More canning adventures and observations

My haul of tomatoes

Saturday, I went to another canning workshop, this time on tomatoes.  I've been both excited and scared about tomatoes -- they seem to be some of the most useful and versatile things to can, but also the most associated with the possibility of botulism.  So, I've been reading and doing research (there's a super handy infographic here if anyone is interested), but I also wanted to go to an actual class so I could ask specific questions of a knowledgeable person.

The class was great for a couple of reasons.  First, as expected, I got to ask specific questions and get some food safety reassurance.  Second, I learned that canning tomatoes can actually be super easy!  I was expecting to have to spend a lot of time pre-cooking or making sauce, but it turns out that, while you can do those things, you don't have to -- you can just pack whole tomatoes (peeled and cored and with added acid) and then turn them into whatever you need later.  Both methods have upsides and downsides, of course.  This way is quicker on the front end, and a little more versatile, but does require more work and thought on the back end.  The trade off was worth it for me, though.

Coring and scoring!

So, on Sunday, I went to the farmer's market in search of tomatoes for canning and found a farmer who sold me 27 lbs of tomatoes for $15, which comes out to about 55 cents/lb!  That was great, even though I had to lug it all home, uphill. :)  I spent pretty much the rest of the day, on and off, working on the tomatoes.  It was about 3 hours of hands-on work spread out over about 9 total hours.  Lots of time, but I got 25 pints out of it!  I just learned that I could've used the peels and cores to make a few pints of thick tomato sauce, but I didn't know that at the time.  Ah, well, next year.  I think it was worth it, despite all the effort. 

I have some more observations about the whole canning thing.  :)  Some of these are from the tomato canning, some are from things I'm reading, and some are just thoughts from the past month.

Mountain of peels and cores, and some peeled tomatoes waiting to be packed

• Tomatoes are a lot less scary than they seem.  From the reading I've done (and the info from class), it looks like there are 2 main things to worry about -- botulism due to acidity levels not being high enough and general spoilage from not having a good seal.  The seal bit isn't actually that worrying -- mold and other nasty things of that nature are easy to notice, so if your seal is bad, the outcome is annoying but easy to see.  Your food will have issues you can see or smell, so you can avoid eating it.  The botulism risk is scarier since it can be invisible, but it's actually pretty easy to solve -- make sure your tomatoes are sufficiently acidic!  The official USDA recommendation is to add either citric acid (which I didn't have) or bottled lemon juice to make sure it's a standard acidity.  I went for the latter, but I really don't like the taste of the stuff.  In the future, I think I'll get litmus paper so I can use fresh lemons and just make sure the juice is acidic enough.  The other strategy is to use a pressure canner, but they're expensive and take up space, so I'm unlikely to get one any time soon.
• There's a lot of conflicting information out there!  One reason I'm not putting any recipes here is that I'm by no means an expert, and I don't want to add to the amount of random-seeming stuff that exists when one searches for canning (or tomato canning specifically).  My take away has been to use recipes developed and tested after the mid-80s because that's when the USDA issues its home canning guidelines. The USDA itself has good resources, as does the National Center for Home Food Preservation. I think canning is a lot like baking -- you have to be relatively precise, but once you know what you're doing (and really understand the process on a deeper level), you can do some improvisation. 
• Tomatoes take a long time to process.  In the class, we did raw whole tomatoes packed in water, and those needed to be processed at a boil for 45 minutes (that doesn't include the time spent in the water as it gets up to a boil).  At home, I did raw whole tomatoes packed in their own liquid, which means they were more densely packed and had to be processed for 85 minutes!  It wasn't too bad, since I had other things to work on while the tomatoes processed, but it's certainly not a quick activity. 
• I don't know about tomatoes, but jam makes for great host gifts!  Mu and I have stayed at several people's places and brought them jam, and everyone seems happy about it (though I suppose they could be faking, heh).  I suspect it may also make good holiday gifts. ;)
• Wide mouth jars are more convenient for whole tomatoes than regular jars.  The class used the former, and it was messier and more difficult to pack the tomatoes in, especially without squishing them.  I had the latter at home, by accident, and I intend to keep using them in the future.  The only downside is that the half-pint jars I've been using are regular mouth, so I can't use the same lids for both sets.

Final outsome: 25 pints!

I'm done with tomatoes for the season -- while I could probably use more (I use a lot of canned tomatoes when I cook), I simply don't have time to do more canning before they're gone.  Next up is a workshop on apples!

