Maine Bicentennial, A Cookbook, and Me

 There were no lamb shoulders to be found at the stores where I shop. So I chose a semi-boneless leg of lamb. And kept the preparation simple. Gave it a good rub with freshly ground salt and pepper, and lemon zest and garlic. Popped it in the oven at 425 for about 20 minutes, then reduced the heat to 350 for about one hour and twenty minutes. My goal was to pull it out at 130 degrees (rare), but of course, the less-dense portions of meat were already medium or medium well. Which simply means there was meat to my liking (medium to medium well) and meat to my husband's liking (medium rare), depending upon where you slice. For a meat that I've never attempted before, I think this came out marvelously well. We enjoyed it for our Christmas dinner, and it was really delicious. I will, of course, keep looking for lamb shoulder. Perhaps more available around the Easter holiday? This recipe completes the Flesh and Fowl chapter in the Maine Bicentennial Community Cookbook. This is a grea...

 This has been a great idea, cooking thru this cookbook...in great part because I have tried things I've never tried before, and have fallen in love with new-to-me foods.  Sure, I've had sausage before. But fats don't agree with me much, so I try to limit sausage in my diet. Truth is, I read this recipe and was somewhat intrigued and somewhat intimidated. I wasn't sure I'd be able to make sausage "from scratch." And what if it was too fatty for me? My first stumbling block was that we did not own a meat grinder. So I tried borrowing one. Not much luck. Was loaned one, but it was too rusty. By this time, the Resident Archaeologist was intrigued, and headed out to find one. They are just not that easy to find (the hand crank kind). But he managed to find one, and called it an early Christmas present for us. He even found sausage casings, which it turns out are shelf stable so they just hang on the rack at the store. The grinder attaches easily to the counter...

 This is a "stand alone" recipe, in my opinion. It is originally paired with String Beans with Lamb (see blog), however, I decided it's such a great recipe that I wanted to be able to access it separately, as a side for other meals. And, since I didn't cook it with the Lamb recipe, I can make it tonite with chicken! I changed it up a wee bit. It calls for sauteeing the fine egg noodles in lots and lots of butter. I don't handle lots of butter well. So I chose to just cook the egg noodles quickly in boiling chicken broth, then I threw in bulgur wheat (at the health food store, or buy a box of Tabbouleh in the rice section at the grocery store), which is wonderfully quick-cooking, rather than cracked wheat. Then I took it off the heat, covered the pan, and let it sit for the bulgur to plump up in the hot broth. Added a little EVOO and a couple squirts of lemon, and served it with chicken thighs and a mix of broccoli and cauliflower, and rolls (see Aroostook County B...

 It was already nearly the end of June when I decided to cook my way through the Bicentennial Cookbook. So I realized that some ingredients might be seasonal, and therefore, not readily available, in the six months and twelve days that I planned to attempt this cooking adventure. Sure enough, fiddlehead season had already passed us by. I did try to find frozen fiddleheads, with no luck.  My husband and I love Thai food, but he is not fond of fiddleheads (me, I love 'em, can't get enough of 'em). So I decided to just use whatever vegetables we had on hand, and I will do a proper Thai Fiddlehead Stir Fry next spring.  The thin strips of steak fry up very quickly, so I cooked all the veggies first and then set them aside to quickly cook the meat. It looks beautiful on a plate and tastes so good, you won't need to order out Thai ever again (altho please do, we want to support our local restaurants, especially in this pandemic!). This is the 200th recipe in the cookbook. And...

 The Resident Archaeologist was somewhat suspicious of this recipe. He looked at the beef short ribs I brought home from the grocery, asked me how I was going to cook them, and was not sure he would like the results. You see, he has always broiled his short ribs and basted them with sauce and once he is in the habit of cooking a food one way, he tends to stick with it. Me, I'd never gone near a short rib, and barely recognized them in the grocery. I was a little nervous that this might not turn out well, and had been thinking I'd have an expert short ribs guy to advise me. But he disappeared to his office and I was on this rib adventure all on my own. I decided that instead of cooking the ribs for several hours on the stovetop, per recipe instructions, (I'd feel obligated to babysit them), I'd use a crockpot. I found a crockpot recipe at Taste of Home website which requires red wine and beef broth and some onions, garlic, and carrots. It sounded delicious, so I set to w...

