Bacon Pie

Bacon Pie.

This needed to be a thing, and as far I could tell, it wasn’t. So I went and invented Bacon Pie.

So, my girlfriend’s kid thought she’d throw me a bit of a challenge, when asked what she wanted for her birthday. I told her I’d make her whatever she wanted, cake or pie or cinnamon rolls, whatever. She said ‘pie!’, followed by ‘BACON!’  Little sh!t thought she’d call me out, hah! So I googled a bit, and finding nothing, gave it a bit of thought. What I decided upon was pretty much a pecan pie, swapping out the pecans for bacon. Now, let me suggest that such a simple thing as changing one ingredient can have far reaching and complex culinary consequences. Bacon pie is not the same as pecan pie, this is an entirely different creature, this is not simply grabbing the jar marked ‘Abnormal’ and dumping it in a soon to reanimated body, this is no mere Frankensteinian pie.

BACON PIE

Ingredients:

 

1 cup sugar

1/4 cup corn syrup

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 cup melted butter

3 eggs, beaten

1 cup bacon, cooked and chopped

1 unbaked deep pie crust

Instructions:

Combine the sugar, syrups, and melted butter.<

Add the beaten eggs and chopped bacon, mix well

Pour filling into unbaked pie crust

Bake 325 degrees for 1 hour

Allow to cool. Try not to eat the whole damn thing in one sitting.

Spam Mi

I give you, the Spam Bahn Mi!

That’s right, Spam Mi! I want to set the record straight here, I invented this bad boy.
I love spam, I wish more people would admit to liking it. It’s a better product then most people realize, pretty much pork shoulder, ham, spices, and salt. Spam is rich, fatty, salty,  and delicious; but is has a reputation.
But that’s another post.
This is a sandwich. Oh god, it’s a sandwich.
I love Bahn Mi, the mixing of eastern flavors and herbs with western bread. Damn.
A good, crusty baguette is a must. Don’t cheap out on the bread. I used liver pate as the base, some people are put off by this, but not me. I learned to appreciate pate when I started eating Paleo. I know, I know, Bahn Mi aren’t exactly Paleo, so sue me. I eat Paleo before dinner, when I eat like a French Peasant. Baguette and pate, yeah, that counts for French Peasant.
The fillers are important to. Cucumber and jalapeno slices, pickled carrot and daikon, mint and basil and cilantro and green onion. Each carefully chosen to offer a balance odd flavors, to compliment or cut the richness of the meat. Traditional Bahn Mi use rich meats, cold cuts or short ribs. And Spam is so very rich, like a lovely little white trash tourine. So why not?
I like my spam crispy, but I needed a more eastern flavor. I went with musubi, seared then simmered and glazed in sugar and soy sauce. Gawd Damn.
This isn’t a recipe post, the internet is full of Bahn Mi recipes, so I won’t bother with instructions on how to quick pickle carrots and daikon or why you should slice the jalapeno the long way. No, I’m hoping to convince just a few of you that Spam belongs on a Bahn Mi.
So, I don’t know if I’m really the inventor of the Spam Bahn Mi, but I’ve googled it and- damn I’m not. And given the food culture of innovation, I not surprised. But I’m very proud of this sandwich, and so I wanted to share. So maybe Spam Bao?

First Date

Bonus: Incredibly Easy (and incidentally Paleo) Energy Bars

More like my second date.

Sweet, tender, and unforgettable. I am speaking, of course, of a dried and pitted date. Not a woman, I have another blog for that, this one is about food.