Menu Monday and recipe 18 (and last day of April!)

It's a little nuts to think that April has come to a close, but here we are.  Tomorrow is May 1st, which means the end of my "month of cooking," which didn't really happen quite as planned.  But, since I'm not actually intending to stop cooking, I think that's probably OK.  I'll do an overview of the month sometime this week, but for now, I think I can safely say that, despite the fact that I didn't cook every day, April was a success.  However, going forward, I'm going to stop numbering my recipes. :)

We put our CSA subscription on hold this week because we have a ton of stuff still to use up, so this week, the goal is to cook with the wide variety of random veggies in the fridge.  The tentative plan is as follows.

Monday: Black bean chili with TVP (textured vegetable protein)
Tuesday: Potato pancakes with green garlic, braised greens on the side
Wednesday: Roasted veggies (beets, sweet potatoes, and carrots)
Thursday: Probably nothing
Friday: Depends on amount of leftovers.  Maybe I'll try those black bean burgers I mentioned before but never did make.
Saturday: I want to make dessert of some kind!  Still have that sopapilla recipe to try, and Cindy also gave me a recipe for this delicious baked glutinous rice pudding.  So maybe one of those.
Sunday: Something mushroomy.  I'm thinking of trying a balsamic mushroom recipe with spaghetti squash, since we've got another one living in the fridge.

So, for whatever reason, I've been craving chili for the last week or so. It's really not chili weather here, what with the triple digit weather, but it's what I wanted.  We had dried black beans from the CSA from a while ago, and last week, we got another baggie of beans.  Given that it's only gonna get hotter over the next several months, I figured I may as well use the beans and make chili now. 

Black bean vegetarian chili with TVP
Ingredients
2 cups black beans (I used dry beans, so I'll include the long-soak method in the recipe)
1 cup TVP
6 cups veggie broth
3 medium onions
1 head garlic
2 cans (14.5 oz each) stewed tomatoes (Italian recipe is what I use)
1 can tomato paste
3-4 tablespoons olive oil
3ish tablespoons coriander seed
3-5 tablespoons cumin
3-5 tablespoons chili powder
salt to taste

The night before, wash and sort your beans, taking out any dirt, gravel, or shriveled or discolored beans.  Put the beans in a soup pot and cover with lots of water.  Leave overnight, 8-12 hours.  When you're ready to start cooking, drain the beans, return to soup pot, and cover with about 5 cups of the veggie broth.  Bring to a boil, allow to boil vigorously for about 10 minutes, then turn down the heat so they boil steadily but not vigorously.  Partially cover the pot (this is important, it prevents the liquid from evaporating!) and allow to cook for about 25 minutes.

In the meantime, bring the remaining cup of broth to a boil and in a separate bowl, soak the TVP in it for 5-10 minutes (it's OK to leave longer until you're ready for it).

While that's all happening, chop the onions.  Heat the olive oil over medium-high heat in a large pan and add the onions.  Cook for about 7-8 minutes.  Mince the garlic and add it, along with salt and about half the spices.  Cook for another 5-10 minutes, until the onions are soft.  Add the tomatoes with their juice, tomato paste, and TVP and simmer for 5-10 minutes.

When the beans are starting to be tender, uncover the pot.  Add the onion-tomato-TVP mixture and cook for about 10 minutes. Add the remainder of the spices (or more or less, as you wish) and cook until the beans are fully tender but not mushy, stirring occasionally.  Serve with cheese on top if you have it (we didn't) or whatever other garnish people like for chili.

Nice big bowl of chili!

Recipe summary
Time: Not counting pre-soaking the beans, it took about 1.5 hours, with about 45 minutes being mostly hands-off.
Serves: 8, easy.  It's quite filling.
Highlights/thoughts: I have to make sure to cook the beans for longer on their own, and to cover or partially cover the pot while doing so.  My beans turned out a little undercooked, and I think it's because too much of the liquid evaporated (and then I added tomato, which is acidic and stopped the cooking process).  They weren't so undercooked as to be unedible, and I'm glad they didn't turn out mushy instead, but still.  Oh, and I probably used about 1/3 of the beans I made and just froze the rest.  Also, the TVP isn't totally necessary, but it adds a nice meat-like texture and some extra protein.
Would I make this again?  Yes, though I'm not attached to using dried beans, or black beans.  The flavor was similar to my tortilla soup, which I make with garbanzo beans, so I might try that next time.
Nutrition Facts (per serving): I've just started using a cite recommended to me by Cindy's sister Emily, and it allows you to build custom recipes by entering ingredients from its database (or adding your own if you know the nutritional info).  I don't promise that I'll do this for every recipe, but I figure I'll include it when I bother to calculate it for myself.

