Precious cookers and Conecuh's

My favorite kitchen tool varies from week to week, but there are a few that reign supreme.  At the top of the list is my pressure cooker.  I was quite terrified by pressure cookers from the experience of seeing hot apple sauce spew over my mother when she opened one too soon.  But I was reintroduced to them  by my French mother, Hedwige Clayeux.   With her 3-burner stove buried under the eaves of her steep rooftop apartment on the Rue des Grands Augustins, she would whip up mustard rabbit stew in her pressure cooker that left us all begging for more. Pressure cookers have changed and are now reliable and safe. 

Fast forward 25 years and I use my pressure cooker at least 3 times a week, to make my own chicken broth, a stew, some mole turkey, and last night my Conecuh sausage bean soup. What a discovery to find I can make a bean soup from dry beans in 15 minutes! There are endless possibilities for variations on the general theme of sauteed aromatics, broth, root vegetables, beans and any sausage with a big flavor, like my current favorite from Alabama: hickory smoked Conecuh!

Winter Sausage Bean Soup

1 cup dried beans (I used soldier)
4 cups water
Bring beans and water to high pressure for 3 minutes.  De-pressurize the cooker.  You can drain off some bean water and add broth as needed for best consistency and flavor.

Aromatics
onion, garlic, carrots, celery, red or ancho pepper
Saute in vegetable oil before adding to the soup pot

Root vegetables (cubed): about 1 c. each, or 3 C. total
Rutabaga, winter squash (butternut, acorn, etc)
Winter greens like kale are also good.

1 lb. or more of smoked sausage (Conecuh, kielbasa) (or less if you use andouille, chorizo)

4 c. Chicken broth
1 c. crushed tomatoes

Herbs and spices:
cumin, bay leaf, thyme, ground pepper
1 chipoltle pepper in adobo, seeded and finely chopped

Add all ingredients to the soup pot.  Cook at high pressure for 12 minutes.**
De-pressurize with quick release method and enjoy with a quick salad and a glass of wine.

** You can also add some chopped cabbage at the end and just cook covered for a few minutes to soften. 

For an Italian version of this soup, substitute hot Italian sausage (browned), fennel instead of celery, celery root (diced), zucchini and/or eggplant.

Faux Christmas

Fundooooo!
Faux Christmas at the Brown house and this year the fondue worked! No tears, no terror, just creamy, yummy dipping: Broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, red peppers, green apples and baguette with Tarte Tatin for dessert.  Parfait!

Did Someone Say Sauerkraut?

We landed back in NYC last week after a magical 4 days in Maine where the usual pilgrimages (Hussey's, Morse's, Moody's, Bob's) allowed us to feast on our northern favorites- fried things and cheese.  After gorging ourselves for the better part of a week, Adam and I trecked back home with a cooler full of memorabilia for the Brooklyn dwellers...Beans, cheese, kraut and pickle relish.

We ate salad for 4 nights straight before we could stomach busting out the Maine goodies, but when we did- YUM!  So here's a fast one pot weeknight dinner that is so yummy, the gas that comes later is worth it! 

Cast-Iron Chicken with Bacon and Sauerkraut
(serves 4)

1/2 lb slab of bacon, diced
4 legs and 4 thighs of chicken, bone in
salt
pepper
1 large onion, sliced
4-6 sprigs of fresh thyme
2 bay leaves
1 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
1 tsp sweet smokes paprika
1 lb sauerkraut
1/2 c chicken stock

1. Preheat over to 350 degrees

2. Render fat from bacon in cast iron skillet and remove bacon; set aside.

3. Season chicken with salt and pepper and brown it in the bacon fat.  Transfer to a plate.

4. Brown onions in bacon fat, adding more oil if necessary.  Add thyme, bay leaves, red pepper and paprika- saute briefly.  Return bacon to the pan and stir to mix in.  Add sauerkraut to pan and stir to mix in.  Arrange the chicken pieces on top of the sauerkraut mixture and pour stock over it all.

