Daily Archives: January 13, 2012
Tunch
Mighty Tunch in all His Mightiness
This is Tunch. He belongs to John Cole and just so you know, he’s probably the only reason there is a food blog here. It’s a long story, but my love of Tunch kept me hanging out at Balloon-Juice and then before I knew it, I was posting menus there by request.
Love. That. Cat.
It’s Just a Whisk
Side note: LFern made that beautiful cloth. By hand. On her loom.
….so why do I need a pricey one? For years I made do with one that had a scant few wires, attached with a wire ring to the handle. It barely whisked and was horrible to clean, I seldom used it. I figured if that’s all a whisk can do, I’m better off with a fork.
I’m not sure when or why I suddenly decided I needed a quality whisk. I was probably watching some cooking show and was awed by the host’s deftness with her whisk as she smoothly beat a sauce into submission. I really don’t remember, but that sounds like me.
Anyway, I trolled around for one. There’s not a descent cooking store near me, so when I couldn’t find one at Target or such, I went to Amazon. This is the one I chose:
It had good ratings and you really can’t go wrong I’m finding with OXO – although I do have a gadget from them that I find lacking. But that’s another blog post.
Since the arrival of my whisk I am amazed at what a difference a good, albeit pricey, whisk can make (though this was far from the most expensive I came across in my search). Gravies are a breeze with a good whisk, eggs are fluffier and it’s great for the cakes and cookies I’ve been making lately. Sad it took me so long to realize this.
My two cents? If you’ve got a dime store whisk, take the leap and invest in a really good one and see what a difference it can make. There are probably good arguments for having whisks of varying sizes, but let’s not rush into anything here, it took me 18 years to get a good whisk after all.
Mmm… Italian beef
Made a killer Italian beef yesterday. I have pictures!
This is a chuck roast, not the optimal cut for Italian beef, although that can be disputed. One fellow mentioned that the extra marbling made it “more luxurious”. Leaner, cheaper cuts are favored, if only for economic reasons, I had this in the freezer and wanted Italian beef. I stuck several cloves of garlic into it, into both sides, and rubbed it all over with oregano, basil, marjoram, onion powder, and salt and pepper. Include garlic powder with the rub if you aren’t using the cloves, or even if you do! Add a cup of water to the pan to make collecting the drippings easier. Now place it into a 325 oven:
It spent about an hour and a half in there, internal temps were a shade on the rare side but it was going to cook more later so that was fine. Put it into the freezer to firm up for slicing, then start on your sandwich rolls. I’ve been using this recipe with great success.
The beef should be ready for the slicer by now. I’ve had this model for a long time, not deli shop quality but it does an OK job.
Now then, toss all of this stuff along with the pan drippings into a big sauce pot and add two or three cups of beef broth that has more of the same spices in it, some folks use a packet of Italian salad dressing mix. I’ve used it and it works great. I usually add a few dashes of steak sauce to the mix, and some red pepper flakes. Don’t forget the garlic! I added some garlic powder even though I had a lot of garlic that roasted with the beef, you can hardly have too much.
Bring it all to a simmer and let it cook for an hour or two. Or three. Most of that extra fat will render out so you may want to chill it in the fridge to solidify the fat on the top so it can be picked out.
The aroma from this will have you and all of your critters salivating. Go ahead and sneak a little – cook’s perk! I would recommend this sampling method:
Let’s take a closer look, shall we?
The giardiniera is a staple of the Chicago-land sandwich shops, or so I’ve been told. Several times. It is good on there.
TaMara
jeffreyww
LFern7
indylib