Calories: 288.9

Total Fat 10.7g

  Saturated Fat 1.5g

Cholesterol 0mg

Sodium 799.5mg

Total Carb 38.2g

  Dietary Fiber 11.8g

  Sugars 12g

Protein 13.6g

Cooking with Cindy (or, really, standing by while Cindy and Eric cook)

Mu and I are in LA, visiting Cindy!  Huzzah!  It's really nice to get out of town, and I'm very much looking forward to the Ren Faire tomorrow.  Yay for a mini-break before I have to get back and propose my dissertation.

Cindy suggested that we cook tonight so that I had something to post about, given the last few days.  However, by the time we arrived, Cindy and Eric had prepped all the ingredients and basically just cooked while we hung out and chatted.  Given that we had been driving for about 8.5 hours, this was perfectly fine with me.  So, I can't claim this as my recipe, since I did nothing for it, but I'll give you a brief summary of Cindy's yummy pasta.

Yummy Pasta (very technical name, I know)
Ingredients
lots of cherry tomatoes

Some (most) of the ingredients

lots of garlic (Cindy said she used about 20 cloves)
goat cheese (two medallions from Trader Joe's worked for us)
parsley (spice form is fine)
oregano (spice form is also fine)
pine nuts
olive oil
balsamic vinegar
butter (a pat)
pasta

Boil water for pasta.  Halve the cherry tomatoes and mince the garlic.  In a saute pan, heat up the butter on medium heat.  When it's hot, put in the garlic and cook for a few minutes until browned.  Add the tomatoes and saute, about 5-8 minutes.  In the meantime, cook the pasta as per package.  Toast pine nuts in a separate pan.  Add parsley and oregano, then when the pasta is cooked, add that.  Add the pine nuts and goat cheese and cook for a few more minutes to integrate.  Drizzle with olive oil and balsamic vinegar and serve with a salad! 

Yumminess!

I don't remember exactly how long this took, plus I wasn't here for prep, but it was probably about 20 minutes total.  This served 4, with some leftover pasta.  Super easy and yummy.  Thanks for feeding us, Cindy and Eric!

Cooking, recipe 7 and Tuesday Tip (and the start of a new tradition?)

Since I knew I wasn't going to cook today, I saved yesterday's post for today.  And then realized I didn't have a photo of yesterday's recipe, mostly because I was feeling cranky and totally forgot.  But that's ok, because we have fanart again!  In fact, Cindy and I have decided that this should be a weekly tradition (though I just realized we haven't decided what day it should be, but that's ok).  In fact, today's picture is a warning: if you don't like the idea of weekly fanart, an elephant wizard might make you stick your head in a mushroom.  Like so:

 

I hope none of you meet this awful fate. :)

A note about the mushroom stock from the other day: it's really mushroomy! This is a good thing, but it also means that I wouldn't add this stock to a random soup unless I specifically wanted mushroom flavor.  I knew this when I was making the stock, but it's probably worth mentioning.

Anyways, yesterday, I went and made a bigger batch of food again.  On one hand, it's probably good, since I won't be cooking today and tomorrow.  On the other hand, dude, I'm really incapable of making reasonably-sized things.  In my defense, I had 4 portobellos I hadn't used, and I didn't want them to go bad! So there we are.  I also started a freezer bag of trimmings in order to make veggie stock sometime next week.  We'll see how that goes.  The recipe itself was pretty easy and didn't take a whole lot of attention, which allowed me to make the now-weekly batch of salad for this week while I was waiting for dinner to finish.