Back when I was just a wee lad, five or six, my grandparents used to have dates set out for special occasions like the holidays. Like most people who came out of the depression, dried exotic fruit like dates were a delicacy most of us younger folks just didn’t appreciate. I remember trying one. For some reason I didn’t like it, but ever couple of years I would think back on that memory, and the tender, chewy, caramelly date and wonder…

And then this year I start eating better. I mean really, REALLY eating better. Spurred by digging into nutrition and how our bodies metabolize energy and nutrients, I have completely re-booted how I cook and eat. While looking around for sources of fiber, iron, potassium and magnesium, I came across a mention of a few dried fruits I’d not thought of before. Dates stood out to me for some reason, and suddenly I recalled that first date of my childhood with renewed clarity. It was tender and moist and sweet and reminded me of caramel.  I was a stubborn little shit and had decided ahead of time that my grandfather’s weird dried fruit was NOT going to taste good, so it didn’t.

Except it did.

Really, really good.

I poked about the local grocery store, and found there is a rather wide variety of dates available, ranging in price from a couple bucks for an 8 oz bag to ohmygawdpeoplereallypaythatmuchfororganicgourmetdates?

I picked up the cheap little bag of dried and pitted dates over by the raisins. On the way home, curious, I tried one.

It was good.

Really, really good.

I ate four more before I got home. An entire serving, and as I was tracking calories, I had to limit myself to those 5 delicious dates. It wasn’t easy. Over the next couple days I kept reaching for more. There was just something about that tender, caramelly date that sated my sweet craving like nothing else. I’ve been noshing on my dates almost daily ever since, having found them reasonably priced in the bulk bins at more than one retailer.

I’ve also been experimenting with a number of different recipes involving dates, including a Paleo Salted Caremel Turtle-which recipe I won’t share here, as this is a food blog not an elitist Paleo-Will-Save-The-Planet blog. There’s also the less than family friendly story of my fiend eating half the batch of Paleo caramels, and the resulting intestinal distress that led to an in depth discussion on how her tiny Gut Monsters have cravings, and how if you overfeed them certain foods they go on rampages of destruction….

I will, however, share my Incredibly Easy (and incidentally Paleo) Energy Bars, but only because they are SO easy and SO delicious.

Are you ready?

Ok, here you go.

1 cup dried and pitted dates, 1 cup nuts(your choice), 1 cup other dried fruit(your choice). Mix in a food processor until fully blended and smooth-you won’t see any pieces of nuts. Poor onto a sheet of parchment paper, press flat, chill cut.

Baby Dutch Baby

Or, Individual Dutch Baby.

A Dutch Baby, sometimes called s German pancake, or Dutch Puff, is a sweet popover served for breakfast. Made with eggs, flour, and milk, and often seasoned with vanilla or cinnamon. Served with fresh squeezed lemon, butter,  powdered sugar, or even fruit toppings. A basic batter incorporates 1/4 cup flour and 1/4 cup milk for each egg. It is baked in a cast iron pan, and falls soon after being removed from the oven.

And I absolutely love them.

Sadly, no one else in the house enjoys the custardy deliciousness as I do. And so I am left making single-serving Dutch Babies.

Now, you should know by now that I adore my cast iron pans. I have a dozen, easily. And two of my favorite are these little, 4 and 5″ skillets perfect for frying a single egg, or a single serving of Dutch Baby.

The recipe is very simple. Preheat oven to 425, with your cute little cast iron pan- ok, fine, with your 12″ cast iron skillet- set inside. Get down your blender, and add one egg, 1/4 cup milk, and 1/4 cup flour, and a pinch of salt-or 4 eggs, 1 cup flour, 1 cup milk, and a dash of salt. Blend the crap out of it for 30 seconds. Pull out your pan, and drop in a tsp of butter(or a Tbs for those of you lucky enough to have family members who will enjoy this delicious treat with you). Melt the butter, pour in the batter, and pop that bad baby in the oven for 15 minutes(20 to 25 for the full recipe). Pull her out, admire your awesome handywork, dust with powdered sugar, squeeze a little lemon over it, and that’s it!

How Turning 40 Has Saved My Life. Also, Paleo and Eating Like a French Peasant

I turned 40 recently.

