade, also horseradish and a pinch of tumeric – under
a half teaspoon! Tumeric is anti-inflamatory, good for human skeleton.
Then you saute the onion, garlic and dry spices in a big cast iron fry pan or similar large skillet (with the little dab of oil listed with the spices) – ideally the mustard seed will pop like popcorn (medium high heat) so use a lid! Now before anything burns, but after the onions go limp and translucent, scoop in the marinated tofu with marinade if it isn’t too much liquid.
The heat should still be medium, but you will probably want to reduce after the mustard seed has popped. Of course, you can omit the mustard seed too. If the fry pan is well seasoned, the tofu should start to form a crust. Expect some to stick and scrape back with a metal spatula to keep the tofu loose and browning on all sides. The next object is to bring all the tofu up to temp while not too gently browning the sides of the tofu cubes. This can take as long as 15 minutes. When the heat is right around medium-low, the fu will not stick too much as it browns and you can flip it every two or three minutes. If some of the cubes go the way of the Berlin wall – not too worry.
The tofu can be served at this point as a flavorful cubes over rice with vegetables.
Take the brief time between tofu flips to mix the rest of the goods in a stew pot, pressure cooker or slow cooker. When the tofu meets with your satisfaction, or you’re sick of flipping it, go ahead and toss it in the chili.
Cook slowly over low heat for at least two hours. Test for flavor and consistency. Add liquid if necessary as the cooking proceeds.
Allen, Gary. (1999) The Resource Guide for Food Writers. New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-415-92250-x
Allhoff, Fritz and Monroe, Dave, Editors. (2007) Food & Philosophy – Eat, Think and be Merry. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing. ISBN 978-1-4051-5775-9
Cronin, Isaac. (1999) The Mindful Cook – Finding Awareness, Simplicity, and Freedom in the Kitchen. New York: Villard Books. ISBN 0-375-50275-0
Jacob, Dianne. (2005) Will Write for Food. The Complete Guide to Writing Cookbooks, Restaurant Reviews, Articles, Memoir, Fiction and More. New York: Marlowe and Co. ISBN 1-56924-377-8
Pitzer, Sara. (1984) How to Write a Cookbook & Get It Published. Cincinnati: Writer’s Digest Books. ISBN 0-89879-132-4
Appetite for Books — cookbook reviews
From garden to table.
No White Food 