Category Archives: flour

Jack is Cooking Pork Chops

Posted on by under bread, butter, cheese, eggs, flour, garlic, green beans, milk, paprika, pork chops
Well Hello Internet!
So last night i somehow had the motivation to get up and make some dinner.  nothing fancy, but boy was it good!  i made breaded pork chops
heres what i used
2 pork chops ( from Herondale Farm of course!)
bread crumbs
paprika
parsley
one egg
also
some french cut beans
cheddar cheese
milk
a little bit of flour
garlic
So First i took the bread crumbs and mixed them with a little paprika and some parsley.
then i took the pork chops and dipped them in the egg, and then in the bread crumbs, and then because i like them extra breaded, i put them back in the egg, and then back in the bread crumbs.  that’s easy right?
heres what they looked like
Then i took the chops, and i heated some olive oil in a pan.  i cooked them for like 1-2 minutes on each side.  then i put them in the oven at 350 for another 20 minutes.
In the meantime, i put a little butter in that pan (some of the oil had been soaked up by the chops)
i sauteed some garlic.  then i added the french cut beans.  i let those cook for a couple minutes over low/medium heat.  once they were cooked i put a little bit of flour in the pan to start a roux.  i added maybe half a cup of milk, and some grated cheddar cheese.
This made a nice side dish to the pork chops and added a little bit of green.
heres both together!  sorry for a lack of pictures this time.
mmm  mmm delicious

Jack is cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread 11/02/09

Posted on by under bread, flour, olive oil, salt, sugar

Well Hello Internet!

Tonight i baked a new loaf of bread, and i did it exactly the same way as i did the last loaf, except i baked it a little longer.  I think i seem to have finally got it down!

heres what i did:

this morning (at 9 am)
i took 1.5 cups of starter
mixed it with 3 cups of water
and 4 cups of white flour

i let it sit until 7 pm

this is what it looked like:

i then removed 1.5 cups of this sponge and put it back in the starter

to this i then added
half a cup of olive oil
1.5 tablespoons of salt
1 tablespoon of sugar

after i folded in those ingredients i folded, and then kneaded in
3 cups of flour

i let it sit for 20 minutes:

After that i removed 1/3 of the dough to save to make pizza tomorrow! (follow link!)

I folded the remaining dough into the loaf and let it rise for 2.5 hours (it seems to take longer now that the summer is over).

I baked it in the oven for 15 minutes at 450° and then turned the oven down to 350° and baked it for another 35 minutes.

Here it is:


Jack is Cooking Butternut Squash Ravioli with Alfredo Sauce

Posted on by under butter, butternut squash, cheese, flour, garlic, leeks, pasta, Ravioli

Well Hello internet!

Last night for dinner i went all out and made ravioli.  From scratch!  That’s right i made the pasta dough, and the filling, and the sauce.
But i can’t say that I did it all alone, i had help from my good friend Julie – who also took most of these pictures!
Not only was this extremely delicious, it was easy to make and also lots of fun!

———————————————————————————————————————————-

on a side note, if one were to peruse the archives, they would find that the first video i ever made for jackiscooking, way back in 2007 was butternut squash ravioli.  except when i made it then, it was pre-made frozen ravioli!  This is much better!  check out that post here.
———————————————————————————————————————————-
Heres what you will need:

For the Filling:

one butternut squash.
one leak (or an onion)
a couple of cloves of garlic
salt and pepper

For the Pasta Dough:
2 cups of flour
3 egg yolks
4 tablespoons of water + some extra

One egg for the making of the Raviolis

For the Alfredo Sauce
half a cup of butter
1 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese
1 cup of cream
Garlic
Parsley
Pepper.

First, we cut the squash in half and took out the seeds.  Then we roasted it with the flesh side down for 30 minutes at 375° with a little olive oil.

While this was cooking I made the pasta dough.
I put 2 cups of white flour in a bowl, and made a well in the center.  In this well i put the 3 egg yolks, and the 4-5 tablespoons of water.  i slowly worked flour in from the sides until i had a dough.  (if necessary, you can add more water)
Knead this ball of dough for 10 minutes, and then coat it in oil and let it sit for another 10 minutes.  This will allow gluten to develop.
Heres my ball of dough:

While the dough is sitting, and the squash continues to roast, it is time to saute the leek and garlic.  so take your leek (that has been cleaned thoroughly and diced) and add it to some melted butter in a pan.  cook this for about 5 minutes and then add in the garlic (also diced).
If you’ve been counting my minutes, you will have figured out that about 30 minutes has elapsed now, and so the squash should be ready to come out of the oven.  Remove it from the oven and let it cool.