5. Put pan in the oven for 30-40 min (until chicken internal temp hits 165 degrees).

6. Serve with Hussey's baked beans for the ultimate grasto-intestinal experience!

Ooooh yeah...that's gonna hurt later...

Choucroute...French for Dressed Sauerkraut!

My gentleman grew up eating bitter melon and craves it often.  The first time he served it to me, all I could think was, "Hm, what an accurately named food."  I didn't dislike it, it was just a flavor I was entirely unfamiliar with and couldn't quite decide how I felt about.  We all have those foods we grew up with that someone else might be a little unsure about.   In our family, it's sauerkraut.  We love everything about it - it's crispiness, the vinegar/salt explosion, the fact that it literally stings your nostrils if you sniff too close into a fresh tub. It's amazing.  We like it so much, everytime my parents go up to Maine, they buy multiple gallons of fresh sauerkraut from the aptly named Morse's Sauerkraut in Waldoboro and then dutifully divide it up and drive it back to those of us stuck in Brooklyn. 

So what does one do after receiving a delivery of about 2 pounds of fresh sauerkraut?  Go on a mission to convince your friends that it's delicious, obviously.  I decided to pull out the big guns and make Choucroute, a sauerkraut pork stew that I think you'd have to be crazy to not find delicious on a crisp, cold January day like today.  Plus, I looked it up and the title of this post is a true story - Choucroute means "dressed sauerkraut" in French, and we all know that anything, even pickled, fermented cabbage can be made fancy by the French.  I had some weird odds and ends in my fridge, so this is sort of a mishmash of a Choucroute, but it gets the job done!

Choucroute for Four...maybe more.

Mmmm...look at that fancy dressed sauerkraut!  

4oz. bacon
1/2 lb. smoked garlic sausage like Kielbasa (I actually used chicken andouille sausage because my gentleman is allergic to smoked meats and it still turned out delicious!)
1 onion diced
1 Tbs. gin (the recipe called for juniper berries, which honestly, who has juniper berries?!  So I substituted gin, which is made from juniper berries...and because I like it)
1/2 tsp whole peppercorns
5 whole cloves
A sprinkle of allspice (recipe called for 4 whole allspice, again, who has that?)
1 large bay leave
1 pealed and diced apple
2 cloves garlic, diced
2 to 3 pealed, chopped carrots (optional - I had them and figured, why not?)
3 cups sauerkraut
1 C. white wine
2 C. chicken broth
Ham (I had leftovers, so I used a hunk of ham and chopped it into 4 approximately pork chop sized chunks.  You could also use pork chops, ham hocks, whatever you have on hand)
1 lb. red skin potatoes

1.  In an oven safe pan (I again used my Le Creuset, best xmas present ever, Mom!), brown bacon and sausage, about 10 minutes, then remove from the pan and put on a plate with a paper towel on it.  If the bacon was really fatty, you can pour off some of the fat, but keep about 1 tablespoon in the pan for the onions.
2.  Throw onions, spices, and bay leaf into pan and saute until onions are tender, about 5 minutes.
3.  Add the apples, carrots, and garlic, saute about 2 minutes more.  Preheat the oven to 350.
4.  Add the sauerkraut, broth, wine, and gin and give it a stir.   Boil uncovered for 10 minutes.
5.  Add all the meats and submerge them in the sauerkraut broth. 
6.  Put in oven for 1 hour. 
7.  With 20 minutes to go, boil potatoes on the stovetop. 

Serve and amaze all with the awesomeness of dressed sauerkraut! If you visit the Morse's website, you can even amaze them with sauerkrauts many health benefits.   I like to take some potatoes, fork mash them on my plate, then spoon the sauerkraut, meat, and juices on top.  If the choucroute looks too saucy when you take it out of the oven, you can always take the lid off and boil it down, or just pop it back in the oven with the lid off for a bit longer, but it should be pretty saucy so the potatoes have lots of yumminess to soak up.