And you know what? I’m liking it. I’ve been making a lot of changes the last year, and they are starting to come to a head. About a year ago I was diagnosed with low testosterone, and after a year of testosterone therapy, I’m really feeling so much better. I started running, and more recently have completely re-booted how I eat. I wont go into details on the testosterone, as this is more of a food blog and my intimate life is none of your business(I have another blog for that), but I will say that one sign of low T is weight gain around the middle, which I have. Well, had.

When at my heaviest, at the beach at Bear Lake, Idaho, I notice I had quite the tummy on me. I was 39, less than a year from turning 40, and I realized I wasn’t sure if I could run a mile.

I decided to change that.

At first I couldn’t run a full mile, but after about 9 months of running, I regularly do 3.1 miles(that’s a 5k), and am working my up to 6.2(a 10k!). I’m up to 5 miles on my longer runs. And it feels good!

But this is a food blog, not a fitness one. Though there are places where food(and intimacy) intersect.

Food. I have completely rebooted how I eat. At the start of the year I realized running 3 miles 3 times a week wasn’t quite cutting it with weight loss. So I started counting calories. And oh my that sucked. I went over every single day, I was constantly hungry. I failed miserably. So I started looking around for alternatives, and found Intermittent Fasting, which led me to the Paleolithic Diet.

Intermittent Fasting, without going into details, worked wonders for me as it taught me the difference between being physically hungry, and mentally hungry. Researching it taught me all kinds of useful and fascinating information on how the body processes energy, which helps me make better decisions about what, and how and why and when, I eat.

And then there’s Paleo.

Now, I love my pastas and breads, and I refuse to give them up. Paleo has some excellent points, but like many things can get a bit ideological. All things in moderation, I say, especially moderation. For the most part what I settled on was Paleo Before Dinner. I would avoid all carbs for most of the day-Intermittent Fasting just wasn’t feasible with the exercise routine I developed, I needed protein, so I keep my self in Ketosis for about 20 hours each day.

But all that research on nutrition and health and foods, has changed how I cook. I’ve always been a fan of minimally processed foods, I cook from scratch all the time. But now I’m on a whole new level of cooking from scratch. And yes, there are plenty of carbs, they just don’t feature as the main dish. Well, sometimes there’s Pasta Fresca with a fresh pesto, but you don’t really expect me to give up my fresh pasta, do you? And so while there is fresh baked bread, pasta fresca, etc going on, the rest of the meal is so damn wholesome and healthy I don’t feel the least bit guilty.

I’ve started cooking with the nasty bits. The cheap cuts of meat, less expensive meats, the healthier and more nutritious foods. Grass fed is expensive, but mutton or goat is half the cost of lamb. Beef Short Ribs are much, much cheaper than a Rib Eye. Sardines. Pate. Yes, I’m starting to eat organ meat, and damn it’s delicious!

Throughout history the poorest people have learned how to take the cheapest, least desirable bits and turn them into something delicious and nutritious. Take French Onion Soup, perhaps the epitome healthy and delicious peasant food. In fact, French peasants really, really knew how to pull this off better than almost anyone else.  I love eating like a French Peasant.

I’m 40 now. My testosterone is on track, I’ve lost nearly 30 lbs in the last year, I can run 3 miles without any trouble, and I feel so much better in every way I can measure. I’m in better shape at 40 than I was at 39, and I expect to be in even better shape at 41.

Also, I get to eat like this:

Roast Bone Marrow with Roast Garlic, Homemade Pesto, Grilled Flat Bread; and a Braised Short Rib Pizza with Caramelized Onions, and Smoked Gouda; cold Mexican Coca Cola, 15 Year Old Single Malt Scotch, and of course, a lovely fire.

 

 

On Apples and Cupcakes

I’m not going to go off on some rant about the evils of refined sugar, how it destroys our brains and our bodies, how we all need to eat a diet of natural, organic, whole foods. Most of us can’t afford that lifestyle. Instead, I’m going to tell a little story.