Quinoa with mushrooms, greens, and chili

Ingredients

1 cup of quinoa

2 cups of mushroom stock (or veggie stock or water)

1 onion

4 portobello caps (reserve the stems for stock if you want)

2 broccoli bunches (apparently, broccoli stems aren't good for stock, though)

4-5 medium tomatoes

1 bunch beet greens (this is the first time I used the greens before the beets!)

neutral oil

salt, pepper, and chili powder

In a medium pot, combine quinoa and stock.  Bring to a boil, then adjust the heat so that the mixture simmers. Cover and cook until the liquid is gone, 15-20 minutes.  Set aside when it's done.  In the meantime, chop up an onion.  Heat a little bit of oil over medium-high heat and when it's hot, put in the onion.  Saute 'till tender, 3-5 minutes. Chop up the portobellos and add them.  Cook for about 10 minutes, 'till the mushrooms have given up juices and started browning.  Chop up the greens, broccoli and tomatoes and add them at this point. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and add a bit of water.  Cover and cook until broccoli is tender, 15ish minutes. Uncover, add chili powder to taste, and cook until most of the liquid has cooked off.  Stir in the quinoa, adjust seasonings to taste, and cook for a few minutes to integrate everything. 

Recipe summary
Time: About an hour, of which about 20 minutes is hands-on
Serves: 6-8
Highlights/thoughts: Nice and easy recipe -- you can add pretty much any vegetables and have it turn out well.  It also helps to cook the quinoa in stock of some kind rather than water.  Water is fine, but stock really adds a nice flavor to the whole thing.
Would I make this again?  Definitely, though probably not with identical veggies, since I don't necessarily have portobellos on hand.

And, in relationship to the recipe, here's the Tuesday Tip.  It turns out that chili powder is instant yummy!  I was cooking this and feeling meh in general, and the veggies were turning out pretty meh, despite adding salt and pepper.  I stared at my spice rack for a while and decided, randomly, to add some chili powder.  I specifically used Penzey's Chili 9000, which is a blend, but I think straight-up chili powder would work just as well.  It instantly added a nice flavor and kick and really brought the dish together.  Yay!

Taking advantage of the last days of cold with a soup recipe

I know I said I'd have a soup recipe yesterday, but then there was the Tuesday Tip thing...and here we are. :)  But a day late is better than never, right?

So, to use up the aforementioned beet greens, as well as lots of other veggies, I decided to make a minestrone-style soup, adapted from a recipe in my Cooking Everything Vegetarian book.  I've made it several times now, and the thing I really love about this recipe is that it's designed to be flexible.  You use a few constant things (carrot, onion, tomatoes, veggie stock), some hard vegetables of your choosing, and some soft vegetables of your choosing.  The process is the same every time, but the flavors vary based on what you use, so it's never quite the same.  Hard vegetables are things like potatoes or turnips, and soft vegetables are things like zucchini or greens.  Minestrone typically includes beans, as well, but this recipe doesn't, and I don't like them enough to go out of my way to get them.  Also, the recipe calls for celery along with carrot and onion, but since I'm really not a fan of celery, I just leave it out. 

Minestrone-style soup
Ingredients
6-8 cups veggie stock
1 biggish onion
2-3 carrots
celery if you like it (I don't know how much)
1 can stewed tomatoes, with juice
1-2 cups hard vegetables, chopped
1-2 cups soft vegetables, chopped (or more if you'd like, I prefer this soup a little thick, for some reason)
small bunch of parsley (optional, I've also used dill)
parmesan (optional)
olive oil
salt and pepper

Directions
Coarsely chop the onion and carrot and saute over medium-high heat in the olive oil until soft, about 5 minutes.  One way to save time on this step is to saute a large batch of chopped onions and carrots all at once, then freeze them in recipe-sized portions.  Salt and pepper, then toss in the hard vegetables.  I used turnips this time, since that's what I had on hand.  Cook, stirring, for about 2 minutes.  Add stock and tomatoes, bring to a boil.  If you have some old parmesan around, chop up the rinds and add them at this point - they turn soft and chewy and delicious in the soup!  Turn the heat down and allow the whole thing to simmer for about 15 minutes, until the tomatoes have broken down and the hard vegetables are pretty soft.  Add the soft vegetables and the parsley if you're using it.  This time, I used the now-infamous beet greens, some turnip greens, and some mustard greens.  I also used dill instead of the parsley.  Adjust seasonings to taste and bring the whole thing back up to a simmer.  Cook, stirring occasionally, until everything is soft -- probably another 20 minutes.  If you're cooking other things at the same time, this can simmer for a while and it only gets better.  Serve with more parm, if you'd like. 

This ends up being a lot of soup -- we got about 8 servings.  It tastes even better after it's sat overnight, though!

Tip for the recipe:  Using pre-made onion-carrot mixture is a big time saver, and is a nice way to use up some CSA carrots!  When I make big batches of the stuff, I usually just the food processor to chop up the carrots and onions to save time. Generally, I use a ration of 2-3 medium carrots to 1 large onion.