 
The Leeks should also be done at this point so those can be taken off the heat, and also allowed to cool.
Next up comes the mixing of the filling.  Scoop out the squash into a bowl and get rid of the skins.
Mush it up real nice with a fork, and then add in the leeks.  Mix these together until they are well incorporated.
Now its time to return to the dough!  So cut the ball in half and roll out they two halves until they are really thin.  If you have a fancy pasta roller, you can use that.  If you have a rolling pin, you can use that also.  But I have neither!  So i decided a wine bottle would work really nicely!
Now comes the time to make the raviolis!  Take maybe 1 or 2 tablespoons (depending how big you want the raviolis) of the squash mixture and put them in little balls over one layer of the dough.  (remember!  you want to get as mush use out of this dough as you can, so place the balls well.
Take the egg for the ravioli and mix that up.   brush it everywhere on the dough where there is not squash.  next take the other sheet of dough and place it on top.  press down in between all the balls.  now its starting to look a little like ravioli!
Cut between all the ravioli, and press down all the edges – sealing inside all that squashy goodness!
Next bring a pot of water to boil.
While the water is boiling, it is a good time to start making the Alfredo sauce.
Take the butter and melt it in a pan.  Add in the cream.  Stir and simmer.  Add in the cheese, and let it melt.  add in the garlic, salt and pepper.  if you have any parsley that is nice too.
ok put that to the side.
The water has now boiled!  so its time to cook our ravioli.  just a few at a time.  i made 10 ravioli, so 5 at a time, which is essentially a serving.  or a little more, these are pretty filling!
Fresh pasta, takes no time at all to cook.  maybe 2 or 3 minutes. Ravioli conveniently will let you know when they are done, because they float!  so when they float you can scoop them out and serve.  Put some of the delicious Alfredo sauce over it, and thats it!
So that’s it!  and as always, (well normally always in my video blogs) the first bite on camera!
Special Thanks to Julie – who provided much help in the preparation, and also most of the photos!

Jack is Cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread 10/12

Posted on by under bread, flour, olive oil, salt

* update *

this loaf is the most perfect loaf of bread i have made!
hopefully i will be able to repeat it!

———————————————————————-

Well hello Internet!

Tonight I baked a new loaf of bread, and I think this is the best one
yet! I’ve carefully recorded everything I did this time so if I can
repeat this and get exactly the same results I’ll know I’ve got it!

Here’s what I did this time

I took 1 1/2 cups starter and mixed it with 3 cups of water and 4 cups of flour

I let it sit for 7 hours

Then I removed 1 1/2 cups of the sponge and put it back in my starter jar for the next loaf

To the sponge I added half a cup of olive oil and one tablespoon of salt.  Then I added between 2 and 3 cups of flour – until the dough was just right – that is until it was just past sticky. I believe this is the most important part, and what I have been failing to achieve in the past.

So I let the dough autolyze for about 15 minutes before shaping the loaf. Then I let it rise for 2 hours

I baked it in the oven for 15 minutes at 450 degrees, and then 25 minutes at 350 degrees.

Jack is Cooking (Baking) Sourdough Bread 9/21/09

Posted on by under bread, flour

Well Hello internet!
So as it is Monday I am baking a loaf of bread.  My last loaf of bread was probably one of the most successful, in terms of its texture and what it looked like.  However since I ran out of white flour while I was making the dough, I ended up substituting with too much whole wheat flour.  This time I am repeating the recipe, but with an opposite ratio.  Instead of 3 cups of whole wheat flour and 1 cup of white flour being added to the sponge, I am going to use 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour.

So here it is:

This is my starter and the sponge I made out of the starter.  This morning at about 9 am i put one cup of starter in a bowl with 3 cups of water and 4 cups of white flour.  Mixed them together and then let them sit (covered) for about 12 hours

Here is my sponge:
As you can see it has bubbled up and risen quite nicely.

Next, I remove 2 cups from the sponge and put it back in the starter.  This feeds the starter, so it will be nice and ready to go next week when i make another loaf.
Then I put in half a cup of olive oil, 1 tablespoon of salt and a tiny little bit of sugar, maybe like a teaspoon.

Then to this mixture I slowly added while stirring 3 cups of white flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour (i like to mix this together before i add it into the sponge).  eventually i can no longer stir with my spoon and i have to mix it with my hands.

This mixing eventually turns into kneading.  i have been experimenting with the amount of kneading.  this time i barely kneaded the bread at all, and also decided to have a slightly moister dough, so it is a little stickier, and not the right consistency for kneading.
Here is the Dough:

Then comes the shaping of the bread.  i folded the bread and rolled it into the shape i wanted and then placed it in the bread rising pan that i have

Here is the bread before rising:

I let it rise for 2 hours, and here is what it looked like:

I then baked it in the oven at 450° for 20 minutes, then turned down the heat to 350° for the final 30 minutes of baking.

Here is the result:

So it looks pretty good i think.  but when it turned out onto the baking pan the upward risingness of the bread turned into outward rising, so the bread is quite wide and flat, but nice and soft on the inside and crunchy on the outside.  the bread also tastes pretty darn good.

I think perhaps the rising problem can be cured by allowing gluten to develop more and then the dough will be more cohesive.  either more flour, and or kneading will probably solve my problem.

We’ll find out in a week or two i suppose!