Category Archives: eggs

Jack is Cooking Persian Rice

Posted on by under cardamom, coriander, cumin, eggs, garlic, ghee., honey, kale, onions, prunes, rice, saffron, sausage, yogurt
Well Hello Internet!
I recently discovered the deliciousness of persian cuisine.  One of the things i liked the best was the way this particular method of cooking rice creates a delicious crust of rice on the top.  Hidden inside can be all sports of delicious meats, fruits, and vegetables.  I investigated some recipes, and before long i had figured out my own delicious version of it.  There are quite a few steps to it, but each of the steps is relatively straight forward.  The rice is cooked very differently from my Perfect Rice recipe, which was an interesting thing to discover.  All together this takes about 3 hours.

Heres what you will need:
For the Filling:
1 lb Merguez Sausage with no casing (look for Jack’s Merguez Sausage at Herondale farm)
1.5 Onions (sliced)
1 cup prunes (chopped up0
1 small bunch of kale (finely chopped)
3 cloves of Garlic (finely chopped)
salt
pepper
a few strands of saffron
1 teaspoon turmeric

For the Marinade/Crust
2 cups Yogurt (Especially good with Greek yogurt, but any yogurt will do fine.)
9 or 10 strands of saffron – soaked in 1/4 cup boiling water
zest of half an orange
salt and pepper
1/2 teaspoon cumin
1/2 teaspoon coriander
2-3 cardamom pods (cracked open and ground)
1 tablespoon honey

For the Rice
3 cups basmati rice (cleaned and rinsed until the water is clear)
2-3 tablespoons ghee
1/2 onion
3 egg yolks
salt and pepper.

To Prepare the Filling

1.  Mix all the ingredients from the marinade together

2.  Take the sausage and place in a pan with 1 onion, 2 cloves of garlic, saffron and turmeric,  cook over medium heat until the sausage is cooked, and the onions are tender.  Leaving the juice in the pan, mix the cooked sausage and onions into the marinade.

3. Heat back up the juice in the pan, and add the other half an onion plus 1 clove of garlic.  Cook until its starting to get soft, then add the kale.  Toss for a few seconds, then add the salt and pepper, plus the prunes.  cover and cook for about 5 minutes.   Set aside.

To Make the Rice
1.  Preheat oven to 375°

2.  Fill a large pot of water and bring to a boil.  Add 3 cups of rice stir making sure all the grains are separate from each other (kind of like cooking pasta).  Cook for maybe 4 minutes, then strain the rice out through a sieve.  You want the rice to be soft on the outside, but still crunchy on the inside.  Its going to be cooked some more in a little bit.  Run it under cold water to stop the rice from cooking.

3.  Remove the meat from the marinade, and set aside.  Add 3 egg yolks into the marinade and whisk together.  Mix in about 1/3 of the rice.

4.  Take a Pyrex dish (it could be round or square), and add 2 tablespoons of ghee.  place in the oven for to heat up the pan and melt the ghee.   ( about 5 minutes)  Remove from the oven

5.  Spread the rice mixture into the bottom of the hot pan.  Try to make a nice even layer that goes a little up the sides.  Keeping mostly to the middle of the pan, spread out a layer of about half of the spinach and prune mixture.  Then a layer of all the meat followed by another layer of spinach.  Finally cover everything with the rest of the rice, fully encasing all the meat and spinach.  sprinkle with any leftover marinade and juice, salt and pepper.

6. Cover with a layer of greased wax paper, followed by 2 or 3 tight layers of tinfoil.  Press down on the rice mixture to make sure everything is good and compacted.  Place in the oven for about 1.5 hours.

7. After about an hour and a half, take a look at the underside of the rice, through the pyrex.  it should be turning a nice brown color.  At this point i like to turn the oven up to about 450° for the last 20 minutes or so.  This will make the crust nice and dark golden brown – and nice and crispy..

8. Remove from the oven and let it sit for 15-20 minutes still covered.  Remove the wax paper, and tinfoil.  carefully run a knife around the edges to separate the rice on the sides.  Place a serving plate over it, and flip the rice out onto the plate so the brown side is up.  Garnish with some fresh parsley, and serve.