 We purchased a turkey early in the week, and it defrosted by the weekend, so we decided to do the full-fledged Thanksgiving meal this weekend, and do something different on the actual holiday. I was interested in making this recipe, since I have not made homemade stuffing in a number of years, going with the ease of boxed stuffings.  It came together very well, with the innards simmering in a pot for as long as I needed them to simmer (it ended up being much longer than the hour the recipe calls for, as I got busy, but longer does no harm). The onion and celery and cooked innards and some spices pulsed together in the food processor nicely. I then threw the stuffing bread (torn and dried in the oven) into a big bowl with the meat/veggie mixture, and poured the liquid from cooking the innards over the whole of it, and stirred it up. Add some freshly ground pepper and salt and it's all good! I loved the smell of this, as I stirred it all together. There is something about the s...

 One of my favorite dishes to order in a restaurant is steak salad. It is easy to eat, not too heavy, and you get all the flavor of a steak without eating too much. When I found this recipe in the cookbook, I was so excited! I have been anticipating making it for months now. And since we are not eating out at restaurants during the pandemic, I am all the more eager to become adept at making this to enjoy at home. Not frequently, mind you. It's not every day one can afford filet mignon. But for a treat, it is a delight. The person who submitted this recipe, Heather Paquette, said that it comes from her grandmother, Virginia Gearan, who owned a restaurant, The Glass Menagerie in Kennebunk. The salad recipe comes with a homemade dressing recipe. I bought an inexpensive glass cruet for serving the dressing. The recipe calls for using a blender for the dressing, but I made such a small amount that a hand whisk worked just fine. My husband and I come from different worlds, when it comes ...

 I'm really enjoying the lamb recipes in this cookbook. This one especially. Lamb is a great meat for chili, it turns out! The spices in this recipe are a flavor funfest. Garam masala, chili, cumin, coriander, and turmeric. The lamb compliments the spices perfectly. And mixing chili with red hot dogs? Brilliant! You'll see in the photo that I can't get enough onions. I put plenty of onions in the chili itself, but red onion on top just adds to Onion Enjoyment. I opted to layer the meal, buttered and pan toasted hot dog rolls, split and fried red hot dogs, lamb chili, and red onion. I did not have any Greek yogurt on hand, but that would have made the meal. The person who submitted this recipe is from India. Her husband invented this recipe by accident, when their child was hungry and wanted a hot dog. He saw the lamb chili and, pure inspiration, put them together. It's a winner!

 We do not own a Dutch oven. And I've priced them and decided I've lived this long without one, I can probably make do without one. So, I opted for the crockpot for this recipe. I also chose to use chicken broth, where it calls for water. I used thyme where it calls for summer savory. And no potatoes (my crockpot told me, it's either the potatoes or the dumplings, pick one, as there is no room for both). And I didn't need to use a Gravy Master. I browned the chicken, deglazed the pan with white wine, then cooked the veggies. All I had to do was add flour and chicken stock, and a wee bit of tomato paste, and it thickened up marvelously. Then everything went into the crockpot, plus more chicken broth, and the dumplings just get plopped by the spoonful into the liquid. I cooked it on high for four hours, but you could do a full 8 hours, on low, if you had the time. And do you know what my husband and I both remarked, immediately upon tasting this delicious stew? "It t...

I love discovering new foods, foods that people have brought to Maine, from their homeland. Juanita Cuellar Nichols submitted this recipe, and shares that her family came to NYC from Colombia. She has a childhood memory of her father flattening the balls of cornmeal dough into discs for stuffing with the meat and potato mixture. The recipe recommends Masarepa, a brand of precooked cornmeal, and for the life of me, I could find it nowhere. I was pretty sure that regular cornmeal would be too coarse to hold together for a dough. At last, I discovered Masarepa on a grocery shelf. So now I ran into a small problem with the dough. The recipe appears to indicate that you mix the cornmeal with Goya Sazon (I do think this seasoning is really meant to be used with the meat mixture) and salt and 2 tablespoons of oil, form it into a ball, knead, wrap in plastic wrap, and let rest twenty minutes. But how does all of that cornmeal bind together with a mere 2 tablespoons of oil? After researching on...