A few years ago at a local grocery store I noticed two chubby little kids tagging along behind their massively obese mother. The fat little boy saw some shiny red apples, and asked his mother if they could please have some apples? She looked at the price, and said they were too expensive. I was shocked, when your over weight kids ask for apples, you don’t say no!

So I wandered over to check the price, and Red Delicious were $2.49 lb. That’s a lot for apples, when the Fuji were $1.99 and the Jonagolds were on sale for $1.49. Still, rather than say no, you say ‘how about these green apples? They look good, and they’re on sale!’ But she didn’t.

Later on, at the other end of the store I saw the same family looking at the Hostess display, where the Cupcakes were 2/$5. The mom exclaimed how that was such a good price, and loaded up 2 boxes of 8 count cupcakes.

Oh my effing gawd. One whole pound of Apples for the same price as one 12 oz  box of cupcakes, and she loads up.

This, this right here is why we have an obesity epidemic.

It’s not about finding foods made without refined sugar, it’s not about eating local or only organic; it’s about little choices we make, like Apples vs Cupcakes.

Elitist Blogging to Save The World

Look, if you assume I’m paying $5 for a coffee every morning, than your advice on how to trim my budget is *expletive* worthless.

I am sick of seeing all these blogs and articles about how to save money, by giving up your daily latte and brewing your coffee at home. I already do that. And we cancelled our cable service in favor of Netflix and a Roku. We don’t buy any packaged meals, we buy rice and flour and potatoes and beans and spices, and make everything from scratch. I can’t downsize from my status-symbol car to a more efficient one, as I already drive a beat up old pickup that’s paid for and still gets great mileage. I mow my own lawn. So, how about you shut up already, or give me some budget trimming advice that isn’t meant for someone making over $100,000 a year.

There is a trend the last few years, articles and blogs telling the well-to-do how to save the world, from living green to eating healthier. And it’s nothing more than elitist snobbery.

One article I found was about a family that eliminated all garbage. The total non-recyclable garbage output from this family could fit into a small grocery bag. This required daily trips to the store for fresh produce and meat, expensive reusable containers, making her own detergent, etc. When I seriously looked into this kind of lifestyle, I quickly saw that not only was it not financially feasible for us, but it would require almost full time commitment. IE, I would not be able to have a job.

Yeah, that’s gonna work for us blue collar families. Though I’m glad you have the time and resources to live like that.

And then there’s that homesteading rancher mommy, with more land an money than anyone one person needs. Hell, she has ranch hands! I have two daughters who hate weeding! I have 0.14 acres, and on there I have a garden, chickens and bees. The pioneer lady has 1500 acres. Yeah, her advice on self sufficiency is gonna help me.

What really got me angry though, was an article on giving up sugar for an entire year.

I’ve been looking lately at reducing the amount of sugar in our diets, and so I was at first intrigued. This woman wanted to eliminate ALL refined sugar from her family’s diet. Admirable. She spoke about how even tortillas contain refined sugar. And so on my next shopping trip, I checked the labels on everything, and sure enough tortillas and spaghetti sauce contain large amounts of refined sugar. And then I looked at prices, and what it would cost to buy the trendy organic products without refined sugar.

My grocery costs would more than double.

Tortillas, the ones I buy-and yes, I know I should make my own-cost $2 for a pack of 12. The only ones without refined sugar, were $5 for a pack of 5. Spaghetti sauce? I keep a few cans of the $1.o5 stuff around for nights when I just don’t feel like making it from scratch. I started looking for sauce without sugar. $4 a can? Nope, sugar. $6 a jar? Nope, sugar. It wasn’t until I looked at the $8 a jar sauce that I found one without refined sugar.

Look lady, I’m happy you make so much money you can spend $300 a week on groceries, but for my little family, we barely spend that in a mont, for a family of 4. And our pets.