Jack is Cooking Blueberry Almond Tarte

Posted on by under almond meal, almonds, blueberry, butter, eggs, flour, fruit tart, hazelnut, rum, sugar, vanilla
Well Hello Internet!
I made a delicious blueberry almond tarte for thanksgiving this year.  I felt there needed to be something besides pumpkin and pecan pie.  So i made this delicious creation instead.  
It is very simple to make. There are basically only two elements that need making, and that is the crust, and the Crème d’Amandes.
you will also need:
Blueberries (1 pint)
Almond Slivers
a 9 inch tarte ring
You can use any crust you like pre made or otherwise, but i like to make a hazelnut crust, which is excellent for any sweet crust.
Here is my recipe for hazelnut crust (this will make about three 9 inch tarts) 
125 grams powdered sugar
250 grams butter
3 eggs (room temperature)
300 grams flour + a little extra
150 grams hazelnut meal
75 grams almond meal
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1.  Cream the butter and the sugar in a mixer.
2. Add the eggs one at a time until full incorporated into the butter/sugar
3. Mix in the flour, hazelnut meal, and almond meal.  it is possible that the dough will still be a little wet, so just add in a little more flour until the dough holds together in a ball.
4. Refrigerate until firm (at least 1 hour).  This dough can be frozen, and used at a later date.
While the Crust is Chilling you can make the Crème d’Amande.
For one 9 inch tarte you will need this:
165 grams butter
165 grams sugar
165 grams Almond Meal
2 eggs (room temperate)
30 grams corn starch
1/2 teaspoon vanilla (or 1/2 a vanilla bean scraped out)
30 ml Goslings Rum (or other dark rum)
1. Cream the butter, sugar, and almond flour.  
2. Add Eggs one at time.
3. add corn starch
4. add vanilla and rum, and mix until fluffy.
This can also be put in the fridge and or frozen until the time you want to use it.
To make the Tarte:
(preheat oven to 375°)
1.  Roll out the crust, and place in tarte ring.
2.  Fill evenly until with the crème d’amandes. (you don’t want to fill it all the way up.  about 80%.  There will be displacement!!)
3.  Artfully place the blueberries on top of the crème d’amandes, but do not push them down.  just let them rest on top for now.
4. take the almond slivers and place them around the edge of the taste, on top of the blueberries.  if you desire you may also put them in the middle.  
5. Bake in the oven for 35 minutes, or until the top is nicely golden.  You will notice that the blueberries have sunken into the crème d’amandes,  which is exactly what should happen!

When it cools remove it from the Tarte Ring

And Serve it warm with whipped cream

There is no way this cannot be delicious!

Jack is Cooking Pea Souffle

Posted on by under butter, cheese, eggs, flour, garlic, onion, peas
Well Hello Internet!
the other day (actually a couple of weeks ago… this post got lost somehow) i made a pea souffle with my newly learned knowledge of making souffle.  
apparently souffle’s are very easy to make!
all you need is to make a bechamel, and egg whites, with whatever filling you want!
heres what you will need:

flour 1 tablespoon
butter 2 tablespoons
milk 3/4 cup
salt and pepper
a little nutmeg

frozen peas
garlic
an onion (chopped up)
salt and pepper
paprika
olive oil

6 egg whites
a pinch of salt

pepper jack cheese (grated)  you could use cheddar, or any other cheese of your own fancy.

preheat the oven to 450°

So First!  i sauteed the peas, garlic, and peas, in a little olive oil and flavored them with some salt and pepper and some paprika.  when they were all done i put them in my blender and blended it until it was a fine mush.  or one might say a purée…

Next!  i made my béchamel.  that’s pretty easy.  first you melt the butter.  then you add the flour to the butter, and mix it together.  then you add the milk stirring constantly.  when it comes to a boil it should be a pretty thick mixture.  yum yum!  this is an important base to lots of different recipes.  i like to add a little nutmeg for flavor.  after it was done i mixed the pea purée into the béchamel.

then i took my egg whites and whipped them up until they were nice and stiff.  after that i took the egg whites and folded the béchamel purée mixture together.  really really fold these!  no mixing!  you must keep the fluffiness of the egg whites or it won’t work!

after that i filled some ramequins half way, then put a nice little bit of cheese into each one, and filled them up to the top with more of the mixture.  and then a nice coating of cheese on top!

into the oven, and cook them until they have puffed up and gone nice and golden brown on top!

mmmmm mmmmm delicious!

Jack is Cooking Quiche

Posted on by under eggs, leeks, milk, pancetta, quiche, spinach

Well Hello Internet!