 Have you ever encountered a person who becomes your best friend, in an instant? And you think, how did I never run into this person before? Why is it that we are best friends now, when I wish it could have been forever? Well, "that" is the way I feel about a New England Boiled Dinner. I have lived in New England all my life. Yet, no one has introduced me to Boiled Dinner. Til now. No worries. I'm grateful to have the new relationship now. But I'm just a little amazed that I've missed out for all these years. It might be as simple as the clam vs mussel issue (see Beer-Steamed Mussels with Corn and Basil blog). Maybe I tried corned beef in a can and that ended our relationship. (I did encounter red flannel hash in a can, and that was problematic, for sure). But I'm grateful to have experienced this meal, and with the expert guidance of the Resident Archaeologist, who knows how to cut the meat to get the best taste/chew experience. You have to cut across the gra...

 Here I am, in the kitchen, happily browning the lamb for this meal. I adore curried foods and my mouth is watering, anticipating the meal. In walks the Resident Archaeologist, to see what I am up to. I explain the recipe of the day, and mention that the recipe calls for browning the meat in ghee, but I skipped it, because who cooks meat in butter? This, of course, is my upbringing with a diabetic mother, who kept the whole family on a wicked healthy diabetic diet, which eschewed sauces and butters and whatnot. He stares at me. Erupts in laughter and explains that if I'd ever tasted a buttered steak, I'd know what I've been missing. Ah, the benefits of a childhood with buttered meat. So, except for the missing ghee, which by all accounts would make it taste even better, this recipe is marvelous. I did find that I needed to add sour cream to tone down the spice. I'm not exactly a hot spice kinda girl. This recipe introduced me to Garam Masala, which is a happy new relati...

It does seem fitting that as we near Election Day, I try Representative Chellie Pingree's recipe for Roasted Chicken. Over the past couple of decades, due to time constraints, I have often baked chicken in the roasting bags one can purchase at the grocery.  However, this recipe requires the time-honored practice of basting the chicken regularly, to keep it moist. So, I was a little anxious that it might dry out. No worries! It came out of the oven perfectly moist. I did find that due to the veggies and fruits in the cavity, it took a little longer to bake than usual. Normally, I do not stuff a chicken, but since I try to follow a recipe as closely as possible the first time around, into the cavity went the diced celery, onion, apple, and garlic. It smelled great while baking! The recipe calls for fresh herbs, but we've had a frost, so I just sprinkled Herbes de Provence liberally, and it turns out that was just what the chicken needed. Thanks, Rep Pingree! And btw, I voted by a...

 Get ready for the spiciest meat you have ever tasted in your life! I saw the amount of meat (one pound) in proportion to the amounts of spice (Tablespoons, not teaspoons!) and decided to downsize the spices according to what our taste buds could handle.  It's good stuff (see that play on words?!), and would be a great side for a Thanksgiving meal. We were not having turkey and all the fixin's the day I made this recipe. So, I punted and tried it on sliced baguette bread. I thought it was great, the only thing I would have added maybe was a dollop of spicy brown mustard on top to compliment the meat mixture. Where the recipe calls for turkey drippings, in a pinch, with no turkey on hand, Campbell's Soup makes pretty good turkey gravy and adds terrific depth of flavor. Merci, Grandmere, and Robyn Norton, of Berwick, who submitted the recipe.

I love the picture with this recipe. The grandmother who loved to make this recipe, and send family members home with containers of it at the holidays. And her grandson smiling, next to her, when he was a young boy. There is an inset photo of the grandson today, all grown up, and he hails from Portland and has submitted this beloved family recipe. Thanks, Chad Conley! Confession, I did not cook down a pork shoulder and a beef chuck roast. I took the short route and bought (unseasoned) ground pork and ground hamburg and mixed it together and cooked it in a fry pan, adding onions, (and garlic because everything is better with garlic, in my humble opinion) spices (I added ginger and nutmeg to the spices listed in the recipe), bread crumbs, (and milk to keep it moist while it cooked down).  I remember from my childhood that my mother used a meat grinder, but we do not have one, so purchasing ground meat was the way to go. I let it all simmer for a long time, covered, stirring now and t...