These types of articles are of no help to most of us, they are nothing more than things to collect on Pinterest. So good for you, I’m glad you can show off how ‘green’ you are. But try doing it on less than $40k a year like we do, then I’ll be impressed. And then blog about it.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

Budget for the budget strapped, urban homesteading for those on less than 1/4 acre, healthy cooking that won’t break the bank or take the entire day.

I’ll even give you the best tip I’ve found so far, right now, for free. Cook from scratch.

 

Recipe: Mulligatawny Soup

Most of the time when I ask my lovely wife what she wants for dinner, she tells me ‘food’. She just wants something delicious and is happy she does not have to cook. But the other day, while thinking about eating healthy, she decided she wanted Mulligatawny Soup. It’s a rare thing for her to request something, and so I was happy to oblige. This is my friend Sara’s recipe, I must give her credit.

MULLIGATAWNY SOUP

Ingredients:

• 1 cup diced yellow onion
• 1 ½ cup carrots, diced
• 1 ½ cup celery stalks, diced
• 2-3 Tbsp butter
• 3 tbsp all-purpose flour
• 2-3 Tbsp curry powder
• 4 cups chicken stock
• 4 cups water
• 2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and diced
• 1 cup cooked white rice
• 1 cup cooked diced chicken
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
• 1 cup cream, hot

Directions:

In a large stockpot, over medium to low heat, add the onions, carrots, celery stalks and butter. Cook until tender, but do not burn them. Stir in the flour and curry, to coat the vegetable mixture and cook for about 3 minutes. Pour in the chicken stock and water and let simmer, uncovered for 30 minutes. The soup will reduce and thicken in this time. Then add in the remaining ingredients, except the hot cream. Let simmer for 15 minutes and then add in 1 cup hot cream. Stir and serve!

I Forgot To Make Room…

Life has been hectic lately, between my oldest daughter having problems at school and my wife needing to have her gal-badder removed, and somewhere along the line I stopped making room for pie. I stopped cooking healthy as much, I stopped baking treats for myself in the morning, started surviving instead of living.

Somewhere in there, in the last six months or so, I discovered cigars, which was the one silver lining from this period.

It started as a gift for my best friend’s 30th birthday. I bought him a nice bottle of Scotch and picked up 6 real cigars for us all to share. We’ve smoked the occasional ‘cigarillo’, machine made knock offs purchased at a gas station, but these were real gawd damn cigars. Hand rolled and everything. I told him that it’s time to put away childish things like cheap whiskey and cheap cigarettes, and to learn to appreciate ‘man’ things like Scotch and cigars.

He laughed.

A bunch of us ‘men’ went out on the back deck(which I had built for my friend) to enjoy the cigars. My friend was not impressed, but for the most part they were well appreciated by the rest of the guys. But for myself, it was one of the singular most enjoyable moments in recent memory.

I went back to the cigar shop the next day and bought a half dozen more for myself. I had gone in the day before the party, knowing pretty much nothing about cigars. I found a local shop, Beehive Cigar Co, and wandered in. A nice man with a handlebar mustache asked how he could help me, and I told him my situation, and my rather limited budget. I had no idea what a cigar costs, only that they were pricey. He took me into their walk in humidor and showed me at first the higher end sticks, ranging from $12 to $24 a piece. I cringed. Next he showed me the back wall of the humidor lined with ‘house blend’ cigars, ones they have made just for them by some of the finest makers in Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic. He took a half an hour to explain how the shape of a cigar affects its flavor, and the difference between ‘sun grown’ and ‘shade grown’. He helped me select six reasonably priced($6 ea) shade grown coronas.

When I came back I picked up six assorted sticks, to try out new flavors and styles. For Father’s day my lovely wife ordered a nice little sampler pack and desk top humidor for me, so I was able to sample some of the very best of the top name cigars. Turns out I have expensive taste.