Over the weekend to practice for my quiche endeavors i made one at home.  in fact tonight i have made another quiche!  this one is better than both the ones i made before!  the first one i made was lacking a certain technique we learned in the class.  the one we made in the class was ok, but was a little plain, and the quality of the cheese was not superb.  but the one tonight combined the best of both!  im on a quiche roll!

anyways quiches are pretty easy to make, and they sure are delicious!

you can make them with pretty much anything but the basics for a quiche lorraine are

eggs
milk
salt
pepper
a pinch of nutmeg
cream
bacon
and gruyere cheese

and of course a crust

i have been making my own pastry crust, but that’s a whole other post.  so to keep things simple i reccoment just buying a frozen pastry crust.  and make sure its not a desert pastry crust because those tend to be sweeter.  if it is not cooked yet bake the crust first.  until it is a little golden.  (a clever trick here is to line the crust with parchment paper and fill the crust with rice, or beans.  this stops the bottom of the crust from bubbling up and breaking!!)

for this quiche that i made i went a little fancier, and i used this:

2 eggs
100 ml of heavy cream
100 ml of milk
salt
pepper
paprika
50 grams of pancetta
leeks
spinach
30 grams of goat cheese
60 grams of gruyere cheese

so first! blind b
cook the bacon and the leeks and the spinach.  after they are cooked set them aside.  grate the gruyere cheese finely.  and slice up the goat cheese.  hold all this on the side

in a bowl, whisk the eggs.  add in the milk and the cream, and whisk them all together.  add the salt and pepper, and paprika, and if you have a little nutmeg put a sprinkling of nutmeg in.  don’t put all that much salt in because the pancetta and the gruyere are naturally salty.  this is the custard

then take your pastry crust, and crumble the goat cheese evenly in it. then sprinkle the gruyere cheese over this.  on top of this spread out the cooked bacon spinach and leeks.

next!  take the custard and using a strainer (if you have one, its not totally essential) slowly pour the custard over the all the other ingredients, careful not to let it spill over the sides of the crust.

then bake it for 25 minutes at 275° or 350° or until the custard is set.  you can tell its set because a knife will come out cleanly, yet it will still be slightly jiggly if you shake it.  like jello!

personally i like it a little brown on the top so i stuck it under the broiler for 1 minute after just to give it a nice browning on top.

and ta-da!  quiche!:

Jack is Cooking Dandelion Salad

Posted on by under bacon, dandelion, eggs, onion, salad

Well Hello Internet!

Last night as part of my dinner i made a dandelion salad.  Dandelions you say??  YES!!! indeed dandelions.  what everybody thinks is normally just a weed is actually pretty delicious as long as its the spring time and they haven’t grown to gargantuan proportions.  (when they get very big they get very bitter)

This delicious recipe was introduced to me by Nicole – Julie’s Mom.  i am ever so grateful she introduced me to this, i wish i could eat it all the time, as it is super super delicious!

now then, dandelions grow everywhere.  but you should be careful that they are not in a cow field or something as the cows will probably have pooped on them, if there are any left… cows know all about how delicious dandelions are and so eat them all up!!  also, since they are technically a weed, you need to get them from a place that hasn’t put poison all over them… cuz that’s just gross…

Heres what you will need:

Dandelions!
boiled eggs
bacon
an onion
balsamic vinegar
an oil (a not very strong olive oil, or grapeseed oil, or other light oil)

so the first thing to do is to pick yourself a whole lot of dandelions.  the next thing is to not pick the flowers, you just want the leaves.  about 4-5 inches in length.  bigger than that and they are too big.  i have seen dandelion in the supermarket, but they are normally really really big, and when they are that big they really are way too bitter.

so after you pick yourself a nice basket of dandelions, take them home and start washing them.  wash them good, and pick out all the grass and flower buds and anything else that may have found its way into your basket:

After you have cleaned everything very well, take a knife and chop everything up real well:
Then take your hard boiled eggs and slice them nicely and put them in the salad:

add a splash of balsamic vinegar, and some of your choice of oil.  give it a toss!
take the bacon and chop it up all nice and small, and also take an onion and chop it all up nice and small.  if you want you can serve this on the side, or you can mix it in.  this adds a nice bit of extra flavor!
and serve away!!  
mmm mmm delicious!