Two of the promised recipes!

Turns out, I lied about the salad -- still haven't done it.  Ah, well. :)  The lettuce is the crisper and should keep a little longer. Let me tell you about the two of the things I did accomplish, instead.  I should tell you, I don't do very precise directions.  I can tell you approximately what I did and how it turned out, though.

Roasted Beets and Carrots (inspired by Cin's comment on my first post)

Ingredients:
Large bunch of carrots (probably a dozen and a half small to medium carrots)
Beets (I had a pretty small bunch, 4 medium ones.  Could have used double that, really)
Garlic (I used 6 heads of green garlic, which is probably equivalent to half a head of older garlic)
olive oil to taste
salt and pepper to taste

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400F.  Peel carrots and chop into bite-size chunks (those turned out better than the few thinner bits I had).  Peel beets (save the greens!) and chop into bite size chunks (if your beets are really small, quarters are probably fine.  Mine were larger).  If using green garlic, peel the top layer of skin and chop off the green ends (save them!).  Chop the garlic into biggish chunks -- they'll taste better that way. Toss everything with salt, pepper, and enough olive oil to coat the lot.  Spread on a baking sheet, in a single layer if possible.  Roast for about an hour, turning over at the 30 minute mark.  Serve immediately, makes a great snack!

I'm not sure how many servings this is -- it's really a side dish or snack, though Mu and I ate pretty much all of it as dinner. 

Tip of the recipe: save the beet greens, they can come in handy later!

Polenta with Zucchini, Tomato, and Mushroom Sauce
Ingredients:
Sauce:
2 medium zucchini
6-8 tomatoes (you can probably use canned tomatoes here with no real difference.  I'd guess 2 cans would do it)
1-1.5 pounds of common mushrooms (I used brown, you can use white, too)
a handful of dried porcini (this is optional, but even a small amount of dried porcini makes everything taste a little like porcini)
onion/green onion/green garlic greens (I used the latter, given my CSA share, but any of these will work for a little extra flavor)
1 can olives (optional, but I love them.  I just used a can of plain black olives, I don't think the fancy ones are necessary since it's all cooked)
olive oil, salt, red pepper to taste
white wine to taste (for sauce, obviously, though I like to sip as I go :) )

Polenta (from Mark Bittman's "How to Cook Everything Vegetarian" book)
1/2 cup milk (whole is best, but anything will do)
2 cups water
1 cup coarse cornmeal
salt and pepper to taste

Rinse your dried porcinis, put them in a small bowl of boiling water (enough to cover them), and let them soak for about 30 minutes.  In the meantime, trim and slice the zucchini (I like to do half circle slices for smaller zucchinis, or quarter circles for larger ones).  Core and quarter the tomatoes.  Carefully wash and pat dry the mushrooms, then slice them.  You can slice the stems, as well, though if they're very long, I usually chop the long bit off.  Chop your onion/whatever you're using. :)  In a reasonably large saute pan over medium high heat, heat some olive oil, then saute the onion until it's gotten softer, about 2-3 minutes. Add zucchini and mushrooms and cook for a minute or 2, 'till it cooks down.  Drain and add the porcinis and the tomatoes.  Salt and pepper, add a splash of wine and a little water, then turn heat to medium low and cover.

While the sauce is simmering, start the polenta. Combine milk and water in small saucepan over medium heat and bring almost to a boil.  Slowly, whisk or stir in cornmeal.  Salt and pepper, but not too much.  Bring heat to low and simmer for 10-15 minutes, stirring frequently.  Polenta should be reasonably thick at the end.

While polenta is cooking, check on the sauce.  When zucchini and mushrooms are tender and tomatoes have broken down, uncover.  Add olives and saute until liquid reduces (if you want more of a wine taste, you can add another splash). I like to add crushed red pepper for some spice at this point.  When it's almost gone, add polenta (if you want, you can also just finish it off and serve it over the polenta).  Cook for another few minutes, stirring to coat the polenta evenly.  Adjust seasonings as needed and serve!

This yielded us 6 servings, I believe.

Tip of the recipe: dried mushrooms are awesome!  I got a pound of Asian Porcini, and while they're a little pricy, they also last forever.  A handful goes a long way towards adding flavor, so I feel like they're a pretty good deal overall. 

Tomorrow, minestrone-type soup!