Like most things that catch my interest, I hyper-educated myself on my new addict- um hobby. I know all about the exodus from Cuba, and how Cohiba(one of my absolute favorites) was at one time Fidel Castro’s personal cigar. I know how makers infuse cigars with trend flavors to meet the demands of today’s consumer, like the Drew Estate Acid line(I am drooling over a box of Dew Estate Box Pressed Espressos). I know the important difference between cigars, and the higher end tobaccos used, and cigarettes and cigarillos sold in convenience stores. I know about the health risks associated with cigars, minimal considering you don’t inhale. I know how to select, smell, trim, and light a cigar; why you don’t ash and what a long ash indicates.

Most importantly, I know how to sit and enjoy a nice stick, letting the flavor wash over my tongue, setting my mind to wander as I take a moment to just sit and savor the moment.

And that right there is what a cigar is all about.

Taking a moment to just sit and savor something nice. I had forgotten about that, had forgotten to savor my morning coffee in my rush to get the kids up and off to school. So now a couple times a week, not nearly as often as I would like though, I take an hour for myself. I leave my phone inside so as to not be bothered, I take a cup of coffee, a book, and nice Garo Double Habano, and sit on my front porch and just revel in the moment.

Spring Chicks!

Our Wellsummer went broody again.

Sigh.

So I figured if she’s not going to pay her rent, I’m going to put her to work another way. Hatching eggs. I ordered some fertile hatching eggs online, and two days later sneaked them under her.

Then came the rather long 21 day wait for them to hatch. I am not a patient man when it comes to my new projects. Sadly, nature can’t be rushed. It was killing me.

I thought this would be a fun experience, watching her hatch them and raise them, and who doesn’t like day old chickies?

One of the advantages of chicks from the farm supply store is you are pretty much guaranteed hens, they have a 95% success rate sexing them. Chicks from eggs, while a more enjoyable experience, are ‘straight run’, which means you get what you get. That means about half of them will be young roos, which are most definitely not allowed. This greatly influenced my decision on what breed to order.

There were Speckled Sussex eggs, or Barnevelders, there were even French Black Copper Marans (which have the darkest brown eggs of any breed), there were Swedish Flower Hens and Cream Legbars.  How was I to decide? Then I found a post selling a dozen fertile Sex Linked Easter Eggers eggs.

Sold.

Sex Links are a hybrid of two colors that produce chicks with a sexlinked trait, usually a small spot on the head of males. Easy to identify which ones to keep, and which ones you have to find a home for quick, before the city, cranky neighbor, or HOA find out. I like Sex Links, we’ve had one before and she was my favorite.

Easter Eggers are another hybrid cross, more of a mutt really, that have the Blue egg gene. You never know what kind of egg you will get from an Easter Egger, brown, blue, or green. My youngest daughter’s favorite hen right now is our Easter Egger, who lays a nice green egg every other day.

So this sounded like the perfect egg! We love Easter Eggers, Sex Links mean we can get rid of any young roos before they crow and cause problems. So I contacted the seller. They were from a black Easter Egger roo over a Barred Easter Egger hen, which would give me black(ish) Easter Egger chicks. Her hens weren’t laying at the rate she wanted, so I could either wait a week(uh-huh!) or she could send a mixed shipment with some other Sex Links she was working on, a French Black Copper Marans over a Barred Rock hen. I could not contain my enthusiasm! Not a straight FBCM, but still! I leaped on that offer!

A few days later they arrived, each carefully wrapped in bubble wrap, and after an hour of carefully freeing them from their protective prison, I slipped a dozen eggs under my cranky broody hen.

Two days ago they started to hatch. I’ve not turned the TV on. Hell, I’ve hardly done any house work. How could I? There were chickies hatching!

No matter how carefully they are wrapped, there is always some damage during shipping, and I was expecting about a 50% hatch rate. We got five, but on is a sad little straggler that is not able to walk. I don’t expect him to make it. That makes four. A little less than I was hoping for, but not bad. Two have spots on their heads, two don’t Means two new little hens to add to our flock. And yes, that means two young lads to find homes for.

Today they are out of the nest for the first time, and Momma is teaching them to scratch in the dirt and look for food.