 Okay, so I'll admit it. Cooking meat is sort of intimidating. I am never quite sure how to go about it. What if it overcooks? What if it undercooks? I much prefer baking, as there are toothpicks and the browning of the crust, and so forth, to determine doneness. Meat has been rather a mystery to me, since it is all about the interior, and who knows what goes on in there, right? So, have I ever baked a picnic shoulder? Heck, I didn't even know what one looked like until I was pleasantly surprised, while browsing the meat display, to discover a package labeled "boneless smoked picnic shoulder." I decided to try the very smallest package, about 1 1/2 pounds. I was not interested in boiling it, then baking it. A small note at the bottom of the recipe indicates that these things can be quite happily cooked in a crockpot. Hallelujah! Then I decided that the yellow mustard/brown sugar/milk bake was not quite the taste I was going for. With a nod to Lauren Webster's gram...

 Sometimes I'm in a hurry to get a meal on the table, and this looked like an easy meal to prepare. I like to bake meatballs in the oven, so those came together pretty easily. The sweet peppers and onions I chose to separate. I roasted the peppers in the oven and sauteed the onions in olive oil in a saucepan while the tomato sauce was heating in another saucepan. I did step out of the kitchen for what I thought was just a minute, but note-to-self, onions can burn in a heartbeat if you don't watch them. Yup, they got black pretty darn quick. I took them off the heat and when I called my husband downstairs to supper, I just explained that the onions were supposed to be "charred." (Did he buy it? well, no, but all the more onions for me, right? I don't mind a little "char.") I remember enjoying dynamites in my childhood when my family lived in Bangor. Some of our friends introduced us to them. My mom was a great meatball-maker, and we all loved her meatball...

 In our household, my husband is fond of dark meat, I like white meat. Hence, I eat the chicken breast, he goes for the thighs and legs. In deference to his tastes, however, I picked up a package of chicken thighs. I don't mind the darker meat, when there is sufficient flavoring, and this recipe promises flavor! My husband wrinkled his nose when he saw the jar of green olives. I knew what he was thinking...way too salty. Did you know, they sell low-sodium green olives? And that's what I bought. The recipe cautions to rinse the green olives and the raisins and the capers. Hmmm. Not seeing the need to rinse raisins, I just rinsed the olives and capers in a fine mesh sieve. I was concerned that these ingredients would still be too heavy on the salt, so I cut back on the amount in the recipe, maybe by a third roughly. The recipe does not call for a deglaze after browning and setting aside the chicken. But I rummaged in the spice cupboard and found some red cooking wine to deglaze t...

 I saw the title of this recipe and I thought, oh dear, a loved one's recipe, and they want to remember his life by this wonderful meal. No, the dude did not die! The real story is hilarious and you just have to get the cookbook to enjoy it.  I rather like the anticipation that goes along with a marinade, don't you? You measure the one-two-three (in this case, five) marinade combo in a ziplock bag, pound the chicken breast and pierce it to absorb the marinade, drop the chicken breast in the bag with the marinade, seal, and squish it all over, then gently lay the bag on a plate in the fridge (I always put something under the bag to catch any drips...ziplocks don't always seal perfectly). Then you go about your life and tomorrow's supper is, well, "in the bag." My husband was busy cooking something else for his dinner tonite, so I just prepared one chicken breast, plus a side of Creamy Mashed Turnip (another fine recipe from MBCC) and some garlic bread for my me...

 This recipe is intended to be made and poured over Cracked Wheat Pilaf. But I made Basmati rice which is equally delicious, especially when you use chicken stock instead of water to cook the rice. I shall have to try the Cracked Wheat Pilaf another day. I enjoyed making this recipe...a first for me, cooking leg of lamb, chopped into cubes. There are a few simple ingredients, and I only changed one thing. The recipe calls for oregano, but I thought liberal sprinkling of Herbes de Provence would lend a much deeper flavor. Sure enough, the Resident Archaeologist gave good reviews for flavor! This seems to me perhaps a nice dish for the crock pot, to allow the savory flavors to blend and so as the meat is not at risk to get tough in the skillet.  I ended up cooking things separately that the recipe wanted me to cook together. I felt I just couldn't properly cook the onions in and amongst the lamb chunks. The lamb just deserved a pan all its own. And the string beans, they just ne...