Turkey Soup

One thing that I do every year is say I’m going to make turkey stock with the bones and carcass from the Thanksgiving bird. Into bags the parts go, then into the freezer to wait for me to pull them out and create stock.

Who’s with me?

In reality, the bones and parts usually end up the trash, without so much as a drop of stock being made. This year, I changed that, and early to boot since our traditional meal will include Prime Rib, not turkey. So, we had turkey this weekend, and from the pieces and parts, I created one bad ass stock. Are you ready?

The Stock

• Turkey parts. Bones, carcass, neck, gizzards, skin, whatever. The wings work well here too.
• 1 onion, cut into quarters. You can leave the skin on
• 3 celery stalks, with leaves, cut into thirds
• 2-3 bay leaves
• 1 cup of salt
• As much garlic as you like
• Water to cover

Put everything in your largest stock pot. Add water to cover. Bring to a boil then reduce heat to a simmer. How long depends on how much parts you put in. 2-3 hours would be a good place to start. If you are going to make soup with this now, continue on, otherwise get it cold ASAP. You can store it in Mason jars (even frozen) for use later.

The Soup

• Turkey Stock
• Vegetables
• Noodles, beans or both
• Salt
• Herbs, spices and garlic

Pretty vague, right? I know. It’s time for you to get a little creative in the kitchen. This is something that is impossible to screw up, so go crazy!

Want spinach, tomatoes and beans? Go! More traditional carrots, celery and rice? Sure. All starch with potatoes, noodles and barley? You can do that too! The stock is, essentially, a blank canvass ready to accept whatever flavors you want to through at it. Go nuts, have fun and get the rest of the family involved. I can practically guarantee that you won’t screw it up!

Been awhile since I’ve shared a recipe. Mostly because it’s been awhile since I’ve cooked anything worth sharing. I changed that tonight. Like all of my recipes, this one is easy and good!

The kicker for this dish was the black bean salsa.

• 1 bag frozen corn, thawed or 3 ears cooked and cleaned
• 1 can black beans, rinse thoroughly
• 2-3 roma tomatoes, diced
• 1 bell pepper of your choosing, diced
• 3 tbls cilantro or parsley, chopped fine
• 3 cloves of garlic, minced
• Juice from 1 lemon
• 3 tbls Olive oil
• 1 tbls salt
• 1 tlbs fresh ground black pepper

Put all of that into a plastic mixing bowl (since the acids and stainless steel don’t get along too well) and mix until combined. Let sit at room temperature for at least 1/2 hour before serving. If you can wait an hour, that would be better.

Once that is done, build it out. You will need about 2lbs cooked chicken, cut into strips. I used thigh meat tonight, but breast would be equally awesome. Finally, you will need about 3 cups cooked rice. I’ve been favoring Jasmine rice of late, but any white rice would do nicely.

On a plate, as above, put the rice, then chicken. Top with the salsa. The avocado was a bonus since I found some that were decent at the market, but completely optional.

Serve with any light colored beverage of your choosing. I would try this with a good wheat beer, Pinot Grigo or Sauvignon blanc.

This is a great way to have your veggies cold, especially nice when the outside temps are in the 100’s, much like today in Southern California. Trader Joe’s works best, where possible.

• 1 Bag (1lb) frozen brocoli
• 2 medium sized beefsteak tomatoes, or 3 Roma’s, cut into 1/2 wedges
• 1/2 red onion, sliced thin
• Vinaigrette of choice, my choice was Cranberry Walnut Gorgonzola.

Cook the frozen brocoli. Use the microwave for this to help keep the house cool. You don’t have to cook it all the way, just until it is thawed all the way. When it’s done, get it into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking and get the temperature down. Drain.

To your salad bowl, add the cooled and drained broccoli, tomatoes and onion. Toss with dressing. For best results, let marinade in the refrigerator for 1/2 hour before serving.

No TJ’s nearby? You can use fresh broccoli instead, just steam it first. Need a different dressing? I’m partial to a simple red wine vinegar and olive oil mix for this, but we had the cranberry walnut handy.

Serve as a salad with anything you like. Goes particularly well with beef or grilled chicken.

Seafood with Artichoke Hearts

Simple and good. If you can find the ingredients at Whole Foods or your local market, it would be worth while.

Needs

• 1 bag frozen seafood mix (shrimp, calamari, scallops) from Trader Joes
• 1 bag frozen artichoke hearts, thawed
• Jasmine Rice
• 2-4 TBLS butter
• 1 lemon
• Olive oil, salt, pepper
• 1/2 cup chopped cilantro
• Garlic. Lots and lots of garlic.

What to do

• Coarse chop your artichoke are garlic
• Add olive oil to a hot saute pan.
• Artichoke hearts and garlic in. Saute until hot. Put some color on the ‘chokes if you want. Not necessary if you don’t.
• Add the seafood mix. Saute until heated/cooked through.
• Drain most of the liquid from the pan. Don’t get a colander dirty for this, just tip the pan over the sink and hold the goods back with your wooden spoon.
• Add the butter and juice from one lemon. Cook until you get a rockin’ butter sauce.
• Finish with the chopped cilantro. Salt and pepper to taste

Serve this over a bed of Jasmine rice.

Changes/Additions You could boost the color/flavor by adding fresh diced tomatoes or green onion. Or a little pesto (regular or sun dried tomato). Serve over pasta instead of rice would be good as well. Add a shot of dry white wine to the pan after draining, before the butter to get more of a scampi flavor.

Beverage choice The butter is going to want something crisp/acidic/sharp to contrast. A nice Pinot Grigo, Fume Blanc or Savignon Blanc. You beer drinkers should learn to drink wine, but if that’s not an option, any fine Mexican brew would be nice with this.

If it’s not already, this recipe should totally be in the Cooking with All Things Trader Joe’s book.

Sure it’s all cold and crappy now, but as soon as the weather warms up a bit you might want to give it a try. Simple and good and very similiar to one of my all time pasta dishes, Angel Hair Pomadoro (angel hair pasta, olive oil, fresh basil and fresh diced tomatoes).

Warmed Angel Hair Pasta with Artichoke Hearts

This is a great use for all of that Angel Hair Pasta left over from last night.

• Angel Hair Pasta, 1/2 lb, cooked
• 1/2 lb fresh or frozen (and thawed) artichoke hearts
• 2 TBLS chopped cilantro
• 1/2 cup your favorite vinegrette
• Parmesean cheese to taste
• Olive Oil

We are looking for warm, not hot. Not room temperature either. Closer to body temp.

Warm the pasta and artichoke hearts in a saute pan with a little olive oil. Add vinegrette, toss to coat and heat through. Plate as you like, top with parm and cilantro.

Add to this what you like. Fresh cracked pepper, pesto or fresh diced Roma Tomatoes would be very nice additions. Makes a great side dish to chicken or fish. Add some shrimp and make it a dinner.

A nice crisp white or light ale would be fabulous with this too.

Here you go!

This year for Christmas, g’ma cooked up a very nice Prime Rib. I only had to cut it.

Almost looks like I know what I’m doing.

This recipe was originally posted on January 1st, 2007. Since I made this on Christmas Eve, I have had a few requests for it.

And, as usual, if anyone actually makes this, I would be interested in hearing how it turned out!

What you need

• 6 Sweet Italian Sausages, casings removed
• 1 yellow onion
• 2 bunches green onion
• lots of garlic
• 1 jalepeno
• 4 celery stalks
• 3 carrots
• 1 turnip
• 3 red potatoes
• 1 small bunch of cilantro
• 8 cups of chicken stock (2 32oz cans)
• 1 can whole tomatoes with juice.
• 1/2 cup barley
• 1/2 cup lentils
• Salt and pepper to taste

What to do

Chop/pull the sausage apart and cook in your soup pot on medium heat until they are nice and brown and released most of their fat. Add the onion, jalepeno cut in half (leave the seeds you sissy) and the tops from the green onions. Cook for about 1/2 hour.

Chop all your veggies into about 1/4″ pieces. Remove the jalepeno and add the rest of the veggies to the pot. Save the green onions and cilantro. Add the barley and lentils. Add the chicken stock. Cook for about 1 1/2 hours until the lentils are tender. Add water as need to keep it from turning into stew.

Finish with green onions and cilantro.

This will be hot! You can actually leave it, covered, on the stove for 2 hours before you serve it. A nice loaf of french bread would be good with this, or a small side salad.

Try this with Corn Bread. Good stuff!

For those of you that aren’t aware of it, nutella is a chocolately, hazelnutty creamy spread from Europe that is made entirely from rainbows, awesome and chocolate with a light hint of hazelnut. Yes, it’s good stuff and, at least in Europe, everyone eats it on everything.

The problem is that it’s not available everywhere here in the states. Sometimes you’ll get lucky and find it at your local grocery store, but not too often. Usually it’s relegated to the gourmet shops like CostPlus or Trader Joes. This is too bad.

I think that if more people had access to nutella, the world would be a better place. To do my part to help out, the image above conveniently links to a page on Amazon.com where you can purchase a jar of this heavenly goodness for the low price of $4.25. It’s luxury in a jar people!

I can think of nothing finer in the morning to go with my steaming hot cup of coffee that a toasty bagel with a luscious coating of nutella on top. Not even Mom’s cooking can bring this kind of goodness to the table my friends.

This holiday season, do your part to help humanity. Introduce someone to nutella. We will all be better for it.

Thank you.

Meritage: An invented term, used by California wineries, for Bordeaux-style red and white blended wines. Combines “merit” with “heritage.” The term arose out of the need to name wines that didn’t meet minimal labeling requirements for varietals (i.e., 75 percent of the named grape variety). For reds, the grapes allowed are Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Petite Verdot and Malbec; for whites, Sauvignon Blanc and Sémillon.

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Ok, maybe not exactly a Meritage, but it was my own version of it.

I decided for TDay to get a bottle or two from the “old stock”. One of them was a ‘77 Fetzer Cab. Once I got it opened filtered and decanted, I gave it a try. It was a bit flat. So I let sit a bit more to see if it would wake up, but it wasn’t. At least not really.

Also opened was a bottle of Sutter Home Zin. Not the greatest but it would work for my purposes here. I added about a third of a bottle of that Zin to my Fetzer Cab. Gave it a good stir (which also helped it to breathe a bit) and tasted it.

I’m not a huge fan of any Sutter Home wines if I’m honest. They have a taste like they were bottled next to the grape juice line or aged in a cardboard box. Not the greatest to be sure. Until it was added to that Fetzer.

It popped right away after that. Much like adding a pinch of salt to your tomatoes. It was spicy, oaky and just a bit of berry. It very much tasted like a Fetzer Cab.

I am definitely going to try this again, but use something better as my mix-in. Perhaps a newer vintage of the same wine? Maybe a nice old vine zin? I’m sure the results will be just as awesome.